The March Selected Story 2 is by David Bernstein
Please feel free to email David at: dbern77@hotmail.com
IT'S A BOY
by David Bernstein
Jim’s wife was pregnant when the zombie outbreak occurred. She was in her first month then, now in her eighth, due in twenty-one days.
He and his wife, Beth Anne, lived on a farm on the outskirts of Crown Point, a small town in upstate New York. The property bordered Lake Champlain, a one hundred and ten mile long body of fresh water. The land surrounding the farm was open field, with patches of forest—mostly pine, scattered about. A small mountain, part of the Adirondack region, rose in the distance, leaving the remote farm further isolated from the rest of world.
The nearest neighbor, dead now, had been a mile away, making any zombie threats minimal. In the past year, Jim had run into only one zombie. It was a decayed, orange-camouflage-wearing member of the walking dead.
He was most likely a hunter who’d died out in the woods near the mountain. The poor fellow had a large gaping hole where his stomach should’ve been. His intestines hung out like a line of smoked sausages. Jim finished him quickly with a 12-gauge shot to the head.
All in all, Jim considered himself lucky, especially when measuring what he had seen on the news, when there was news.
They had livestock: cows, goats, and chickens. The cows ate grass, the goats ate almost anything, including grass, and the chickens ate bugs, worms, and various kinds of vegetation. All the animals were easy to keep, surviving off nature’s provisions, while supplying the couple with food and milk. There was plenty of wood for the stove. A fresh vegetable garden flourished, expanding about a quarter acre of land. Deer, pheasant, rabbits, and fish from the lake supplied all the protein they needed.
The only thing Jim truly worried about was his wife’s pregnancy. Every day, he reminded himself that for centuries, people had been having children without the assistance of doctors, mid-wives or hospitals. Beth Anne would have to follow suit. There was no other choice.
“Come feel the baby,” Beth Anne said, lounging on the sofa. “The baby’s kicking.” She had her feet up, sandals off and even though the world had fallen, she still did her nails.
Jim looked upon his wife with soft, care-filled eyes. She was gorgeous, her basketball size stomach holding the essence of their love for each other. She had her shirt pulled up and took his hand, placing it gently on her warm tummy. He felt nothing, then a thump. It was quickly followed by another and another. He felt the baby in her stomach, which so far, seemed alive and well.
A bright smile showed on his face. “That’s incredible,” he said.
“I’m going to sit out in the sunroom,” she said. “And enjoy the beautiful day.”
“I’ll be right there,” he said. “Just want to finish up some chores. I have to finish fixing the window.”
“Bring some tea with you when you join me,” she said.
“Will do,” he answered.
Hammering away a few minutes later, Jim heard a horrible scream. He dropped the hammer, running to the sunroom. His wife lay on the floor, holding her ankle.
“What happened?” he asked in alarm.
“A damn snake just bit me. My ankle is burning.”
Jim saw the reptile slithering away toward the open patio door. Its scales were covered with dark and light brown diamond-like shapes, a copperhead. They were poisonous, the bites very painful; still, few people died from them. But his wife was pregnant.
“Where’s the snake bite kit?” he asked, snapping out of his daze.
“I don’t remember where we put it. Who would’ve . . .” she cried out, “. . . thought we would’ve ever needed it.” Sweat was already lining her forehead, strands of hair plastered to her face. “Suck the poison out.”
Remembering what he’d learned as a Boy Scout, Jim grabbed a sharp knife and sliced open the skin where the bite was located. He placed his mouth over the area and began sucking. Iron and something sour, probably the venom, assaulted his mouth like some awfully made cocktail.
“It’s so hot in here. I feel like I’m on fire,” Beth Anne said, her breaths coming quickly. She lay back on the cool floor, holding her stomach. “Jim, the baby?”
Damn, what did she want him to do? He wasn’t a doctor. Damn. Damn. Damn. How the hell did a snake get into the house? All these thoughts raced through his mind as he continued to suck and spit.
When he finished, he carried Beth Anne to the couch and brought her a cold washcloth and a glass of water. How did this happen so fast? Copperheads could make someone sick, but they weren’t supposed to be deadly. He laid his head against her chest, her heart beating rapidly. She started convulsing, her eyes rolling back. “Beth Anne,” he yelled, holding her. “Beth Anne.”
