Nights of the Living Dead

by Jonathan Maberry

  So coming back out, I told Deb I’d think about it.

  Deb shrugged, fine.

  And I told her if I did decide, I wanted to do it up close. World falling apart, like my old man says. Men with hair like ladies. Ladies working jobs supposed to be for men. Tattoos. Athletes dancing in the end zone. So if I was going to do it—I’d do it real close, like a man ought to.

  Deb shrugged, again, fine.

  And that was it.

  That one evening.

  A short conversation—with a break to piss—on the back porch, and then we were inside, to the bed, tossing on Beau’s sheets, but the whole time we were tossing I could scarcely stay hard because I was imagining that rotted snaggletooth, and by the end I’d made up my mind on the thing, and there wasn’t nothing else to think about.

  * * *

  The whole of summer and fall, it was like climbing the rungs of the high-dive ladder.

  Each day, another rung. And the higher I climbed, the harder it’d be to turn back—’cause that’s darned embarrassing, you got someone behind you, nine rungs down, and you both have to go back, rung by rung, everyone watching.

  No, once you start climbing—no matter what you’re feeling—you need to just keep on.

  And the pool. The jump. That thing you have to do. That was Beau. That was the dentist with the rotted snaggletooth and the wasted porch that’d make for a fine backyard deer blind.

  There’s a sort of person, I guess, that once an idea gets in their head—it can’t be stopped or rerouted. Only thing that can stop it is the introduction of some new, better idea or some hard force coming the opposite way.

  And unfortunately for Beau, I didn’t get any new, better ideas all summer and fall, and no hard force came the opposite way, either.

  * * *

  We went out on day four of rifle hunting season, December 9, coffee with a splash of whiskey not doing much to fight the cold sting in the air. Beau got me in his shiny red Chevy pickup and we were parked by five thirty, stepping into the woods before the first light of morning.

  Beau brought a flashlight, and he flicked it on—but I threw my hand over it. “Dark’s nice. Enjoy it. Sun’ll be up soon. This hour, the quiet, it’s right.”

  “I can’t see where I’m walking.”

  “I know the way.”

  We trekked across the Derry Ridge, thick with spruce and white pines, walking more than an hour—following the old logging path at first, then veering off, deep, where you get twisted and lost if you aren’t careful.

  Beau wore a bright orange vest and his hunting gear was all fresh—got it at that new Ace Hardware. He had all variety of gadgets and devices dangling off him, clanging with each step.

  We came to the blind, and the first thing he said was, “We should have brought stools.”

  The blind was simple: a wide, overturned spruce, one gnarled branch making for a natural rifle rest. Sitting on stumps, we had a view of a stream fifty feet out and a wide clearing beyond it.

  It was fine, but it was nothing like Beau’s back porch.

  I smiled, knowing soon, I’d be shooting off that back porch.

  We opened our first beers just after five thirty, the sun up but not fully at ’em, casting light through the trees in spotlight arrays—yellow-orange shafts, slicing down.

  Beau wanted to clank beers, toasting to a good day, and I did it but I had to swallow a lot of words. I hate that, drinking with a guy who always wanted to hit your beer.

  Clank. Clank. Clank.

  Like you had to keep reminding each other you were having a decent enough time.

  But I wanted the booze doing backstrokes through his bloodstream, wanted him loose and cocky and rubbery, so every time he raised, I clanked. And every time he slowed down on his drinking, I’d crack another, and that’d cause him to quickly finish his and fish for a new one.

  “Safety off,” I said, tapping his rifle. “That ‘safety on, until you’re ready to shoot,’ stuff? That’s for kids and women. I discovered that overseas, first time it got hot.”

  That was a lie, the stuff about learning that in battle, but I knew it’d pull at him right.

  Beau reached out, click.

  He drank and he talked about the Steelers, then about his dental practice, saying it’d be a life of free checkups for me if we bagged something more’n five years old.

  Then there was a silence, and I could feel him wanting to say something, and I hated that sort of holding pattern quiet, so I out and said, “What?”

  “I heard, over there—that some of our guys, they go around, slicing off people’s ears.”

