Lilly Bange: Epilogue

“Out of the ash
I rise with my red hair
And I eat men like air.”

Lady Lazarus, Sylvia Plath

Its morning. The students begin to wake to birds singing, school grounds being mowed, and a big, bright sun that just begs you to skip class and take a nap on the Terraces. The hiss and moan of the undead is only a nagging mosquito on a day like this, annoying but easily ignored. There are those who are preparing for the storm, furiously working to protect their loved ones, arm themselves to the teeth, and make the student body aware of the disease creeping and slouching their way. But there are those who still do not know what is on the horizon. O the horizon! Look children! Something from our collective nightmares! Bogeymen, goblins, monsters are marching!

A girl is left in her room. What's left of a girl is left in her room. The disease is quick and unforgiving, when one suffers a bite. But the airborne! It is slow, and meticulous, shutting down one faculty at a time. Senses. Hunger. Thirst. Heat. Feelings. Emotion. Memory. The girl was ripped apart at the seams. She lost a sense of well being. Safety. Self. In her earlier final hours she tries to write a note to her friends, the last remaining people on god's green earth that might actually find her. She writes illegibly and franticly, the sticky heat tugging at her mind and threatening to take that last bit of what she is. The note is never finished. She lays on the floor with her notebook under her. She curls in to keep out the cold, but the cold is not outside, not tonight.

She slowly wakes to the morning. The shivering is gone. The cold is gone. She feels nothing on her skin. It is a blessing. Slowly her eyes open, blinking stupidly as light floods the room from the picture windows. A small growl is issued as she attempts to roll and block the light. The floor doesn't feel right.

She can't feel the floor. She can barely comprehend what is happening. Thoughts come in clips and phrases. Light. No. Floor. Feel. Hungry.

Hunger.

She pushes herself up on shaky limbs. First on all fours. Hands and knees.

Steady. Up. Walk

She climbs to her feel and stands completely still. She is trembling. Thoughts come slowly through the miasma in her head. There is a constant drone of but one thought.

Feed. Feed. Feed.

Her head pulls to her right, to the door. She sniffs. Opens her mouth and takes a gulp of air. Tasting it. Tasting the smell of something...something good. Something smells so good.

Eat. Eat. Eat.

Her head shakes slowly and unsteadily. She tries to clear the thoughts, arrange them, bring some order to the primitive brain.

EAT EAT EAT

The call is more frantic as her insides twist. Find food. Find food. What food? She panics. A quick few steps to the door and she hits it heavily with her unfeeling body. A snarl. Rage builds suddenly, and in a flurry of hands and arms the door is opened. The girl runs. Runs towards the good smell. She runs towards the door, outside. Breaking though her cinder block prison she is met with the sun, warm air, and a multitude of students. She is outnumbered. Heavily. So hungry.

Almost without thinking she darts for the fence, the blockade around the school. Quick as a bunny she sprints and leaps at the fence, climbing it clumsily and falling to the dirt on the other side. She is out. She runs into a long abandoned park and under a tree. Her chest heaves as her eyes dart around from under her sanctuary. She sees many people, but they move without purpose and they smell different. The scent from the school is gone, but the message is loud and clear in her head.

GO BACK. GO BACK. FEED. FEED. FEED.

She is loose.