Undead with Benefits (5 page)

Cass stared at me blankly. “I . . . don't know what that means.”

“Just ignore him,” Amanda said, rolling her eyes. “It's probably about comic books.”

Inside, the first item to catch my attention was the grizzly bear. It was stuffed and mounted, up on its hind legs, flailing its paws and roaring. A price tag dangled from one of its claws. I raised my eyebrows hopefully at Cass.

“Um, let's maybe start smaller?” she replied.

Besides us and the bear, the only other creature in the store was the withered old man hunched behind the cash register. He looked like the type who'd have a banjo close at hand and probably had a ton of stories about “the Japs.” He sucked on some hard candy judgmentally, watching as I inspected a rack of hand-carved stone Native American pipes.

“Sup,” I said to him.

He wrinkled his forehead at me in response. “You aren't from around here,” he observed.

“Nah. I'm from back east,” I replied casually, remembering my sophomore-year community service at the old folks' home and how much they liked hearing a young person talk. “Just passing through.”

“That's wise,” said the old man. “You won't want to linger.”

He turned away from me, busying himself with something behind the register. Cass had sidled up next to me.

“I feel like we're in the beginning of a horror movie,” she whispered.

“I know,” I whispered back. “When does the guy with the leather mask burst out of the back room with a chain saw?”

She shuddered, but grinned at me.

I picked out one of the cooler medium-sized pipes. The thing looked like a hybrid between a flute and a crowbar, and was decorated with beaded leather tassels and what I assumed to be authentic American eagle feathers. I held the pipe up for Cass to inspect.

“This good?”

She shrugged. “I don't know. It's your, uh, paraphernalia.”

I snorted. “Paraphernalia. Who calls it that?”

Cass looked a little embarrassed. “Sorry. I've never actually done that,” she said, waving at the pipe.

“Oh man!” I exclaimed. “We've gotta smo—”

“Decorative use only,” barked the old man, interrupting.

I examined the pipe again. “Psh,” I muttered. “We'll see about that.”

On my way to the register, I also grabbed a black cowboy hat off a rack. It wasn't exactly Johnny Cash level—the material seemed more like cheap felt than whatever actual cowboy hats are made out of (cowhide? I dunno), but it looked badass. And I was a zombie outlaw now, so why not?

This was the point where I'd usually just strut out the door, brazen stealing having become our style over the last couple days. Instead, I glanced over my shoulder at Cass. She was biting her lip but gave me an encouraging nod.

I set the items on the counter in front of the old man. He sighed, like I was disturbing him.

“Let's call it fifty dollars,” he grumbled.

I looked him in the eyes, trying to really amp up the incredulity. “Dude, I just gave you sixty bucks. Where's my change?”

For just a second, there was annoyance and disbelief on the old man's face. But then it was like something passed through his field of vision: his eyes momentarily lost focus and his pupils got all big. He shook his head once, sharply, like he'd just dozed off, and then opened the cash register. He handed me ten bucks.

“My mistake,” he muttered, rubbing the back of his head. “Thank you for your patronage, son. Be careful out there.”

I managed to play it cool until we were outside the store. Then I turned to Cass, wide-eyed and grinning. “Dude, I can't believe you can do that! It's amazing!”

“Dude,” she repeated, deadpan, her hand dropping away from her face. She'd been pinching the bridge of her nose. “Yeah. I guess it's pretty cool.”

“Did it actually work?” Amanda asked. She'd gotten out of the car and was peering at a bulletin board posted outside the trading post.

I pushed my cowboy hat down on my head and tipped the brim toward her. “What does it look like?”

“Like maybe I should be in charge of making our shopping list, so we end up with more than goofy hats and bongs.”

“It was just a test run! Now that we know the psychic credit card—no offense, Cass—is working, we can get serious about our supplies.” I paused. “What do you even pack for breaking into a government quarantine zone?”

“I've got some ideas,” Amanda replied. She started back toward the car, but first jerked her thumb at the bulletin board. “Maybe that explains why this place is so creepy.”

