Zomburbia (21 page)

Music came out of the speakers and I immediately stopped laughing. I sat up and found Buddha over by the stereo.

“I know this!” I shouted at him. “Chacho played this in his truck the other night.”

“Big Star,” Buddha said as he walked back to the couch. “This ‘Muchacho' has good taste.”

I stared at him with my mouth wide open. I could feel the gears in my brain spinning at a million miles an hour. None of the gears would catch. Goddamn that pot for making my fuzzy brain even fuzzier. Buddha was looking at me now, a little worried. I think he could tell there was something going on with me. It was something he said. Just a minute ago.

“That's it!” I yelled. Buddha sat back away from my explosion. “Muchacho!”

“Muchacho what?” he asked.

“Muchacho . . .” I searched my memory. Nothing. “Shit,” I said, and sank back to the couch.

The other three laughed. Maybe at me, maybe about something else, I didn't know. I worried at the fact that I couldn't follow the thread of a minute-long conversation. Was that the pot or the Z? I don't think pot had ever affected me like that.

I blinked my eyes and looked around the apartment. Then I blinked some more.

“Did someone turn down the lights?” I asked.

“Oh, yeah,” said Sherri. “It's getting dark.”

Brandon looked around. He alternately blinked and opened his eyes as wide as he could.

“It's not dark,” he said. “There's something about the color.”

Buddha nodded. “Get ready, kids, here it comes.”

“What is this?” Sherri demanded.

But I never heard if Buddha answered her.

 

The world is gray.

The four of us are the only spots of color and we're quickly fading. I stand and it's a struggle. My arms and legs don't want to work right. I feel an itch that wasn't in my body. An idea grabs me and won't let go.

“I need to get downstairs.”

I think the others will argue with me, but only two of them stand, ready to join me. The old one with a beard stays and waves us on. He cackles and mutters to himself.

We head out the door and to the elevator. It takes all three of us to figure out pushing the button to operate the thing. It's only the call of the others outside that can get us to concentrate enough to figure it out. After an eternity, the doors slide open and we stumble inside. We stare at the buttons on the control panel for a long time before the boy bellows and stabs at one of the buttons with a jerking motion of his arm. I hope it's the right button.

The doors open onto an empty room. It smells of gunpowder and meat. There was violence here recently and it makes me salivate despite my dry throat. Beyond the room, through the window, I see the others. The mass of our kind gathered in the streets. All I want in the world is to be with them.

We run across the room and throw ourselves at the window. Why can't we get to them? The girl manages to throw herself against the door in such a way that it opens and she falls out. The boy and I see the opening and we follow her.

As soon as we exit the room, as soon as we're out on the street, all sense of “I” and “me” is gone. In its place is left “us” and “we.” We are absorbed into the mass of our own kind. Everyone so different but all the same. We feel the comfort of losing our selves. We are lost in an ocean of the group's thoughts. “Hunger.” And beneath that, we feel or hear something else, something more. We're not far enough gone yet to sense it properly.

A misshapen face, nose and cheeks missing, eyes milky, stands inches away from us, staring, sensing we are different. But even we are gray, no trace of pink, of color. The face sniffs us, deep chuffing noises, and then moves on. We are the same and so it has no interest in us.

We move through this colorless world, fascinated with the feeling of belonging. We are lost within a mass of others just like us. We've never felt so free.

But still, there are the nagging voices, just out of range of our sensing. And, slowly, the realization of hunger. It starts as a feeling—remote—in our stomachs. Soon it's all we can think about. Our hunger consumes us.

We wander aimlessly through the gray landscape, bumping into the others like us, choosing turns at random. Searching always for what can sustain us.

As we stumble down an alley, drawn by the smell of rotting meat—one of us fed here a while ago—we hear something and stop. Something new has come to us. Behind the Dumpster, something radiates. As we walk closer, we see a shimmering flash of color against the wall. The hunger, already more than we could bear, spikes and we're driven forward.

An animal yowls at us as it darts farther down the alley. For a moment, we stop and watch it. The cat, alive, pulses with color, stands out in this monochrome world like a flare in the darkness. It's so easy to track. We run as fast and as well as we can after it.

