My Girlfriend is Falling Apart.

We barely made it back to camp last night before the rain started up again. She slowly-I mean slowly-craned her neck back until she was staring straight at the sky. I thought she was going to break out in a song from the way her mouth opened and her eye rolled back in her head. Was this her way of showing fear?

I took her to the tree, the big one with the huge leaves that kept her fairly dry, and tied her up. She lunged at me as I walked away, one arm reaching for my shoulder, but she missed me by a good two or three feet. I think she has lost whatever depth perception she used to have. After the night before, I pretended that she didn"t want me to go. Sorry, honey. I have work to do.

I dashed to my little lean-to, which leaked because I hadn"t fixed the walls in a while, even though I kept meaning to. I shifted the parts aside until I could find a decent place to lie down that wasn"t dripping rain. I took out the last of the romance novels and read it out loud. In this one, a woman was on a journey to discover herself while sleeping with a bunch of men. I think the only thing she discovered was a really good o.r.g.a.s.m.

There was a lot of inner reflection. Silly stuff about how she felt and how much she worried about how the men in her life regarded her. She went on for pages about how she was unloved and neglected by most of them until she met Mr. Right, who happened to be a pilot. I wish there were a pilot here so he could fly my a.s.s off this rock. It was just plain silly, but I read it anyway. I think she has enjoyed this one just as much as the others.

I finally fell asleep after taking the last deep drink of the tequila. I was down to just a few shots, if that. I slurped them down and used fresh raindrops as a chaser. It did the trick and helped me fall asleep. The last thing I saw before I closed my eyes was her staring at me like I was a bowl of chicken teriyaki. She looked ridiculous with the gag on her rotting mouth.

I woke up and started singing almost immediately. I was so happy because I was going to work on the raft all day, and with any luck, I would leave the island tomorrow. I blew a kiss to her as I went by. She snarled at me, then started clumping around the tree in circles like she used to do. Well, I guess I"m not the only one feeling chipper this morning.

I untied her and left her alone. She could do whatever she wanted to as long as she kept her teeth safely behind the gag. I was pretty sure I would have to fight her off once or twice today, but hey, who doesn"t want a girl"s attention?

The first thing I did was get as many oysters and clams as I could. The night before, I had left the luggage with my collection of sh.e.l.lfish in a pool of water to keep them fresh. I added to the collection and tossed out the ones I thought were dead. If they moved again, I would re-add them. As hungry as I have been, I have no desire to cook dead stuff and eat it. That doesn"t sound right. Freshly dead stuff. Like saying freshly live stuff, this brought back bad memories of finding her quivering body. Finding her husband as he lumbered toward me. Finding the dead shark with the death breath. I don"t think I will ever be able to watch a zombie movie again for as long as I live.

She wandered near a couple of times, but only came at me once. I pushed her away and batted at her, deflecting her clumsy attacks. I hit her hand as she tried to get it around my neck, and one of her fingers snapped backwards and stuck there. I grabbed her wrist to take a look. I tried to push the finger back in the right direction, but when I did, it came loose and fell off. I held the finger in one hand and did a double take. c.r.a.p, she really was falling apart.

I pushed her away and tossed the finger aside. On second thought, I dug a hole in the sand and buried it. No sense in creating more zombie animals. She stumbled away on her heavy metal foot and walked in circles for a while. Every time she spun past me, she hissed or snarled but couldn"t really form the thought to come after me again. Just in case, I escorted her to the tree where her husband"s rotting parts were hanging and left her facing it. She stared up at one of his legs and snarled like she was still p.i.s.sed at him.

Caught some of the little fish that collect near the pools of water the tide leaves in the rocks. Not my favorite, but every little bit helps. I planned to hang them near the fire all night so they would dry out and turn into tiny-fish jerky. They would go great with some of the salt I have been making from dried out seawater. Sea salt from the islands. I should come back and start a business. Right after I firebomb this G.o.dd.a.m.n island back into the ocean.

