A Living Dead Love Story Series

by Rusty Fischer

  He pushes the empty bowl back to me. There’s some creamy filling left on the bottom. He nods toward it, sounding vaguely fatherly. “You need to have a little of that for good luck.”

  He was always big on that luck stuff. Even on New Year’s Eve, we’d toast with real champagne, which he’d kill me for any other time of the year. It was just a thimbleful for me and the rest of the bottle for him for good luck. And birthday cake: I always had to have a huge slice, even if I was on a diet, for good luck. And fireworks and lucky pennies (but only if they were heads-up). Suddenly it dawns on me: the dude is completely superstitious.

  I nod and dutifully dip my fingertip into the fluffy white cream, then stick it in my mouth for instant sweetness.

  Brains aren’t sweet. Nothing the Sentinels do to prepare brains is ever sweet, and aside from the occasional soda or sports drink, I haven’t tasted anything sweet since I’ve been here.

  It hits my system like a bite of brains—my eyelids fluttering, my tongue sizzling, my synapses firing—and then it’s gone. I’d love more, but Vera has warned me, ad nauseum, about eating too much Normal food, as in any. I sit back and sigh, almost as contented as Dad after he ate the whole thing.

  He has a cup of coffee going, brown smudges around the lip of his mug. It has a picture of a sunrise on it and, underneath, the words Wish you were here. It’s another Sentinel find from the souvenir shop, but I think he’s grown quite fond of it.

  “So,” he says, putting it down and smacking his lips. “What’s got you downer than usual, my dear?”

  I shrug, not even denying I’ve been a full-fledged brat for the last seven days straight.

  When I don’t answer right away, he smirks. “Well, it can’t be Stamp, for obvious reasons, and Vera says you’ve been getting on brilliantly with your Keeper training, so . . . must be Dane.”

  I look up too quickly.

  He smiles, knowing he’s hit the bull’s-eye. “What is it this time?” he manages to ask without rolling his eyes, his feelings on the matter of Dane quite on the record by now.

  “This time?”

  He wags a finger. “Don’t look at me like that. Last time he was hanging around with that new blonde zombie; the time before that he was still hanging around with . . . That’s it, isn’t it? They’re still hanging around together?”

  I nod, then shake my head, then nod some more. Ugh, this is too much to talk about with Dad, particularly my dad. I don’t miss my ex-BFF Hazel often, but at times like this I do. Heck, right about now I’d settle for Chloe and one of her get-off-your-butt-and-do-something-about-it pep talks.

  “I just . . .” I begin, avoiding his eyes. “We used to talk all the time. He’s all I have here, besides you and Stamp. And you’re always busy with Stamp, and Stamp’s not exactly the best conversationalist anymore . . .”

  He arches an eyebrow. “He still loves you, Maddy.”

  “Has he said that?”

  “He doesn’t have to. I see that look in his eyes whenever you walk into the lab at night.”

  I frown. “The janitor gets the same look when he walks into the lab.”

  “But he keeps it longer when you’re around. That’s an important distinction to make.”

  “Exactly. My point is . . .” I don’t really have one. I’m just mad. And sad. And mad. And whenever I’m around Dad, he makes me think of home, and that makes me think of being Normal, and that makes me remember I’m not anymore. “My point is, I guess I thought we’d be together forever.”

  Dad shifts in his seat before clearing his throat. “You know, Dane has been a zombie a lot longer than you have. I think . . . Well, maybe he knows a little more about the word forever than you do at this point.”

  I look past him to the poster of a surfer on the wall just over his head. It’s so ridiculous, yet he put it there the minute the Sentinels gave it to him. I guess he figured something is better than nothing or maybe he just wanted to spite the Sentinels or maybe he’s a closet surf dawg. Who knows?

  I refocus on him. “Forever or not forever, I thought we had something special.”

  He nods. “I could see that. Of course you did. You don’t go through something like what you kids went through and not have something special. Have you talked to him about your feelings?”

  “I haven’t had a chance. Courtney’s never away from his side.”

  Dad narrows his eyes. “He’s a Sentinel now. He can certainly choose where and when he roams about.”

