Generation Dead (12 page)

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Played with
, as though they would be playing hide-and-seek.

"Marissa's daughter? Remember Marissa, that woman I used to date?"

Pete remembered, with growing dread. No news was the only good news Dad was capable of providing.

"Well, her daughter, Julie, died about two weeks after you went back home to your mother. Helluva thing. She had a massive asthma attack. They said it was triggered by a spider bite or something."

Helluva thing
.

He watched Angela Hunter laughing with Layman and Scarypants, and the pen he'd been tapping on the back of the chair in front of him snapped in his hand, spilling a long blue bubble of ink onto his skin.

He smeared the ink bubble onto the seat cushion next to him. Dad was utterly clueless about how Pete had felt toward Julie. Just like he was clueless that Pete would never feel that way about anyone ever again.

The sad tale of Dallas Jones, the original zombie, had hit the media a few weeks after his dad broke the news of Julie's death to him. At first, Pete had secretly clung to the hope that Julie might come back, but when she didn't, that hadn't surprised him either. People hung around the edges of his life, but they never really "came back."

His hand was blue from the base of his little finger all the way down to his wrist. People had begun to leave the auditorium, but not Morticia Scarypants; she was still hanging

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around where the hot blonde stood trying to pass out sign-up sheets. There was something about Phoebe that reminded him of Julie.

Why Scarypants gave him this feeling, he wasn't sure. Julie had been the furthest thing from a goth and she hadn't been the dress-and-boots-wearing type, either. But there was something-- an expression, a smile. Something.

He watched Phoebe for a little while, and then he left to go wash his hands in the big lavatory outside the auditorium. He ran the water as hot as he could stand it and squirted six shots of the thin pink hand soap into his palms and worked up a lather. The restroom door swung open, and he heard someone shuffle in. Frowning, he looked up and saw the blue-gray face of Tommy Williams in the spotted mirror.

"Didn't think you'd have much use for this room," Pete said, smiling and shaking his hands over the sink. "Seeing as how the parts don't really work anymore. They don't, do they?"

He watched Williams clench and unclench his hands.

"Leave ...me alone," the dead boy said, his strange voice echoing over plumbing and tile. "Leave ...Phoebe ...alone."

Pete thought about walking over and drying his hands on the dead boy's shirt, but the idea of coming that close to his body without the benefit of football pads and tape was nauseating to him.

"You should be the one leaving her alone," he said. "Freak."

Tommy took another step toward Pete, and Pete had a moment of panic because he really didn't know what he would do if the zombie reached for him or took a swing at him. There

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wasn't anyone in the school he was afraid to fight with, from Adam on down--anyone living, that is. He'd tried a half-dozen different ways to hurt him in practice, but the zombie had shaken him off like droplets of sweat off his skin.

"I know ...what you are ...thinking," Tommy said, the left side of his mouth lifting in a sick approximation of a smile. "You are thinking ...what do I ... do ... if he ... hits me? What do I ... do ... if he puts his ...hands ... on me?"

"You can't get inside my head," Pete said, but he saw Tommy raise his hand and cover the light switch with it. Pete looked over his shoulder at the door. He didn't want to be in the dark with the zombie; not in this bathroom, not anywhere, ever.

"I'm already in your ...head," Tommy said, his voice a dry whisper. Pete felt the exhalation of air touch his cheek, and he shuddered. "Do your worst at practice. It...only makes me ...stronger. But do not...threaten ...my friends."

Pete was about to reply, but he couldn't find the words, and then the lights went out. He threw a punch in the dark, hit nothing but air, and threw another one with the same result, then covered up, expecting a rain of blows that never came. A moment later the lavatory door swung open and the room was illuminated with light from the noisy hallway outside.

Pete felt along the wall and got the lights on a moment before Norm Lathrop entered. Norm hesitated upon seeing Pete, probably debating whether or not he should just run out the door before Pete had a chance to terrorize him.

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"You're in my way," Pete said. He took a paper towel out of the dispenser and wiped his forehead.

"I'm sorry," Norm said, almost jumping on the way to the urinals.

I've got to do something about the freakin' zombies, Pete thought, and punched open the bathroom door.

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***

CHAPTER TEN

S
O," PHOEBE SAID, SQUEEZING over next to the dirty bus window. There weren't all that many students taking the bus home, but she and Margi usually shared one of the double seats. "So what?"

"So what do you think?"

Margi was practicing being "obtuse." "About what?" "About the assembly, brainiac."

"Oh. I don't know." She took her iPod out of her satchel and started to scroll through the long list of bands.

Phoebe sighed. "I'm going to join," she said, "if I can get in."

"I figured you would," Margi said. She selected a song off of M.T. Graves's solo album
All the Graves Are Empty Except Mine
and pushed the volume until they could both hear it, a thin tinny wail, above the chugging of the bus. "You'll get in."

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"You figured I would?" Phoebe rocked into Margi's shoulder, applying gentle pressure. "You and me against the world, right, Margi?"

"Yeah. I know why you've been hanging out after school, Pheebes. I know it doesn't have to do with getting your history project done."

"Oh," Phoebe said. "I did get the project done, though."

Margi leaned gently back into her, like she appreciated Phoebe not coming up with some stupid cover story that would have embarrassed them both. Margi's stare normally had a hard edge, but now her eyes were soft and scared.

"What is the deal with you and him, anyhow?"

Phoebe turned to look out the window; they were already on the wooded roads. She saw no zombies--
differently biotic persons
--swaying in place among the birches and oaks.

