Blood Harvest: Two Vampire Novels (5 page)

A horrible thought occurred to Peg. How could
she really be sure this was Zoey at all? It sure looked like Zoey,
but the idea that Zoey had somehow lived had vanished from Peg’s
brain years ago. It was almost easier to believe that this was some
imposter. That was absurd, though. She had Zoey’s face. She had
Zoey’s tattoo. Besides the teeth her body was exactly the same…

Exactly the same. In her shock and disbelief
Peg hadn’t even realized the other thing that was incorrect about
this picture. Perhaps she’d been thrown off by the filth all over
her, but Zoey didn’t appear to have aged a day. After eleven years
she still looked like her nineteen year old self.

Peg tried to dismiss that idea. That could
only be her short-circuiting mind playing tricks on her. As soon as
she got Zoey cleaned up she would see the differences, she was sure
of it.

“I didn’t call 911, just like you asked,” Peg
said. “But I really think that’s a bad idea. The police need to
know.”

“You can’t,” Zoey said. “I’m ripe.”

“You’ve got that right, sis. But that’s
something we can fix.” She held out her hand. “Come on. I can clean
you up.”

Zoey hesitated. “The fruit is all grown and
it’s ready to be picked,” she whispered.

Peg summoned up some of that deep inner
patience she’d been forced to learn when she became a mother.
“Zoey, you’re safe now. I promise you. I won’t let anything happen
to you.”

You were the one that let something happen
to her the first time
, she thought.

She closed her eyes for a moment, did her
best to force the negative thoughts from her head, and then opened
them again. She moved her hand closer to Zoey but she made no
attempt to touch her. Something about her body language suggested a
gazelle that had heard something suspicious in the brush and might
bolt at the slightest provocation.

After several tense seconds Zoey put her hand
in Peg’s. Peg gripped it firmly and Zoey squeezed back, although
thankfully without the same bone-crushing strength as earlier.

With the same care she had taken when holding
her son’s hands during his first steps Peg led Zoey out from
between the furnace and water heater. Zoey didn’t seem overly weak
but she took every step with extra care as though she expected the
ground to sink beneath her at any moment. She stopped for no
apparent reason at the bottom of the stairs to stare into space,
and Peg could only get her going again by taking both her hands and
leading her up the stairs in an awkward backward sort of crab
step.

She didn’t give Peg any more trouble until
they reached the top steps. Peg came out into the hall but Zoey
pulled away and pressed herself tight up against the wall just
beyond the door.

“Zoey, please. We have to get you cleaned up
if…”

“Too bright,” Zoey murmured. “No more light.
Faced it already. No more no more.”

Peg frowned and looked around in the hall.
She didn’t even have the light on in here. It was actually slightly
darker than on the stairs. “Honey, I don’t know what to say. We
have to have some light.”

“No! No more! Walking in the day felt bad.
Please. Make it go away.”

“You mean… the daylight? Do you want me to
close all the windows?”

Zoey sighed and her face looked almost, but
not quite, pleased. “Yes! You understand. Thank you. Thank you,
Peggy, thank you.”

If it meant she could get Zoey moving again
then Peg didn’t see what harm there would be in humoring her. It
was probably a good idea to keep anything going on in here to
themselves for now anyway. Most of the neighbors seemed nice
enough, but yet another lesson she had learned the hard way in the
last eleven years is that, no matter how large or small the town,
you could never quite trust the people living next to you to mind
their own business. In a town the size of Oconomowoc one could be
sure that the local busy-bodies were always on the lookout for some
bit of juicy dish that they could spread around, and Peg was sure
that a naked girl walking around her house covered in shit would
qualify.

She went around the whole lower floor making
sure the blinds and curtains were closed, but that brief time alone
set her thoughts out on a disturbing path. Zoey didn’t seem to be
enough in her right mind at the moment to think about not wanting
the neighbors to see. Instead, she’d said something specifically
about not liking walking in the day. She had somehow managed to
come in through a locked door, going through an entire neighborhood
in broad daylight while in a state that should have sent the
neighborhood watch into a shit-tizzy. Try as she might, Peg
couldn’t figure out how that was possible. Her brain tried to look
at it from all angles, but the matter refused to form a shape that
she wanted to recognize.