The bindings on the raft were holding up pretty well. A day by the beach seemed to have hardened them with the same salt I was going to use to start my new company. If the sea-salt business doesn"t work out, and how can it not, maybe I will hire someone to research the berries here. I could bring them back and give them to a pharmaceutical company. Maybe they could make some longevity pills or something.

Or keep people alive for a while.

Or start a zombie invasion. Yeah, I have seen the movies. It only takes one evil doctor in a laboratory to start that s.h.i.t up, and then everyone is forced to live in a farmhouse and fight the things day and night. Screw that.

Still, I went to the little evil flowers and studied them for a few minutes. I tried to stay away from this area, because I knew how dangerous it was. If she ate the berries, there was no telling what other animals would try to ingest them.

The flower was still in bloom, a beautiful violet-colored blossom with those wicked-looking serrated blades for leaves. The berries hung under them and reminded me of blueberries, but smaller. I took a stick and knocked a few off, then scooped them toward me.

Just a couple of inches away-death and rebirth. I studied them and decided that they needed to go with me. I wrapped some in a leaf and then double-wrapped that with another. Took those back to the camp, put them in one of the medicine bottles, and stashed them in the backpack along with all the other things I had, which didn"t amount to much. I had the lighter that I kept in the plastic storage bag Ally bought me. I had my previously waterlogged wallet and what is left of my ID cards.

An empty bottle of tequila I would save to use for water.

I took a couple of the books I had collected over the last few weeks, the ones I had read and disliked the least. I thought about bringing the enema kit, but what was the point? I was going to leave her here to rot. There just wasn"t room on the raft, and what the h.e.l.l was I going to do with a zombie chick who is falling apart?

Would I be sad to leave her behind? A little bit. But when I came back to show the Hollywood guys where I had lived and how I had survived, she would still be there as proof. That was going to be a great day. I bet I was going to be on Oprah with my girlfriend, Ally, who waited so patiently for me to survive. Everyone would want to hear my story, and I would give it to them. I might write a book about it based on you, dear Diary. I mean how hard can it be to write a book with zombies in it?

I got back to fishing and hunting. There had been no sign of pigs or boars or whatever that tusked thing was that she killed. I wish one would show up so I could cook it. Boar jerky probably tasted amazing. A lot better than the spiny starfish I was used to living on.

She wasn"t near the tree when I got back to camp. I heard some leaves crashing together not far from the raft, so I went to investigate. She was indeed caught in a pair of branches. When I went to free her, she didn"t even try to bite me. What the h.e.l.l is wrong with her lately? I have gotten so used to being on guard from this killing machine that it was strange not to have my hands up to fend off her attacks. She just followed me back to the beach with a few tugs. I stopped near the tree her hubby was in.

I wonder how he is doing up there? If I walk out into the water, I can just see his rotting head. I don"t like to do that. I waved at his shape nonetheless and went back to adding sh.e.l.lfish to my "refrigerator."

Tomorrow is the day. I can"t wait!

I looked her over later in the day. Took off her dress and left it on the ground. I was going to bring it with me in case I needed the cloth to fix the raft. She had a lot more of those patches of dead skin. Dead skin. That sounds funny, since her whole body is dead.

A couple of the patches of skin fell off, and I could see the dried tendons underneath. Come to think of it, she does sort of creak and make weird noises when she walks. Like paper sliding together. I have seen some petty gross things in the past few weeks, so I think that can explain my curiosity and my following actions.

I grabbed her arm and studied one of the gross holes left in her skin. Her forearm had several of these places, so I pushed against one only to discover that it was really dry. The tendons inside were almost hard. They didn"t squish like they should. I pushed one aside and looked at her to see if she felt it. She didn"t show any sign of pain or even irritability. Of course, with her mouth in that weird grin from the gag, it is hard to tell if she is making a face at all.

I dug deeper, pushing aside sandy stuff that sprinkled on the ground, and touched the bone. I pushed it a few times to see if it was hollow, but it seemed as hard as a rock. That must be good. She started to pull her hand away, and I could feel the leathery tendons tighten over my finger. I jerked it out of the hole and looked at it to make sure it wasn"t cut.

