Thanks for stopping by! Below is a zombie apocalypse story. It is a four part story that explores loneliness and loss. It is a bit heavy emotionally. There is also some blood and horror elements, but they don't feature too prominently. This story will span a few different categories. All characters in sexual situations are 18+. Story and character's are mine! Enjoy!
Angela's Apocalypse: The Lonely Existence
September 2043
Only a couple zombies milled around the quiet suburban cul-de-sac. Angela peered through the small opening in the papered windows of one of the upstairs bedrooms. Carefully, she replaced the paper she had held aside and leaned back on the cushioned window seat staring around what was very obviously a young girl's room.
Posters of actors, bands, and musicians plastered the walls, a pastel-colored Bluetooth speaker shaped like a vintage radio sat on a dresser overflowing with clothes and bras. A few completed building sets lined the bookshelf surrounded by dusty dolls. Stacks of books and a handwritten journal were piled on a night table next to the white and pink poster bed with disheveled sheets.
Angela hadn't touched anything in here when she had slipped into the house for the first time, trying to escape the small mob of undead that pursued her. When she had stumbled upon the big house almost a year ago, she was relieved to see the exterior doors still intact.
Her original plan had been to hunker down here for a few days, heal from her twisted ankle, restore her stashes of food and medical supplies then go out to get Heidi back. But, after the choking sobs over the loss of her daughter had subsided a heavy blanket of depression had settled around her, obscuring her purpose, causing her to wonder what the fucking point would be.
The face of her late husband, Joshua, popped into her head and she couldn't fight the relentless tightness in her chest as the memory surfaced in her brain. The memory of him turning back for the bag of supplies that he had dropped. The supplies that had earned him a bite to the neck.
Caleb had quickly lifted his gun, tears streaking down his stoic face, and blew his father's head off before anyone could say anything. Her sweet 17-year-old boy whisked Heidi into his arms, tugging at his mother's shoulder, roughly pulling her along shouting to fucking run.
Angela was too stunned to do anything but follow his instructions and she did for months. In a daze she followed the lead of her son and daughter. She wondered how that had affected her children. Watching as she disappeared into a shell of herself, becoming a numb follower instead of the leader she should have been.
She had failed them both so epically by allowing herself to vanish into her grief. They had lost their father as well. What made her loss so much more profound that she was permitted to allow her babies to take care of her instead of the other way around?
The night Heidi was taken, Caleb had also been killed. Not by the undead. He'd been killed by the living when he tried to protect his mother and sister. When he'd lunged to grab Heidi back from those masked people they'd shot him in the chest.
They didn't even have the decency for a head shot.
Holding her son close as his life flowed out of him was so much harder than losing Joshua; she had no one to pull her from her stupor. Only herself. The task of ensuring her son didn't return as one of those unholy terrors took her last bit of sanity for a while.
A tickle on her face made her realize she'd started crying and she sighed. She hated when the dense fog of depression rolled back, and she felt feelings again. Remembering her family always did that. She decided to go downstairs to the kitchen to find something to eat.
Traps, barricades and snares littered the long hallway and staircase. It had been a force of habit to set them up rather than an act of self-preservation. Since her whole family was gone, she didn't really see the point of living anymore. At least, that's what she told herself. A small part of her, the part that still knew how to hope, told her she could always go find Heidi and rescue her from her kidnappers. But a bigger, more cynical part told her she couldn't do it on her own, or that Heidi was probably already dead or too traumatized to function anymore anyway. That part of her was always so much louder.
Angela ate her meager breakfast perched on the counter listening to the occasional moan from the zombies outside. She stared around the kitchen she had become so familiar with over the last year.
A family photo stuck to the fridge with a magnet shaped like a triangle of cheese, depicted two men kissing with what she assumed was their young daughter making a face just below their heads, the Eiffel Tower standing tall in the background. She had taken it down carefully and glanced at the back to see if anything was written there.
