The Girl in the Heart-Shaped Locket

Day…

I no longer know the date. There is no need to know what date or day of the week it is anymore. I know it’s summer – I can tell that because of the oppressive heat and the hours of daylight. These days, the only sort of time you need to be aware of is the coming of the dark.

Sunset is when THEY come out. THEY only come out at night. Night time is their time. You have to know when sunset is approaching – after a while you get a sense for it – and when the sun is setting that is when you had best have found somewhere safe for the night before darkness falls! It has to be somewhere with solid walls, a thick door and metal bars on the windows because, otherwise, THEY will find you even in the pitch black darkness! THEY can see in the dark and can even smell if you are cowering high up a tree. And THEY will get you and eat you while you scream.

It all started with a sneeze – just a simple sniffle – and then everything happened so quickly. The Sickness spread from person to person, country to continents in a matter of days. First, cold-like symptoms, then all the hallmarks of flu, and within three days you were conscious. The few of those who didn’t die within a couple of days either awoke symptomless or remained unconscious. The majority of the survivors of those first few days – those who stayed unconscious – began to change as if they were hibernating whilst their bodies and minds went through a kind of metamorphosis, changing into something new and deadly, and insatiably hungry.

No one knows what exactly the Sickness was, why it did what it did to some and killed the rest. Not all of us became sick though – not many of us but some, including my parents, the wife and I – however, everything was so chaotic, we didn’t have time to think about helping others; we were so completely focused on getting to our loved ones as the world ended around us.

The last news broadcasts made allegations of some biological attack or secret weapons containment breach; others called it a holy plague. Within a week millions were dead, lying in their beds, bodies filling the overflowing hospitals, but many having collapsed in the streets, and society fell with them. The internet went off first, with telecommunications ceasing merely hours later, and the essential services shortly after that. The world was plunged into darkness.

That was when THEY woke up.

Whatever THEY are now, they are predators, and they have no humanity left in them. Most of the world’s scientists and experts were dead or unconscious before The Awakening – that’s what we survivors call it – so no one studied them or could provide an explanation. THEY did not die – they’re not the dead walking. If they were, their bodies would have rotted away by now, and this is far from the case. So, not zombies, I am sure of that. Not vampires either, for the same reason, though THEY seem to fear sunlight and flee from bright lights but THEY eat everything and anything not just the blood, just as long as it’s meat. THEY don’t talk except for guttural shrieks and grunts, but THEY understand one another which explains their coordinated attacks of the settlements. I doubt we’ll ever truly know because THEY will find us all in the end. THEY are always hungry.

Those of us who survived those early days fled from populated areas, seeking shelter in the countryside as even the suburbs were infested with those things and littered with the decomposing bodies of those too bloated and foul smelling for even their tastes.

That’s when I found her! Just lying there on the road, silver chain broken, I found the heart-shaped locket and I stumbled along, leaving the burning city behind me. The locket sparkled in the firelight of the inferno taking hold of the buildings. I don’t know why I picked it up but I did. I had nothing with me to the clothes on my back and her! Picking it up was almost an automatic action and I didn’t really acknowledge it until much later when I found the locket in my pocket.

The settlements did not last long and the couple of us who made it out of the world’s last civilisations scattered like leaves in the wind; most too afraid to be around others, except for the marauders and gangs who hunt the rest of us for our resources and their sport. Still, they cower in shelters at night, like us, because there are too few left to fight the hordes that come in the dead of night.

So, now, I live a solitary life. It is the only way to survive. You see, THEY are drawn to settlements or congregations of people. No one knows whether it is due to some form of lingering memory of human social behaviour and our need to be with other people, or whether it is mere coincidence THEY come when we are gather in groups. I think THEY do still remember but I also think THEY are better able to smell out a group of survivors. We stink! We live in dirty clothes and the amount of waste people quickly create when there is no running water or sanitation is frankly amazing, and the thought of the smell of those settlements is enough to turn my stomach even now.

I cannot say it out loud – that would be too real – I can admit here to being lonely. It is not good to show anyone weakness these days even when interaction with other survivors is rare and dangerous. Weakness gets men killed, women raped and children staked out to be devoured in the night.

