Kiss of Life

by Daniel Waters

  "Hey ...everybody," Cooper said, "call...me ...Coop."

  "Hey, Coop," replied most of the class, nearly in unison.

  "Yes," Alish said. "You may recall that our Mr. Williams read an article about a tragic fire at a place called Dickinson House, in Massachusetts. Melissa and Cooper were made homeless by that fire. We are thrilled that concerned parties helped them find residence here."

  He hesitated. The article that Tommy read indicated that the fire was more of a massacre than an accident, with seven zombies being reterminated in the flames and just the two on the couch surviving. Phoebe looked over at the girl and wondered what the mask hid.

  "Well," Alish said finally, "please do what you can to make our newest students feel welcome."

  "You are probably all wondering how our fair Ms. Stelman is doing," Alish continued. Phoebe and the other "veterans" of

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  the Undead Studies class snapped to attention. Sylvia Stelman was a zombie classmate who had been taken for a special "augmentation" procedure. All they knew about the "augmentation" was that it would supposedly restore Sylvia to a near-living state. They had no idea how it was performed or what exactly it entailed, and the Hunters refused to elaborate. Sylvia had been gone a number of weeks, and naturally everyone in the class was worried about her.

  "I am happy to report that the first phase of her augmentation is complete and that she's doing quite well. If she continues to progress at this rate, we should soon have her back in class."

  "That's great," Margi said. Kevin's head lolled forward and back, probably in eager anticipation of being the next in line for an augmentation. "Can we see her?"

  "Not yet." Alish's smile remained fixed on his face.

  "Well, that's our news," Angela said. "I have a new project, which we're going to have you all work on, but first are there any topics you would like to discuss?"

  "There were more killings," Tommy said. "Of zombies. In Texas ... a mob of...people ...tied two of us to the ...tailgate ... of a pickup truck. The killings were ...soon after ...a talk given by ...Reverend Nathan Mathers. They ..."

  Phoebe couldn't look at him as he told the rest of his grisly story. She knew that part of what she was feeling was akin to "survivor guilt," something she'd overheard Angela talking to Margi about: a feeling that one was somehow complicit in acts of violence that one had nothing to do with. Phoebe

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  listened to Tommy talk about how the mob tracked down the zombies and tortured them, and she couldn't help feeling as if she'd helped tie the knots.

  She'd certainly tied them around Tommy. Her guilt went beyond survivor guilt, however. There was a hopeless quality to Tommy's reporting today, and she knew it was because of the way she'd treated him.

  When he was finished, there was a moment of stunned silence, and then Colette spoke.

  "Tommy," she said, "why don't you ...ever ...talk about ...the good news? Your site would be ... so much ...better if you had some ...good news."

  Phoebe looked for his reaction, but all he did was blink.

  "What ...good news?" he finally said.

  "You never ...talk about...the good ...things. Like Z," she said. "You ...wear Z."

  Phoebe smiled because Tommy bought a bottle of Z, "the body spray for the active undead male," when they were on their first date. She smiled, despite the conflicting feelings the memory brought up. Tommy started to reply but Colette interrupted him.

  "And ...Aftermath," she said, "you haven't ...ever mentioned ...Aftermath either."

  Tommy managed a sardonic grin.

  "You want me to talk about ...cologne ...and dancing ...when ...our ...people are being killed?"

  "What is Aftermath?" Alish asked, looking even more confused than usual.

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  "It's a club," Margi answered.

  "A club?" Alish leaned over and put a skeletal finger to his dry lips.

  "A zombie club, in New York City," Margi said. "Music, dancing. It's open twenty-four hours a day."

  "In New York City?" Karen said. "I've never heard of a club like that."

  "Margi found an ...article ... in a music magazine," Colette said. "It was started ... by Skip Slydell."

  Skip Slydell was the entrepreneurial founder of Slydellco, the company responsible for launching zombie hygiene products like Z body spray (for the active undead male) and a line of T-shirts with slogans like "Some of my best friends are dead" and "Open graves, open minds." Phoebe had heard Margi refer to the clothing line, which Colette often sported, as "inactive wear."