  He smiled timidly, like he was nervous he’d offended me. “Did you ever see that? Guys slicing off ears? Wearing them around their neck like trophies?”

  “No.”

  “Well, I guess that’s a good thing—we can’t have our boys in uniform cuttin’ off ears, wearing them around,” he said, and then he raised his beer, and we clanked to that.

  You believe it?

  We really did—we clanked to not cuttin’ off ears.

  And he smiled as we clanked, and the dead snaggletooth showed itself again, and I decided damnit, I can’t stand to wait much longer.

  So I finished the beer in my hand while I let the feeling build in me—an anticipation I hadn’t felt since the war. This sort of shaky hand, tooth-clenching exhilaration, knowing what was to come.

  It’d been just under two hours when I stood and said, “It’s going right through me.”

  “Drinking beer is like trout fishing.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Catch and release,” he said, and he laughed too loud, and then said something about how I’d barely even drank the amount he had and he hadn’t had to piss yet.

  I left my rifle propped against the limb, then walked twenty feet through the brush, slipping behind a wide oak. The piss came in short, hard spurts that stung a bit, splashing the oak and the forest floor. A sour smell, pooling around my boots.

  I zipped, shut my eyes, breathed in and out slow and long, then called out in a half-whisper—

  “Beau. I got a view. Come on, it’s yours.”

  I heard Beau stand, all his devices dangling and clanking, then him stomping through the grass, slowing, moving half-gentle as he crept up.

  “Where are you?” Beau said, and I could imagine him now, eyes narrow, searching, anxious, probably imagining it like this was his war.

  I pressed my back to the oak. Heard him trudging, eager.

  So eager, he’d be running his tongue over that tooth.

  I watched the ground, seeing Beau’s shadow fall, hearing the footsteps like kindling popping, one final step, and then my breath was held.

  “I don’t see it,” Beau said, and then he didn’t say anything again, ever, ’cause I was spinning out from around the oak, grabbing his .270 by the barrel, his eyes popping, a quick hiccup of a laugh, not believing for a moment, thinking something like, “well this is a strange joke”—and then I was jerking the gun down, bringing Beau with it, my finger finding the trigger and pulling as I continued yanking down, safety off, firing, the blast muffled just slightly because the barrel was so tight against the flesh of the man’s chin, and his whole jaw blew open like he’d been chomping on an M-80. The base of his skull blew out the back of his head, a whirling, spinning plate of flesh and bone and greasy hair.

  The butt of the rifle hit the dirt, pushing up into Beau’s mouth, so he flopped onto his back.

  His jaw, his throat, the ground—just dripping, sopping red flesh, everywhere. His breath was coming only in small, spitty bits—like trying to drink pop through a straw with a split in it.

  Beau’s eyes found me. His upper lip—his only lip, now pulled back, and I saw the rotted gray snaggletooth.

  And his tongue running over it.

  It felt like he watched me a long time—longer than he should have. His tongue running over the tooth for minutes.

  Die.

  Go o
n.

  His tongue licking that tooth twice more, and then, for a final moment, his eyes focused on me—and I only then realized I hadn’t breathed, not once the whole time.

  I breathed then, and at the same instant, Beau finally stopped licking.

  He was dead.

  I ran my handkerchief along the end of the barrel, where I had grabbed it.

  I walked back to the blind, drank two thirds of a beer. I checked my watch. It was a quarter past eight.

  It should have been done.

  But that rotted snaggletooth.

  That hooked, nasty thing—protruding, everyone having to look at it. That tooth that chewed meat, chomped cod each Sunday at the Methodist fish fry—he left it there, for everyone to see.

  Suddenly, Beau’s voice: “You ever see that? Guys slicing off ears? Wearing them around their neck like trophies?”

  I admit, my heart jumped, thinking it came from the man. But it was just my brain making noises.

  Go on, Jack, I said. You’re on the final rung, just pull yourself up and over and march to the end of the high dive.

  But I didn’t.

  Beau’s hunting pack was in the blind. I removed a curved, freshly sharpened blade and walked to the body.

  His tongue was hanging out and his face was pale.

