The Darknet

Although this is a Zombie story, it is a new approach to this type of story, one that makes a little more sense. If you like it, upvote it, and I'll post more. The protagonist of the story is an eighteen-year-old girl named Kayla.

  The Darknet 

   Chapter 1:

  “I love you,” I say. 

  “Yeah, me, too,” Jaime answers, “Bye.” 

  Before I can even say, “Bye,” he’s ended the call.

 I’ve been talking to my boyfriend, Jaime, on my cell phone. As usual, he answers my I love you with me too. We’ve been going together since soon after the start of school, and now, summer is almost here. We’re both seniors and will graduate this year, but we’re going to different colleges next fall.

  “I love you,” I hear, coming from my door.

 Looking at it, I see Shawn, my brother. He’s eight. He raises his hand to his mouth and smacks it with a loud kiss. He has a stupid grin on his face.

  “Do you love me?” he asks.

  My door is open, and his head is poked around it. He has apparently been there long enough to hear me end my call with Jaime. 

  “Get out. Shut my door.” Picking up a pillow, I cock my arm like I’m going to throw it at him.

  He smacks the back of his hand with another kiss. “Tell me you love me first.”

  “Shut the freaking door,” I say, swinging my feet over and off the bed. 

  “Mom sent me to tell you dinner’s ready,” he says.

   “Okay, you told me. Now, shut my door. I’ll be down in a minute.” 

  “Tell me you love me first.”

I jump up as if I’m going to charge him, and he slams the door. I hear him laugh as he runs down the hall. I shake my head, but I have to smile.

 If dinner’s ready, I have to go downstairs. It’s the one meal that Mom insists we eat together, all seated around the dining room table. When I get there, Dad isn’t at the table. Usually, he’s already seated by the time I arrive. I’m always last. Mom and Shawn are already seated.

  “Where’s Dad?”

  Mom gives a toss of her head in the direction of the den: “There was another of those killings, this time in Portland. It’s on TV. He wanted to watch it. He’ll be here in a minute.”

  “Cool!” Shawn says, his eyes big and round. “Was this one eating someone’s face, too?”

  “Not while we’re eating, Shawn,” Mom says. 

  “I’m not eating,” says Shawn.

  “We’re seated down to eat,” Mom says.

  “I want to go see.” He starts to get up from the table. 

  “Sit down, Shawn,” Mom says. 

  Shawn sits down, but he turns his head, and looking at me, mouths, “Fuck.” He knows better than to say it out loud. It would set Mom off. Turning back to Mom, he whines, “I want to go see.” 

   “No,” she says.

  I think the first such incident was a couple years ago in Florida when some naked man was killed while eating a homeless man’s face. He was just some crazy they said. The cops had to shoot him to stop him. Lately, it’s been happening all over the country, crazy men, and crazy women even, killing and eating people. The first guy was certifiably insane. Lately, the people lived normal lives until one day, they freaked out and started eating people. Mostly on the West Coast, it has been happening in Seattle, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, but it looks like the craziness had made its way to Portland.  

  “Was it a zombie?” Shawn asks when Dad comes in from the den. 

  There’s no such thing as zombies, Shawn,” Dad says.

  We keep telling him that, but Shawn insists the killers are zombies. He has a video game where some virus has been unleashed turning people into zombies. He says that’s what is happening now.  He turns in his seat facing me, rolls his eyes up in his head, sticks out his arms, making claws with his hands, and points them at me.    

  “Brains. I want brains.” 

  “Stop it, Shawn,” Mom says.

  He turns around, looks at Mom, and shrugs: “She doesn’t have any brains, anyway.” 

  Shawn looks at Dad: “Did he eat the guy’s face?”

  “Can we not talk about this until after dinner?” says Mom. 

  “After dinner, okay, Shawn?” Dad says.

  “Yeah, I’m about to throw up,” I say, and Mom glares at me.

 Shawn exhales a long, audible, sigh. He eats, but he keeps glancing toward the den. Dad is distracted, too. I’ve pretty well lost my appetite. It was scary when it was happening in Seattle and San Francisco. It’s terrifying to think it’s happening in Portland. I’ve been to downtown Portland by myself. I think I’d be afraid to go, now. 

  What if it happens in Tualatin where we live? Portland’s not far away, maybe ten miles to downtown Portland. Of course, I don’t know it happened in downtown Portland. It could have happened on the other side of town for all I know. It could have happened on this side of town, too. Now, I’m eager to finish dinner, so I can check it out on TV.

  Shawn pecks at his food. I don't do much better.

  Mom turns to Dad and asks her usual question: “How was your day, Dear?”

