Pariah

by Bob Fingerman

  “This may be the last I get to taste you,” she said, now tearing up.

  “No, it won’t. In the words of that great statesman, the Governator, ‘Ah’ll be bock.’ ”

  Ellen semi-smiled, her face scrunched up, trying to hold back the tsunami of emotion.

  “Okay then,” Alan said, refitting the scarf, balaclava and goggles, then gloves.

  With the grace of Paul Prudhomme, he positioned himself on the windowsill—he was barely able to fit through the opening—swung his legs out, gripped the rope and lowered himself onto Dabney’s van. The zombies noticed the motion but didn’t seem overly riled. Ellen’s heart jackhammered her innards. Her ribs ached. Her eyes felt in danger of escaping their sockets, so focused were they on Alan and the horde below. She couldn’t watch. She couldn’t not watch. With a faint wave, Alan sat on the van’s roof, lowered himself to the ground and disappeared from view.

  Several excruciating minutes passed and then Ellen spotted Alan’s bloated form bobbing up York toward Eighty-sixth Street. Though the zombies didn’t make way, they didn’t attack, either.

  When she exhaled, it felt like the first time in her life.

  It was more than weird to be out among the undead.

  Though he couldn’t be certain, Alan felt as though in spite of the temperature and copious garments, he’d stopped sweating altogether. It was unlikely, but he felt a permeating chill. To combat fear he kept his thoughts clinical. He’d absorb the detail he couldn’t see from his window for future studies in watercolor and oils. Their skin was matte, but with oily patches, the pigment bleached or discolored. The white zombies were pasty yellow, the black ones gray and ashy. Even the matter underneath their shredded derma, the fasciae, peeled to reveal brown muscle tissue and dry bone. Everything looked desiccated. What you guys need is a good moisturizer, Alan thought. Some Oil of Olay or some Neutrogena. Something with a high SPF rating. I mean, look at you guys.

  He focused on the path ahead. The bookstore was two and a half avenues west. Even at a snail’s pace, without realizing it, he’d already made it to First Avenue uneaten. That was good. That was very good. Were he a man of faith he’d think it miraculous.

  Since the zombies hadn’t made an opening for him he was rubbing elbows with them—even the elbowless. Though there was generous padding between him and them, each contact mainlined straight to his nerve endings. Focus, he thought. Focus. He recalled self-help gurus like Tony Robbins, with their “can do” attitude and their mind-over-matter mantras. Alan had always taken those guys to be con men, though, so conjuring them didn’t help. And really, didn’t their shticks always boil down to creating wealth? Not helping. Not fucking helping.

  Condensation accrued on his glasses and interior of the goggles, the top portion of his view becoming erased by fog. Great. Soon I’ll be blind. Mr. Magoo on a rescue mission. That’s genius. Something shoved Alan from behind, propelling him forward a few paces too quickly. His face contorted under its wrappings, his lips compressed between his jaws, half swallowed to stifle the shriek lodged in his throat, eyes shut, preparing for the worst. He collided with several zombies, but they responded only by growling and lightly shoving back. Am I immune? Alan wondered. All this time, maybe I could’ve gone out. Maybe I don’t even need all this gear. Yeah? Don’t get cocky, his brain chided. Good idea, brain.

  The slog west was interminable. What struck Alan as odd was that down among them they didn’t smell bad at all. Maybe it was all the wadding around his nose and mouth, but they seemed virtually odorless. Did the stink rise? Were they losing their scent or was he merely desensitized? They were ghastly to behold, though, and being in their midst hammered home the improbability of their existence. How did they persist? Some were barely more than skin tarpaulins encasing collapsed innards and strings of sinew. Movement would brush his undercarriage and he’d look down only to see some half-, third- or quarter-zombie inching along the pavement like a semipulverized worm. The most natural bit of genetic programming was the survival instinct, but this was so beyond that.