  Would anyone know?

  No.

  His lower jaw was blown apart, everything pulpy and wet.

  So I crouched down and pulled back his upper lip. I dug the knife in to the gum, gentle, rocking it back and forth, loosening that rotted snaggletooth.

  And his eyes stared up, still open, watching me.

  Beau’s voice, again, in my head: “You ever see that? Guys slicing off ears? Wearing them around their neck like trophies?”

  “Yes,” I answered, and I twisted the blade until the tooth popped into my hand.

  I walked to the water, held the tooth in, let the blood stream off it. The rotted snaggletooth—still wet—went into my watch pocket.

  Then I pulled the truck keys from Beau’s coat, took a final glance at his body, and began jogging back through the woods.

  * * *

  It was nearly nine thirty that morning when I got to the Chevy, and that’s when the first thing went wrong. Beau’s CB was busted. Beau was a volunteer fireman, and his CB was shot—and even though it was a wrench in the plan, it made me feel less bad about the whole thing. Not that I felt bad to start with, but if you’re a volunteer fireman your CB had to work, and if it don’t, you’re asking for it.

  So I sped toward town, tires screeching as I hauled past the Five & Dime, feeling folks’ eyes on me, but knowing that was fine—that was part of it.

  The police chief’s name was Tharp, and he was at his desk when I came in, me waving past the deputy, saying it was an emergency. I was proud of myself, the way I did it, panting a bit, adding just a little struggle to my voice as I said, “Chief, there’s been an accident. Beau Lynn shot hisself. He’s dead, I’m certain, and hell—ah hell, just shit—I saw the whole thing, the way he fell and—shit, Chief, it’s an awful mess.”

  * * *

  Fire ants had begun to eat at Beau’s body, parading down his exploded throat, funneling in and out of his nostrils, picking at his open eyes—a few drowned in the red pool where he lay.

  Tharp looked at the body for a long moment, then lit one of his long cigarettes. “Tell me again, how you saw it?”

  “I was right here. I saw a buck, but I didn’t have my rifle—I was taking a leak—so I whispered to Beau. He walked out, and then I see his foot catch the root, and he starts to fall. It happens sort of slow, the way he goes down, and I open my mouth to heckle him a little, but then I hear the shot. He smacks the ground or the gun or both, I guess, but then he sort of trampolined back up, only when he came back up the blood was like a fountain.”

  And as I said it to Tharp, I was thinking, that is what it looked like.

  “Did you try to revive him?”

  “Revive? He didn’t have a throat.”

  “You check for a pulse on the wrist?”

  “He didn’t have a throat, Tharp.”

  Chief Tharp glanced at me. “You got blood on you,” he said, stating it, but also saying it like a question.

  I looked at my finger, where I’d pried the rotted snaggletooth free. Blood on the tips, under the nail, dried.

  “Right, well, sure. I had to fish the keys from his coat. I didn’t say I didn’t touch the body, just that I didn’t check for any pulse ’cause the man’s face had been blown to nothing. Also, some got on me when he fell, I’m sure, I wasn’t but five feet away.”

  Quiet for a bit, Tharp looking the body over.

  “See, he had the keys ’cause he drove us out,” I went on, smiling inside as I said it, because I had the answers. “Insisted on driving, with the new Chevy. Wanted to show off the leather.”

  Tharp nodded slowly. “That does sound like Beau.”

  Tharp said a bunch more, about an incident report, about calling Fish & Game, about Deb, about me sitting for a taped conversation, about what a shame it was. He didn’t want to leave the body, but wouldn’t anyone be able to find us here. Reluctant, he decided we’d both walk back, and he’d lead the state troopers back in. He lifted Beau’s rifle, said he’d bring it out. Last, he took my rifle, said he had to check it, and I said of course, sure, I understood.

  Back out through the trees, one state trooper waiting there, leaning against his cruiser, along with an ambulance and two paramedics.

  I packed a lip and stepped away, letting them talk, no point in listening.

  There was this feeling like the tooth was squirming in my pocket—yet when I stuck my finger inside and felt that rotted snaggletooth, it was perfectly still. I was rubbing it when I heard Tharp calling, like he’d been calling for a long while.

