History 101. It’s a 6.

Previously on “Zombies and puppies”: our heroine Jaya and golden retriever Seven, having rescued friend and ally Ryan from the clutches of the zombie aka rabid horde, are taking temporary refuge at a Tractor Supply Co. in McKinney, Texas, a few miles from the abandoned warehouse where Ryan was held captive. As Seven investigates the perimeter of the property, an adrenalin pumped Jaya aggressively interrogates Ryan for details surrounding his capture and more importantly, answer her most pressing question: who was the mysterious alpha rabid, dubbed Gladiator? Click here to read the last Episode. 

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I was tired, no not tired, weary – life weary. All I wanted was to curl up and get lost in my old brown and tan oversized chair that for reasons no longer valid, was big enough to fit 2 people, and get lost in the pages of a book.

Thank you, murderous zombie citizens of post-apocalyptica; thanks for killing my parents, my friends, my husband and that girl who worked at the 7-Eleven near the drugstore who was always trying to read some college textbook between ringing up drunk high school students and fending off 12 year old boys, trying to impress her; you didn’t miss anyone I loved. I ran my scraped, blood mascaraed fingers along the the silver chain around my neck, down my chest until I felt the circular outline of the white gold keepsake between my breasts; I pressed until I winced. I will find people, scientists, doctors, someone with the cure for the disease or whatever the hell it was that set the world on its axis and sent humanity into a tailspin.

I got up from the picnic table, Ryan now staring off into a landscape populated by monsters both made and self-made, a crow distracted me, shouting down from its weightless circle in the sky; I remembered a line of dialogue from a classic film: “there are two kinds of pain in the world – pain that hurts – pain that alters.”