25th May, 2.50pm

I know there’s never a good day to be held hostage, but when it’s as beautiful outside as it is today it sucks even more. It’s been hot and sunny for the last few days. I’d got used to it being cold – winter went on for so long. I wish I’d enjoyed last summer a bit more now. Before zombies and psychos went and spoilt everything for the rest of us. I didn’t, of course, not only because the weather was crappy, but I was getting over my last boyfriend, Lewis. It wasn’t a case of full-blown-broken-heart – we’d had a good year together and had just out grown each other – but I still had a rough time adjusting to single life. I stayed in my bedroom a lot, listened to music and generally moped, and missed what little sun there was. Whenever Jake burst into my room, wanting me to play with him, I’d scream at him to, ‘Get lost, you little creep!’ His games usually involved him dressing up as Spider-man and me pretending to be Poison Ivy, or – when Jake’s whining wore me down – Doc Ock (I used to tie two scarves around my waist for Doc Ock's arms – tentacles ... whatever). The last thing I wanted to do last summer was dress up like Doc Ock. I wasn’t to know …

25th May, 1.20pm

This morning, once we’d been let out of our room by Eddie, I trudged down to the kitchen with the others to see how much food, if anything, we’d been left for breakfast. But there wasn’t any food on the kitchen table, not even the remains of our new house mates’ meal for us to pick over. Instead, four glass bottles filled with clear liquid, a rag poking out the top of each, stood on the kitchen table where Trent, Caine and Misfit sat. Petrol bombs. Marvellous. When I ask what they were for, Caine replied, ‘Hmm, for some fun and games, sweetheart.’ He looked me right in the eye – in a deep and penetrating manner that made me feel naked. Eddie, who leaned against the kitchen work surface, and Trent laughed at Caine’s words, but – as always – Misfit looked down to his tattooed hands and appeared to be as impressed by Caine’s remark as a Goth is with National Laughter Day.

I looked at Misfit, concentrating on his hands, and managed to work out what’s written across his knuckles – Life Lost in Gothic style script. I couldn’t help wondering, did he get that tattooed before the zombie outbreak, like some kind of indelible portent?

‘He’s got seven piercings,’ said Caine, interrupting my thought.

I turned to Caine. ‘What?’ I asked him.

‘Seven piercings, haven't you Misfit? One in each ear, one in his lip and one in each nipple.’ Caine yanked up Misfit’s grubby, torn and faded black t-shirt and revealed a pierced nipple. Misfit batted Caine's hand away. ‘That makes five,’ Caine continued. ‘So, guess where the other two are … Ask him nicely, I’m sure he’ll give you a private viewing.’ Caine laughed, a hand on the nuzzle of the shotgun propped up against the side of the table. ‘Won’t you, Misfit? You’ll give her a private viewing.’ Caine gave Misfit a playful punch on the shoulder. ‘Bet she’d be well up for it. Wouldn’t you, sweetheart,’ he said to me. ‘Ever been with a guy with –’

‘Leave her alone, Caine!’ I was surprised that the words of warning came not from Sam, who stood beside me, but from Misfit. I’d barely heard him speak since they’d arrived, now here he was sticking up for me. Caine turned his icy blue eyes on him, and was about to say something when Sam took a stride towards the table, loomed over Caine and said, ‘Don’t. Ever. Say. Anything. Like. That. To. Her. Again.’

Caine picked up the shotgun, while Trent put a hand to Kay’s axe on the table in front of him. Everyone looked at Caine. He placed the shotgun across his lap. ‘Sorry, Pretty Boy. Didn’t mean to step on your toes. I know she’s your bird, but no harm in having options, hey?’ He said, sitting forwards and slapping Sam on the back. ‘No hard feelings, eh?’ Caine stood up. ‘And Misfit, clear this shit up,’ he said nodding down to the table littered with a ripped up beige cotton summer dress, a funnel and a petrol can amongst other things. ‘And then organise some breakfast, you little fuck. I’m starving.’ Caine picked up two of the petrol bombs, while Trent stood and picked up the other two. They strutted across the kitchen and placed the petrol bombs on the work surface, near the sink.

Caine leaned back against the sink and pulled a packet of cigarettes and a lighter from his pocket. He tapped a cigarette out of the packet, place it in his mouth and lit it, all the time looking at me – in that way that made me feel naked – smirking. Misfit swept his arm across the table, knocking everything other than the petrol can onto the floor. He looked at Caine to gauge a reaction. Caine ignored him.

