Zombie, Illinois Read Online Free PDF Page B

fellow reporters are not looking over my shoulder.
    â€œBut um . . . there are some things about the videos that nobody can explain,” I stammer. “Things that make me think they could be.real.”
    â€œOh yeah?” she says, turning back to face me. “Like what?.”
    â€œUm, like . . . “ I fumble. “Okay . . . like why the institutions where the footage supposedly comes from haven’t disavowed it. They haven’t said, ‘No, that’s not from our hospital.’”
    â€œWhy would they need to do that?” she asks.
    â€œA lot of the videos are from specific hospitals and medical schools, right?” I say. “They’re supposedly posted by med students who are like ‘I shot this with my camera phone on such-and-such day doing rounds at such-and-such hospital.’ Those places are full of doctors and scientists—the types of people who are straight shooters when it comes to what’s real and what’s not. I think if somebody had made fake movies of cadavers in their hospital getting up and twitching, then of course the hospitals would come out and say the videos are fake—CGI tricks or whatever. Of course they would. There’d be a humorously-worded press release about it. It would be cute and be picked up on all the news services. But the hospitals and doctors haven’t done that. There are no cute press releases. No doctors have said that it didn’t happen. They haven’t done anything. That’s what’s scary...
    â€œYesterday, one of the writers at The Exiled called the PR office at L.A. County, where that video of the dancing zombie was shot—you know. that one?—and he posted the audio of the call, and it’s terrifying. Because the PR guy won’t say ‘No, that didn’t happen.’ He just says things like, ‘What do you think happened?’ And ‘I’m not making a statement like that right now.’”
    â€œSee, we’re reporters, and we deal with PR guys all the time. And that’s how they talk when they’ve got something to hide. The hospital where that footage was shot? It’s got something to hide. At least its PR rep thinks it does.”
    There is a long pause. Have I totally lost Latin Joan Jett, talking about reporters and PR flacks? Have I been boring and old mannish? I almost certainly have.
    Goddamn it.
    And then she says, “My name’s Maria Ramirez” and hands me a PBR.
    I accept the beer—probably with comically wide eyes—crack it open and have a swallow. Suddenly, I find my urge to get home early has almost completely faded.
    I may just stick around to see the show.

Leopold Mack
    For all of its helpful pronouncements on subjects relevant to the human soul, the good book has little to say about regret. This is a shame because the topic is so rich. It runs deep. It affects us all.
    There are many different kinds of regret. One can regret the done or the undone. (Or even the yet-to-be done.) There is the private regret that hits late at night as you struggle to fall asleep. There is the sloppy, flabby regret that comes with eating, drinking, or flirting too much. (Consequent vows of abstemiousness usually follow this one.) There is the inexorable regret that bombards you when confronted with the consequences of your misdeeds. There is the public regret expressed in front of others—dramatic, exhausting, and usually insincere.
    The regret encountered as I climb back into my preacher car and begin the drive back north to Chicago is probably my least favorite of all.
    I reactivate my cell phone almost absently. I’m lightheaded. Exhausted. I need a shower.
    The tiny phone whirs to life, and soon informs me that I have one voicemail. I hit play and put the phone to my ear. I cringe as soon as I recognize the voice. I scramble to turn down the radio.
    The voice belongs to Ms. Washington, one of my oldest and dearest