Then I did something stupid. I smelled my finger.

When I was done puking, I went to the pool of water and scrubbed my hands in sand and water. I rubbed so hard that I almost drew blood.

I don"t know what to do with her. With those big sores, she is going to be filled with bugs soon. I can"t have them eating my girl from the inside out. One day she will have so many in her that she will just fall apart, and that will be a real shame. Diary, I need her so I can sell my story. Who is going to believe that I lived on a deserted island with a zombie for a month and didn"t kill her or go crazy? Or go crazy and kill her?

I went back to camp and tossed her clothes in a heap. Then I went over her body and cleaned up as many of the little critters as I could. It was a thankless job, but she put up with it. In fact, she only tried to bite me a couple of times.

I moved her eye patch aside and cleaned out a spider that was living there. He was a nasty-looking thing that had green legs with red spots all over them. I dug him out with a stick and tossed him on the fire.

I helped her up, stuck her metal foot under a log (that will keep her out of zombie trouble) and went back to work on the raft.

It was just about done. There wasn"t much to it. Six logs-not really logs, more like long thick sticks about ten inches around-with the tail section secured to the top so I can sleep in it. I have some food saved up, and I have been collecting coconuts for the last few days. Have about ten or eleven of them. I plan to zip them in a bag and secure it to the top of the raft.

I took everything of importance I could find and added it. Knife, empty bottles. The Vaseline and even the magazines.

The raft is all set. It"s on a bunch of smaller logs, so all I have to do is give it a push and it will roll right into the water. Too bad I don"t have a compa.s.s, but I plan to pick a star at night and aim for it. A nice bright star. What to do with the girl? What to do ...

Well, Diary, I will call it a night. It"s a big day tomorrow. d.a.m.n! I just noticed that I am running out of pages. I don"t know what I will write on when they are full, but with any luck, I will be rescued by then.

Day 29.

My Girlfriend is Dead Weight.

I had trouble sleeping last night, because I was so excited! I got up a few times and paced around in the middle of the night. Smacked bugs, rubbed one out, sang a few songs, stuff like that. It was so hot that I lay sweating for hours before exhaustion finally took over and I slept. I woke up just before dawn and felt like I had sand in my eyes because they were so dry.

I went down and checked the tide, but it was still out about twenty feet. I started getting ready by rolling a log behind the raft and finding a strong branch I could use to launch it. I went over all of the knots and straps again, looking for any loose ones, but they were all holding up pretty well.

The heat was already starting to p.i.s.s me off, so I got in the water and gathered some sh.e.l.lfish. There was a good-sized crab I managed to s.n.a.t.c.h up by once again offering my hand as bait. This is not a good way to catch crabs, because they are fast little b.a.s.t.a.r.ds in the water. He reared back, and I thought I would get my hand out of the way in time. He got me right between the thumb and first finger. It was like a bolt of pain ripped my hand apart. I grabbed him by the back of his sh.e.l.l, marched back to the fire and promptly threw him on it.

I took great pleasure in watching him wither and crackle while I showed him my hurt hand. She was staring at me, making those little hooting noises. That better not be laughter.

"You"re next if it is."

I untied her after breakfast and let her thump around. She had a few new bugs on her, but no spiders this time. I flicked them off but didn"t eat any. Since the shark incident, I have been scared to eat anything that has come in contact with her or her zombie kin.

I checked the tide, but it was moving so slowly it seemed like it would never get to the raft. I was excited and scared at the same time. I was leaving my safe haven and putting my trust in the water, which was a bad idea, since I can"t swim very well. But I"ve had a lot of on-the-job training over the last month. I guess as a last resort, I could eat some of the berries before I went under, then I would come back, just like her.

But then I would be a zombie underwater. How long could I walk around the bottom of the ocean before pressure smooshed me or some big predator ate me? I could see it now: walking around in circles for days when a big whale sees my undead a.s.s as a quick snack.

A zombie whale! That would teach some whale hunter. What would Captain Ahab have done if he was hunting Moby-f.u.c.king-zombie-whale? He probably would have cut his losses with the leg and gone back to being p.i.s.sed off at the world.

