I really was under the impression that what we were doing was Morally Wrong™. However, the car that we stole was, completely and undeniably, really awesome. The warped rationale I came up with for why we took it was that the owner was probably one of the zombified individuals we left behind on the school grounds. Arguably, not that great of a rationale.

"Why in the hell do you know how to hotwire a car?" I asked Alex as she messed with the car. I stood watch, not looking over at her as I spoke.

"Um, boredom and youtube, duh. You can learn just about anything if you're bored enough and watch enough youtube videos."

As though to prove her point, the car roared to life. Just in time, too, because I was starting to see huddled figures moving towards the parking lot. I knew our best shot at not either dying or ruining our new ride was getting out of there, so we did.

If I were to list the benefits of having lived less than a minute's drive from my best friend's house, I would not have put "don't have to worry about choosing which house to go to in the case of a zombie apocalypse". But, hey, it was a very convenient benefit. Alex was technically closer, and her house was more easily accessible through side roads, so we went there first.

What I said earlier about guns? How only police and criminals have them? Well, I left out the very important group of "out of place redneck doomsday preppers living in the middle of a liberal state". It wouldn't be an important group if Alex's neighbor wasn't firmly within that classifier. He was a crotchety man who seemed the type to own about five houses and only showed up once a month. The neighborhood seemed to be in a state of suspended animation, no one outside at all, but a lot of cars missing from their driveways. Alex's house was one of the many.

"Grand," Alex muttered when she saw that her parent's car was missing. "Just... grand."

"They're fine, I'm sure."

From the way Alex's face fell, it was as though she hasn't though of the possibility them might not be until that moment. "Right. Okay, well, we need to grab something before we go."

"I'll help. What do we need?"

"Not my shit. Stuff from Captain Conservative," Alex said, pointing at the house next to hers.

It didn't look like a fortress or anything. Frankly, I wasn't sure at first why she chose that specific house to loot. I had heard her complain about the guy that lived there a couple times, but generally it was just calling him such colorful phases as "xenophobic asshat" and "a paranoid man with delusions of self-importance" which, however insulting they clearly are, don't tell you that much about a person. Turns out, he was a bit more than paranoid.

I don't know what the exact rules are about guns. Or other such weapons. Or hand grenades. The world is a bit occupied with not dying, so there's not much time to sort out where the second amendment applies and doesn't. Whatever the lawbooks say about them, though, there is no way that all the stuff Alex's neighbor had was legal. Not all of it was very useful, but it also was very likely not legal.

"Why does he need tanks of nitrogen?" I asked Alex, looking around the front room as she grabbed things from rooms around the house. "And why are you taking so long?"

She ignored my first question, but shouted back, "Oh sorry, is my inexperience as a robber showing? I've never been in this place, but I figure we should get stuff that'll keep us not dead. Or not undead. Whatever!"

Turns out what Alex figured would help us was about a bucket filled with freeze dried food and a gun about as long as her arm slung over her back.

"Make sure you have bullets, dumbass," I told her before hurrying through the door she had come from. Apparently Alex didn't intend to get me a functioning defense against the flesh-eating nonsense happening outside, so I was going to get it myself. Alex had already knocked in the window, so why not? Why break and enter and then still get killed?

I expected mostly guns, but turns out Neighbor had a significant array of dangerous shit. As a person who probably could not be trusted not to kill herself with a butter knife until about two years ago (about the point when knowing how to use knives became very useful), I avoided the wall of swords. Man, I wish I had grabbed a sword. Swords are so cool. Anyway, I took a small handgun from a shelf and followed my own advice. I grabbed the box of bullets that seemed to have some connection to it and shoved them into the pocket of my jacket.

If the bullets turned out not to fit the gun... Well, I also grabbed a medium-handled axe just to be safe. That may have been one of the first times allowing a teenage girl an axe made a situation safer. Well, better me than one of the boys from the roof.

"Car. Now. Your house," Alex told me as she unlocked the front door and opened it. I grabbed the bucket of food Alex had collected so she would have more mobility.

Immediately, Alex yelped and slammed the door shut.

"What?" I asked, rushing forward to look through the tiny window at the top of the door. I didn't have a chance to really look before she answered.

