I don't even know how to feel about it at the end. I was having very weird dreams that led to writing this.
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It had been a full night and most of a day since we'd been trapped in the basement of my mother's house. There was one door leading up and out and bars over windows to small to escape from.
We had to barricade our one escape route to keep my mother and sister out.
"I don't know long we'll be able to stay here." Leave it to my little brother to state the obvious.
"I know. But what else can we do?"
"I don't know."
I shouldn't have come here. He called me and asked me to come check on our mother and sister. They'd come home from a shipping trip with a fever that put them both down in bed with a vengeance.
"They're not responsive. I know you're busy, but I want to know if you think I should take them to a doctor."
Without observing them firsthand I could tell they needed to see a doctor, but I think my little brother needed me more than they did. I could hear it in his voice. It was long after I came over that everything went to hell. Whatever infection they'd contracted gave them a bloodlust that made them kill our middle brother and forced us to take refuge in the basement with our five-year-old sister.
And for the last twelve hours we'd been left through a sleepless night, trying to come up with a plan in an unfinished basement with a constant banging and rattling on the door. We knew the gurgling and screaming was what was left of our loved ones, but that only made it that much more unsettling.
What had happened had gone down so fast that I'm not even clear about what did happen. I know if I had to do it all again, I certainly wouldn't have left my cell phone in the car. There were no means of communication in the basement, in or our. No TV. No phone. Nothing. We had no way of knowing how widespread this was, I had no idea how to call my wife and children to make sure they were okay, I had no way to do much of anything.
My best guess was that this fever hit a lot of people, otherwise my wife would have sent the police here to bail us out. But who knows.
On the plus side, we had plenty of food and water if it came to that. The food storage and water heater were secure in the basement. My mind had come up with plenty of long term survival ideas (for example, we could cook with an open flame on the concrete floor as long as we were careful and the windows were cracked to let out the smoke), but I wanted to get out of there as soon as I possibly could.
I also had a hatchet. It was a holdover from a campout my Dad had taken us on when he was still around. It was rusted and had spent the last two decades in a tool box next to the furnace.
The hardest part was reassuring Leigh, our little sister, that everything was going to be okay. Thankfully, she was sleeping at the moment. The time she was awake was spent going through boxes of old family photos and wondering out loud what had happened to her mother.
Anthony checked Leigh once more and put a blanket on her, an old cotton one from my childhood with E.T. and Elliot on it. Then he came over to me, sitting down and wondering aloud what we were ever going to do.
"You know what we have to do."
"You really think no one's coming?"
"I have no idea. But I'm sure someone would have come by now."
"It's only been since yesterday."
"I know. I think if anyone was coming it would have happened by now."
"Then why are we still here?"
"I don't know. I'm going crazy. I haven't even talked to Jenny or the kids since before I came here, since before all this..."
"You really think this is happening everywhere?"
"I can't think of any other reason we haven't been bailed out of this."
"And you really think...?"
"Yes, Tony. I do. Will you stop asking me fucking questions? You've seen as many movies that start just like this as I have."
"So you don't think there's another way?"
"No."
"I can't do it."
"And you think I can?"
We'd had the same argument over and over again for the last few hours. He couldn't do what needed to happen. Obviously Leigh couldn't. And if I ever wanted to get to my wife and children again and have my remaining siblings survive, I was going have to do it myself. I would have to bludgeon what was left of my mother and sister to death with a dull hatchet.
I alternated between finding the resolve to do it and wanting to wait it out because I wasn't sure if I was capable of the violence that the situation required.
"How long do you think they'll keep on that door?"
"I don't know, Anthony. I have no idea. I have no answers. You know as much as I do."
On cue, the scratching at the door grew louder. I looked up the stairway and tried to remember times I had down here that were less horrific...
...Reading a comic book atop that old bean bag, only to be interrupted for my mother's call to dinner...
...Skipping school with friends and sneaking down here to play Mario Kart on the old big screen we used to have down here...
Perhaps the most poignant and sweet memory of this basement was sneaking down here with my wife before we were married and making love, silently in the dark.
All of those memories and a hundred more would be shattered into tiny pieces. After the end of this ordeal, all of it would be eclipsed by this terror. It would turn all of my memories here into a horror film.
In the end, it wouldn't be a choice at all. If I wanted to get my brother and baby sister out of this, if I ever wanted to see my wife and infant children again, I would have to find the strength.
Never in my wildest imagination did I ever dream that my life would depend on my ability to warm up to the idea of chopping my beloved mother and little sister into hamburger with an axe.
"And you won't?"
Vehemently, Anthony shook his head. He was always much more of a momma's boy than I was. It was no surprise that he'd leave me to do the dirty work.
It was then that the scratching at the door stopped. Anthony and I shared a scared look and listened hard to find a clue as to what was going on.
"Maybe they collapsed," Anthony whispered to me.
I shrugged.
Knowing full well he wouldn't volunteer and forcing him would be the same as sending him to his death, I hefted the hatchet, taking on the responsibility myself. "I'll go first. You grab Leigh and stay close behind. If there's a problem, I'll take care of it, but you get to my car."
I handed him the keys.
"Okay."
"You get her in the car and you wait for me."
He seemed in shock.
"Anthony?"
He took a breath and finally nodded his head in the affirmative. I could only imagine what was running through his mind. None of it was pretty.
"It's just like that game we used to play with the NERF guns."
Anthony scooped Leigh up in his arms, stirring her awake. "What's going on?"