  The crowd seemed to swell as Alan pushed onward, the space between him and them closing, closing, closing. The material of the hunting parka, the uncounted layers of baby snowsuits, all of it, felt inadequate. The undead’s emaciated frames, their pointy shoulders—some ending there, armless—their angular hipbones, all of it scraped against the plasticized shell of his outerwear, injecting amplified echoes directly into his ear canals. His pulse thudded in his temples and he could hear his heart laboring. He fought the urge to scream. To laugh. To cough. He wanted to choke. Bile rose in his throat several times and he swallowed it back. How can they not smell me? I must reek of fear. Any second I might shit myself. Does shit sound the dinner gong? Do they still crap? Though many people did so at the moment of death, defecating seemed likely to be solely the province of the living. But these things ate living human flesh. After it went down did it just sit in their stomachs or did they expel it? Seeing them in the flesh, it was hard for Alan to imagine them digesting. They were so withered, almost mummified. Did the ones missing their gastrointestinal tract still feel the need to feed? Did they absorb nutrients? So many questions.

  Alan felt like the zombie equivalent of Dian Fossey, a scientist studying a contrastive species . . . only dumber.

  He looked down at the pavement to check for zombie scat.

  Am I insane? I must be. What sane person would be out here in the first place? The padding he wore began to feel like a giant sweat diaper, because Alan felt it must be spraying off him. He stood motionless, pondering his predicament and his grip on it. His eyes focused not on what was happening beyond the the twin layer of fogged lenses, but retreated within, his focal depth confined to his own eyeballs. Things moved there: floaters. He watched the transparent blobs swim in the vitreous humor between the lens and retina.

  A fly alit on his goggles, its unexpected appearance making Alan flinch. His spasm attracted some unwelcome glances and the odd hiss. Oh shit. Don’t let me get killed by a fucking fly. The insect remained on the lens, grooming or whatever it was they did when they fussed with their forelegs. Seeing was growing more difficult as the condensation crept further down the lenses. Alan’s eyes darted back and forth, making contact with dead eyes in the mob. It struck Alan that he’d portrayed something inaccurately in his zombie portraits: he’d made their eyes symmetrical, forward facing, their vision binocular. Up close he could see that in almost all of them—the ones who still had eyes—their peepers pointed in different directions, one aimed straight out, the other rolled to the side or pointed inward at the nose. Some rolled back into the socket. All glazed with death, grayed and fogged and yellowed. Flies and larvae crawled in and out of the zombies’ various orifices, their hosts organic mobile homes.

  Alan’s head ached.

  Maybe there was a word for what his stomach was experiencing, but probably not one in English. Maybe German. And thirty letters long.

  Something gripped Alan’s ankle and panic bypassed his leg and deposited itself directly in his colon. He looked down and through the miasma saw a legless zombie with only one arm hitching a ride, its clawlike, almost fleshless hand digging splintered nails into the thick fabric of Alan’s hunting overalls. Oh fuck. Oh Jesus. Alan didn’t dare attempt to shake it off for fear betraying his humanity—his edibility. Maybe if I start moving again it’ll go away. Step after mired step the freeloader was dragged until Alan found himself stuck, unable to impel that leg forward. He looked down again, straining his eyes to fathom the hindrance. Another zombie had trodden on Alan’s passenger. Alan tried to disengage his leg from the bony hand. Nothing doing. In death—or would that be unlife—was rigor mortis the status quo? Until his hitchhiker’s hitchhiker stepped off, Alan was anchored to this spot.

  Alan wished he wasn’t an atheist.

  The other zombie stumbled off the back of Alan’s passenger and he moved forward, wondering how long the calf-gripping parasite would hold on.

&nbs
p; Situated in a large apartment building, the Barnes & Noble was midway between Second and Third. It struck Alan, as he waded through the crowd, that zombies didn’t really walk. The ones that could stood upright, sort of, but they just kind of shuffled around aimlessly, their movement dictated by the group rather than the individual. They were like plants impelled to move by a breeze. The only time he saw them propel themselves with purpose was when it was feeding time. But I’m moving with purpose. Maybe because I’m moving so slowly. It had to be scent. Were there scientists anywhere working on answers? Some underground bunker somewhere? If so, was that even a comforting thought?