  Dad shrugs: “Okay.” 

 Usually she can get a little more out of him, but it’s obvious he doesn’t want to talk about work today. Like me, he’s probably wondering about the cannibal attack. The way Shaw fidgets and looks toward the den, I know he’s thinking about it.  I’m scared; Dad looks worried; Shawn seems excited; Mom is just being Mom.   I push my plate away:   "I'm not hungry."

  "Me neither." Shawn is already out of his chair.

  Mom opens her mouth but shuts it again when Dad stands up. "I'm not hungry either," he says.

  The three of us head for the den. Dad has left the TV on but turned down. I can hear it.

  “Someone, help me clear the table,” Mom says.”

  I know by someone she means me. Shawn won’t do what he considers to be Girl’s work.

  Dad can get him to do more manly jobs around the house. No one, not even Dad can get him to clean his room. If our housekeeper didn’t clean it for him, it would be declared a disaster area by the local authorities, and we’d be out on the street. It gets bad enough as it is. Maria, our housekeeper, only comes in twice a week. I don’t know how one kid can total a room in just a couple of days, but he can. It often looks like he had a wrecking crew over for an overnighter. Mom would rather yell at him than clean it herself, and I’m not about to clean it for him. The yelling does no good, so his room stays wrecked until Maria comes in to clean it. I pause on my way to the den: “Leave them. I’ll get them. I want to see what they’re saying on TV first.”

  From the clanking I hear coming from the dining room, she continues to clear the table. Sometimes, I think playing the martyr is what makes Mom happiest. I’ll hear afterward about how no one helps her around the house. Normally, that would be enough to get me to turn back, but I’m curious about this latest cannibal incident, especially since it’s so close to home. I don’t for a moment think it’s some kind of virus turning people into zombies. It must be just copycat killings, crazy people imitating something they saw on TV. There are some weird people in the world.

 By the time I get to the den, Dad is in his chair. Shawn is sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the TV. I stand behind Dad’s chair. Dad presses the back button on the DVR remote rewinding the DVR until it’s at the start of the newscast. He hits play, and the newscast starts.   The reporter is standing in front of some apartments: “Frank Langley of Tigard was killed today by his next door neighbor.” 

  Crap! Tigard? Tigard is the next town over toward Portland. That’s not ten miles away. That’s a couple miles away.

  Cool!” says Shawn.

  The reporter continues: “His neighbor, Lloyd Thompson, lived across the entryway from Langley. Both men lived alone. A downstairs neighbor heard pounding on a door upstairs, probably Thompson pounding on Langley’s door. Apparently, when Langley opened the door, Thompson attacked him. The downstairs neighbor heard screams and called the police. By the time they arrived, Langley was dead, and Thompson was eating him.”  

  “Did he eat his face?” Shawn screams at the TV.

  “Shut up, Shawn,” I say. “I want to hear this.”

  “Shush. Both of you,” Dad says, and we listen to the reporter.

  “The police shot and killed Thompson. He attacked them, biting one of the officers. From the neighbors we’ve interviewed, there was no animosity between Langley and Thompson as far as they knew. Both men kept to themselves. They described Thompson as friendly and quiet. The police haven’t yet determined if drugs or alcohol were involved.” 

  “He was a zombie,” says Shawn.

  “Shut up, Shawn,” I say again, but they don’t have much more to report. Some guy went crazy and killed his neighbor is all they have at this time. I wouldn’t think much about it, except that he killed him and then started eating him. Something is going on. I’m just not sure what it is. It’s scary as hell, and it happening practically down the street from us. They don’t give the address of the apartment, but it’s in Tigard, and Tigard is practically just down the street from us.

  I put my hand on Dad’s shoulder.  “What do you think, Dad? What’s happening?”

  Shawn looks around at me: “Zombies.”

  “You got to take that game away from him,” I say. “It’s going to turn him into a zombie. I think if I hear him say zombie one more time, I’m going to puke. There’s no such thing as zombies, right Dad?”

  “People don’t come back from being dead, Shawn,” Dad says.

  “Yes, they do,” says Shawn. “What about that kid last winter that drowned? He was dead, and they brought him back to life.” 

  “He wasn’t brain dead,” says Dad. “The cold water kept it from dying, so he wasn’t technically dead.”

 “His heart wasn’t beating. They had to restart it. If they didn’t restart it, he’d be dead, wouldn’t he?”

  “Yes, but…”

  I interrupt Dad. “He didn’t rise up out of his grave, Shawn.” 

  “So…in Demon Evil the zombies don’t rise up out of their graves either. The virus kills them, and they wake up zombies.” 