She clumped past me. I waved at her, but she didn"t bother waving back. I threw a couple of pebbles at her, but she just kept on going. She stopped under the tree her husband was in and stared at the trunk for a while. Then she turned around and walked the other way, like she was a guard or something. She did this for a long time.

I wonder if she is worried about me leaving. Can she sense that this is our last day together? I went to her and took her hand to lead her to the stream. I might as well give her a farewell bath. I mainly splashed water on her, but she didn"t even react. So I sat her down in the end of the stream and let the water rush over her for a while.

She looked at me with her one good eye, then snarled and snapped a few times. I washed her hair and even tried to use some sand to scrub it, but it didn"t do much good. Besides, big clumps of it came out, and I had to toss them into the woods.

"Are you going to miss me?"

Snarl.

"I bet you are. I bet you are going to be so lonely."

Snarl, snap, snarl.

I should write a country song about how my girl got her snarl back.

"I"ll come back for you. Really, I will. I"ll come back with a bunch of scientists, specialists and doctors, and we will do everything we can for you. Or bash in your head. I won"t lie, though, baby. They might want to take you apart and slice up your brain."

She just stared at me, so I helped her out of the water and let her dry as we walked. Her skin was so cold when I held her hand with its missing finger. The absence of the digit bothered me, so I took her other hand and led her back to the beach.

I was having second thoughts about bringing her with me. I didn"t think it was a good idea to leave her. Without me, she would walk into the ocean within a couple of days, and then she would be lost forever-or until she walked out on some beach and started eating people. How would I prove my story?

I supposed I could tie her to the tree, which would make it a lot easier to find her when I came back. But I was almost out of rope, so if I tied her up, she would be on a really short chain, unable to move more than a few feet from camp. I doubted it would even work. She is a crafty little zombie. She has become the Houdini of the undead. It seems like every time I figure out a way to secure her to something, she figures out a way to escape.

I could tie her up in the tree so any potential predators wouldn"t get her. But then I worried that birds might peck pieces out of her body. Not that there are a lot of birds around. But even one or two could do a lot of damage over the course of a month. Plus, they might turn into zombie birds. Yikes! They might carry the disease to some other city or country. Besides. How would I get her body up in a tree?

I already knew what I had to do. I just wasn"t sure how to do it. I knew that I couldn"t leave her here. I have known it for a while, but I didn"t want to admit it. I had to take her. I had to figure out a way to drag her with me. I didn"t have room on the raft, and how could I control her? If I tied her down and the raft came apart, then she might float away. I couldn"t put her in the tail section. We couldn"t both fit. Besides, she stinks and is falling apart. And I would have to spend all my time making sure she didn"t bite me.

I went back to the raft and looked it over. It was so pathetic that I barely had room to move around, let alone carry her along with me. I walked the beach and dug up a few more clams near the water. I walked farther along the beach and thought I spotted a big sea cuc.u.mber thing. I waded into the water but gave up when I realized it was probably just a rock.

I wandered even farther but didn"t find any treasure. This section of the beach just doesn"t attract that many fish or crabs for some reason.

I heard talking-maybe chanting-and blamed it on the sun. h.e.l.lo, cruel heat. Why do you have to play mind games with my rapidly departing intellect?

I took a step toward the trees. Then another. The noise was getting louder, and I was starting to think it wasn"t related to my scorched mind at all. I was hearing voices, and they weren"t in my head!

Was I about to be rescued at long last? Here I was, all set to run myself out of Dodge, and the cavalry had finally arrived. That was just my luck. I heard a saying once that if it weren"t for bad luck, you wouldn"t have any luck. My luck was so bad it was trying to a.s.s f.u.c.k me while messing with my mind.

Another step and then I was in the bush. I moved toward the beach where the islanders had made landfall not so long ago. Or was it? Was that a week ago? A month? Twenty years? It seemed that long. Time wasn"t really my friend here. When I was at the hotel, I sure wished time would stop.