  As he cleared the southwest corner of Second Avenue, Alan felt his passenger again snag on something; this time the sensation was accompanied by the sound of fabric tearing. Alan looked down and saw the culprit, scarcely visible through the haze: not his zombie hanger-on, but a rusty detached bumper. His guest’s detached hand, however, was still hooked onto Alan’s pants leg, the rest of the zombie lost in the profusion of spindly legs. Then Alan noticed a splotch of something pale and pinkish. Paint? Chalk? His own pale skin exposed in the perforation. Fuck. The bumper had torn it, too. He transfixed on a small blossom of red dripping down his calf.

  The adjacent zombies’ postures stiffened a fraction, as did Alan’s.

  Inches away, one zombie canted its head at an angle that telegraphed its intent: to begin the beguine. Fuck that. Faster than Alan would have thought possible the zombie lunged and snapped at him, burying its teeth in the outer layer of the parka, near the shoulder. The padding was thinnest there and Alan felt a pinch. Not skin breaking, but piss inducing. Alan punched his attacker hard and it fell away, leaving behind a couple of teeth.

  Nonetheless, the word was out: dinner is served.

  Scent.

  Violent motion.

  The zombie’s associates heaved toward Alan, their need raw, guileless. Alan swatted at them, punching and shouldering. They were weak but plentiful. He was practically blind, but his goal was within yards. More teeth and limbs bit, pawed, and clawed at Alan. He heard more material tearing. One arm penetrated the outer parka shell and he felt it groping at the bib of his overall. If he started hemorrhaging Baby Sof’ Suit® infant winter onesies he’d soon graduate to plain old hemorrhaging. The image of his own entrails boiling out filled his forebrain. No, no, no! He twisted side to side and the perpetrator’s arm snapped off with a sickening pop, still twitching within Alan’s coat, its bony digits grazing his right nipple, which stiffened inappropriately. Oh god, oh god, I’m being felt up by a severed arm!

  Alan drew his arms in, making himself as compact and missilelike as possible, then, bulky as he was, tore ass toward the bookstore. Skeletal hands snatched at him, as did stumps. His hood got yanked down, snapping his head back, material cinching around his throat. He gagged, but kept on. The goggles pulled sideways across his face exposing one eye, blocking the other, his glasses straining between them and his face. Terrified as he was, the sudden rush of air on his wet face felt refreshing. Don’t readjust. Keep moving. Keep moving, you fucker! Do it! No blitz, no fucking blitz! Please. He rammed forward. Another pair of rotting arms attempted to detain him. I’m not a huggy person! Get off of me! He wrenched to one side and broke away. Half blind he saw his objective loom ahead. Make way for Stay Puft!

  Even if Mona’s not in there, even if they’re all perished, I’ll—Alan couldn’t think of anything encouraging. I’ll be stranded here and die. So be it. Maybe I can find some duct tape and mend the rips, provided they don’t eat me alive in there. Alan vaulted over the broken window, palmed the scarf off his muzzle and with his teeth yanked off a glove. Dexterity restored, he readjusted his now defogged glasses, fished a flashlight out and clicked it on. The zombies were right on his ass, stumbling into the confines of the store, the first wave making a nice carpet for the others to tumble over. Alan whipped the light left and right, up and down.

  “Mona!” he shouted. “Mona!”

  No reply.

  With no other options, he bounded up the escalator and cast the beam of light in every direction, deciding on heading deep into the store. He was a goner, but why make it easy for them? Stumbling over piles of burnt books and ruined standee displays he tripped and cracked his goggles on a bookshelf. He peeled off the other glove and removed them. “Okay,” he wheezed, breathless. “Okay. Okay.” He crawled behind the bookcase and, staying on his knees, ventured deeper into the store’s second floor. He could hear the graceless footfalls and ravenous moans of his pursuers. When properly motivated, those fuckers could move.

  Edging out of the aisle, his palm made contact with something moist and sticky. He aimed the beam of light at the floor, which was shellacked with a well-trodden layer of semifresh blood that led to the men’s room door.

  “Oh Jesus.”

  Rising, Alan looked over his shoulder and caught an eyeful of the mob. They’d reach him in moments. Ellen was right. This was a stupid idea. Foolhardy. Dumb. Not concerned with what killed cats, curiosity compelled Alan toward the john, his footsteps punctuated by the audible tackiness of the coagulating blood. Pushing open the door he saw Mona, curled in a fetal position under the sink, her pants pulled down and blood smeared across her thighs and bare ass.

