Zombie High (4 page)

If you open the window & jump, turn to page ……..
37
If you crawl further back & hide, turn to page ……..
51
If you wait & sneak out, turn to page
………………..
53

Seeing that Miss Millstone is reaching for the
doorknob, you decide that there’s no reason for you to
continue sitting here along with the rest of your
classmates like fresh deli meat waiting to become
someone’s midday snack, so you break away from the
pack and head for the window. Looking out the glass, you
see that there is now only one or two of the undead
creatures on the school’s lawn, and you figure you should
be able to outrun them and get somewhere safer where
teachers don’t just invite them into the building with you.

Turning the latch, you push open the large window
and look down. The drop is at least twenty-five feet,
maybe more, and you swallow the sudden dryness in your
throat as you look down. As you quickly contemplate the
safest way to go out the window and stick the landing
without breaking your neck, your mind flashes back to the
eighth grade when a ginger haired kid jumped off the roof
of his house with a trash bag held overhead thinking he
could parachute down. The guy ended up in the hospital
with a broken clavicle and a spiral fracture up the right
leg.

From behind you, you hear Miss Millstone say,
“Yes?” as she opens the door and then screams as
whoever, or whatever is in the hall makes its first lurching
step towards her.

That was all the encouragement you needed as you
push aside any lingering thoughts about that ginger kid
and climb up so that you are sitting on the windowsill with
your legs hanging out. You inhale once, so that you have
breath with which to scream with on the way down, and
then shove off the ledge. It’s right about the time that
your entire body is weightless and floating for a half
second in midair when you begin to think that maybe this
wasn’t the best idea. It only lasts a second, however, as
you begin to plummet towards the ground and then you
find yourself too busy trying to remember how you’re
supposed to land in a situation like this. Whichever way it
was, you don’t do it, and you land on the soft moist
ground with something bending the way it wasn’t meant
to go. It’s now that you cry out the scream that never
made it from your lips on the way down.

Realizing that the scream wasn’t a smart move, you
try to control the pain, sucking air in through your teeth as
you look down to see what happened. As it turns out, the
rain from the previous night softened the ground and your
ankle rolled as you hit the ground. It’s not broken,
thankfully, but jogging is out of the question. For that
matter, standing is excruciatingly painful.

Deciding that your first instinct this morning was
the right one, and you should have never left your bed,
you decide to head home. The drive to school takes
twenty minutes, but without a car all you can do is try to
walk it. The thought of hotwiring a car in the school
parking lot crosses your mind, but realistically no amount
of time playing GTA video games ever gives you the skills
to actually pull off something like that. Besides, in order
to get in the car, you would have to break the window,
and while you could find a rock to do it with, once the
window is broken you’ll have no real protection from
zombies.

Turning towards the back of the school, you figure
the fastest way home is to cut through the field and then
make your way through the neighborhood.
Unfortunately, just walking from the window around to
the side of the school already has you wincing with the
pain in your leg, and you’re walking in your own
shambling gate.

It takes you nearly ten minutes to hobble your way
across the length of the football field, and as you reach
the other team’s end zone on the far side, you are sorely
tempted to sit down and take a rest. The only thing that
keeps you from giving in to the pain is the fact that there’s
no safety out here, and the walk home is already looking
like it’s going to be two hours too long at this rate.

From a side street to your left, you hear a loud
truck revving its engine, and then the squeal of tires as it
peels out. Seconds later, you see the dented beat up
looking old Ford racing its way through the intersection
with a zombie pinned to its front grill.

Stumbling out into the street on your bad leg, you
attempt to wave down the truck in hopes that you can
hitch a ride and get home faster. At first it doesn’t seem
like the driver of the truck noticed you at all as it
disappears down the side street out of view, but a
moment later you hear the screeching sound of its brakes
locking up as the driver stomps the pedal to the
floorboard.

Waiting just a few feet into the street, you see the
old pickup return to the intersection. But this time the
driver is going in reverse. Clearly, the rules of the road
don’t mean as much to this guy as they would to a normal
driver. Oh well, at least he should be able to get you
home a little faster if he is willing to bypass a few stop
signs. Raising your arms once again, you begin to walk
towards him, hoping to meet him halfway and tell him
your story, but the driver turns the wheel and shifts the
truck into drive, clearly intending to come to you.

From the back of the pickup you see another man
who looks younger than the driver, probably just a few
years out of high school himself, stand up in the bed of
the truck. The driver says something to the younger one,
and the guy in the back nods his agreement just as the
truck begins to approach. The truck doesn’t accelerate
with screeching tires like it did before. Instead, the driver
just slowly adds on a little more pressure to the gas pedal
while he keeps a look out at the surrounding homes.

Figuring that they must be in a hurry and worried
about being overrun by a horde of zombies, you attempt
to quicken your pace. The increase in speed does nothing
to help your ankle, and you grunt several times as you put
your weight on it. Perhaps it’s this which finally synchs
the two guy’s decision, but you have a feeling they had
their minds made up about this long before they ever
spotted you because when the truck is just a couple dozen
feet away from you, the driver yells something and floors
the truck. Upon hearing the driver’s yell, the younger guy
in the back of the truck pops up to a standing position, but
this time you see he is holding something. It takes you a
second to put it all together, but by that time the driver
yells out, “Mind if we play through?” and lets out a
maniacal laugh while the one in the back calls out “Fore!”
and swings a metal golf club into your face.

