Pa Collapsed

The east side zombies were always friendly and polite. They felt it only appropriate to ask before eating any brains. Who would just go up to someone and take a scoop. It seems really very rude. “People don’t walk behind the counter to steal ice cream from those buckets, right. So why should anyone, go and scoop peoples brains”. Miley’s father used to say that all the time. Or some variation of it anyway. People rarely repeat themselves exactly. There is always an extra word, an Um, or some other interjected word or phrase. And context always changes. 

Now, the west side zombies may take a little extra scoop from time to time. They were more like surgeons about it. They discovered that it behooved them best to take a little piece of the brain at a time. That way, they could eat more variety of brains. By taking one human brain out, it is like eating a dozen whole pizzas or drinking so much water that you die. It isn’t actually healthy and zombies like all other beings evolved to maximize survival. Some humans like it. Some humans don’t mind a zombie taking a bit of their brain. After all, studies show it isn’t as harmful as once believed and there is a certain uptick of brain activity from simply the exchange. Humans are social beings. Brains adapt. It could easily be argued, and there are some that do, that zombies are the next step in human evolution. They don’t die. Save for an extreme tragedy and being exposed to sunlight, no, right, that is vampires. though, fire will take a good bit of the life out of zombies. But they don’t die easily at all, they can hang out all day in Hawaii and all night in the coldest winters of Fairbanks, and not have any medical issues as a result. They don’t consume any of the traditional resources and don’t require water. They can actually live without taking a single thing from the land, except for a brain or two and adaptation has made it better for them to take smaller doses. Zombies may be humans at their best and save for a few whipper snapper west siders, they follow pretty strong etiquette. 

Mr. Leans was a school teacher for a small district in the suburbs. The school house was pretty far out of town and even though it covered a wide range of ages, it was an old fashioned one room school house. People and zombies preferred to teach at home now, so the school was more for just a few people who either couldn’t work out day care or of those out of time sort of folks who wanted their children to learn outside of the home. The school sat on top of a hill with a spectacular view of the conflation of two rivers. Mr. Leans was always surprised more parents didn’t want their students to come just to enjoy the view. There were a lot of cold, dark winter days, when no students showed. He would stand, ankle deep in snow and just stare out at the river, trying to find the point where the clouds and water divide. He would give a quick lonely shiver and do a personal check to make sure his boots held out the snow. He always lost time on those days, not knowing if minutes or hours passed. A light would come on on a house on the other side of the shore and he would turn around to see the single smokey puff from the school house chimney. In the growing darkness, the brick chimney stood out like an isolated arm. The entire house like an awkward Dali painting, balancing on one leg with a single arm in the air, puffing out smoke rings that surrounded the school house. Only to dissipate in a second, and he would remain. His footprint path had long been covered by the snow fall. 

Days like this he would stay at the school house. The fireplace kept the building warm enough and there was plenty of firewood. He would stretch out a cushion, cover it with a blanket, then wrap himself up in a sleeping bag and that is how he slept. He would close off the vent so he couldn’t hear the fire crackle and there he slept, with whatever books remained in the room. He could last a good long while up there, with the food and he could even burn the books if he needed to. 

One winter, one particularly bad winter, in which most students never showed, he spent most of the days teaching Miley. She showed up every day, no matter the conditions. Her father made it a point that she was educated and risked, not quite life because he was a zombie, but certainly limb, to get her to school through very icy roads. Miley was a really wonderful child. She was quite smart and had a curiosity, that all adults wish could be continued throughout life. Why does curiosity end? It doesn’t always, but many adults grow a little bit rigid. Mr. Leans hoped Miley would learn about life but never lose her interest in the world. He would take a deep sigh and watch the sun through the clouds dip below the horizon. The night would be out soon and if the sky cleared, the auroras could be visible. Mr. Leans quite liked it on top of that hill, with the school nearby, standing to one side of a clearing, at a lonely view that would make a gorgeous landscape painting. 