  "I'm kind of surprised you don't know about it," Margi said, probably because there was some sort of relationship between Skip and the Hunter Foundation, as he had been a guest speaker in their class. "He opened it as a not-for-profit, so it's classified as a charity or something."

  "Really?" Alish said, intrigued, looking back at Angela, who shrugged. "He made no mention of this. It isn't easy to get the government to recognize the differently biotic as being a group deserving--or even in need of--charity. And what do the differently biotic do there?"

  "Dance," Colette and Margi responded in unison.

  "Dance?"

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  "Well, and listen to music," Margi said. "Sometimes Skip gets live bands to play."

  "Live bands," Colette said, and Phoebe watched the corners of her mouth twitch upward. Margi busted out giggling, her snorty laughter made musical by her jangling bracelets and dancing spikes of pink hair.

  "Amazing," Alish said.

  "Skeleton ...Crew ...plays there," Colette said. "They have ... a zombie ... in the band."

  "DeCayce," Margi added, in a teasing voice that made Phoebe think that Colette was a big fan of Skeleton Crew.

  "Amazing," Alish repeated.

  Angela cleared her throat. "Does anyone else have anything pertinent to discuss before we start today's assignment?"

  "I've got something I want to talk about," Thornton 'Thorny' Harrowwood III said. "Something that really made me mad."

  "Mr. Harrowwood," Alish said, making a sweeping gesture with his liver-spotted, knob-knuckled hand. Phoebe thought it was kind of cute the way he was enjoying the class so much. It made her wish that he attended more often, but he was probably too busy with all the important lab and scientific work the foundation was doing. "You have the floor."

  "I got a detention yesterday for saying the word 'zombie.'" Everyone in the room, even Tommy, who Phoebe hadn't seen crack a smile since homecoming, seemed to think that was pretty funny. Alish laughed out loud, unmindful of his daughter's warning glance.

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  "It isn't funny," Thorny said, but a moment later he was laughing too. "Honestly, it made me pretty mad. You guys call each other zombies. We use the word here in class all the time and nobody gets offended."

  "Colette said that she didn't like the term," Angela said gently, reminding him one of the earliest discussions they'd had as a group. Phoebe saw Melissa reach for the whiteboard, but she put it in her lap without taking the cap off the marker. She wondered if the girl was able to talk, or chose not to.

  "I've ...mellowed," Colette said. "Like ...cheese."

  Margi cracked up all over again after adding something about how well Colette would go with Thorny's "wine." Phoebe wondered if the two of them had been sucking the air out of helium balloons prior to class.

  "Har-de-har," Thorny said. "Go ahead and laugh. We've lost every game since Adam and Tommy left the football team; my girlfriend, Haley, broke up with me because all my zombie--oh excuse me, my--'differently biotic' friends are too creepy; and now I get a detention for saying a single stupid word."

  He looked up at his classmates, shaking his head as though overwhelmed by the sheer enormity of ruin that had been heaped upon his bony shoulders.

  "Life sucks," he said, and the dead kept laughing.

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  CHAPTER SEVEN

  "THE VAN IS waiting," Phoebe said, taking arm. "Let me help you."

  No. No
help. Right leg left leg no help Phoebe helpless no help.

  "I've got your arm. Lift your leg, the left one. That's it. Almost there. Good."

  No help. Phoebe touching holding arm can't feel. Can't feel Phoebe holding arm can't move no helpless baby invalid.

  "I'll get in on the other side," Phoebe said, "don't worry."

  Worry not worry Phoebe Karen in back Margi Colette. Girls girls not worry speak speak speak not worry.

  "Don't...worry."

  Phoebe smile smile Phoebe Adam two words together pretty good good progress Frisbee in three weeks. Three weeks, final.

  "You can't really rush it. It isn't like ...physical...therapy. It will come."

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  Turn. Turn can't turn. Karen can't see Karen Karen in back. Turn Phoebe leaning leaning on shoulder like she used to Phoebe can't smell her hair her shiny hair smelled like gardens remember hair like lilacs.