Instead the same details just kept going over
and over in her head. Fast or stealthy enough not to be seen. Not
liking sunlight. Incredible strength. And those teeth. Oh, those
teeth.

Don’t you dare
, Peg thought.
Don’t
you fucking dare think it. I know what you’re going to try to say
and you’re not fucking allowed. Your mind is blown. You’re trying
to make sense of things. You have the right to lose just a little
bit of your shit here. But you do not get to start making such
crazy accusations. Not even mentally. You do not get to try to say
she’s a
…

Peg slammed her hand against the wall before
her mind could actually form the word. The pain felt surprisingly
refreshing. She did it again, then again, until finally she could
feel the bruising starting in her hand and there was a small dent
in the drywall. That was yet another thing she would have to
explain later, but it was worth it. The moment had passed. The word
that had been on the tip of her tongue was gone, and she would not
let it come back.

Cleaning Zoey took a
lot longer than Peg had expected. She routinely checked her phone
for the time as she helped Zoey with the shower and the time kept
slipping away toward the moment where she couldn’t make any more
excuses and would have to pick Brendan up. She’d figured that Zoey
would be able to do most of the work herself, but once she had Zoey
under the shower the girl just stood there with her eyes wide as
the water pounded down on her head. She tried saying something at
some point, but when the water had gotten into her mouth she’d
squeaked and clammed up. It was as though she had not taken a bath
or shower in the entire time she’d been gone and now couldn’t
remember what they were for. Judging from the way the muck was
caked onto her, Peg almost thought that might be the truth.

Eventually Peg had no other choice than to
take off her own clothes and join Zoey in the shower to scrub her
down. As soon as she was under the water too the intense
awkwardness of the situation hit her. A memory, very fuzzy from
age, came to her of their childhood. She remembered their mother
bathing them together after some particularly rowdy play date in
the park, although all the rowdiness would have to have been on
Peg’s part since she only remembered Zoey as little more than a
baby. Her mother had put them in the bath together to save time and
Peg had thought that was just the greatest thing in the world, to
have her sister with her where they could play with their bath toys
together. She had a very vague memory of being perplexed to see her
baby sister naked for the first time and discover that they
actually looked alike under their clothes, and she’d asked her
mother if everyone looked like that. Her mom had said more or less,
and Peg had asked her if that included boys. Her mother had then
been quick to change the subject.

That playful innocence about nakedness was
all gone now, though, and Peg couldn’t help but feel distinctly
uncomfortable with the idea that she was now standing naked with
her sister. It wasn’t like there was anything sexual about it, and
it wasn’t even the first time Peg had been this close to a naked
woman, thanks to a night of drunken experimentation years ago. No,
what made this feel so weird was the sense of vulnerability she
felt in the situation. She still couldn’t even fully register the
fact that her sister was here standing in front of her, yet with
only about an hour of getting reacquainted, time that hadn’t even
been very productive, Peg was forced to literally bare all. Zoey’s
eyes remained unfocused the entire time, which Peg couldn’t help
but feel was a blessing. Peg’s body was like a chronicle of all the
time they had spent separated. Here were the stretch marks from
when she had been pregnant. There were the tattoos that Peg had
added after Zoey’s disappearance. She was most self-conscious of
all about the various scars that criss-crossed her upper arms,
shoulders, and legs. Those were the self-inflicted wounds that had
slowly built up from all Peg’s cutting. Tony would sometimes run
his fingers over them during intimate moments, but Peg was never
quite comfortable with that. Those scars were hers, not to be
shared with anyone else. Now Zoey would be able to see them as
well.