I took a closer look at the board. It was absolutely covered with
MISSING
notices. Almost all of them were teenagers and almost all of their disappearances had taken place within the last six months. But the one thing every flier had in common? Every missing face was last seen somewhere in Iowa.

“How is this not national news?” I exclaimed, glancing over at Cass. “You NCD people must have hella good PR dudes.”

Cass didn't look all that interested in the bulletin board. She still lingered on the sidewalk in front of the shop, a distant look on her whiter-than-usual face. I thought about how she'd fainted after using her psychic hoodoo back in Illinois and worried she might be about to pass out or something. As soon as I took a step toward her, she snapped out of it.

“Everything okay?”

“Yeah,” she replied, keeping her voice quiet, probably so Amanda wouldn't overhear. “I'd just never done that before.”

I squinted at her. “What're you talking about? I've known you for like three days and I've already seen you straight knock people out with brainpower.”

“No, what I mean—I've never done it like
that
before. For personal gain, you know? Breaking the law.”

“Ah,” I replied sagely, catching on. “With great power comes great responsibility.”

“Spider-Man. I know that one,” Cass said, smiling a little.

“So,” I started tentatively, turning the pipe over in my hands, a symbol of our ill-gotten telepathic gains. “Is this going to be weird for you? Because we can just steal shit the old-fashioned way. You don't have to help if this, like, violates the psychic code or something. I get it.”

“There's no code,” Cass replied, staring down at her feet. “It's nothing like that. I just—” She sighed and looked up at me. “I kinda liked it, okay? Does that make me a bad person?”

I tried not to laugh. This girl had messed with just one old man's brain and was now asking me—a guy who'd literally messed, as in, smeared on my face, more than a couple brains—my thoughts on morality.

“I'm probably not the best person to ask,” I answered honestly. “If it's any consolation, pretty sure you're the least criminal person in the car. And doing it this way is less public for us, less rampagey, you know? Safer for humanity.”

Cass snorted. “Very heartening. Thanks.”

“No problem,” I said, and then, without really thinking about it, I tossed her my black hat. She caught it against her chest. “Welcome to outlaw life.”

“Outlaw life,” Cass scoffed. “Let's hope I don't end up on a wanted poster.”

“Or one of those,” I said, pointing toward the bulletin board.

Amanda honked the horn impatiently. As soon as I'd climbed into the car, she pinned me with one of her dagger-sharp glares.

“What was that about?” Amanda hissed, jerking her chin toward Cass. Our conflicted psychic was studying the bulletin board now, turning the black hat over in her hands. After a moment, she resolutely plopped the hat on her head.

I stifled a laugh, realizing only then what a goofy wardrobe choice the cowboy hat was.

“Just a pep talk,” I said to Amanda. She kept staring at me. “What? She's not as used to the lifestyle as we are.”

“What lifestyle is that, exactly?”

“You know, the criminal lifestyle.”

“Criminal
undead
,” Amanda stressed. “And no, she wouldn't be used to it because she's not one of us. Stop romanticizing things with stupid hats.”

“I don't—that doesn't even make sense,” I replied, flustered, not sure how or why we were fighting. “What's wrong with you?”

Amanda shook her head. “God, you're oblivious, Stephens.”

“Really? I hadn't noticed.”

“Durp durp,” Amanda replied, rolling her eyes. “You're so funny. Everything's a joke.”

Cass climbed back in the car and Amanda peeled out of our parking spot. I looked over at Amanda, wanting to ask her what I was being oblivious about, but also knowing she wouldn't want to talk about it in front of Cass. So maybe I wasn't that oblivious after all.

“What're we stealing next?” Cass asked from the backseat.

I thumbed through the marked-up road atlas. “GPS, for starters.”

“Don't think this gets you off the hook for Iowa, Coyote Ugly,” Amanda said, eyeballing Cass in the rearview.

Cass self-consciously touched the brim of her hat. She put on a good front, but I could tell Amanda was getting to her. It was like being back at RRHS, watching Amanda grind down the new girl until any in-crowd aspirations were undermined by shame-eating and that wild-eyed shakiness usually reserved for movie POWs fresh out of Vietnam. I thought we ditched this side of her back in New Jersey. I didn't like it.

