Last Words by Jackson Lear

was hit. She said she would stuff her face with food and not care about her looks any more. I was hoping for more of an actual strategy, since I’m her guest and I might need her help to get me out of the country. Derek said he would try to sleep with every girl in the apartment. Cristina was open to that only if Madrid was closed off, but she told Derek that he better promise to be spectacular before she even considered it.
    So far they’re saying that animals aren’t infected (not even the rats), but they can carry it. So a dog bite can pass on the virus even if the dog isn’t a zombie.
    The National Guard in the States have lined up along the border of Mexico. There are helicopters, gun ships, and drones flying around shooting anyone who crosses the border illegally. Note how I said ‘shooting anyone’ and not ‘ready to shoot anyone’.
    Rachel, Louise, and I have to go to the British embassy today (Louise, despite being Irish, is here on a British passport). We’ve all called them and they have our details already, but they need to see our passports and find out how we’re doing. They’ll probably also make us do a health check. I wish we could just stay indoors and not leave the apartment. If there is someone infected then making everyone go together in a giant mob isn’t going to be real helpful. We have to be there at 12:45.
    No one has slept properly in a week.
     
     
    Part 2.
     
    We’re back from the embassy. It was two hours of waiting and three hours of being questioned. They made us do a health check and they wanted to verify all of our details. Sure enough, they weren’t remotely happy when I told them that I’ve been backpacking through Europe for two months. They brought me into a special room where they checked my shoes and the dirt on them (these were my spare shoes, my travelling shoes were still at Rachel’s). They asked for dates and specific locations for where I was, what hostel I stayed at, who my roommates were, what time did I arrive and all that. I couldn’t remember most of it. The longest I stayed in a single hostel was four nights. I suspect that if I brought my diary along (as it actually has the dates and locations within) then it would have been taken and read by someone who doesn’t need to read it. I should have also brought my old sudoku book. I was writing notes to myself just after finishing each puzzle, like: ‘On the train to Amsterdam now, there’s a girl here who looks like Donna Noble, only she’s 20.’ Stupid stuff like that. I finished that book in Nice and wouldn’t have brought it to the embassy either. So I was bored. Rachel and Louise were done first and went back home. For a while I wondered what would happen if they detained me until after the curfew kicked in. Would they give me a comfy bed in an air conditioned room? Or would I be in a hospital bed being jabbed and prodded?
    The landlady came while we were gone. Apparently she is not happy at all. She expects everyone to pay extra because some of us have overstayed our visit. She wanted the money upfront, right then, in cash. It’s a good thing I wasn’t there because I’m staying there … illegally? There’s hardly anything legal about this place. It’s an apartment with twelve people (supposedly) crammed inside.
    Cristina wasn’t having any of it. She and the landlady were battling it out for an hour. Everyone has already paid (except for myself and Louise). Cristina said that price gouging was illegal and we have all paid at least until the end of the month. She also demanded to see a return of the deposit that the newbie had paid for Louise’s bed. That stumped the landlady for a while and she didn’t understand why Cristina wanted to see it. It turns out that the landlady stumbled a bit and asked why she would have to pay it back. It looks like the landlady wanted to charge double use of Louise’s bed at an increased price. Cristina jumped on the phone to register her complaint against