Amazombia

Chapter 16.

  In the morning Dena and I do some quick fishing. I send off the bird with a note, “Heading east.”

  Sleeping on things last night, gets me to thinking. My boss doesn’t need to know that George was killed. I can’t say with any certainty that he was killed, can you? All we know is I woke up, and his body was gone. Now, if he was killed, he would have turned into a zombie and ate me right away. It’s not like zombies have courtesy to wake you up before chowing down. I’m going to try to stay free as long as I can, at least until we get to the village.

  We pack up the canoe with the gas and oil, a few well-made bowls, and this old dress of the mother's that Dena insists will be worth a lot if we need to sell it. Unfortunately for you, dear reader, we don't have time to do the back and forth translating as we did the past few days, so it's back to a lot of pointing, gesturing, grunting and aggravation between the young girl and me. The universal language of the teenager is a sullen face, mad at self-contrived nonsense.

  Take the dress, for example. Clearly, it merely has sentimental value to the girl. For all I know, it could be her mother's wedding dress. Also, the swelling has subsided quite a bit in her face, and sure enough, beautiful girl. And even with the family getting hacked up and her left for dead, it still doesn't kill the spirit that lives in all teenagers: angst against the world.

  She does no rowing. All. Day. Long. I even stop rowing (we got two good paddles from her dad's rowboat...why waste them on two zombie torsos, anyway?). I stop rowing, wondering if she will get her paddle wet to avoid drifting into some low hanging thorny bushes. Nope. She starts yelling in gibberish, and at the last second, I have to row to avoid her from getting scratched up. I put her in the front, as we all know, whoever sits in back works half as much when rowing a canoe. Yet I'm doing all the rowing, so it's a very slow going affair making our way downstream.

  Cayman start appearing, little mini crocodiles. I used to lick my chops whenever I would see these things, but now, I've lost my appetite. I'm also more aware of my body odor. Like a young boy emerging from boyhood into puberty, I feel the need to keep up appearances.

  I'm also very nervous. It has been so long since I've had to think for myself, act on my own behalf. It’s a little nerve wracking. I'm doing all the work, which basically means the river will carry us to our destination with a minimal amount of steering on my part.

  I daydream.