Lakewood Memorial (6 page)

She opened the door and screamed.

A man in a muddy suit grabbed her and pulled
her out the door.

“
Maylee!” yelled Dalton,
racing outside.

“
Damn it!” yelled Brooke,
following.

Outside, Maylee was struggling with the man.
He was trying to bite her but Maylee was barely holding him off.
Two teenagers were approaching. One had half his face missing.

Dalton grabbed one of Maylee's shoulders.
Brooke grabbed the other. The man pulled Maylee toward him. The
teenagers drew near.

Maylee screamed and kicked the man in the
face. He fell back and let go.

Dalton and Brooke pulled Maylee inside as
the teenagers grabbed for them. Dalton shut the door and locked
it.

“
What the fuck!” shrieked
Maylee.

“
Don't open the door!”
said Brooke.

“
No shit, really?” said
Maylee, pacing. “What the hell is going on?”

“
I don't know,” said
Brooke, looking for her phone again.

Dalton was looking out the large front
window. “They're eating the pizza guy.”

“
You mean the pizza,” said
Maylee.

“
No,” said Brooke, “he
means the pizza guy.”

Maylee went to the window and looked. “Oh
shit.”

“
The cops aren't
answering,” said Brooke, holding her cell phone to her ear. “Why
the hell aren't they answering?”

Maylee and Dalton turned to look at Brooke.
Maylee walked over. “Let me try.”

“
I know how to dial,
Maylee,” said Brooke.

The window crashed in. Four arms grabbed
Dalton and pulled him outside.

“
Fuck!” yelled Maylee,
running and jumping out the window.

“
Damn it!” yelled Brooke.
“I'm in charge here! Stay inside!”

She ran to the window. Maylee was pulling
Dalton away from the two teenagers. Brooke climbed out to help. One
of the old ladies, face covered in the pizza boy's blood, grabbed
her.

The smell from the woman was awful. Her skin
was clammy and cold. Brooke's grandfather had died two years ago.
Brooke had touched him in the coffin. His skin then felt like the
old woman's now. The woman hissed at her and leaned in to bite.

Maylee's foot slammed into the woman's head.
The old woman fell over and Brooke scrambled away.

“
Hitting them in the head
seems to help,” said Maylee.

“
Back in the house,” said
Brooke. The old woman was getting up. The teenagers were closing
in. The man with the muddy suit was coming up from one
side.

She helped Dalton back in the window. Maylee
climbed in and Brooke followed. The group of crazy attackers was
approaching the window.

“
We need to block the
window,” said Maylee.

“
Here,” said Brooke. “Help
me.” She grabbed hold of the couch and pushed it toward the window.
Maylee and Dalton joined her. The three of them tipped the couch up
onto its side, against the window. The crazies outside pushed at
it.

The three of them stepped back and looked at
the couch. “That's not gonna hold long,” said Dalton.

The couch started falling forward. Brooke
caught it. Maylee and Dalton each grabbed a side. Arms reached past
the couch and grabbed at them. One of the arms was missing most of
its flesh.

“
This isn't working!”
yelled Maylee.

“
Shit!” said Brooke.
“Run!”

They ran away from the couch, across the
living room and into the hall. The couch thumped to the floor
behind them.

“
Get to the back door!”
said Brooke.

“
Wow, no shit?” said
Maylee.

“
Not now, Maylee!” yelled
Brooke.

They ran into the kitchen. They stopped,
sneakers squeaking on the linoleum.

A man in an old-fashioned suit was there,
stumbling toward them. His skin was dry and taut against his skull.
Thin white hair barely hung from his scalp.

Brooke blinked.

His eyes were gone.

He groaned at them.

Dalton screamed from behind Brooke. The back
door that led out from the kitchen slammed open. A large woman
missing an arm staggered in.

“
Come on!” yelled Maylee
from behind Brooke. “We can get out my bedroom window!”

Brooke shook her head clear.

“
Yeah,” she said. The
three of them ran from the kitchen.

