Blog of the Dead (Book 1): Sophie (3 page)

Of my breath as it clouds the window pane,

Of my soft skin as it touches cold, hard glass.

Sam sat next to me as I wrote it and he asked if he could read it. At first I said no because it’s just the start of the first draft, but then I showed it to him anyway. After he read it, he shoved up on the sofa so that his body was as close to mine as it could get without actually sitting on my lap and slid his arm around my shoulder. With his face close to mine, he stoked the hair away from my face so tenderly … then Polly came in with tea.

She’s getting better at it, making tea. It no longer tastes like lukewarm toilet water. Now it tastes like hot toilet water. And it could do with some milk.

I’m pretty freaked out by the fact that if Sam had tried to kiss me just then, I think I would’ve let him. That moment, I am pleased to say, has passed.

We’re rationing the crisps and chocolate and stuff but we haven’t got a lot left. We know we’re going to have to go out there soon and brave the desolate, zombie ridden streets of Folkestone before we get too weak to search for food.

But we’re scared.

November 20
1.25pm Day 7
Shit! I can’t stop shaking or crying. Richard got out last night. I feel sick.

2.40pm Day 7
I have almost stopped shaking now. So, last night, I heard a thump, and then some crashing from upstairs. Me and Polly were in the living room but neither of us knew where Sam was. I reached the door first and took a peek out into the hallway. Nothing there that could explain the noise, but I could see Sam sitting at the dinning room table, a copy of Stephen King’s
The Stand
clutched in his hand. He wasn’t reading it though, just staring straight at me, his eyes all bugging out his head. I heard a scrambling noise coming from the first floor landing. Richard had got out.

Polly pushed past me and dashed straight to the kitchen. The eight inch chopping knife was still up in Sam’s bedroom but she emerged from the kitchen holding a long, heavy, serrated bread knife. ‘Let’s get that fucker,’ she said as she made her way to the stairs.

Her gung-ho approach totally freaked me out. I couldn’t let her go up there alone, so I bolted for the kitchen, aware that the choice of weapons was diminishing. I found a pair of long bladed scissors. Then I saw Sam – completely unarmed – running after Polly and I panicked, looking for something I could get for him. I remembered the long handled Maglite torch that Dad had insisted on me taking from home and keeping ‘in a safe place, Sophie’ and I thought,
thanks, Dad
. I frantically opened the second draw down, under the cutlery drawer, then remembered it was in the bottom draw. I opened it and pulled out the torch, reassuringly heavy in my hand, and bolted out of the kitchen after the other two.

Before I got to the stairs, I heard Polly say, ‘Oh fuck.’ When I got there I saw her standing about halfway up the stairs, the bread knife held limply in front of her. She stared up at Richard as he staggered along the landing outside the bathroom. Sam told her to come down and get out of the way, but she ignored him – rooted to the spot like a persistent weed on a patio.

I gave Sam the Maglite. He looked a bit disappointed with the torch and looked longingly at my scissors. But Richard staggered down the stairs, closer to Polly, who had gone all catatonic and appeared to have forgotten about the potentially lethal weapon in her hand. Richard – now looking like a dead frog that had been drying in the sun for a few days with papery skin stretched over his yellowing bones, bloodshot eyes bulging out of his gaunt face – reached his rotten arms out before him. Polly backed away but not quick enough. Richard got hold of her hair and pulled. She shrieked and tried to pull herself free, but Richard grabbed her left arm. Polly remembered the bread knife and swung it but she got her aim wrong and the blade dug into Richard’s shoulder. Of course, this would have been enough to slow down or even stop a human, but zombies, well, they require more of a head related injury. So, Richard bent down towards Polly, pulling her up as he did, teeth bared.

Sam shot up the stairs. He swung the Maglite at the backs of Richard’s legs, making him lose his footing. Richard tumbled onto his back, taking Polly down with him, the bread knife falling out of her hand. Richard appeared oblivious to Sam’s attack and only had eyes for Polly, pulling her hair so that she was right on top of him, her face inches from his gnashing teeth, all yellow, pussy spittle flying.

