Chapter Three

“Help! Oh God, whoever is in there, please help us! Please! They’re coming!”

I sat up quickly at the sound of screaming coming from outside my door. I ran to it and looked through the window. Two girls maybe a year younger than me were banging at the door. There was a mob of zombies coming up the street behind them. I turned around to see Evan behind me. “Help me move the couch,” I shouted. “We have to let them in! They’re being attacked!”

Evan didn’t move. “Emmy,” he said in a low serious tone. “We can’t. The zombies are already on our steps, they’ll get in. Those girl are as good as dead, we have to think of ourselves.” I looked up at him, rage burning behind my eyes.

“If we’re going to survive this thing we need as many people and as much supplies as we can get. Now help me!” I spun toward the couch to find Jesse pushing it out of the way. I joined in, and together, with help from Evan toward the end, we moved the couch from the door and flung it open. One of the girls leapt in immediately, but the other had been grabbed by one of the zombies. I stretched out my hand and she took it, but the monsters were too strong. We couldn’t get her inside the door. Beside me, my brother and Jesse were cutting down any zombie who tried to get at me and the girl.

She gulped and looked at her friend pulling at my waist, trying to help get her inside. “Kim,” she said, tears in her eyes. “I love you. I’ll miss you. Good luck.” Then she looked at me very seriously. “Let go and shut the door.” I shook my head furiously. But she looked me in the eyes and simply said “Please let me go.” I stopped trembling with the effort of holding her away from the mob and looked down at the girl with her arms around my waist.

Then I shut my eyes and let go.

Jesse and Evan jumped back and slammed the door, then immediately pushed the couch back in front of it. No screaming came from outside as the fourteen year old girl was devoured by the zombies. There were only the moans from the creatures and the sound of the tearing of her skin and bone. We sat behind the couch, shaking as we listened to the monsters eat that poor innocent girl. The one she had called Kim was curled up next to me, her head on my shoulder, tears running down her cheeks onto my shirt. She wept silently into my chest.

Evan got up and pulled the large sleeping bag from under the other three and draped it over the girl’s shoulders. She still clung to my waist where she had been pulling so hard to try and save her friend. She mumbled something, but the word was covered by her tears. I leaned close to her to listen.

“Alex…why?”

I tilted Kim’s head up and wiped the tears from her face. I picked her up and brought her over to the one chair we hadn’t used to barricade the windows and doors. It was the chair dad used to sit in to tell us stories when we were young. It was large enough for three of us to sit in and so soft and plush it felt like you were lying on clouds. Nothing in the world could make us part with this chair; not even a zombie apocalypse. I laid her on the chair and told her everything was going to be okay.

I never knew lying could be so hard.