Reawakening

by Stein, Charlotte

How could you hate someone who said something like that? She thought of hate’s opposite word instead. She thought of kissing him when he least expected it then did just that.

  It took the tension out of his shoulders, at least. And when she pulled away he looked mystified and pleased and better, all at the same time.

  “I think it’s called survivor’s guilt,” he said but it came out all blank and funny and side-tracked by the kiss. It made her laugh, instead of all the other awful things she could have done.

  Like bawl her fucking eyes out.

  “Yeah. I think you’re PTSD-ed to fuck, honey, got to say,” she said then he laughed. Shook himself. Told her they should follow Blake to the hardware store—unless, of course, she wanted to stay by the chopper.

  She rolled her eyes.

  “You’re sticking with me, aren’t you? Have you guys made some kind of deal? One of you with me at all times?”

  He went to protest but didn’t get much further than an open mouth.

  “You guys didn’t even know about wrist guards! I think I should be the one taking care of you two morons.”

  He batted at her as she rounded the chopper. Tongue curling up to touch his upper teeth. Playful, just like that. It made her think of Kelsey and how often they’d said dumb stuff about everything horrible just to make it okay. To make it bearable.

  Like the zombie scorecards. Three points for bagging one with a moustache. Twelve points for one with its boobs out.

  A thousand for one that had once been related to you.

  “Yeah—Blake told me about the bite, by the by.” He was following, but easy-like. Not right on her, as though a zombie was going to lurch out of all of this vast, safe, emptiness, and eat her. “Baby, if you were hungry, you coulda just come right on to me. I got no weird biting hang-ups and plenty of things you can eat.”

  How weird that him saying so set off none of her zombie panic alarms. And all of her sex panic alarms. Though she had to say, it was a lot less like panic and a lot more like being zinged with a little sexual innuendo cattle prod.

  The hand he put on her back—just lightly, just nothing much as he fell in step behind her, on the way to the hardware store—zinged her, too. It made her body turn to liquid and she imagined that hand sinking in, suddenly—all the way to his wrist. All the way to the core of her body that glowed hot and white whenever her mind went to that word he’d used.

  Eat. Like the thing they did, only he’d turned into something better, sweeter, hotter. God, had the sun been beating down that hard, before? It felt like it hadn’t, and yet somehow she was suddenly sweating inside the stupid leather jacket she’d made herself wear.

  “That too much?” he asked, as he went for the door they’d obviously popped open, sometime in the past.

  “God no,” she replied, and didn’t even feel bad about it. There was no reason to feel bad. “The opposite. It’s not enough.”

  He grinned at that.

  * * * *

  The only problem was—his grin, that cheeky comment, the feeling of turning to liquid…it all made the need to get something greater. And despite the extreme daring involved in getting out the words “it’s not enough”, she still found herself unable to ask for the thing. The thing that needed to be asked for if they were going to fuck her, now.

  There weren’t any in the cabin, or the storeroom. She knew. She’d checked, thoroughly. So this is how it had to be, and if they continued gassing about butane tank sizes over there in some musty corner of this store she didn’t like, she could just…slip out. And get some.

  There’d be some in the gas station. Gas stations always had them. No problems.

  Though it still made her feel a little uneasy to leave them in the hardware store without saying anything. There had been that corner, behind the counter. The one she hadn’t liked the look of. Of course, there couldn’t have been anything hiding in it—zombies didn’t just wander into dark, empty stores. They had to be in there to begin with, and Blake and Jamie would have cleared the place by now.

  As hopeless as they were on some things, she knew they would have done. So why the unease?

  Because it was just the way things were now. She saw a dark corner, and there it was. Unease. She left her two guys alone in a creepy place, and oh what was that? Yeah. Unease.

  And all so she could get something so small and stupid! It made her feel small and stupid. She walked quickly, but the small stupidity stayed with her. It itched at the back of her neck. It put down her guard, and that was enough.

