Scraps & Chum Read online

  SCRAPS & CHUM: Short Stories

  By Ryan C. Thomas

  Copyright 2012 by Grand Mal Press. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written consent except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address www.grandmalpress.com

  Published by: Grand Mal Press, Forestdale, MA

  http://www.grandmalpress.com

  Scraps & Chum, Ryan C. Thomas, copyright 2012

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Grand Mal Press

  p. cm

  Cover art by Grand Mal Press

  Table of Contents:

  SPOILED MEAT

  SIREN

  THE PINCH

  BLEEDING ON THE RUG

  SQUEAKY WHEELS

  THE RUNNER AND THE BEAST

  MARTIN’S JOB

  SPOILED MEAT

  Yesterday in the park, I fed the zombies, tossing bits of cadaver flesh onto the cold cement as they fought each other like pigeons for the morsels. They’re not so different from pigeons, really, when you think about it, driven as they are by a primal need to feed, to sustain.

  The pigeons, by the way, are all gone. I ain’t seen a four-legged creature in some time. Not even a dead one. They’re all just…gone.

  Anyway, yesterday, one of them creatures that was feeding, a small girl of about seven or eight, still in pigtails, ate right from my hand, licked the blood off my fingers and moaned for more. That was a first for me, and I thought it was a good sign. I kept urging her to bite, saying, “come on, just a nip, you can do it, Precious.” But she didn’t. Frustrated, I drove my hand into her top teeth and drew blood from the veins on the back of my hand. But nothing happened; no sickness overcame me, nor did it get her chewing on my goods. I held my hand out longer and longer until she licked it clean like my Labrador used to do to my dishes after some spaghetti, but she still wouldn’t bite. And just like a dog—to keep this analogy chugging forward—she sniffed around my chest and legs, looking for meat I might have hidden. But I had no more to feed her.

  Clean meat is scarce; uninfected corpses have been hard to come by lately. I know there’s one under a car near the bookstore. The zombies have been trying to get him for a couple days now, but he’s wedged under there good, his head all sunken and his belly distended. Died from hunger, that poor guy did. Hell of a way to go, right? Perhaps tomorrow I’ll dig him out and cut him up…if I can get him back to my “home” before the zombies tear him limb from limb. The zombies. The Zees as I call ’em now…just to break up the boredom.

  Maybe I could tie the chunks of meat to me and see if that works, see if they take me in the process.

  Where was I?

  The little girl. Yeah, the little girl, eyeball dangling on her cheek like a cat toy, she finally gave up and went foraging. But the others, they stood around me just waiting, eyeballing me hard, as if I could pull fresh meat from the air and fill their bellies. “Don’t you look at me like that,” I yelled. “I got the freshest meat this side of hell. Look,” I said, holding up my hand so they could see the bite mark from the girl’s teeth. “Look at it. Smell it. It ain’t bad. Taste it! For Christ’s sake just try it!” But they didn’t listen, just stood there swaying, looking up into the sky, maybe waiting for it to rain. Oh they can hear, don’t get me wrong, they got ears like boom mics, but if it ain’t alive—aside from me anyway—they don’t’ give a shit. I looked at my hand, my knuckles pruned from the little girl’s tongue, and started to cry.

  Tears make the time go by these days.

  When the sun went down I made my way over to the 7-Eleven for some fine dining. All around me, the Zees shuffled about, moaning and groaning like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir played at 33 rpm. I used to complain about the noise from my neighbor’s stereo, that Satan music, big metal or angry metal or whatever they call it, but what I wouldn’t give to hear it now, to hear something different than these things bellyaching all damn day and night.

  The 7-Eleven’s power has been out since I got here, and half of the store is burned to the ground. The canned food aisle made it through pretty much untouched, though, and so I grabbed a can of Chef Boyardee and opened it with the can opener I keep in my pocket. Room temperature, but God, food is food, right?

  I cried while I ate, that much I remember, sitting there, tears rolling down my face, a Zee staring at its reflection in one of the cooler door windows. Mixed in my tears with the imitation raviolis and swallowed it all down.

