Amazombia

  Chapter 15.

  I turn my head towards the noise. Very human sounding, like a young girl. I look towards the bed area, I hear the whimper again.

  I get up and head into the shack and stand very still, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. There is soft crying.

  "I'm not going to hurt you, I'm an amigo," I say to the form hiding by the beds.

  I peer into the corner of the shack and see a girl, about fifteen, huddled in a corner, trying to crawl into herself.

  I pat my chest gently. "Amigo, amigo," I say. She only cowers lower into the ground.

  I slowly walk outside back onto the front landing. Actions speak louder than words. I look around for some fishing lines. Sure enough, secured to one of the bamboo pole struts are a fishing line, and a net, and a whole bunch of ropes with white foam buoys attached to more netting. I take my chances with the fishing line, and in no time, catch a pacu. It looks just like a piranha, but the only difference is they don't try to bite your fingers off when you retrieve the hook.

  I start making a fire in the back near a blackened area that I can only assume is the cooking area near the lean to. The zombie child and the zombie father wiggle and squirm helplessly. I don't want to kill them, but the sight of them will probably upset the young lady inside, so I do the next best thing.

  I carefully drag each one by their stumps down towards the front of the shack. There is a small rowboat tied to an even smaller dock, along with cans of gas, oil, oily rags. The rowboat has no motor. I'm puzzled. I put each zombie carefully in the boat and send them on their way. The current of the river drifts them downstream, around a corner, and out of sight.

  The fire is crackling pretty good, so I kick some coals off to one side. I gut the fish, and for the longest time, don't feel like eating fish entrails. It's almost like I'm a free man. I indulge the thought of being free, however short and elusive the feeling may be. Today, I will eat fish. I wrap the fish in some banana leaves, and while doing so grab a few ripe bananas. I throw the fish on the coals, and leave a trail of bananas leading from the side door out towards the fire and wait.

  The girl comes out, she's a bloody mess. Her face is beaten to the point that she looks like a freakish monster. A human caricature. Eyes puffy, nose twisted, lips swollen, black and blue. She's missing some front teeth, and she's got ligature marks around her throat. She has been left for dead but refused to die. And she's timid, very timid. She gingerly eats a banana, and has difficulty swallowing. I offer her a soda bottle filled with fresh river water by yours truly. She nods her head and drinks.

  I pat my chest and tell her my name. She tells me hers: Dena. I go to get up to shake her hand and she runs off into the shack screaming bloody murder. So the first night, I eat the fish myself. The second day, same routine. Only this time I don't move when she comes out to eat. I leave her half a fish by the side door. I do this for three more days.

  On the fourth day, when I see zero progress being made earning the trust of this girl, I say, "Screw it." I go inside and grab the two language books. She starts shrieking in some native language, "icky bicky booey tooga" or some other nonsense. To lighten the load on you and me, I'll surmise what I did, and how she and I conversed.

  It turns out she speaks a mixture of Portuguese, French, and her native tongue. So I would find the word in the English to French dictionary, point it out to her, she would look it up in her French to Portuguese dictionary, and we talked. I kept good notes, and fortunately for you, there won't be any of that bizarre dialect you endured earlier with me and George.

  "OK, miss," I say, "By now you can see that I'm not here to hurt you. I'm at a point where I'm really ready to go on my way, but before I go, do you think you want to tell me what happened to you here?"

  She has a bit of trepidation, but the language barrier being broken, she gushes out her story in her slurry Portuguese.

  "My mother was killed two seasons ago. It was by the same man who killed my brother and father just a few days ago. The man had a scar, a white eye."

  "Yeah, one of the slave traders?"

  "Yes. They also use this river to run their drugs up north, I think. I don't really know. It's only what I heard when I was in school. My parents would tell my brother and me to be wary whenever we traveled down to the village for school after harvest. Of course we knew to look out for zombies, but who they told us to be aware of was much, much worse."

  "When my mother was alive, I was walking with my boyfriend, my mother allowed it. My father didn't approve of the boy. He said I should wait until I was fourteen."

  "So you're fifteen, miss? I have a daughter about your age," I tell her.

  She continues, "Anyway. That summer I fell in love. My boyfriend was from a good family in the village. He treated me with respect. One day he asked to follow me and my brother home to school so that he could get my father's approval."

  "Approval for what?"

  "Marriage, of course." She rolls her eyes as I roll mine, and for a brief moment, I could see just how pretty she is, under all the disfigurement. I hope for her sake the swelling subsides. It will. The young bounce back fast.

  "As we are walking back, my boyfriend is teasing my brother. My brother swears at him. They get into a fight, and he wrestles my brother to the ground. My brother then runs off home crying. My boyfriend and I laugh. We enjoy our time alone. He tries to kiss me, I let him.“ She starts crying.

