Undead with Benefits (36 page)

“Me too,” Amanda replied. She smiled up at me. “I didn't know you were the jealous type, Stephens.”

“Does it really count as jealousy if you actually make out with another guy?”

“Eh. Gray area. Maybe don't ditch me again.”

“Sorry,” I said. “It was really shitty without you, by the way.”

“Good.”

We kissed then. Slow and gentle, but when I tried to pull away, Amanda sucked on my bottom lip and wouldn't let me go, so we kissed some more. We kissed until she hiccupped again and broke away to wipe her eyes.

We sat quietly for a while and watched the horizon burn. Eventually, I opened up my backpack and unrolled the bandana. In the dark, I handed Amanda the little bottle of body spray I'd stolen from the mall.

“I got this for you,” I said.

She laughed, easy and surprised, and sprayed a little bit in the air. It was a vast improvement over the heinous combination of fire and rot.

“Thanks,” she replied, and squeezed me.

“I got you a record too,” I continued. “But it broke and I had to use it to stab Red Bear in the eye.”

“Wow. Crazy day.”

“Yeah.”

There was just one last thing left in my bag. I pulled out the remaining syringe of Kope Brothers Un-Undead Super Serum. It glistened with significance in the moonlight, or maybe that was just my imagination.

I tried to hand it to Amanda, but she shoved my hand away.

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “You should.”

“I won't,” I replied. “Not without you.”

“That's stupid,” she said. “Stop being all fucking chivalrous and do what we came here for, Jake.”

“You stop being all whatever girl-chivalrous is,” I retorted.

She sighed. Both of us stared down at the syringe in my hand. Amanda pushed a hand through her hair and looked me in the eye.

“If—if I hadn't gotten shot, if you hadn't—hadn't used that one on Cody to save me,” she said shakily, “we could be human right now. It's my fault. You shouldn't have to save me twice in one day. It's ridiculous.”

“No way,” I said. “It's not your fault at all.”

Because it wasn't. There were other forces at work here. Other reasons why everything had gotten so screwed up.

Sensing me tense up next to her, Amanda ran her hand across my mohawk. She touched her forehead to mine.

“I don't mind staying this way with you,” she said. “It's not so bad.”

I knew she was lying. I pictured her crying in that hotel room when I'd mistakenly yanked out a chunk of her hair. Amanda wanted to be human again more than I did. The last couple weeks had worn her down and today was the worst day yet. And she was lying to me, for my benefit, willing to keep living this miserable existence so that I didn't have to go it alone.

It made me furious, but not at her.

“There's another way,” I said. “I know where we can find more.”

Amanda leaned back, searching my face to make sure I wasn't joking.

“Where?”

I pictured it. Sunshine, fish tacos, psychic manipulation.

“Out there,” I said through gritted teeth, keeping it vague. “Back over the wall. West.”

Amanda was quiet for a moment. “You gave some to
her
, didn't you?”

I nodded. On the horizon, something huge exploded, a rippling ball of fire rising into the night sky. The force of the blast reached us a second later, the rusty struts of the water tower creaking.

“World's ending,” I observed.

“I'm not sure we could make it back to the wall,” Amanda said. “Not sure we could make it over.”

“We could hunt down some of those soldiers,” I suggested. “Figure out how to dodge machine-gun fire this time.”

Amanda smiled sadly. “Let's just sit awhile longer.”

We both fell silent, the reality sinking in that this night on the water tower might be it. That we were just two rumbling stomachs away from not being us anymore. We didn't move, though. I think both of us realized that maybe enough was enough—there was only so much highway you could travel, so many people you could eat, before it was time to call it quits.

Amanda reached across me for the backpack and for a moment I thought maybe she'd had a change of heart, that maybe she wanted to take the cure after all. Instead of the Kope Juice, she took out the T-shirt it'd been wrapped in and tore off a strip from the bottom.

“Give me your arm,” she ordered.

I did as I was told and Amanda carefully looped the strip of fabric around our wrists, binding us together.

“In case we turn, this will keep us together,” she explained. “Those ghouls seem so lonely. I don't want to be like that.”

I smiled and squeezed her hand.

“Okay, but it's going to make it really hard for us to climb down the ladder.”

Amanda snorted. “If that's what we decide to do.”

“Yeah,” I replied. “If.”

Amanda put her head on my shoulder, and together we watched the fires gutter and wink in the distance. Pretty soon we'd have to definitively decide the great zombie debate of the modern era: Which is better? Fast zombies that charge relentlessly toward their next meal, or slow, shambling hordes that stick together in undeath because it'd be too unbearable not to?

Pretty soon, but not just yet. For a little while longer, we could just be ourselves. The living dead, living it up.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

JEFF HART
is originally from Rochester, New York, and now lives in Brooklyn. He is also the author of
Eat, Brains, Love.

 

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BOOKS BY JEFF HART

Eat, Brains, Love

CREDITS

Cover art © 2014 by Christine Blackburne / MergeLeft Reps, Inc.

Cover design by Michelle Taormina

COPYRIGHT

HarperTeen is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

 

Undead with Benefits

Copyright © 2014 by Full Fathom Five, LLC

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2014937630

ISBN 978-0-06-220036-5 (pbk.)

EPUB Edition JUNE 2014 ISBN 9780062200372

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