Henrietta (Day 1)

Henrietta Thompson, 80

Buffalo, New York  

I liked to say I lived a long and happy fun filled life…well, that’s until my daughter felt that I might be to much of a bother for her and her precious husband to take care of; so, she put me into the “HAPPY HILLS RETIREMENT HOME”…hmph, if I sound a little on the bitter side…I’m not…I’m very bitter. Sometimes I almost wish they never started me on the “LAZARIUM” pills. It might’ve been better if I couldn’t remember all that I do or what they do…and Jack…I really miss you. (Jack was my husband of 48 years)

“Hi Henrietta…how are you doing today?” Nurse Johnson says to me as she walks into my room.

Startled, I quickly turn away from the window and turn to Nurse Johnson.

“Oh my…”, I say as I let out one of those  embarrassing laughs . “Did I startle you Mrs. Thompson?” She asks.

I move over to my bed; “just a little.” I say with a smile.

“I’m sorry sweetie…I didn’t mean to do that…but it’s time for your meds.” Says Nurse Johnson as she casually makes her way to the counter and plops down her little plastic container that houses those itsy bitsy teeny weeny purple capsules of life that I swear are a God send…and a curse.

I’m sure my smile can be seen from miles away, with just the thought of taking my “LAZARIUM”… I can almost imagine what a person hooked on some kind of illegal drugs would do or feel for their next “fix”…(I learned that lingo on Law and Order…Jack and I used to watch that show together. Sorry…I digressed)…they want to stop but can’t…almost the way I feel…but with less guilt.

I sit on my bed…waiting patiently for my “LAZARIUM”...like a dog waiting for a nice meaty bone.

“Ok, Mrs. Thompson…” the Nurse says as she turns toward me with the pills in a small paper cup.  “Hear you go.”

“Thank you” I say, trying to hold back the drool. (not seriously but sure felt like it though)

I take my pills then hand Nurse Johnson the paper cup.

“Is the Doctor still coming to see me today?” I ask.

“Actually Dr. Hooper was called into the Hospital today…apparently there was some kind of accident downtown and a lot of people were hurt…and from what I heard, a lot of deaths too.” Nurse Johnson tells me. “Oh my…that’s terrible.”  I replied…but before I could even say more; both Nurse Johnson and I are frightened by the horrific sounds of screaming and yelling coming from out in the hallway.

Nurse Johnson rushes to the doorway. She stands motionless…almost in complete shutdown.

I quickly jump to my feet; “What is it, Nurse Johnson?” I yell out.

Nurse Johnson turns back to me with fear in her eyes…I’ve never seen such fear in someone’s face before.

“Oh dear God, what is it child?” I ask but before she could say anything; someone swooped by the door, pulling her away.

I jump with fear…nearly wetting myself (embarrassing, I know… but true).

I hear Nurse Johnson’s screams as the join the many others.

Oh God, what is going on out there? I think to myself.

I see another nurse running past my door followed by…um, it…well…it looked like Mr. Edwards…but he passed away early this morning. It couldn’t have been him.

Scared but none the less, I decided to take a look out the door…I felt the need to know what’s happening.

I slowly walk toward the door…as I reach the entrance to my little room that I call home; I peek out the door and see horrible…horrible things…oh God…I-I almost cannot believe what I am seeing.

I see my friends…the people I live with and eat with and…and laugh with…they are attacking the staff. They are attacking and…and no, no…no…they…they are eating them.

“Oh God…what the hell is going on here? God almighty…what is going on?” I say quietly to myself but unfortunately not quite enough. Several of my friends…well, what were my friends, look in my direction and with a horrific sounding yell by one of them, almost as if it were a bugle letting out the call to charge because by golly, they all came running towards me…with arthritis, heart problems, fibromyalgia and whatever else was plaguing these old pokes before right now, sure isn’t slowing them down.

I try to run in the other direction but not watching where I am going, I trip over Nurse Johnson’s half eaten body.

