Life After: The Cemetery Plot

Life After: The Cemetery Plot is the first short story in the Life After series, a collection of new adult horror fiction by American author Bryan Way. It was self-published by Way on July 1st, 2014. The short is followed by Life After: The Basement and Life After: The Phoenix, and is directly connected to the novels Life After: The Arising and its sequel Life After: The Void.

Synopsis
The death of a relative can be tough on a family, but nothing makes their passing more punishing than jealousy and greed.

''When the recently deceased William Pelletreau leaves nothing to his scorned family, brother-in-law Holt Prendergast coerces his wife Judy to give him the cheapest burial his funeral contract will allow. However, Holt's obsession with squeezing every penny leads to the discovery that the local cemetery's secrets are as dubious as they are terrifying, and if Holt wants William buried his way, he might have to dig a grave himself.''

Taking place before the events of Life After: The Arising, Life After: The Cemetery Plot enriches the arc of the series by filling the void of questions the novel's characters can't answer, such as the cause for the car accident on route 3, how it is the undead can dig out of their graves, and most importantly, who is patient zero?

Plot Summary
Holt Prendergast and his wife Judy prepare for the funeral of William Pelletreau, who has passed away suddenly; though Judy mourns the death of her brother, Holt is more concerned with the cost of the proceedings and any possible leftover inheritance. On the day of the funeral, Holt's niece and her boyfriend discuss the discord among her family, specifically mentioning that Holt's miserly tendencies have been a point of contention in the past.

Befitting this assessment, Holt spends the trip back from the funeral complaining about the cost of William's burial vault to Judy, and, once home, immediately gets in touch with the sexton of Brookwood Cemetery in an attempt to question the vault's necessity and mitigate the cost. Once redirected to the company that supplies the vaults, Holt discovers he was duped; even though the sexton suggested that cemeteries are legally obliged to use them, the supplier insists that vaults fall under the purview of cemetery regulations rather than federal, state, or municipal law, and that Brookwood has not been their client for years.

While hosting the wake, Holt gathers William's brothers and sisters to insist they take legal action on the grounds that Brookwood is charging them for a burial vault they won't be using. Frustrated by his tone and still in mourning, the family spurns Holt's posturing. Left alone with one of his in-laws, Holt bitterly muses on how William relied on the family's help while he was in college and ultimately abandoned them once he got a job at a major multinational finance and insurance company. A passing remark from his in-law sees Holt ditch the wake under the vague pretext of preparations for construction project at Thomas Massey High School.

Holt returns to Brookwood on the night of the marching band festival at TMHS, determined to dig up William's grave and prove his coffin was not placed in a vault. After several hours of digging in the sinkhole-laden cemetery, Holt discovers that his suspicions were correct: William's coffin is naked in the dirt. After taking pictures for proof, Holt is stunned to hear a sound from within the coffin; believing that William might be alive, he slices through it with an electric saw and reaches in, being bitten on the first attempt and losing two fingers on the second. Panicked, Holt makes a run for it, but his feet subside into several sinkholes, one of which sees him suffering a severe bite wound to his leg before he makes it back to his truck, where he finally comes face-to-face with a zombie.

Holt races out of the cemetery, barely avoiding scores of pedestrians and other vehicles as he speeds to the hospital. It doesn't take long until he's being pursued by the police, but that ceases to matter when Holt causes a devastating collision, jamming up an intersection following the realization that a zombie had stowed in the bed of his truck. Holt's impudence sets off a series of catastrophic accidents, culminating in his loss of consciousness due to severe blood loss.

Holt barely regains consciousness in a hospital, overhearing two nurses discuss his dire circumstances, both in health and with the law. The ward struggles with an influx of patients from the local high school, and as Holt's health fails, he entertains a notion that he will survive moments before he passes away.

Conception, Writing & Publication
When Way realized he had failed to substantively address the exact nature and epidemiology of his Zombie apocalypse, he set to work on the Undeath Syndrome Surveillance and Diagnosis report. Inspired by a similar piece of fiction that imitated the language and structure of legitimate medical documentation, Way studied several academic reports on viral outbreaks and attempted to master the prose necessary for an elaborate fiction, ultimately backing himself into what he deemed an interesting subject for a short story early in the spring of 2012.

In the midst of conceiving a narrative for Brookwood Cemetery, the burial ground from which the undead would ultimately emerge, Way was inspired to craft a story that would concisely deal with a series of unscrupulous burial practices facilitating a full-blown epidemic. Ideas for Life After: The Cemetery Plot followed quickly; Way conceived its premise within minutes, determining that the tale would focus on a quarreling family's disagreements over the death of a recent loved one that would ultimately unveil the manner in which the depth of this particular cemetery's corruption would contribute to the apocalypse.

Embracing the inclusive nature of the premise, and a notion that it seemed to emerge organically from the labor of the background material he'd been producing, Way quickly fit the new story's conclusion into the opening scene of Life After: The Arising, attempting to craft a self-contained short while enriching the details of the Life After universe. The initial draft was completed in May of 2012. Life After: The Cemetery Plot was the first in a trilogy of shorts Way published in quick succession with the hopes of drumming up publicity for both Life After: The Arising and Life After: The Void.