Zombie Wake by Storm J. Helicer Page A

with the boys ended with the story of the man under the pier. He
had approached them trying to sell what he called Indian marijuana. They said
he was stubborn and wouldn't take no for an answer.
    A few minutes later, I stood at the
foot of the fire, speaking into the radio, “R1122, I need a wants and warrants
check on one, ID in hand, first of Earl: Edward, Adam, Robert, Lincoln, second
of Dunkle , David, Union, Nora, King, Lincoln, Edward;
DL number CA0076487.” Earl had voluntarily emptied the contents of his pockets,
a crunched up paper bag filled with large white trumpet shaped flowers, toxic
Jimsonweed, a wallet, and a black comb.
    While I waited for the response,
Earl inhaled his cigarette with force, which is often a sign of outstanding
felony warrants. I widened my stance and looked toward his hands. Seeing my
eyes on his thumb, he said, “Man, I'm just trying to make a buck. You know the
Chumash drink it as a tea. They're just flowers. Listen, I've had a pretty
shitty go of it.” Holding up the purple plum, he went on. “It's been nearly two
years, I wish they'd cut it off. I was up in Alaska on a crab boat. I went to
grab a cage and my thumb got caught in the winch. The thing took off all my
skin down to the bone. I didn't have any insurance and still the doctors
decided to save it—got an old doctor, treated guys on the field in World
War II. So they cut a slit here in my belly and sewed my thumb in it.” He
lifted up his shirt and ran his good thumb down the scar. “When they took it
out three months later, it was like this. Look.” He pushed the bulb toward me.
“There's a nail in there I can't even cut. I can't do a damn thing with it. The
whole hand hardly works and it's throbbing all the time.”
    *
    He had changed significantly in the
two days since I last saw him. He was walking with both hands outstretched,
like the thumb was guiding him. Even though we're trained to shoot for the
heart and head, it was the hands my first bullet hit. Shooting the hands occurs
frequently in simulated gunfire trainings. The “victims” walk away from these
trainings with paint blotches all over the chest, head and hands. I didn't
notice it was Earl as an individual until I pulled the trigger and saw the red
spatter and flying fingers.
    With the rest, distinguishing
anyone was next to impossible. They, more like it, was one mass, traveling like molasses,
rolling down the hill through the campground. There were two groups, one from
the east and another from the west. In the parking lot, they merged. I knew the
campground was at capacity but it seemed like the number moving toward me was
more than the 450 person upper limit. I was too far away from my vehicle to
make my way through the sea of scabs and froth.

Vehicle Collision

2
    Just over a week ago, I dressed in
the dark to respond to a vehicle collision. Car accidents are too much of my
occupation these days. Because the park is bordered by a
major highway , California’s Highway 101, rangers are often the first on
scene arriving ahead of the highway patrol, fire, and ambulance. That day, just
north of the campground, during the first rain of the season, a bus slid off the
road. It was probably the most gruesome accident I have witnessed. Just south
of the Gaviota tunnel the road juts to the left. In a
depression where the road curves, a pool of water gathers every rain. Year
after year, cars speeding through that section of road hit the puddle and veer
off, sliding, spinning, and sometimes going over the edge. A similar sequence
of events occurred with this bus.
    It was a short, blue and white bus
with thirteen passengers, the driver and twelve patients. Traveling north, from
Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital to Stanford Medical Center, the bus, the highway
patrol concluded later, hit the water, slid across three lanes of highway,
rolled as the tires made contact with the center clearing, slid on its side
taking two sedans from the southbound side and pushed them