"Ready to bash more heads?" Alex asked grimly, pulling the gun off of her back and setting it down on the floor. She grabbed a nearby sledgehammer to replace it and cringed.

"Bet I look more ready than you," I told her, more than a little worried that Alex wouldn't be able to do jack shit with a sledgehammer that probably added up to about a quarter of her body weight. "How many?"

"Few enough to not try to figure out how the hell a gun works."

"Well, that's vague. Thanks."

"'Course."

Then Alex swung the door open. Recalling the sloppy moves and close-calls of that skirmish as a more experienced survivor, fighter, and... well... killer, I'm surprised we didn't just die. Immediately. Completely. I'm surprised Alex didn't accidentally give herself a concussion that ended in her death. I'm surprised I didn't accidentally guillotine myself with that axe and promptly (you guessed it) die. Somehow, though, we were really really lucky.

I'm not even the type of person who really believes in luck, but it was damn lucky that we managed to accidentally kill those zombies. There were only four of them, but they were nothing like the three from the school. Those ones had seemed kind of lost and confused. They acted like kids when they get lost in the toy section of Walmart or Target or one of those places: Yes, very interested in all the cool goodies on all the shelves, but also not sure what to do.

These zombies, they had intent. They were still slow, and I think that's what probably saved us. (Who am I kidding, thank zombie Jesus that those things have a maximum velocity of like two miles an hour. We'd be living among them if they didn't.)

We got to the car as soon as we could, barely remembering to run back to get our guns and bucket of food stuff. All I can remember about the very short drive to my house was how disgustingly sticky blood is. I think most psychologists would very quickly inform Alex and I that we need to chill in a ward somewhere. Take a breather from this whole zombie apocalypse thing. It's not good on the mind. But truthfully, the last time I thought of the general pool of zombies as truly human was when I was trying to wipe their blood off of my hands.

It was literal and metaphorical, two in one! Gotta love impactful moments that are almost ironic!

The driveway at my house wasn't empty like Alex's had been. Instead, our SUV was still in the driveway. The door to the house looked like it was locked, and at the very least it was in tact. Everything else was deserted.

I expected tumbleweeds to start rolling through and minute and a man named Clyde Erwin to challenge me to a shooting contest or a duel. It was a total ghost-town vibe. Alex and I both wanted to get out of there as fast as we could. Everyone else had fled, and they had the right idea. There were too many people in one area, and too few ways to protect ourselves. People make jokes about going to Costco during the apocalypse, but at the moment, I felt more like going and hiding in a forest. Of course, step one would be finding Alex's mom and dad. But first...

I took a deep breath and held tight to the handle of my axe before nocking three times at my door. I knew the combination to the door lock, and even where a spare key was, but I knocked anyway. Because you know what? If I heard someone come and open the door to my house when everyone I knew had suddenly become a bit more cannibalistic than usual, I would get jumpy. Zombies don't knock.

"Mom, Dad, it's Alex and me. Guys, we need to go. Now. Let me in," I said, not daring to shout, but hoping that they would be listening near the door.

Alex pantomimed chopping down the door, and I kicked at her.

Just then, the door opened a crack. Standing on the other side was my mom. I didn't give her a chance to be relieved, immediately grabbing Alex's hand and pulling her inside with me before closing the door again, locking it tight.

"Aurora, thank god. I can't believe--"

"I'm still alive? Same, honestly," I muttered. Mom glared at me.

"No, I just mean I'm so glad you made it back. Your dad is getting stuff together, we need to leave. There's some sort of--"

"Zombie shit going down? Yeah, I know. We had to fight some at the place we took the SAT. And at Alex's place."

Mom frowned. "Listen, girls, everything will be fine. Aurora, go grab anything you need from your room. Alexis, go with her. Please hurry."

I saw her eyeing my axe as she walked away, a stain of red still present on its metal edge.

"You heard the lady," Alex said as she tugged me back toward my bedroom.

"What, to hurry? You don't need to tell me twice."

Any time spent was too much time. My mom and dad weren't exact zombie-hunting machines. We needed to get out of there before any of the zombies tracked us down.

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So the girls now have to deal with Rory's parents not having really seen the zombies yet. Suburban mom and dad meet zombies seems like a recipe for disaster. They need to find somewhere safe and secure.

Where would you go in a zombie apocalypse?

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