I could see that Sam wanted to take a swing at Richard’s head with the torch but couldn’t because Polly was in the way, so I ran up the stairs, stuck my scissors into one of Richard’s arms. I stabbed repeatedly, careful not to hit Polly. Richard loosened his grip on her, so I grasped Polly by the shoulders and pulled her up and back as best I could. We both fell back, all the way down the stairs, me losing the scissors somewhere on the way. At the bottom, I pushed my way clear of Polly and sprang to my feet in time to see Sam whacking Richard in the head with the Maglite. Richard writhed around, a big chunk of Polly’s long brown hair still in his hand, trying to get to his feet. I ran up the stairs, picked up the scissors and stuck them between his eyes with a grunt that would’ve made a tennis player proud.

And that was the end of Richard.

Sam said later that he couldn’t get me to let go of the scissors for about an hour.

November 21
9.05am Day 8
Sam dragged Richard’s body out of the house late last night. He couldn’t risk going out the front, not with Mr Cat Toy still there, so he dumped Richard in the back garden. Luckily it’s totally enclosed, so it was safe enough to go out there. He took Richard right down the back, behind the shed, so we can’t see him from the house. Total respect to him for doing it. The thought of touching Richard ... Even so, I said I’d help if he needed me to, but Sam said that he could manage as long as I came out and shone a torch for him.

I’ve suggested to the other two that we should get ourselves a car and split to my parents’ house in Guildford. Surrey is closer than Polly’s parents in Cambridge and we still haven’t heard from Sam’s family. But Sam – like my parents – thinks this is a dumb idea. He says we should sit tight and wait for help to arrive. Sam’s convinced that the army are on their way. It’s been a week. How long do we wait for help? And, although I haven’t let on to my mum and dad, we haven’t got any food left.

November 22
7.30am Day 9
If you search on YouTube, there are films of zombie outbreaks all over the world. Towns and cities are worst hit, but I don’t think anywhere is unaffected. I don’t think help is coming.

November 23
10am Day 10
We’re starving.

I found a packet of Cup a Soups that had fallen down the back of a cupboard. They were well past their use by date and had probably been there since the last tenants, but we had them anyway. They were delicious.

We’ve practically taken the kitchen apart, but that’s it now.

No more food.

Zombie infested street of Folkestone here we come ...

November 24
10.40am Day 11
I don’t ever want to go out there again. No way. Shit! None of us wanted to go. But with no food, what were we supposed to do? Starve to death? Ok, perhaps better than being eaten alive, or bitten and infected. But while starving seems like a better option, I guess we humans have an overriding survival instinct. So, time for a day trip.

We had a plan – sort of. Polly was to open the living room window ever so slightly and get Mr Cat Toy’s attention, while me and Sam head out the front armed – him with the eight inch kitchen knife and me, the tried and tested scissors that I killed Richard with – and, with Mr Cat Toy’s brain dead attention on Polly, we’d skewer the rotting bastard. Then head to Sai’s News and Wine down the road, nip in, grab some food and dart the twenty metres back to the house. Simple.

Well, like the best laid plans …

It started well. Polly kept Mr Cat Toy occupied by doing this ‘you want my fingers? Well you can’t have my fingers ...’ sort of dance through the open window. Mr Cat Toy played along obediently in a sort of ‘yes I want your fingers, oh! Where’d they go?’ kind of way. I almost felt sorry for him, it was so pathetic. Me and Sam crept out the front. I let Sam do the honours. He didn’t even hesitate.

So, once Mr Cat Toy was down and out, Polly came out after us, carrying a pair of shears she found in the garden shed. We debated having her stay behind to open up for us when we came back, but we figured we’d need the extra hands to get as much food as possible. And, seeing as we were only going a little way down the road, we could chance that nothing would get in. They can’t cope with doors and stuff, we learned that from Richard. He got out eventually, but still …

I had a quick peek down the street in both directions but it was deserted. Desolate. Creepy as shit. It’s not a main road, but it was always pretty busy before, especially during the school run, what with the school at the end of the street. Now it’s a ghost street. If you’ve ever been way out in the country, somewhere in the middle of nowhere, then you know what quiet really sounds like. But that much quiet in a town setting is just plain weird. The shop didn’t look that far away. Not really. We crept our way cautiously. It felt strange being outside after almost two weeks, sort of dreamlike, the adrenaline coursing through me added to the effect.

