Eat, Brains, Love Read Online Free PDF Page A

But I didn’t.
    There was only one person I was looking for.
    And I would find him.

JAKE
    â€œJAKE! C’MON, MAN!” I WAS LYING ON THE GROUND, and Amanda Blake was shaking me.
    The first real thought I had was, Dude, Amanda Blake knows your name.
    The second thought I had was, What the hell is going on?
    I didn’t know where we were or how we’d gotten there. I didn’t know why I was with Amanda Blake either, although for some weird reason, I wasn’t really surprised by it.
    I sat up on my elbows and looked around. Amanda and I were in a parking lot somewhere.
    The sun was bright, the sky that rippling, swimming-pool color, and we were surrounded on all sides by barbed wire and chain-link fence. The view in every direction was blocked by warehouses and crappy, low-slung industrial buildings. Little brown weeds were poking up through the cracks in the concrete.
    Amanda was standing over me, glancing nervously over her shoulder every few seconds. “Listen,” she said. “We have to get the hell out of here. Now.”
    I stood too. “Um,” I said. I felt weird talking to her like we were friends or whatever. My head was pounding. “Where are we? How did we get here?”
    She looked at me impatiently. “Think,” she said.
    I thought. Then I thought some more. I rubbed my tongue over my teeth and found they still had that satisfying Hawaiian Punch stickiness to them. I shrugged.
    â€œI dunno. What?” I asked. Just as the words were out, I let loose a huge belch. Gross. What was that taste? My stomach had really been acting up today.
    Then I remembered.
    I mean, sort of remembered. It was like remembering a dream, or remembering a movie your parents let you stay up late to watch when you were really little but you kept falling asleep.
    Still. Even sort of remembering was bad enough.
    â€œHoly shit,” I said.
    Amanda didn’t say anything. She just nodded, like, Uh, yeah.
    I sat back down, and put my head in my hands. “Holy shit,” I said again. “Did that really happen?”
    â€œWell, if you remember it and I remember it . . .” Amanda said.
    â€œOkay, so wait. Is what you’re remembering something that has to do with us turning into monsters and eating all of our friends?” I asked. I was rubbing my forehead, squinting to keep the sun out of my eyes. I felt a little faint.
    â€œBingo,” Amanda said.
    My heart sank. “What the fuck is going on?”
    â€œA better question,” Amanda said, “is whether we really want to know .”
    I looked at her like she was nuts. “Of course we want to know,” I said. “Something truly fucked up just happened here. I want some answers.”
    Amanda sighed and looked down at her red tank top. I had a vague recollection that it had been white when I’d seen her earlier. “Ugh, I’ll never get this blood out,” she mumbled to herself.
    â€œBoo-hoo,” I said. “Maybe you still have the receipt somewhere. Forget that! What do you think happened?”
    She opened her mouth to speak, but hesitated. “You’re going to think I’m crazy.”
    I stared at her. “Amanda. We’re in a strange parking lot covered in blood. I’m pretty sure any explanation has to be crazy.”
    Amanda tossed her hair and looked me right in the eye. “Fine,” she said, all matter-of-fact, “I think we’re zombies.”
    She stared at me, waiting for me to respond. I stared at her, waiting for the punch line.
    â€œOkay,” I finally said when it was obvious that there wasn’t going to be a punch line. “You’re insane. I don’t know what the hell is going on here, but you’re crazy and I’m going back to school to figure out what happened.” I stood up again and began to dust myself off.
    â€œJust listen,” Amanda said. “It seems crazy to me too, but then again, here