  “That’s my point. I’d like to say it was all Courtney’s fault, but it’s Dane I blame the most.”

  He furrows his brows, making the birthday hat on his head shift a little starboard. “Who’s Courtney?”

  “The blonde zombie.”

  He nods, and it lists. “Oh.”

  I look in the kitchen and see some extra plates and napkins he never brought out.

  His lips purse.

  “Did you tell Dane about my rebirthday party?”

  “Maddy, listen—”

  “Did you?”

  “He’s very busy. He’s not in training anymore, you know.”

  I grit my teeth and shove the words out. “Did you invite him?”

  “Yes, I did. He said they’d be by if they could make it.”

  My dead stomach tightens like a corkscrew. “They?”

  Dad looks down into his coffee cup, which I notice is empty. “He and his Sentinel Supporter.”

  I groan. Out loud. Then I do it again, even louder.

  He smiles, reaching for my hand. “I just wanted you to have a nice rebirthday party.”

  I soften a little; it’s not Dad’s fault Dane’s being a total tool to the nth degree. “I am.”

  He snorts, standing to pour more coffee. He looks at his watch and reaches for the cream on the counter.

  I’m suddenly standing.

  “Leaving so soon?” he asks, already grabbing his lab coat.

  I smile. “I thought we could go see Stamp. Didn’t you say Zerkers have an easier time eating Normal food? Something about their metabolism?”

  He grabs another Twinkie and a spare birthday hat from the kitchen counter. “They pretty much burn through everything we give them,” Dad says excitedly, leading me into the hall.

  The bright fluorescent lights reflect off the foil in his own birthday hat, which I conveniently forget to tell him he’s still wearing.

  “So, yes, a Twinkie is certainly not going to clog his pipes, if you know what I mean.”

  Chapter 4

  Stamp Tramp

  I keep the Twinkie behind my back the whole time they’re moving Val to the observation bay in the back wing of Dad’s lab. It takes Dad two random Sentinels plus his lab partner, Hector—a giant Sentinel he recruited his first week in Sentinel City—to wrangle Val from her cage.

  There are chains and handcuffs and a big leather muzzle involved. Val watches me the entire time, not blinking, not smiling, not screaming like she was. Even with all the precautions, Dad steers clear.

  Suddenly her back is to me and she’s doing that awkward ankle-chain shuffle you see prisoners do when they’re walking out of the courthouse on Gavel TV. She’s in hospital scrubs, green and ill fitting, and her white-blonde hair is limp and soft and fine against her scalp. She looks small between the two towering Sentinels, particularly Hector, who is like Lurch on steroids. But I know firsthand that looks can be deceiving and behind those yellow Zerker eyes is a mind burning with ways to tear me—and everyone else in the room—limb from limb.

  But not tonight, biotch. Not on my rebirthday!

  When Val is in the other room, Dad turns around and nods at me, then shuts the door behind him and locks it tight.

  Suddenly it’s just me and Stamp in the outer lab. I tap in the six-digit code on his keypad, and the cage door hisses open.

  He looks at it doubtfully, as if he doesn’t believe I’m here or he thinks it’s all a trick.

  I sit back on a stool next to the table across from his c
age, finally sliding the snack cake out from behind my back. I look at it, frowning. It’s all mashed up. I must have gotten a little tense there, watching Val led away, her eyes on me the entire time. I thought I was immune to it, or at least used to it, by now. All these months after she tried to kill Stamp and me, I guess I’m still a little stressed out over the whole thing.

  But Stamp doesn’t know any better. And, really, can you actually damage a Twinkie? I tear open the plastic wrap.

  At the first smell of sugar and pastry and God knows how many preservatives, Stamp inches from the cage, no longer suspicious, and reaches for it greedily. His hand stops just above the cake, and he looks to me for approval.

  I know Dad and Hector have been working on his manners, so I nod and say gently, “It’s okay, Stamp. It’s yours. It’s for you.”

  Say no more. He snatches it up, neon-yellow crumbs flying everywhere as he jams it into his maw, smacking and slurping like it’s his first taste of brains after I yanked him out of his grave and fed them to him from a picnic basket.