I couldn’t get up fast enough…they all surround me…the pain…oh God the pain. They are biting me! They are tearing at my flesh! My screams are now just sounds of gargling blood that’s filling up in my mouth and throat…what a way to go…the last thought that goes through my head as they rip out my innards was…I really hate my daughter.

Henrietta Thompson…deceased

  

Michael (Day 1)

Michael Sanders, 36

Syracuse, New York

My mother was living with Alzheimer’s for the past 6 years before the drug "LAZARIUM" was prescribed to her. I could swear it was the best thing for her and the family. Those pills were a miracle…not long after she started taking them she was running around, shopping, gardening, playing with the grandkids and telling her wonderful stories that I so very missed…my mother was alive again.

Almost a full year had passed since my mother started taking "LAZARIUM" and she was doing so great that we (my brother’s family and mine) decided that it would be a wonderful thing to celebrate her 68^th birthday on Fisher Island. With all that my mother has been through the past 6 years, she deserves a week that she’ll never forget.

On the weekend before we were to leave, I took the kids (Connor, 13 and Jacob, 8) to pick up my mother…as we pulled up, I instantly felt that something wasn’t right. My mother loves the sunlight to shine in through the windows and she always opens the curtains first thing in the morning…it’s now 1 o’clock in the afternoon and the curtains are still closed.

I park the truck in the driveway and I tell my kids to wait in the cab.

I walk up to the front door and ring the doorbell…I wait a few seconds then I ring it again. A minute or so passes and still no answer.

She knew we were coming over to pick her up…now I’m starting to really worry.

I turn to walk back to the truck to get my keys; I have a spare key to the front door.

I get to the truck and reach for the keys that are hanging in the ignition.

“Did Grandma leave?” my son asks with a confused look on his face. “I don’t know yet but wait here till I come get you both” I say to my kids as I back out of the cab and close the door.

I quickly make my way back to the front door.

I slide the key in the lock and turn…I look back at the kids to make sure they are okay, they were and I turned back to the door and turn the knob.

I open the door and as I begin to walk into the house, I call out; “Mother…its Michael…hello” But I hear nothing.

I walk further into the house; I head toward the living room and still nothing. So, I call out again…”Mother.” I’m starting to get a little worried; “Mother…where are you?” I call again but louder.  

As I pass the hall leading to the bedrooms, I notice a stepstool on the ground, laying on its side and a broken glass frame. “Mother…mom!” I yell out. I rush down the hall; I figured she must’ve fallen and probably was lying somewhere hurt.

I quickly look in the bedrooms, still calling out for my mother but I hear nothing other than my own heart pounding through my chest.

I stand quietly for a moment at the entrance to my mother’s room. Then suddenly I hear what no parent ever wants to hear…the sound of my kids screaming from the truck. I’ll never forget those nightmarish screams…and the shot of fear that went down my spine.

I quickly run back down the hall and toward the living room and out the door.

My children’s screams grow louder as I fly down the walkway toward the truck.

As I reach the driveway…I am over-whelmed by intense fear as the sounds of my kids screaming, stops.

“Connor…Jacob!” I scream as I fling the truck door open…and my own personal horror is realized right before my eyes. “Oh God! Mother! Oh God…my God!” I scream as I see my mother on top of my kids…her grandchildren…tearing at their flesh and eating them.

With one of my son’s intestines in her hand, she quickly turns to me with blood dripping from her face and her eyes free of color...and her neck wobbled as if it were broken or not attached to her skull.

She looked like a wild animal…or worse...something out of a horror movie.

Before I could do or say anything else she quickly lunges at me and we both fall to the cold cement driveway.

She bites me on the shoulder but her tooth doesn’t make it past my shirt. She tries again but I hold her off.

I notice a crowed starting to gather…the neighbors coming out to see what was all the commotion but like most people, they don’t want to get involved, especially what they see before them. Not sure I would either.

I yell out to the gawkers, “Help me! Help…me!”

My mother gets ahold of my ear and clamps down on it…I scream as she rips my earlobe off and blood shoots out onto the ground.