  When I was done, I tossed the can at the Zee to see what reaction I could get. Damn thing didn’t move, didn’t even notice a can just bounced off its head.

  The gun in my pocket called out to me again, like it did every day. Like Romeo to Juliet, in a metaphorical sense, you know. It begged to be used.

  But I can’t do it. If I take that route…I’m dead. I mean really dead. Gone. Nothing. I don’t want to be dead…I want to be undead. I want to feel something, even if it’s just aching hunger pangs and a yearning for brains. I don’t want to stop feeling.

  Ain’t that what life really is? Feeling?

  And so I sat and cried some more—tick tock tick tock—and eventually just fell asleep on a candy rack covered in melted chocolate bars.

  ***

  When I awoke this morning in the 7-Eleven, a group of Zees was looking down on me, their drool landing on my chest and soaking through to my skin. How best to describe the odor of Zee drool? You ever—whoever you are, who finds this dog-earned notebook one day—you ever open a trashcan that a baby’s diaper has been festering in for a couple days, all out in the sun and stuff? Now cover that diaper in fresh puke from the town drunk…okay, you get the idea. It’s like that. Better than any alarm clock when it comes to getting you out of bed, that’s for sure.

  “Morning, sunshines,” I said. This was met with a witty retort, or what I guess would be a witty retort if I could speak zombie. To me it sounded like one of them didgeridoo things from Australia.

  They said the plague was a global problem—what’d they call it, a pandemic?—before all the radios and TVs went dead. But I bet there are some bush people in the Outback that survived. Well, maybe. Maybe not. It’s been a while. And it means shit anyway because where the hell would I get a plane or ship to get there. It’s been…what…six months now…and I ain’t seen a living soul. I’ve driven/biked/walked from Dallas to San Diego, and bupkis.

  I rolled off the Hershey’s mattress and looked outside, saw it was another beautiful day for being the most unwanted man in existence.

  Getting over to the bookstore was a huge pain the ass, what with the cars all flipped about and the Zees all following me around waiting to be fed, tripping me up like cats running between my legs. Like I got a chef’s hat on or something. They know I can get the food.

  They can learn, the bastards.

  Once I’m gone, I want to keep on learning as well.

  I want to be a part of something.

  There was a time maybe I didn’t, when I wanted nothing but peace and quiet, and was happy to hole up in the TV room downstairs. Got to the point most people said they didn’t want me around anyway if I was gonna be like that—which reminds me of the time Brandy asked me what ostrich sized meant—and I think at first I was sorta happy ’bout the prospect of a Zee plague. But now…

  As I walked, I started thinking on that whole situation, remembering what it was like in the school basement. Boy, that was dumb hiding down there, with no real way out and nothing to eat but big cans of unsalted corn and beans meant for the school cafeteria.

  Someone, one of the town folk I’d never seen before, had a radio, and we’d been list
ening to static that morning, being as how the airwaves had been dead for over a week. The Zees were scratching at the door, shaking it, making it rumble in the jamb. They’d been doing it for longer than the airwaves had been dead, so we’d kind of gotten used to it. Ain’t that pathetic? The radio, however, was pissing me off something fierce.

  “Can’t you turn that shit off?” I said. “Ain’t no one gonna broadcast nothing.”

  “Some of us are still optimistic,” the man with the radio said. “You should try having some hope.”

  “And you should go chat with what’s on the other side of that door. Give all of us some more room to move. Take that damn radio with you.”

  “You really are a jerk, Mr. You know that?”

  “I know lots, like you’re heating up my nerves. Them things out there want you, they better hope they get in before I beat you dead with that radio first.”

  I was contemplating taking a swing at this guy when the door swung open. Don’t ask me how…must have been all that yanking and pushing and pulling for two weeks straight, and the damn thing just gave. Them creatures were piled so high on the other side they literally spilled into the room, grabbing at the nearest piece of flesh they could see. The screaming was deafening as everybody ran around all helter skelter, taken by surprise, swinging pots and pans and yardsticks. I punched, I kicked, I shoved hard, the blood in my ears cutting out the sound of people being eaten alive all around me. In the confusion, the ground came up to me right quick, Zee feet stepping on me as they went after their quarry, and so I called it quits and lay there waiting for my turn. Tick tock tick tock.

