I think people make zombie outbreaks out to sound a lot different than they actually are.
Like, the world doesn't turn to shit overnight, and suddenly, half the population are zombies. That just doesn't happen. That's not realistic.
No, something leaks into the water supply. Maybe someone develops a new drug, and it didn't work out quite the way it was supposed to. New form of sickness? Yeah, maybe. But it definitely didn't just happen.
So, who am I? Where was I? Where am I now?
I guess that'd be something to tell you. I'm Brooklyn; a seventeen year old girl. Right now, I'm holed up in my friend Jordon's ground floor apartment with our friends Jorel, Dylan and Danny. We're waiting for Matt and George to get here, and we've been waiting just long enough to start worrying about them. This is extremely surreal to me, because in addition to the zombies, I'm trying to survive alongside my favorite band.
Confused? Yeah, I expected that.
Let's go back a month - at a Hollywood Undead concert. I dragged my best friend there, and she was really into it, let's just say. By the end of the show, she was drunk as fuck, but not drunk enough that we needed to go home. We were about the last people in the line to meet the guys, and I had never been more excited in my entire life. Apparently, neither was she - because once we finally got to the front, after talking to Matt for five minutes, she was falling all over him - "You're cute... let's have sex." and he didn't know what to do. Clearly, he didn't want to. She was just going on and on about stupid things, like how fun it'd be to be a groupie, and how hot they all were. For six guys who wrote songs about this stuff, it was sort of funny to see them all bewildered by her.
I finally got her distracted and told her to go chat up a guy about twenty feet away, while I sat behind and apologized for her.
"She's sorta wasted out of her mind." I laughed. "You guys put on a really great show tonight, guess it'd be exciting, being the last stop on the tour and all - oh, and is your leg okay?" I asked George. He nodded. He basically killed it doing stupid shit onstage.
One thing led to another, and before I knew it, I was giving Jordon my number.
"I'll call you after, maybe we can all hang out or something." he suggested, walking towards their tour bus.
"Sounds good, have a good night, guys!" I smiled.
"Have fun taking care of your friend!" Dylan winked.
I glanced behind me to find her drunkenly making out with some guy three times her weight, and flashed Dylan the thumbs-up. "Yeah, I'll do that."
"Mari...?" I carefully approached her, tapping her shoulder. "Mari..."
"MARI." She snapped out of it and looked at me.
"Oh hey, Brookie!" she slurred. "Meet Zach." I just nodded.
"Hey, Zach. Mari, it's time to go."
"No, Zackie and I are going to get married..." she trailed off.
"As your best friend, I'd be doing you a disservice." I just shook my head, grabbing Mari's arm and dragging her away.
"Call me, baby!" she yelled behind her. "Hey, seniora cockblock." she looked impatiently at me.
"Dude, you're going to realize why I did that in the morning. Trust me."
We drove back to my apartment in my beat up Sunfire, and she passed out as soon as she hit the couch. Figures. Maybe she was more wasted than I thought.
The next morning, I woke up to the sound of Mari puking her guts out in my bathroom. This happened near every show we went to; by now, it just didn't bother me anymore.
"Bitch, you better not be gettin' any on ma floor!" I yelled in the most ghetto voice I could.
"Gurl, you need to get out." I heard her weakly yell back. "And get me some gatorade!"
I grabbed my hoodie. It's not like I was doing anything else.
"Whatever you say, your majesty." I joked, walking out of the apartment. It was a nice day outside - cloudy, but still nice. So I decided, screw the car, walking fifteen minutes to the store isn't going to kill me.
I walked up to the counter with a whole armful of Gatorade.
"You and Mari went to a show last night." Kendrew looked at me, all too knowingly.
"Every damn time..." I pulled out my wallet and handed him a twenty.
"Who'd you guys see?"
"Hollywood Undead."
"Must've been a time - she hit on any of them?" I laughed thinking back to last night.
"Yeah, you know Da Kurlzz right?" He nodded. "Yeah, she told him he was cute, that she wanted to have sex with him, and how cool it'd be to be a groupie."
Kendrew just shook his head.
"Oh, and then she told me she wanted to marry some fat guy."
"Sounds like quite the show."
