 Well, most zombie films and fiction isn't really about zombies. They're about people and how they deal with the problems of zombies. Well, Breathers is about zombies and how they deal with the problem of people. Just to give you a brief background, the main character, the main protagonist, Andy Warner, has died from a car accident that killed his wife, left his child orphaned, and now he lives in the basement of his parents' house. And he's completely disfigured, he can't talk, and, of course, he has a reanimated corpse. Andy! It's 8.30 in the morning and I'm drinking a bottle of 1998 Chateau Montelena Cabernet Sauvignon and watching SpongeBob SquarePants on Nickelodeon. Occasionally, I flip the channel to two cable PBS feeds and watch Sesame Street or Barney and Friends. I'd rather watch Leave It to Beaver, but we don't get TV land. Andy! I feel like I'm six years old again, staying home from school and watching TV in bed while my mom makes me cream of wheat with sliced bananas and cinnamon toast, except instead of comic book hero posters spread across my wall, I have bottles of wine, and my mother isn't making me breakfast, and my heart is no longer pumping blood through my veins. Andy! I've been living in my parents' wine cellar for nearly three months and my mother still calls out for me expecting an answer. With a sigh, I turn off the television and get up for my mattress. Dragging my left foot, I shuffle over to the stairs. At the top of the stairs, silhouetted by the light, pouring in through the kitchen window, stands my mother. Your father needs some help with the new disposal, honey, she says. Can you come up for a few minutes and give him a hand? I don't need any help, Lois, says my father from somewhere behind her. Will you just let it be? Oh, nonsense, she says. Andy would love to give you a hand. Wouldn't you, honey? I stare up at my mother in blink, wondering if she lost her mind when I died in the accident or when I showed up three days later at the SPCA needing room and board. Behind her, my father reasserts he doesn't need my assistance, adding he would rather not have to breathe the stench of my rotting flesh. It's just for a few minutes, my mother whispers to my father. Her head turned away from me. It'll make him feel useful. She says this like I can't hear her. Well, don't just stand there dawdling, she says, turning back to me. Come on up and help your father. It takes me nearly two minutes to climb the 15 steps from the wine cellar to the house. The entire time, I hear my father grumbling about how other men have normal families. Not every corpse that reanimates moves in with his or her parents or has a friend or relative willing to take them in. Nearly half end up homeless or in shelters, with the less unfortunate getting-unfortunate getting harvested for parts and sold to medical facilities or impact testing centers. And it's rare for a spouse to take the undead back into the fold, especially if they're any breather children. I don't know about the other states, but California's Child Protective Services frowns upon single parents who allow a zombie to live at home. And when it comes to visitation rights, the undead have zero. After the accident, my seven-year-old daughter, Annie, went to live with my wife's sister in Monterey. As far as Annie knows, I'm dead. But during the first few weeks after I reanimated, I would call my sister-in-law's place every day, hoping Annie would answer the phone just so I could hear her voice and tell her aunt and uncle got an unlisted phone number. After a couple of months, I gave up. Eventually I decided everyone was acting in the best interest of my daughter. As much as I miss Annie and wish I could see her again, I don't think it'd be a good idea. Knowing her father as a zombie might not be something she's ready or able to accept. Besides, I don't want her to remember me this way, and I don't exactly think she'd want to take me to any father-daughter picnics. Show and tell, maybe. When I reach the top of the stairs and step into the kitchen, my mother sprays me with a can of Glade neutralizer fragrance, circling around and covering me from head to toe, emptying the last of the can in my hair. My parents buy Glade and bulk. Mom prefers the neutralizer fragrance because it works directly toward the source of the odor. I'm partial to Lilac Spring, though Tropical Mist has a nice fruity scent. My father is on his back under the kitchen sink, his head and upper torso inside the cabinet. A brand new garbage disposal sits on the counter next to the sink. Harry, my mother says, and he's here to help. I don't need any goddamn help, he says, straining to loosen a bolt on the old garbage disposal. Oh, nonsense, my mother says. You've been under that sink for over an hour already. Of course you need help. My father could probably pay a plumber and have the disposal fixed in under an hour. Instead, he'd rather spend three hours at growing frustrated and swearing in inanimate objects so he can save $120. Lois, my father says going after the bolt again, I'm going to say this one last time. I don't need any help. The wrench slips and my father's hand smashes against something hard and metal. My father slides out from under the sink, holding his right hand and reeling off a string of profanities that would make me blush if I still had any blood in my cheeks. He storms out of the kitchen, making sure to give me a wide berth and holding his breath while avoiding eye contact. Don't mind your father, my mother says, walking over to the oven as the timer goes off. He's just in a mood. My father's been in a mood ever since I've come home. My mother removes a cookie sheet filled with Pillsbury cinnamon rolls from the oven and sets it on the counter, then grabs a knife and starts to slather the cinnamon rolls with a pre-packaged icing. There are a lot of things I miss about being alive, going out to the movies with my wife, who's been playing Annie play soccer, sitting around a beach bonfire without having to wonder if someone's going to try to throw me into it. And sometimes, I miss food. It's not that I don't eat. I eat all the time. But one of the major drawbacks of being a zombie, aside from the decomposing flesh and the absence of civil rights and the children who scream at the side of you, is that food has lost most of its flavor. Everything tastes unseasoned, unsweetened, watered down. You need... Sorry, even the wine I drink I can't appreciate and I don't get drunk. You need a functioning circulatory system for that. So mostly, I eat out of habit or boredom with perfunctory pleasure and no definitive memory of how anything is supposed to taste. But as I watch my mother spread icing across the cinnamon rolls, I'm overcome with nostalgia. It's like 30 years have been wiped away in an instant and I'm sitting at the breakfast table. My stalking feet dangling above the floor. A mug of steaming hot chocolate in front of me as I wait in anticipation for my mother to finish icing the cinnamon rolls. I want to tell my mother I love her, but I can't. I want to give her a hug, but I don't because I'm afraid she might scream. Or else open up another can of glade on me. Sometimes I feel guilty about what I've put my parents through, but it's not like I've done this on purpose. Still, I appreciate what they've done for me, all that they've sacrificed. They could have left me at the SPCA. I guess that just proves you never stop being a parent even after your son comes back from the dead. Here you go, honey. My mother hands me a plate with a hot, steaming, freshly-iced cinnamon roll. I smile and go to sit down at the kitchen table. Oh, Andy, could you take it downstairs? She says, we have company coming over.