 Demon Evil is the name of the stupid game he plays.

  “Viruses might kill people, but they don’t come back as zombies. Right, Dad?” I say. Dad shakes his head, and I take it as an affirmation of what I said, so I continue: “Besides, if it was a virus causing it, don’t you think we would have heard about it?” 

  “It’s a government cover-up,” Shawn says.

  “Dad! You really got to take that game away from him; and make him stop watching those scary movies,” and I say to Shawn, “The men in the white coats are going to come and take you away, kid, and if they are, I wish they would hurry up. Maybe, I could get a little peace around here.” 

  Still seated cross-legged on the floor, Shawn puts on his zombie face, the one with his eyes rolled back and his mouth open. He’s twisted around, his head turned toward me, his hands, like claws, held out:   “Brains…I need brains.” 

 “Yeah,” I say. “You certainly do. They forgot to give you any when they made you."

Giving me his I know more than you think I know grin, he says, “They didn’t make me. Mom and Dad made me.” 

  From what I’ve heard come out of his mouth, he definitely knows more than I think he should know at eight-years-old. He knows more about sex and such stuff than I did at eight, but if he’s not playing his stupid video game, he’s online chatting with his friends or doing, God knows, what else. He has his own laptop in his room. He could be looking at porn for all anyone knows. I think Mom and Dad should pay more attention to him, but Dad is a doctor, and his work keeps him busy. He can be called out at any time of the day or night, besides working his normal hours. Mom is just Mom. Sometimes, I don’t think she ever wanted kids.

  I guess I can’t blame Shawn for being the weird kid he is. Mom doesn’t care what he does, as long as he stays out of her hair.   She paid more attention to me, but I was a girl she could dress up and show off to her friends. I look more like her than I do like Dad, and everyone always told her how cute I was. Mom is still a good looking woman I’ll have to admit. She works out at the gym and keeps fit, unlike some of my friends’ moms. 

  I go into the kitchen. Mom is scraping plates, rinsing them, and stacking them. I pick them up and start loading them into the dishwasher. She doesn’t look at me. She’s giving me her silent treatment.

  “It happened this time in Tigard,” I say, trying to break the silence.

  “Things like that are happening all over,” she says. “It was no excuse to ruin dinner. None of you finished eating. You’ll all be raiding the refrigerator later making a mess, and I’ll have to clean up after you.”

  “It wasn’t happening in Tigard,” I say. “That’s just down the street from us. Doesn’t it worry you?”

  “I heard about it when I was over at Evelyn’s. It was two single men that lived in apartments across the hall from each other. It was probably some kind of lovers’ spat.” 

  “Mom, you’re such a snob. They didn’t say anything about them being gay or being in some kind of relationship.”  

 She gives me her haughty look, chin raised, mouth in a tight line, looking down her nose at me:   Just because you associate with those people doesn’t mean I have to like them.” 

  I shake my head. This is about Ryan, my gay friend. I must have been about fourteen when I brought him home for the first time.  Ryan was in the den. We were watching a movie. I went to the kitchen to get us drinks and snacks. Mom came into the kitchen: “He’s a cute boy. Is he your boyfriend?”

  “No, Mom. Ryan’s gay.”

  Her jaw dropped at that: “I don’t think you should be associating with homosexuals.”

 “Mom, we’re friends, okay? I can be myself with Ryan. We like the same things, and I don’t have to play games around him.”

  “What do you mean games?” 

  “Never mind.”  I didn’t want to go into all the games a girl has to play with guys, never knowing whether they want to be friends or whether they’re hot for you. I don’t have to play those games with Ryan. Mom has since got used to seeing Ryan over at our house. She still doesn’t like that he’s gay, but she no longer makes snide remarks about him. 

  Ryan is cute, and most people wouldn't pick him out as being gay just by looking at him. He’s not by any means a jock: he’s about 5’9” and slender, but he dresses like any other boy, no fingernail polish or makeup of any kind like some gay boys. He has ear studs, but not humongous ones, and many straight boys wear ear studs or earrings. Even some boys on the football team wear earrings. 

 I give up on trying to talk to Mom and finish loading the dishwasher. When I go back to my room, I have two voice mails on my phone, one from Janelle and one from Ryan. I check them out, and each is saying, “Call me.”     

  I decide to call Ryan first. 

  “Hey,” he says, when he answers.

  “What’s up?” I say. 

  “Did you watch the news?"

  Ryan isn’t one to call me to talk about what was on the news. None of my friends are; so I know what news he means.

  “About the murder in Tigard?” 

  “About the zombie attack in Tigard,” he says.  

to be continued...