The Living Dead

by John Joseph Adams

  Bobby watched them play for a while. A pass went wide, and the spleen skidded past him. He put a foot on it to stop it. It flexed unpleasantly beneath the sole of his shoe. The boys stopped three yards off, stood there breathing hard, awaiting him. He scooped it up.

  “Go out,” he said, and lobbed it to little Bobby, who made a basket catch and hauled away with his head down and the other kids in pursuit.

  When he turned to peek at Harriet he saw her watching him, her palms pressed hard against her knees. He waited for her to look away, but she didn’t, and finally he took her steady gaze as an invitation to approach.

  He crossed to the fountain, sat down beside her. He was still working out how to begin his apology, when she spoke.

  “I wrote you. You stopped writing back,” she said. Her bare feet were wrestling with each other again.

  “I hate how overbearing your right foot is,” he said. “Why can’t it give the left foot a little space?” But she wasn’t listening to him.

  “It didn’t matter,” she said. Her voice was congested and hoarse. The makeup was oil-based, and in spite of her tears, hadn’t streaked. “I wasn’t mad. I knew we couldn’t have a relationship, just seeing each other when you came home for Christmas.” She swallowed thickly. “I really thought someone would put you in their sitcom. Every time I thought about that—about seeing you on TV, and hearing people laugh when you said things—I’d get this big stupid smile on my face. I could float through a whole afternoon thinking about it. I don’t understand what in the world could’ve made you come back to Monroeville.”

  But he had already said what in the world drew him back to his parents and his bedroom over the garage. Dean had asked in the diner, and Bobby had answered him truthfully.

  One Thursday night, only last spring, he had gone on early in a club in the Village. He did his twenty minutes, earned a steady if-not-precisely-overwhelming murmur of laughter, and a spatter of applause when he came off. He found a place at the bar to hear some of the other acts. He was just about to slide off his stool and go home when Robin Williams leaped on stage. He was in town for SNL, cruising the clubs, testing material. Bobby quickly shifted his weight back onto his stool and sat listening, his pulse thudding heavily in his throat.

  He couldn’t explain to Harriet the import of what he had seen then. Bobby saw a man clutching the edge of a table with one hand, his date’s thigh with the other, grabbing both so hard his knuckles were drained of all color. He was bent over with tears dripping off his face, and his laughter was high and shrill and convulsive, more animal than human, the sound of a dingo or something. He was shaking his head from side to side and waving a hand in the air, stop, please, don’t do this to me. It was hilarity to the point of distress.

  Robin Williams saw the desperate man, broke away from a discourse on jerking off, pointed at him and shouted, “You! Yes, you, frantic hyena-man! You get a free pass to every show I do for the rest of my motherfucking life!” And then there was a sound rising in the crowd, more than laughter or applause, although it included both. It was a low, thunderous rumble of uncontained delight, a sound so immense it was felt as much as heard, a thing that caused the bones in Bobby’s chest to hum.

  Bobby himself didn’t laugh once, and when he left his stomach was churning. His feet fell strangely, heavily against the sidewalk, and for some time he did not know his way home. When at last he was in his apartment, he sat on the edge of his bed, his suspenders pulled off, and his shirt unbuttoned, and for the first time felt things were hopeless.

  He saw something flash in Harriet’s hand. She was jiggling some quarters.

  “Going to call someone?” he asked.

  “Dean,” she said. “For a ride.”

  “Don’t.”

  “I’m not staying. I can’t stay.”

  He watched her tormented feet, toes struggling together, and finally nodded. They stood at the same time. They were, once again, standing uncomfortably close.

  “See you then,” she said.

  “See you,” he said. He wanted to reach for her hand, but didn’t, wanted to say something, but couldn’t think what.

  “Are there a couple people around here who want to volunteer to get shot?” George Romero asked, from less than three feet away. “It’s a guaranteed close-up in the finished film.”

  Bobby and Harriet put their hands up at the same time.

  “Me,” Bobby said.

  “Me,” said Harriet, stepping on Bobby’s foot as she moved forward to get George Romero’s attention. “Me!”

