Enter the Zombie

by David Lubar

  I heard Rodney snicker. But I didn’t take my eyes off Principal Ambrose. I could outstare anyone, not just bullies like Rodney.

  After a moment, the principal glanced back down at the rules. “I don’t think the other teachers who’ll have to get involved will be all that happy about spending hours creating a contest for just two teams. Especially when one team doesn’t have a chance. No chance at all.”

  Another stare.

  Another snicker.

  “I’m sure Mr. Lomux will be especially unhappy.” Principal Ambrose flipped open the rule manual. “Each contest needs a physical education specialist, as well as a science teacher and a language arts teacher. No, I fear Mr. Lomux will not appreciate this at all.”

  Mr. Lomux? Oh, boy. That was going to make things more complicated. He was so mean, he was almost like an adult version of Rodney. He would have been even more dangerous if he wasn’t stuck with a brain about as powerful as the sort you’d find in the average earthworm.

  “That’s bad,” Mookie whispered. “Remember what he did to us with the socks?”

  “Yeah,” I whispered back. “That was pretty brutal.” After we’d annoyed him by not acting like “real men,” he’d made the whole gym class put our dirty socks over our noses and breathe through them.

  “So,” Principal Ambrose said, “there’s absolutely no disgrace in deciding to withdraw from the competition.”

  “No thanks,” I said. “We’re in it to win.”

  Rodney and Eddy both started laughing. Mort didn’t laugh, but I could see from his smile that he thought his team would have a very easy time beating us. And they would—if we were actually who they thought we were. But everything they thought was wrong.

  They thought Abigail was just some spooky kid who didn’t talk much in class. They thought I was a decent athlete, but not as good as they were. Sure, I’d won a field day event last fall, but that memory had faded. Or maybe they didn’t think chin-ups meant all that much. I guess, in a way, I really couldn’t argue with them. It was hard for me to think of myself as a good athlete, when I knew I was dead. But my muscles never got tired, and I never ran out of breath. I guess that gave me a big advantage in anything that needed endurance.

  Either way, they didn’t really have a clue what Abigail and I could do. As for Mookie, they had no idea how tough he could be. He might act like a total goofball, but if I asked him to hang from a rope by his teeth, he’d find a way to do it, and he’d hang on as long as he had to. Unless, of course, he opened his mouth to shout something like, “Don’t worry! I’ll never open my mouth.”

  “Last chance…,” Principal Ambrose said. “I’ll see that you still get nice certificates for second place. And you won’t have to add to your teachers’ workloads or go through the humiliation of losing.”

  I didn’t even bother answering.

  “All right. Have it your way,” he said. “Go back to your classes.”

  Rodney bumped me on the way out. I thought about slugging him with my extra-hard fist. But I didn’t want to get in trouble. More important than that, I didn’t want him to suspect there was anything unusual about me. I probably shouldn’t have stared at him for so long without blinking. Luckily, his brain power, and his memory, were pretty much like Mr. Lomux’s.

  “Well, that was a waste of everyone’s time,” Abigail said.

  “No way. Look what I got.” Mookie held up a small brown lump. “I made a whole piece of brownie from the crumbs. Anyone want a bite?”

  “Anyone want bacteria?” Abigail said.

  “It’s all yours,” I said.

  As we walked back to our classroom, I noticed that Rodney was heading toward the gym. “Great,” I said. “He’s going to let Mr. Lomux know what’s happening.”

  “They’re probably going to plan some way to make us lose,” Abigail said.

  “Or hurt us,” I said. Not that I could feel pain. But stronger bones or not, I could still get damaged.

  Then I realized there was an even bigger problem. “Oh, no!” I spun toward Abigail. “You know what this means?”

  “I’m way ahead of you,” she said.

  “I’m not,” Mookie said. “I’m never ahead of you. I have no idea what you two are talking about. What’s going on?”

  5

  So Much for Secrets

  “If we have our first round of the Brainy Brawny competition here at Belgosi, kids will find out how smart Abigail is,” I said.