We got to Sai’s shop, but it was locked up tight. Damn! I mean, that place was always open, but when we’re all about to die of starvation and could really do with a break, it’s closed – fan-bloody-tastic. Polly raised the shears in front of her, a handle gripped in each hand, and drove the blades into the glass. There was a bang, but the glass held. ‘Fuck,’ she said and tried again. I noticed Sam looking about and asked what he was doing. ‘We’re getting in there, one way or another,’ he said. ‘I’m too hungry.’ Then he started kicking at a wall outside someone’s house. The people who lived there were either dead or too worried about zombies to care about their wall, but it still felt like a weird thing to do, in broad daylight as well. Vandalism. It just brought the whole crazy situation home. It occurred to me then that we could do whatever we wanted. We pretty much owned the town now. Folkestone was ours by the sheer fact that we were the only ones brave enough to venture out.

While I pondered on that I heard a smash and realised that Sam had broken through the window with a brick he’d dislodged from the wall. Once the fallout had settled, Polly moved in and knocked the higher bits of glass away with the shears, while Sam kicked the window in a bit more down below to make a hole big enough for us. Then I heard Polly cry out, then swear really loudly. She dropped the shears and grabbed hold of her arm. I could see blood oozing out between her fingers. ‘My Arm! My fucking arm is going to fall off!’

‘Let me see,’ said Sam, but Polly refused to move her hand.

‘There must be some first aid stuff in the shop,’ I said. ‘I’ll go and have a ...’ I didn’t finish because I could hear something moving in the alley beside the shop. A scraping, shuffling sound. I knew I shouldn’t, but I couldn’t help myself. Still caught up in that dreamlike state, I didn’t think anything bad could come of it, and, if it did, I could just wake up couldn’t I? I took a couple of steps to my right so that I could see down the alley. And there they were … I don’t know how many, I didn’t count them. I just swore at them.

‘We need to get out of here right now, people,’ I said. ‘Zombies!’

‘But we haven’t got any food,’ said Sam. ‘I’m not going back empty handed. I can’t.’

I could see more zombies coming down the street in the direction we’d come from. They hadn’t reached our house yet, but they would soon if we didn’t hurry back.

‘I can’t believe I’m doing this,’ I said. ‘But, Sam, take Polly back to the house. I’ll get us some food and meet you there.’

‘No way I’m leaving you –’

‘No time to argue! I’m doing this, Sam. I’m a runner, remember? I can get some supplies and be back to the house before that lot get there. But you need to go now. Get Polly back.’

‘You’re mental,’ said Sam.

‘I’m fucking hungry. Put the kettle on, Polly. I’ll be back in five ...’

Sam and Polly ran off to the house, Sam carrying the knife and the shears, while Polly tried to stem the crazy blood flow from her arm. I heard them both shout ‘Good luck!’ but I was already in the shop. I didn’t have time to go behind the counter for carrier bags so I picked up a metal basket and started shoving in the first food items I could reach. Then I legged it out the shop … right into the path of a zombie. I rammed my scissors right between its eyes. It fell to the ground at my feet and I pulled the scissors out. They didn’t come out easily. I had to put the basket down and put my foot on its soft, rank body and tug. The scissors came out with a squelch and a spurt of disgusting black blood. Another zombie staggered towards me but I didn’t have time to fight, or I’d end up surrounded. I could see the zombies down the street getting closer to the house. I couldn’t risk being cut off.

I ran, the shopping basket swinging wildly. A few things fell out of it but I didn’t have time to go back for them. Onwards. But I just wasn’t fast enough. Three zombies stood between me and a cup of Polly’s hideous tea. I stopped in the middle of the road and surveyed the situation. I was going to have to fight. The one out front lunged at me but I sidestepped it, turned and plunged the scissors into the back of its head. I yanked them free as the stinking thing fell to the floor. Then I made for the next one, black bloody scissors raised – anyone would think I’d been doing this all my life. But he was a tricky little bugger and came at me a second sooner than I thought he would. The zombie grabbed hold of the arm that had the scissors. I swung the shopping basket at it, slamming it into the side of its head. This made it let go and while it tried to steady itself, I brought the scissors down into its head.