Bookshelf Battle

“The horror. The horror.”

Bernie’s starting to become the weak link in our survival group’s chain.

Bernie sat on the cold tile, trying to conceive of the atrocity he’d just committed.

“It’s ok man,” I said as I rested a hand on his shoulder. “It’s the zombie apocalypse. We’re all bound to do something stupid sooner or later.”

“But look at them all, man!” Bernie said. “I…I can’t believe I did this.”

“I can’t believe he did that either,” VGRF said, surveying the mess.

“Is there a point to making him feel bad about it now?” I asked. “What’s done is done.”

Alien Jones strolled in, nonchalant as usual.

“Gadzooks!  Is anyone going to clean up all these candy bar wrappers?”

“Twenty Crunchtasticks,” Bernie said as he laid back on the floor and grabbed his stomach. “Oh my God, I can’t believe I ate them all.”

“We’re all under a lot of stress,” I said. “You just have to find a way to deal with it by doing something more productive than snarfing down a bunch of candy bars.”

“This isn’t how I wanted my life to be,” Bernie said. “I wanted the Funky Hunks to go double-platinum! I wanted to hang out with Fiddy and Snoop and drive a Bentley and throw hot tub parties with supermodels.”

He leaned up and grabbed my shirt collar.

“So many supermodels! Where are my supermodels, BQB? Where?!”

“Some things just weren’t meant to be,” I said. “Some people get a hot tub full of supermodels. Some people don’t. We live and die by the cards life has dealt us and there’s no use whining about it.”

“But we were on TV!”

It was time for a confrontation that was years in the making.

“For five minutes,” I said. “Fifteen years ago. At four a.m. on World’s Lamest Musicians. When are you going to get over it, Bernie? The Funky Hunks are dead! Deader than those zombies outside the gate that want to kill us! Stop selling oranges and get a job!”

“What?” Bernie asked. “You’re going to make fun of my oranges now? I will have you know that I provide the world with much needed vitamin C. Whenever you don’t have a cold, you can thank me.”

Fun fact: Stank Daddy, the top rapper on today’s charts, coined the phrase “Dropping a Funky Hunk” to refer to the production of a lousy rap song. All rappers live in fear of “dropping a Funky Hunk.” The phrase is interchangeable with, “Dropping a Funky Dump.”

“You bum five bucks off of people who feel sorry for you and give them an orange so you can trick that rattle trap you call a brain of yours into thinking you actually DID something,” I said. “Yes, Bernie. We tried something with the Funky Hunks and we failed. Our rap duo was a miserable failure. On the great list of ‘Worst Rappers in History,’ we actually rank BELOW Milli Vanilli even though those guys were caught lip syncing. And you know why? BECAUSE WE SUCKED!”

“I don’t suck! You suck!”

“We totally sucked,” I said. “But you know what? At least we tried. We tried and we failed and that’s more

“You bum five bucks off of people who feel sorry for you and give them an orange so you can trick that than most people ever do. Be honest with yourself. You refuse to try do anything else now because you’re afraid any new path you take will end up in a massive failure of Funky Hunkian proportions, don’t you?”

Bernie stood up and marched toward the gate, which was teaming with hungry undead beasts.

“I don’t have to take this!”

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“I’m leaving.”

“You can’t go out there!”

“Watch me. I’d rather be out there with those things than with a poor excuse for a friend like you!”

Bernie’s hand was inches away from slapping the red button that would open the gate.

“Stop!” I said. “You’re going to let them in!”

Various zombies of all races, colors and creeds were rattling the gate, looking at us like we were delicious chicken nuggets.

Alien Jones pointed a finger at Bernie and instantly, my buddy was frozen.

“Holy Crap!” I said. “Did you kill him?”

“He is frozen indefinitely,” Alien Jones said.

“Can you do that to them?” I asked, pointing at the zombies.

“It only works on living organisms.”

“Bernie’s really down in the dumps, huh?” VGRF asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “But since when is there a guarantee that we are all supposed to get the life we want?”

VGRF handed me Alien Jones’ space phone. She’d been reading an e-book. On the cover was a young girl holding a sledgehammer.

“I think the author of this book could help us out with that.”