Bob ate Linda: A Cautionary Tale of Undead Relatives

I figured we could use a little levity, and since The Walking Dead is in full swing again...
 
Well....


***

 

 

"Mom, have you seen Linda?"

 

"Bob ate Linda, sweetie."

 

"Goddammit, Bob!"

 

"Watch your language!"

 

Bob sat in the corner, pouting and ashamed. He knew eating Linda was wrong, but he couldn't help himself. He was dead, after all. Or is it undead? In any event, Bob wasn't much of a thinker when his heart was still beating. They couldn't really fault him for eating Linda now. Of course, they didn't need to keep Bob there in the first place.

 

John shook his head. "Remind me again why we keep him here?"

 

"Because he's your uncle and I said so," exclaimed Ramona, John's mother.

 

"Ma, I get that he's your brother and all, but he's a zombie. As in doesn't breathe, and eats people now. We have to get rid of him."

 

Ramona whacks John in the arm with a wooden spoon.

 

"Ow!"

 

"He's your uncle and he loves you and you just stop with that 'zombie' nonsense."

 

John rubs his shoulder. "Mom, dearest mother; Uncle Bob ate Linda."

 

"Well dear, we all have to make sacrifices now."

 

With that Ramona turned and went back to the kitchen where she'd been preparing a pot of meat sauce. John shuddered and tried not to think about what she'd put in it. With a heavy sigh, John walked over to Bob.

 

"Ughnnnnnn."

 

"Shut up, Bob."

 

Bob reached for John, but John brushed his feeble arm away and affixed the chain back around Bob's waist and secured it with a new padlock. This time he made sure to keep the key hidden from his mother.

 

"There's no such thing as zombies," she'd say. 

 

"You're not the one who has to clean up the bodies," John muttered under his breathe. 

 

"What's that, dear?" called Ramona from the kitchen.

 

"Nothing, just talking to Bob," he called back before rolling his eyes and gritting his teeth. He glared at Bob before heading out to the yard to deal with what was left of Linda.

 

Linda.

 

Another sigh.

 

John liked Linda. They'd met after things went south, and she had been staying with them. She was six years older than John's eighteen years, had an infectious smile, and seemed smart. Now she was fertilizer.

 

John had to cover his nose first to keep himself from gagging. He was a hockey player; John knew how badly the human form could smell on the outside. It paled in comparison to the odor of internal organs splayed out across the back patio. Before he thought too long on the subject, and brought himself to the point of physical revulsion, he grabbed a shovel and scooped what was left of Linda into the wheelbarrow. They lived in an older suburb, and their lot was one of the largest in the tract. For better or worse, John had been forced to dig a compost hole back behind the shed. It was there he dumped them.

 

Them.

 

"For fuck's sake, how long is this going to go on?" he asked himself silently as he wheeled Linda's… well he wasn't quite sure what part of Linda that was, but he wheeled it through the yard and dumped it with the rest.

 

Steve.

 

Some kid named Dave, he thought. Dan? No, Dave.

 

And now Linda.

 

He'd thought about just sticking a screwdriver through Bob's ear and putting an end to it, but his mother would never forgive him. No, he was stuck with undead Uncle Bob. At least he had a new lock so his mother couldn't let him go again.

 

When he hosed the rest of Linda off the patio and returned to the house, his mother was waiting with her arms crossed.

 

"Unchain him."

 

"No!"

 

"Jonathan Peter, you unchain your uncle this instant!"

 

"Mom, I am not unchaining my zombie uncle so he can eat more people. Forget it."

 

"I wish your father was still with us. He wouldn't put up with this sass."

 

John's mouth dropped. He had no words. He shook his head and pushed by his mother.

 

"I'm going to my room. Call me when dinner is ready."

 

With that he ascended the stairs, entered his room and slammed the door. Ramona glowered from the foyer.

 

Thankfully they still had power. A lot of areas of the country didn't, according to the news. At least he could still watch his movies and listen to music. He was about to turn something on, anything to take his mind of the grisly chore he'd just completed, when his phone rang, startling him.

 

Kelsey.

 

He blushed.

 

"Hey Kel. What's up?"

 

"Nothin. I'm bored. Was gonna see if you and Linda wanted go to the park and throw rocks at zombies."

 

John cringed.

 

"Bob ate Linda."

 

"Jesus! Seriously?"

 

"Yeah. My mother is nuts. She still thinks he's her little brother, not an undead people-eater. Remember that kid Steve from down the street?"

 

"Steve too?"

 

"Yeah."

 

Yeah, Steve, too.

 

"Your mom is nuts."

 

"Tell me something I don't know. Anyway, she made sauce. Wanna just come over and hang out and stay for dinner?"

 

"Sure, I guess. I'll be over in a few."

 

"Cool."

 

They hung up and John rushed to his door. If Kelsey was going over he needed to take a shower in case he got any of Linda on him. He opened his door only to find Bob standing there.

 

"Aghhghgghhhhhh…."

 

"Son of a bitch! How? Mom!"

 

"He's your uncle!" she yelled from downstairs. "You can't keep him chained up!"

 

John pushed Bob away when he tried to bite John's arm.

 

"No!" John yelled. Bob tried again, and John swatted him in the nose. That did the trick. Bob cowered.

 

"We do not eat family. Look at me Bob! We. Do not. Eat family."

 

Was that comprehension in Bob's eyes? Maybe. Who knew what brain cells he still had left.  Just to be safe, John locked the door when he showered.

 

 Such was life in the zombie apocalypse at 813 Meadow Way.

 

 

© 2017 J.J. Goodman. All rights reserved.