Zombie, Illinois (8 page)

We have a show the very next day-a corporate event for a diagnostics company up in the northern suburbs. This schedule is typical for us. Most nights, my drums never leave my car.

“Watch out for zombies,” Sarah shouts with a laugh as she pulls away in her Nissan Cube.

“Totes!” I call back from the loading dock.

The other girls follow Sarah's Cube out of the parking garage, and I am all alone. The ugly, utilitarian surroundings remind me that this is not a place for hotel guests or residents of the expensive condos upstairs. This is a place for serfs and servants, where comfort is not a priority. I'm surrounded by ugly concrete floors below and cheap lights above (the kind that will make anybody look haggard).

I get into my SUV and carefully back it up to the ledge by the freight elevator where my drums rest. I get out, open the back, and put on my weight-belt. I begin lifting the heavy cases one by one into my car. (This shit is good for your upper body. I've got some sexy-ass arm muscles, and they're not just from the drumming.)

Behind me, someone calls the freight elevator. Its wooden doors close automatically, and it hums softly as it's carried away to the upper levels of the hotel. I set my kick drum case on the concrete beside me, and it makes a loud “crack.” I listen to it echo through the vast subterranean levels of the garage. It starts out loud and then fades away into nothingness. After that is only silence.

I feel very alone, and it's not an awesome feeling. I'm a social person who doesn't like to be by herself. This is a little eerie.

I try to think about something other than being alone down here.

Something else.

Not zombies.

Stewart Copeland.

Yes.

So I'm there loading out, straining and sweating under the weight of my hardware cases and remembering watching Stewart play Wrigley Field with the Police back in 2007. (Sting's son was in the opening band, and that made me think about wanting to make a bunch of little Stewart Copelands. At the end of the show, Stewart threw his sticks into the audience. I was sitting too far away to have a shot at catching them. The next day one of them was on eBay, but some jagoff beat me to it. Fucking goddamn “Buy It Now.”)

I finally begin to hear other people-noises coming from distant parts of the garage. Someone moving something heavy. Footsteps. Workers. It relaxes me a bit. (I'm sure there are plenty of security cameras in the upper parking garage—the one for
guests
of the hotel. [They probably even have security guards watching them.] But I don't see
any
security cameras down here.)

I get the last of my cases into the back of my Jeep, and shut one of the doors. Then I turn around and almost scream.

Standing by the front of my vehicle is a large man who looks . . . well, he looks a lot like a Strawberry Brite Vagina Dentata fan. He's imposing—at least six feet tall—with a red beard, a face full of piercings, and tattoos that creep out from beneath a ripped Slayer t-shirt. He's on the younger side, but his skin is mottled in a way that makes his age hard to determine. His skin is also an alarming shade of light-blue. His face looks immobile, like he's wearing a mask. I'd say it
was
a mask, except
all
of his exposed flesh looks that way. He is wet. Dripping. His hair and beard are ribboned with green algae.

I realize that he looks like just what he is—a corpse that has been underwater in the Chicago River for a few weeks.

Did this guy drive his car into Lake Michigan? Get drunk at a Slayer show at the House of Blues and fall off the State Street Bridge? Whatever the case, he's been sleeping with the fishes for a while now. He's got that strange city-fishy smell you get after it rains: 25 percent blacktop, 25 percent dead fish, 25 percent sewer, and 25 percent unknown.

And then he takes an awkward, sopping step toward me, and I know instantly.

Zombie.

Those internet videos are real, and this is definitely a zombie. All I can think is: How do you do, Mr. Zombie? Get ready, because you're going to be my first.

First question: Fast or slow? (I have lots of other questions too, but you've got to start somewhere.)

Never taking my eyes from the shambling dead man, I back to the rear of my vehicle. The squishy corpse clearly wants to follow me. His water-logged eyes roll in their sockets, watching my retreat. He struggles to raise one leg, and then carefully takes a sopping step forward. It doesn't bring him far, but it's still progress. He raises his other leg and tries to take another.

Slow zombie it is.

This is exhilarating. My heart is racing. I wonder how the hell it snuck up on me. How it got so close without me hearing it! Then I look down at its feet. The shoes have partially rotted away and the remaining leather has congealed into the foot—which has, itself, congealed into a blue mass. What's left is a sort of fleshy, leathery
matter
acting as a natural dampener against the concrete floor. The zombie might as well be wearing slippers.

I look around for more of them. (That's the first thing you learn from watching zombie movies.. There's always more than one...)

I look left. I look right. Nothing. Nobody behind me on the loading dock, either. Nobody in the dark corners of the giant garage, at least as far as I can see.

Well then . . . an early riser.

I stand still and try to breathe quietly. The zombie takes another squishy step in my direction. In the distance, I begin to make out human voices. Are they from people in another part of the parking complex—perhaps on another level—or are they voices from another section of the building entirely, piped down to me through ductwork and vents?

“Hello!!!” I scream. “Can anyone hear me???”

The zombie doesn't even start.

“I could use some help over here!!!” I try again. “Young woman needs help!!! Hello???”

My voice echoes and fades away. After a moment, I can still hear people in the distance. They do not respond or return my cries. The zombie takes another step forward.