We slow as we reach the dead end where the animal has trapped itself. We spread out. We can't let it escape. Nowhere else to go, it arches its back and growls at us—a hissing, snarling sound deep in its throat.

As we approach it, our hands outstretched, an idea comes to us. This feeling, it's not just hunger. We are dazzled by the sight of it, its color and vitality, the life it contains. What we feel is love. We love it and its life so much that we have to have it be a part of us. The thought of letting it go and not having some tiny portion of its life inside of us is unthinkable.

It tries to find a way through our collective grasp. There's no way out. Finally, there's no other option, the creature leaps forward, claws exposed, and it's a whirlwind of slashing legs and biting teeth. It doesn't matter. We love it so much, we'll accept its punishment. The injuries are a small price to pay to possess it.

Several of us have our hands on it and we are all desperate to have it to ourselves. It comes apart as we fight over it, and still it screeches as we open our mouths wide and let its blood, its life and vitality, flood our mouths.

And then there's blackness.

I
came to because the sun shone right in my eyes. I squeezed them shut even more tightly than they'd been. It didn't help. I rolled from my back onto my side and reached for a pillow to throw over my head. That's when I noticed I wasn't in my bed. Instead of my worn cotton sheets, I felt grass underneath me. I opened my eyes and propped myself up on my elbows. Sunlight flooded into my head, which I thought was going to explode.

I immediately lay back down as a headache the size of a rottweiler jumped up and down on my skull. I fought off a wave of nausea. Why was I outside? Why did my mouth feel like it was lined with fur?

I became aware of a loud snore beside me. Moving my head as little as possible, I rolled over to see Brandon there on the grass beside me. I chanced a look down, my head throbbing the whole time, and I laid back, relieved that we both still had our pants on.

When I rolled over, I'd pinned my left arm under my body and I became slowly aware that it hurt. A lot. I raised my body up and pulled my arm out from under me, wincing as it scraped against the ground. Three deep gouges ran up and down my arm, each one filled with dried blood.

What the hell?

I struggled to remember what happened the night before that could account for this. My mind came up empty. Actually, it felt like it might stay empty for the rest of eternity, which would be fine with me if the pain in my head would just stop.

“Brandon,” I hissed, and stopped to squeeze my eyes shut again. Speaking brought a new wave of agony and nausea. I blindly reached out with my left hand and hunted around until I found him next to me. I groped my way up his body until I had hold of a lock of his hair. Then I yanked it for all I was worth.

He jerked away from me and yelped, “Hey!” Then there was silence for a while. “Oh, Jesus,” he said.

“Yeah,” I said, “so you're awake?”

“I am now.” His voice sounded thick with phlegm and he coughed, and then he moaned. “Where are we, Court?”

Court?
Even in my diminished state, I knew that that particular bud would need clipping. “I was hoping you could tell me,
Brand
.”

“Why are we outside? Where's my truck?”

“These are all excellent questions.” I'd planned to say something else, too. Something really scathing. Nothing would come to mind. “I wonder if Sherri is feeling like crap right now, too. I mean, I
hope
she is since this is her fault.”

Brandon didn't answer. I heard him moving around and decided to take a chance and open my eyes to see what was up. I winced away the pain of actually taking in the world. Brandon had sat up. He slowly looked all around us.

“Where
is
Sherri?” he said.

I sat up as fast as I dared—which wasn't very fast—and my head swam anyway. Tiny black dots floated in front of my eyes until I squeezed them shut. Once the feeling passed I opened them again.

We were in a pasture bordered on one side by a split rail fence and on the other three by rows of some sort of trees. What they were, I had no idea, I'm not a tree expert. A few cars buzzed by on the road beyond the fence.

“There's your truck,” I said to Brandon.

“That's good. I'm glad we didn't walk all the way here.”

“Yeah, driving while we were blacked out is so much better,” I said. “But where's Sherri?”

Brandon just shook his head. He looked really far away and he had a dopey grin that irritated me.

“What's up with your arm?” he asked.

I looked at it again.

“I don't know, scratches I guess.”

“Scratches?” The dopey grin was gone, replaced by a look of concern. Hungover concern.

“Down, boy,” I said. “If these were zombie scratches, I'd already be, you know . . .”

“I guess.”