  “Hey, that shouldn’t be a problem. We know how smart she is, and we like her,” Mookie said. “Even if she’s smarter than anyone really needs to be.”

  “It’s not the same. We’ve been through all sorts of stuff together. We know her better than anyone.” I looked over at Abigail. If she’d been some stranger who raised her hand all the time and knew all the answers, I might feel differently about her. But together, we’d faced life, death, and a very messy flock of seagulls. We’d even tackled an eighth-grade bully—and lived to laugh about it.

  “It’s up to you, Abigail. Mr. Murphy can’t force you to do this. And you’ve worked really hard to keep your secret all these years. Things can stay the way they are, if that’s what you want.”

  “I want to do this,” Abigail said. “It’s important to help BUM. And you know what—I’m tired of hiding the truth. Deception has become too large a part of my life.”

  “I sure know what you mean. It’s hard when your whole life is wrapped up in hiding stuff.” I spent a ton of energy keeping the truth from everyone. I pretended to eat, so my parents wouldn’t worry. I even pretended to go to the bathroom, because my mom paid far too much attention to stuff like that. Half my life was a lie, and the other half was spent spying.

  Sometimes, late at night, when I had too much free time to fill and couldn’t help thinking about stuff, I wasn’t even sure who I really was anymore. But unlike Abigail, I didn’t think I could deal with having everyone know my secret. People would run away from me if they knew I was a zombie.

  “Hey,” Mookie said. “What’s my secret? You and Abigail have secrets. I gotta have something. I’m good at bowling, but that isn’t a secret.” He took a couple steps and threw an imaginary ball.

  “Well, you have the power to turn just about anything from a solid into a gas, merely by swallowing it,” I said.

  “That’s no secret,” Abigail said. “That’s general knowledge, with frequent reminders. Sometimes I’m amazed that you don’t float.”

  “Maybe your secret is so secret, even you don’t know it,” I said.

  “Yeah,” Mookie said. “I’ll bet you’re right.”

  “Speaking of secrets,” Abigail said, “I think you might be able to back me up for the academic part of Brainy Brawny.”

  “Me? I’m not all that great when it comes to knowing stuff.”

  “Maybe not when you were alive. But I have a theory. Here—this will just take a moment.” Abigail reached into her purse and pulled out a deck of cards.

  “You just happened to have those with you?” I asked.

  “No. I brought them specifically for this. Watch closely.” She held the deck up, with the cards facing me, then put her thumb on top and riffled through the deck so each card flashed past.”

  “Are you doing some kind of magic trick?” Mookie asked.

  “Nope,” she said, turning the back of the deck toward me. “Nathan is.”

  “What are you talking about?” I knew only one card trick, and I could never do it right.

  “Tell me the first card you saw,” she said.

  “Ten of hearts.” That was easy. It was the front card.

  “Right.” Abigail pulled the ten from the deck and showed it to me, then dropped it into her purse. “Next card?”

  “Not a clue.”

  “Just take a guess.”

  “King of clubs?”

  “Right.” She turned the whole deck toward me to show the king, then turned it away and pulled the king off. “Keep going.”

&n
bsp; “Six of spades?”

  “Right.”

  “Nine of hearts?”

  “Yup.”

  I got the whole deck without a single mistake. “How’d I do that?” I asked when she showed me the last card.

  “I’m not positive, but I have a theory,” she said.

  “That makes one of us. I don’t have a clue.”

  “Our brains have short-term and long-term memories. Stuff we don’t need gets tossed out. At least, that’s what most scientists believe. But your brain is dead. I had a suspicion it would keep everything. What did I have for lunch yesterday?”

  “Chicken sandwich, fruit cup, and seven chocolate Kisses.” I couldn’t believe I knew that.

  “What did I have?” Mookie asked.

  “That’s too easy. You had one of everything,” I said. “But how does this help with Brainy Brawny? They aren’t going to be asking what we had for lunch.”

