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Laugh About;

the End of the World

He would just have to laugh about this. That was not what he needed now. That was

God¶s concern now. He only had one thing to do now and that was what he should think about,

laugh about, and he must laugh heartily and make everything into a joke, and not worry.

To worry; about the apocalypse, the death of his friends, the death of Marla, the

zombies²was as bad as being afraid. Though being afraid is perfectly acceptable emotion, he

just simply didn¶t have enough laughter to shrug fear off right now. It would just make things

more difficult. He had already made things difficult enough by trying to drink a whole case of

warm beer, and polish off his carton of cigarettes by noon (they always made him feel sick to his

stomach).

The invasion had been slow at first, like the staggering of their undead feet on the

concrete; scoffing, moaning, screaming, gasping, they never stopped, never took a break, so

there was to do is laugh about it. Laugh about them looking like people he once knew. Laugh

about the explosion that would send them back to the hell they crawled from, full or not. No

horsemen, four or four-hundred, could tell him what to do now. He had made up his mind, and

he had laugh about it.

He laughed from atop the Wal-Mart roof, ³save moNEY! (a shot from his 12 gauge rang

clear as the bells that once rang at the end of Marla¶s necklace), live better! (another ring,

another bell)´
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³NO, not now, hahahha!´ He laughed away his pain to an empty sky, and a deserted

world. He laughed and laughed till he wheezed for breath and his sides hurt. Only the dead

remained to hear his laughter. ³Got to laugh´ he said. Laugh about coming to Wal-Mart. Laugh

about getting trapped here. Laugh about your friends being eaten. Laugh about Marla being taken

by a crowd of them. Laugh about being the only one left. AND, most of all, laugh about blowing

them all up. Laugh about them. GOD damn IT! LAUGH! That¶s just as far as I can laugh, as far

as I can think, as far as I can go, not caring.

Carl crawled down from his roost atop the gas station and made his way to the first pump.

As he tied the homemade bomb he could hear them coming, hear them trying to remember to

breath, hear the hissing sound the bullet holes made as their rotten cores sloshed with their

morning meal of teenagers. For a second, just a second, Carl thought he heard one laugh, as

though his attempt at revenge was fool-hearted. No matter, it was done. He kissed Marla¶s

necklace, and with that light the fuse. He ran at first away from the gas station into the parking

lot, but then stopped. He looked at the swarm coming closer and he just laughed.

A fire ball the size of a foot ball stadium engulfed his entire being, and as he was

vaporized, and he laughed about it.