Luke's Diary: An Unlucky Man in a Zombie Apocalypse. Days 201-400

Day 211: Saturday 25th March 2017 21:49

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Day 211
Saturday 25th March 2017 21:49

What a frustrating day.

First of all Auntie Meryl came to see me at work. The hunky dentist has sorted out her toothache but this hasn't stopped her moaning about the heater, among many other things. "It's too cold in that chalet," she said, "I'm freezing my nipples off. Do you want me to die of the cold? Is that what you want? Why can't you get me a heater?" "OK," I said with a forced smile on my face, "Wait here." I stood up, exited my office, walked down the corridor and knocked on Esther's office door. Her authoritative voice beckoned me in. "Good morning Esther," I said with a huge fake smile, "Could you please hand me a risk assessment form for a heater, please?" Looking down at her paperwork, Esther smirked. She raised her head and with a smug tone in her voice said "Of course I can, Luke. I'd be happy to help." Esther handed me a form with a big self-righteous grin on her face. "Wasn't too hard to follow the rules was it?" she said. I frowned at Esther, snatched the form out of her hand and returned to my office. God that woman gets on my f*cking nerves. I filled the form in, returned it to Esther and told Auntie Meryl that her heater would be with her before the end of the day.

The next frustrating thing was when I was getting ready to leave work and Benjamin came to see me. He took his shoe off and placed it on my desk. "What are you doing?" I asked. "Remember how I said I'd keep my mouth shut about you sending Mike away if you did stuff for me?" he asked. "Yeah . . ." I said. "Well this is the start of you doing stuff for me," said Benjamin, "There's chewing gum stuck in the bottom of my shoe and I want you to get it out." "What?" I said, "Why can't you just do it?" "Well if I did it, that kind of goes against me blackmailing you doesn't it?" "I'm glad you're not dressing this up as something it's not," I said with frustration in my voice, "You know you should be ashamed of yourself." "This is all very fascinating," said Benjamin, "But this is all time and effort you could be using to get the gum off of the bottom of my shoe." I gave a defeated sigh, sat down and started using a pencil to try and remove the sticky gum from the bottom of Benjamin's shoe. "Do you know what?" I said, "It's the end of the world, people have died and instead of working as part of a team, helping out and contributing, you're exploiting people's vulnerability and just looking out for yourself." "Yeah, that's pretty much it," said Benjamin. "We helped rescue you guys from the fish and chip shop," I said, "We helped you out when you needed it." "Yeah, I know," said Benjamin, "Good job too, otherwise I'd have to get that gum off my shoe myself." "Do you know you're an absolute knob?" I said. "I do," said Benjamin, "Do you know you're taking far too long to get that gum out of my shoe?" Benjamin's attitude was really irritating. After I removed the gum Benjamin told me to be at his around 2pm because he had some housework he wanted me to do. "House work?!" I exclaimed, "You taking the p*ss?" "Well," said Benjamin, "If you mean 'taking the p*ss' as in having a laugh – no, but if you mean 'taking the p*ss' as in, taking the p*ss out of you – yes. See you at 2pm." I was left feeling really frustrated.

Later on I spoke to Millie and TJ and told them about Benjamin. "He's making me do some of his work shifts," said TJ, "I swear to God I'm going to kick his head in." "Please let me have a word with him," said Millie, "He might listen to me." "He won't listen to you," said TJ, "He's loving lording about over us. He told me he's going to get me to empty his sh* bucket. B*stard." "People are going to start asking questions," I said, "If everyone sees me and TJ doing stuff for Benjamin they'll know something dodgy is going on." "Well maybe that's something you could say to Benjamin," said Millie, "If he knows his behaviour is going to raise suspicion he might start to question his actions. You never know, he might even stop." "Maybe I'll just stick my foot up his arse," said TJ, "That might make him stop." "That's not going to help," I said. "It'll help me," said TJ. "Look, you punched him yesterday," I said to TJ, "Yes, it's tempting to whack the smug little pr*ck but it won't help. He'll run straight to Dump and blab that we sent Mike away." "I know what could sort all this out," said Millie, "We need to get Mike back." TJ started sarcastically clapping his hands. "Well done Little Miss Clever Clogs," said TJ, "Brilliant idea. Mike could be anywhere out there. He might even be dead for all we know. What are you suggesting? We jump over the wall and just go looking for him?" Millie pointed out that the rule book states that residents can request to leave Dumpville and that all requests will be considered. "So, what exactly are you saying?" asked TJ. "I'm saying that we need to speak to Dump and tell him we want to leave," said Millie, "We can find Mike, bring him back and that'll show everyone that this place isn't all it seems, that Dump lied and it'll stop Benjamin from blackmailing you." "Hang on, Millie," I said, "It's dangerous out there. I'm not sure that going outside the walls just so me and TJ can be spared from doing Benjamin's housework is a good idea. Anyway Dump'll never let us leave." "Well he's got to consider it," said Millie, "It's in the rule book – the rule book he created." "I don't know," I said, "There's got to be another way around it." "Look," said Millie, "It's an idea. Just have a proper think about it." Millie left me and TJ to contemplate. "What do you think?" I said. "Well I'm not going out there," said TJ, "My leg is only just getting back to normal and I've got a certain Mrs. Dump to try and shag." "Well I'm not leaving Auntie Meryl again," I said, "Rather than risking our lives and leaving this place maybe we should just appeal to Benjamin's humanity."

