Returns Accepted Here

I awoke from my sleep slowly. As my heavy eyelids opened, I surveyed my surroundings. Everything seemed in place: my backpack still hung from a tree about 20 feet away; the sticks and twigs I had scattered across my temporary campsite were unbroken; nothing was caught in the perimeter “fence” I had crafted from several bungee cords and empty cans; and I was still alive and nestled in the thick branches of the tree I fell asleep in. I sat for a few minutes, huddled in my sleeping bag and wrapped in tarps while I listened to the noises of the woods. There was very little noise, but that comforted me. Noise was never a good thing this close to the town as it attracted the attention of both the living and the returned.

After I had my usual morning debate as to whether to get up and keep moving or to lay back down and wait for what will eventually come, I decided it was best to get moving. It was getting windy and colder and freezing to death sounded worse than the living or the returned. I awkwardly wiggled my way out of my sleeping bag and tarp bed, nearly falling out of the tree at least three times, but eventually managed to remove myself and roll everything up. The descent down the tree trunk was the easy part as I had gained enough experience basically living like a squirrel for the last 9 months.

As my boots touched the soil, the first snowflake fell.

*         *         *

I’ve always hated snow. It’s soggy and heavy and just gross. But now I discovered a new reason to hate snow: it was loud. At least this snowfall was. Usually wet snow stuck together and formed a slush, but as this wet snow fell the top would freeze and form a layer of ice which crunched loudly beneath my boots. Thankfully, the wind was so loud most of the time it made it hard to hear the rhythmic crunching of ice as I trudged onward.

The snow continued to fall thicker and faster as time passed and the thick fog of white flakes made seeing more than a few feet in front of myself impossible. I felt like I was in a snow globe. A snow globe where behind every tree could be one of the living or returned, but you could neither see nor hear them until they were already upon you.

I shook this thought from my head and tried to think of a plan rather than give into panic. Staying outside in this growing snowstorm would certainly result in my becoming a human popsicle, but in 9 months I hadn’t managed to find a suitable shelter. I know the town was near but going into town was dangerous.

I glanced down at my watch and, although it told me it was only 5:00, the sky was growing darker rapidly and the temperature was dropping with the sun. I decided to bite the bullet and make my way toward town.

*         *         *

Once out of the cover of the wood, the wind was much stronger and the snow far deeper. The strong wind sent the cold air straight through my layers of clothing and my teeth began to chatter and my fingers grew numb and red. I moved as quickly as my stiff legs would carry me, not bothering to try to cover the tracks I left in the knee-high snow. I knew this town well, so I knew my destination was not far, but navigating in this snow globe world was disorienting and took longer than it needed to.

My face burned from the cold air and constant wind and my entire body was now trembling in an attempt to warm itself. I was about to give up hope of ever finding my way in this mess, but out of the whiteness a tall brick building suddenly appeared, and my hope returned at the sight. I followed the closest wall around a corner and to the sliding glass doors. As I approached the doors I paused for a moment and waited for them to automatically slide open. It took about 5 second for my frozen brain to remember that there was no electricity anymore and I would have to force the doors. I chuckled at myself before pushing the doors open, following the direction that the big red arrow and “Push in case of emergency” text indicated.

Once inside, I turned and tried to shut the door, but it wouldn’t shut entirely and left about a six-inch gap. I decided this was probably for the best because if I needed to make a quick exit it would be easier to pull open the already cracked doors. I turned away from the doors and stepped over the dirty and cracked yellow sign that read “Welcome to Family-Mart!” that must have been knocked over some time ago. I chastised myself for not ensuring the building was clear before entering. I normally avoided large buildings like this entirely, but I already knew that every other structure around had been boarded up to either keep something out or something in.

I sat down with my back to one of the exterior walls and stayed there for a minute or two while I exhaled warm air onto my hands and rubbed them together in an attempt to return some feeling to my fingers. It’s no good trying to clear a building if you can’t feel your hands. As soon as feeling returned to my fingers I pulled my backpack close and pulled my baseball bat from the sleeve I had sewed onto the backpack and my headlamp from the biggest pocket. After securing the head strap of the lamp, I tightened my grip on my bat and started my way down the aisles, working from the far right by the door I entered through to the final aisle on the far side of the store. One good thing about small towns, is that even their supermarkets are small.

Surprisingly, the store was entirely devoid of life. This struck me as odd, for in the months since they first returned, I had never come across a building which was empty. Even in small buildings there was usually at least one straggler, but in bigger buildings like this one could almost always expect to find a group of the living holed up or a large number of returned shuffling about until something made a noise and set the entire group off. But this building stood empty. It reminded me of how it felt going to a 24-hour store at 3:00 a.m. before all of this and being alone except for the one- or two-night shift employees.

As I continued to walk through the store, I began to notice the strange amounts of supplies still left on the shelves and displays. There was a near fully stocked canned goods section, boxed foods were all in their place, and there were even batteries in the home goods section. Normally the living have already picked places like this clean of anything that could be remotely useful, leaving behind a carcass of metal shelves and tile floors, but this supermarket looked nearly fully stocked. The only thing that was missing was the produce, bakery, fridges, and other things that would spoil and smell, but nothing was sitting on the shelves rotting. The shelves had been cleared of these items, but not “looted” like the other stores. It looked like someone took time and care to remove those items before they smelled up the entire store but left anything that would be useful to a survivor on the move.