  She was almost on it before her brain stopped paying attention to Jamie and Blake and started paying attention to the thing it usually did. Survival. Be aware at all times. Be on your toes, June, ‘cause they won’t wait for you.

  That was Kelsey. And it was Kelsey, now, who shouted in her head and made her jump three steps back before she’d even gotten a handle on the situation. All this time, and that girl was still saving her life.

  Of course, the thing still turned. It was just there, standing on the edges of the gas station’s forecourt. Just where the tarmac turned to bristling grass, as though it wandered here for a cup of Joe and three packs of smokes. Nothing serious. Not that far from my home, down in Middleton.

  Hey. How are you?

  She was fucking furious with herself, that’s how she was. It was a big fucker, too—probably fat from eating half of suburbia, down there. Then the food had run out and it had gone searching, the way they did.

  And behold, it had found her. Boy, did it look happy that such a thing was the case! It reached hands out to her immediately. Bloody all the way up to its armpits, of course. It still had the remains of its old human uniform on, though. Slacks. One shoe. Was that a tie, stuck with blood to the remainder of its shirt?

  Yeah, she thought it was. She thought it was, as she went for the first thing instinct told her to. The gun at her hip—the one in a holster she couldn’t fucking pop. Her old gun— well. That had rested in the unsafe confines of her right pocket.

  But oh no, not this thing. This had to be fancy, it had to be in a holster, oh dear God, she was going to die because she’d needed to have sex and wanted to put her gun in a holster.

  The zombie snarled and she saw quite clearly that something had split its mouth at the corner. The whole left side of its face came apart when it made a sound and she saw the entire row of its back teeth. A lot of gum. Maybe part of that hinge, where jaw met face.

  She’d seen it before, of course. They broke each other easily, and they seemed to feel no pain. There was no clutching at this obscene wound in its cheek. It just lunged at her, hands clawed and ready to grab.

  Though she had to say—that was far and away the most notice she’d ever had of an attack. Usually they didn’t snarl or reach out first. Usually they just went for it, and this one’s decision to be confused by her presence had saved her life.

  Well. Maybe it had. When it lunged, she still hadn’t managed to get the gun free. The button was popped but getting it out was a different matter—especially when she had to complete this operation while darting away.

  Back, back, Kelsey snapped, and her brain brought up an image of the gas station forecourt immediately. It told her where she’d walked, what was behind her—the works. Her brain didn’t let her down.

  It got her off with one clipped elbow—on a gas pump—and a scuffing of her heel against a pebble that hadn’t been there before.

  But she didn’t go down. That was the main thing. Not going down. Not going down and getting the gun out, while her breath tried to whine in her chest and her heart tried to kill her. How fucking dare you get me into this situation again, her heart said. You’re a fucking lunatic, and I hate you.

  But that was okay. Because she hated herself too. She couldn’t get the gun out and she was drawing the thing toward Jamie and Blake and fuck, fuck. It was making that noise—the awful one. The one she still heard in her sleep, the one that made them sound as though a velociraptor had taken
over their voice boxes.

  It chilled her blood and drove her mad, and she really couldn’t blame herself for grabbing the nearest thing that came to hand—a bottle of car wash stuff from a stand outside the gas station—and hurling it at the thing’s head.

  Hell. She’d thrown worse. Sillier. Once she’d attacked one of them with a Barbie Dream House. A bottle of car wash stuff seemed almost sane by comparison.

  And it connected, too. It glanced right off the side of its head and deepened that split in its face. A flap of skin hung down, now, all fat and glistening and juicy.

  But that was okay. That was fine. Be as gross as you want, zombie, she thought. Because the rage had descended and oh it was just as bleak and terrible as she remembered it being. She could feel it boiling up behind her eyes, and when the thing grew agitated because of the blow and went for her again, that was fine.

  She went for it, right back. She got another bottle of the stuff—by the handle, this time—and swung, hard. No throwing. It wouldn’t get anything as nice and civilized as throwing. This time, it got the full deal, right in the face.