When 2pm arrived, TJ and I went to Benjamin's. "Afternoon lads," he casually said, "Right on time, come in, I've got loads of jobs for you to do." TJ and I entered Benjamin's chalet and he handed me a big pile of washing. "There you go, Luke," said Benjamin, "My pants are going to need some proper elbow grease, there's some really deeply entrenched skiddies." "Benjamin," I said, "Just before we carry on, can we have a little chat?" "What about?" asked Benjamin. "Well it's about all this," I said, "I mean, getting me to remove gum from your shoe was a laugh and all that but . . . you know . . . enough's enough, yeah?" There was a short pause. "No," said Benjamin, "Wash my sh*tty pants." "Come on, Benjamin," I said, "Be fair. We've not done anything wrong to you. We don't deserve to be treated like this. Don't you think it would be nicer if you stopped making us do things and we just went back to how things were before? Don't you think you'd feel better if you stopped blackmailing us?" There was another short pause. "No," said Benjamin, "I feel fine. Go on, hop to it. TJ, you can empty my sh*t bucket while Luke's doing my washing." "How long are you going to carry this on for?" I asked. "Dunno," said Benjamin, "For as long as my sh*t bucket needs emptying and my skiddy pants need washing." "People are going to start asking questions," I said, "Especially when they see me and TJ doing stuff for you." Benjamin shrugged. "I suppose you'd better come up with some excuse, then," he said. "What sort of excuse?" I asked. "That's your problem, not mine" said Benjamin. His casual attitude really annoyed me. "You w*nker," snapped TJ. "Oh, that's not a nice thing to say" said Benjamin, "Not exactly the best way to appeal to my compassionate side." Like a pair of chumps, TJ and I did exactly as we were told by Benjamin. I washed his disgusting sh*t stained pants and TJ emptied his sh*t bucket. I'm starting to think that leaving Dumpville and looking for Mike, as Millie suggested, might be a good idea and more preferable to this terrible exploitation. God knows what he's got planned for us tomorrow.

On a slightly more positive note, Trudy is out of the medical section. She said that TJ giving his blood has stabilised the baby. I asked Trudy if that meant TJ was the baby's Father. "Yeah," Trudy quietly said, "That's exactly what it means. The Doctor explained everything to me. I'm due around 12th June. He did the maths and we worked out that the baby was conceived when we were at the High School. TJ's definitely the Dad." "Oh my God," I said, "This is huge. How do you feel?" "Well, I'm not sure," said Trudy, "You know what TJ's like. Would you want him to be the Father of your baby?" "Well maybe not," I said, "But Mike's departure has had a real impact on him," I said, "Maybe he's realised that family is important. He didn't have to come and help out did he?" "He might not have wanted to," said Trudy, "But he knows that if he hadn't have helped, everyone would have sent him to Coventry." "He did the right thing in the end," I said. "Yeah, but did he do it for the right reason?" asked Trudy, "Anyway, since when have you and TJ been best friends? You're usually slagging each other off but since we've been here you've been as thick as thieves." "I just think he's been through a lot," I said, "What with the shark and his brother and all that. Have you told him he's the Dad?" "I haven't," said Trudy, "But the Doctor did. TJ hasn't mentioned anything to me. I suppose it's weird for him to talk about it. To be honest it feels weird for me too. I don't really want to talk to him about us being parents and having a child together." "Oh Trudy," I said, "Are you seriously going to go back to ignoring the fact that you're both having a baby?" "Not mentioning it worked before," said Trudy, "Anyway he doesn't want to be the Dad, does he? He's happy leaving me to bring up the baby and I'm happy to be left to it." "If he wasn't interested in being the baby's Dad, why did he help out with his blood?" I asked. "I've told you," said Trudy, "He didn't want everyone blanking him. That's why he helped." "I think it was more than that," I said, "I saw him leaving the medical section last night just after he'd given his blood. He was a bit embarrassed but he seemed proud of himself. It was like he wanted to do the right thing and he was glad that he did." I told Trudy that it was her pregnancy and her business but that it might be worth thinking about how TJ may slowly be coming round to the idea that he's going to be a Dad.

I'm glad Trudy and the baby are going to be OK. After a day of being blackmailed and forced into washing sh*t stained pants and getting gum out of shoes, a bit of good news is a nice end to a cr*p day.