I froze. Something was wrong. Even in a small town like this one, the people would have flocked to the supermarket to stock up on anything they could get their hands on, but the only sign, other than the missing perishables, that anyone had been inside of this Family-Mart since the beginning was the fallen sign at the entrance. My hands began to shake, this time from fear and anger at my own stupidity rather than cold. I turned off my headlamp to avoid detection from whatever might be near and began to make my way back to the entrance. I moved as silently and quickly as I could, but something told me I was already in trouble.

Before rounding the corner of the last aisle before the entrance, I stopped and craned my neck around the corner to have a look. I crossed my fingers that everything would be as it was when I entered the store, and for a moment it appeared that way. The wind could still be heard howling outside as the snow continued to fall, my backpack was still leaned up against the wall near the door, and the sign was still on the floor. But there was something on top of the sign. It was hard to make out what it was, so I held my position at the edge of the aisle and held my breath.

At first nothing happened. But in the darkness, I saw the blob on the fallen sign move slightly. It wiggled and looked a bit like a chunky worm, but suddenly a small hand shot up from the form and a second followed shortly after. Against my better judgement, I came out from behind my cover and approached the shape. As I moved closer, I could hear small gurgling sounds and quiet babbles and in what little moonlight there was, I could make out what looked like a baby wrapped in an oversized blanket.

I reached forward with my hand, but quickly withdrew as I still had no way of knowing if this baby was living or returned. Instead, I reached out with my bat and gently nudged the blanket away from the infant to get a better look at it. It was still hard to see, but everything appeared to be where it should be on the baby girl’s body. She still had all her limbs and seemed like one of the living, but unless they’re dormant and basically sleepwalking you usually can’t tell until you see their eyes. I glanced around and up at the door through which I entered this eerie building in search of any signs of movement or anything else out of place but saw nothing.

I wished myself luck and flipped the power switch on my headlamp. The light immediately shone down on the infant who recoiled from the sudden brightness. I knelt next to the baby to examine its eyes, but it stubbornly refused to look anywhere near the direction of the light or open its eyes. I set down my bat, gently placed my right hand around the top of the baby’s head and held her head still. To avoid causing her discomfort I removed my headlamp and pointed it more toward her feet so it wouldn’t shine in her eyes. She immediately opened her eyes which caused me to jump a little. I looked down at her and smiled, her eyes were normal. They looked blue and thought it was hard to tell in the light, but I was fairly confident that they were not red, white, nor black and they were not shining like the eyes of the returned. But her eyes were piercing and as I looked into her eyes, I felt relaxed. It was almost as though she was trying to draw me further into her eyes and I leaned forward without realizing.

I continued to slowly lean toward the baby’s face all the while looking into her eyes. Her eyes held the past I was so desperately craving. The past with my family and electricity and nothing to run from or fear for my life. Her eyes were home. Her eyes were warm. Her eyes were the moon, bright and shining.

It was then, as I hovered inches from her tiny innocent face, that she blinked for the first time and I was back in this frightening earth and I really saw her. In the light of my lamp, I could see her skin was a shade of yellowish brown which looked almost sickly and eyes were now glowing a dull milky shade of white and her small lips were curled into a smile. Her smile grew, despite her spell over me being broken and behind her lips I saw teeth where there should be only gums for one her age. The teeth were black and had bits of reddish goop stuck between them.

I held back a scream as I leapt away from the baby. I dropped my headlamp in my fright and my bat was still laying next to the baby. Before I had time to come to my feet, the baby began to cry. It was a loud and piercing noise which echoed through the supermarket and made my ears ache after spending months in near silence. Seconds after she began screaming a wave of bodies crashed against the glass sliding doors and the windows surrounding them. The doors and windows shook and groaned in protest to this assault but held for now. The returned outside of the building snarled, yelled, and smashed against the glass. From the ceiling above my head I heard hurried footsteps and as I looked up several of the tan fiberglass ceiling tiles raised up into the space above and bodies began to jump from that space to the floor below.

They landed all around me and as they closed in quickly, but carefully to avoid bumping the displays, I could see their glowing eyes and the anger they held for my invasion of their home. The baby on the floor stopped crying and was picked up by one of the returned who had jumped from the ceiling. This woman then turned to those who stood outside and let out a bellowing wail. Those outside immediately stopped their ruckus and stood silently with their eyes on the woman who had silenced them. She began making noises which sounded low and guttural and seemed unnatural coming from such a small woman, but her noises clearly held meaning to those on the other side of the glass who nodded and began to disperse.

Upon their departure, she turned to face the others inside of the building and began to speak to them as well. She made a wide sweeping gesture over her head and then in front of her toward the crowd followed by pointing at the door, then at me. When she pointed at me, she let a deep and terrifying noise which made the floor shake beneath us all. The crowd then looked at me and repeated the sound. It seemed like they were agreeing upon something, but before I had time to figure out what it was, the crowd rushed me and the light in the supermarket was lost in the sea of bodies.