  "How long did it take you to ...develop?" Phoebe asked Karen.

  Margi giggle Colette giggle in front seat develop heh funny. Phoebe blush heh funnier. Karen's voice from back like music.

  "I don't know what's got into those two," Karen said. "Don't go by my experience. The timing is different for everyone. And for some it's overnight, for other it has been years."

  "But how long?"

  Breathe breathe breathe can't breathe try can't Karen laugh and sigh smile walk and talk. Sigh two weeks. Smile one week. Walk one week no ten days.

  "I was pretty close," said Karen, "when I woke up."

  Awaken. The great awakening awaken the awakened. Why are we here and why did we come Karen's hand on shoulder can feel it?

  "But I'm not saying you should stop ...trying, Adam sweetie," she said. "Just don't get...angry ... if it doesn't work right away."

  Try. Try hard trial in a few days. All in van ready to roll. Thorny and Kevin back with Karen Margi Colette up front Phoebe. All but Tommy look see Tommy walking toward woods Tommy alone. Tommy alone. Van coughs starts Tommy turns waves lift arm lift arm lift arm lift arm!

  Wave.

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  CHAPTER EIGHT

  HOEBE SMOOTHED out Adam's tie on his chest and saw him watching her. She wondered if he was aware that her fingertips grazed over the bullet hole through which his life had drained away.

  "You look great," she said, going on tiptoes so she could kiss his smooth cheek. A strange benefit of death was that his beard stopped growing, even though the hair on his head still did. It was strange.

  She wondered if he could feel her kiss. She tried to imagine what the kiss would feel like if he were still alive. Did her mouth feel warm to him? If he weren't dead, would there be more texture to her kiss, sensation beyond a vague sense of pressure?

  "I bet you'll be glad when this part of it is over," she said, taking his arm. "I know I will."

  He nodded. His answer arrived a few heartbeats later.

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  "Yes," his voice ghostlike.

  She had his arm with both of hers now, hugging it like she was dangling over a cliff and it was the last handhold available.

  "He'll go to jail, Adam," she said. "He has to."

  She was really putting some strength into her hug. She was beginning to think that no matter how tight she clung to him, it wouldn't change anything.

  Her guilt was crippling, sometimes. Standing there, gripping him tightly, she wondered if things would change between them if and when he started to "come back." Would they be more than friends? Did he still want that? Did she?

  She rested her head against his arm the way she used to when he drove her home from school and she had had a bad day or there was something that she wanted to talk about. She knew he used to be able to curl fifty pounds with that arm-- Thunder, he called it. Thunder was the left and Lightning was the right; he named them just because it hacked his stepbrother Jimmy off so much. Now he was lucky if Thunder obeyed him enough to bend at the elbow.

  Phoebe let go of him when Joe called from the kitchen down the hallway to see if they were ready.

  "We're coming, Mr. Garrity," she responded.

  Phoebe led Adam into the kitchen where his mother and Joe waited, both of them looking stiff and uncomfortable in their coats and ties. Phoebe couldn't help but think they looked like people going to a funeral. Joe's suit looked as though it might have fit him way back in the Clinton administration but was straining at the seams today. He'd tried to clean the grease

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  off of his hands, but Phoebe could still see it embedded in his fingernails and in the ridges of his fingertips. He didn't smile often, but his eyes softened at their weathered and wrinkled corners as she led Adam by the hand into the room.

  "Johnny's warming up the car. You look good, son," Joe said, his voice like the starting rumble of the '66 El Dorado parked on the front lawn that he tinkered with on occasion. He clapped a thick, calloused hand on Adam's shoulder.

  Phoebe waited for Adam to respond, but he didn't.

  "Blue is a good color for you," she said, as much to distract herself from her thoughts as to cover up the awkwardness. She patted his arm, and in doing so was reminded that he was wearing the same suit he'd worn at the homecoming dance on the night he died. The jacket and tie came off sometime at the Haunted House, which saved it from being ruined when Pete Martinsburg killed him.