  The Twinkie’s gone in a heartbeat. Finding nothing left, he licks his fingers, then the plastic wrap. He picks a few crumbs off his scrubs, which are white now to signify he’s in recovery.

  I don’t know exactly how one recovers from being bitten by a Zerker, but if anyone can, it’s Stamp. I used to think he was just another jock chump, a pretty boy with good manners and a roving eye, but now I know that beneath his broad shoulders and hairless chest lies a heart that would stop at nothing to keep beating.

  Or not beating, as the case may be.

  I’ve been through some pretty harsh stuff in the last year but nothing compared to poor Stamp. He stands here, nothing left to lick, looking me up and down as if I’m his next Twinkie. I spot the spare birthday hat Dad left on the slate counter and hand it to him.

  He holds it gently, rolling it over in his hand. It’s pink and green, all shiny foil with glitter sprayed everywhere. Dad must have asked for birthday hats and the Sentinels came back with the most ghastly, girly, neon, 1970s things ever. That anyone could still be making these horrid hats kind of boggles my mind. I wouldn’t put it past the Sentinels to literally build a machine and go back in time just to spite Dad.

  But Stamp appears to like it, probably because it’s big and shiny and pretty and shiny. “What . . . What do I do with it?”

  Lately with him, everything is a question. Don’t get me wrong; it’s a lot better than when we first got here six months ago, when it was all grunts and groans and later half words and almost words and just plain wrong words. But after months of working with Dad one-on-one—speech and cognition therapy and relearning—he’s got to be about as good as he’ll ever be.

  “Put it on your head. Like this.” I demonstrate with an invisible hat. He watches carefully, as if it’s the most important thing in the world. It kind of breaks my heart how important things are for him now, daily little chores and habits I take for granted.

  “Okay.” He puts it over his bristly black hair. It complements his pale face, gaunt cheeks, and half-yellow, half-black eyes.

  He’s still good-looking. I mean, would he scare a room full of Normals if he walked in right now? Sure, no doubt. But if you sit with it awhile, if you let his features marinate, he’s still handsome in a kind of gothic way. What’s more, he’s here, still kicking, after getting the worst of it from day one.

  Why is he still here? The Sentinels don’t trust Stamp—that’s for sure—but they need him. He’s one of the few zombies ever to survive a Zerker bite. Part of the reason they keep Dad around, I suspect, is the work he’s done getting Stamp back on his feet, figuratively and literally.

  Still, I knew the boy Stamp, and he was funny and bright, his alabaster skin flawless, his lips plump, his hair thick and shiny with a Superman curl dangling in front of his unlined forehead. Now he looks rough and weathered, as if he’s aged a decade in the last year.

  He will never be a pretty boy again, but there is something ghastly cool about him, particularly in his innocent eyes and gentle gestures. I know the Zerker blood lurks inside him, dormant and unkind. Dad’s warned me a hundred times about how strong Stamp is now, how quick he is to anger, how violent he is when upset, but I haven’t seen it. Not yet. And though Dad is the only Normal I still trust, part of me just doesn’t believe it.

  Not Stamp. Not my Stamp.

  “How’s it feel?” I ask, chuckling.

  He keeps moving the birthday hat around to center it, even though there’s a little elastic string he could fix under his chin to keep it in place. But I know it would take an atlas, three laptops, a topographical map, and a compass to explain it to him, and I don’t have that kind of patience tonight.

  “It feels shiny,” he says without a trace of a smile.

  I want to laugh, but I don’t because his feelings get hurt easily now that he’s more aware he’s not like all the other zombies in Sentinel City.

  “It is shiny.”

  Well, it is.

  He smiles. He sits on a bench between his cage and Val’s, his long legs splayed out in front of him like a kid’s.

  “How do you feel tonight?”

  “Better.” He looks toward the back of the lab at the closed door: beyond the big glass window, Dad’s shining a light in Val’s eyes; the muzzle’s still wrapped around her jaw. “Better now,” he says.

  I nod, knowing what’s next.

