‘Sleep Like the Undead’ Mattress and Bedding by Megan Moreland

‘Sleep Like the Undead’ Mattress and Bedding by Megan Moreland

Everything is going according to plan.

I switched shifts with Victoria so I could do patrols with Shaan. Which, in and of itself is amazing. I love doing patrols with Shaan, I love doing anything with Shaan. In fact, I think I might love Shaan, he just hasn’t picked up on it yet.

“Aloof.” That’s how Victoria described him. But in all fairness, I think maybe he’s just too wrapped up in his job to think about falling in love right now. I mean, protecting the last surviving human settlement in a late-stage Zombie apocalypse can be pretty consuming work.

All that to say, he doesn’t know we’re perfect for each other… yet.

And that’s why I have a plan.

So, the plan: Shaan and I are doing patrols, and I casually tell him about some zombie activity I heard about over on the west side. And by “heard about,” I mean that I may have planted some old animal corpses to lure a large number of zombies to the parking lot of the old west port mall.

Shaan, being Shaan, insisted we go check it out. And just as I had planned, a whole monster-truck-load of zombies were roaming around the old mall’s parking lot.

It took us the whole evening to polish off those zombies. Usually, I would hate having to kill that many. Since I’ve been trained from birth to kill zombies with my eyes closed, the task can become about as boring as watching paint dry. But, because Shaan was there, I got to watch him smash brains in all evening. He even took off his jacket when he started feeling hot, and oh boy oh boy, did he look good with zombie blood trickling down his muscular forearms.

And now, just like I planned, the sun has set and we aren’t behind the safety walls of town. Which means, according to protocol, we have to find a place to lay low until the sun comes up.

Now, while the watching-Shaan-sexily-obliterate-zombies part of the evening had been riveting. The real goal behind this elaborate plan of mine is to force us to find a safe–and preferably small–spot where we will have to spend the night together. We may even have to cuddle close together to share warmth.

I can’t wait.

“We should probably find a place to lay low in the mall,” I suggest to Shaan as he wipes the last of the zombie brains from his gorgeously-bearded-face.

“Good idea,” he grunts.

The front doors of the mall have long been torn off making entering a relatively easy feat. The hardest part is navigating through the thick foliage that has grown around the old mall’s entrance. There’s no power left in the building, but there are a few skylights overhead that let in rays of moonlight.

Honestly, it’s kind of romantic.

“Where do you think would be a good place to rest for the night?” I ask as we step over a few decomposed bodies.

I imagine us curled up next to each other in a janitor’s closet sharing stories and laughing all night long. Then maybe, when I fall asleep, he’ll let my head rest on his shoulder and he’ll tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. Maybe he’ll realize how beautiful I am when I’m sleeping, and he’ll declare his love to me by morning.

“I know a spot.” Shaan trudges ahead of me.

“Oh?” I pause because, well, him ‘knowing a spot’ was definitely not part of my plan. “Have you been here before?”

“A few times.”

I follow after him as my mind starts to wonder what spot he could be talking about. It could be an old camp site that someone put together while hiding out in the mall. Maybe, in the back of a clothing store, surrounded by clothing racks. Maybe there are a bunch of comfy blankets set out on the floor and they’re surrounded by candles.

I begin fantasizing about how romantic it could be for us to spend the evening surrounded by warm candlelight. There is no way that Shaan wouldn’t get feelings for me after an evening like that. Suddenly, I regret not packing a picnic for us, I could have made little sandwiches and even brought a bottle of wine.  I stop fantasizing when Shaan comes to a stop in front of…

I squint my eyes to make out the faded sign above the shop, ‘Sleep-like-the-Undead Mattress and Bedding.’

“A mattress store?” A feeling of disappointment starts bubbling in me.

“It’s been converted into a hideout,” Shaan says as he begins untying a rope that is secured around the door handles. My feet don’t move when he opens the door and waits for me to enter. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I lie.

Inside the shop is what I imagine a mattress store would look like before zombies took over the living world. Everything is neatly in its place and mattress after clean-white-mattress are in rows all through the giant room.

“There are so many beds.” I say, and I don’t think I can hide the disappointment in my voice. This is not a part of my plan. An entire giant secured room with possibly forty beds in it? Shaan could sleep on the other side of the room from me! I won’t even be able to watch him while he sleeps, or hear the soft way he snores!

No. No. No!

