Brace For It

"Omg, I literally CANNOT wait to get my braces off!" you say to your group of friends. "I hate braces!!!"

Trust me, no one hates braces more than I do. People usually keep them on for a measly two or three years. But me? I'm gonna have them on for the rest of my life (Can you imagine me all old and wrinkly and fifty in braces?).

The reason why I'm gonna have to suffer eternity with all this metal in my mouth is because all the orthodontists are either dead dead or the walking dead.

For the past three years, zombies have taken over the world. The virus has spread world-wide and has infected billions of people. At least, I'm pretty sure that's the case. Me and my younger sister, Penelope Barnes, haven't seen or heard from another living soul in the past two-and-a-half years.

I've made it my life goal to find an orthodontist and get my braces off. Kinda silly, right?

You.

Are.

Dead.

Wrong.

After six years of having these stupid, useless pieces of metal in my mouth, I want them out. Penelope thinks I'm just being stubborn. She thinks that I'm overreacting about having braces and thinks I should just focus on staying alive and not getting bit by any zombies. The way I figure it, you should always have a reason to stay alive. And my reason is that I want my braces off. Besides, she was born with straight teeth. She doesn't know the pain of having braces.

I remember that when the zombie apocalypse started, Penelope and I raided a local bookstore in search for some Zombie Survival instructional booklets or whatever. Those books have come in handy. For example, I've learned that in order to kill a zombie you have to shoot a bullet through its brain. Let me tell you that that information has saved my life time and time again, especially when Penelope and I raid the local grocery store for food every week.

"Kaylee, do you want some taffy?" Penelope calls to me from the other side of the grocery aisle.

"Oh my God Penelope YOU KNOW I CAN'T HAVE TAFFY," I say, in reference to my braces.

"Sorry," she says in a not-really-that-sorry kind of way.

I brush it off and search the grocery store for sugar-free gum and some toothpaste. Dental hygiene in the zombie apocalypse is super important because, like, what if you get a cavity and have to live with a tooth-ache for the rest of your life because there are no dentists? If one good thing has come out of this apocalypse, it's that I'm super appreciative of everything now (including dentists). Yeah, it's a little bit late to be appreciative, but better late than never.

Usually the grocery store only has a few zombies in it and they don't really disturb us, but today they seemed to be on every corner. I wheel my grocery cart through several aisles, tossing random food items and toothpaste into it. My shopping spree gets interrupted several times because I have to stop to load my late dad's gun and shoot zombies.

DIE, ZOMBIES, DIIIIE!!! I think to myself while I blow the brains out of five zombies. I like shooting things.

"Stop having so much fun," Penelope reminds me from across the store.

I begin to sing Miley Cyrus's song "Can't Be Tamed" really loud-like as I shoot through a hoard of zombies. While I'm singing I think to myself, I wonder if Miley is still alive. I wonder if any celebrity is still alive.

And then I get all teary-eyed at the thought of Misha Collins dying so I stop singing and kill off the last of the zombie hoard.

"Kaylee, are we done shopping? Can we go home now?" Penelope asks, poking her head out from behind the aisle's corner.