  “When are you taking me out of here?” He sounds almost but not quite whiny, like a kid the first time he asks if he can open his new toy on the way home from the store, knowing his parents will say no a dozen more times before they finally pull up in the driveway and give in.

  “Soon, Stamp. Soon.” My face is stony, as always. I avoid his yellowish eyes, as always. I kind of regret coming here. Then I look at the hat drooping off his head and smile.

  “You said that yesterday.”

  I shake my head. “I didn’t see you yesterday.”

  “You said that two yesterdays ago.”

  Another head shake. Here we go. “Okay, but I’m not in charge. Remember? Maddy doesn’t run Sentinel City. Other people do, and I guess they kind of like it with you in here for now.”

  Is that insulting?

  It’s kind of insulting, I know, but Stamp is weird. Things that would insult pretty much anyone else on the planet—you know, like “They want to keep you locked up because you’re crazy strong and can’t really control yourself anymore”—don’t even faze him. But then things you don’t think will insult him do. Like when I said, “You look better,” and he growled, “Better than what?”

  This time Stamp just grins. “But you’re nice. You could help me if you wanted to.” He waits a beat before twisting the knife of guilt just a little more. “If you really wanted to.”

  “I do want to, Stamp. But it’s not up to me.”

  He sighs, looking around the room. I know he’d cry right now if he could. His chin even starts to quiver a little and suddenly I feel like a mom dropping her kid off on the first day of kindergarten. “When will you come again?”

  I smile. That’s so like him, to ruin a good moment by asking when there will be another good moment. “But . . . I’m still here, right?”

  His chuckle is like a dry cough. “I know, but it makes me happy to think of when you’ll be here again.”

  Actually, that’s kind of logical. Maybe Stamp’s not slow—just very, very philosophical.

  “I’ll be back soon, Stamp.” Before he can ask again, I quickly add, “Tomorrow. Or the next day. But let’s enjoy now.”

  He nods. “Good idea. Let’s enjoy now.” He looks around again, as if I’m hiding a pony or maybe a Christmas tree. “How do you want to enjoy it?”

  I snort. “Just sit here. Talk to me. We have a lot to catch up on.”

  “Here we go.” He sighs.

  “How much do you remember?”

  “Not much.”

  “How much?”

  “I r
emember you and me. That’s how much.”

  “Where?”

  He scratches his head, feeling the hat. He takes it off, smiling at it in his lap. He doesn’t try to put it back on, and I wonder if it’s because he’s forgotten how or because he’s punishing me for spoiling his fun. “Away from here.”

  I nod eagerly. “That’s right. Before we came here.”

  He smirks. “You were fun then. Not like now.”

  I can’t argue with him there. “Why was I fun then?”

  Stamp looks down, rolling the hat over and over in his bony fingers. “Because I wasn’t like this then.”

  Ouch. “Were you fun then?”

  “Funner than I am now.”

  I notice that my voice has become low, probably because it’s at its most nonthreatening then. “How come?”

  He looks toward the back of the long, sterile room, and I turn, following his gaze.

  Val is looking at us through the lab door window, eyes big and yellow over her leather muzzle. One sleeve is rolled up, and Dad’s taking a sample of her Zerker blood.

  I look away and find Stamp staring back at me.

  “Her,” he says softly, as if she might hear. “She took my fun away.”

  I grit my teeth, knowing I shouldn’t but saying it anyway: “Yes, Stamp. Yes, she did.” I meet her stare. “She took all our fun away.”

  The birthday hat is crushed between Stamp’s hands. I know from the look in his eyes, he doesn’t remember doing it. I stand.

  He shakes his head. “A little longer, please?”

  I sit back down and open my mouth to say all right.

  He shakes a finger at me. “No more questions, ’kay?”

  I nod. “No more questions. Not tonight.”

  “’Kay,” he says, smiling. “Let’s just enjoy No More Questions Night.”

  I smirk.

  We look at each other, knees almost touching, his expression soft and scared. I lean forward and touch his hand. He lets me; he doesn’t always.

  Maybe he knows tonight is special, after all.

  Chapter 5

  That’s What Friends Aren’t For