  And she did it the way Kelsey had taught her, too. Don’t just bludgeon it once. Crack it again on the way back up. Down, then back up again. One-two.

  How satisfying it was, to feel the bottle smash into its face. How that feeling surged up her arm and through her chest and up, up, to all the places in her head that screamed for blood.

  She got plenty of that. When she smashed it back up, the zombie almost spun on its heel and its head went on a weird, diagonal angle. High, high, like in a boxing match slo-mo, when the prize fighter gets a real one to the kisser. Blood arcing from his mouth. Arms flailing.

  He went down, though she didn’t expect him to. Oh no. She didn’t let herself be lured into that kind of security. Sometimes they didn’t go down, because they didn’t feel pain and the only thing that really took them out was extreme blood loss, or decapitation, or a head shot.

  Or maybe a broken neck. It looked like she’d broken its neck. Just like that—where had that strength come from? Where had that rage come from? She didn’t know. Only knew one thing, really. That the same questions always came, after she’d killed something that used to be a human being.

  And that she had to feel sick and exhausted now. On edge and ready for it to stop flailing and get up to get at her.

  But it didn’t. It just laid there, twitching and pinwheeling occasionally. From this vantage point, she could no longer see the gruesome flap of skin. Could only see the almost normal and only slightly blood-mottled right hand side of a thing that used to be a man.

  She dropped the bottle on it and stepped back. Tried to collect herself. Get back to the place she’d been in just a minute or two ago. Jamie, she thought and that was good. Better.

  Only it had an edge of panic now, too, because what if they’d encountered a wanderer? What if they’d—

  “June!”

  She turned at the sound of Jamie’s voice, heart suddenly in her throat. Hell—forget throat. Her heart was coming out of the top of her head and if she didn’t see that they were okay immediately she was going to…she was just going to…

  This time when she went for the gun it came free as though it had been oiled.

  Sod’s law, really, that it did so just as they hoved into view. All normal and fine and not in the middle of a zombie battle.

  Though really, the words “normal” and “fine” didn’t apply. Blake looked green. And for some reason he was trying to hold onto Jamie’s arm—though Jamie wasn’t having any of it. He didn’t even seem to register her, at first. Instead, he just shoved right by and gave the zombie two in the head.

  Like an assassin, she thought, again, though this time the word had far colder connotations. He didn’t linger over it and when he returned to face her it was as though he’d stopped to cough. A brief pause. Nothing to it.

  Though his expression had a lot to it. Oh yeah. It had a whole helluva lot. She’d never seen him look anything like it before, and didn’t want to again. There was something wild in his eyes that wasn’t recklessness, or silliness, or anything good.

  “What is the matter with you?” he said, and there wasn’t anything good about that either. His voice sounded…God. Heartbreaking. The fury in it didn’t even touch her. His anger didn’t make her feel frightened or unsettled.

  It was how high and hoarse and tight his voice went. Like he was just barely strapping down something unbearable. Like his heart, oh his heart. Give it a chance and it would devour every piece of sanity in him.

  She knew it, she knew it.

  “You go off like that on your own—you don’t tell us? How could you not, June? Tell me. Answer me!”

  Blake put a hand to him, but she could tell he wasn’t going to accept it—even before he shrugged it off.

  “Come on, buddy—she’s okay,” he said but she could hear the shake in Blake’s voice, too. God, how she would have hated either of them for going off on their own! How she would have screamed at them for almost getting themselves killed.

  Oh Lord yes, how she knew that his heart was eating at him and understood why he had to walk away with his hands in his hair.

  Because it was the way she felt, too.

  Chapter Seven

  He wouldn’t talk to her for a long, long while. Not on the ride back. Not after she’d cleaned herself up. She sat down to eat, and he left the table and disappeared upstairs.

  At least Blake’s expression was sympathetic. And he added a he’ll come around, just for good measure.