I have to improvise. There has to be something I can do to salvage my plan. I perimeter check the room while Shaan locks the doors that we came through.

Damn, everything is really secure.

Then I come across an abandoned machete in the corner of the room and an idea takes hold in my mind.

“Shaan.” I say his name with just enough panic in my voice that his head shoots up like a hawk.

“What is it?”

I squint into the darkness out the window of the store. All I can see is the huge parking lot scattered with abandoned cars and overgrown bushes. “I think I just saw people out there.”

Shaan is at my side in a millisecond squinting out into the darkness too. “People?”

We both know how unlikely this would be. I’ve already decided to sell this lie though, so I nod, “Over there.” I point to an outcropping of trees. “I’m certain there were humans, and they were being followed by zombies.”

I don’t even finish what I’m saying before Shaan is speed walking back across the mattress store and unlocking the doors that lead into the mall. “I’ll go scope it out.” He says tersely, reloading his weapons and attaching them to his sides.

“I’ll hold down the fort here,” I say.

He gives me a nod, then leaves.

God, that man is sexy.

Now, time for plan B.

Shredding mattresses with a machete is surprisingly easier than one might expect.

Well, at least when the machete is sharp. After I’ve disintegrated about 10 mattresses the blade starts getting dull and my arms start burning a bit. I don’t slow down though, at any moment Shaan could return from my wild-goose-chase. And when he does, there can only be ONE mattress left.

I chop. I slice. I whack. I stab. I demolish every mattress my machete meets. leaving one queen sized bed in the middle of all the wreckage for Shaan and I to sleep on. King sized would be too big.

I’m basically wheezing by the time Shaan returns, sweating from head to toe with chunks of mattress and feathers from pillowtop comforters plastered to my skin. I can only imagine his surprise when he opens the door to the mattress shop to find mountains and mountains of mattress foam with me and one un-touched mattress right in the middle.

He freezes in the doorway, his eyes taking in the massacre of mattresses then landing on me. He says nothing, but the words “What have you done?” seem to shoot out of his eyes.

A different kind of sweat breaks out on my back.

Right. What was I doing?

I was so focused on phase 1 of plan B: destroy the mattresses, that I forgot about phase 2: explain your actions.

I open my mouth and close it again. Then, “Zombies!” I blurt, “There were zombies.”

Shaan’s eyes go over the room again, and this time I follow his scrutinizing gaze trying to see the room the way he sees it.

“They were in the mattresses.” I add.

Shaan takes a step forward, his foot falling ankle deep in mattress debris. “In the mattresses?” he repeats my words, and I realize just how insane I sound.

I nod my head because it’s too late to go back on my lie now.

“Where are the bodies then?” he asks, “The blood?”

“They erm- they got away.”

“They got away?”

“They were really fast. Like way faster than normal Zombies,” I word vomit. “And they were basically lying-in-wait in the mattresses. It’s like they’re getting more intelligent or something.”

The lie sits in the air between us and I think I may feel sick.

Shaan says nothing and I can’t tell if he’s honestly considering what I’m saying or deciding that I have possibly lost my sanity. That’s when a person steps out from behind Shaan, a woman with two children huddled around her knees.

“It’s true.” The woman says in a soft voice. “The zombies that were following us, they were like nothing I’ve ever seen before.”

“What?” I’m the one who asks the question because who the heck is this lady?

“My children and I were running from a couple of zombies when Shaan found us,” The woman says, her big concerned eyes looking to Shaan and then back to me.

“It’s true,” Shaan confirms, his fingers rubbing thoughtfully across his beard. “Those zombies were not as easy to kill as the others had been. And the way they were following you, it’s as if they were stalking prey instead of mindlessly chasing.”

“What?” I ask again, because what the actual hell is going on here? I just pulled a lie out of my ass, and now everyone is acting like it’s true!

The woman nods her head, her eyes welling with tears. “It’s true, we wouldn’t have survived if you hadn’t seen us, and come to help.”

I blink as understanding dawns on me. “So- so when I told you about the people out the window… you found them?”

Shaan nods, “They’re very lucky that you saw them.”

“Yeah.” I agree weakly. “So lucky.”

Shaan looks to the woman and her children. “We will rest here for the evening.” He tells them, “Then tomorrow we will take you to our safe house.”

The woman nods, then all five of us turn to look at the one remaining queen-size-bed.

* * * * THE END * * * *
Copyright Megan Moreland 2024