‘Get your own breakfast,’ said Misfit. He stood, pushed his chair with the backs of his legs so that it fell backwards and hit the tiles with a crack, and stomped out of the kitchen. I expected him to slam the kitchen door behind him in true stroppy teenager stylee, but he didn’t. Caine didn’t react to Misfit’s tantrum. Just kept staring at me.

18th May, 2.45pm

Caine put a finger to his lips and stepped back behind the half open kitchen door. I could still see him but he would be hidden from Sam’s view. Caine pointed the shotgun at my head and nodded to me. I knew what that nod meant: Act natural, sweetheart.

I stood with my back to the other three guys at the kitchen table and stared out of the kitchen, down the hallway. Sam came into view on the staircase. ‘You ok, Sophie?’ he asked as he descended the last few steps. He walked along the hallway with a strange expression on his face, and I realised that I must have looked crazy – just standing in the kitchen, eyes wild, brain wondering what words it might safely let slip from my gaping mouth.

‘Sam …’ was as far as I could get.

Sam crossed the threshold into the kitchen. His gaze shot over my shoulder and his eyes bulged. I knew he’d spotted Trent, Eddie and Misfit at the table. ‘What the –’ began Sam.

Caine stepped around the door and pointed the gun at Sam. Taking advantage of Sam’s moment of shock, Caine put an arm around Sam's neck, and held the shotgun to the side of his head.

I put my hands to my mouth to stifle a scream. ‘Don’t hurt him. Don’t you fucking hurt him!’

‘I won’t,’ said Caine, ‘as long as you do as I say. Go and wake up the others, bring all your weapons down here and put ‘em on the table. And I mean all your weapons. My boys’ll do a search afterwards, and for every weapon they find that you haven’t handed over, I’ll slice pretty boy’s face.’ Caine used the butt of the shotgun to tap his belt, where I saw a five inch bladed knife beneath the leather. I looked Sam in the eye. What choice did I have? I backed towards the door. ‘Don’t try anything stupid – Sophie, isn’t it? Or it’ll be your fault when Sam, here, gets cut.’

I turned and ran from the kitchen and up the stairs. I got to Charlotte’s room first. I opened the door. She was still asleep. I knelt by the side of the bed and shook her shoulder gently.

‘Sssh, Charlotte,’ I said when she woke with a gasp.

‘What? What is it, sweetie?’ she asked, sitting up and brushing her long hair out of her face.

‘Those guys from yesterday. They’re back.’

‘What –’

‘No time. They’re downstairs. They’ve got Sam … and the shotgun. Too much to explain right now, but we need to get the others up and … they want us to surrender all our weapons.’

‘What the fuck …?’

‘They’ve got Sam. We have to do as they say. Help me wake Stewart and Kay, and get all our weapons together. Now!’

‘Shit. This is really happening. Ok,’ said Charlotte. ‘I need to … I-I need to get dressed …Give me a minute.’

‘Sure. Just a minute. I don’t like leaving Sam with those creeps.’ I stood up and dashed out of Charlotte's bedroom. I darted into my room and changed my pyjamas for jeans and a t-shirt.

While I was still in my room, I heard Kay shouting, a door slamming and feet pounding. I ducked out into the landing in time to see Kay marching towards the stairs, axe in hand, while Charlotte ran behind her, looking worried.

‘Kay!’ I called.

She stopped and turned to me. ‘We’ll see about this!’ she said. ‘Nobody’s going to barge in here and start bossing us about! Over my dead body! They can do one!’

‘What’s going on?’ asked Stewart as he appeared at his bedroom door. He rubbed his eyes.

‘No, Kay. They’ve got Sam.’ I said, ignoring Stewart (he’d just have to catch up).

‘Well, we’ll get Sam back and kick those fuckers out,’ said Kay.

‘They’ll hurt him … kill him.’ I walked over to Kay and put a hand on her arm. ‘There’s not time to figure anything, and we can't risk them hurting Sam,’ I whispered. ‘I think we have to do what they say for now, and come up with a plan later.’

‘You can’t be serious,’ said Kay.

‘I’d hurry up if I where you,’ a voice called up the stairs – not Caine’s. I leant over the banisters and saw Eddie in the hallway below. ‘Caine’s just handed the gun to Trent and got his knife out. Just saying …’ he continued with a smirk.

