Best New Zombie Tales: Vol. 1 Part 4

"Where? Exactly? Um, well, we drove all over the place. Into Redding and all over town, then, uh... Palo Cedro, we drove out to Palo Cedro. And then we came back into Anderson on Deschutes."

"You didn't stop anywhere?"

"No. Oh, wait." After they left the hospital, they had stopped at an AM/PM minimart so Randy could take a leak and Liz could buy a soda. Kirk told McCready about the stop.

"You were still in Redding at that point?"

"Yes."

"At what time did you stop at the minimart?"

"It was a bad night, Officer McCready. Natalie had just died. I'm not sure what time it was. Maybe nine o'clock, nine-thirty. Maybe closer to ten. I'm not sure."

"I understand. After that, you just drove around for a couple hours?"

Kirk nodded. "Till almost midnight, when Randy dropped me off at my place."

"Who's car were you in?"

"Randy's mother's car, Randy was driving."

"After you were dropped off, where did they go?"

Kirk shrugged. "As far as I know, they went home."

"I'd like to talk to both of them," she said.

He gave her their names and addresses and she wrote them down in a small notebook.

McCready nodded. "Okay. I'd appreciate it if you'd keep your eyes and ears open, Kirk. If you hear anything about this, if you suspect anyone" She took a small card from her s.h.i.+rt pocket and handed it to him. "you'll call me, won't you?"

Kirk took the card and nodded. "Sure."

After McCready left, Kirk headed back to his bedroom, but Dad caught up with him in the hall.

"Kirk," he said, "I'm going to ask you again. Did you do something foolish last night?"

"I... I don't know what you mean by foolish."

"You don't know anything about what happened to Natalie's body?"

Kirk's brain clenched as he tried to keep his face neutral. "No, I don't know anything about it."

Dad stared at him for a long time, frowning, then nodded once and patted his shoulder. His face relaxed and he smiled a little. "Okay. If you say so. Do you have plans tonight?"

"No. I'm tired. I think I'll go to bed early, maybe read a little."

"Well, don't skip dinner."

In his bedroom, Kirk called Randy on his cell phone. They'd spoken briefly that afternoonRandy had wanted to come over, but Kirk had said he wanted to be alone. Now he told Randy about Officer McCready.

"Why the f.u.c.k's she wanna to talk to me?" he said, his voice becoming high and squeaky.

"Because you were with me last night," Kirk said. "And because you were a friend of Nat's. That makes us suspects."

"I'm a suspect?"

"Just calm down. Get out of the house if you don't want to see her, but make sure you call Liz and warn her. We've got to get our stories straight. After we stopped at the AM/PM, we went out driving, nothing else, we just drove around. You drove us toare you listening? This is important. You drove us to Redding and we drove around there for a while, then we went to Palo Cedro, and then"

"Palo Cedro? You said we drove out to Palo Cedro? You think she'll buy it? Even people who live in Palo Cedro don't drive through it after six o'clock at night."

"It was the first thing that popped into my head. We drove around in Redding, then drove out to Palo Cedro, then came back to Anderson on Deschutes. Got that?"

"I got it, I got it."

"As soon as we hang up, call Liz and tell her, okay?"

"Yeah. Then can I come over to your house?"

"Not tonight. But plan on coming over early tomorrow. I'm going to need help."

"Help doing what?"

"Deciding what to do with Natalie."

After dinner, Kirk went to his room and tried to do some homework. He couldn't concentrate, so he played a computer game for a while. All he could think about was Natalie sitting alone out in the pool-house.

There was a knock at the door and Mom came in. He was seated at his desk and she went to him, hugged him. She was plump, with short, curly blonde hair, and she smelled of the stew they'd had for dinner.

"Oh, Kirk, baby, I'm so sorry," she said. "Who would do such a horrible thing?"

It took him a moment to realize she was still talking about the disappearance of Natalie's body.

"Can I get you anything, sweetheart?" she said.

"No, I'm fine, Mom."

"If there's anything you need, or if you want to talk, you know I'm always here for you. I just don't understand how someone could do such a thing. Can you imagine why someone would do such a thing?"

Kirk imagined Mom coming across Natalie in the pool-house and it gave him a chill. She would probably have to be hospitalized.

She finally left, and he went on with his game for awhile, then stretched out on his bed. Time crawled along.