  “Mona! Oh my God, what happened? Mona! Mona!”

  No response.

  He knelt beside her and touched her throat. His pulse was racing so fast he couldn’t tell if she had one. He pressed his face to hers. It was warm. He felt gentle breath escaping her pursed lips. A huge sigh of relief escaped his own. “Mona?” he repeated a few times. Nothing. But she was alive. The sound of the mob approaching cleared his head. He stooped over and lifted her up, swallowed some deep lungfuls of air and kicked open the door to be greeted by the faces of several dozen zombies, whose greed melted to disdain as they got dosed with Mona mojo.

  And with unfettered joy, Alan laughed.

  Back on Eighty-sixth, with the retreating crowd creating a concentrically widening berth, Alan gently lowered Mona to the ground and removed his now—thank goodness—superfluous damaged outerwear. As the giant parka disgorged a torrent of sopping-wet baby winter onesies the zombies hung back, snarling, some rocking their heads back and forth so violently they looked in danger of snapping off.

  “Wouldn’t that be a tragedy?” Alan scoffed.

  Alan made his way homeward, Mona cradled in his arms. In the light of day he saw her face, neck, and shoulders were badly bruised, her cheek bore a long gash and both her lips were split. One eyelid looked puffy and discolored. After the zombies had withdrawn in the bookstore Alan noticed what was left of Karl on the bathroom floor—not even enough to reanimate. Alan didn’t bother looking for Eddie, not even for the pleasure of gloating over his corpse. Mona’s contusions and disheveled wardrobe told the story. Eddie could rot. Alan’s injuries were limited to scrapes and bruises. He sighed with relief.

  At the intersection of Second Avenue and Eighty-sixth Mona’s eyes opened and, seeing Alan and the clear blue sky above, she actually smiled. It was the single most beautiful thing Alan had ever seen.

  “Hey, you,” he said, trying not to mist up.

  “Hey,” she replied. “You can put me down.”

  “You sure? I don’t mind carrying you.”

  “Who are you, Jesus?”

  Though uninflected, Alan gaped at her remark.

  “Was that a joke?”

  “Just put me down.”

  Stunned, Alan gently angled her till her feet touched the ground. She took a few moments to stretch and get her land legs, readjust her clothes, then fished a folded piece of paper out of her pocket and, with a light limp, started walking with purpose.

  “What’s that?” Alan asked, keeping pace.

  “The list.”

  Alan was gobsmacked.

  “Are you kidding?” he stammered. “After what you’ve been through? Jeez, Mona, take the day off.”

  “Can’t.”

 
At the nearest pharmacy Mona procured mifepristone for Ellen and herself. After she passed out she had no idea how far Eddie’d gone. Though her privates were the only part of her that didn’t hurt, she wasn’t taking chances. Ellen might change her mind, but Mona didn’t want even the remotest possibility of bearing Eddie’s offspring. Alan, noting Mona’s pharmaceutical choice, kept mum. They stepped back into the daylight and walked home in silence.

  With the sky whitening under the season’s first snowfall, Alan turned away from the window. Though the horde was still plentiful, their numbers were perceptibly thinning. Ellen might be right after all. Maybe it was only a matter of time. Alan sat back down at the table and contemplated his next move. Buying hotels was always risky.

  “Dude,” Mona said, agitating the tiny top hat.

  Alan looked at her. She, too, had changed a bit in the months since “The Karl and Eddie Incident.” She’d likely never be Miss Personality, but she’d come a long way since her debut. She managed a smile now and again and her sentences, though short, were mostly actual sentences. Ellen absently rubbed her distended belly, feeling movement within—little Alan or Michael junior. Alan hoped the latter, but only time would tell. Maybe it would be a girl. With Dave gone from a grief-inspired suicide—his evicted husk still lingered outside staring up at the building—it was down to Alan, Dabney, and the two women. Cozy. Dabney, who’d abandoned his rooftop shack in favor of more conventional digs, had lightened up on the boozing, though he still enjoyed a dram on occasion. He entered the living room opening a jar of salsa. The chips were already on the table.

  He took his seat and dipped a chip.