‘Shit!’ I said, turning to Kay and the others. ‘Get your weapons – all your weapons. We have to take them downstairs now. I don’t see any other way. Then you can all meet Caine and see just how serious you think he is.’

So, since that Thursday morning, things have gone down hill. Trent fixed a new lock on the French doors. He and Eddie locked the French doors and the back door, as well as all the windows throughout the house, upstairs and down, and gave the keys to Caine. Trent also fitted a lock to what used to be mine and Sam’s room, and is now mine, Sam’s, Kay’s, Charlotte’s and Stewart’s room. They lock us in at night. In the day we can move about the house as we like, but that shotgun never leaves Caine’s side. And the other three always carry knives and crowbars – Trent’s taken a liking for Kay’s axe. She’s seething. 

There have been quite a few showdowns between us and them, but it always seems to come down to the team with the gun always wins.

All our weapons have been confiscated. We only get to have a weapon when two of us are forced out on a supply run (the only time we’re allowed outside). To ensure that we comply and don’t try anything stupid while out, the other three are held at gunpoint until the supply runners get back. We’re always searched at the door so we can’t risk smuggling in weapons.

We’ve been living like this for over two weeks. Caine and the other three get to have most of the supplies. They eat like kings and get drunk every night, while the rest of us live on scraps. We’re tired and hungry. 

Caine is worse than any zombie I’ve come across.

12th May, 6.30pm

‘Wh-what do you want?’ I mumbled as I stood in the kitchen doorway a week last Thursday. I wanted to scream, Get the fuck out of my house! and slap the four guys around the head, and kick their arses right out of the French Doors. But the way Shaved Head Guy kept looking down at the shotgun on the table in front of him, then back to me with a sly grin on his face stopped me. Angry but scared – that was me at that moment.

‘We just want to make some new friends,’ said Shaved Head Guy. ‘Don’t we boys?’ Tall Blond and Short Piggy laughed, while Tattoo Boy looked down at his hands on the table. He picked at the skin around his right thumb. The back of his left hand had a black and grey tattoo of a death's-head moth – the type of moth that looks like it has a picture of a human skull on its back – and each of his four fingers on both hands were tattooed. I caught flashes of Gothic style lettering but couldn’t make out what it said from where I stood.

‘Please just go,’ I said to Shaved Head Guy.

‘That’s not very sociable, is it, sweetheart?’ said Shaved Head Guy. ‘If we’re gonna be living together, we need to get along, eh?’

‘We're not going to be living together,’ I said. Feeling a little braver, I took a couple of steps into the room and stood as tall and firm as I could. ‘There’re tons of empty houses out there. Why here?’

‘You look like nice people,’ said Shaved Head Guy. ‘And you have a gun. Where’s the ammo, by the way?’ Shaved Head Guy picked up the shotgun and held it like he was trying to guess its weight. He cracked it open on its hinge and looked down at the shotgun shell inside. I wondered where he’d learned how to do that.

‘There isn’t any more,’ I said. ‘That’s the last one.’

Shaved Head Guy smirked. ‘You don’t want to lie to me, sweetheart,’ he said. ‘I will find the ammo –’

‘I’m not lying,’ I snapped. ‘That’s the last fucking one!’

Shaved Head Guy snapped the shotgun closed. ‘Fair enough,’ he said. ‘Better than nothing. Guess I’ll have to make this one count.’ He turned the shotgun so that it pointed at my head. I stifled a gasp, annoyed at myself for showing a sign of weakness. Shaved Head Guy laughed, lowered the gun and placed it back on the table. ‘Only kidding,’ he said. He stood up, picked the shotgun up in his left hand and walked round the table towards me. ‘I’m Caine,’ he said. ‘And here we have Trent,’ Shaved Head Caine motioned towards Tall Blond, ‘and Eddie,’ he nodded to Short Piggy.

‘Alright,’ said Eddie.

‘And that little runt is Misfit,’ Caine pointed the butt of the gun at Tatttoo Boy, who glanced up at me through the stands of fair hair that fell into his expressionless face, and back down to his tattooed hands. Caine turned his full attention onto me. ‘And you are?’

‘You have to leave,’ I said, ignoring Caine’s question.

‘No. We’re not going any-fucking-where, sweetheart,’ Caine said coldly. ‘We want a place to lay low for a while, and you lot look like you’ve a nice little set up. Here’s the deal,’ he continued, ‘you and your lot look after us, go out into those zombie infested streets and get food and alcohol for us, and we won’t hurt you. How’s that sound?’ Caine was close enough to me now that he poked the nuzzle of the shotgun into my chest. He laughed, but I stood firm.