They made it to Maylee's bedroom. Maylee
climbed onto the bed and knelt by her window. She undid the lock
and pushed the window up.

“
Come on!” she said,
looking back at Brooke and Dalton.

A withered hand reached inside and grabbed
Maylee's hair.

“
Maylee!” Dalton screamed
and rushed to the bed. Brooke followed.

Dalton grabbed the arm and tugged. Brooke
grabbed the arm and tried to push it out the window.

Maylee frantically tugged at the fingers in
her hair. Brooke changed tactics and tried to help. She did her
best to pull the fingers from Maylee's hair. Maylee grunted and
squirmed. Brooke could hear panic in her voice.

Dalton yelled and leaned backward, pulling
at the arm as hard as he could. With a sloppy tearing noise a huge
sheet of skin came free of the arm. He screamed and dropped the
skin.

The arm showed no reaction. It pulled Maylee
toward the window.

Brooke let go and stood on the bed. She
grabbed the window and slammed it down on the arm.

The arm didn't flinch.

“
Shit,” she said, pulling
the window back up.

The arm pulled Maylee closer to the window.
Maylee screamed.

Brooke slammed the window down again. It
bounced off the arm, snapping back up a few inches.

The arm kept pulling Maylee steadily toward
the window. Maylee kicked at the bed, dragging dirt across the
sheets.

“
Goddamn it!” yelled
Brooke, pulling the window up.

“
Look out!” screamed
Maylee, her head drawing near to the windowsill.

Brooke screamed and slammed the window down
as hard as she could. It hit the arm on the wrist, inches away from
Maylee's head.

The wrist snapped and the hand tore free.
Maylee scrambled up and off the bed. She screamed with disgust as
she pulled the hand out of her hair and dropped it.

“
What the fuck!” she
shrieked.

“
There's no blood,” said
Dalton.

Brooke and Maylee looked at the severed hand
on the floor. There was no blood anywhere.

“
What the fuck!” Maylee
repeated. “Why the fuck isn't there any blood?”

Groans came from the living room and
kitchen.

“
Shit,” said Brooke. “We
need to get to a room they can't get in.”

“
The bathroom,” said
Dalton. “There's no windows.”

Brooke nodded. “Hurry.”

She led them to the hallway. A crash came
from the living room and they stopped to look. Three crazies were
climbing over the fallen couch. A fourth was stepping onto the TV,
which had apparently just fallen.

Groaning came from Brooke's side. Cold hands
grabbed her and Dalton screamed. The eyeless man from the kitchen
had her.

Brooke screamed and tried to push the man
away. He clacked his rotten teeth together, inches away from biting
her.

“
Let her go!” yelled
Dalton, kicking the man in the side.

Maylee ran back into her bedroom.

“
Maylee!” yelled Brooke,
struggling with the man. “We have to stay together!”

The four crazies in the living room were
getting closer.

“
Let her go!” Dalton
repeated, kicking the man again.

Maylee ran back into the hallway, holding an
aluminum baseball bat. Screeching, she brought the bat down on the
man's head. The man's skull caved, crumpling his forehead into a
frown. The man let go.

“
See!” yelled Maylee. “The
head!”

Brooke pushed the man back into the kitchen.
She briefly noticed the woman missing an arm - the one who'd
followed the man into the kitchen - was gone.

“
Into the bathroom,” she
said. “Hurry!”

They rushed further down the hallway, then
banked left in the bathroom. Brooke turned, let Maylee and Dalton
past her, and shut the door. Brooke's sweating hands fumbled as she
pushed the handle in and turned it, locking the door.

Maylee sat back against the sink, clutching
the bat. Dried skin caked the top of it. Dalton leaned against the
toilet.

For a second they all stared at each other,
panting.

Then the shower curtain collapsed at them.
It draped Brooke, knocking her to the floor. Brooke felt the weight
of a person atop her, writhing against the curtain that separated
them. Groaning breath hit where the curtain stretched against
Brooke's cheek. The breath smelled foul but had no heat. It was
cold.

