End Dayz

Belle

November 12th

Dear Diary,

I’m pretty sure that yesterday was actually the worst day of my life. I know I say that all the time, but it was just totally horrible and scary, and I can’t stop thinking about what happened. It actually makes me feel sick. Seriously, even when things seemed to be the absolute worst, creepy strangers start showing up in town and ruining everything.

Grace, Dad and I walked to the grocery store. Not the FoodPort by our house since there isn’t anything left there but rotting meat and vegetable mush, but the big one in the middle of town. It was insanely cold out, but we were walking anyways because “exercise is good for us,” and we “have to conserve fuel for the generators,” or whatever.  Either way, we couldn’t wait any longer. We had to find more food. We’ve been rationing our food lately. On Monday I only had a can of corn and some cereal. I tried to convince Dad that we should start checking the empty houses on our street for supplies, but that’s disrespectful or something.

After today, he might start to see things my way.

Even the walk there was miserable. I hate the cold, and I tripped over my third grade teacher on the way to the store. How ridiculous does that sound? She was frozen solid and buried under about a foot of snow. Mrs. Treacle had obviously been turned, there was a pretty big chunk missing from her shoulder and she had that hungry expression frozen on her face.

I used my knife to make sure she wouldn’t thaw out and go back to eating people once spring came. Dad says we won’t have to worry about them for a few more months but I didn’t want to risk ever having to see her again. Seeing people I knew before always gives me nightmares.

When we got to the grocery store I was in a bad mood, even though Dad tells me to look at these trips like shopping sprees. Fun in theory, but it was still just the three of us and a grocery store.

The door wasn’t locked when we got there, and it was obvious that my dad was worried we’d come all this way for nothing. That man misses food more than anyone. At least we know that there are probably more people alive nearby.

We got inside and saw the store hadn’t been picked clean yet, so that cheered me up a bit. Since I’m the pickiest about what we eat I volunteered to load up a cart with cans and other food while they looked for practical stuff. If we’re calling this a shopping spree, I’ll take pasta over batteries and bleach any day.

We had checked the whole store for any of the infected before we’d split up, so while I was checking boxes of cookies for their expiry dates I wasn’t even thinking about… well, anything but cookies.

I spun around when a glass bottle fell off the shelf and shattered on the floor, but he was already next to me by then. This homeless-looking guy was standing right beside me, just staring. I tried to scream but he grabbed me and covered my mouth with his crusty looking hand.

I tried to kick him, scratch him— anything. But he was so much stronger than me, and it was hard to steady myself while he was pulling me toward the back of the store. He obviously hadn’t had a bath since the infection started spreading and smelled like moldy socks, maybe even moldy socks on a dead guy.

I did manage to knock over a canned-pasta display, but the cans all landed on top of each other and didn’t make as much noise as I  was hoping for. My dad and Grace were on the other side of the store, but it wasn’t that big of a building. If I could just get their attention then my dad would be able to help. He was always so paranoid about my leaving his sight, and this wasn’t a good time to start letting me do my own thing.

We went through a set of swinging doors into the back room and the guy pushed me up against a wall. He stood there and looked at me again “My, aren’t you pretty? he said before I tried to run back toward the door. He was too fast and grabbed me around the waist.