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"Layman," Coach Konrathy yelled, "wake up and get your ass on the line."
Adam complied and "put his ass" on the offensive line. As he did he could almost hear Master Griffin's calm voice in his head, asking him just how much of his ass he was willing to put on the line for his beliefs.
The dead kid got up the way he always did--slowly-- but did not seem injured by Stavis's illegal hit. Adam tried to get into his head. What, if anything, was going on in there? Why was Williams even out here? Did he have something to prove? Was it love of the game? Did he even realize that there were teammates of his working hard to take him out of the game--permanently? There just didn't seem to be any point in offering himself up to the punishment he was experiencing.
And--the thought creeped in like rain through cracks in the ceiling--did Phoebe really have a thing for him? Why would she find him the least bit attractive? How on earth could a dead kid interest her in that way? There had to be some crossing of wires, somewhere.
Back in the locker room, the sudden silence told him that Williams was passing through. Williams didn't shower, at least he never showered with the rest of the team in the gang showers down the hall. He didn't sweat, and one could just as easily wash the mud and turf off one's face at home as in the showers.
Adam shucked off his shoulder pads and covertly watched the reactions of his teammates as the dead kid walked by. The
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open hostility of the remaining Pain Crew was pretty easy to register: Martinsburg was whispering something to his head thug, Stavis, and to Harris Morgan, who looked to be first on the recruiting list now that Adam had dissolved his membership.
Most of the team turned away, like the presence of the dead kid was an embarrassing secret that no one wanted to acknowledge. Denny Mackenzie, whose neck had been saved today by Williams when he blocked a charging Martinsburg coming in for the sack on Mackenzie's blind side, was pretending to be fully engrossed in something that Gary Greene was saying. Williams opened his locker, withdrew his backpack, and headed for the stairs.
Tommy Williams was a player on the Oakvale Badgers, but no one seemed very pleased about it. Konrathy was leaning in the doorway of his office, watching Williams make a deliberate path toward the exit.
Thornton Harrowwood had the locker closest to the door. He was sitting on the wooden bench with a damp towel wrapped around his skinny waist and was stuffing his filthy uniform into a large green duffel that was nearly as big as he was. He looked up at Williams as he passed and held up his hand like it was no big deal, and Williams slapped it gently without breaking his ponderous stride. Like it was no big deal.
Adam smiled, but then Konrathy called Thornton into his office. Adam became so engrossed in trying to figure out what was being discussed behind the closed door that he almost
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didn't see his former pals in the Pain Crew skip the showers and follow Williams out the door.
"He's talking to that spooky bitch," TC said as they crossed the lot toward the woods.
"Doesn't change a damn thing," Martinsburg said. He was twirling the aluminum bat, his wrist making swift circles. "Harris, she's your responsibility. If she tries to run or interfere, stop her."
"Aww, man. I ain't hitting no girl."
"I ask you to hit her? Just stop her." Martinsburg pointed the bat at Harris Morgan's chest. Pete outweighed the fit running back by a good forty pounds and Harris took a half step back, but it was Pete's expression more than the bat that did it.
"Stop her," Harris said. "Got it."
"If you plan on punking out like Layman, you'd better tell me now."
Harris shook his head.
Martinsburg looked again at their quarry, who had turned and entered the woods with Little Miss Scarypants.
"Now, what do you suppose they're up to in the woods?" he said, sending a long stream of spit through his teeth and onto the asphalt. "She gonna help him get his pads off?"
The dead kid had knocked the wind out of him at practice today. Pete had been just a few steps away from leveling the quarterback with his shoulder when the dead kid came from his blind side and sent him down, driving all of the wind from his lungs.
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There was one moment when the zombie stood over him while he lay flat on his back, his closed lungs struggling to draw in air. The dead kid looked down, and Pete felt a moment of breathless panic as he saw the cold gray glare of his eyes under the shade of his helmet.
Now you know what it feels like to be dead. He could hear the zombie's voice in his head, and he thought he detected the slightest tic of a muscle by his mouth.