  Want to know the crazy part? I fell asleep. Yup, right there in the middle of all that carnage, waiting for my turn, I fell asleep. I’d heard of guys doing that in the war, some kind of defense mechanism of sorts. What’s crazier, of course, is that I woke up again.

  Untouched.

  When I got up, some of my former compatriots were shuffling around, having joined the enemy so to speak. All around me, the Zees paced back and forth, ambling around with blood on their lips, flesh stuck in their teeth. Thing is, the basement door had shut again and some bodies were in front of it, acting as a big doorstop. The Zees were scratching on it, from the inside now, just like dogs. Yeah, like dogs, remember? I got up real slow, waiting for them to notice me, waiting for the inevitable to happen, not really sure why I was still alive anyhow. Not caring about much neither.

  “Hey,” I said to the room, “you missed me. Come on, get it over with.” I opened my arms in a hug.

  They looked at me, looked back at the door, went on pacing.

  They didn’t want me.

  Sheeit, I thought, now ain’t that just a bit off kilter. Why didn’t they want me? Didn’t make no sense, you know? They shoulda been all over me, pulling my meat from my bones like I was a Thanksgiving turkey. But they couldn’t care less. What they really wanted, I learned after some time—time spent staring straight ahead, fighting to rationalize my position in all of this—what they really wanted was for me to open the damn door. Because when I finally pushed through them, grabbed a bulk size can of corn off one of the shelves (most of the shelves were tipped over, the cans all ruptured when the others had used them as weapons) kicked the bodies outta the way and opened the door, they immediately made for the hallway beyond it, and eventually, the door to outside.

  On the street in front of the school, I sat on the curb and watched all the Zees walking around on the sidewalks, on the lawns of nearby homes, down the center of the roads. They all passed by me and gave a look my way, maybe stopped and stared for a few seconds, but none came over. Hell, I even took to throwing rocks at them to see if I could get their attention, but they’s a one-track-mind kind of species I learned.

  The sky was black with smoke from a thousand fires burning all over the county. I didn’t hear no birds singing or dogs barking or cats howling. It was just me and the Zees.

  At first I didn’t know what to feel, but by nightfall, it started to sink in that I was really alone. Not the kind of alone I’d wanted before, where I could turn on the TV and see a ballgame, or get a hello from Jack at the liquor store, or stare at that single mom two houses down who wore them tight pants. I mean really alone. Unwanted. Ostrich sized.

  Two streets over was the Episcopal church, so I got up, grabbed my can of corn again, and made my way over to it. The door was open, the stained glass shattered, and there were Zees inside, which seemed a bit disrespectful to me, them being in God’s house and all. But then, who’s to say all this mess wasn’t God’s idea, some sort of cleaning method so he can start over fresh.

  I pulled up a pew and stared up at Jesus on the crucifix above the altar. “I don’t get it,” I said. “Everybody’s gone, all eaten and come back as something else. But not me. There something I’m missing here?”

  No reply. Nothing.

  And then I cried, which was the first time since Korea I’d done that. It was a real cry too, the kind you just can’t stop once it starts, the kind that goes on until you’re dry inside, the kind you gotta fight to breathe through. Some time later, I looked at Jesus again and begged him to take me too. “I’m lonely,” I said. “I don’t want to die. Everybody else, they get to keep on going, even if it’s as a monster. At least they got something. At least they got each other. You’re leaving me with nothing. Nothing! Tell me what I did!”

  The can of corn knocked the cross to the ground.

  I fell asleep in the pew.

  ***

  Where was I…

  …tangents, tick tock, tears…

  Oh yeah, this morning at the bookstore.

