The Fine Art of Being a Walker

“The Fine Art of Being a Walker”

“Lurch, don’t walk!” yelled the Director. “You’re not taking a stroll through a park.” The young woman, dressed in a soiled grey tee shirt and

dungaree shorts, sporting long blond hair matted with theatrical blood, stood momentarily frozen in place. Quickly, regaining her composure, she thrust her left hip forward slightly and stumbled onward, head lolled to one side. “Much better. More lurch-like,” said the Director drolly.

Being a Walker is a fine art.

Some people, like me, have perfected this art. Others, not so much. It was apparent to me that most of the Walkers here today fell into the second category.

An elderly male Walker ambled toward me on my right, his gait was commendable, an uncertain lumbering movement. It was as if he might topple over at any moment. Effective. Yes. A huge crimson gash on his left temple glistened sickly wet. The make up crew was spot on today.

As the older Walker neared me, and I him, he abruptly moved aside, apparently wanting to avoid a collision. He thereby broke a cardinal rule for Walkers: Be clumsy. Walkers collide, they inadvertently jostle each other, they never move aside for other Walkers, and they certainly never abruptly move. In fact, if one Walker bumps into another, each should propel away from the other, tripping, falling to the ground or careening into other Walkers.

Being a Walker is a fine art.

Walkers, when they inadvertently come into contact with other Walkers, should be like pinballs when they hit other objects; they follow the laws of physics. The Director sighed, and rested his forehead in his hand.

A young girl, perhaps six or seven, wearing a nightgown soaked with blood, had a deep trench-like wound extending down from under her obliterated right eye socket to her chin. Her head crudely tilted to one side, her good eye was down-cast. Her expression was emotionless. One hand clutched at her blood- smeared gown, the other lay at her side, fingers curling and uncurling. What a little star in the making, I thought. I surreptitiously watched the little girl Walker stumble along and out of sight.

Being a Walker is a fine art.

Crossing my path just ahead was a small horde of Walkers, men and women, some old, perhaps in their 70s, some young, maybe in their 20s and 30s. Each of this rag tag group of bloodied, dirty Walkers, had either visible or not so visible wounds that, in all likelihood, accounted for their status as Walkers. As they ambled past me, appropriately lurching, stumbling, teetering, and such, they each met my eyes. Amateurs!

They broke another cardinal rule for Walkers: never acknowledge another Walker. Each Walker must walk alone, grappling in the solitude of reanimation. Feelings, emotions, connections, ambitions, all abolished, relegated to living humans, not to Walkers. Eye contact is a chief means of human connection. I see you. I feel you. I understand. Walkers do none of these things.

Being a Walker is a fine art.

“For God’s sake, why don’t you just ask each other if you had a nice weekend!!!” the Director snapped at the group as it stared at me.

Eventually, three older female Walkers approached me, gritty, grinding their teeth, each exhibiting grizzly gaping head wounds. They were hungry, as a Walkers always are, for human survivors or human remains. Perhaps they would come upon a desired feast of mortal flesh.

Suddenly, they turned their noses skywards and snorted audibly, in unison. I was barely able to keep my hand from clamping over my mouth. The Director’s voice boomed “Sniffing? Sniffing? You’re Walkers, not fucking blood hounds!”

The trio had broken a cardinal rule for Walkers: Do not sniff. Walkers don’t seek out scents; scents find them. If they happen to smell (or see) a human, they’ve discovered prey. If they neither see nor smell humans, Walkers go hungry. The scent of humans, dead or alive, wafts along on air currents to the sensitive noses of nearby Walkers. Then, and only then, might a Walker, detecting a wayward scent, follow his nose, as they say. Aha, they may surmise, human flesh!

Being a Walker is a fine art.

I suddenly noticed the same young girl Walker I’d encountered earlier, crouching several feet off to my right. She had come upon a human who was lying on the ground, apparently having a seizure. A rush of blood pushed out of a trough carved into the human’s neck. The young girl Walker clumsily straddled the human, and leaning down towards the wound, lapped greedily from the blood fountain.

So impressed was I by this youthful Walker gorging herself nearby that I could barely keep from shouting “Brava! Brava! Brava!” I knew immediately that the Director shared my pride for this young female Walker. Remaining in character, as any talented Walker would, I teetered unsteadily to the Director’s side, bowing my head down low so that my mouth was level with his chin.

Perhaps the Director thought that I had approached him to ask for words of wisdom about the fine art of being a Walker. Perhaps he thought we would jointly opine at length about the talented young girl Walker newly discovered. Perhaps he thought we would talk about how adroitly I am able to play the the role of a Walker. As it was, we did not have any conversation at all.

Instead, in an unbridled fit of artful love, I bit down as deeply as I could into the supple, soft throat of the Director. My teeth easily pierced through his skin, the underlying fat, muscles, veins, and finally the fat pulsating arteries rich with oxygenated blood underneath. As I drank, I imagined that the rhythm of my swallowing kept harmony with that of the young girl Walker nearby who was enjoying her first feast, her virgin feast. This was method acting as it’s at its finest.

Being a Walker is indeed a fine art.