Shoving him away, I look for a weapon of some sort and spot Chloe’s clutch purse lying on top of a nearby table; I’d know it anywhere—it’s the only purse in the room with a rhinestone skull clasp. Reaching inside, I grab the lighter and a handful of cherry bombs.
They feel pebbly and rough, and I’ve never been a big fan of the Fourth of July—or boys’ room pranks, for that matter—so I don’t exactly know what to expect from the little suckers. But I trust Dane, and he said they work (although he only read about them in The Guide), and it’s too late to stop believing him now.
Standing slightly back, listening to Stamp’s screams, desperate to help, frightened that I will suck at this, I light the first cherry bomb and toss it into the crowd of growling, chewing, snarling Zerker jocks. The sulfur spews like a great green gas, following the first bomb as it circles end over sparkling end, the fizzing and sulfur spewing from my hand to the crowd.
One by one I light, sizzle, toss, and throw; light, sizzle, toss, and throw.
They land, spew, spout, sizzle-crack-boom-BOOM!
Suddenly it’s a sulfur explosion, sparks spitting where one left off, explosions shattering the floor, the tables, the very air I don’t breathe anymore. Immediately, the Zerkers freak out, fighting each other, pounding fists to faces, kicking bent knees with shiny shoes, and punching bloody knuckles in order to get away from the thick sulfur smell filling our corner of the gym. Seeing his opportunity, Stamp scrambles away, favoring one awkwardly bent leg, his left arm limp and twisted, his face scratched, scarred, bruised, and bloody.
He reaches me in a heap of trembles and tears, his boyhood back, his manhood gone, obviously grateful and embarrassed and hating me and loving me all at the same time.
And here is Stamp, at my side, and there is Dane, screaming in frustration, trapped between two Zerkers, and I have only the slightest, barest, craziest notion of what might possibly come next.
I ignore Stamp’s thanks, drown out his pleas, and reach for his Taser, yank it from his bloody, trembling hands, apologize profusely with my eyes, and zap every one of his former teammates until the spasms stop and they crumble to the floor, heads hitting the polished hardwood with thickening, crunching finality.
They lay in a twisted, beefy pile, more like a heap, slashed tuxedos, bleeding eyes, skin seared from the sulfur, necks fried from the Tasers, Zerkers no more, their skin pale and already yellowing, their eyes black and dead, and even that is sad to me; more pawns in Bones’ crazy, twisted game of Zerkers versus zombies.
In their short, violent Afterlives, the jocks have managed to succeed at one thing. By Tasering them all, I have wasted precious time, and steps, putting me farther away from Stamp, separating me from Dane. Now we are at three points of a distant and dangerous triangle: Dane battling Bones, Stamp in grave peril as Ms. Haskins gets him in her sights, and me standing awkward and triumphant above a pile of twisted corpses still sizzling and cold: Queen of Jock Mountain.
Behind me, Stamp is whimpering, his ankle twisted, his arm sprained, his face bruised and flushed with pain and fear and shame.
Across the room, Ms. Haskins is advancing on him. Her eyes are full of Zerker hate, her circuits fried by Bones’ bite, her only goal to serve him, to ruin us, to separate Stamp from his brains and me from the only guy at Barracuda Bay High who ever looked at me twice.
I watch helplessly, too far away to reach them with my stiff limbs and with only one cherry bomb left, sitting squat in the middle of my trembling hand.
Behind me, Bones is lifting Dane high, his strong, granite arms rising. They are both in tatters, their formalwear ripped to shreds, their skin exposed, their mouths open and angry.
“What now, Maddy?” Bones cackles casually, as if lifting Dane above his head is no more trouble than flicking a fly across the dinner table. “Who do you save? Stamp from Ms. Haskins? Or Dane from me? Who do you let die? Which boy is worth risking your Afterlife for?”
He is only too right. I watch helplessly while Bones brings Dane down onto his knee like some WWE wrestler even as Ms. Haskins yanks Stamp up by his collar and gnaws on his neck like a fat kid with an all-day sucker.