  The area outside the bookstore had its usual collection of hungry monsters hobbling around it. I’d given some of them names, the ones I’d seen around a lot: Goopy and Scabby and No-Arms and Pussface. When they saw me coming, saw the other Zees following me like puppies, they ambled my way as well, as if to say, Thank God, can you please help up with this big metal doohickey, our ball rolled under it and we can’t get it.

  “Yeah yeah,” I said, pushing through their numbers as they sniffed me and played with my shirt (I think they could smell the last bits of good meat I’d tossed out). “I see your food, you dumb idgits. I’ll get it for ya. But first, anybody want an appetizer?” I held up my arm, took out the can opener and ran the dull blade across my forearm. As the blood began to trickle out, a few of them stepped forward and inspected it, but just like the other times I’d tried this, they lost interest and went back to moaning at the car.

  Throwing my head back, I screamed at the heaven’s “What! What the fuck did I do! Why not me?”

  Of course, there was no answer, same as that day in the church. Well, I think one of the Zees farted. Which, really, about summed up what God was doing to me anyway.

  “I ain’t doing it myself!” I shouted again, just for good measure, pulling out the gun and waving it all crazy-like. “I ain’t ending it like that. If you want me, you take me like you took the rest! This ain’t fair!”

  And I sat down and started boo-hooing again, which lately, had become my shtick. “What’s wrong with me, what’s wrong with me, what’s wrong…” Over and over and over, rocking like a Weeble.

  At some point I felt one of the Zees push me, like to say, hey buddy, get to it already. Goopy and Pussface were standing next to him, anxious for me to get up as well. Like I said, just like dogs.

  “All right, back off,” I said, standing up and going over to the car. Past the car in the window of the bookstore was a paperback I’d thought about going in and getting a few times now. Maybe today I would. Maybe it was time to get out of this town—I could use the reading material for traveling. Maybe I should leave tomorrow. The roads are still pretty jammed up with crashed cars and ambling Zees, and I can’t ride a motorcycle to save my life, but the bike shop nearby has some good selections. Maybe Mexico would fare better for me. Maybe I could even keep riding down to Panama or something.

  Drop
ping to my belly, I reached underneath the car and grabbed hold of the dead man’s pant leg. His head was all jammed up in the pipes, his eyes still open and dry as chalk, and I had to pull pretty hard to get him out. ’Course, once his leg hit the sunlight those Zees pushed me outta the way and went to town, big time.

  Hoping against hope, I thrust my arm into the feeding frenzy and felt one take a nibble on my pinky. Hurt like a bitch, but it felt so damn good to be wanted. But the sonofabitch pushed my arm outta the way like it was broccoli on a plate of chocolate cake. Fuckers didn’t want me after all. Same old same old.

  Yanking some carnage from No-Arm’s mouth—in case I needed some for later—I went into the bookstore and grabbed the paperback in the window. It was The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kozinski. I’d read it ages ago, and it depressed the shit outta me, but right now, I needed to know someone else felt my pain. Needed to know that someone else out there, even if he was fictional, was as unwanted as me. Rolling it up, I stuffed it in my jacket pocket, made my way back around the Zees, who were all on their knees ripping every last bit of flesh and sinew off that rotted cadaver, and headed back to the park.

  The pigtail girl was there again, just sitting on the bench, cradling an unopened can of Coke like it was a baby doll. Let me tell you, when you have no one to talk to, the walls become a real good audience. These Zees were no different than walls, and so I sat down beside her and looked in her eye, the good one that wasn’t swishing about on her cheek, and struck up a conversation.

  “Hi, Precious,” I said. “What you got there? That your baby? What’s its name?”

  If it had been a real baby it woulda been an unhappy one because she tossed it on the ground and growled at it as if it had ruined her life. Satisfied with that, she took up sniffing my coat again and discovered the meat I had in my pocket. Suddenly ravenous, she started to tear into the leather, her strength much greater that you’d expect, so I turned away from her and got my hand on the meat before she rendered me naked. Judging by the look of it, it was a head scrap: an ear and part of a scalp, some hair stuck to it on one end. When she saw it she lunged at me.