  “That’s true. But they might ask stuff in an area where I’m not strong. I know—I’ll make you a reading list.”

  “Sure. It’s not like I have a ton of stuff to do at night.”

  We went back into science class and took our seats. As I listened to the lesson, I imagined what it would be like if Abigail didn’t have to hide her brains. She was so smart, and so excited about knowledge, she really wanted to share everything. Maybe this would be good for her.

  * * *

  As we were leaving school, Abigail’s phone beeped. “Not again. I keep getting these weird texts.” She held up the phone.

  RARF LOWER

  “That’s not how you spell barf,” Mookie said.

  “That’s not how you spell anything meaningful.” Abigail turned off her phone and dropped it into her purse. “I’ll see you guys later. I have to go do something with my mom.”

  Mookie was free, so he walked home with me. “I got it!” he said right before we reached my house.

  “I hope it’s not catching,” I said.

  “No, seriously—I just figured out how to bring you back to life. Remember Frankenstein?”

  “Sure.” I’d watched that movie once. It was really old, but it was sort of cool.

  “The monster was all dead, right? He was just a bunch of stitched-together dead parts, until he got zapped with electricity. That brought him to life.”

  “We already tried electricity. Remember? You zapped me with that defibrillator when we figured out my heart wasn’t beating.” That seemed like so long ago. I could still remember lying down in Mr. Lomux’s office while Mookie zapped me with a zillion volts.

  “But that was just a little jolt,” he said. “The monster needed lightning. We have to figure out how to get you hit by a big bolt of lightning. Hey, I’ve got a kite. Isn’t that what Ben Franklin used?”

  “Are you trying to get me killed?” As the last word left my mouth, I realized it didn’t make sense. But there had to be a word for it.

  I guess Mookie had the same thought. “You mean killdered?” he said. “Wait—killderd. No, that doesn’t sound right. Deader. That’s it.” He grinned. “Nope. I’m not trying to make you deader. I’m trying to unkill you.”

  “Either way, it won’t work,” I said. “I got zapped by an electric fence, too, and that didn’t bring me back to life. Electricity isn’t the answer.”

  When we reached my porch, Mookie stopped, wrinkled his nose, and looked around. “Speaking of electricity, I think a squirrel just got zapped by a power line.”

  “Oh, no.” I guess Mom had come home early and decided to cook. She does that once in a while. I went inside and headed for the kitchen to see how bad it was.

  There were pots everywhere. I sniffed. The house smelled like the bottom of the charcoal grill after it’s been sitting around outside all winter.

  “You’re just in time. I made chili. It came out great.” Mom dipped a tablespoon in the pot, then thrust the spoon at my face. “Here, taste.”

  I was going to say I was full. But Mom looked so proud, I couldn’t let her down. I opened my mouth and leaned forward.

  “Chili!” Mookie pushed me aside and clamped his mouth onto the spoon. “Mmmmmmm,” he said with his lips still around the spoon. He stepped back, chewed, swallowed, then said, “Delicious. This is the best chili I’ve had all day.”

  “I’m so glad you like it.” Mom opened the cabinet door above the sink. “I’ll get you boys a bowl.”

  “Not now,” I said. “I’m still pretty full from lunch.” I edged my way toward the hall. “But it smells great. Really great.”

  “I’ll have some,” Mookie said. “Better give me a bowl for Nathan. He could get hungry later.” He got two bowls of chili from Mom and took them up to my room. “It definitely tastes better than it smells.”

  “Thanks for saving me,” I said.

  “No problem. Maybe I get a little gas once in a while, but the stuff you cook up in your gut can kill people. The chicken wings were bad enough. I’d hate to think what would happen with chili.”

  “Me, too. But I can’t keep this up forever,” I said. “Sooner or later, they’re going to figure out something is wrong with me.”

  “I don’t know,” Mookie said. “Parents don’t pay that much attention to kids. I got stuck at the top of that tree in my backyard last year, and my parents didn’t even notice until the next morning. They were having some sort of ceramic-angels shopping marathon on TV, so Mom was pretty wrapped up. Dad never notices anything.”

