“Once the truck leaves, we’ll have an open door policy.”
BT looked at me for a second, digesting the new information.
“I guess you didn’t think this out too well?” BT stated flatly. And then he did something completely unexpected. He busted out laughing. It was infectious. In between moans I was laughing too, tears streaming out of my eyes. I won’t lie, some were from the pain but most were from the sheer mad hatter laugh.
“What the fuck Mike?” Alex said so seriously. I burst out with a whole new round of gut splitting (bad example in light of recent events) laughter.
“Sorry, sorry.” I said grabbing on to my stomach to ease the spasming muscles. “Okay, I’m fine sorry.” Alex’ look of consternation set me off again. BT was literally prostrate on the floor slapping his hand down on the ground because he was laughing so hard. “Okay I’m better now.” I said through a huge grin that threatened to split my face in two, though some might consider that an improvement.
BT sat back up, wiping his broad forehead with his hand. “Whew. I think I’m done.” He looked over to me, I’m pretty sure the pathetic look on my face is what set him off again.” Riotous laughter exploded from BT, even the zombies stopped for a second.
After several long moments BT was able to finally string a question together. “Did you swallow some?” BT asked.
“Swallow what?” I asked innocently as the bile in my stomach churned.
“Talbot you have a piece of what looks like a liver on your chin.”
I absently wiped the incriminating evidence away, while also shuddering in revulsion.
“What happens if he eats a zombie, does he become one?” Eddy asked. One of the here to fore silent children.
Ah, precocious kids, don’t you just want to throw them up against a wall and see if they stick?
BT looked at me like I had the answer to Eddy’s query.
“How the fuck would I know.” I answered his unasked question.
“You’d probably have to have an ulcer or something so that the infection could get into your blood stream.” Joann stepped up and gave her educated guess.
“Well what of it, Talbot, you got any ulcers?” BT asked, with not a hint of his earlier merriment.
“Shit BT even if I did, do you think now would be the time for me to disclose that.”
BT didn’t know whether to shoot me or laugh his ass off again.
Tracy saved the day. “BT, he doesn’t give a shit enough about anything besides himself to develop an ulcer.”
That was all it took, BT’s threatening stance instantly turned back to laughter. I hoped Tracy and Joann were right and Eddy could go fuck himself. My stomach lurched under the strain of digesting the zombie’s unmentionables.
I was SO ready to let go again and join BT, although this trip down the rabbit hole might lead me to a rubber room. But let’s reason this out, if you are out-of-your mind insane in a sane world, then it is like algebra, you have a negative times a positive, so that makes it a negative. So far so good. Now if you are an off your rocker lunatic in a demented, deranged world, than you have a negative times a negative, which is a positive. I think I was on to something. It was like the old adage, if you can’t beat them, become as crazy as a fucking loon and enjoy the ride, or something along those lines.
BT had finished up his latest laugh-spell and was looking over to me while I was pondering the benefits of psychosis. “So what’s the plan Talbot?”
“Huh? Oh, what the hell makes you think I’ve got a plan?”
“I’ve known you for three weeks, Talbot. I haven’t seen you yet not have a plan, whether they are good or not, doesn’t matter you still always have one.”
“Fine but you’re not going to like it.”
“Does it involve me getting eaten by those ugly freaks?” He asked motioning with his head over to the door.
I spent the next minute laying out what I wanted to get done (it wasn’t much of a plan, so it didn’t require much narration).
“Yeah you’re right, I don’t like it.” BT moaned. He stood up preparing his body for the task at hand.
I looked up with an imploring expression.
“Really?” BT asked. I just kept staring. “Fine.”
BT got behind me and put his forearms under my armpits, he hefted me up no harder than if I was a ten pound bag of dog shit (which I felt like). My knees cracked like rifle shots as they flexed open. I took three or four shaky steps before my lower back finally decided to disengage its fusion from my ass.
“You’re a sight Mike.” Alex said.
“That’s what my wife says.” I answered as I placed my fist into my lower back hoping in vain to unloosen the sailor knot that most likely was going to be a perpetual fixture in my ever widening list of painful areas.
“Don’t flatter yourself.” Tracy threw in for good measure. She rubbed the sore spot as best she could, but this was going to take a team of Sven’s (Swedish masseuses) working around the clock a couple of years to fix.
“Dad, you alright?” Nicole asked coming up to my side and hugging me. Although I think she was more coming up to make sure I didn’t fall over. To confirm my suspicion, she whispered into my ear. “You can lean on me.”
“It’s tolerable.” I lied. She knew. Funny how parents want to protect their kids even when the truth is right there in front of God and everyone.
“Talbot, come on man. I want to get this over with.” BT begrudged from across the room. Alex nodded in agreement.
“Dad?” Coley asked. The concern was etched deeply in her small features.
“I’m fine.” I answered, doing the best I could to make my shuffling walk look like a cockneyed strut. And trying to make my scowl of ache, look like the traditional happy go lucky smile I generally walked around with. If the entire world’s a stage, and we are merely players, I would never earn an Emmy for my performance that day.
“Alex you ready?” A superfluous question, but one that needed asking anyway. The poor guy was sweating profusely from the mountain of clothing that he was wearing. Well that and the fact that he was about to make a dash through a throng of hungry meat-eaters. He looked at me like I was fucking nuts. ‘Ah so my plan was working already. Lithium here I come!’
“In or out?” BT asked.
Sarcasm is going to get me killed sooner rather than later. “What’s that your sex ed book?”
BT wasn’t nearly as close to his slap happy mood as he had been a few minutes previous.
“The bars Talbot, what do you want me to do with them?”
“In.” I said solemnly.
“I knew it, two feet to get it out the door, six feet to get it back in.”
“I’m just trying to ascertain that you are truly involved with the synergy of this colossal undertaking. It’s going to be a team effort, something in which we are all going to have to pull together and think outside of….”
“Fucken stop, Talbot.” BT pleaded. “I was a Project Manager before I decided to de-stress my life. Zombies I can handle. Corporate speak bullshit, well that’s a different matter. I swore that if I ever had to listen to one more suit and tie or dog and pony conference call I was going to go postal.”
“Did you know that’s a misnomer, for the amount of the workforce, the percentage of violence in the post office is actually below that of the national average for workplace violence.”
“What’s the percentage in sheriff offices?”
I got the point.
I stood at the door, plumes of human exhaust issued forth from my mouth, I watched as zombies pressed into our make shift walkway from both sides. Their arms nearly met in the middle, it was not going to be a fun walk for Alex. I shivered at the thought of all those germ infested hands reaching out and touching someone, hopefully not me.