Hitchers (28 page)

I brushed past Gilly, who was sitting in a leather chair beside one of the big windows, completely absorbed in his composition, his eyes clenched shut, his lips moving silently.

“How's it coming?” I asked.

Gilly opened his eyes. “It's coming. I wish Mick would try out a few of the songs I finished.”

Mick glowered when anyone suggested he do this. He didn't buy my logic. The way he figured it, the more attached Gilly got to his songs, the harder it would be to send him back where he belonged. At least, that's what he muttered when I told him my plan. I didn't think he was being completely honest with me, though. He'd seemed evasive, almost angry when I suggested he help Gilly
finish the album.

“How many hours has it been?” Summer asked. Her hair was down today; it was dark and silky, perfectly straight. Not quite long enough to touch her shoulders. She flipped through channels, stopping on a football game. The Bears versus the Colts. “Ooh. Anyone else here a football fan?”

“Eighteen hours and counting. I'm a Bears fan, since I was about nine,” I offered.

“Really?” Summer's eyes lit up. She held up her hand for a high-five without leaving the couch; I adjusted my pacing route, slapped it, then joined her on the couch.

“My grandfather was from Chicago. I've been a Bears fan since I was three.” Summer dropped the remote and propped her feet on the coffee table. The Bears were down 7-3. While Gilly worked, and the National Guard reinforced the barricades set up around the Route 285 loop to repel a horde that was growing larger and angrier by the day, we watched football. I'd already posted what I'd learned from Salamander on the relevant websites, but still, we should have been scouring the Internet for clues on how to shake our hitchers. Time was not on our side.

I glanced over at Summer, who was staring up at the massive TV screen sporting a half-smile, hugging one knee.

She saw me looking, looked at me. “Mmm, smell that?” The aroma of onions and peppers wafted through the open windows, from Queenies.

“Nice,” I said.

“Do you like to cook?”

“No. Lorena was the cook.”

“I can't cook either. Opening the refrigerator is a humbling and confusing experience for me. I eat fast to dispose of the evidence.”

I laughed; I could definitely relate.

Jay Cutler completed a twenty-yard pass on third and ten. Summer raised her fist in the air.

“Nervous?” I asked.

“Plenty.”

“Just be careful not to fall out and you'll be fine.”

She shifted position, pulling one foot underneath her. “I'm more afraid of seeing my brother than anything else.”

Across the room, Gilly dropped his pencil. “Okay. Hey, Mick.” The way he said it reminded me of Dustin Hoffman in
Rain Man
(only dead); I wondered if Gilly might be slightly autistic. In some ways that fit him, but in others it didn't.

Mick brushed the knees of his jeans, stood and stretched. “All right, Finn? Summer?”

“Good to see you, Mick,” I said.

Mick went to the window, stared down at the sparse traffic below. “Good to be me.”

Summer jumped up, tugged my sleeve once, and headed for the door. “Let's go.” Correction—it was Lorena now. I hadn't even noticed the transformation.

It was remarkable, how different a body looked depending on who was controlling it. Summer's gentle, slightly pigeon-toed gait, her tendency to clasp her hands behind her back, was replaced by Lorena's assertive stride, the flex-relax, flex-relax of her thighs, the loose swing of her wrists. Summer's squiggly smirks, which would have been right at home in a
Peanuts
strip, would be replaced by Lorena's wide smiles. Although Lorena wasn't smiling just now. She snatched up Summer's coat and purse from beside the door, turned to wait for us. “If we're going to do this, let's go.” Her tone was tight, impatient.

We threw on our coats, hurried to join her.

“You don't mind?” I asked, touching her elbow.

Lorena shrugged, looked at the door. “Sitting in a hospital room isn't how I'd like to spend the few hours I get before I'm banished again, but you've all decided already, so let's get it over with.”

“I'm sorry,” I said. “I wish we had more time to spend together. This is so important to Summer, though.”

“Fine. I'm not arguing.”

Mick slid past us and out the door without a word.

“Are you all right?” I asked Lorena.

She looked at me for the first time. “You know, in case you forgot, I was there while you and Summer were finishing our date.” She spit the word “date” like it was a pit. “I could see how you were looking at her. You looked at her that same way when she was our waitress at the Blue Boy.”

I tried to say something, but Lorena cut me off.

“I may have to share a body with her, but that doesn't mean I'm going to share my husband.” She folded her arms. “How could you dance with her like that?”

I could feel my ears getting red. “Lorena, you're inside her. When I'm dancing with her I'm also dancing with you. That's always in my mind.” That sounded lame even to me. “Besides, I wanted Summer to enjoy herself, too.” That was closer to the truth.

Lorena grunted, rolled her eyes.

“You know, she doesn't have to hang around. She could go home, or to
Montana
, and every time you came out it would take time for us to meet up again.”

Lorena's eyes narrowed. “She couldn't
afford
to go to Montana—” “Let's just talk about this later,” I said, cutting her off. The last thing I wanted was for Summer and Lorena to have any more reason to hate each other.

Lorena spun, breezed through the door. “Fine.”