  “Yeah, my dad’s like that, too.” I felt my cheek. When anyone drew zombies in comic books or in movie ads, it was always the cheekbones that stuck out first. “But what happens when pieces of me start to fall off?”

  “I guess they might notice that. But you’re not falling apart yet, are you?”

  “Nope.” I pushed my finger against my arm. The skin felt soft.

  “So stop worrying. Things will work out.” Mookie finished his bowl of chili and started working on mine. “Can I stay for dinner?”

  “Sure.”

  “It will be chili, right?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  Mookie had three more bowls that evening before he headed home. After dinner, I decided to test my memory. I grabbed the first volume of the encyclopedia from the bookcase in the living room and opened it at random. I read an article about a plant I’d never heard of, called agony vera. It had sharp needles that caused extreme itching.

  I closed the book and tried to see what I could remember. It was all there, like I was still looking at the page. Every fact about the plant was right in front of me. This was sort of cool. But it was also scary. Everyone I knew was always running out of storage space in their game systems. Would my brain run out of memory if I filled it? Was there some way I could delete the extra stuff? I didn’t want to think too hard about that right now.

  * * *

  The next morning, I asked Abigail, “Do you have that reading list?”

  She gave me a funny smile.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I tried to think of an area where you could back me up, and there’s really nothing. I’m not good at sports trivia, but they won’t ask that in an academic competition. I think I’ve got everything covered. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t forget me,” Mookie said. “I know lots of stuff, too. I can back up Abigail. You can just concentrate on the dead-kid stuff.”

  That was fine with me. It was fun knowing I had this special memory, but it was nice to know I didn’t have to worry about that part of the competition.

  It looked like there was something else I wouldn’t have to worry about. During morning announcements, the secretary said, “Be sure to come to the gym on Saturday morning for the first-ever Brainy Brawny showdown at Belgosi. Come root for your favorite team.”

  “Saturday morning,” I said to Abigail. “That’s perfect. Nobody will show up.”

  “I agree,” she said. “I was afraid they’d hold the competition after school, when there were still kids hanging aro
und. Or, worse, during school. If they’d had an assembly, we’d have the whole school staring at us. This is better. We’re going to be fine.”

  “Definitely.” I couldn’t imagine any kids would bother to come to school on a weekend morning to watch some competition most of them had never heard of or cared about. “There’s no reason anyone would show up. We’ll be fine.”

  I hadn’t counted on Rodney’s need to have a large audience watch him crush his victims. The next day, there were posters taped up all over the hallways in school. Most of them had stuff like:

  COME ROOT FOR RODNEY, EDDY, AND MORT

  For some reason, there was a picture of the Roman Colosseum on most of them. That’s the place where gladiators slaughtered each other. A couple of posters had extra stuff like, WATCH US DESTROY THE COMPETITION or SEE THE WEAKER TEAM GET STOMPED.

  Since competition wasn’t misspelled, I had a feeling Eddy had helped make the posters.

  “It still won’t make a difference,” Abigail said as we stood in the hall near our home base, staring at a poster that promised, THERE WILL BE BLOOD! That one got taken down by a teacher before the end of the day.

  “I hope you’re right,” I said.

  She was wrong.

  6

  Team Spirit

  Saturday morning, Mookie showed up at my house an hour before the competition. “I made us team uniforms.” He held up a T-shirt. It was bright yellow, with black handwritten letters that read, Team Mookie.

  “Team Mookie?” I asked.

  “Well, it’s good to use a name. And you have to admit, Team Nathan doesn’t sound all that cool, and Team Abigail sounds like it has something to do with knitting.” He handed me the shirt. “Put it on. Then we can go give Abigail hers.”

  “It’s extra large,” I said.

  “They come in three-packs. I had to settle for one size. Small and medium don’t work for me. Neither does large. I figured you and Abigail wouldn’t mind a bit of extra room.”

  “She’s never going to wear one,” I said.