The New World

5

PARKER.

It was like any other normal day.

I got up, I showered, I went downstairs to meet my mom for breakfast. I step into the tall, glass shower and feel the hot water hit my cold skin. The spacious, dark marble bathroom echoes with the water hitting the tile. I always loved a nice, hot shower. Walking down the stairs I see my mom standing in the kitchen finishing up the breakfast bowl of fruit and other healthy shit she always ate. My dad jogged down the stairs swinging a briefcase around. The small TV we have in the corner of the counter was close to muted, but the news was on so my dad grabbed the remote and turned it up. It was talking about the Outbreak. It started in Texas, and the disease was slowly making it's way up the coast. It was also traveling down the coast in California. My dad mentions moving again. Geographically, being in Arizona, we were surrounded. Then, he just shook his head as my mom peered at him, worried. He pecked my mom before shuffling over to me and pressing his lips against my temple. He grabs the mug of coffee my mom left for him and before walking out the door reminds us, for the last time, he loves us. I didn't say it back. I just stood across from the large, two-part sink to look out the ginormous, glass window with a simple white frame to outlook the beautiful lake in our backyard. I look at the table underneath the tree that spread out across a good portion of our yard where I normally do homeschooling.

As I sit down I feel the cold breeze brush around me, looking across to my mom to see her hugging her sweater. She grinned at me, but I felt the apprehension in the air. The Outbreak was spreading quickly, and no one was really sure about what to do. She just sipped her coffee and I just took notes, doing what the rest of the world at the time did; pretend like nothing was going on. She had on the Apple Watch my dad had bought her, and it lit up in the silence. We both looked at it, it was telling her she had a call coming in from my dad, but her phone was in the kitchen. She excused herself and walked back inside. I, at the time, hated anything involving Chemistry. I would give anything to go back. Even if it meant getting a C.

I look towards the kitchen from electron configuration and see my mom in the window, talking on the phone. She seemed frazzled, and she paced around the kitchen. She turned to where I could still feel the drop of her jaw, but her eyes were not on me. They were on something in the front of the house, and then I heard the shattering of glass. I sat up, looking around to see if I can see the front of the house and as to why that sound echoed through the valley. Before I even started walking towards the house, I heard water sloshing around behind me. I had to turn, for whatever reason. It looked like someone was struggling in the water, and for the sake of human instinct, I wanted to help. I took a few steps forward, asking a few times if they were okay and needed help. The woman reached forward, climbing out of the water in all fours. The fog that had been lingering above the water rolling over her curled up body. She was hunched over, moaning. My heart pounded. I looked back up at the house, the breeze raising goosebumps on my skin. She was desperately gasping for air. My mom's silhouette had disappeared from the kitchen window. When I turned back towards the woman, who I am unsure of how she got into the lake, was standing right in front of me. I jumped out of my skin, my heart launching itself against my rib cage. Her blue eyes were cloudy, pleading, but hungry. I wasn't sure what for. Her skin was clinging to her bones, her blonde hair matted and pushed away from her face. For a moment, she looked like she was going to ask me for help, but then her head snapped down, unable to look at me. I leaned forward, trying to understand the incoherent mumbles bursting from her mouth. I asked her again, if she was okay, and her head snapped up, her cloudy eyes now almost completely glassed over in white, and she launched herself at me. I jumped back, falling to the ground with her falling on top of me. I stiff-armed her, holding her shoulders at a length to where she could only spit and snarl at me. Her hair fell down and tickled my chin, and her eyes stared at me with the drive I have only seen from an animal. Before I even knew I was screaming. I heard my own piercing sounds bouncing off the surroundings and back into my ears, sparking something in me. I brought my legs up and with everything in me I kicked her off, wrestling her off of me. I was now shivering from the water displaced off of her mangled body on to mine, and from pure fear coursing through my blood. Looking back towards the house, there were lifeless clumps of what used to be humans smashing their way into my home. Before I could even think, another lifeless man threw his body at me, which seemed to be in little control. The wind was shoved out of my lungs from the shock of the hard, cold ground on my back, and I gasped for air as the man next to me rolled over, twitching and seizing. The clouds were dark grey, like it was about to rain. It had that feeling in the air. I continued to gasp for the air to return to my lungs. The body was thrown back on top of me, and before I knew it he leaned down and was snapping his jaw at me. His eyes stared through me, and I almost felt the human inside of him. He looked like he was begging me to help him, but it felt like he was begging to hurt me. Reaching forward I try everything to push him off of me, and his hand wrapped around my wrist, forcing it towards his jaw. The pierce of his mangled teeth into my flesh forced a scream to emit from my lips again. The burn, the sensation of tingling down my arm pumping towards my heart. This will be it. I will find lifelessness just like he had. For some reason, I still found a reason to fight.