The First 30 Days (PUBLISHED)

Twenty-Five - Day 12

A hair raising shriek from outside sat me bolt upright in the chair. The book that I had been attempting to read in the dark, both to pass the long night hours alone and to hopefully gain more useful knowledge, dropped from my hands and landed on the floor with a thump. Cringing, I froze, hoping that the sound would go unnoticed by the too close zombie.

Luck was not on my side. Another scream blasted the night and the zombie thudded into the side of the building. Soft footsteps from behind me sent my already racing heart into orbit, but it was just Shawn and Fallon emerging from where they had been sleeping in the nurse's room. The moon must have been especially bright out tonight, because more light than usual was making it's way through the window, making it possible to make out the worried expressions on both of their faces.

Other than the one zombie that had surprised us in the little cabin our first morning here, we hadn't run across any zombies way out here. The rugged terrain and low population seemed to be working like we had hoped, keeping the numbers of the undead low. Of course, we had known that we were bound to run into at least a few zombies. But that didn't mean that we were any more prepared for another run in with them than before.

"What do we do?" Fallon hissed, eyes locked on the door that was wedged closed with the other chair.

"Maybe it will go away?" I thought back to Evie, and how she lost interest in the bathroom door when I had been quiet for a while. The zombies didn't seem to have much of an attention span. If we all stayed silent, maybe it would go away on it's own.

Lapsing into a tense silence, we all waited to see what would happen next. Thumping and bumping it's way along the outside of the building, the zombie let out rumbling growls and the occasional scream that we could easily hear in the silence of the night. It seemed to have worked it's way away from the end of the building that we were in, the noises becoming more muffled, and I sagged a little in relief. Sure that it was only a matter of time before the zombie wandered off into the woods. It would still be out there, somewhere. And therefore, still be a danger, but I would feel better if it wasn't beating against the siding of the building that we were hiding in.

A particularly hard thump, followed by a splintering sound, made the hair stand up along my arms. That did not sound like anything that would bode well for the three of us. More thrashing and shrieking was accompanied by more splintering, and suddenly the screams were louder than they had been before.

Cursing, something that I had learned he did when things were not going in our favor, Shawn crept closer to the barricaded office door. He leaned close, pressing his ear to the surface, and listened. After a second, he pulled back and motioned to us to stay quiet. Completely unnecessary, but then again, I had been the one who dropped the book.

"It's in the cafeteria."

It sounded like a table and a bunch of chairs were knocked over as more low growling came from just on the other side of our flimsy office door. As much noise as the zombie was making, if there happened to be any more nearby, it wouldn't be long before they joined the party. I wasn't the only one that that thought occurred to, as Fallon whispered, "That thing needs to shut up."

It felt like an eternity as we stood there, huddled together in the dark, listening to the zombie trash the cafeteria. The creature worked it's way around the room, blasting shrieks and clanging chairs clearly marking it's path. When the noise from the outer room suddenly stopped, it was somehow even creepier than the sounds the zombie created.

Looking to the two standing beside me, their faces showed the strain of the last couple of minutes. We were all well aware of the implications of having a zombie roaming the building with us. And now, the thing had fallen silent, and it was even worse. Before, we at least knew where it was. The unknown, as it turns out, was worse than the knowing.

Several more minutes passed, but the zombie continued to keep quiet. Some small part of me began to hope that the best may have happened, and I finally couldn't help but to vocalize my thoughts. "Do you think it's gone?"

I saw hope light up Fallon's eyes at my question, but it was short lived as Shawn answered.

"It was at the wrong end of the room when it went quiet. Near the kitchen, not the door out. I don't think we can afford to assume that it's not inside anymore."

He was right, of course. I knew I certainly wasn't going to be getting any sleep until I was sure that more than a hollow wood door held closed by an office chair was between me and the zombies.

"We need to go out and check." Fallon didn't sound any happier with that thought than I was.

Nodding, Shawn eased closer to the door and pressed his ear to it to try to listen once more. He had emerged from the nurse's room already armed with his bat. Backing toward the desk, I picked up my knife from where I had sat it earlier. Seeing my action, Fallon gripped her own knife, one that she had lifted from the kitchen the day before, in an unsteady hand. Standing back up, Shawn looked over his shoulder to us. "Are you ready?"

The whispered words sent the knot of dread that had formed in my throat straight to my gut, but I nodded my head anyhow. Getting a like response from Fallon, he slowly eased the chair out from under the doorknob, trying to be as silent as possible. Setting the chair out of the way, he eased the door open a crack, just far enough that he could see into the cafeteria.

A couple of frantic beats of my heart later, Shawn pulled the door the rest of the way open.

The moonlight coming in through the high windows illuminated the outer room well enough that I could see the destruction caused by the zombie. The formerly neat rows of tables surrounded by their chairs had been bumped into. Tables had been shoved out of line, chairs toppled. The door leading outside, the one that had been closed, now stood open. Splinters of wood scattered over the floor nearby, letting me know that something about the door had failed when battered by the zombie, and that was how it had gotten in. There really wasn't any surprise there. Security had obviously not been a high priority when the camp was built. Whoever made those sort of decisions had probably thought that, way out here in the middle of nowhere, the risks of any sort of intruder were minimal.

How could that person have known that, one day, a trio of people would rely on those doors to keep out the undead.

The zombie wasn't anywhere in sight. Staying close together, we worked our way across the cafeteria. Stepping carefully, I made sure not to bump into anything that would make any noise. The swinging door that led into the kitchen beckoned. If the zombie was still somewhere inside the building, the kitchen seemed like the most likely place it would be.

We reached the door and paused just outside. Unlike the kitchen door at the office building that Shawn and I had narrowly escaped from not so long ago, this door did not have any sort of window that we could use to see inside. The only way to know was to go in.

Looking at each other, in some sort of unspoken agreement, we moved towards the swinging door together.