During this bad winter, one day, Miley never showed. This was unusual, but the storms had been bad and maybe she or someone in her family had gotten sick. Just because something didn’t happen doesn’t mean it never would. Mr. Leans spent the short day and long night wandering about collecting firewood and making soup. He would sit down and go over his lesson plans and make sure he was prepared for the next day. that night, the auroras danced through the night, though the biggest storm happened when Mr. Leans had already fallen asleep. 

The next day again, no show of anyone and no Miley. He went about his business much as usual. He made a point of cleaning his glasses and realized his spare ones are at home. Not wanting to go back down the hill to search for one unnecessary item, he stayed up at the hill. He maintained his bed, read his books and even drank a little whiskey out of a red thermos top. It was almost like a vacation. Snowed in in the mountains. Romantic comedies have been written with less of a plot. Though usually, there was another person involved. 

On the third day of Miley’s absence about 2:30, he received a call. None of the other students had shown up for a full week and Mr. Leans began to miss his home. He lost his wife a few years ago to the dreaded infidelity. That is a plague that affects all creatures, zombie or human and all genders. There is no cure and no vaccine. The only way to heal is time. Mr. Leans focused more on teaching and reading and making sure the school house was a place of advanced learning. He was caught in a daydream thinking about the clouds and the rivers, and wondering if fish could climb on to the clouds for a vacation, or if they preferred jumping on the auroras. 

When the phone rang, he was jolted from his daydream like a fish jumping for the clouds, and nearly missed the call. The ring felt like it was from another time, or carrying a message from so far away, yet ringing deafeningly. “Hello”, he inquired, and for his politeness he received mainly static in return. He caught just a few bits of language, only a couple of words. He surmised from the tone and rhythm of her speech that it was Miley. “Miley, can you hear me, are you ok? Are you sick, are your parents doing well?” He wasn’t sure she heard him at all as it seemed her speaking continued without stop, even though he caught only a few words. All he really heard before the phone call garbled away to nothing was, “Pa…collapsed. Pa…collapsed”. 

He yelled into the phone, seemingly believing that the louder he spoke the more it could correct the connection. “MIley? Is your dad ok? Are you ok? Can you take him to the hospital?” He asked these questions a few times, before the static stopped completely and the call was disconnected. He called her number but the line was busy. He tried the hospital and any number he could think of, but everything was busy. The snow was falling hard and probably disrupted the phone lines. Connection was never great here on the mountain. 

“Well, I hope her father is ok”. He thought about riding down to the town, but felt it better to wait until the next day to make sure. The sun would be setting soon and tomorrow would be Saturday. There is a slight chance that other students would show on Friday afternoons. He wouldn’t want parents to make that drive and he not be there. He gave several positive thoughts to the universe in the hopes that Miley’s dad was all right. Then he prepped the school house for another night and e ready to leave early the next day. 

After plans were made and preparations completed, he took a long deep slug of whiskey and decided to walk around a bit. The northern lights were dancing through the clouds. He could see the glows shoot through the sky. He had never seen them shine like that. He walked down further than he had ever done to the edge of the cliff. The snow falling around him covering his tracks. When staring out across the rivers, he could see a lot of activity on the edge of the towns. It looked like car lights were moving and several fires were happening. “Oh dear,” he thought, “I hope that doesn’t have anything to do with Miley’s father collapsing”. He start for a long while before feeling the chill. He took one long look above his head at the dancing light show, and a curious look at the unexpectedly active town below. “I’ll figure out what it is all about tomorrow”. With his boot prints covered, and no sign of him having walked there, he stood thigh deep in December snow. He took a deep breath and watched his exhale linger in the air. For an instant, they hid the northern lights above. In that cold moment, he seemed entirely hidden from all the worlds. No visible way how he walked there and total cover from everything. He celebrated that moment before turning to walk back to the school house. His boots sank deep into the snow as he trudged through a path he had to create. The snow making his tracks invisible almost as quickly as he made them.