  “Jack! You hearing me?”

  “Sure,” I said, quickly slipping my finger out, turning. “Little shaken. Just didn’t realize at first, I suppose.”

  “You can head back to town.”

  “You want me to tell Debbie?” I asked.

  “Ah, shit. Needs to come from my office. Soon, before the poor woman hears. I’ll radio the station, have Leonard head over.”

  And so I pulled out, in Beau’s Chevy. As I left, I saw Tharp and the troopers and the paramedics heading in.

  I split off before town, pulling into Ruthie’s Roadside. I ordered the open-faced meatloaf sandwich but I skipped the potatoes, got the coleslaw. Soon, I saw Deputy Leonard’s car speed past, toward Deb and Beau’s house, off to deliver the news of Beau’s accidental passing.

  It was just past two o’clock when Leonard came back up the road. I paid, stopped at Bull’s Tavern, picked up a case of Rolling Rock, and got back into the dead man’s truck.

  * * *

  “So you really did it,” Deb said.

  We were on the back porch, same place where the idea got started six months earlier.

  The sun was low—that depressed winter sunset, always coming before you’re ready for it. As it went down, a strange fog rose up.

  Living in the valley, sometimes the morning fog—you could barely see your hand in front of your face. But this was night fog, and as the moon rose—a silver dollar spotlight being lifted in the sky—a green haze built.

  We were five beers into the case of Rolling Rock.

  “How’d the deputy tell it to you?” I asked.

  “Plain. Straightforward.”

  “You do a lot of fake crying n’at?”

  “Some crying came for real.”

  “Sure, sure,” I said, and then after a moment, “He mention me?”

  Deb shook her head. “Only to say you were there. Not like anyone was suspecting or suspicious.”

  Inside, the radio was on—music at first, but they had cut in with news. Something happening in Pittsburgh, at a hospital. Something else at a cemetery.

  “You shouldn’t be here tonight,” Deb said. “But Christ, Jac
k, I need you to be.”

  She got up, sliding into my lap. Her hands along my skin, nails scratching in that good way.

  She was reaching for the button on my jeans, face close to mine, and I saw she had these green earrings, dangling. I heard Beau: “You ever see that? Guys slicing off ears? Wearing them around their neck like trophies?”

  I ignored it—mind playing tricks—and let Deb make me feel good.

  Her hand ran up my chest, brushing against the dog tags that I still wore. And as she flicked the metal, I heard Beau again, barking, “You ever see that? Guys slicing off ears? Wearing them around their neck like trophies?”

  I pushed her off, saying I need the bathroom. Soon as the screen banged, my finger was stabbing into the watch pocket, clawing, bringing the snaggletooth out, nearly dropping it.

  I held it in my palm, the dead thing.

  Again, Beau’s voice in my head—and that sound, bouncing around, got me stomping through the house.

  Beau had a tiny office in the basement, where he did his billing, balanced the checkbook. An old dental chair in the corner, and a few supplies.

  It didn’t take me long to find what I was looking for: a small drill. Not the dental kind, but the bit was thin, and it would do.

  I gripped the snaggletooth between my fingers—saw Beau’s blood, and I began to drill through the side.

  It started slow, and then a rush as the bit pushed through, and I nearly dropped my trophy.

  But I didn’t.

  I unclasped my dog-tag chain, held it out.

  I fiddled with the tooth, struggling to pull the chain through, and it began to feel like I couldn’t breathe, and then the chain finally slipped through, and I drew it, and the feeling in my chest was relief.

  Back upstairs. Another beer from the fridge. Each step was more solid now, confident—the tooth bouncing against my chest.

  Chief Tharp was outside.

  Stepping out, I saw him on the porch, his back to the field and the tree line. The air was raw and his breath was thick in the moonlight.

  Deb glanced at me, and I saw her mouth was drawn tight. I smiled, cool—as cool as the metal and the rotted snaggletooth against my skin.

  “Jack,” he said, with that policeman-like nod. I wondered if he practiced a nod like that.