Aric, Darin, & Callie (10)
Paris 2032
Angela wondered what had happened to them. Were they shambling around somewhere or had they escaped that fate? Had they joined one of those communities? Was Callie growing up under one of those nutso dictator types or in one of the more equal, diplomatic societies? Were they enduring on the road?
When she could drag herself out from under her depression, when the fog rolled away, the feelings of loneliness and grief too close at hand, she would look at that picture and make up stories about them. In her head Joshua, Caleb, and Heidi were all still here and they were all friends. Aric and Darin loved spending time with her and Joshua. Bar-B-Q's, game nights, happy hours, all of this inside her head wore away a little at the absolute solitude Angela endured.
She had looked high and low for more photos of the family, hoping to make up more stories in an attempt to distract herself. But she found nothing, no family portraits hung on the walls or sat in frames on desks. There was a big empty spot on one of the bookcases in the family room and she wondered if that's where the family photos had been, if that's what Aric or Darin or Callie had grabbed before they left, hanging on to reminders of better times.
Tears pricked her eyes, and she sighed in annoyance as she pulled the plastic lid off a cup of mandarin oranges. She gave the fruit a sniff before she put one in her mouth. She'd gotten food poisoning on more than one occasion and while that particular affliction had been unpleasant before the zombie apocalypse it was decidedly worse after. Trying to keep quiet while your guts are violently evacuating is awful and staying hydrated was a huge challenge especially since she hadn't been prepared for the sickness.
The mandarins seemed fine but had a distinct taste of plastic having sat in their container for longer than intended. After breakfast, she downed a glass of water from her drinking supply and then peeked out a window again.
The cul-de-sac had cleared. Her stores were dangerously low again, something that happened often when she would fall into a depressive episode. Since she could at least function today she thought she ought to go out and replenish them.
After cleaning up in the kitchen Angela moved silently back upstairs to get ready. To leave the house she usually wore black motorcycle pants, a motorcycle jacket, and Kevlar gloves. Goggles, a gaiter scarf and a weather dependent hat on her head. Her dirty blonde hair was short, so it easily tucked into her hat and scarf.
These things where not fool proof as Joshua's death had illustrated, but it was better than regular street clothes and looked more intimidating, hiding her feminine features, making her less of a target for the living who might want to take advantage. The tough fabric of the pants and jacket would slow a zombie down, giving her enough time to get away... in theory. Another image of Joshua flashed into her mind again and her eyes pricked.
She swiped at them angrily, wrestling the memory back into its tiny compartment in the back of her mind. After pulling in a deep breath, she slipped her crossbow over her head and holstered her handgun. She rolled two shopping bags tight and slipped them into her hip pack, before lowering her goggles over her eyes.
Each house in the surrounding neighborhood had been carefully searched for supplies, so Angela had started making longer trips to stores in the area to find food in the last couple of months. The closest one was a twenty-minute walk. The biggest one was a good forty minutes away on foot and probably crawling with undead. She always brought extra arrows of course, but she hated to use them to clear out huge places that were likely to get overrun again. Why waste her energy? Why risk it?
She sighed as she pondered those questions. Since her family was gone, husband and son dead, daughter abducted, she wondered if the energy and risk didn't really matter. After all, she was totally, utterly alone.
The door to a small convenience store stood open. There were two zombies milling around that Angela could see. She shook her head to clear it a bit, then aimed her crossbow and took down the zombies. She waited another moment to see if any others appeared.
When none showed, she retrieved her arrows wiping the tips on the undead's filthy tattered remains of clothing. These were old ones, and she wrinkled her nose at their leathery appearance; skin pulled tight over bones, bald heads and sunken eyes. She shuddered and turned away from them quickly.
Angela managed to find a few things to replenish her stashes, but the small store was rather picked over. She ventured farther down the road to a drug store where she took down five undead with her arrows. She ignored a flyer tacked up on the wall. It flapped briefly at her passing, boasting safety and security.
