Red by Ruby Spademan

I vaguely remember at a young age reading fairy tales before going to sleep and believing them.

To me, the seven dwarfs and talking mice were real. Over the years, though, they disappeared from my memory and I never thought twice about whether they existed or not. But that was the problem you see. The fact that they didn’t exist, because if they did, I might have had a better chance grasping the idea that other things similar to this were real

“Shut the door and lock it. I’ll get the windows,” Mama said to me grabbing the corner of a curtain and pulling it closed. I nodded and did what she asked me to, taking the rusted lock and turning it. For the time being, the thin, broken house we lived in was nearly the only safe place to be in this town. It was “protected” mama said. She talked to me about what was out there, and why I wasn’t allowed to sit on the moss outside the door and see the sun. I asked Papa one day about them and he scolded me, telling me that there was no them and that mama was paranoid. I believed mama.

My feet patted against the floor, which had splinters growing out of it, and I was careful not to step on one. The smell coming from the kitchen was the one of a burning dinner. I went into the small room and quickly took a ham out from the stove, seeing as mama was busy washing potatoes, and placed it on a plate where it was to be cut into pieces.

“Thank you, Lyra.” Mama said to me, smiling. I smiled back. Papa came into the kitchen with his brown suitcase in hand.

“Where are you going?” I asked him, worried.

“To work.” Mama stopped what she was doing and looked up at him.

“You can’t though. You know you can’t.” Papa laughed and shook his head.

“You and your stories. I don’t believe in fairy tales, and I certainly don’t believe in monsters.”

“They’re not monsters,” I replied, “They’re like zombies I guess, and zombies were once people. Papa, people aren’t monsters.”

“Lyra, you’re seventeen. You’re too old to believe inzombies.”

“But she’s right–” Mama said, papa cutting her off.

“No, I have to go.” Papa headed for the door unlocking it and stepping outside. I saw the moon and little white dots surrounding it. They glowed on the pavement and I watched as papa walked silently away. A thought came into my head and I quickly ran to my tiny room and grabbed a small bottle. It was filled with tomato juice. I chuckled thinking about how stupid it seemed and then ran out to papa who was only about half a block away from home. Mama called after me as I ran, but I ignored her and finally caught up to papa.

“Take this with you then.” I stated, handing him the bottle. He looked at me as if I were joking and laughed. He stopped in his tracks.

“This…Lyra, this is tomato juice. This is stupid. Go home.” I frowned.

“But it’s not. This could save your life, papa. Mama told me that is makes the zombies human again.”

“Don’t listen to your mother.” I sighed and we kept walking. A car whipped around the corner, swerving all over the road. I stared at it as it flew by and left.

“See, that wasn’t a zombie. That was just some drunk driver.”

“Yeah, maybe, but that’s no drunk driver…” I said letting my eyes fall on the sight before me. A police car was parked on the side of the road. The man got out of the car after about a minute and stood on the sidewalk returning our stares. He was tall and sickly looking. His eyes were sunken in and his face was pale purple with a tint of green. The moonlight created shadows on him which made him more visible. You could see traces of dried blood on his dark blue shirt and his bones were showing.

“Papa,” I asked as we turned to run, “are you sure you don’t believe in zombies?” We ran back to the thin house and found that the door was locked. The zombie man was close now so I took the tomato juice and sprayed it in his face. He fell. I watched as the man lay there, waiting for him to become human again, but was distracted by papa finally getting the door to open.

“Let us in!” I shouted at a lady whose face I was unfamiliar with. Like I said, this was a safe house. Anyone who was wearing the color red was recognized as human. Anyone who was wearing red…I cursed under my breath and found that neither papa nor me were wearing that color. That’s why the lady wouldn’t let us in. I sighed and pushed her out of the way finally able to get in the house. Mama came up to me and papa with tears in her eyes, threatening to come out.

“Why would you do that?” She scolded. I shrugged.

“Because I had to.” The house went quiet. People who I didn’t seem to know were surrounding us. Watching us. I saw mama go to the door and lock it, along with the windows.

Fifty-four years ago this happened. Fifty-four years ago was the first and only time I’ve ever been outside. The door hadn’t been opened since then, and I was the only one left in this thin, broken house. I stand at the door now, looking back on this memory, and turning this rusted lock open. 

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