Oh my God…are those people really going to just stand there and watch my mother eat me alive…what the fuck!

“Help Me, God damn it…Help me!” I yell out in one last attempt to get anyone to help…but humanity doesn’t live on this block.

As I look up at my 68 year old mother, who just spit out my chewed up ear back down on my face along with blood and saliva…she lets out a sinister growl…her breath, so foul…I felt my gag reflex about to give but the fight to keep my mother from taking another bite outta me, took over and I used every last bit of strength that I had and I pushed her up as far as I could while yelling at her; “Mother! Get…the…fuck…off…me!”

I worked my legs under her and slowly prop my feet to her stomach and I trust my legs out, sending my little old gray-haired mother flying up and over the hood of my truck.

She lands hard with a loud thud on the cement floor.

I jump to my feet but I stumble and almost fall back down to the ground.

I try to regain my stability by leaning on the bed of my truck.

I quickly throw my hand over the hole where my ear used to be as I’m hit with a surge of pain that shoots from head down my spine and to my feet…damn it hurts like a son-of-a bitch. “Fuck” I say to myself.

 I glance around the crowd as I see some of my mother’s neighbors on their cell phones…(which I’m assuming are calling the police)…and others are filming this madness. Insensitivity and technology go hand in hand.

My eyesight are slightly blurred but I do see a rather large man walking quickly in my direction…holding a baseball bat tightly in his hand. At least one person is coming to help; I think to myself.

I look away from the crowd and the large bat-man crossing the street and I focus on the horrific sight of my two boys lying motionless on the seat of my truck.

I cannot even begin to describe the pain that I’m feeling right now…and not that from my ear but that of my heart being torn from my chest. My boys are dead…Oh God…they’re dead.

I begin to weep.

I can hear the sirens in the distance but getting closer...late like always but welcomed, non the less.

Before I realize that the large bat-man made his way across the street and to my mother’s driveway; he yells out; “Hey motherfucker!”

With tears rolling down my cheeks and blood pouring down the side of my face…and my son’s torn up bodies spread all over the seat and this fat ass jerk-off actually thinks I’m the bad guy.

“Come pick on someone who can actually defend themselves…instead of a little old lady!” He yells, as he raises the bat and grips it with both hands.

I look at him with astonishment that this Guido is seriously going to beat me with a baseball bat without really knowing what the hell is going on…what a dick.

I throw my hands up to shield myself from the incoming headache that this large man is about to inflict on me…but before he could swing the bat down on my head, my mother lunges out from behind the truck and latches her $15,000.00 dentures into the fat man’s rather large neck. He drops the bat and begins to scream as he tries to pull my mother off him but she’s on him like a tick on a dog.

My mother shifts her head from side to side then pulls her head back, tearing out the man’s throat.

I can hear the screams now coming from the crowd as the fat man falls to the ground and his blood squirting out like a garden hose turned on full…it was a mess.

I grab the bat and make my way over to my mother as she continues to feed on the fat man’s twitching body.

I grip the bat tightly.

My eyes filled with tears, my breath shallow and my broken heart beating fast.

I raise the bat.

“I’m sorry mom” I say softly, and…I swing the bat down on my mother.

The bat hits my mother on the back but she barely reacts…she just continues to tear at the fat man’s body.

I swing again…and again…and again. She gets up from the body and turns to me. Her face is covered in blood and bits of flesh that’s not her own. That is not my mother anymore. My mother is dead and this thing in front of me is…is j-just a shell…a soulless shell of what was once a wonderful woman.

I raise the bat again. “Alright…let’s get this over with.” I mumble to myself…then I yell out; “C’mon!”

She lets out that menacing screeching again and rushes at me like a wild bull charging a matador.

I swing the bat once more as hard as I can and it connects with her head and she falls to the ground. I step over her body and preparing to swing again but she stopped moving…I wait a few seconds (which felt like minutes)…but my mother lays motionless.

My mother is dead…again.

                                                     (End of Day 1)