How do you like it?
Williams left him there on the turf. Pete's breath was slow in returning, and through it all he couldn't get the image out of his mind of the zombie laughing at him. He was frightened by that image, but fear only served to make him angrier. No one, dead or alive, was going to laugh at Pete Martinsburg and get away with it.
"We'll just come up the path," he said, "and when we get close we'll spread out in the woods. I'll kick it off. Unless they smell Stavis here."
"What?" Stavis said, looking down at his grubby and fragrant uniform.
"You could have at least showered," Pete said. "You reek." Harris laughed, nodding in agreement.
There were a few kids and their parents milling about the parking lot, but no one really seemed to notice them. Pete nodded to his two henchmen.
"Okay," he said, "it's on."
They followed him into the woods.
***
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Phoebe wasn't sure how she was going to broach the subject of her poetry with Tommy, but he saved her the trouble once they stepped into the woods.
"I have your poem ... in my locker," he said. "I realized ...that this ...could be a problem for you."
Phoebe shook her head and tried to think how she should respond. Funny how the clarity of his speech, which flowed more quickly that the average living impaired person's, was giving her speech troubles.
"No," she said, "I was surprised, I guess."
"Your friend," he said, "with the pink hair."
Phoebe laughed. "Margi."
"I did not think of the ... consequences," he said, somehow getting all those syllables out in one word. "Everyone ...knows. I am sorry."
She shook her head and took a step closer to him. He didn't smell like someone who had been at football practice for the past couple hours. He didn't smell like a dead person, for that matter, either. The crisp scent of pine and autumn leaves was all she could smell. His skin was so smooth and white; he looked like a sculpture come to life, someone's idealized version of a young man, without blemishes or flaws.
"Don't be," she said, touching his arm, which felt like smooth stone beneath her fingers. "I wanted you to have it."
He gave a slight nod, his bottomless stare fixed on her. His gaze was disconcerting, to say the least. His eyes did not track when they were talking, and when he blinked, which wasn't often, she could count to three before his eyelids touched. He
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raised his hand as though to touch her cheek, and she thought of how gentle he'd been when he'd removed the leaf caught in her hair.
He surprised her by turning away, the movement sudden and swift.
"This is ...difficult," he said, "for both ... of us. Friendship ...always is. Much less ..."
She didn't get to hear what else he had to say, because at that moment two figures moving low ran at Tommy. One swung a baseball bat and hit Tommy in the chest, knocking him off his feet and onto a rotting log. His helmet bounced twice and landed near Phoebe, who shrieked as a third figure came from behind her and leveled a bat at her throat.
"Shhh," Harris Morgan said. Then he smiled.
"So you like sports, do you, zombie?" Martinsburg said. The bat he was holding out at his side came down with a sickening crack. Phoebe couldn't see where the blow landed, her line of sight obscured by Harris and the log that
Tommy had fallen over.
"Stop it!" she yelled.
"Shut her up," Martinsburg said over his shoulder as he prepared himself for another swing. Harris looked back at Pete, unsure how to translate that particular directive, and Phoebe used the moment to jump on him, swinging her fists.
She punched him once, and they stumbled, but she ended up on her back, the limbs of the trees high above spinning in a kaleidoscope of fall colors. She was dimly aware of Harris rising from her, cursing and licking his lower lip.
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Then she heard the sound of Martinsburg's bat whistling again.
It wasn't easy to rise to a sitting position, but she did. Martinsburg, grinning, was motioning for Stavis to take a turn. She tried to stand, but Harris poked her in the chest with the end of his bat and told her to sit down, swearing. She was gratified to see a thin line of blood where her knuckle had cut his lip.
She saw Stavis hefting the bat with both hands over his head.
"You have no idea how big a mistake you have made."
The deep, even voice belonged to Adam. Phoebe turned to see him looming on the path from where Martinsburg and his cronies had launched their attack. He was speaking to Harris, but he turned to look at the other two as well.
