conte [issue two - Intro to Narrative]

Two days before Christmas, I was thinking that it would be nice to have some kind of family Christmas. It was an abstract thing. But, yeah, that’s when Nathan knocked on the front door. Even at this point, maybe understandably so, I still kind of hated being around her, around dead Megan.

I ran upstairs and let Nathan in. He had a thermos of hot coffee and cigarettes, so we sat and drank and smoked and talked about “them”.

They came up a lot, you know. At times, and those times weren’t often, it was hard not to correct some of the other guys’ assumptions and conclusions.

No, they exhibited no substantial human behavior except for the eating thing. Megan had shown no signs of memory or awareness of self or even awareness of surroundings.

Yes, they did continue to decompose, but at a slower rate than they should. Megan’s wound never healed and had actually begun to… Well, it was bad. And smelly. Her body, primarily her swollen calves and feet, had become a dark purple.

And she was always biting, crashing her teeth together.

Before he left, Nathan said he was going to move in with Barry and Arnold. I guessed he had finally given up on his kids and the phones.

I had become a good trapper and butcher. Dogs, cats, squirrels, possums, even a goat once.

I had also taken books from bookstores in town about pregnancy, childbirth, and baby care.

The big day was coming. I could feel them moving in her huge belly.

Sometimes I thought I could almost see them through her grey, mottled flesh if I held a candle very close.

Here’s the way things were:

We had given up on any contact from the rest of the world. As far as we knew, we were the last people on Earth. When that idea had actually begun to seem likely, Mort was the one to point out the sister thought, the twin – we were all men. I decided then that Mort would be the first person I explained everything to. I was sure he would understand, especially once he saw the children.

The wildlife around the house and between here and town had gotten scarce, and that was true before the snow came. For the last couple of weeks, Megan hadn’t eaten much and I was starting to worry. I had built a kind of delivery center around her – towels, gallons of water, a suction ball, and even a CPR breath pump I scored from a drug store in town.

Barry and Arnold went on patrols every day, never finding anyone alive and only once in a while finding anyone else.

I was going to be a daddy.

Around noon, Barry pulled into the driveway. I heard him pull in and walk to the door, but instead of knocking, he came right in.

I stepped out of the bedroom where I had been looking at the baby clothes I had ready. I had two sets for boys and two sets for girls.

Laundry was going to be a problem I had been thinking about when Barry pulled up.

“We have to talk,” he said, looking uneasily around the house, his eyes lingering on the kitchen.

“Yeah, sit down,” I said, nodding to the couch and chair in the living room. I took the chair and he stood by the couch.

“Look, the guys are worried about you,” he began, “and how you’re spending your time.”

“Nathan said he saw you dragging a bleeding dog into your house a couple of nights ago.” Barry still wasn’t looking at me.

“A bleeding dog?” I tried to sound incredulous. “Why would I have a bleeding dog in the house?”

“You know we have food at my house, right?”

I laughed, sure now they didn’t know.

But, that old voice whispered, maybe Barry could handle it. Maybe Barry could dig it because he, surely, could feel where I was coming from. I had the chance he and Dina had lost.

Barry was a man and he would see what the score was. He would be happy for me.

“I have to show you something, my man.” I stood up and clapped Barry on the back. He followed me to the kitchen.