Free Get Off My L@wn - A Zombie Novel by Perry Kivolowitz Page B

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(for drinking). I joined Ruth Ann on the roof. I gently swept a thin film of
dust off the solar panels then checked their connections and mountings. While
doing that I looked around for where I might put a WIFI access point to extend
our range outside the house.
    Ruth Ann and I took a good look at the Boetche’s
house and agreed that the top of their garage would be the best place to put
the IR emitter. Unlike our garage which was tucked under our master bedroom,
the Boetche’s garage was semidetached. We’d need only a one story ladder which
we already had.
    For a while we looked at Flynn’s house through
our binoculars. There was a tree line beyond his house and a lot of space which
we could not see. The house looked untouched. There was no reason to think
otherwise. The group of creatures that passed through the other day left only
the two stragglers Ruth Ann had killed so far as we could see.
    We decided to visit Flynn’s house first before
putting up the IR emitter. We’d been close to Boetche’s already and knew what
we could see from our house was still clear. We decided we’d go alongside the
Boetche’s house and peek around front. This would give us a look up their
street towards Flynn’s at what we couldn’t see from here.
    We took along a crowbar and some duct tape to
help with getting inside Flynn’s. We armed ourselves as we did the day before
with the exception of Ruth Ann’s hatchet, which was still where she dropped it.
We folded up a plastic garbage bag and put it into a backpack along with
flashlights and some nitrile gloves. On the way back from Flynn’s we planned to
retrieve the hatchet and arrow left between our house and the Boetche’s.
    We made it to Boetche’s house without incident.
I got a look at the monsters Ruth Ann had dispatched the previous day.
Continuing past them quickly was the only thing that saved me from retching
from the sight and smell. We hugged the side of the house and stopped to regain
our breath. We listened. Hearing nothing we inched to the front corner of the
house. Peaking around, we could see the front of Flynn’s house to the north.
All was quiet. We stayed there to watch and listen for ten minutes anyway. This
sort of slow movement with stops for watching and listening (and sniffing) was
recommended in several of the zombie apocalypse survival guides we read. This
advice was spot on.
    We went back around the rear of the Boetche’s
house to head over to the Flynn’s through their backyards. Staying in both
house’s backyards minimized the time we’d be exposed to ground we hadn’t
watched closely over the past month.
    We reached the edge of the tall wild grass
opening up to the Flynn house. Their raised deck was ahead of us, entering
their second floor. The Flynn’s stored their grill and other fair weather
equipment under the deck.
    I motioned to Ruth Ann to pause. We crouched
down and watched. Something was swaying in the breeze in the shadows under of
the deck. Except just then there was no breeze. Ruth Ann readied her bow. We
crept closer.
          We could see it now. What had apparently
been a woman in a smart bloodstained suit rocked slowly back and forth shifting
her weight from leg to leg. She had immense ugly slashes across what may once
have been an attractive face. It appeared her throat had been ripped out. We
heard it rasp, forcing air into its chest in an effort to bellow at us. As it
started in our direction it tried to snarl but all that came out was hiss. Ruth
Ann put her projectile through the thing’s forehead at its hairline. The force
of the impact snapped the top of the creature’s skull clean off. It staggered
but didn’t stop. It closed the distance between us quickly again putting to a
lie the claim our zombies were “slow.” Ruth Ann notched another arrow and
loosed it through the creature’s gaping mouth. It dropped.
    “Shot too high,” Ruth Ann whispered. We remained
crouched in the tall grass watching