FanGirl (2 page)

Alexandra bursts into the barn and sees them, two of them, zombies, rotten and decomposing, cornering her mother.

She’s behind the zombies now.

“Run!” her mom yells.

“No,” she hollers back, hatchet ready.

The zombies are distracted by their yelling, but only for a minute. Her mom uses the gun she’s holding and shoots one of the zombies point blank. Skin and blood fly everywhere. The older woman tries to escape, but a zombie lurches at her and attacks, biting her shoulder, tearing her shirt and flesh. Alexandra springs into action. She hits him across the head with the hatchet again and again until he lets go. With both zombies dead, her mother falls to the ground, bleeding from the arm and crying.

They stare at one another. They know. She’s infected and there is only one cure.

Death.

“Do it,” her mother says, wincing from the pain. “We had a pact. Fast. No hesitating.”

Alexandra says, “I love you,” but doesn’t hesitate
. With the gun she shoots her mother and falls to her knees. A fat tear rolls down her cheek.

After a moment, Alexandra gathers her things, the weapons and her mother’s few possessions, and leaves the barn, taking care to look around for danger. She sees a rush of zombies lumbering toward her. Alexandra runs to the old truck, tries the handle and is relieved when it opens. She tosses her stuff and herself behind the driver’s seat. She slams the door and hears a groan. She scrambles and pulls the gun from her pants, cocking the trigger into the dark. A similar click comes from the opposite side of the cab and you see two guns pointed at one another, inches apart.
Confusion washes over her face. Zombies don’t use guns. The interior light turns on and the film shows Alexandra and a boy face to face, guns pointed at one another.

“Where are the keys?” she yells, as a thump hits the back of the car.

He points the gun out the back window. “In the ignition! Go!”

Alexandra cranks the ignition, which sputters and whines. “Pump the clutch, don’t flood the engine,” he says. The truck starts to sway and rock. “Now!”

“I’m doing it!” she screams. The engine flares to life and the truck jumps forward. She turns on the lights to find the truck is surrounded by zombies. Alexandra takes a deep breath, glances at the stranger and presses the gas.

The screen goes black.

Credits roll. Iris’ name. My name. Blah, blah, blah.

I don’t know it, but the constant vibration of my phone as tweet after tweet comes in, and the growing number of emails, Facebook posts and comments on the website can’t be ignored. A shift has taken place and, whether I’m ready or not, that fan video represents the nine minutes and 38 seconds that change my life.

g

Chapter 2

At school, we develop immediate, quasi-celebrity status. This is not as uncommon as you would expect. We’re not at a “normal” school, but seniors (three weeks until graduation!) at the local performing arts school, East Lake School of Art & Design, aka ELSAD. Iris has a focus on film and technology. Technically, I have a focus on visual arts, but my talent is limited. I take the minimum number of classes required to graduate, but basically I’m a floater. A film class, some drama – whatever I need to do. Many of my classmates dance or act outside of school. Our brush with fame isn’t earth shattering, but in the end, we’re still high school students – popularity counts.

For example, Jonah Roberts was the kid in the cell phone commercials. The “Are You There?” ones that were funny at first, but then became super-annoying. Bridgett Murphy tried out for the reality show “Dance Off” and made it through the first three rounds. Then there was Taylor Lyn
[1]
. She’s managed to get a recurring role as “Cheerleader Number 3” on the werewolf show,
One of the Pack,
that filmed outside the city. Iris and I hate her. Mostly due to the fact that she may have been a contributing factor in the Ruby-Reid
[2]
break up.

I’m nervous as heck when Iris picks me up the first day back, and it only gets worse as we drive to school. Both of our phones will not stop pinging and dinging, notifying us of hits, tweets and texts. By the time we arrive in the parking lot, my leg is shaking with nerves and I’ve bitten my nails down to the quick.

“I upgraded our server. It kept freezing because of the number of hits. I was tired of the complaints,” Iris says.

“Good. I hate it when that happens.”

“I saw your thank you post and tweets. Thanks for doing that. I couldn’t remember to do it while maintaining everything.”

“No problem. It’s the least I can do while you keep it all running.” Iris has been working night and day to keep our site updated. My phone buzzes again and I flip the off switch. I can’t take it anymore.

“Ready?” Iris asks.

“Yep.” I lie.

“Let’s go.” We both exit the car at the same time and run into the flock of waiting vultures.

The walk from the car to class goes like this:

Girl in a shirtdress that should have leggings under it but doesn’t. Jeez. She: “I saw your video! You were soooo awesome!”

Me: “Thanks.”

Nerdy guy, thick glasses, weird shoes: “What kind of camera did you use?”

Me: “Ask Iris.”

Pimply other guy: “How many hits did you get? The video game I designed, Cannibal Bloodlust, has 769,708,769,797 users.” (Okay, maybe I made up the number – who’s listening?)

Me:
“Um, I don’t know.”
[3]

Taylor Lyn:
*Glare*

Me:
Ha. Ha.

Reid
[4]
:
“In
Zocopalypse
No. 1, Alexandra and Wyatt meet in a Chevy, not a Ford.”

