Fragmented Zombie

Kandace and the Zombie Epiphany

Arianna and I never worried about much in our lives other than losing our rights. A cold virus that's just as dangerous -if not worse- than the flu? Not bothered. A bank two towns over got robbed? Not my town, not my problem. My neighbour's twice-removed-cousin just died of cancer? Sad, but not my relative, not my business. I guess you could say: if it doesn't affect us personally, Arianna and I aren't bothered by or worried about it.

It was 7:30 AM, I was awoken by a thud on the window. Usually, this is where a person would go look out the window to see what the sound was. But not me, I was never one of those people. On top of that, I was too tired to care; so I brushed it off as a bird hitting the window.

I sat up in bed while rubbing my eye. While I was sitting there, waiting for my brain and body to fully wake up, I noticed something off the corner of my eye. I looked over to see Arianna still laying in bed. This was out of character for her since she was always up by six. That was the thing about us: Arianna always woke up at six in the morning and I always woke up at noon.

"Ari? Are you okay?" I asked, gently nudging her shoulder.

Concern and panic started to kick in when Arianna didn't respond to my voice or nudging. In a panic, I checked for a heart beat, a pulse, and a breath to see if she was still alive. When I couldn't get a pulse or a heart beat, I yanked the blanket off of Arianna to get a better look at her. Much to my horror, Arianna didn't look human. She looked like one of those things the news was talking about. My whole world started to crash around me as I realized Arianna wasn't just sick, she was dying.

"Goddamn it!" I exclaimed, tears streaming down my face. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Wiping the tears off my face, I rushed over to my closet to see if I could find something to use as a body bag. There wasn't much to work with. But I did the best I could with what I had. Once I found a bag I could use, I walked over to my bed and put the bag next to Arianna.

With a deep sigh, I put Arianna into the body bag and closed it. After closing the body bag, I took a moment to collect myself. It made me sick knowing that my girlfriend died before either of us could say our last good-bye to each other. After about five minutes, I took a deep breath, and took the body bag to the living room. Once, in the living room, I put the body bag on the floor and straightened it.

I sat on my living room couch, nervously bouncing my knee with my now ex-girlfriend in a body bag. I had my TV on, leaving it on the local news channel. There wasn't much that was new. The only thing that was new was the rising number of infected. The last time Arianna and I watched the news, we were instructed to put the infected in a body bag should their bodies be dormant. However, they never said what to do after that.

I kept my eyes glued to the TV, waiting for them to provide us with further instructions. As I watched, the number of infected kept getting higher. It was almost as if the people that were trying to report their infected loved ones and neighbours were infected before making the call. I waited for further instructions for what felt like hours, only to find that it was twenty minutes.

While I was watching the news, the body bag I put Arianna in started moving. I freaked out but ignored it just long enough to get to the end of the news segment. As I was watching the news, the body bag kept moving. Along with the movements were muffled noises. It specifically sounded like muffled grunts and growls. This scared the hell out of me. I called to report Arianna's infected body, except I added that I thought she was dead before putting her in the bag. The fear in my voice suggested that the infected person may not be dormant for very long. I took the opportunity to ask what it was I was supposed to do since the news never mentioned what to do after putting the body in a body bag.