Terrifying Lies - Craig Nybo

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say hi, but it was clear that he’d turned. He had the telltale hollowness in the cheeks and half of his shirt lay torn down from his pale body.

      Seeing him out there just standing and staring—maybe salivating a little bit at the possibility of sinking his teeth into my flesh—caused me to lose my game. I went back into the school a bit depressed. Maybe it will be a better day tomorrow.

      4 - May 16th, Year 1

      So many flies. I had to force my way into a janitorial supply closet upstairs in the school with a crowbar to find a can of spray insecticide. I’ve been spraying it around the doorjambs. I think it has helped. I can’t escape the sense that the putrid insects are standing by waiting for me to die so they can do the ugly thing that flies do on my carrion. I have news for them. I’m going to survive. I have plenty of canned food. I have my glued together guitar. I have books. I have everything I need to keep it together.

      The only problem is the quiet. I try to get outside in the yard to workout and stay in shape. But it’s all me. There are no trucks droning by, no fans, no voices chatting through the halls, no sirens, not even the distant sound of a jackhammer wielding road crew. It’s eerie—I hate to use that word, but it’s the only one that fits. The quiet gets to me. Eventually, to break the monotony, I think I might have to make a pilgrimage outside the school. I’ve been watching the zombies shuffle around. They move slow. I think I could sidestep them. But I don’t have the guts to leave my compound.

      For now, it’s the music that keeps me together. I’ll keep writing. I’ll keep biding my time.

      5 - May 18th, Year 1

      Call me crazy, but I’m thinking about leaving the school, not on a permanent basis by any means, but I have a hankering for fresh air and fruit pies. Funny, the little things I crave.

      One of the first items of business upon setting myself up in this big cold school was getting food. I checked through the refrigerators and pantries in the lunch room and found enough staples to keep me into the bad tasting flour paste and beans I’ve been eating for the past month.

      I beat the crap out of a vending machine on the second floor until I got inside. I’ve pretty much demolished my stash of chips and candy bars. The worst part of it is, I’m out of fruit pies. Man, I love those. I crave them. If for no other reason, I think I might leave the compound just to find a bag of them to bring back with me.

      If I do leave, I need to find weapons. I’m sure I can dig up an aluminum baseball bad. But what I really need is a gun. I’m going to start prying lockers open; maybe some wayward student kept a firearm in his book bag. Who knows, it’s a sick world. I don’t really have the stomach for killing, even one of those zombies out there, but I’ll kill if I have to; I have it in me.

      6 - May 23rd, Year 1

      I spent the past three days moving from locker to locker, prying them open one by one. As I worked, I made a pile of anything I found useful, sanitary supplies, deodorant, although I don’t know who I’m trying to impress.

      I found books, mainly the classics on the literary booklists. There were a few pop novels, some Stephen King, some Dean Koontz. Funny how, while fighting to survive in the middle of a zombie apocalypse, I’m drawn to stories about monsters. Chock it up to maintaining my sanity, or perhaps losing it.

      I found several MP3 players with varying levels of charge on them. One of them, an off-brand unit I found in a kid’s locker plastered with Metallica posters, has a play-list that I can accept: Pink Floyd, The Ramones, Rush. Any MP3 players I found with flowers on them or jacketed in pink covers have been stored in a dark corner of the school in case of an emergency. I’m not much of a Taylor Swift or Justin Bieber fan.

      In one locker I found what I was looking for. Tucked into the pocket of a student body officer’s sweater was a Glock .9mm. That wasn’t all, I also found three boxes of Girl Scout Samoa cookies and 2 cartons of bullets. The sweater hanging from the hook has Bill Spillman embroidered on its chest. Some girl pressed her lips against the inside of the locker door and left her signature in red lipstick. Seems Mr. Spillman had everything including the perfect girlfriend and plenty of ammunition. Thanks, Bill, my next zombie kill is dedicated to you.

      7 - May 26th, Year 1

      I’m not a killer. I’ve done a lot of things in my life, some of which I regret; but I’m not a killer.

      I remember going hunting with my cousin back when I was about 13 years old. His uncles sat around the fire at night, swearing, farting, telling stories. I don’t think the hunting trip was much about hunting. My cousin and I spent the better part of the trip riding motorcycles around the trails. One day we took .22s with us.

      As we rode, we saw lots of squirrels. At one point we stopped for a little sport shooting. I aimed at a squirrel. I remember swallowing hard, not wanting to shoot. But I couldn’t ignore my cousin’s peer pressure. I pulled the trigger and dropped the little creature out of a tree. It fell on its head and broke its neck. It lay on the ground, twitching and making horrible noises. Out of sympathy, I put ten more rounds into it before it finally stopped writhing. I told myself that day that I would never shoot another living thing.

      What I shot just outside the school grounds today wasn’t a living thing. At least that’s what I keep telling myself.

      I decided to leave the school. I didn’t make it a quarter of a mile before I met Mr. Barry, my old gym teacher. He still wore that same gray sweat suit I remember, only it was sauced with grime and gore. He came at me, slow, lurching, reaching. I raised my Glock and told him to stop, but he didn’t listen. He just kept coming, his mouth open, his eyes sunken and distant.

      I had to shoot him like the squirrel. I missed with my first 2 shots—I felt panicked. But I got my head around what I was doing, took the time to aim carefully, and put a bullet in his forehead. He dropped like a bag of cannonballs. Then he writhed there, arching and gutting out groans and hisses. I shot him three more times. Then I threw up.

      I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it, killing them I mean. Mr. Barry wasn’t a living thing, but he was a moving thing. I’m going to have to find the guts somehow to do what I know I am eventually going to have to do.

      8 – June 24, Year 1

      I think the zombies are getting smarter. The school is huge, quiet, damp, and gloomy. I’ve found a cool corner of the cafeteria where I’ve taken to sitting and doing nothing but staring at the opposite wall, sometimes for better than an hour. The world is shot to oblivion out there. I don’t know if there is anyone left alive. I’ve got to get out of here before they come in after me.

      I found a motorcycle in the parking lot. I don’t know how much gas is in the tank. Cars jam the streets, stacked up along the lanes like a train of coffins. At least on a bike, I think I can weave around them and find a way through.

      I’m going to leave the school tomorrow. Next time I check in, it should be from outside. Wish me luck.

      9 – June 27, Year 1

      I’ve never experienced fear so potent as when I mounted my motorcycle and ground away from Warden. I felt naked and vulnerable. As I hit the streets, not being an experienced cyclist, constantly maneuvering around stopped traffic has been a challenge. But I’m getting used to it.

      The streets are jammed up with cars and trucks. Its like people just turned off their vehicles, got out, and walked away. I’ve seen a few morbid sites, human remains behind the wheel, eyes gouged out, throats bitten into, parts of bodies torn away for easy protein. I’m glad I wasn’t commuting home from work when the outbreak hit.

      It still astounds me how quickly it all happened. The news, always fishing for new disasters to put on the waves, jumped all over the outbreak. They called it a disease. But I’m not so sure it’s as simple as that. I can’t help but feel a sense of justice in the whole affair. I don’t know what we humans could possibly have done to reap such retaliation. But I sense that a higher, or lower, power has a hand in our circumstances. I watched a news man who looked like a retired Chip and Dale dancer report a strange new outbreak, then flipped the

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