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Day One: Tranquility Shattered
There are days that you will never forget. They are burned in your memory, branded by trauma. April 1st, 2009 is one of those days. It started like most other days. I turned the news on first thing in the morning expecting to catch the weather as I made a couple of lattes. Still wiping the sleep from my eyes, I fumbled through my morning routine on auto-pilot. The newscaster's voice was a low drone in the living room.
Three scoops of grounds...two scoops of sugar...top off the water reservoir...brew...find two cups by the sink...pour the milk...steam one cup...pour the espresso. It was a routine I could do in my sleep.
As I walked past the TV on my way to wake up my wife, I glanced at the screen; no weather report on yet, just bodies, smoke, cars and buildings accompanied a pleasant female voice.
I shaved, finished my latte in three greedy gulps and brushed my teeth, more concerned about trading the pleasant flavor of coffee for toothpaste than the news. A quick comb of my hair and I was ready for cloths.
Again I glanced at the news as I shuffled from the bathroom to the bedroom; more images of death and destruction, but still no weather. The wall clock told me I was running on time, so the weather report must be running late. "Huh, imagine that, a weather reporter being unreliable," I smiled at my internal monologue.
It wasn't until I finished getting dressed that I actually sat down and paid attention to the reporter. "If you are just joining us, this is the scene from downtown this morning. Untold destruction, uncontrolled fires and death everywhere..." The images were filled with too much smoke and wreckage to recognize any landmarks.
I glanced at my watch, the digital calender showed 4/1. "April 1st, hmmm; APRIL FOOLS DAY! OF COURSE!" That had to be it, an April's Fools Day joke, War of the Worlds style. I grinned and turned off the TV.
Armed with my usual compliment of cell phone, wallet, keys and pocket knife, I headed for the car. Laura called to me from the living room, "Hugs and kisses! Don't forget hugs and kisses!"
"BOY! Front and center!" I yelled. My son came running from his room, still dressed in his Spaceman Spiff PJ's. "Be a good boy and be nice to your mom young man."
"Okay, I will." He hugged my knees, "I love you dad." It was that unconditional love that only a three year old can give. A qick hug and kiss and I was out the door.
As I was fumbling for my key, I noticed a young man, maybe a teenager walking slowly down the sidewalk on the other side of the street. We had three schools in walking distance, so it was not an uncommon site. Approaching the door to my car, I noticed the smell of of smoke in the air. April was a little late in the year for using a fireplace and it was too early in the day for a cookout.
Finally behind the wheel, I did a quick check of my cd player and mirrors. Backing out, I heard a THUMP and felt the car shake. I hit something. Not a car. I looked around frantically searching my mirrors and windows. "DUDE!" I screamed, embarrassing startled by the teenage boy plastered to the driver's door. He was starring at me with bloodshot eyes. The dark circles and steamer trunk size bags under his eyes made him look like he hadn't slept in days.
"Dude!" I repeated, a little less hysterical, "What the hell?" BAM, BU-BAM! His hands slammed into the window followed a split second by his forehead. He launched himself at me repeatedly, stopped only the safety-glass of my car window. I watched the first two attacks in stunned horror. The glass was a spiderweb with cracks and blood smears by the time I regained my ability to react. More on survival instinct than reason, I made my way over the center console and out the passenger door.
In retrospect, the only thing that I remember as a clear thought was, "Give him the car." I must have thought he was a car-jacker.
On my feet, out of the car, standing in my own front yard, I started to think again, and not a moment too soon. With bloody knuckles and face the boy was charging at me. I would like to say that my reaction was well planed and elegant, but it wasn't. As he leaped on me, I fell backwards. I don't know if it was the judo lessons I took as a child, the wrestling I did in high school or the combat training from the army, but one of them took over and I flung the kid over me with a stiff leg to his stomach. He landed with a crunching snap on the sidewalk leading to my front door.
I got to my feet first and made a dash for the door. I had just enough time to slammed the door, my full weight against, when he hit it from the other side. I threw the deadbolt and hotel latch screaming over my shoulder, "LOCK THE DOORS! NOW!" My wife, to her credit, only took a split second to get over the shock and bolt for the back door.