‘No,’ I said. ‘You can’t do this – just walk in here and take over our lives. We won’t let you do it. We’ve worked too fucking hard to let a bunch of freeloaders barge in and treat us like slaves. We’re not going to do what you want!’

‘Yes you will. There might only be one bullet in this gun,’ said Caine, raising the shotgun before him, ‘but that’s all I need to put a hole through the head of one of your friends. Which one shall I shoot, hmmm? That pretty young girl, or the pretty young boy?’

‘You fucking wouldn’t …’ I said, feeling my legs go weak.

‘I fucking would,’ said Caine. ‘So, I suggest we go and wake your friends up and tell them about the new system. Either that, or I shoot the first one of them to come down those stairs.’

Caine nodded over my shoulder, towards the hallway, just as I heard feet on the stairs and Sam’s voice calling, ‘Sophie, how long’s it take to make a coffee?’

5th May, 12.50pm

I cried on the drive home from Asda last week. Sam stopped the Land Rover in the middle of the road. He turned and looked at me. I wiped the tears from my cheeks with the backs of my hands, and followed the action with an attractive sniff.

‘Sophie –’

‘I’m ok,’ I said.

‘No your not. And it’s ok,’ said Sam. He leaned across and put his arms around me. ‘It’s ok not to be ok,’ he said into my ear.

I wrapped my arms around Sam’s neck and held on tight. Sam hugged me back, burrowing his chin into my shoulder. I wanted us to stay like that forever, but Sam pulled away and my arms fell from him. I watched as he sat back in his seat and placed his hands on the steering wheel, head bowed. I thought he’d start the Land Rover. Instead, he turned, leaned forwards and kissed me. The kiss had been gentle and Sam backed off before I could even respond. He sat looking at me. I couldn’t breathe. I knew that the next move wasn’t mine to make.

Sam leaned across and kissed me again. This time I was ready and I put my hands behind his neck so that he couldn’t get away again. I needn’t have worried because Sam put his hands on my back and drew me into him as we kissed. He snuck his hands under my t-shirt and ran his nails up my lower back. When he finally pulled away from me, biting my bottom lip gently as he did, Sam had a sleazy grin on his face. ‘Home?’ he said.

‘Fuck yeah!’ I said.

That night (ok, the second we reached the house) Sam moved back into our bedroom.

So, that’s the good news. Now for the bad news – we have some new house mates. Nothing to do with the boy me and Sam saved in Asda. We left his cowardly arse back in the supermarket. I don’t even know his name and I don’t care. The new house mates turned up last Wednesday evening as we sat around the kitchen table eating a dinner of tinned veg and canned pie filling.

‘What the fuck …?’ said Kay at the roaring crescendo of multiple engines from outside. Kay put down her knife and fork and went over to the window just as the crescendo climaxed and the engines cut out. ‘Who ordered the motorcycle gang?’ asked Kay, turning to look at the rest of us.

‘What?’ I said, standing and walking over to join Kay at the window. A man – about late 30s/early 40s, tall, burly, shaved head, leather jacket – opened the gate and made his way up the drive towards the house. Three other guys, all younger, followed him. ‘Shit!’ I said, ducking down from the window and pulling Kay down with me. ‘Who the fuck are they?’

Me and Kay crouched beneath the window, our backs against the wall. I looked at Charlotte, Stewart and Sam, still sitting at the table, knives and forks held limply in their hands. ‘Hide,’ I mouthed to them. But then I heard the tap, tap on the French doors.

‘What do we do?’ I asked.

‘Well, not much point in you two hiding down there when they’re staring right at the rest of us,’ said Stewart. Good point – the table was in full view from the French doors. Me and Kay both stood up to see two of the younger newcomers, one tall and thin with bleached blond hair, the other short and fat with piggy eyes, looking through the window at us. The older guy and the youngest of the four, a boy with shoulder length fair hair and tattoos peeping up from the neck of his t-shirt, were stood by the French doors.

‘What do we do?’ I said again as the older one with the shaved head started tapping on the door again.

‘Hello in there,’ he called through the glass.

‘We’ll have to let them in,’ said Stewart.

‘No fucking way,’ said Kay. ‘We don’t know who they are.’