I scream, Bones laughs, Stamp squirms, and as I stare at the ceiling, praying for help from above, I suddenly see a tangle of pipes and nozzles. Bones lifts Dane up again, cackling even louder this time, and I light my last cherry bomb behind my back, scramble to the top of the nearest tall table, and throw it as high as I can. It ignites on the way up, the scent acrid and coppery, already spewing thick black fumes as it spins and spins, one sparkling end over the other.
Bones smells it first, his head snapping to one side to watch the cherry bomb ignite and climb, climb, climb into those pipes and nozzles. Meanwhile he holds Dane high over his head like some kind of zombie umbrella. Ms. Haskins ignores it, her head buried too deep in Stamp’s life force to bother with anything as paltry as the end of her own.
And Stamp? Stamp is too far gone to know what’s happening when the sprinklers spring to life, showering the entire gymnasium floor with hundreds of gallons of water in a huge, gushing tidal wave. And me?
I pray and curse and lean down from my table, ignite Stamp’s Taser with a crackling sizzle of bright blue voltage between its two metal vampire fangs, and plunge it so far into the gymnasium floor I can see the crack in the varnish even through the searing wave of pure electricity flowing out like a bright blue mushroom cloud across the rippling, sizzling waterfall.
32
Maddy’s Choice
TIME DOESN’T STOP, exactly; it just slows wwwaaaayyyyyyyyyy doooowwwnnnnnn. In my head I know the events are whipping by at lightning speed, but my eyes reveal them one at a time, almost in slow motion. The scene plays out not in real time but frame-by-frame-by-frame; death by slideshow.
Frame 1: Bones screams.
Frame 2: Bones looks up at Dane.
Frame 3: Bones looks down at the floor.
Frame 4: Bones drops Dane.
Frame 5: Dane does one slow roll through the air.
Frame 6: Then two.
Frame 7: Ms. Haskins stops biting Stamp.
Frame 8: Ms. Haskins screams.
Frame 9: Stamp groans.
Frame 10: Ms. Haskins drops Stamp.
Frame 11: Stamp falls to his knees.
Frame 12: Then his hands.
Frame 13: Stamp slumps over.
Frame 14: Ms. Haskins pivots.
Meanwhile, in a million simultaneous frames all at once, the floor flickers to life as electricity sears across the football-field-sized varnished floor. It spreads like an oil fire, with a faint crack and swift sizzle. There is not an ounce of rubber in sight, only gallons and gallons of gushing, rushing water.
As the electricity races, the frames speed up now, from slo-mo to fast-forward. Dane topples silently to the floor, his eyes wide as gravity sucks him down to earth. Nothing in his zombie powers is strong enough to stop the downward pull.
I hold my breath and at the last minute, just as Dane passes Bones’ head on the way down to the floor, he reaches out and grabs the Zerker in a choke-hold. His arm in its torn tuxedo sleeve looks like a thin log against Bones’ white throat. From across the room, I hear the powerful Zerker’s Adam’s apple crunch and watch his face erupt into a map of surprise and rage—mostly rage.
It’s too late. Buck as he might, struggle as he must, time is finally against Bones this time, and the slow-motion replay mode continues speeding up until it’s almost back to normal. Down they go, water sloshing, Dane toppling, death in the balance, his arm still clipped tight to the Zerker’s throat.
I close my eyes, can’t stand the suspense, open them again, and suddenly Bones is on the floor, jerking like a fish on the deck to buck Dane off of him and reverse their positions. Dane is on top of him now, wiggling frantically to stay there like a vacationer on a life raft coursing through the gnarliest part of the raging rapids.
I drop the Taser into the water; let it go completely. It fries, sizzles
, and sends out one last blunt wave of flickering blue electricity before shorting out altogether.
Dane rolls off of Bones roughly, splashing to his feet awkwardly and racing across the room as puddles turn into steam around his ankles with every stiff, jerky step. He tries to stop in time but can’t, the untested bottoms of his slick new tuxedo shoes sliding even when his legs stop moving as he topples into the table, into me, and spills both of us on the floor.
“Maddy! You’re all right. Maddy!” I’ve never in my life seen anyone so happy just to see me; to see me alive. To touch me, to hold me in his arms as if the future really does depend on it. His eyes, usually so dark and brooding, are now electric and full of life. His smile lights up his pale white face, his mouth wide and inviting.