My son stood in the living room, "Dad! You don't have to yell!" he yelled at me with his hands over his ears. The irony would have normally made me laugh, but not this time.
"Liam, get in your hiding place and stay very quite. Don't come out until I come and get you." The entire time I was talking, the boy outside was pounding on the door. Now he was making an animalistic screams.
"Aren't you going to answer the door?" He asked me, ignoring my instructions. His mother scrambled in the room, scooped him up in one arm and headed for the back of the house without saying a word. The pounding on the door continued for about five minutes. After that, there was a period of whimpering and clawing.
I dared a peek through the transom, hoping that the boy did not notice me. I couldn't see him, which could only mean he was press against the door. The door was metal clad and foam filled; built to withstand a hurricane. I had once punched it hard enough that I should have broken my hand. As I leaned against the door, I saw the two shallow, marble sized dents leftover from that day. I knew then that the door would hold.
I decided to check on my wife and arm myself. Coming around the corner in to the hallway leading to the bedrooms, I was confronted by my wife. She never looked more like an amazon than that moment. I froze first in surprise, then impressed. She stood all of six feet with my combat quality roman short sword held like a baseball bat. Her fiery red hair backlit by the wall sconce. She mouthed, "What the fuck?!"
I waived off her question, "Did you call the cops?"
"I couldn't get through," She whispered glancing at the phone on the floor then back down the hall, craning her neck to get a good look behind me.
"Liam hiding in his closet?"
"Yes. What the hell is going on out there."
I honestly didn't know what to tell her. "Some kid just attacked me." The sound of breaking glass came from the front hallway. I grabbed the sword from my wife, Laura, and pointed toward our bedroom, knowing that she would get her katana (samurai sword). We weren't "gun nuts" only because we had a four year old. Neither of us ever thought of getting rid of our swords. We just hung them over the doorway to our bedroom. Even our son had several toy swords and was already learning how to use them in our weekly training sessions.
As I entered the front hall, I saw glass from the transom on the floor and a bloody hand raking back and forth over the remaining glass shards. With the amount of damage to the wrist, I expected to see much more blood.
I jumped, practically out of my shoes at the sound of a gunshot right out side of my front door. The hand disappeared from the transom and there was a soft sliding sound down the front door. The sound of a soft knock startled me almost as much. The "shave-and-a-haircut" rap was a familiar one. "Who is it?"
"God. Now open the door." My best friend's voice came from the other side of the door. In quick order, we moved the body off the steps and got back in the house.
Brian pushed past me and came up short when he almost ran into my wife who was holding her katana at the ready. "Nice to see you too," he quipped as he laid two rifles he had slung over his shoulder and a canvas bag on the couch. "I don't have long. The girls are in the truck. We are on our way to my dad's place in Punta Gorda. If you want to join us there, you better bust some serious ass. The shit hit the fan downtown and the interstate is already a war zone."
He did not stop to see if I was interested. Glancing out the front window he kept looking back and forth as he spoke, "I know you don't have any guns in the house so I brought you the .30 I bought from you and Erica's .22. There is a box of .30 caliber and about a couple of hundred rounds for the .22 in the bag; it's all I can spare."
In the next five minutes, my world was turned upside down. Brian confirmed the TV reports and for the first time in my life, I heard a real reporter use the word Zombie without referring to a movie. I would like to say we had a plan and everything went according to it, but that would be the furthest thing from the truth.
We collected as much food and water as we could and piled it in the trunk of our car. Laura packed "yard clothes" for all of us in my old army duffel bag and helped our son, Liam, gather a few toys. The entire process took us less than 10 minutes and we were on the road following Brian's truck. We weren't two minutes from the house when both my wife and son started listing all of the things that we should have packed and didn't. The only one that even remotely bother me was the first-aid kit. I had a small one in the trunk, but the home kit had everything you could possibly want.
Day 2: Planning for a War, Famine and Disease
Planning for the apocalypse is best done in advance. If you have the opportunity, I highly recommend you get your shit together before things go south. It will keep you from doing most, if not all of the stupid things we did on April 2nd; now affectionately referred to referred to as the second worst day of our lives. Here is your chance to learn from our mistakes.
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