He waited until he heard his parents close their bedroom door and the house became silent. He went down the hall to the bathroom and took from a shelf an aerosol can of pot-pourri-scented air-freshener. Back in his bedroom, he turned off the light. He stuffed a couple pillows under his blankets just in case someone decided to look in on him. He took a penlight from the drawer of his bedstand and climbed out his window.

The night was damp and still and cold. The rain had stopped, but clouds blocked out the light of the moon and stars. Kirk moved silently across the back yard, around the covered pool, and went into the pool-house.

The odor had grown stronger, but thanks to the cold weather, it was not as bad as Kirk had feared. He relied on his penlight instead of turning on the lights inside the pool-house.

Natalie had not moved from her place on the toilet, but as soon as he entered the bathroom, she made a quiet, high-pitched sound and moved slightly beneath the sheet and afghan. Her eyes moved a little, but a milky film had developed over them and they seemed to have sunk deeper into their sockets. He put the can of air freshener on the counter beside the sink and closed his hand on her upper arm beneath the blanket, tried to move it. It was still stiff, but there was a little more give than before.

"Nat, can you understand me?"

She made a noise that sounded like, "Uh-huh," but he wasn't sure. Once she was able to move around, would she be able to walk and talk? Would she be anything like the Natalie he knew? And what was he going to do with her?

It had seemed like such a good idea to go to Mrs. Kobylka and ask her to help him. But he hadn't thought it throughhe hadn't even thought it halfway through.

Natalie struggled as if her body were bound. Her cheeks were hollow and her cheekbones stood out against her grayish-yellow skin.

"I'll come back a little later, okay?" he said. "I promise, I'll be back in a little while."

Before leaving, he sprayed the air freshener all around inside the pool-house.

Back in the house, he put the can of air freshener on his bedstand, then stripped down to his boxers and got into bed. He did not expect to sleep, thoughhe had too much on his mind, too much to think about. But he'd slept little the night before, and it wasn't long before he drifted off into a deep sleep.

In his dream, Kirk was with Natalie. They were nowhere in particular. All that mattered was that they were together. They were lying down, Kirk on his back, Natalie on her side next to him, and they were kissing. She was naked and he stroked her silky skin. Her long black hair draped down and tickled his face as she threw a leg over him and straddled his hips. He moved his hands over her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, squeezed them, took one in his mouth. It was one of those dreams that was so vivid and immediate that he had no clue he was dreaming. He was lost in her, consumed by herand then there was a terrible smell, the kind of smell that conjured images of dead and rotting animals on the roadside and squirming maggots. It filled his nostrils, his throat, and became bigger than the dream itself, until -Kirk woke up coughing. There was a weight on top of him. When he opened his eyes to the gray light of morning, he thought for a moment he was still dreaming.

Natalie was on top of him, naked and grinning, her dead eyes just inches above his face. Her puckered b.r.e.a.s.t.s dangled flatly from her chest. When she spoke, the odor from her mouth was vile. She said, "Kiss me, Frog Boy.

- FOUR -.

Kirk's erection had slipped out of his boxers and was pressed hard against something ice-cold and sticky-moist. The erection wilted immediately as Kirk struggled to get her off him. He closed his hands on her upper arms and was repulsed by what he feltcold skin that was dry and scaly, reptilian in texture. Natalie's thighs clutched him with surprising strength, but he rolled her off and fell out of bed. He hit the floor with a thud and sprang to his feet, hoping no one else in the house had heard the sound of his fall.

As Natalie sat up on the edge of the bed, Kirk stood still a moment and listened for the sound of someone coming toward his room. He heard nothing. The clock on his bedstand read 8:57his parents had already left for the day. He wondered if Kevin was home, or if he was spending the day with Jake again.

The sash of the window he'd left open a crack had been lifted all the way upNatalie had climbed through it as she had in the past. He considered closing it, but thought better of it when he got another whiff of Natalie.

She stood and moved close to him. "Kiss me, Frog Boy," she said again, smiling. Her voice sounded like a boot being pulled out of thick mud.

The smell that came from her mouth was so sickening, Kirk gagged. He grabbed the can of potpourri air freshener and sprayed it around the room, then took the cell phone from the bedstand and punched in Randy's number. As soon as Randy answered, he said, "I need you and Liz to get over here right away."

"'Sup?"