I'm going to have to do this my damn self. (I could run, sure, but I realized a long time ago that if you run once, you'll be running forever. Whatever I'm up against, I prefer to stand and fight.) But what to use?? I've got to get to the brain. Everybody knows that's how you kill zombies. I immediately start looking around for weapons.

The back of my car is full of drum gear that looks like crazy metal spider arms on stands. They'd appear intimidating in a fight against a human, but they might just annoy a zombie. They certainly aren't going to get to his brain. I also have heavy drum cases full of drums. I could throw one of those and knock the zombie over, yes, but that would only stop him for a moment.

Nope. We're going with sticks.

I reach inside the backseat of the Jeep and find my backpack. I grab a stick in each hand and strike a stance like I'm a martial artist fighting with Sai. The zombie regards me intensely, water softly dripping from its soaked clothing. Though it may be wet and slow, it is still filled with dangerous intent. It gnashes its teeth. It looks at me longingly. It
wants.

Timing my movements to the zombie's plods, I lunge forward and jam the right stick into its eye as hard as I possibly can. There is a moment of resistance, and then something gives within the socket and I'm able to drive the stick further in. Unfortunately, the zombie jerks back before I can go quite as deep as I'd like. It cranes its neck, momentarily disoriented, with three-quarters of a drumstick extending from its face. In the same breath (mine, not his [obviously]), the zombie rights itself, and lunges forward once more.

Fuck,
I think. Only one socket left.

Transferring the other stick to my right hand, I bob and sway in front of the zombie like a boxer waiting for the right moment to strike. It lowers its arms and leans in, like it's smelling me.

Gross.

I jump forward and jam the drumstick hard into its remaining eye. The zombie staggers back again, blinded.

Once the stick is secure I step back and Karate-kick the butt end as hard as I can, driving it even deeper. This seems to do the trick. The tattooed giant falls to its knees and then plops unceremoniously onto its side. It moans once, and then ceases to function.

I lean against the side of my Jeep and try to catch my breath. I feel like I've just run a series of wind sprints.

Before I can even start thinking about how I just killed a zombie—how I just
killed a zombie!!!
—I hear a loud shuddering noise and flinch. The doors of the freight elevator behind me are opening up. Two smiling porters with Trump Tower embroidered on their uniforms exit the elevator. They are pushing a small dumpster on wheels.

One of them is talking: “And so she's putting her pants on outside my door, and then my mother comes around the corner and before I can say anything she . . .
holy hell!”

The porters freeze. They are confronted by an exhausted young woman and a dead body with drumsticks driven into in its eye sockets.

“Shit . . .” one of them says, and runs back into the elevator. The other pulls out a cell phone and starts dialing. “Are you okay, miss?” he asks as he hastily dials.

“Okay?” I answer distantly. Then I kind of think about it.

“Yeah, I'm okay. I'm pretty fucking awesome, actually. I just killed a zombie.”

“You did
that?”
the porter asks, gesturing to the crumpled body.

I nod.

He frowns and goes back to his phone. He cancels one call, and then places another. Three numbers long.

That's when I decide maybe the next thing I should do is get out of there.

The next part is like a dream. (I think because it involves a lot of running but never escaping what you're running from.)

I leave my rusty sledgehammer buried in the zombie's breast and run.

Zombie.

Yes, “zombie.” For so I know it to be.

When people see a zombie, there seem to be three typical reactions. There are those who, instinctively, feel themselves qualified to attack—to start fighting the zombie with whatever's handy—and this is what they do. There are those who instantly retreat to a safe place and start battening down the hatches. And then there are those who simply go mad and start running, anywhere and for no reason.

I'd like to think I would be in the camp retaining enough sense to at least run
for cover,
or with a purpose in mind.. .but no. I just run. I run down the dark Chicago streets as fast as I can.

Something primal kicks in and I want to find someone who'll take care of me. A policeman. Mom or Dad. Any type of authority figure.

But I'm not seeing anybody. The streets are dark and empty. Holy fuck.

I notice that I'm saying “Jesus Christ” over and over under my breath as I run. Is it a prayer or a curse? I have no idea. I just keep saying it.

A few moments later I find myself in Palmer Square Park. I'm hardly registering locations or navigation points as I flee in cowardly terror, but some part of me remembers that this large green space has a name. Palmer Square is a friendly area where you can normally count on finding joggers and kids playing soccer. At worst, you get a couple of gruff, smelly homeless guys minding their own business.

In the orange glow of the streetlights ringing the park, I make out a furtive group of figures huddled together. I stop and look more closely. Two are naked. One is half-naked and has what appears to be the broken arm of an embalming apparatus dangling from the side of his chest. Two are dressed nicely, wearing a tuxedo and Sunday dress, respectively. I stifle a scream and run in the opposite direction.

My brain starts trying to work. I try to think of where to go or whom to call. I toy with the notion of heading back to my apartment, but I'm afraid the zombie in the yellow dress will still be there waiting for me.

I head away from the park, running north. In a few moments, I find myself at the traffic circle containing the Illinois Centennial Monument. A fixture of the neighborhood, the 70-foot Doric column emerges from a stout base atop a shallow hill. The base itself is about 10 feet high.