  I wait. I tear off a piece of my cape so she can wipe her bulgy eyes and blow her broken nose.

  "I stop him, and he's mad. He starts walking back to the village, and I am alone. I call after him, but he doesn't come back. I wait a little while, and I think I hear something in the trees above me, but then it's quiet. So I start walking back home alone."

  "I hear a noise again, like someone is following me. At first, I think it's my boyfriend. So I pretend not to notice, and I sing as I walk. I laugh after a time. I walk, staring straight ahead, when I hear footsteps behind me. When I stop, they stop. I turn around suddenly, laughing as I do. It's my boyfriend. He's standing there; he is wearing only a wide grin."

  "And he starts laughing too. I blush and yell at him, but I can't stop staring and laughing and I'm covering my mouth. He walks towards me, and I don't know what to do. I don't want to run. Then there's a crack of a gun behind my boyfriend, and he looks at me with this face. Such hurt, and he holds his stomach, and staggers. I start screaming. And there is another crack, and his face shatters. He falls into the dirt, motionless."

  "I'm crying hysterically. And through my tears, I see standing behind my boyfriend, this man. He had a white scar down his face.”

  “Same guy that passed through here just a little while ago, huh?”

  "Yes, he killed my boyfriend two years ago. My boyfriend got up, undead. He started coming towards me. Scarface shoots him dead for good, and then starts chasing me. I run home, crying. When I get there, my brother has told my mother how my boyfriend teased him. She starts beating me. Telling me I suck at school, I suck at chores; I'm a burden to the family."

  "While she's beating me I try to tell her what had happened, but she sends me down to the river to gather the fishing nets. I tell her that the man is outside, and she ignores me. I stand in the house, and she beats me, thrashes me. Finally, I am ready to die, so I go off to tend to the fishing nets. I wish to be a slave. I don’t care. My father is away, far down the river, he won't be back for a few days."

  "That night, I hear creeping outside. I want to tell my mother, but I don't. To hell with her, and my brother too. When my mother hears a bowl knocked down outside, she thinks it's a monkey, or the wind. She curses, and takes a flashlight outside. I hear a scuffle, and she tries to scream, but then she's quiet."

  "Maybe Scarface got her, I think, but I am half asleep. It all feels like a bad dream. When I wake up, I hear my father's boat coming up the river. I step on my brother; he's sleeping in my parents bed. He cries, and I tell him to shut up. I run out to the d
ock, and I tell my father what happened to my boyfriend."

  "He just chuckles, and tells me I need to wait before I can date. He never listens to me. I start crying, and go behind the house to see what my mother is cooking for breakfast. I see something really strange, that I have never seen before. It is just my mother's body and head. Her legs and arms have been cut off. I start screaming for my father. My little brother comes out, and he sees our mother. And he starts screaming, trying to put her arms and legs back on her body. My father comes running to see what is happening, and he sees mother on the ground. She's trying to bite my brother. My father yells at us to go inside the house. All I remember then is hearing his axe make very dull cuts, like he was chopping wet wood."

  I ask her, "You’re sure this is the same man that killed your family a few days ago?"

  "Yes, he couldn’t kill me, because…you know," she points to her lumpy face and I can see the hint of a tattoo, a series of dots run along her nose. I thought it was bad acne. Oh well. Anyway, one of the perks to being a slave is we’re property. Sure you can kill a slave, but most people don’t, because if they do, they have a lot of ‘splaining to do, Lucy.

  I remind her, "See? We got more in common than you think. You got maybe owners around here? Save us a lot of trouble.”

  "Downstream. Will you help me to avenge my family?"

  I sit and think, then tell her, "I am going downstream, you can come. This village can’t be too far from here, I understand. I was with a man who was sent to kill the leader of this village. Do you know the one?"

  "Of course, it is where I went to school. The village elder is the father of my boyfriend, and my owner. But why would you want to see him? Why would someone want to kill him?"

  "Let’s see. I’m on loan. My owner lives pretty far from here. The guy who I was loaned to got killed. If I’m caught out here with no definitive plans on getting back home, I’m screwed. You know how it is. Slave gobble-de-gook." (Strangely enough, the Portuguese language has an exact phrase for the English term gobble-de-gook, and is one of the few words that doesn't have to get translated from English to French to Portuguese).

  "The man with the scarred face was alone when he killed my brother and father."

  "Yeah, him and some amigos had some kind of falling out. I don't know what over, but maybe your owner might know. Either way, we’ll be safe so long as we have an excuse to be traipsing around the countryside with no owners, right?"

  "Right," she smiles.

  “So it’s settled. I drop you off at the village, and hopefully someone will escort me back home. You know, it’s funny. I remember what it’s like to be free, and part of me wants to stay free. I wish things was different.”