Stupid time.

But back to the voices-the ones NOT in my head.

I stepped faster, sure footed like a bush hunter. If this was Africa, I would have purchased a cool hat and whip when I arrived. I might even have a leather jacket, because that"s what the famous archeologist Dr. Jones wore. It might be a hundred and ten, but nothing broke his cool.

The beach was just ahead, and I was now able to make out movement. Not a mirage but people. A lot of people. More people than I had seen in weeks.

I should run out and greet them. I wish I had something to offer, like a tray of ice-cold coconut slices. What the f.u.c.k was I thinking? As soon as they saw me, they would probably try to kill me. I had chased them off last time, even if I didn"t mean to.

I stood behind the leaves and watched the men get out of their boats. I was pretty sure it was the same visitors as before. They wore the same kind of clothes. I remembered the big boy with the tropical-print shirt. What, was it on sale at Village-R-Us?

They didn"t look so happy go lucky this time. They looked irritated.

I was hoping my rescuers would arrive with food and beer. These guys were arriving with weapons. They had huge shields made out of leaves woven tightly together. They were also building a whole stack of spears. Then one of them pulled out something different, something that looked like a blow gun. Or a really long pipe. If it shoots darts, then it is silent but deadly in a different way than the coconut-powered gas that I seem to emit on a regular basis.

Ah, s.h.i.t. They were here, and they were here for me and her Highness. The princess zombie had finally drawn the attention of someone who could do something about her rotted state. I had to get off the island, but how could I make a run for it if they had those cool boats? They would be on me within minutes. Then it would be bye bye, zombie girl and bye bye, big Hollywood paycheck. And maybe bye bye, my life.

I needed a plan. I needed a way to distract them, a way to destroy the boats, and a way to get off the island without getting me and my girl filled with holes. There was no way I could be sure they would let me live. They might be savages, headhunters even! Maybe that was what they were after all along!

I took a few deep breaths and then went to retrieve her.

I led my girl along the well-worn path to the little lake I was so fond of spending my days in. My plan was pretty simple. I was going to hide her somewhere they would never think to look. Then I would go back and take care of them.

Just to be clear, I had no idea how I was going to take care of them.

I used some rope to tie her in a neat zombie bundle. With her hands at her sides and her legs tied together, I was able to tug her into the water. Now this may come as a surprise to you, oh dear Diary, but instead of sinking like dead weight, she floated. I dragged her corpse out to the center of the lake, took a deep breath and then swam for the bottom.

Once I had her on the floor of the lake, which was only seven or eight feet deep, I was able to drag a few large rocks to hold her down there. A few bubbles rose to the surface, but as I sank her, they stopped when her lungs were full of water.

It was time to put part two of my non-plan into effect. I was going to do what I did best.

I was going to hide.

Day 30.

My Girlfriend Hates Long Goodbyes.

Night fell. It fell hard ... I"ve always wanted to say that.

I found a nice little cubbyhole up above the waterfall. Not much s.p.a.ce, and it smelled like s.h.i.t. Pretty sure an animal lives in here. I wish the little b.a.s.t.a.r.d had made it to my camp for a barbecue.

I pulled some giant leaves over the tiny entryway and waited. I heard the men stomping below and talking in some language that may as well have been French. I didn"t understand a single word.

I resisted the urge to look at them, to peek between the leaves and see what they were up to. Of course they pa.s.sed my girl where she lay on the bottom of the lake. I hoped there were no piranhas or other carnivores in the lake. If she got eaten, I was not getting my movie deal!

So night fell, as I said. I waited and waited until the moon was as high in the sky as I have ever seen. I crept out to the camp the islanders had made and found them pa.s.sed out, surrounded by these wooden containers that must have had booze in them. It turns out the blow gun was not a gun at all. It had a pipe end that was filled with something black. What were these guys up to?

To make matters worse, a few of the flowers lay limp next to the giant pipe. Holy s.h.i.t! Were they smoking the zombie berries? If they all woke up dead and howling for blood, I was so far beyond f.u.c.ked it made my head spin.