An hour later he checked her temperature, the thermometer reading one hundred and three degrees Fahrenheit. She was in and out of delirium. An hour later she was dead, Jim listening to her last breath as it escaped her mouth. He’d tried CPR, but to no avail. He sat next to her cooling body and wept.
Unable to deal with the pain of losing his wife and unborn child, Jim downed a bottle of whiskey. He stomped through the house, breaking things and cursing until passing out on the couch, next to his wife.
He awoke shortly before six a.m. Puke and droplets of blood littered on the floor. One particular pile of vomit resembled day old oatmeal. Looking at his bare feet, he saw they had slices on them from the broken glass scattered about the floor. He’d made a real a mess. He staggered to his feet. His wife, thankfully, was still dead. She’d been a corpse for eight hours, roughly the time it took for a person to turn.
Nauseous, head pounding, he grabbed another bottle of whiskey, knowing the task that lay ahead. He gulped a good portion of the contents before returning to his wife. He carried her dead body, slinging her over his shoulder, outside. He grabbed an ax by the woodpile and laid her down on the cutting stump that at one time had been used for chickens.
He held the ax over his head, tears coming first. He slumped to the ground. His wife’s body had paled, her veins showing through, purple. The virus was ready to help her rise. She smelled rotten, dead.
Getting to his feet, Jim stood over her. Holding the ax high once again, he saw her body twitch. Her fingers started to wiggle. She was awakening. With a scream of terror, Jim slammed the ax down, severing his wife’s head from her body.
The sound had been almost as horrifying as the act. The spine making a popping sound as it came apart. Beth Anne’s head dropped and rolled a few feet away, her blonde hair a tangled mess. The mouth hung open as if astonished by what Jim had done.
He fell to his knees, sobbing hysterically. He would have to bury her, but not today. He needed not to see her anymore.
As he wiped tears away he saw her body move. Jim stared hard at the headless corpse as it rocked. Had the virus mutated? The brain no longer in control? No, something was trapped under it, causing the corpse’s dead weight to move.
Jim placed a foot under his dead wife’s body and kicked it so it rolled onto the back, the giant bump that was his child facing up. Something was moving inside, stretching the skin in places. Points of pressure revealing a tiny hand print, then a foot. His baby was still alive and trying to get out. Jim watched as his horror turned to joy.
His dead wife’s stomach kept stretching. Finally a tiny finger broke through the dry skin, followed by another, before a small hand showed. The flesh began tearing in different places as the fetus tried clawing its way out. It seemed to struggle, taking a while, so Jim bent down and assisted. He pulled back flabby pieces of skin, ripping and tearing at it until the baby was free. It was a miracle!
Jim grabbed the baby, pulling his son free from the gory cavity. The child’s skin was colorless like a cancer patient’s. Its veins showed through the skin. The eyes were sunken in; the cheekbones protruding. It shouldn’t have been alive, but it was. Jim gleamed with pride.
The baby opened its mouth, revealing a full set of jagged, black, baby teeth. Jim’s face brightened with happiness. His child was advanced, already having a full set of teeth. It moaned and began snapping at Jim, holding its arms out.
“Now, now, Jim Jr.” he said. “I know you’re hungry, but you’re going to have to learn not to bite.” He took the baby inside the house, placing him in the playpen he’d acquired when he went out house searching. He looked upon the zombie child with tender, adorning eyes. “You look so much like your mother.”
The next day Jim slaughtered a chicken, offering it to the baby, but he wouldn’t eat it. Realizing the baby wanted its mother, Jim chopped her up and began feeding her to little Jim Jr. Looking toward the future, he realized they would have to move to a more populated area where he could get his son the proper nutrition he required.
When David Bernstein, a.k.a. MacabreZombie, isn’t writing some type of horror, he can usually be found reading or watching it. He’s been published in a number of horror magazines and anthologies. He is currently working on a novel titled Amongst the Dead of which the first three chapters can be read at Tales of the Zombie War. David keeps getting ideas for short stories and has to write them. He lives in the New York City area with his girlfriend of eight years.
Some of David's publishing credits include Ruthless, Dreams and Screams Anthology, Letters From the Dead, Dead History Anthology, Night Chills, and many others.