I was about to say something when I noticed the blood.

“Look at that,” I said, pointing toward a billboard at the entrance ramp for the thruway. The ad was for Kope Brothers Pharmaceuticals, some Iowa company that promised “a healthier tomorrow” for the happy family it depicted lounging in hammocks. I'd seen a lot of these ads out on the highways—that wasn't the eye-catching part. On this particular billboard, every family member was literally defaced by jagged skulls, and scrawled over the billboard's bottom half was a giant
CUM 2 DEAD MOINES
, all in a very dark shade of crimson.

“They've been here,” Amanda said. “Those Iowa freaks.”

“All those missing kids,” I added, connecting the dots.

“I hope that's paint,” Cass said from the backseat.

“Me too,” I replied.

It definitely wasn't paint.

CASS

WE DROVE TO OMAHA BECAUSE THE CITY NESTLED right up against Iowa's western border and yet hadn't been swept into the quarantine zone. Also, Jake and Amanda figured that a bigger city would provide better opportunities for psychic-assisted shoplifting.

They were right.

We hit an electronics store first. Picked up a GPS and a Nintendo 3DS that Jake explained he couldn't live without. After he came back to the car with video games instead of something remotely useful, Amanda decided she wouldn't sit out any more shopping trips. So that pretty much ruined my day. And not just because I'd had fun wandering the store with Jake, listening to him ramblingly explain why some game called Metal Gear Solid should've been called Metal Gear Flaccid, thinking about that moment with the cowboy hat and how he'd totally been flirting with me, and ignoring my inner Tom warning me not to mistake kindness for romance.

It ruined my day because the psychic stuff was easier with Amanda.

We hit a camping-supply store for a tent and sleeping bags, a shoe store for boots and sneakers, and every pet store we could find in the GPS. Which meant I'd taken an active hand in Nebraska's guinea-pig holocaust, so I wasn't feeling good about that. At every one of those stores, when Amanda approached the dude/guy/lecher behind the register and sweetly explained that she'd already paid, it was incredibly easy for me to slip into their minds and make them believe.

Because they wanted to believe the hot girl. These sad retail boners hung on her every word.

It made me want to die.

The worst one was our last stop of the day, a coffee shop a few blocks from our hotel. We spread out around a table in the back; Jake busy with some game where an elf in green spandex shot sword lightning at little trolls, Amanda scanning the room like a bird of prey, and me trying to enjoy the spiced ginger coffee and homemade Milano-style cookie I'd bought with some stolen money. The cookie was amazing, actually; it made me feel just slightly less gloomy, and the sugar helped the achy brain I'd been dealing with.

There were a few young people sitting at tables, artsy guys mostly, sipping coffee and working on their laptops. When one of them put his computer away and stood up, Amanda jabbed me in the ribs with her elbow.

“Go time,” she said.

“Ow,” I replied.

“Never say
go time
again,” snickered Jake, without looking up.

“Shut it,” Amanda shot back, already on her feet.

With Amanda leading the way, we cut off Laptop Guy before he made it to the door. He was short—shorter than Amanda, actually—wearing some baggy jeans, sandals, and a coffee-flecked T-shirt. His immediate reaction with Amanda standing in his way was to try straightening his unkempt brown hair.

“Hey,” Amanda said, all demure sweetness, pointing at his laptop bag. “I think you grabbed my computer by accident.”

In the time it took Amanda to speak, I'd slipped gently up against Tim's mind. That was his name, by the way. I knew that now. There was a dull ache behind my sinuses—maybe I'd pulled this trick too many times today—but I pushed ahead anyway.

“Uh,” Tim said to Amanda.

Why is she talking to me is this my laptop wow she's hot I'm so stupid just an accident where's my laptop,
Tim's mind said to me.

Just an accident
was the phrase I plucked out of Tim's stream of consciousness and pushed forward.

“Shoot, sorry, it was an accident,” Tim said, handing over his laptop bag to Amanda. “I have the exact same one . . . at home?”

Yes, Tim. At home.