And I’m so safe in his arms, so far and removed from the teachers and the footballers and Bones, and when he kisses me, gently, so gently, I laugh and smile and cry without tears and kiss him back (not quite so gently), and he’s laughing and saying, “I guess this makes you Zombie Number 1 from now on, huh?”
And still I’m kissing him and laughing and crying without tears. He helps me up from the cold, wet, dead floor, holds my hand as we walk toward Ms. Haskins’ once sexy, now lifeless body. Her eyes are open and, instead of closing them, I tear a cloth off of the nearest table like the world’s worst magician and, as punch glasses and paper plates and centerpieces topple to the floor, I toss it gracelessly on top of her.
I know it wasn’t really her doing all that evil stuff moments ago, but sometimes evil is enough to wipe away our fondest memories. Gone are the warm, fuzzy images of her in Home Ec, offering to write me a letter of recommendation and nurturing me toward the art world. Now all I see is a dead Zerker, her mouth drenched in Stamp’s blood, her cold white feet sticking out from the other end of the blanket; one shoe on, the other off.
Gone now, lost forever. Like the rest of them, like all of them. Everyone in this room, all the bodies scattered on the floor, teachers I loved, feared, laughed with, laughed at, respected, ignored—all gone, all dead, silenced forever.
The athletes, so promising, so young—all gone, all quiet, all corpses destined to join Scurvy in the graveyard—may they all rest in peace. And Dad, my dad: he will touch every one of them in the morgue, with care and tenderness, weeping, probably, to see life snuffed out so young, so violently, so unnecessarily.
If only he knew it was his own daughter who had snuffed most of them out for good.
Next to Ms. Haskins, Stamp lies dead and cold, his eyes closed, his expression peaceful, his poor battered face (that face!) a picture of pain and grief. He is like a giant rag doll, arms and legs akimbo, face slack and empty, a lifeless bag of bones and guts. Already his skin is pale and waxy, the gash in his throat where Ms. Haskins bit him bright red and garish in contrast.
My poor Stamp, gone and cold.
I kneel next to him, crying dryly, throat raw from too many sobs and no tears.
Dane’s hand is on my shoulder, his breath cold in my ear as he says, “You have to bite him, Maddy. You have to …turn …him. Before it’s too late.”
“W-w-why?” I stammer. “He’s gone; let him be. Why can’t we just leave him in peace?”
“He’s not in peace, Maddy,” Dane says. “Not really. Think about it: Ms. Haskins bit him right before you electrocuted her. Before you fried them all. He hadn’t technically turned yet. Right now, electricity or not, he’s theoretically in the Awakening stage. It’s like, how do I explain it? It’s like he’s in death’s cocoon, wrapped up deep and tight, where nothing—and no one—can reach him. Not even 10,000 volts; not even a million volts. You know how you get a surge protector to keep your computer from frying when the power goes out? The computer doesn’t take the jolt; the surge protector does. Right now Stamp’s body is like a giant surge protector.”
“What’s it protecting?” I choke out the words.
“His brain. I could tase him for 10 minutes straight and nothing would happen; nothing would change. He’ll still wake up a Zerker, Maddy. That’s his fate. Unless …”
“Unless”—I finish for him—”unless I …bite …him.”
Dane’s face is cautious and kind. He is leaning against me, his tuxedo still wet, his skin so dreadfully cold, his face so pale, his eyes so dark and …kind? He is definitely not who I thought he was. Then again, I’m not who he thought I was.
Together …what could we be?
If we were to leave here, to turn right now, to ignore the bodies, the corpses, the friends, and the BFFs we left behind? At the moment, it’s so tempting to just hold him, to close my eyes, to hide from it all, to bury my head against his cold, lifeless chest and let him whisk me away to where there is no warmth, no family, no familiar faces or places—only a blank slate and our eternal future.
A future together.
On the floor, Stamp lies lifeless because of me. Bones turned Hazel because of me; Hazel seduced Stamp because of me. Because Bones wanted to use them both, because he knew if he did I would weaken, crumble, falter, and fail. He didn’t care about the threads that wound out from his plot, touching our lives and ruining them completely.