Mick drove. The security guard tipped us off that the press were waiting for Mick at the exit from the parking lot, and sent us out the delivery entrance.

As we sped through town I looked out the window, feeling ashamed. For two years I'd mourned Lorena, wondering if I'd ever be able to love someone else. Now, miraculously, Lorena had returned, and I was struggling with feelings for another woman. Maybe it was understandable; wouldn't it make sense that my feelings
might blur and become confused when my wife was sharing a body with another woman?

But I'd been attracted to Summer at the diner, before I knew Lorena was inside her. Lorena seemed to think it went back even further. Was I attracted to Summer even when Lorena was alive? I didn't remember that at all. I'd been madly in love with Lorena.

I pressed my forehead to the window. This was a stupid thing to be worried about. The way things were going it wasn't going to matter. It was pretty clear both Lorena and Summer were not going to survive this. There was serious doubt
I
would survive this. On top of all that, I had no idea how Summer felt about
me
. I'd left my wife to be electrocuted in a rowboat, and goaded my twin sister into jumping to her death. I wasn't exactly a prize.

“I'm sorry,” Lorena said, her voice low.

I looked at her. “What?”

“I'm sorry. Don't worry about it.”

I nodded. She took my hand and squeezed; I squeezed back and went back to watching out the window.

There were National Guard troops at most of the intersections, people in olive fatigues who looked like they wanted to go home. The military always wanted a clearly defined mission; this assignment must make them crazy.

“What do you hear from your friend at FEMA?” I asked Mick.

Mick shook his head in disgust. “They're mostly taking a wait and see attitude. I pointed him toward your posting about what happened to your mate Dave, and he said they'd come across a similar case, but didn't see how to capitalize on it on a larger scale. So they're waiting.”

So much for the cavalry riding in to rescue us at the last minute. It occurred to me that that would make a good
Toy Shop
strip. The National Guard gallop into the toy shop on horseback to help Tina get free of Little Joe's ghost, and stand around doing nothing, asking if anyone has any hay.

It was a strange sight, the three of us and a bodyguard Mick had hired, hanging out in a hospital room. Mick was right about the fame thing—he could have asked them to vacate an entire wing of the hospital for a couple of hours and they would have obliged.

“How long do you think she'll be?” Lorena asked.

The muscular man with the black-rimmed glasses glanced at Lorena, then back out the window. Grandpa wasn't going to get another chance to take a swing at Mick, or anyone else.

“It's got to be a nightmare in there. I'm not convinced she'll even be able to locate him,” I said.

“Am I part of the nightmare?” Lorena asked.

I turned, surprised. “What?”

“Whenever you talk about The Returned there's this tone of dread and disgust in your voice. The prospect of a lot of dead people in one place constitutes a nightmare. I'm one of them, you know.” As if I could forget that, with her voice the way it was, her quavering hands.

“Sorry,” I said. “Somehow I never connected you to the rest of them. It's like, I don't know, like you were there by mistake.”

Lorena rested her chin on her fist, stared at her feet. “No one gets there by mistake.”

The squirming in my muscles started up. Grandpa's turn again. “He's coming,” I managed to say to the bodyguard, then I gritted my teeth until I no longer had teeth.

Grandpa eyed the bodyguard and grunted. “If I was in me own body, in me prime, I might have a go at you.” He stayed in his chair.

I wasted no time turning toward Deadland. If Summer had managed to make the trip she might be grateful to hear a friendly voice. I braced myself, not sure what to expect.

As soon as the room came into view, I felt myself slipping, like I was sitting on a greased slide. I had to sort of
puff out
to keep
from falling out of my body; it wasn't quite like stretching out my arms and legs, not exactly inhaling deeply to expand my chest. It was something in-between that I did instinctively without knowing quite what I was doing.

Once I felt secured it took a moment to understand what I was seeing. The room seemed larger—more the size of a high school gym than a hospital room. It needed to be, to fit all the bodies. Where the bed should have been was a heap of muttering souls, a giant pudding of entwined bodies. Others were scattered across the floor, some lying, others sitting, a few standing. Yet more were stuck to the walls and ceiling.

Then I saw Summer. I should not have been able to see her, because she should still be in her body, looking at Deadland but not in it. Instead, she was in it. There was someone on top of her, and she was screaming at him to get off.

“Summer,” I called.

“Finn?” She turned and looked for me. Her voice was flat, toneless, the distress washed out of it by this world.

The man lying across her was huge. He had his face pressed to her thigh; he was shushing, the way you'd comfort a small child. “Hold still now, Andrew's here to help you along.” Then he pressed his mouth to her thigh, worked his jaw, scraping her leg with his teeth.

“Get off of her,” I shouted. Soul eater. The words leapt to mind instantly. This was what Krishnapuma had written about, a soul that doesn't want to blow away, so it replenishes itself.

He raised his head, looked in my direction. He moved easily, fluidly, immune to the high-G torpor of the world of the dead. “Who said that?”

“You can't see me because I'm not dead. But I can see you. Leave her alone.” I had to speak up to be heard over the constant low rumble of the dead, going through their mindless recital of the things they'd said in life. It was like trying to have a conversation at a crowded party.