Less Than Human

Since it is pride month, and I wanted to work towards making short stories before I officially publish a book, I decided to write a story about a zombie girl who falls in love with a human girl, and how said zombie girl tries to win her heart despite not being human.

• Romance
• Short story
• Fiction

								
The first time Zoe met Jasmine, it was on a cool autumn night, and she was all alone in the cemetery. All the other corpses were bones, and all the ghosts that used to reside with her had all moved on to the afterlife or had decided that they were too good to make friends with a zombie, so Zoe was always alone. Except on Halloween when Zoe would see others her age enter the cemetery. To tell scary stories, smoke, drink, or hang out before the clock struck twelve. Zoe recalled how she used to love being with her friends during the holidays until one Halloween night she ended up losing her life in a car accident and now is forever stuck here in the graveyard for the rest of her undead life. 
When Jasmine came to the cemetery, Zoe was resting by her headstone when she heard her laugh followed by the laughter of her friends. It wasn’t on Halloween, so Zoe wasn’t free to walk around the cemetery without people seeing her and telling her what a great costume she was wearing, so she knew that she had to stay out of sight. 
Zoe crept around the headstones and mausoleums when the group of teens made their place in the center of the cemetery. Loud bunch, Zoe recalled. She remembered hearing their names as they passed around beers and other snacks. Ethan, Angel, Darren, Mike, Christa, and there was Jasmine. Her heart fluttered when she saw how beautiful she looked. From her ebony skin that glistened in the moonlight. To her braids that clacked when the beads would hit each other. To her lips colored in black lipstick. In Zoe’s eyes, Jasmine was perfect.
Zoe watched the friend group tell bad jokes, gossip about their classmates, and take turns taking drags out of a cigarette. She kept her eyes on Jasmine whenever she spoke or did anything else like smile or laugh and Zoe cherished it. 
Zoe eventually stopped watching the group and started to go back to her headstone when a bright light shined in her eyes. She blocked her face with her arm and when she moved it away, she could see that the group of friends all had their attention on her. Zoe was frozen. She looked at each of her friends. She wasn’t going to hurt them or eat their brains like she once thought zombies did until she became one herself and realized that wasn’t the case and that she didn't have to eat at all. 
To try to convince the teens that she was no threat, Zoe held up her hand and waved and tried to smile at them.  
“Hello.” She croaked. 
Screams echoed through the cemetery as Jasmine’s friends all hightailed it out of there, leaving behind everything else except the cellphones glued to their hands as they ran. Zoe could hear them scream words like monster, hideous, and other words that would describe her in this situation. Zoe wasn’t surprised that they reacted that way, and thought that if she saw a zombie in the cemetery, she would scream too. 
There was one friend who stayed behind. Jasmine. Zoe was confused. Why she didn’t run away like the others? Was she not scared of her, or did she not believe Zoe was an actual zombie? 
Zoe took a step back as she watched Jasmine pick up the trash left behind, and toss them away into the grocery bags they had brought. She even went around to pick up trash left behind by previous visitors. When Jasmine was finished, she tied the bags and started making her way out of the cemetery. She turned to look at Zoe, smiled at her, and waved goodbye. Zoe waved again. A wave of happiness hit her as she walked to her headstone, thinking of Jasmine. 
Jasmine had stopped by the cemetery for the past couple of days to come clean up the place. When she came, Zoe remained hidden behind the gravestones, but she knew that Jasmine could tell that she was there watching her, and wouldn’t look her way when she stepped on a twig.
Zoe spent time in the cemetery daydreaming. Hoping to one day catch Jasmine’s attention and that she would notice and fall for her the same way Zoe fell for her before reality hits her and Zoe remembers that a human and zombie couldn’t be together and how Jasmine might reject her for being something that isn’t human or how other people would react to a zombie and a human girl being in a relationship together. In Zoe’s eyes, it’s not meant to be. 
Unless Zoe could try to make herself seem more human. Human enough that Jasmine would fall in love with her. Sure, it’s not an easy task and would take a lot of work to make her look human, but because she was so determined to win Jasmine’s heart, it wouldn’t hurt Zoe to at least try. 
She didn’t have any makeup, so Zoe used what she could. She made eyeshadow from the flowers her family would bring to her grave that she would grind. Her lipstick was made from the raspberry bush planted behind the cemetery fence. She cleaned her tattered and dirty witch’s dress. She brushed the dirt, grass, and maggots out of her hair.
When Zoe finished, she looked down into a puddle and smiled. She pushed her hair back, picked up a dandelion, and tucked it between her hair and ear, and she waited for Jasmine’s return to the cemetery. 
Days turned into nights, and there was no sign of Jasmine coming. The cemetery was starting to pile up with bits of trash that on some nights, Zoe would be the one to clean up hoping that Jasmine would show up. 
She would hear voices only to find out that it was the groundskeeper coming to mow the grass, her family who came to visit, or other families coming to visit their loved ones. Not a single person that came in was Jasmine. Zoe was almost close to thinking that Jasmine was not coming and that she never will. 
Zoe heard the sound of cans clattering and thought it was another group of teens, so she dipped behind her gravestone as she always did, and poked her head out. It was Jasmine who was walking along the gravestone, cleaning the rest of the mess that Zoe intended to pick up. Zoe fixed her hair and looked into the puddle. She picked herself up and dusted the dirt off her dress and walked over to Jasmine. 
Jasmine looked up when Zoe got closer. Startled, Jasmine stepped away from her, but Zoe reassured her that she wasn’t going to hurt or eat her, after some hesitance, Jasmine offered a bag to Zoe and the two of them spent the night picking up trash and creating a bond with each other. Zoe learned more about Jasmine and Jasmine learned more about her. Zoe told Jasmine about bits of her past life she remembers while Jasmine would talk to her about what happened at school that day. Zoe couldn’t contain her emotions as Jasmine took her hand and took to the edge of the graveyard. They lay on their backs and looked at the stars. 
“How come you never leave this place?” Jasmine asked, turning to face Zoe. “You must be lonely.”
“Yes, I am lonely,” Zoe replied. “But then again, I don’t think humans would take kindly to a zombie living amongst them, so I kind of just…stay here.” 
“Then maybe, I should come visit you more often.” Jasmine said.
If Zoe’s heart still could beat, it would skip. If she still had part of her cheek, she would blush. If she could still breathe, her breath would hitch. She wondered if Jasmine had the same feelings as she did. If her heart was skipping beats. If she was somewhat blushing. If her breath would stop. 

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