wanted to make sure I could keep her safe, too.
I felt almost naked without the gun now, so I bent over and picked up the shotgun and cradled it in the crook of my elbow like I’d seen men do on Western movies since time immemorial. It felt weird there resting against my arm, but it actually was fairly comfortable holding it that way. I almost went out on my little circuit until I realized I hadn’t reloaded the shotgun since I’d fired those shots at the zombie attacking Thompson. Fannie Mae had the pack sitting on the floor next to her so I bent over again and took out one of the boxes of shells. I squatted down next to it as I thought for a minute. I hid the box with my body because I didn’t want any of the other men to see it. My guess was they’d take the shells as community property and want to add it to the arsenal.
The last thing I felt comfortable enough with was letting someone else have my shells. Phooey on that.
Not that we had that much to begin with. There were four boxes left in the bag and each held 25 shots. I emptied the box I’d taken out and refilled the shells in my various pockets. It wasn’t exactly comfortable and I was a little jingly but I did feel a little safer. I waited until I was a few feet from Fannie Mae before I loaded two of the cartridges into the shotgun. I felt infinitely better for having a fully loaded shotgun, even though that was still only eight shots. My guess was that if I got into a scuffle and had to fire all eight I was probably dead anyway.
But I didn’t want to think about that either.
The first place I wanted to hit before making my rounds was the bathroom. I’d forgotten to go when we got here and Fannie Mae laying on me had pushed the appropriate buttons. Of course, now that I’d thought about it I desperately had to go. Everyone studiously avoided looking at me as I made my way through the House. The bathrooms were in the back so I pretty much had to pass everybody. It felt like there were eyes on me everywhere although when I turned to look none of them were. My guess was that my exploits outside had made the rounds. As far as I knew I was still the only to kill one of the zombies. That was either an object for admiration or fear; I couldn’t really tell which by the side looks I was getting. It had either elevated my status or made me a pariah.
Regardless, I made my way to the restroom without any incident. It was a single-use one size fits all kind of restroom. Which by definition meant it was always disgusting. The door was shut to guard against the smell and when I turned the knob and pushed it open all that greeted me was the midnight darkness of the room inside – and the unassailable smell of shit.
Awesome.
I stepped into the tiny room and reached out with one hand searching for the light switch. It seemed to take an eternity to find it and any second I expected something to jump out at me and eat me. But eventually I did find the stupid light and flipped it.
The fluorescents came on and immediately blinded me.
I went into the room and shut and locked the door behind me. I didn’t really need to search the room because there was nowhere to search. There was a tiny closet off to the side that had no door and had shelves full of single ply toilet paper. There was a toilet off to the corner of the room and a sink with a beaten up mirror above it. Someone had nicely placed a towel and some soap next to the sink and I breathed a sigh of relief at the sight. I felt like I was covered in zombie goo and mud.
I flicked the safety on the shotgun and put it down next to the toilet. I wanted to get used to turning it off and on so that I could remember to do it quickly in the face of a zombie. Now I’m not going to mince words here. I know in movies and books the heroes never really have to go to the bathroom unless it’s to further the plot but in real life that’s just not the case. There were no zombies lying in wait for me and nothing bad happened in the bathroom.
To me, that is.
The toilet is another story entirely. I’d been holding in this massive crap since the moment we’d been attacked by zombies and Barrett had been… killed. Something must have shaken loose and now that I’d been given it the chance it wanted out. And out it came. Massively and explosively.
That’s really all the details you need on that.
When I was done and used half a roll of single ply to clean myself up I flushed the toilet and said a quick prayer to God that it didn’t back up. He answered my prayer and the full bowl slowly emptied out. The stink still remained but since most of that wasn’t mine I wasn’t too worried about it.
I washed my hands in the sink and while I was at it I scrubbed my face as best I could. It was covered in mud and grime and I hoped I could wash off some of the memories of this night but of course that just wasn’t meant to be. When I was on the toilet I’d gingerly rubbed my hand on the knot on my thigh and even though it still radiated a fair amount of pain it wasn’t debilitating or anything and I could barely feel it with my jeans on. Thankfully. I was almost able to walk normally now.
My reflection sighed bitterly after I turned the water off. Well, I sighed, you know what I mean. The restroom was insulated enough from the rest of the House that I had a few moments of solitude. I didn’t really like what I saw in the mirror and the thoughts that were running rampant through my skull. I didn’t see how this situation could ever be over. Would we just sit here in this building forever and ever? Would the zombies just come crashing in and eat us all up? And even if we could get out of here wouldn’t the situation just keep going on and on as the zombies spread until they took over the world and the world was nothing more than a rotting carcass feeding on itself?
Lightning lit up the room from the small window set high in the wall. I could see small drops of water on the window and realized it was finally starting to rain. Of course, cause wasn’t that just what we needed? Zombies and dead friends and rain galore. I had a feeling the rain wouldn’t slow them down at all.
In the silence I heard something slithering outside the window. It shook me to my core, sending shivers up and down my spine. It was just the rain, right? Yep, just the rain. I strained to listen harder, willing my ears to become super ears. The slithering repeated, but thankfully the window was too high or I’d have felt obligated to look out. Saying screw it, I quickly exited the bathroom, shutting off the light behind me.
Since I was closest to the back of the House I decided to start there. I guess you could call it my perimeter search. There was only one man on the back door: Mr. Wilkinson. The three tufts of hair sticking wildly out of his mostly bald head would have been comical if we weren’t in the middle of the apocalypse. He turned around to look at me and grunted a hello, then, “What are you doing back here, Duke? Shouldn’t you be in the front with everyone else?”
I said, “I don’t feel comfortable out there unless I know that we’re covered on all the doors and windows. It’ll only take one of them getting in to screw us.”
“You don’t need to worry,