Me:
(middle finger)

And so on and so on and so on.

g

Reid corners me in
drawing class. He is, to put it nicely, a competitor. Oh yeah, he is also a stupid jerk. Even though he technically de-virginized us (and me personally) to the glory of
Zocopalypse
, we never saw eye-to-eye on the books. He focused on maintaining the integrity of the story and mythology on his own site, zombieface.net. His views border on mocking and he can take his criticism too far, which never sat well with us. Iris and I love to analyze the awesomeness of the characters and their relationships
[5]
, the artwork and gory details. So after Reid and I broke-up (*cough* he cheated *cough*) and we implemented “Operation Destroy Reid,” Iris and I created our own website, Z.net, to explore our interests in the fandom and profile her films.

I cut him off before he can say anything. “I know, I know, a Chevy not a Ford. We couldn’t find one. We were lucky enough my grandfather lives on a farm with a barn. It’s not like we had a budget or anything.” I keep my eyes on my sketchpad.

“True, but you did an okay job as Alexandra.”

Huh. “Thanks, I guess.”

He hovers for a minute longer, fingers tapping on the table and causing my pencil to jump across the paper.

I sigh, big and dramatic, letting him know exactly how exasperated I am. “I need to get this done. What do you want?”
I notice he looks a little sweaty under his Pac Man T-shirt. Cute, but sweaty. Is he sick? I inch away. “Spit it out.”

“Do you have plans to make another video?”

“No.” I’m sure he received a lot of hits on his site due to our hard work. He wants more. I focus on my drawing, but he doesn’t move. “What do you want, Reid?”

“I was trolling the other night and saw Iris tweet the link. It’s good, Ruby. Really good. You should do another one. Make a serial.”

He wishes. “How much traffic did you get?” I ask.

“A lot,” he says, a sly grin forming.

“Well, you can forget another one. My days as Alexandra are over. I already told Iris to forget making a second one.”

“Too bad. You were kinda hot.” Jerk. He’s lucky Iris isn’t here. I may still get emotionally and physically confused around Reid, but that’s not a problem she has.
Thankfully,
he moves before I can do more than shoot him a dirty look, but he stops short of his own desk. “You guys going to FantasyCon
[6]
?”

“Oh yeah, and we entered the lottery for spots in the Zombie Parade.”

“Me, too. They said the drawing would be this week.” FantasyCon was the week after graduation. Memorial Day weekend.

“Friday. I can’t wait. I hope we get chosen. I’ve been working on my costume.” I’d found the perfect face paint for my zombie costume and a method to make oozing sores online.

“Going as Alexandra?”

I scoff. “Like I said, that was a one-time gig. No more acting for me.”

Famous. Last. Words.

g

Later, I’m trapped in
what I consider the Sixth Circle of Hell. German class.

1. Catching Reid and Taylor Lyn lip-locked at the midnight showing of Rocky Horror.
   
2. Talking to my mother about college.
   
3. That awkward moment when I shout, “Like during the zombie apocalypse” and everyone stares at me like a freak.
   
4. Stupid Taylor Lyn.
   
5. Drama class.
   

I compulsively check the clock, minute by minute, until I can escape. Frau Smith has us translating a paragraph from a novel, English to German, while she grades papers. Das Spiel verderben.
Mid-word, my butt vibrates and I slip the phone out of my pocket. Iris.

Yr gonna die
what?
DIE!
OMGWHAT??
Meet me at the car after school. DIE!
I hate you
EMOTICON LOVE! <3

She did not just emoticon me. I have this deep hatred for the use (and overuse) of the emoticon. The following are all forbidden:

• Smilies
  
• Hearts
  
• Winky eyes
  
• Suggestive commas
  

The ban is primarily because the smiley is used to lessen the blow of a backhanded insult.Text: Your hair looked great today – good thing mullets are back in. : )

I mean, what? People think the smiley takes away from the insult. In my opinion, if you’re going to insult someone, just do it. Tell them their hair looks terrible. Do it. Even worse is the pity emoticon:

Text: O.M.G. Did you see Reid flirting with Taylor Lyn after soccer today? Did he dump you? : (

Iris and I determined that if we were in charge of emoticons they wouldn’t be : ) or : ( or <3, they would be things like: Rage or Bitchslap or Despair or Eyeroll. Since I refuse to use emoticons, instead we say:

EMOTICON FACEPUNCH!

She sent me that <3 trying to get a rise out of me, which is evil since I have 20 more minutes of hell before I can make my escape. When I do I find Iris, she’s waiting at the car, bouncing on her toes. Her braids shake with excitement
.
“Get in the car,” she directs.

I climb in the passenger seat. “What’s going on?”

“Read this!” she yells, shoving her phone in my face.

I grab the phone. “What is it?”

“Just. Read. It.”

“Okay, okay.”

“Out loud.”

“
Iris…”

“Do it!”

“Fine. ’Hi, saw your video! It was great! Best fan video we’ve ever seen. We would love for you two to lead our Zombie Parade at FantasyCon later this month.’ Oh. My. God.”

“I know!” Iris beats her hands on the steering wheel.

I skim the rest of the email. The organizer of the Zombie Parade wants us to lead the parade. He requests that I wear my Alexandra costume.

“This is crazy!”

“I know!” Iris repeats.

A thought enters my mind.

“What?”

“You know who’s going to be so pissed about this?”

We both say his name at the same time. “Reid.”

g