Dead of Night

The Dead Of Night

The first thing I noticed upon waking was that I was alone in bed. After nineteen years of marriage I could honestly count the number of times this had happenned on one hand. It was a sound that had awakened me, a soggy thump like someone dropping a wet towel on the floor. I had been having a nightmare and though I couldn't remember much of it, I will never forget those screams. Then came an irregular shuffling from down the hall, I knew the sound of all three of my family members' gaits and this was not one of ours. Momentarily frozen in place I listened as the stranger's footsteps drew near to my bedroom door, which was left ajar in case of something just like this. The footfalls stopped outside my room and I could see the door vanishing into shadow as it was opened silently. My paralysis broke and I snatched the 9mm automatic from under my mattress, racked one into the chamber, and said, " Stop, I have a gun." Through the now open door a stooped intruder entered my room and I squeezed off three shots at center mass, loosing my night vision to the blinding flash. I fumbled for the chain that would turn on my reading lamp.

There stood my wife of nearly two decades, who I had just shot three times. The two in her abdomen were spurting ribbons of intestine and foul smelling bile, the one in her chest was oozing thick black puss. It looked like it had gone right into the heart but she just stood there leaking all over our bedroom floor. Then I saw blood, not from the bullet wounds but on her hands, on her mouth and chin, spilled down the front of her ruined pajamas. And I saw her eyes, rolled back to show only bloodshot whites, and she began that stooped shamble again, coming forward blindly in that alien stride. "Stop baby." Little more than a whisper now, "Stop or I'll shoot." But she didn't stop and I shot, twice into her head. As she fell to the floor and grey matter dripped down the wall, tears wet my face. I wiped them away, that thing was not my wife and I had more important things to worry about than grief; namely the children. We had two and my teen-age son slept in the next room. At least I thought he was asleep at first, somehow spared from the night's horrors, then I noticed the blood dripping from his bed and pooling on the floor. I saw my beautiful boy lying there with his neck chewed almost all the way through, our dreams for his future now just memories. I had to shoot him in the head too, we all know the rules.

My daughter's room was empty, not unusual, she was in the habit of wandering downstairs in the middle of the night, falling asleep on the couch with her blankie and the family cat, Peaches. Surely I would find her there, sleeping peacefully, and we could escape this nightmare together. I forced myself to return to my bedroom for a pair of jeans, my bug-out bag, and the twelve guage Ghetto Blaster from the closet. Creeping down the stairs I felt numbly optimistic, the worst had to be behind me, and there was my little girl waiting near the bottom of the stairs, Peaches held to her chest. My relief was short lived though for she raised the cat to her mouth and took a big sloppy bite. My tears came freely now, my last hope gone, and the abominable act that had to follow clear as a bell in church. "It's gonna be ok honey," I choked out, "give daddy a hug." Stopped on the base of the steps I considered letting her come to me, embracing her as she bit deep with her baby teeth, instead I leveled the gun. If she bites me I will die or worse ran through my head as hers bumped into the barrel. I closed my eyes and pulled the trigger, dropped my gun and caught my daughter. For a moment I squeezed her tight and pretended everything was was back to normal, then she started shaking and gunsmoke burned my lungs. "I love you" I said and let her go.