"Stay out of this, Layman," Martinsburg said. Stavis lowered his bat and regarded the new threat. Phoebe noticed that he was actually wider and heavier than Adam, although not quite as tall or as fast, but Phoebe guessed it didn't really matter when Stavis was holding a baseball bat.
"No," Adam said, and took two steps, closing the distance between them.
"I told you to pick a team, Lame Man," Martinsburg said.
"Guess I did," Adam replied, still moving right at Pete.
"Be a shame if one of your knees got busted out," Martinsburg said, but there was a shrill quality to his words, an absence of confidence that hadn't been there before Adam had appeared. "Like your gimp buddy, Manetti."
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"A shame," Adam repeated. He was about five feet away from Pete when Harris dropped his bat and dove at him.
Phoebe called a warning as she scrambled for the bat, and Adam's left foot lashed out and caught Harris square in the solar plexus, knocking him flat on his back. But Stavis didn't have the qualms that Harris Morgan did about striking a fellow Badger, apparently, because just as Phoebe turned, he stepped in and gave a short thrust to Adam's stomach, and Adam went down on all fours. Stavis made a move like he was going to hit him again, and Phoebe screamed, throwing the bat Morgan had dropped, which Stavis deflected awkwardly, stumbling backward.
She stood up and faced the two, and saw that behind Martinsburg, Tommy had risen to one knee. Martinsburg caught her reaction and turned back toward Tommy.
"You just stay put," he said, "or I'm going to walk over there and beat your girlfriend bloody." He looked back at her and spat. "I might do it anyway."
Phoebe watched as Tommy looked up at his attacker and did one of those three-second blinks. Then he set his leg down and kneeled on the soft soil of the forest floor.
"Yeah, that's right, dead boy," Martinsburg said, twirling the bat, "she might not come back."
There was such hatred in his voice that Phoebe could almost feel it. Stavis stood between her and Martinsburg; Adam was retching into the soil. Harris was groaning, but she heard him starting to get up.
Tommy was staring up at Pete. Pete walked toward him and readied his bat.
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The first figure that appeared out of the woods was nearly Adam's size. To Phoebe's buzzing mind it was as though he had materialized out of the darkness of the forest. A second figure and then a third--the girl with platinum hair who liked short skirts, and a pale boy with a shock of faded red hair--appeared from behind trees and clusters of brush, until there were six figures in a loose ring around them.
Harris, still separated from his bat and rubbing his chest as though to erase the print of Adam's sneaker, made another colorful comment as a seventh figure appeared behind him on the path. The eerie silence with which these new players had appeared sent a chill through Phoebe, one that was amplified as yet another figure walked past to stand between her and Stavis.
"Colette?" Phoebe whispered.
Martinsburg and his cronies milled around, not sure how they should react to this new development. There were eight kids total, standing in a loose ring around them, motionless as tombstones.
The giant one, his movements awkward, helped Tommy to his feet. He regarded Pete with an expressionless stare that still managed to convey a threat that was unmistakable.
He straightened up, and Phoebe saw that he was even taller than Adam. He loomed over Stavis and Pete the way the gray trees loomed over them all, the newly risen moon throwing its shadow over them like a shroud.
"You ... might... not," he said, his halting voice filled with quiet force, "make ...it...back."
The ring of dead kids began to close. The giant spoke, and
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each of them took one step forward, tightening the circle like a noose. Harris was the first to run, but Martinsburg and Stavis were close behind.
Phoebe, her eyes wide, thought she caught the hint of a smile on Tommy's lips. But the moment passed, and she ran over to Adam, who was still trying to shake off the effects of the hit to the gut.
"Are you okay?" she said, crouching next to him. Her skirt was ripped and there were twigs and leaves all over her. She was going to have a great time explaining this to her parents.
Adam groaned and spit. "P ...peachy."
