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"There's nothing you can do for her now" his neighbor Jim said. "We were
lucky to get her into the shed. Luckily for you I stopped by to borrow that
weed-whacker."
"How?" Robert asked, trying not to break down completely. He was exhausted,
having spent practically the entire time since dawn running from and fighting
off his wife.
"Who knows?" Jim said. "She must have been bitten by one of them, that
much is obvious. Did she leave the farm over the past few days?"
"Oh lord" Robert said, so softly that Jim didn't hear him. He remembered
that the other day Millie had gone into town to get her hair and nails
done. That was before the warnings came out about the disease. "She was
in town" he confessed. "But…she wasn't a zombie when she came back.
She was normal. I swear she was."
"It's hard to tell" Jim told him. "Any little bite. Even from an infected
mouse. The disease makes the mice crazy, just like humans. They become
like dobermans. Just a little bite. Millie might not even have felt it.
And the disease takes a few hours to infect a person, to turn them."
"She was chasing me all over the house" Robert confessed. "I could
barely fight her off. It was like she wanted to rip me to shreds and…"
"Eat your flesh?" Jim said. "Yes, and she probably would have. I've got
to get back home. It's getting dark. Tomorrow I'll stop by with the
shotgun and we will take care of Millie. It's kinder that way, trust me."
"I don't know if I can do it" Robert said.
"I think you can. It should be you that does it. But if not, I'll do
it for you. And I've got a spare rifle I'll bring too. You're probably
going to need it if this whole zombie business keeps up."
Jim drove off and Robert went into the house. He was numb, almost a
zombie himself. He found himself in the living room, running his fingers
over the keys of his wife's piano. He remembered how nice Millie's
derriere had looked as she sat on the stool and played, the way wisps
of her blonde hair fell over her cheeks as she leaned slightly forward
into the keyboard, the look of her eyes intent upon the sheet music.
But there had been little music in the house of late. Robert thought to
himself that perhaps it had been inevitable, with him living on the farm
raising sunflowers, and Millie being from the big city and all. After
the first year she really never did seem happy. Robert took to drinking
in the evenings at the local bar up the highway. At the same time Millie
turned her attentions on Leo Stradman, a lawyer in town with 20 years on
her. Learning of the affair increased his drinking. And his more frequent
nights out increased her distance. Everything, very slowly, seemed to
collapse.
After a while he went into the kitchen and heated up some soup. In spite
of not having eaten anything at all during the day, what with running
around trying not to be eaten himself, he brought the spoon up to his mouth
only occasionally. Finally, he threw down the spoon. Millie was gone. She
was alive but she was gone. Turned into some…thing. He remembered the
dinners they had eaten together in the early days, the good days, always
laughing afterward about how neither of them was much of a cook as they
did a couple of shots of tequila together.
"Tequila sounds good" Robert said to himself. He went over to the buffet
and poured himself a shot and belted it down. And then did a few more.
Finally, he walked into the kitchen and pulled out a box of Stouffer's
Swedish meatballs from the freezer. He opened the box and put the frozen
meatballs in a bowl and then, reading the cooking directions, put them in
the microwave on Hi for 4 minutes. When the meatballs were done he put them
on a plate and walked out to the shed. As he approached, his wife, hearing
his steps no doubt, or perhaps then being able to smell his live flesh, or
possibly the meatballs, once again began the hideous growling and again
started pounding on the door. One by one Robert dropped the meatballs into
the shed through a small hole in the door. He heard his wife snort and
chew the meatballs as he fed them to her.
Zombie she might be, but he loved her still, or the memory of what she
once was only a few hours or a few months or a few years before. He
went back to the house and laid down on the bed, not even taking off his
boots. It was going to be a long time until morning.
😆 Thanks! 😀 You can blame insomnia. You know I never did see I Am Legend. Which might be one of the few movies of that type I haven't seen. You ever see Sean Of the Dead? That one's hilarious. And as it so happened I first saw it with my friend Sean.
'You are Legend', Ed! 😀 Cool and funny story!:yes:
Blond hair and zombies, soup and meatballs.Musta been a really bad night.:lol:Cool story.:up::heart:
@ Star.:lol: :lol:Life is strange, yeah? Especially with zombies around. And thank you!:heart:PS. You know it's snowing here? Not very much, very light, but…:yes:
Originally posted by edwardpiercy:
Nope, never saw that one but it must have fun to see it with Sean. And I know 'I Am Legend' from the book. One of the best zombie horror stories I've ever read (not that I've read that many!).:)
Yeah, Sean and me sat around drinking some beers and watched it — a great time. And of course Sean loved his "namesake" movie. :lol:I'd like to check the book out but probably should stick to the movie — only 2 hours, and I'm kinda lazy these days. :p
Meatballs :chef:
'At's a spicey meatballa!:lol:
I watched "Night Of The Living Dead." once. :up:.As for Will Smith's disaster movie, They should have put the last scene first. And they really should have left the, 'I was saving it.' bacon scene out. :doh:.
@ Qlue.They keep doing Night of the Living Dead. But considering I never liked the original much, I felt no pull towards the others. There are much better zombie movies out there. And thanks for reading! 😀
How Gothic. :p
I Am Legend the movie and I Am Legend the book are two entirely different things. Only the title is the same. This goes for another Will Smith film: I, Robot which has absolutely nothing to do with Asimov's book. If you want zombie movies with depth, 28 Days Later is my recommandation. Britsh. I really like this story. I actually tried to write a story with a zombie theme once, but couldn't seem to get it going. I am currently working on a story about this young couple who buys an old house, and the only thing the former owner left was an antique telephone, and one day it rings, and the guy absolutely has to take it…Horror is nice.
@ Martin.I saw 28 Days Later and it's a good zombie movie. Although it seems to me that it is actually two movies — the first half being a kind of empty Omega Man type thing going on, and the second falling more into the conventional killing the zombies thing. Not to be missed (?) is Zombie Strippers. Whose tag line is "Live Dead Nudes" which should give you some idea. A totally ridiculous movie that succeeds at many unintelligent levels.:up:I like the idea for the horor story. Just from the set-up it could actually be sci-fi or horror — depending on where you take it. Anyway, good luck with it. And I will read it. @ Qlue.See last paragraph above. :p 🙂
28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later – excellent movies, especially the second one :left:
Originally posted by edwardpiercy:
Probably not. It's in Danish, and I don't have the skills to translate. I might do an English version, but… Well, English is not my native laguage and I find it hard to express the more subtle and refined levels in other laguages than my native. Sorry.
So I guess I won't read it. :p
:lol:I've never been into horror flicks, I know some people love them, but I find them too stressful to watch! Kudos on the story. There's a nice balance of humor to offset the gore :up:
Thanks, Mags!I guess the way I look at it is that compared to zombies eating my brain, my life isn't really that bad. :p