Brooke screamed and pushed up. A hand
grabbed at her and teeth ground against the curtain.

Brooke heard Dalton and
Maylee screaming. The person atop her shook as something repeatedly
struck them.
Maylee's
bat
, Brook realized.

“
Where the hell did she
come from?” yelled Maylee.

“
I recognize her from the
kitchen!” yelled Dalton. “She must have wandered to the bathroom
while we were in your bedroom.”

“
Get her off of me!”
shrieked Brooke.

Brooke heard Maylee and Dalton scrambling to
grab hold of the woman. A few seconds later, her weight shifted
upward.

Brooke scrambled out from under the curtain.
Her attacker, the large woman missing an arm, was struggling in
Dalton's and Maylee's grip. She bit at all three of them, missing
but coming close.

“
Open the door!” yelled
Maylee.

“
Are you crazy?” said
Brooke, panting. “They're out there...”

“
We can't keep her in
here!” yelled Maylee.

Brooke swallowed. Maylee was right.

Brooke turned, braced herself, and unlocked
the door.

She opened it. The eyeless man stood there,
reaching for them. Other crazies reached around the door frame.

“
Duck!” yelled
Maylee.

Brooke did.

Maylee and Dalton shoved the lady forward.
She stumbled, tripped over Brooke and fell out the door. She
knocked the eyeless man over and they both fell into the
hallway.

Brooke stood and slammed the door. She
locked it as fast as her shaking hands would allow.

“
Shit,” said
Maylee.

“
Is everyone okay?” said
Brooke. She turned to put her back to the door. Groaning and
scratching came from the other side.

Dalton and Maylee nodded.

Brooke nodded in reply and slid down to sit
on the floor. She put one foot against the side of the toilet,
bracing the door with her body.

“
What do we do now?” said
Dalton.

“
Now,” said Brooke,
fishing around in her pockets. “We call the cops again.”

Dalton nodded. Brooke felt in her pockets
more frantically, panic growing. “My phone.”

“
What?” said
Maylee.

Brooke sighed and put her forehead in her
palms. “My cell phone. I must have dropped it in the living
room.”

Maylee and Dalton stared at her.

Dalton swallowed. “And the house phone is in
the kitchen.”

Brooke nodded and sighed, looking around the
windowless room.

“
Shit.”

And groaning and scratching came from behind
the one and only door.

Nine

“
We got problems,” said
the jackass in the hunting jacket. His hurt friend - was his name
Moe? - was pale and sweating behind him.

Angie nodded. “Yeah. I just knocked
someone's head off with a fire extinguisher. I'm going to get the
cops.”

Behind her, Freeda made a worried noise.
“The head's still moving.”

Angie sighed. “Don't look at it,
Freeda.”

“
That doesn't stop it
moving.”

“
Stops you talking about
it.”

Moe swayed back and forth slightly. “Park, I
feel bad...”

The jackass - apparently named Park -
frowned at Angie and Freeda. “I give such a shit about everything
you're saying, I really do. But you ain't getting out that
way.”

He pushed the doors to the waiting room
open. Looking past him, Angie could see a few patients struggling
with a crowd that was slowly pushing its way into the waiting room.
One member of the crowd - a teenager with a religious t-shirt - bit
into the face of a patient - an elderly woman with a walker. The
woman screamed as blood shot out onto the teenager's face.

Angie heard movement behind her. She turned
to see someone slowly coming through the hole the ambulance had
made.

It was an overweight man, half in the room
and half out. He blinked at the floor as he tried over and over
again to pull himself into the room. He reached into the room with
one hand. The other arm was hidden outside, behind the edge of the
hole.

“
Sir?” Angie started to
say.

The man groaned and lurched the rest of the
way into the room. He had no other arm. He had a stump, fresh and
bloody.

Movement came from the floor. Angie looked
down. Dr. Gordon was getting up. He straightened and his wet guts
spilled out onto the floor. He took a step toward Angie and the
others, his foot clumsily squishing on a loop of his own
intestines.