Get Off My L@wn - A Zombie Novel by Perry Kivolowitz

that would almost certainly be found there but the building
supplies would have been nice.
    The last time either of us had left the
immediate area of the house, Ruth Ann had gone alone to get ammunition. That
was ages ago when there were still living people around. We didn’t want to risk
leaving the house empty back then.
    Now, with zombies found right outside, we actually
felt safer both being away. We had a good solid house and watch zombies to keep
people from casually wandering around trying doors. Besides, it would be too
dangerous now for one person to go into a building without someone else
covering them.
    We packed up the Volvo and watched the cameras
for a few minutes. Seeing nothing stirring I lifted the garage door while Ruth
Ann pulled the car out. I locked up and we started on our way. We decided to
avoid the main road and head to town the back way.
    We didn’t get very far before we came upon a two
car wreck on 10 th street just over a hill. We had been driving
slowly so stopping before joining the wreck ourselves wasn’t an issue. I never
got why characters in zombie books were always speeding from place to place
often getting into wrecks of their own making. With no zombies behind us, the
only possible danger was in front. Why hurry into it?
    We scanned all around us while Ruth Ann idled.
From where we were, it wasn’t clear there was a way through but it was clear
there was movement inside one of the cars. To go forward we’d have to get a
better look. I pocketed the revolver and took our crowbar. After zipping up to
leave the warmth of the car, I stepped outside.
    The vehicle closest to us was an empty pickup
truck, driver’s side door open. It had partially crossed the yellow line and
crashed the driver’s side corner of another pickup. It seemed everybody around
here drove pickups. Some pickups were working trucks, hauling what they were
intended for. Most though were just shiny toys.
    In this case, the proverbial shiny red truck had
a dull red to black interior coating of dried blood. With my crowbar ready to
jab through a skull, I looked into the open door. Apart from the caked blood
there was a tennis shoe, incongruously clean and appropriate for a teenage girl
on the floor of the driver’s side but nothing else.
    The other car involved in the collision, another
pickup, was an older model that was clearly a working truck. What had formerly
been the working man that worked it was still inside seat belted with its
windows rolled up. Clearly the temperature swings inside the car had not been
kind. The rotted putrid hulk banged on every accessible surface keeping its
eyes riveted upon me. With its windows rolled up there was only the dull
banging and muffled moaning to be heard even from a dozen feet away.
    Fortunately, zombies don’t operate seatbelts or
door locks; the ghoul wasn’t going anywhere. I shifted the shiny red truck into
neutral. The hardest part of shoving the truck backwards into the ditch on the
side of the road was getting it over the road’s crown. That and ignoring the
raging zombie behind me. In short order the road was clear. As we drove past I
half expected the other truck’s driver to twist his head right around like
Linda Blair in the Exorcist. It didn’t happen.
    We passed a large dairy building where cows came
to get milked. There were no animals in sight. In fact, we hadn’t seen any of
the cows, horses, goats or even llamas that we usually saw along the road. On
the exterior wall was sloppily painted
    “God forgive me”
    The screen door and interior door to the nearby
house were both busted down.
    After the local elementary school there was a
dense crop of trees close to the road on either side. Ruth Ann didn’t feel comfortable
heading into it. She nosed in, far enough to see another wreck just around the
bend in the road.
    We backed up and went through the elementary
school’s parking lot side stepping the blocked bend in the road. The parking
lots of the