The awkwardness gave way to frustration as
Peg tried to scrub Zoey down. The scent of her Dove soap and Tony’s
Irish Spring thankfully started to overpower the stench Zoey had
come in with, but the crap that covered her was not easy in coming
off. The more she worked the more she was certain that she was
indeed putting her hands in shit, and soon the bottom of the tube
was caked in an ugly gray-brown smear even with the water running
over it. She ruined several loofahs and wash clothes, turning them
into crusty messes that she was sure no one would ever want to use
again. And still, despite all the scrubbing, some of it just would
not come off Zoey’s skin. It was as though the shit had been
permanently rubbed into her in some places, tattoos of the most
disgusting order.

Finally Peg declared that this was all she
could do for now and turned off the water. The tub would need to be
cleaned now and she would still need to go around the house
cleaning off anything Zoey might have touched, but she was at least
in a semi-presentable state. Zoey looked down at herself, and
although she didn’t say anything she looked for a moment like she
was on the verge of a smile. Peg took that as a sign of
approval.

“It’s a start at least,” Peg said. “I’m going
to get you some clothes, and then I have to leave.”

The sound that escaped Zoey’s lips made it
clear that she was not comfortable with that.

“I swear, it won’t take me more than fifteen
minutes. I have to go pick up my son.”

Zoey blinked. “S…son? I don’t…” Zoey looked
her up and down as though truly seeing her sister for the first
time. “Peg? What did… I don’t understand.”

“I really don’t either at this point,” Peg
said. “But we’ll figure it out, okay? I swear to you I won’t let
you down again.” The
again
slipped out against Peg’s wishes.
Years of therapy and group sessions were supposed to have drilled
it into her head by now that what had happened was not her fault,
but still she believed it on a deep, unreachable level.

Peg led her into the living room and left her
there long enough to get some of her older clothes from her
bedroom. Nothing fit Zoey, considering she had always been a
smaller girl to start with and Peg had put on a few pounds here and
there, but she looked decidedly more normal even with the baggy
t-shirt and sweatpants hanging off her tiny frame. Zoey didn’t
appear very comfortable in them, making Peg wonder just how long it
had been since she’d worn something. It seemed ridiculous to think
that she might have been naked for eleven years, but then it seemed
ridiculous that she would be naked at all.

“I’ll be right back then,” Peg said. “Just
stay here.”

“It’s out there,” Zoey said. “He’s looking
for me.”

A shiver crept through Peg’s body. This was
the first thing Zoey had said that might make some sense. “Who’s
looking for you, Zoey? Is it the person who kidnapped you?
Did
someone kidnap you?”

“You have to watch, you have to see,” Zoey
said. She didn’t even bother to look at Peg. Her gaze darted
rapidly in every direction like she was trying to make some sense
of her current environment. “He has no brain. Just eyes. He’s eyes
on legs, and he’s out there.”

Peg so desperately wanted to ask her more,
but she didn’t have any time. Besides, Zoey didn’t look like she’d
be able to answer anything coherently at the moment anyway. Maybe
after Zoey realized she was safe here she might start to calm down,
and then finally Peg might get some answers. In the mean time,
though, it hurt Peg in ways she didn’t yet fully understand to look
at Zoey like this. She might still have looked nineteen—a detail
Peg still wasn’t able to fully accept yet—but her mind was nothing
like the exuberant and slightly bratty teenager Peg had been
missing all these years. Peg honestly had no idea if her ordeal had
been anything she could recover from, but she swore right now that
she would do everything she could to help. She owed Zoey that
much.

It suddenly occurred to her that there was
something missing from this experience. In every futile fantasy
she’d ever had about her sister returning, whether it was
accompanied by joy or fear or anger on Peg’s part, there was still
one common part of the vision, and Peg hadn’t even done it yet.
Careful not to spook her and very much aware of how foreign the
action felt after so long, Peg leaned forward and gave her baby
sister a hug.

Zoey paused, and for a few moments Peg
thought maybe she was too far gone to even appreciate this. Then,
with some hesitance, Zoey hugged her back. And Peg finally started
to cry.

Peg almost got a
speeding ticket on the way to the sitter’s.