  “You just scared him, June. He doesn’t deal well with things that scare him. I wasn’t even sure anything could make him scared, until he got a Spidey-sense tingle and demanded to know where you’d gone.”

  She gave him a hug for that Spidey-sense comment. One-armed, leaning in. Intending it to be casual and like a thank you until Blake suddenly gripped the back of her t-shirt and pressed his face into her hair.

  Then it just made her fiercely love him and want to cry all at the same time. God, she would never have gone to the gas station alone if she’d known this would happen. It wasn’t even the zombie attack, really. She suspected they’d have reacted the same way if nothing had happened at all.

  It was just the idea of someone disappearing. Of being there one moment and not the next. Do it for long enough and you start to think you’re a mental case who’s just imagined that girl who came into your life a few months ago.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, and meant it. Because he was shaking and obviously as strung out as Jamie. Just in a different way. “I swear, I won’t ever do anything like that again.”

  “Don’t be sorry. We should be sorry for wanting you attached to our hips when you can clearly take care—”

  She cut him off. That was worse than the fury, hearing him try to explain or not be a chauvinist or some other dumb thing. As though she wouldn’t have done the same if they’d disappeared on her!

  “Stop, Blake. It’s okay for you to be worried about me. It’s okay. It’s more than okay. Just don’t…don’t apologize for that.”

  He nodded against the side of her face and the death grip he had on her relaxed, somewhat.

  “He’s mad at himself too, you know. You should go talk to him.”

  She rolled those words over in her head. Mad at himself. Over what? Over getting so afraid for her? He shouldn’t be, he just shouldn’t be—she had to go and talk to him. It had been a need before, but now it was a pressing urge.

  “Okay, okay,” she said then he let her go. Though he seemed to appreciate the little stroke of her hand through his hair before she left the kitchen and climbed the stairs of doom.

  He was in the bathroom but both doors were shut. The one that led from the hall and the one that led from the bedroom. Usually he left at least one of them partially open—though it didn’t matter anyway ‘cause you could always tell he was in there. With Jamie, there was no danger of accidentally walking in o
n him—he always sang in the shower or hummed to himself while shaving or shouted that Kanye West had a new album out from the john.

  She loved his never-ending stack of old newspapers. She loved him for pretending they’d only been printed that morning, instead of years ago.

  But now the doors were shut and locked, and he wasn’t singing or talking about the oil spill in Nicaragua or anything like it. She thought about all of those pills in the medicine cabinet and went a little crazy, briefly.

  “Jamie?”

  Saying his name like that—it made her wonder. Was it really Jamie or had it started off James or Jimmy or maybe a surname like Jameson? Maybe his actual first name didn’t have anything to do with the letter J at all. Maybe it was Clyde. Clyde Jameson.

  Though really, all of these thoughts were only there to distract her from the lack of answer. She knew it. Anybody would know it. She sounded desperate and wavery and not like herself.

  “Jamie, I…uh…”

  “I don’t wanna talk right now, June,” he said, which stung. But at least there were words. At least he was still breathing.

  “I know. I know, it’s just…I wanted to say that I was sorry. For going off like that. I won’t ever do it again, okay? Because…because I know how much it would fuck with my mind if one of you wandered off somewhere, you know? So I understand. Why you’re mad, I mean.”

  Silence, then. A long, long silence. So long, in fact, that she almost went to say something new, until he cut in with—

  “I’m not mad, June-bug.”

  That was good, right? And if so, then why did it sound kind of bad?

  “I’m just…fucked up. Yeah. That’s what I am. Fucked up.”

  Oh, right. That was why.

  “Just…open the door, okay? Lemme talk to you.”

  “I can’t right now, June. I’m just…I’m just not like you.”

  That froze her, a little. What did he mean by that? That she was cold and unfeeling? It sounded like it but she pressed to know more, even so. It was better to know if the guy you were apparently in love with thought you were a stone cold bitch.