‘It’s not very neighbourly to ignore us,’ said the man with the shaved head. He had his forehead pressed against the glass and his hands cupped above his eyes. The tattooed boy stood beside him, looking uncomfortable. He kept glancing all around himself, like he expected to be jumped on any second.

Nobody inside the house moved. ‘Do you think they’ll go if we ignore them?’ asked Charlotte.

‘I’m thinking not,’ I said.

‘Hellllllloooooo!’ called Shaved Head Guy, mockingly.

‘I’ll sort it,’ said Sam, and he stood and walked over to the French doors. ‘Hi. Look, we’re not looking for any trouble, ok?’ Sam said through the glass. ‘We just want to keep our heads down, avoid zombies and carry on surviving.’

‘I understand that,’ said Shaved Head Guy.

‘Good,’ continued Sam. ‘So you’ll understand if we don’t open up.’

‘But that wouldn’t be very friendly,’ said Shaved Head Guy. Tall Blond and Short Piggy grinned, while Tattoo Boy looked down at his boots. ‘And we just want to be friendly.’

‘Well, look –’

‘Out the way, Sam,’ said Charlotte. She had the shotgun and she pointed it at Shaved Head Guy’s … um, shaved head. ‘Well, we don’t want to be friendly, ok? Go away and stay away!’

‘Nice gun,’ said Shaved Head Guy. He smiled and backed away from the door. ‘Have a nice evening,’ he said, giving us a little wave. He turned and skulked off down the drive, the other three following him. Tattoo Boy glanced back at us for a second then joined the others as they climbed back on their bikes.

Charlotte didn’t lower the gun until the roar of the bikes had receded.

Thursday morning, I left Sam in bed while I headed downstairs to make us both a coffee. When I heard talking coming from the the kitchen, I guessed it must be Stewart talking to Kay or Charlotte. But there, sitting round the kitchen table, were the four guys from the day before. Shaved Head Guy had the shotgun on the table in front of him. He smiled at me when he saw me. ‘Morning sweetheart,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry, we’ll get that lock fixed,’ he nodded towards the French doors that were open, the lock busted. Trent, here – Shaved Head Guy nodded towards Tall Blond sitting beside him – is handy with that sort of thing, aren’t you?’ Trent nodded. ‘Nice place,’ said Shaved Head Guy. ‘I think we’re going to like it here.’

28th April, 12.30pm

So, Sam’s leaving. I lived in denial until he went out on Tuesday and came back with a silver Land Rover Discovery.

‘Escape vehicle?’ I asked. I stood on the drive, my arms folded.

‘Yep,’ he said, running his fingers across the Land Rover’s bonnet, a look of pride on his face.

‘Uh huh,’ I said, and skulked back into the house. I didn’t want Sam to see the tear that ran down my cheek.

Supply run time. Sam volunteered to go into town. He wanted to pick up supplies for his trip. I offered to go with him. He didn’t object. Sam drove the Land Rover, parking it outside Asda. ‘So, where you headed … when you go?’ I asked as I climbed out of the Land Rover. It was the first word either of us had spoken since leaving the house. I walked around the vehicle to stand next to Sam.

‘I dunno,’ said Sam. ‘I’m just going to drive north and see what I find.’

I followed him into the store. At the top of the escalators, Sam used his claw hammer to kill a zombie and then he grabbed a trolley. As I walked alongside Sam, towards the almost empty food shelves, I tried to think how to say the thing I really wanted to say: Why don’t you ask me to go with you? Would I go if he asked me? Would I leave the others to head off into the sunset with Sam? Fuck yeah. Instead I said, ‘We’re going to have to start searching the other supermarkets. This place is almost dry.’

‘Yeah,’ said Sam, half-heartedly as he stopped to load the last of the baked bean tins into the trolley. ‘I need to get some blankets and …’

‘What is it?’

‘Did you hear that?’

‘What?’ I asked.

‘Shhhh.’ Sam put a finger to his lips.

I listened. I heard groaning. ‘Zombies,’ I said.

We left the trolley and crept along the tinned food aisle, and took a cautious peek down the length of the supermarket, back the way we’d just come. I could see a swarm of zombies gathering around the refrigeration units. We’d bypassed those aisles, knowing that the diary produce and meat products would be well past their sell by dates. But something down there attracted zombies.

I turned to Sam. ‘If we’re quiet, we can get some food and get out round the back of the store and –’

A cry, short and sharp, from the refrigeration units cut me off.