"Yeah, it was pretty -" my phone started ringing, and Mari's name showed up on it. "Hold that thought."
"Heeeey Mari..." I tried to speak quietly.
"Bitch, where the fuck is my gatorade? You've been gone for like, a half hour."
"Slut, eat a pancake. I walked."
"Just come back. I want my juice. Pleeeeeeease." she begged.
"Fine, I'm coming right now."
"I LOVE YOU."
"I love me too." and I hung up.
"Well, I guess that's my cue to leave." I laughed, looking at Kendrew. "Have a good day, buddy."
"Buddy. Fucking Canadian, get out of my store." he joked. Everyone I've become friends with here in LA made fun of my Canadian accent and words.
"Fine!" I huffed, walking out. Kendrew was my other best friend - the first person I met when I came here. He used to live in the apartment across the hall from me, and he brought over tacos when I first moved in, insisting that I was probably too tired to cook from moving. And we just sort of went from there.
But let's fast forward for a month.
I haven't seen Mari for a week, and LA is overrun with zombies. That'd be about right now. I'd be all of a couple days off, I'd say. But I go from absolute normality in my cramped apartment, to absolute chaos, with the guys telling me that I'm staying with them at Jordon's place.
I leaned back on the couch. "Well. This is fan-fucking-tastic. What are we supposed to do, seriously? There's only so long we're going to be able to stay here without leaving, as much as we all hate to admit it, but you all know it just as much as I do."
"I don't even know." Jordon sat beside me. "At least none of us are alone."
The doorbell rang, breaking the silence that was fallen over the room, other than the sound of one of Jordon's mixtapes.
I sprinted to the door, finding out who it was. I was happy to hear George's voice saying, "Who the fuck else do you expect, buzz us in!" I did that, and in less than a minute, I could see him and Matt outside the peephole, both weilding guns. I quickly unlocked the door, letting them in and giving them both hugs.
"I'm so happy you guys are here." I muffled into Matt's shoulder. "I was worried."
George laughed at me. "You worry too much."
We walked back downstairs, and I was smiling. Hard.
"Look who's finally here." I exhaled, relieved - sinking back into my spot on the couch.
"How is it outside?" Jay asked. We'd been inside together for the past two days, and we boarded up the windows.
"Oh, you know, sun's shining, birds are singing, corpses are following us around. It's a grand old time." Matt sarcastically replied.
"Worse than Thursday?"
"Let's just say, compared to today, Thursday was paradise."
Jay just rolled over. "What are we even going to do?" I heard his voice, muffled from the pillow. Nobody knew what to say.
"We're going to kick some fucking zombie ass!" Jordon enthusiastically jumped in.
I just smiled at him. "Seriously."
"No, I am serious. I'm going out right fucking now. We're going to need supplies, we're going to need guns - a lot of guns, we're going to need food, ammo..." he listed off. By now, his eyes were gleaming like he was a little kid. "Think about it." he looked at all of us, seriously. "Right now, the world is fucked over. We can do whatever we want, no consequences. If we want to go randomly break in some windows downtown? Yeah, let's do it. Walk into a store and just take whatever you want? That's cool too. You guys are looking at this in the complete wrong light." he tried convincing us, and I had to admit, it was working.
"I'll go." Dylan perked up. "We can do whatever we want."
"Anyone else?" Jordon offered. I stood up.
"You pretty much had me at no consequences." I mischieviously smiled. He looked at the rest of the guys, who were like statues on the couch.
"So let me get this straight, I'm bringing a chick with me, and you guys are too pussy to go?" he mocked them.
Danny just thumbsed us up. "Couldn't pay me to go out there."
Jordon shrugged. "Grab bags, guys. We're going to steal everything." he smirked at Dylan and I. I just looked at him and smiled, grabbing two of the umpteen guns lying on the kitchen table - shoving a pistol in my hoodie pocket, and carrying a shotgun. Dylan did the same.
"We'll be back!" I yelled, shutting the door.
"Be safe! Don't die!" I heard Jay yelling, right after I shut it.
Dylan opened the door to go outside, and we breathed in the smell of Los Angeles - the smell of smog, the smell of the beach, and the smell of rotting bodies. Today was going to be a good day.
