'Not much return on investment here then.”
'Gary, there's a full rack of papers over there. First, I'm going to grab a paper, find the friggen’ ad you’re talking about, decide for myself what I think about it. Then I'm going to roll it up and beat the living shit out of you with it.”
'Man, I thought they were kidding when they said they put gun powder in the Marines’ eggs. You're a mean man, Mike.”
'That's it,” I said pushing my chair away.
'And absolutely no patience, hold on.”
I stopped.
'It's got a picture of this guy Rodney Carnahan on one knee, and he's holding a small boulder up to the photographer. Then there's a side picture of the bride-to-be, Amber Allaman. And it says and I quote, 'Amber, you came into my life when I needed someone like you the most. You’ve become my best friend and have given me a son who, like his momma, is the light of my world. Would you do me the honor of becoming my wife, Amber Marie Allaman, and not just my baby-momma? Love Rod.' Do you think she got to see it?'
'Man, I hope so,” I said, looking over his shoulder. “Although we don’t really know who this Amber girl is. I mean, sure she's very pretty, but you can't tell from a black and white still picture what's going on in that head of hers. Maybe, just maybe, the zombie-pocalypse saved the rest of Rodney’s life.”
'I'm telling your wife you said that.”
'I'll drive that truck off a bridge with the both if us in it, if I even THINK you'd say anything. Have I made myself clear?'
(Super secret note just for Rodney – Please post the results on my Facebook page!)
(For everyone else, that was exactly what you’re thinking it was!)
Pre-Zombie Apocalypse
A Talbot family get together is rife with one-liners and zingers. If you let your guard down for even a second, or show a moment of weakness, the others will descend on you like a pack of starving wolves on a fallen Caribou. Our family motto has always been “Kick ‘em when they’re down.”
This is just one example. Gary, who is undeniably a great cook, started to describe how awesome his apple pie is. I told him that I’d also been working on my own, and after years of trial and error that I finally thought that I’d gotten it right. So my sister immediately shouts out ‘Pie Off!’ Gary and I thought it was an awesome idea. My daughter Nicole, who is okay in the kitchen, threw her hat in the ring. What the hell, I thought, the more people I beat, the sweeter the victory.
My sister, who can’t make Jell-o, decided that this would be an opportune time to show off her skills (or lack thereof). “I want in too!” she shouted. Now, I don’t know if she was just caught up in the excitement of the moment or what, but I grinned to myself. This was going to be like shooting fish in a barrel.
So Gary immediately says, “If it comes out of a box, it doesn’t count.” Many laughs ensued. I took it to another level. “Sis, I could show up with an apple and beat you.” My brothers (and myself) were laughing so hard we had tears coming out of our eyes. My sister was not a happy camper. She told me she hated me. I just laughed harder. I had won that round.
The Blood Locket
“Severed Hand, what do the spirits divine for our hunt?” Chief Running Bear asked.
Severed Hand had spent the majority of the fall day secluded in his tepee with twigs of ash, elderberry bush, and sage smoking on an enclosed fire pit.
“It is not good, Running Bear. I cannot get a clear message from the spirits. I think that you should wait until I have been shown the path,” Severed Hand told his exasperated Chief.
“That is the same message as yesterday and the same as it was the day before. If we wait much longer, the herds will be gone and our clan will suffer greatly come the approaching winter,” the Chief said.
“I fear Running Bear that to leave now would endanger our people even more.”
The Chief snorted in disagreement. He normally deferred to the spiritual leader as long as the Shaman spoke words the Chief wanted to hear. It wasn’t that Chief Running Bear was too egotistical to listen to his advisor and friend, it was that he had sixty people in his clan that looked to him to make it through the harsh winters. If they did not secure at least three bison on this next hunt he would lose a great many people to disease and famine, and he loved them too much to let that happen.
“I will give you until the sun has risen tomorrow, Severed Hand, to coax an answer from the spirits.”
“Chief, you of all people know that it does not work that way. The gods will tell me what they feel I should know when they feel I should know it.”
“As long as it is by tomorrow,” the Chief said, heading back to his tepee. The cold of the night was beginning to seep deep into his bones. ‘A few more seasons and the younger bucks will need to prove who is worthy to lead us,’ the Chief thought. ‘But not yet.’
Severed Hand reentered his smoke filled hut. He sat cross legged on his stack of elk and bison furs breathing deeply of the aromatic smoke, controlling his breaths that he might achieve a state of heavy meditation. His eyes rolled up into the back of his head; his second sight was shrouded in a thin veil of black. A lone crow blacker than the veil stood on the other side, one flat black eye staring at him hungrily. It cawed once and as it jumped into the air and flew away, the veil was parted. The emptiness beyond was too much for the Shaman who passed out. It was several hours later when he awoke. The Chief and twenty of the tribe’s braves were already gone on the hunt.
“What have I done?” Severed Hand lamented as he clutched the amulet tied around his neck.
The women, children and infirm gathered around the main fire at the center of their encampment like they were wont to do when the men went on their hunts. Severed Hand spent the day asking all of the spirit guides for as much protection as could be afforded for his people.
“Chief Screaming Hawk, we need to get the people to a safer location,” Severed Hand implored the former leader of the clan.
“I am old, Shaman, the people no longer follow my rule,” Screaming Hawk said as he stared deep into the fire, remembering a time when he was as fast as the animal he was named for.
“You are not so old that they do not listen to your words. Do not pretend to have gone soft in the head, your people need you,” Severed Hand said forcibly.
“What would you have me do?” Screaming Hawk asked, angry that he had been disturbed from his reverie.
“I do not know, but I feel that this land that we stand on now is not safe.”
“The spirits have said this?” Screaming Hawk asked curiously. Severed Hand had always been a trusted advisor while he had been the chief.
“Not in signs that I can divine, Chief, but that we should leave immediately I do not doubt.”
“Leaping Frog,” the old Chief said to a young boy that was running around the fire. “Get your mother.”
The boy stopped immediately. As the son of Chief Running Bear he was afforded special privileges. But to not do as an elder, and a former chief at that, asked was more trouble than he cared to find himself immersed in. Leaping Frog nodded and ran off.
Leaping Frog’s mother, White Fawn, was headed towards where Screaming Hawk and Severed Hand were sitting by the fire. She shivered as the warm touch of the sun slid from her shoulders and behind the mountains. A preternatural chill rippled up her spine. She sped her step up but it was too late as she felt her flesh rip from her side to the bottom of her shoulder blade. She fell to her knees as her spine became exposed to the cool twilight air.
Severed Hand turned to watch as she fell face first into the soft dirt. The black abomination that straddled her prone body had the same flat black eyes as the crow he had seen in his vision. Severed Hand rose, quickly grabbing his staff and running towards the fallen woman. Screaming Hawk was just turning around as screams of fear and pain issued forth from around the camp.
The blackness had moved from White Fawn; blood poured forth from her wound. Severed Hand reached into