‘There’s someone down there,’ said Sam. ‘Come on.’ He pulled his claw hammer from his belt and headed towards the zombies.

I grabbed Sam’s elbow. ‘They might’ve been bitten already,’ I said.

‘Or they might not.’ Sam pulled away from me.

I put a hand to the knife through my belt. I’m usually the first into a fight or a rescue mission. But, let’s face it, they don’t always end well, and, right then, I was tempted just to walk on by. Then I saw him … a boy, no more than about fourteen/fifteen. He clambered up onto one of the refrigeration units. He crouched on top, looking down at the zombies that surrounded him. In his right hand he held a crowbar. Sam was halfway between me and the zombies. I pulled my knife from my belt and darted after him.

‘Help!’ yelled the boy when he saw us coming. (What the fuck did he think we were doing?)

The zombies hadn’t noticed us approach, and they crowded around the unit, rancid arms reaching up towards the boy. We were on the ones at the back before they knew what had hit them. Sam smashed rotten heads, while I stuck the knife in, black blood oozing like oil from a punctured can. The others noticed us now.

‘There are too many, Sam! We’ll never get to the boy before the zombies get us.’

Sam grunted with the effort of braining zombies. He looked up towards the boy, then back to the crowd of zombies now coming for us. We backed away as we fought, more and more zombies leaving the refrigeration unit and staggering towards me and Sam. The boy stared at us with wide eyes, like a rabbit caught in the headlights. But it was now us that needed help.

The boy looked down, saw that the way below was clear and jumped down to the ground. He looked me in the eye. Then he turned and ran towards the exit.

‘Hey!’ I shouted after him. But he had gone.

Sam grabbed my arm with his free hand and pulled me away from the approaching zombies, and we darted up the nearest aisle. We ran up towards the back of the store and around towards the exit. We got to the top of the escalators just in time to see a zombie rugby tackle the boy to the ground. He lay on his stomach, the zombie on his back. Despite the fact that he had just left us to the zombie hoard, I dived towards them, grabbed the zombie’s hair in my hand and pulled its head back. I heard a snap as the zombie’s neck broke. But it wasn’t dead. Its putrid jaws snapped at air. I plunged my knife into its right eye, and let the body drop onto the boy. He scrambled to his feet, shoving the body off his back. He turned to look sheepishly at me.

‘Thanks,’ he said.

‘Whatever,’ I replied.

‘We need to move,’ said Sam. Zombies headed our way from the refrigeration units. ‘Come on.’ Sam ran towards the escalators. Me and the boy followed. Sam lost his footing at the top of the escalator and went tumbling down.

‘Sam!’

He rolled all the way down to the bottom, where he lay in a heap, not moving. Then I saw him … it. A leather clad zombie staggered through the door towards Sam’s motionless body at the bottom of the escalators. Zombie-Liam.

‘SAM!’ I screamed as I pelted down the left hand escalator. ‘Sam, wake the fuck up!’

Zombie-Liam, the left side of his face missing, reached Sam. He bent down, his long, blood matted hair falling onto Sam’s body. Sam came too and screamed at the sight of Zombie-Liam. He tried to wriggle out from beneath him, feeling around for his claw hammer with his right arm. I couldn’t even see where the claw hammer had landed. Zombie-Liam held onto Sam, while Sam punch him in his decomposing face.

I must have flown down the rest of the escalator because I don’t remember that part of the decent at all. Sam had Zombie-Liam by the neck, keeping his gnashing teeth, dripping with yellow saliva, from his face. I raised my knife and I drove it down into the top of Zombie-Liam’s head. Zombie-Liam stopped moving. But that didn’t stop me from pulling the knife out and ramming it in again … and again.

‘Sophie. That’s enough,’ said Sam, still holding Zombie-Liam by the neck.

I pulled my knife out of the mush that remained of Zombie-Liam’s head and sat down on the bottom step of the escalator. Sam pushed Zombie-Liam’s body off of him.

‘You ok?’ I asked Sam as he climbed to his feet.

‘Yeah. You?’

‘Yeah. Yeah, I’m ok.’ I trembled all over.

I heard the sound of feet on the escalator behind me. I panicked, turned and saw the boy heading down towards me. I relaxed.

‘You two are hardcore,’ he said with a grin.

‘Yes. Yes we fucking are,’ I said as I stood up. ‘Sam, let’s go home. I’ve kinda lost my appetite.’