"I don't know what the deal is. I don't know that there is any deal. There's a connection, I don't know what. We're communicating, and that's rare for you or me to do with anyone. Living or dead."

Margi nodded. "That's our choice, pretty much."

"Pretty much."

They were quiet for a few moments, which was uncharacteristic for Margi.

"Will you join with me?"

Margi shrugged.

"C'mon, Gee," Phoebe said. "Weird Sisters, right?"

Margi leaned her head against Phoebe's shoulder. "Minus one," she whispered.

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"Gee ...."

"No, I know, I know. Maybe it could be a good thing. Like I'll learn how to talk to her or something." "Colette?" Phoebe asked.

"Yeah, Colette."

"Maybe. Maybe you would. That would be good, right?"

"Sure. But it's still weird, you know? Something is happening. Something is up. Why aren't there any dead kids on the bus today? Colette, or your pal, or the other one? They don't drive."

Phoebe looked around her. The dead kids never missed their ride home. Margi was right. It was weird.

"I didn't even notice."

Margi shifted against her shoulder, like she was nodding. She also rubbed her eye. "I'm not totally brain dead, you know. I see things too."

"I know you do, Gee."

"You'll tell me if you and--Tommy--are more than friends?"

"I'll tell you," Phoebe said. "I don't even know if we are that

yet.

Margi sniffed. "Pheebes and Gee against the world, right?"

"That's right," Phoebe said, putting her arm around Margi's shoulder and hugging her.

The old bus groaned to a halt at Phoebe's driveway, and Rae, the driver, said "Good night, ladies," same as she did every time they disembarked. Rae didn't discriminate--she said her farewells to living and dead students alike.

Gargoyle met them at the door, his rump swaying back and

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forth with doggy glee when Margi stooped to pick him up and let him lick her face.

"Careful," Phoebe said. "Foundation is poisonous to puppies."

"Shut the hell up and get us some snacks. I'm taking my little pretty boy outside."

Phoebe turned the stereo on and filled the house with The Empire Hideous. She took a pot of coffee out of the refrigerator and poured some into tall glasses in which she added too much cream and too much sugar and too much ice, which was how they liked their coffee. There was a bag of potato chips and a box of crackers and some hummus spread.

Margi came back with Gargoyle and began singing along with Myke Hideous, her husky voice blending well with his doleful intonations. Phoebe smiled, filled with affection for her.

"Today's beverage?" Margi asked, setting Gar down and watching him pad over to the couch and hop on.

"Crème brûlée," Phoebe said, holding out the tray for Margi, who selected one of the glasses.

"Mmmmm," she said. "Tastes sweet."

"That would be all the sugar I added."

"Yes. Good choice. So what are we doing, other than getting caffeinated?"

Phoebe brought the tray over to the coffee table and sat next to Gar, who rolled over for a tummy rub.

"I TiVo'd something last week. I thought we could watch it."

"Uh-oh. My spidey senses tell me this is a setup."

"Wow, Margi, I'm really impressed. First bilocation, and

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now precognition. Your telepathetic powers are working in overdrive today."

"It's that psychic bond we share," she said. "Because if there is one thing you are not, it's predictable. Goo-goo eyes at a dead kid, even I couldn't have foretold that."

Phoebe tossed a throw pillow at Margi. "The show was on CNN. It's called
The Young Undead in America
."

"I sense a theme here," Margi said, flopping ungracefully next to her, with Gar in between. "I don't suppose that we could just listen to Empire Hideous and call it a life?"

"Nope. We're going to be socially conscious today. Topical. I hear differently biotic persons are all the rage these days."

"Hmm. Me too."

Phoebe worked the TiVo remote with one hand while using the stereo remote to kill the music with the other.

"You're good at that," Margi said. "You should have been a guy-"

"Too cute," Phoebe said. "And I like smelling nice."

There was an opening montage narrated by someone who'd mastered the art of the grim monotone. Then there was a brief clip of the Dallas Jones video with some explanation of the start of the living impaired phenomena, crosscut with some sound bites from Reverend Nathan Mathers, who seemed to think that the dead coming back to life was a sure sign of the Apocalypse. The montage ended with the narrator suggesting that, as with any other new trend in American society, someone would be on hand trying to profit from the phenomenon. The montage ended by showing a well-dressed man with a toothy smile

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signing copies of a book called
The Dead Have No Life: What Parents Need to Know About Their Undead Youth.

Phoebe rubbed her temples. "Telepathetic powers, activate," she said, and then attempted to replicate the narrator's delivery: "One thing is clear: the living impaired phenomenon has changed the very fabric of American society."

"One thing is certain," the narrator replied, "the presence of the living impaired has irrevocably altered the American way of life--no pun intended."

Margi laughed. "You totally watched this before."

"I totally did not," Phoebe said. "If you watched the news occasionally you'd be able to do it, too. And you'd be better at doing the voice."

"Deadpan. No pun intended."

"You're dead right. No pun intended."

"He has a better vocabulary than you do. Irrevocably."

"Someone has to. Inevitably."

They sipped coffee as the Dallas Jones video began to run.

"Ugh, I hate this," Margi said as the now-familiar grainy black-and-white image began to click forward. Dallas Jones walked into the convenience store and withdrew a gun from the pocket of his puffy black bomber jacket and pointed it at the clerk. There was no sound, but it was clear he was shouting at her.

Dallas turned his head to look toward the street, and in the moment he turned back, there was a smoky blur as the shotgun blast caught him high in the chest and blew him back a good five feet into a rack of snacks and a pyramid of soda cans.