Kirk looked at Natalie. She stared at him with her head c.o.c.ked to one side. Her whole body was a sickly blend of gray and yellow. Her skin was striated and scaly, b.r.e.a.s.t.s flat, nipples puckered. Her face was taut on her skull, sunken eyes bracketed by deep-set temples. She stared at him like a slow-witted child for a long moment, then sat down heavily on the edge of the bed, as if she were exhausted and bored.

"Natalie's up, that's what," Kirk said. "Call Liz. Tell her to pick you up in her car."

"Why can't I use my mom's car?"

Natalie got up, went to Kirk, and knelt before him. "Let's do it here," she said.

"I'll tell you later," Kirk said. "Tell Liz to bring some clothes, something old that she doesn't care about. And some perfume, tell her to bring some strong perfume."

Natalie pulled his boxer shorts down with one tug and closed her other hand, cold and lizard-like, over his p.e.n.i.s.

"No!" Kirk shouted, jumping backward. He bent down and pulled up his boxers. "Stop that, Natalie, please. Sit down. Just sit down."

She stood and went back to the bed, dropped onto the edge and stared at him.

"What's going on over there?" Randy asked.

"She tried to... she wants to... just get over here, okay?"

"What are we going to do?"

"I'll explain when you get here." He cut the connection and put the phone back on the bedstand.

Natalie lay back and leaned on her elbows, spread her knees, and said, "Let's do it here. It'll be ex... ex..." She frowned a moment as she searched for the right word. "Exciting." She pulled her dry, cracked, purple lips back in something that was supposed to be a smile. It looked, instead, like an expression of pain.

Between her legs, her v.u.l.v.a had turned a deep yellow and glistened with draining fluids. The smell that rose up from her v.a.g.i.n.a was rank.

Kirk had to turn away, unable to look at her anymore. He quickly put on jeans and a sweats.h.i.+rt, socks and sneakers. Without looking directly at her, he said, "Natalie, you have to stay here, okay? Can you stay right here for a few minutes?"

"Kirk?" She said the name as if she'd never spoken it before and sounded scared and confused.

He turned to her as she sat up on the bed.

"I'm..." She c.o.c.ked her head again and seemed to have difficulty finding the word. "Hungry. I'm hungry."

"Just stay right here for a few minutes, okay? Don't move."

Kirk opened his bedroom door and poked his head out. He looked down the hall, listened for the sound of someone else in the house. He stepped out of the room, closed the door, and went down the hall to the living room.

"Kevin?" he called.

The house was silent. He went into the kitchen.

Apparently, his parents had decided to let him sleep instead of waking him for breakfast. His mother had left a note on the counter telling him Kevin was spending the day with Jake again. She wrote that he should not make plans for that night because Dad was bringing home a Christmas tree and they were going to decorate it.

Something rubbed up against Kirk's ankle and scared him so badly, he cried out and tossed the note into the air. He looked down to see one of the ferrets slinking around his feet. Mom had gotten them almost a year ago, but Kirk had never gotten used to their presence in the house. They made him nervous. Although Mom could somehow tell Bud and Lou apart, they were identical to Kirk's eyes. He nudged the ferret with his foot and said, "Go on, Bud. Or Lou."

The ferret skittered out of the kitchen.

Kirk opened the refrigerator to find something for Natalie to eat. He quickly made her a sandwich of turkey cold cuts and lettuce and wrapped it in a paper towel. He went back up the hall and stood at his bedroom door for almost a full minute. He did not want to go back in his bedroom and see her again. The personthe thingin his bedroom was not the Natalie he had lost. It was certainly not the Natalie he had expected Mrs. Kobylka's spell to resurrect.

"Hungry," Natalie said in the bedroom.

Kirk wondered if she knew he was standing outside the door. Was that possible?

He went into the bedroom and found her lying on her back on the bed, staring at the ceiling, hands flat on her flat belly.

"Hungry," she said again, talking to herself. She wasn't aware he had returned.

He kicked the bedroom door closed behind him. She sat up as he went to her and handed her the sandwich.

Natalie stared at it a moment before taking it. She held it to her nose, touched the crust of the bread to her tongue, then took a bite out of it. She chewed clumsily, sloppily, as if she weren't sure what she was doing, and pieces of meat fell out of her mouth onto her thighs. She bent forward and spit the rest of it onto the floor and tossed the remainder of the sandwich aside. It landed on the corner of the bed.

"You're not hungry anymore?" Kirk said.