‘Yeah,’ said Sam, putting his arm around me. ‘Home.’

20th April, 12.45pm

When I said that Polly had finally done the decent thing and killed herself, I meant that Polly had finally done the decent thing … Polly style (eg, thoughtlessly). Not only did she use precious ammo – we only have one cartridge left for the shotgun now – but she blew her head off in the kitchen, leaving a big fucking mess.

‘I’m going to stick my neck out on this one and suggest that she’s dead,’ said Stewart.

‘Bloody selfish. Don’t expect me to clear it up,’ said Kay.

‘Yup. She could’ve destroyed her own brain in a tidier manner. The naughty pudding,’ said Stewart.

‘She could’ve done it outside,’ said Kay. ‘Outside with the rest of the stinking corpses that I don’t have to clear up.’

I stared at the near headless body, the thick pool of blood oozing forth like oil paint from a squashed tube; the blood, brain and skull fragments splattered on the pale pine kitchen cabinets and walls and my heart sank. I really hate cleaning.

‘I’ll get a mop and bucket,’ said Sam.

We all pitched in, in the end. Charlotte and Stewart carried the body outside and threw Polly over the fence into the next door garden, while the rest of us mopped, scrubbed and picked bits of brain out of the skirting boards. Blood, and lots of it, is a bitch to clean up. Luckily we didn’t have to do it to covering-up-a-murder standards. No one was coming round with that spray they use on CSI.

Sam moved into Polly’s room last Sunday. Kick in the teeth. While he was on the sofa, it was like the break up was a temporary thing. But now he has his own room, it’s like he’s saying, ‘I’ve moved on. You should do the same’. Have you any bloody idea how hard it is sharing a place with your ex, huh?

I couldn’t get to sleep last night. One of those mind-won’t-shut-the-fuck-up-and-switch-off nights. I’d just started to drift off when I heard music. It wove itself into my thoughts and I started to dream about being in Googies in town. A band was playing but they were all zombies. Keith was there. He was dancing, but he kept falling to pieces. The band got really pissed off when no one in the audience clapped at the end of their song, so they got a giant tortilla wrap and rolled everyone, including me, up inside it and ate them. When I came too, I could still hear music. I looked at the clock. 3 am.

The music came from outside my window. I crawled out of bed and pushed the curtain back a little. I saw Sam sitting on a bench outside, Stewart’s guitar on his lap. I rolled a cigarette, pulled a hooded top over my pjs, smoothed down my hair and went downstairs.

‘I didn’t know you could play,’ I said when I stepped out into the back garden. I shivered in the cold night air. Sam stopped playing and looked at me.

‘I can’t,’ he said. ‘Not really. I had lessons when I was younger but I didn’t really keep it up.’

‘Sounded good to me.’ I walked over and stood beside him, lit my cigarette, and took a deep pull. ‘Don’t stop,’ I said. Sam looked down at his fingers that touched the strings, but he didn’t play. ‘Are you ok?’ I asked him.

He made a sort of snorted laughing sound, but said nothing. He ran a finger along the crack in the guitar.

‘Sam?’

‘I’m not sure I can be here any more,’ he said without looking at me.

‘What’d you mean?’

‘I’ve been thinking about it for a while,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to just stagnant here. I want to travel, to see what’s out there.’ Sam looked up but avoided my eye.

I took a moment to catch my breath. Sam … leaving … NO! ‘There’s nothing out there. Just more of the same … zombies. Death. Fight for survival,’ I said, trying to keep my voice steady.

‘I want to travel, meet other survivors. Hear their stories. Move on. There has to be more to life than waiting to die. I want to be more proactive,’ said Sam, and his eyes met mine. I looked away. I felt dizzy. I sat down on the bench beside him. Well, I say ‘sat’, I more of fell to avoid dropping to the floor in a heap.

‘Y-you’d leave us?’

‘There’s nothing for me here,’ he said.

Heart – stopped, Soul – shattered, Mind – lost.

‘I’m going,’ said Sam.

‘When?’

‘I don’t know yet. I need to get a car. Or a bike. Soon.’

My cigarette had gone out, half smoked. I looked at it between my fingers, but I didn’t light it. I felt too sick. I clenched my teeth, trying to stop the tears. But a part of me thought, maybe this is for the best. Maybe with Sam gone, I can move on? But move on to what? This really is no life.