I poked around in my mouth with my tongue again. There was something in there. I finally reached in and dug around with my fingers. I pulled something out and looked at it. It looked like I had a bunch of hair in there. What the hell? I threw it away in disgust.

“We have to go look for Sherri,” I said. “Why aren't you concerned about where she is?”

I took out my phone and dialed her number. It went right to voice mail. I hung up without leaving a message.

“Sherri's fine,” he said. “She's probably at Buddha's place, or she woke up in a field like we did.” He looked around, like maybe Sherri was going to spring up out of the grass.

“That's not good enough!” I shouted. “We need to look for her.” I felt so scared I could barely think. The only thing that made sense was to try to find Sherri.

“Okay,” Brandon said. He did an impersonation of a reasonable person, but I could see anger creeping in at the edges. “Where should we start? Buddha's place?” He stopped and looked around. “Where is that, do you think?”

“I don't know.”

“That's right, Court, you don't know. I don't know.” He stopped and scooted close to me. It felt like he was about to reach out for me, but maybe he thought better of it. “We'd just be running around, burning gas and making ourselves crazy. The best thing we could do is head home and wait for her to call us. The moment she does, I'm in my truck so I can pick her up.” He gave me a sincere smile that made me want to punch him in the junk. “Believe me, she'll be okay.”

“What if she's not okay?” I asked.

“Jesus,” he said, “you worry too much.”

I worry too much about my friend who went missing while we were stoned out of our heads on a drug made from zombie brains. A friend who was the main course for a bunch of shufflers for all I knew.

“Take me home,” I told him, and slowly managed to stand up. The ground seemed to roll gently beneath me as I walked toward the truck. It was like the one time I was on a boat. I didn't like it.

Brandon caught up to me and he took my hand in his. I let him because it helped steady me.

“I'd drive you home if I knew where we were.”

“We'll figure it out on the way.”

“What's all over your face?”

“I don't have a mirror, jackass.”

He turned his head this way and that and squinted at me. “It looks like either your lipstick got smeared all over your face . . .”

“Or . . . ,” I prodded.

“Or, I don't know, blood maybe?”

I stopped. Something nagged at me. Something from last night, and then the fact that I had hair or something in my mouth.

“Oh, shit,” I said, and I started to retch. I didn't even try to hold it back. I just wanted it out of me. I fell to my hands and knees as I heaved up everything in my stomach. The pain in my head shot from “dull ache” to “drum circle” in nothing flat. Brandon backpedaled away from me and fell on his ass.

“What's going on, Courtney? Are you okay?”

I waved him away. He let me finish without talking to me again. When I was finally done, I grabbed up a fistful of grass and wiped my mouth as well as I could.

“Do you remember a cat?” I asked. “From last night?”

“Maybe? Why?”

“I remember a big group of us cornered it in an alley . . .” My voice trailed off. I tried to think of some other explanation and came up empty.

“What is it, Court?”

“Don't call me that anymore! I hate that shit—shortening people's names. We're not in an episode of
Friends,
okay?”

“Okay, just tell me what's going on.”

“I think I ate a cat last night,” I said. I whispered it. Brandon sat forward and I know he was about to ask me to repeat myself. Then he got it. His eyes widened. He opened his mouth to speak. Nothing came out.

“Yeah,” I said. “If I hadn't just puked, I think I'd be sick.” I could barely remember the specifics. All I could recall with any clarity was the feeling of belonging and how incredible it was. But I could bring to mind enough flashes to know that I'd helped kill and eat that poor cat. I wanted to be sick all over again, maybe forever. I'd never killed anything that wasn't already undead. Oh, God, I didn't even kill spiders—I scooped them up and put them outside. How could I have done this? All because of that stupid drug.

Did other people on Z kill animals? Had they ever killed other people? I shoved the thought away for now.

“Do you have any water in your truck?”

“I should have some bottles in there, yeah.” He stood and held out his hand to help me up. My head actually felt better since I'd been sick. Yea, vomiting. He took my hand again and we started back toward the truck.

“Do you think that's where you got those scratches?” He examined my arm.

“It must be,” I said. “Which is fine, that cat deserved to scratch the hell out of me.”

“It wasn't you,” Brandon said, “it was the drugs.”

“That's bull, Brandon, and you know it.
I
chose to take the stupid drugs.
Me
.”