The dead kids had begun to disperse, silently shambling back into the forest in the directions they had come from. One of them, the young-looking boy with the red hair, made an odd high bleating sound, and Phoebe realized he was trying to laugh. Short Skirt Girl smiled at her and said "Bye!" in an amused, perky fashion before skipping away down a pine needle--strewn path.
Phoebe scanned for Colette and saw her just as she turned and melted into the forest. Soon all but the giant and Tommy were gone.
"This is Mai." Tommy motioned. "He is ...large."
"Hello, Mai," Phoebe said, and Mai began lifting his arm. "Tommy, are you hurt? My God, they were hitting you with baseball bats!" Mai finished lifting his arm, and three of his fingers twitched. Phoebe realized he was waving.
Tommy's head swiveled from side to side. "The blows did not hurt... as much ... as the ...idea ... of the blows."
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"Tommy," she said. Adam coughed.
"Take care ... of your friend. And"--Tommy paused, but something made Phoebe think it wasn't the half-speed of undeath that was holding him up, but finding the right words--" thank him ...for me."
She watched Tommy walk into the forest, Mai following him like an enormous shadow.
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***
CHAPTER NINE
P HOEBE LOOKED OUT THE grimy window of Adam's truck, scanning the woods and thinking about those kids and where they might have come from. Her sleep last night had been restless, and having Adam drive her to school today just made the events of last night seem even more surreal.
Last night Adam hadn't said two words on the entire drive home, and this morning it was she who didn't want to speak.
"Do you understand what happened last night?" Adam asked. "What was that? I don't even know who half of those kids were."
"Colette," she said. Her heartbeat felt like she'd tripled up the caffeine dose in her morning brew. "Colette was there."
Adam was silent for a moment. "Yeah. Colette. And that girl from the lunchroom, I recognized her. But who was that big
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black kid, and the one that was smiling? Where did they all come from?"
"I have no idea."
"You know, some of them were watching the practice the other night," he said. "They don't go to our school, do they?"
"Some of them do," she replied. "Not Mai, though." "Colette didn't say anything to you, did she?" "No. No, she didn't."
/> Adam nodded as though he understood the significance of that.
"That was weird, is all I can say. It's like they live out there or something. Or whatever you call it."
Phoebe hugged herself. "Not to mention that you were hit with a bat. A baseball bat , Adam."
"Yeah," Adam replied. "Yeah, that was a first. Clocked the wind right out of me."
Phoebe looked over at him, and he was actually grinning, like it had been some kind of adventure.
"Adam, has football left you that desensitized to violence? How can you be so flip about what happened?"
"I've gotten into fights before," he said, shrugging. "Never with bats, though."
"Is that all you have to say?" she said. "We watched Tommy get beaten . With clubs . I think they were trying to kill him."
"He's already dead, so ...."
"Adam!" she said, her voice loud enough to make him flinch. "You know what I mean!"
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"Okay," he said. "Okay, I'm sorry. I guess I wasn't thinking of it like that."
"They could have hurt us too, if Tommy's friends hadn't come."
"I don't think they would have done that, Pheeble. I think ..."
"So it's okay to beat a living impaired person?" "That isn't what I mean. I ..."
"Let's just drop it, okay?" she said, turning toward the passenger window.
"I'm sorry," he said after a moment. "I guess I just wasn't thinking about being threatened. The whole thing was just so weird."
She didn't answer and continued to stare out the window. She thought it was weird, too, and with each passing mile she expected a living impaired person to appear suddenly out of the woods.
"Say," he said, "what were you doing out there, anyhow?"
Phoebe squeezed her eyes shut. "Let's not talk right now, okay, Adam? Can we talk about this later?"
"Sure, Pheeble," he said. His touch was light and brief on her shoulder. "Sure."
Phoebe didn't know why she felt like crying. She opened her eyes and saw dead kids, dozens of them, lumbering through the woods toward the road. She blinked once and they were gone. She looked back at Adam, as solid and sure as an oak tree. He was trying to rescue me, she thought, and the guilty realization cooled her anger.
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