Crossing the street quickly, in hopes of not being
seen by the occupants of the truck or anyone else, you
hobble your way across the front lawn headed for the
front door. Along the way, you feel your injured foot
squish into something soft, and you have a brief panic
attack thinking it must be a fleshy zombie thing before
you lift your foot and realize that it’s just the leftover
excrement of some neighborhood dog. Cursing, you try to
wipe off some of the offensive feces but between the pain
in your ankle and the time it would take to do a thorough
job, you end up only removing a fraction of it.

When you finally reach the front door, you press
the button on the side to ring the doorbell mostly out of
habit, before you try peering in the window set in the
door. Not seeing anyone inside, you knock on the door
and then begin trying the door handle, but no one
answers and the door is locked.

Looking left and then right, you decide that there is
no higher probability that one of the other home owners
on this street will have left their front door unlocked, so
you might as well try around the back of this house.
Worst case, you reason, if you have to you can break a
window or something just so that you can get inside and
use the phone, then you can, at least, call someone to
come get you. The back of the yard also looks to have the
advantage of being fenced in with an eight foot high
privacy fence, so if you do have to break a window, at
least it won’t be visible from the street and the fence
might do you some good at keeping the zombies or
whatever they are away while you hole up inside.

You quickly edge your way around to the side of
the house to where the walkway runs beneath the fence,
and reach up to your full height. Even still, with your arm
fully stretched, you can only barely reach the top of the
fence, and you are forced to hop a little off your good foot
before you get a grip on it. It feels like almost a full
minute goes by as you try to pull yourself up while your
feet slip repeatedly down the side of the smooth fence
surface, and you end up cursing yourself for not
participating more in gym class. Eventually as your cheeks
flush and sweat beads up on your forehead, you finally
scramble your way to the top and are able to see over the
edge.

On the other side, you see a well-manicured lawn
of soft green grass with a cute little toy house beneath a
far tree where a little girl might play. There is also a large
ball sitting in the yard, and a tool shed off to the far left.
The best part is that there are no zombies as far as you
can see. Deciding to go over, you throw your right leg
over the top and roll your body over the fence.
Unfortunately, you never looked straight down and you
did not see the small tricycle sitting against the fence.
When you come down, your foot lands on its seat and
your leg goes out from under you and you collapse in
pain.

It takes a couple of minutes before you are willing
to try to move any part of what has now become your bad
leg, and when you do, you almost cry out involuntarily
despite knowing that you need to be quiet for fear of
zombies finding you. There’s not going to be any running
in your near future.

Looking to the house, you decide that even though
you’re on this side of the privacy fence, it would still
probably be smarter to get inside just in case these
zombies can find you by smell. Besides, you still want to
get to the phone and call for someone to come pick you
up.

Using the privacy fence for support, you manage to
stand up on your one good leg without exacerbating your
injuries much. You take a second to breathe before you
head towards the house and hope that you can maintain
your balance on the way.

When you’re ready, you take the first tentative
hop. You wobble for a second on the landing, but you
remain upright and try again. Four hops later, you reach
the side of the house and are able to use it to help
support yourself as you continue towards the corner
where you expect to find a back door into the home. At
one point, you have to hop away from house’s support as
you make your way around a bush, but you eventually get
to a corner and spot what you’re looking for, a way in.

Approaching quickly, you reach for the door handle
and find that it’s locked just like the front door was.
Determined to get in, you dismiss the moral dilemma of
your next action and decide to simply break the window
using a small potted plant next to the walkway. This is the
apocalypse after all, so a broken window really isn’t all
that bad, all things considered.

The windowpane set in the door breaks easily, and
you are able to reach through and unlock the door. With
this done, you hurriedly open it up and step inside hoping
that the noise doesn’t attract any of the undead which
may be in the area. Unfortunately, you didn’t consider
the potential for the living, and as your foot steps down
on the linoleum, you find a double barrel shotgun pressed
into your cheekbone.

“Hold it right there,” begins the voice of the old
man to your right. “I’m not sure what you think you’re
doing, but if you know what’s good for you, you’ll back
yourself out the way you came.”

Figuring the man to be too old to pose much of a
problem, you decide to grab for his gun. What you fail to
recognize, however, is that the wall closest to you is
decorated with several military awards and medals.
Therefore, when you attempt to attempt to pivot and
snatch the gun from the man, he doesn’t hesitate to shoot
you just like one of the many Communists he was forced
to shoot back in the war.

The last thing you hear before death is the old man
saying, “I survived the Commies, I sure ain’t going down
by the hands of some stupid kid.”

Trying to explain your way through this, you say,
“I’m sorry, Sir. I tried the bell, and knocked on the front
door, but no one answered.”

“So you decide you should just break in and raid
the place then just because I didn’t answer the door?
What kind of kid are you? I ought to shoot you right
now.”

“No, Sir,” you say, stumbling over the words as you
speak. “I…I just wanted to use the phone to call my
parents for a ride. There are zombies out there.”

“What do you think, I’m blind? I know there are
zombies out there. That’s why I have this shotgun, and
I’m not answering the door. Those damn Commies
probably cooked them up and sent them over here to
wipe us out.”