  Mrs. Garrity moved to hug her son. Phoebe turned away, because there was something in the way that Mrs. Garrity hugged him--which she did often--that always brought tears to her eyes. She'd make furtive touching motions on his arms and shoulders, the movements of her hands like the fluttering of butterflies unsure of where to alight, and then she would seem to collapse into his broad chest. Adam was at least a foot taller than his mother, and although his body wasn't fully under his control, Phoebe thought she could see his shoulders hitch forward whenever his mother embraced him, as though he were trying to will his arms to enfold her.

  Phoebe stopped watching, because it wasn't her tears that

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  Adam needed now, it was her strength. Adam had enough people crying and showering him with pity, and he didn't need either from her. She wiped her eyes as Mrs. Garrity's sobs became more audible.

  "Let's go," Joe said, shoving open the door. Phoebe followed him down the front steps, noticing as she did that Joe was wiping at his eyes with an oil-stained thumb, flicking away an invisible tear. Johnny saw them coming and turned down the heavy-metal CD he'd been listening to.

  Joe turned back to Phoebe and gave a mirthless laugh.

  "Every day is a goddam funeral," he said so that only she could hear. Then he called up for his wife and son to get moving, and as he climbed into the front seat of the waiting car, he yelled at his living son to not play his goddam music so goddam loud. There were two groups of people outside the steps of the courthouse. Three, counting the thin row of policemen standing between the two main groups. On the right, a dozen or so people clustered around a middle-aged man in a suit. He was shouting into a megaphone and holding a placard that said "Free Peter Martinsburg." Beside him a woman wearing equally conservative clothing had a sign that said "Pro Life" in bold black letters. There was a biblical quote or two which, bizarrely, were accompanied by a photograph of Reverend Nathan Mathers, who had a number of books out condemning the zombies as evil harbingers of an impending apocalypse. Phoebe wondered if the protestors thought the quotes they bore were actually attributable to Mathers and not the authors of the Bible.

  Across from them were a loose collection of mostly young

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  people, some dead, most of whom were sporting black Slydellco T-shirts, the ones with semi-humorous, semi-political sayings like "Some of My Best Friends Are Dead" or "Got Zombie?" Karen was there, along with Colette and Margi. Thorny and his supposedly ex-girlfriend Haley were holding hands. Phoebe spotted Tayshawn toward the back, talking to Kevin Zumbrowski. The zombie contingent didn't have any signs, unless you counted the slogans on their T-shirts, and spent mo
st of their time watching the more organized, vocal demonstrators along the way. One surprise was that a few of Adam's football teammates were there, wearing their Badger letter jackets.

  "Look, Adam," she said, pointing to them, "look at all your friends."

  Adam stared out the window. One of the football players was taking pictures of the protestors with his cell phone.

  "Get ...hurt," he said. Johnny had already found a parking spot by the time he finished his sentence.

  "They won't get hurt," she said. "The police will keep things quiet." She was trying to believe that, but there was real anger in some of the faces in the "Free Peter" crowd. That killing a teenaged boy could be in any way justifiable seemed an insane concept, but she knew that Pete had plenty of supporters because of his stated intention, of "protecting a living girl" from a zombie.

  She didn't know if prison was the right answer, but Pete Martinsburg definitely needed help of some sort.

  "There's a side door over here," Joe said. "Let's try to avoid the crowd."

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  Phoebe looked back, praying that no one on either side would do anything foolish. She was looking at Tayshawn as she whispered her prayer.

  She led Adam into the empty courtroom, where a lone, unsmiling bailiff stood by the American flag at the front of the room.

  "There's a step," she said, leading Adam toward the front row, just behind the tables where the defense and the prosecution set up. A low hum came from gratings high in the wall where ductwork pumped warm air into the room. Outside, it was chilly, even for a New England November. Adam was still taking his seat when Joe, Adam's mother, and his stepbrother Johnny entered the courtroom in a noisy bustle. They were followed by State's Attorney Lainey, who looked like she already had a headache as she fielded questions from Joe and his wife.