CHAPTER FOUR
My eyes opened.
The room looked different.
It seemed somewhat colorless or something.
All those shoeboxes lining the walls: Less depth to them – something. They didn’t seem so much “there”. They seemed, odd. Almost two-dimensional. That’s so weird – maybe my vision didn’t fully recover from my fits.
What about the zombie? I wondered calmly. I looked around with my funny vision. He was nowhere around. He was gone.
What about my leg?
The blood was dry. My wound – I didn’t feel it. I pawed at it – my arm felt really stiff, and my fingers and hand practically didn’t have any dexterity to them. But I was able to paw my wound. I didn’t feel anything there. No pain. No touch – but I felt the pressure of my hand.
I looked at my hand. It was very pale. I turned my hand over to see the back of it. Very, very pale. And thinner, and somewhat sinewy. Stronger.
I rolled over onto my stomach. I uttered a weird sort of snort, in the exertion. But at the same time, I didn’t feel like I exerted energy whatsoever, like I didn’t even have to catch my breath moving my entire body.
Catch my breath – I wasn’t breathing!
I tried to breathe in air. I couldn’t. I sniffed and snorted and growled – I couldn’t control the noises.
I stopped trying to breathe for a second – like I was trying to hold my breath but I didn’t feel like I was losing oxygen.
But In ceasing my effort to breathe, I also stopped making sniffing and snorting noises. That was good. So I just didn’t continue trying to breathe.
I stood up. I felt unbalanced. I staggered slightly to catch my balance. But that didn’t help much. I was still swaying slightly.
I looked around. I was still alone.
And I should be afraid – but I wasn’t. I knew there was a zombie around, and my mind calculated with the concern, yet my body didn’t register it. It was unusual.
I went to walk out of the shoe store. But there was no easy stride in my legs. They felt stiff. So I sort of staggered in the direction instead. My leg was pretty wounded…
I craned my spine and neck to look upward. The two-dimensional version of the world (I still was seeing this way) looked odd. I was seeing out of both eyes but had no depth perception at all. I had to calculate the distance of the mall’s glass atrium ceiling by observing it’s size and guessing off of that. I raised my hand upward to touch it. It looked like it could have been so close. This vision was unusual.
And through it was my dullened interpretation of the darkening sky.
I had been in the mall for almost the entire day. I was out for a long time.
I went to run my hands through my hair, which is a nervous habit. My arms jerked and bent upward, revealing the pallor skin that my arms had. The palms of my crooked hands slammed against my forehead, giving no pain and hardly any sensation. My fingers clawed into my bushy feeling hair and I almost tore it out of my head. I made my hands let go before I scalped myself.
I looked at my arms – my palor arms – and then lowered them to my sides, making an effort to control their motion smoothly.
What was wrong with me?
Maybe I lost so much blood. I’ve never been hurt this bad before, and never bled that much. I should get to a hospital!
I had to leave the mall, I decided. I snorted unintentionally, and made my way down the mall atrium, in an uneven, not perfectly straight walk.
I reached the mall door. I made my stiff hands grab its handle. I pulled at the handle forcibly. The glass door squeaked from the effort, but did not give way. It was locked.
I tried to swear at the door – but I ended up emitting a sort of man-bark.
I startled myself, but again, only in my mind. My body was calm. Wired-feelling, but unresponsive.
Why can’t I speak? I even went to utter this out loud to myself. But all that came out was a choppy series of grunts ending with a snort.
Something was really wrong.
I became anxious. I was in a dark empty mall, and for all I knew a zombie was still in there. And it bit me.
It bit me. I just remembered.
I didn’t want to think anything past that thought.
I turned my body around – an ungraceful lurching movement – and galloped toward the bathroom, through the dark mall.
Although it was so dark, I still registered things around me quite well, in my trippy two-dimensional aspect.
I turned into the bathroom.
The zombie was there.
He was by the far wall. I saw him notice me. I stumbled to a stop, looking at him. He looked back, but only briefly. He heaved and snorted and reeled toward the bathroom stalls. I stood there watching him. He had seen me, but left me alone. Incredulous, I ignored him, too.
I stumbled over to the bathroom mirror, and my waste hit the sink, causing no pain. But the blow caused me to bend over the sink and become face to face with the horrible image of myself in the mirror.
My eyes. The iris and pupils were pale like death. I had black circles under them, against a pallid skinned face. Deep lines had formed around my eyes. My hair crowning me was no longer fresh and alive; it appeared tangled and dry. My lips were pale and cracked. I looked really sick. Or dead.
I looked like a zombie.
Shocked, I yelled at myself – a strangled, throaty roar. What the hell happened to me!?
This couldn’t be. I couldn’t be a zombie. I still had my mind. I still had my will. I knew who I was. I am Alex Henry. I have a dad, and a brother named Eric. I glared at my unalive eyes in the mirror. I am Alex Henry!
I reached my hand to my face. My sense of touch was greatly reduced, but I felt the stiff dryness of my facial skin.
I touched my mouth with my hands. My were no longer soft. They were cracked and rubbery.
I touched the mirror – I don’t know why. I touched my face in the mirror, to see if this was real.
Still, this couldn’t be.
But reality slowly sunk in. Slowly, but it did sink in. Yes, I had changed into something horrific. I would never be the same. And somehow I maintained my mind. I mean, zombies don’t maintain their mind. They just don’t. They are basically ex-human animals.
The thought was terrifying. But my body was abuzz with undying energy, yet I guess without active adrenals or emotional response of any sort: fear did not make me pale (any further). I did not lose my breath. I did not risk any symptoms of an epileptic fit. I just stood there, staring at myself, taking myself in.
I am a zombie.