D. Walker - The Snacking Dead

She tried in vain to brush Ronnie’s hair, but Ronnie pulled away and made that slurping sound. She felt she hadn’t been the best mother. But she wouldn’t give up. She would adapt to her kids’ special needs, and they would get through this thing as a family.

serves 8

Nonstick spray

1 (13-ounce) bag corn tortilla chips

1 (15-ounce) can refried beans

5 ounces cured (cooked) chorizo, diced small (don’t use fresh chorizo here)

½ cup pickled jalapeños

1 pound (4 cups) pepper Jack cheese, grated

Pico de gallo or salsa, for serving

Mexican crema or sour cream, for serving

Chopped cilantro, for serving

Lime wedges, for serving

1 Preheat the oven to 425°F.

2 Coat a large rimmed baking sheet with nonstick spray and distribute half of the tortilla chips in a single layer. Dollop half of the refried beans, half of the chorizo, half of the jalapeños, and half of the cheese. Cover with the remaining chips and repeat the process with the remaining ingredients. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until the cheese is melted and beginning to brown.

3 Let nachos cool slightly, then garnish with the pico de gallo, crema , cilantro, and lime wedges. Serve on the baking sheet.

Don’t worry if you can’t find nonstick spray. A chisel works just as well.

A man in an orange fishing vest stumbled,dazed and frantic, through the orchard. The biters had gotten his kids and his wife. Now he was lost, alone, and weak with hunger.

He’d already jumped at so many stray noises that this time he failed to notice the sound of a snapping twig. A willowy woman in a torn mauve pantsuit lunged at him from behind a bush. She had the same starved look in her eye as he probably did. Except she had found something to eat. Him.

He lifted the heavy tire iron he carried in his belt. As he crushed her skull he heard a crunch of leaves. Two more walkers converged on him out of nowhere, grabbing at his shirt and dragging him down. He was too weak to lift the tire iron a second time. He squeezed his eyelids shut and saw a vision of his wife on their wedding day.

There was a whistle like a scythe through grass, a warm rain on his face, and the smell of bacon. He opened his eyes one at a time.

The walkers lay on the ground, the tops of their heads like putrescent bowls dribbling red on the dry leaves.

Above him stood Death.

She wore a black hood that obscured her face, but her sweatshirt was emblazoned with a hot pink skull. She carried some kind of long shovel, its edges filed sharp and smeared with gore. Her left hand gripped two chains, at the ends of which swayed a pair of smallish biters, their mouths sealed with duct tape.

“You must be hungry,” said the apparition.

The man’s throat dried shut. He nodded.

She held out a cleaver with bacon balanced on its flat. The man gawped at it in wonder.

“Bon appétit,” said the specter. “In this world, you either snack or get snacked on.”

serves 6 to 8

8 strips bacon, each cut into 3-inch pieces (about ½ pound)

Nonstick baking spray

¼ cup light brown sugar

¼ teaspoon ground cayenne pepper

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 Preheat the oven to 400°F. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil and add the bacon pieces in a single layer. Line another baking sheet with paper towels and place a cooling rack on top. Spray the cooling rack with nonstick spray and set aside.

2 In a small bowl, stir together the brown sugar, cayenne, and cinnamon. Sprinkle the brown sugar mixture evenly over the bacon pieces. Bake until the bacon is well browned, crisp and bubbling, 16 to 18 minutes. Remove the baking sheet from the oven.

3 Transfer the bacon pieces to the cooling rack and set aside to cool completely and firm up before serving.

Cut these into bite-size pieces for an uncluttered look and effortless eating. A sensible hand food for hand-to-hand situations.

Daryl thundered down the road on his brother’s motorcycle, crossbow slung on his back, poncho flapping in the wind, a hatchet handle dangling from his open saddlebag. He was on a mission.

He sped past walkers drawn by the unmuffled engine. One of them stood moronically in the middle of the road. Reaching for the hatchet, he gunned the motor and drove right at the walker. He caught a glimpse in the rear-view mirror of the dead geek’s head flying off. He liked the loneliness of the open road.

He’d left the group of survivors to get supplies, but he would have found just about any excuse to get out of there. Their endless debating, finger-pointing, and crazy moods made his insides coil up tight. You can brain a biter, but how do you survive the survivors?

That was the thing that scared him the most. He wasn’t sure he was coming back.

People had spooked him his whole life. His parents only yelled or whupped him when they paid him any mind at all, and his brother’s protective care wasn’t much gentler.

But there had been this one girl he couldn’t scare off. She used to bring him cheese sandwiches. There hadn’t been much to eat at home, what with his brother Merle gone and his dad sleeping off his liquor most of the time.

He could barely ever manage to say two words to her, but she’d come back every few days with a homemade lunch. He had been just a dumb kid, but he knew an angel when he saw one. First time the wolf in his gut stopped yapping for a second.

She’d asked him to show her how he skinned a squirrel. He’d always used a hatchet; it got less hair in the meat. He had wrapped her pale hand in his on the hatchet handle and guided her arm.

“First you chop the head,” he told her. He’d wondered if she noticed how bad his hand was shaking. He couldn’t look at her the rest of the day.

Damn, what was that girl’s name?

By the end of that summer her family had moved back down near Atlanta, and he’d gone back to roaming the woods alone. He was probably better off on his own. Not like she was his family. The outbreak didn’t change a thing.

Of course he knew things weren’t the same now. He just wasn’t always sure how. Seemed to him the living weren’t so different from the dead sometimes. The dead are hungrier is all. And there are a lot more of them.