Zom-B (Zom-B 1)

Chapter Fifteen

Saturday drags. I stay in all day. A few of my mates call and ask me to come meet up, but I tell them I don't feel well. They say everyone's talking about me and how I rescued the baby. I laugh it off like it's no big deal.

Dad takes us out to a Chinese restaurant for dinner. Mum dresses up and slaps makeup over her bruise. She and Dad share a couple of bottles of wine. He lets me have a sip when nobody's watching. Laughs when I grimace.

"Don't worry," he says. "You'll get used to it."

Dad's polite as he can be to the staff. Funny how he doesn't have a problem with foreigners when they're serving him food. Most of his favorite grub comes from overseas, Chinese, Italian, Indian. I consider pointing that out to him, but I don't want to set him off again.

Mum and Dad head to the pub after the meal, leaving me to guard the fort at home. Dad gives me a fiver and tells me to treat myself to some chips and sweets. He scratches my head and grins. I grin back. The aggro of yesterday isn't forgotten by any of us, but we move on, the way we always do. No point living in the past. We'd have burned out long ago if we held grudges.

I watch a film, surf the Web, download some new tracks, play a few games, go to bed late. I don't hear the old pair come home.

I get up about midday. Dad's still asleep. Mum's working on a Sunday roast. We're a bit stiff with each other. It always takes us a while to return to normal after Dad loses his temper. We're both embarrassed.

We eat at two. Dad's hungover but he still manages to polish off his plate. He loves roasts, never leaves more than scraps. He drinks beer with the meal, saying that's the only way to combat a hangover. Normally he praises Mum's cooking but he doesn't say much today, nursing a headache.

"That was nice," I mutter as Mum clears up.

"I've got dessert for later," Mum smiles. "Pavlova. Your favorite."

It's actually Dad's favorite, but I don't mind. We share a smile. Things are getting better. The air doesn't feel so tight around me now.

Dad watches soccer in the afternoon. I watch some of the match with him. I make a few scathing comments about Premiership players and how they're overpaid prima donnas. That's usually guaranteed to set him off on an enthusiastic rant, but today he just grunts, wincing every now and then, rubbing his head as if that will make the pain go away.

Some of Mum's friends come to visit. They don't say anything about her face, don't even ask if she had an accident. They start chirping about what happened at the War Museum but Mum shushes them before Dad kicks off again. They retreat to the kitchen and carry on in whispers.

I go to my room when the soccer's over and phone Vinyl, hoping he won't have heard about the museum. No such luck.

"I hear you're London's newest superhero," he chuckles.

"Get stuffed."

"They should send you over to Ireland to stamp out the zombies."

"Don't make me come and give you a kicking," I warn him.

He asks if I've heard the latest rumors. Apparently Pallaskenry wasn't the first place the zombies struck. According to supposedly classified documents that have somehow surfaced on the Internet, there were at least three other attacks in small, out-of-the-way villages, one in Africa, two in South America.

"If that's true," Vinyl says, "you can bet there's been even more of them in places we haven't heard of yet."

"It's all crap," I tell him. "They're trying to scare us."

"Maybe," he hums. "But it looks like the curfew's going ahead. They've already introduced it in a lot of towns in Wales, since that's so close to Ireland. London nightlife's gonna be a thing of the past soon."

"That won't last," I snort. "You think people here will stand for a lockdown? I give it a week or less. The rumors will die away, the curfew will be lifted, everything will go back to normal."

"I hope so," he sighs.

We chat about TV and music. I tell Vinyl how Nancy confronted me at school, treating me like a racist. I get huffy about it, conveniently not mentioning the fact that I made gorilla noises. Vinyl isn't in the least sympathetic.

"Well, you are a racist," he notes.

"No I'm not," I snap. "I'm talking to you, and you're hardly Snow White."

"I'm your token black friend," he chuckles.

"No," I sniff. "You're my token retarded friend."

I hang up before he can yell at me. Giggling wickedly, delighted to have trumped him, I punch the air, then go take a long, hot bath. There's nothing like a good soak when it comes to relaxing. I lie in the tub for an hour, staring at the drops of condensation on the ceiling and window, feeling peaceful. The old scar on my thigh is itchy, so I scratch it, then turn on my side and let the air at it. When it stops annoying me, I lie flat again.

Mum and I watch TV together later. Dad's gone out to the pub. Mum opens a box of chocolates and we share them. Belgian chocs. They're nice, but I prefer Roses or Quality Street. You can't beat a good Strawberry Cream.

Dad gets back with a few of his mates not long after ten. My stomach tenses when they enter - I think Owl Man is going to be with them - but these are just some of his campaign buddies. They have posters and leaflets. Local elections aren't for another three or four months, but they've been asked to start canvassing early. One of the posters has a picture of a zombie, set next to a photo of a Muslim bomber. WHICH DO YOU FEAR MOST? it asks.

Dad and his mates love the poster. Mum and I pretend to admire it too. Then we go to bed early. Dad doesn't like us hanging around when he's talking shop. I'm sure that I'll struggle to drop off, or have the nightmare again, but I don't. I'm out in a minute and sleep the sleep of the dead after that.

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