He didn't answer. When we climbed over the fence, Brandon opened the truck and found a bottle of water for me. I used it to wash my face off and then to rinse out my mouth. He held out a second one for me and I drank that one down. I immediately felt better when I drank it. I just didn't know if I deserved to feel better. I thanked him and climbed into the truck. I just really wanted to get home. I wanted to see my dad.

“Shit,” I said under my breath.

“What is it?” Brandon asked as he got us onto the road and started driving in the direction we'd been facing.

“My dad is probably freaking out.”

I found my phone in one of my jacket pockets. I expected to see a zillion messages. There was just one. I pushed the RETRIEVE button and listened.

“Hey, Courtney, it's Dad. I just wanted to touch base and let you know not to stay up waiting for me to get home. I'm going out with Beverly and we'll more than likely go back to her place after. There's a lasagna in the fridge and a twenty on the counter in case you need anything. Call me if you need to. I'll see you sometime tomorrow. Love you. 'Bye.”

I stared at my phone for a long time. I felt like it had betrayed me. Or Dad had. Someone sure had. Maybe me.

“Everything okay?”

“Everything's great,” I said. “Where are we?”

“I think we're actually somewhere around Silverton. I saw a marker and we're on Two-thirteen. If I keep driving this way, I'll run into Silverton or Salem. Either way, it won't take too long to get you home.”

I didn't say anything. I just sat back and crossed my arms over my chest. I wanted to have a world-class sulk.

I tried calling Sherri again. I just got her voice mail. “Call me,” was all I said when I got the beep. I settled back into the seat.

It turned out we were headed toward Salem and would be home in twenty minutes or so. I fought with myself the whole way there. I kept telling myself that Sherri was fine; she'd probably made her way home the way Brandon and I had made our way to that field. I'd hear from her later. Other stuff worried me, too. The fact that my dad wasn't home, hadn't been home, really irked me. I told myself that it chapped my hide because he was being totally irresponsible to stay out all night when he had a teenage daughter at home. He should be there for me when I needed him! That wasn't it or, at least, that wasn't all of it. A big part of it was that I wanted him to know I'd been out all night and to be furious and demand to know where I'd been. I wanted him to do all the things Dad had never done—I wanted him to goose-step back and forth in front of me and send me to my room without any dessert.

I wanted him to get out of me what had just happened. Why did I want to get caught? It was freaking dumb to think that would make things better. I mean, I'd probably lose all the money I'd earned over the last year. That meant bye-bye New York, or anywhere else cool, after I was finally done with school. More than that, I could end up going to jail. They'd probably make me tell them about Buddha. How long would I last in jail once Buddha figured out it was me that got him arrested? No, telling anyone, my dad included, was not the way to go. I needed to stop being all passive-aggressive with myself. If I wanted to stop selling drugs, I should man up and just stop. I totally could anytime, too. As soon as I had another few thousand, I would stop.

I heaved a big sigh and sank even farther into the seat.

“I'm sure Sherri's fine,” Brandon said. He gave me quick concerned glances as he drove.

I forced a smile. “Thanks. I'm sure she is, too.” It was easier to lie than it was to tell him that I was worried. But just hearing him mention her name made my heart beat harder.

We drove on for a minute before he cleared his throat. I thought maybe he wanted to turn on the radio or something.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I just wanted to ask you about last night.”

“What about it?” I asked.

“Did you like it?”

“Did I like it?” I repeated. I couldn't believe he was asking that. “Brandon, last night, while under the influence, I ate a
kitty
!” I was sitting up by then, practically shouting right in his ear. When I was done, I scooted as far away as possible—right up against the door. My head throbbed again and I savored the feeling.

“Yeah,” he said nearly whispering. “I mean except for that.”

I felt my jaw fall open. I rubbed my face. He was serious. “Except for the part where I killed and consumed a small animal, did I have a good time? Is that what you're asking?”

“Yeah.”

“Yes, Brandon, except for that, I had a lovely evening.”

He nodded, this weird, convulsive head movement. “Sure,” he said. “Sure.”

“I get the feeling you want me to ask you how you liked it, Brandon.” He shrugged in this really unconvincing way. “Okay, so how'd
you
like it?”