I kissed her on the forehead, "We're leaving, sweetie."
Looking down, I considered the axe in my hand and looked back to Leigh, and then to Anthony, "You keep her eyes covered."
He nodded again.
"We have everything we need?"
Once more he nodded.
I paused to give them both a hug, both to bolster their strength and mine.
With that, I took the lead, creeping slowly up the stairs as quietly as possible, Leigh heavy Anthony's arms behind me doing the same.
As quietly as I could, I pulled the boards we'd used to barricade the door and lay them down on the stairs. Each squeak and squawk of a nail or the wood giving made my hair raise, my teeth clench, and my blood boil. Once the boards were removed, I delicately put my ear to the door, trying hard to hear what might be happening on the other side.
It was of no use.
We'd be going into this situation blind. How could we be sure our family members were still even out there? What if some other band of wandering undead stumbled into our house and...and...?
I was grasping at straws. I didn't want my mother or my sister to be out there. It was just wishful thinking. If it were strangers behind that door, there wouldn't be any issue and my heart would not be so heavy. Bludgeoning an anonymous zombie would be infinitely easier than what I was likely to face.
Behind the door was dark. It was twilight outside and the different swaths of orange and blue light painted the living room with an eerie glow. The only thing more unsettling than the light was the lack of sound. It was as though the world was on mute.
Anthony crept up behind me, Leigh in his arms, staying close.
Step after careful step we came out into a room we'd both spent too much time in, watching television, playing games, spending family time together... But now everything was dead quiet.
I knew there was something wrong when I felt my foot slip beneath me. I'd stepped into a puddle of thick tar that I realized was a collection of infected, coagulated blood the color of midnight. Reducing my voice to a whisper, I pointed down at the mess and told Anthony to watch out.
Leading away from the sludge was a trail of the dark liquid, heading in the direction of the front door. "I think they're gone. Let's get to the car."
Each step we took toward the door doubled the anxiety welling in my stomach. Every bit of me wanted to cry and be done with all of this all at the same time.
At long last, we reached the threshold of the front door and I turned the knob, pulling the door open.
The car was there, just like I'd left it, but that didn't matter because there was a horrible screeching and gurgling coming from the kitchen and heading our way fast...
I shoved Anthony and Leigh out the door toward the car, shoving the keys into his hands. "Go!"
Sending him on his way, I turned around and blocked the doorway with my body. What was left of my mother and sister wouldn't get what was left of my family without killing me to do it.
Seeing them was harder than I thought it would be. Huge chunks of their hair was missing, their mouths were oozing the thick blood like drool. I couldn't be sure if it was their blood or if they'd eaten some other rotted thing. They limped and hobbled toward me just like you'd expect them to. Their eyes were a pale, milky white all the way through and all the love they once held were gone.
Their pace quickened and the noises they made grew louder. It was low in the throat, like the growl of a cat.
I decided I didn't want to be around for much longer so I made a dash for the car.
Anthony had made it inside with Leigh, but had locked the doors. I pulled up on the handle at the same time he tried unlocking the door for me twice in a row, dooming me to my fate.
"Open the fucking door!"
But the cat growling had grown into screeching and they were on directly behind me. I couldn't open the door to the car while they were this close and risk exposing the others.
The axe must have weighed a hundred pounds at that moment.
Knowing I had to do it, I tried to banish every thought of love and caring I'd ever had for my mother and sister. My only chance was to summon every ounce of hate and loathing that I could muster.
But I loved them. Hate and loathing weren't something I had just laying around for these people.
By this time I'm sure I must have been crying like a baby.
The blade went into my sister's temple and all I could think of was all the times she tattled on me as a child, but it wasn't good enough.
I needed something worse than that.
My sister fell backward and it was my mother's turn.
Her hands were raised, coming for me, I tried to dodge and the hatchet connected with her neck limply. The rage I could muster was in trade for all the times I'd been grounded.
But it wasn't enough.
Her forward momentum brought her into the car where Leigh was seeing this, shrieking and crying like any five year old in this situation would be expected to do. Anthony tried his hardest to shush her and cover her eyes, but she was hysterical.
I found the anger to finish my sister by the fury of what I'd been forced to do. I connected the full force of the axe into her forehead, cleaving her head in two. She dropped to the ground, down for the count. I hoped, anyway.
My mother and I turned for each other.
And I hit her with every bit of hurt I could muster for every embarrassment I ever suffered at her hands.
But she still kept at me.
Once more I hit her. In the bloody, flailing arm, I got her. This time, it was with the anguish I felt when I thought of losing her.
But it wasn't enough.
I hard to reach. Deep down. There was something still holding me back, but then it came... Like a flood, washing over me, letting it all go.
I hit her with the pain I felt every time I watched her do nothing when my father would attack me senselessly, viciously, before she left him.
With the force of every injury she ever watched him inflict upon me I smashed the axe through her. And again. And again and again and again.
I was a wild animal. A caged jungle cat who'd finally been let free and lashed out at the keeper keeping him.
It wasn't until I looked up to see Anthony and Leigh crying, still locked in the car that I thought to stop. My hands were covered in the thick tar to my forearms and my face was bleeding tears.
"I'm sorry," I said aloud, softly. "I'm sorry."
Like a fool, I dropped the axe and was finally able to get into the car.
Leigh crawled into my lap. I held her and we cried and cried and cried.
It would have been an understatement to say that this might have been the worst day of my life. But things would get better as soon as I found my wife and children safe...
They'd have to, right?
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