Shelter In Place: Last Coors Banquet Series Part 2

Shelter in Place Chapter 14 / 14

Johnny was drunk. Johnny was way more drunk than usual. This wasn't just a few cans in the afternoon buzzed, this was spectacularly wasted, and quite frankly he was amazed he hadn't fallen off the ladder and broken his neck.

He'd thought a few drinks would help him get the nerve to go back up to North Hills and creep in, avoiding the guy with the gun. Facing down zombies with nothing but his fists was one thing, but being shot at had rattled him more than he wanted to admit.

So one beer had turned into six, and then into more, and now here he was, barely able to think straight, sat high above the street, just one wrong move away from plunging into the alley below.

"I always wonder, did you ever think about me, LaRusso?" Johnny asked, as he gazed out over the valley with his back against the billboard. "Did you even remember I existed?"

"Actually, yeah," he said, as he thought about it. "You must have thought about me 'cause you were always milking the Karate shit with your ads, and I was right there, part of that story."

"I used to think about you all the damn time, like ever since that first moment we met and I told you to put the radio down and you didn't," he said, as he sat with yet another can in his hand, thinking about the beach.

God, he loved the beach. He missed the beach. He always felt better when he was sat on the sand, watching the sun set over the water, but at this point he couldn't decide whether it was because of the beach itself, or just because it was where everything started.

"Man, that really got me interested," he said. "No one had ever said no to me like that before."

He let out a small chuckle as he though back over that night. "Do you remember how I knocked you down and you got up and sucker punched me? Yeah, that was it for me, game over, man. I couldn't stop thinking about you after that and it drove me insane. It was like I was obsessed and I wanted to punish you for making me feel like that."

"I thought maybe if I avoided you it'd go away, but then on Halloween you doused me with that hose and it broke my Walkman," he let out a sigh, then drained his can, and tossed the empty into the street below. "I loved that Walkman, man. It made me so pissed that it was broken."

It was getting late, and the sun was starting to dip towards the horizon. He knew he needed to get up to North Hills, but he'd never make it before dark. He never went out at night, no matter how drunk he was. Johnny was stupid, but he wasn't that stupid that he'd put himself out there in the dark, on a level playing field with those things in terms of vision. He had to make a move soon.

"Every time I see one of these billboards with your stupid face on it I feel like you're judging me. I mean you're dead, but you're still looking down at me and laughing," he said, pausing to take another drink.

There was a moan in the street below and a lone zombie came shambling into view. It hadn't noticed Johnny, and it wasn't chasing anything, so it was slowly walking in a circle, not really going anywhere.

Johnny had been sat on the billboard all afternoon, staring off across the valley as he drank and talked. During that time he hadn't seen a single sign of life; no people, no cars moving in the distance, no planes, no helicopters, and even the zombies seemed few and far between.

The only movement he'd seen was smoke curling into the air in the distance. Electricity cables, gas lines and appliances finally breaking down after 3 months with no maintenance. Burning buildings with no one to stop the fires were taking whole blocks with them. The world was starting to fall apart already.

"It looks like it won't be long till everyone alive is gone," Johnny said sadly, "but you'll still be up here on your billboards, LaRusso. The last evidence that we ever existed." He let out a laugh, then added, "Maybe aliens will invade one day and think you were like the leader of the human race or something."