But I am lonely. God, I’m so lonely! I think that is the real reason why I am writing this journal. I can tell you anything, not fearing to express myself lest someone decide I’m an easy target with resources. People have become monsters and they can be as brutal and uncaring as the actual monsters! It’s become a harsh world and people have had to evolve to survive in it, though if I can refrain from pillaging and raping others can too! They don’t. Then again, I grew up in the countryside and know a little about gardening so I have been able to grow my own vegetables, snare rabbits and hares, and find water sources teeming with fish. Yet, a full belly does little to ease the overwhelming loneliness I feel deep in my bones, though I suppose it’s better to be lonely than eaten alive … and I have her!

Our emotions always separated us from the animals and but we’ve lost much of what we were. Those few of us who survived The Awaking and the fall of the settlements fled into the countryside and avoid other people at all costs because when their food source left, the predators followed. Thankfully, I stumbled across an isolated farmhouse on a hillside overlooking a small picturesque village I think I visited as a child. It looks out across the whole valley so I can watch out for dangers and see the continued beauty of nature. Like the village, the farm was empty … well … I found the farmer and his wife hanging in the barn. I do not know what happened to the cattle or sheep. I assume the farmer let them out to roam free, believing their chances of survival were better than his. I buried them on the hill to look out over their home. At least they can rest easy now.

For me, it took me days to search the hauntingly empty village with its handful of homes and its one village shop, checking for those things and any survivors. There were none. So I liberated what supplies I could and fortified my new farm, adding metal bars, sheets, and corrugated iron to the windows and door and, with effort, knocking down the barn so as not to offer a dark and musty retreat from daylight if THEY ever wander up the hill. It’s safe and secure, isolated and lonely.

Yet, I have her for company. The girl in the locket, I mean. I fixed the broken chain and keep it round my neck at all times, except at night when THEY are snuffling at the door or banging on the bars on the windows. Those times, I hold her, looking at her picture and attempt sleep. Sleep is another luxury commodity which is rarely found these days. Always being on edge, having to be alert, consciously aware of every sound precludes sleep most nights. When I finally manage to drift off naturally, nightmares of what happened plague my dreams, souring any fantasies of the girl’s laughter and smile, transforming into flames, and screams, and the shrieks of delight as THEY rip into my wife, my old father valiantly standing his ground, swinging a cricket bat, protecting my mother. I often dream of how I was unable to reach my parents as they disappeared under a sea of monsters. Why did I turn and run? I was scared. But they were family! There was nothing I could have done except get myself killed and so I fled, fleeing from their cries of agony, running from my own cowardice. I left them and I ran.

Running saved my life that night. It has saved my life quite a few times since as well. However, fear has always been able to catch up and THEY are never too far behind either. But running brought her into my life. I don’t know who this girl was, who she loved and who loved her in return, or whether she is even still alive. I don’t even know her name and, still, she’s always here. When things get too difficult for me to cope, I have to tell myself to get up, stop crying, dust myself off and carry on because one day she may stumble upon my little cottage and I’ll be able to return the locket to her, finally getting to know her name and see her smile in real life.

Perhaps she found my wallet?! Finding it on the road or the street where it fell. I hope she takes comfort in my pictures in it. My driving licence or the strip of photos of me and my wife, pulling stupid faces in a photo booth on our first date. Who knows? Stranger things have happened especially these last few months! Or has it been years? As I said, dates no longer hold any meaning for the survivors of this world. Wishful thinking is just about all the hope I have left in my soul. There is nothing to plan for – no future in the world anymore. Living is merely surviving the night and finding food and water during the day. And loneliness. Always loneliness!

The sun is setting and I don’t risk candlelight at night. A flicking flame could be enough to bring a whole horde of those things to my door, and no door is strong enough to resist countless hours of frenzied pounding and tearing. I’ll write more tomorrow, I promise. That is assuming nothing gets in and eats me in the night.

THEY are about because I hear them grunting and growling late at night and the ominous crunch on the gravel.

Think I’ll hold the locket tonight. It’s a precious thing. Something someone cherished. Now I cherish it with all my heart.

I don’t know who the girl is in this heart-shaped locket, and I may never know, but I love her nonetheless.