Dane clears his throat. I look from Stamp to Dane, and he blinks, his lashes long and tender—I never noticed before. Then he explains, almost reverently, “One way or another, Maddy, he’s being reanimated as we speak. Deep inside, the Zerker rage is coiling through his body, rewiring his circuits, frying the guy you knew. The guy you …loved. Still love, might love, whatever.”
He stops, touches my chin, drops his hand, continues, “You can either turn him to our side and make sure he’s safe or let him wake up a Zerker in his grave, angry and mean and hungry—and alone. Do you want Stamp to wake up alone? With no memory of you or Hazel or me or Bones or any of …this? Someday, we might even have to do to Stamp what you did to Bones and Ms. Haskins.”
I think of Dane’s kiss, so gentle yet hard; his hands, cold like mine. I think of eternity with him, his deep black eyes, his dark ways, his strong presence. I look at him, now, and can see he’s thinking of it, too.
And yet, he’s making it so Stamp and I can be together at last.
Together forever. Why?
He could have let me leave Stamp lying here. Knowing he’d wake up a Zerker, knowing he wouldn’t be the Stamp I knew or loved or cared about or wanted. And, worst of all, knowing that I wouldn’t know any of this. He could have kept his mouth shut, kissed me, whisked me away, and I would have never known. And yet now he’s giving me a choice, even if it means bringing my first crush back to life.
I tremble. “Dane …”
He picks up my copper stake and hands it to me. “Of course, there’s another option.”
I take the stake. “What?”
“If you stake him now, while he’s out, if you plunge this into his body and leave it there, stuck inside, when he finally reanimates, it will kill him.”
“But I thought you said …”
“You can’t shock him to death, Maddy; not with a Taser or a dozen Tasers or a thousand Tasers, but according to The Guide, the copper will scramble his system, rewire his life force. It’ll be like a circuit breaker he won’t be able to turn on, won’t even be able to reach. He’ll just …never wake up.”
“Wow, Dane,” I say, oozing sarcasm in place of tears, “that is just great! Oh, joy. What fun. Why didn’t you tell me earlier? So, I can either turn Stamp into a zombie and watch him rot for the next thousand years or kill him now. Is that what you’re saying?”
“I didn’t say it would be an easy choice, Maddy.” His voice is quiet, eyes deep and dark and sad and tender. “I just said you had a choice.”
He gives me a long look and says, “I’m going to check on Bones, Maddy. We’ve all seen those movies where you turn your back on the dead guy and then turn around and he’s not there anymore. I don’t want him coming back in the sequel, you know what I mean? I just want to make sure he’s out for good; that’s all. Whatever dec
ision you make with Stamp, just know that …know that I care for you. That I’ll always care for you, whether we’re a couple …or you and Stamp are.”
He turns without saying another word. I go to speak his name, but that’s not enough. I stand and follow and grab him, turn him around and kiss his cheek, his eyes, his nose, finally his lips. It’s like I’m starving and can’t get enough Dane, like I’ll never kiss again. He accepts it passively, neither giving nor receiving, and when I’ve had my fill, I hold his face in my hands, look into his deep, dead eyes, and whisper, “Thank you.”
Then I watch him go, his shoes squeaky on the damp gym floor, his legs stiff from the effort, from the cruelty, from the exhaustion. His shoulders are broad but slumped; it’s like he’s aged a century overnight. I watch him until he kneels gingerly next to Bones, until I hear something breaking and then tearing and see parts of Bones—pieces, really—start to pile up next to what’s left of the Zerker’s bent, broken body. I shudder, tired of the violence and the fear, of hearing it and seeing it up front and center, and turn to Stamp.
He looks pale already, long and lean as he lies stretched out on the floor, deadweight from head to toe. I try to picture him as one of …us. He has the hair for it; I’ll give him that much. Dark and thick and strong at the roots and, hell, I sure wouldn’t mind staring at that Superman curl for the rest of eternity.
But is that what I really want for him?
Is that what I really want …for me?
I listen to the breaking, to the tearing, as Dane turns Bones into, well …bones, once and for all. And I look at Stamp, and think of his family, and how they’ll miss him, how they’ll miss him either way. And how, selfishly, I’ll miss him.
With the stake in my hand, Stamp’s hand in the other, I choke back the last of the night’s tearless tears and kneel to finish what I started.
A Living Dead Love Story Series Page 20