  “It’s going to be a great picture, Mr. Romero,” Bobby said. They were standing shoulder to shoulder, making small talk, waiting for Savini to finish wiring Harriet with her squib—a condom partially filled with cane syrup and food coloring that would explode to look like a bullet hit. Bobby was already wired… in more than one sense of the word. “Someday everyone in Pittsburgh is going to claim they walked dead in this movie.”

  “You kiss ass like a pro,” Romero said. “Do you have a show-biz background?”

  “Six years off-Broadway,” Bobby said. “Plus I played most of the comedy clubs.”

  “Ah, but now you’re back in greater Pittsburgh. Good career move, kid. Stick around here, you’ll be a star in no time.”

  Harriet skipped over to Bobby, her hair flouncing. “I’m going to get my tit blown off!”

  “Magnificent,” Bobby said. “People just have to keep on going, because you never know when something wonderful is going to happen.”

  George Romero led them to their marks, and walked them through what he wanted from them. Lights pointed into silver spangly umbrellas, casting an even white glow, and a dry heat, over a ten-foot stretch of floor. A lumpy striped mattress rested on the tiles, just to one side of a square pillar.

  Harriet would get hit first, in the chest. She was supposed to jerk back, then keep coming forward, showing as little reaction to the shot as she could muster. Bobby would take the next bullet in the head and it would bring him down. The squib was hidden under one Latex fold of his scalp wound. The wires that would cause the Trojan to explode were threaded through his hair.

  “You can slump first, and slide down and to the side,” George Romero said. “Drop to one knee if you want, and then spill yourself out of the frame. If you’re feeling a bit more acrobatic you can fall straight back, just be sure you hit the mattress. No one needs to get hurt.”

  It was just Bobby and Harriet in the shot, which would picture them from the waist up. The other extras lined the walls of the shopping mall corridor, watching them. Their stares, their steady murmuring, induced in Bobby a pleasurable burst of adrenaline. Tom Savini knelt on the floor, just outside the framed shot, with a hand-held metal box in hand, wires snaking across the floor toward Bobby and Harriet. Little Bob sat next to him, his hands cupped under his chin, squeezing the spleen, his eyes shiny with anticipation. Savini had told little Bob all about what was going to happen, preparing the kid for the sight of blood bursting from his mother’s chest, but little Bob wasn’t worried. “I’ve been seeing gross stuff all day. It isn’t scary. I like it.” Savini was letting him keep the spleen as a souvenir.

  “Roll,” Romero said. Bobby twitched—what, they were rolling? Already? He only just gave them their marks! Christ, Romero was still standing in front of the camera!—and for an instant Bobby grabbed Harriet’s hand. She squeezed his fingers, let go. Romero eased himself out of the shot. “Action.”

  Bobby rolled his eyes back in his head, rolled them back so far he couldn’t see where he was going. He let his face hang slack. He took a plodding step forward.

  “Shoot the girl,” Romero said.

  Bobby didn’t see her squib go off, because he was a step ahead of her. But he heard it, a loud, ringing crack that echoed; and he smelled it, a sudden pungent whiff of gunpowder. Harriet grunted softly.

  “Annnd,” Romero said. “Now the other one.”

  It was like a gunshot going off next to his he
ad. The bang of the blasting cap was so loud, it immediately deafened his eardrums. He snapped backward, spinning on his heel. His shoulder slammed into something just behind him, he didn’t see what. He caught a blurred glimpse of the square pillar next to the mattress, and in that instant was seized with a jolt of inspiration. He smashed his forehead into it on his way down, and as he reeled away, saw he had left a crimson flower on the white plaster.

  He hit the mattress, the cushion springy enough to provide a little bounce. He blinked. His eyes were watering, creating a visual distortion, a subtle warping of things. The air above him was filled with blue smoke. The center of his head stung. His face was splattered with cool, sticky fluid. As the ringing in his ears faded, he simultaneously became aware of two things. The first was the sound, a low, subterranean bellow, a distant, steady rumble of applause. The sound filled him like breath. George Romero was moving toward them, also clapping, smiling in that way that made dimples in his beard. The second thing he noticed was Harriet curled against him, her hand on his chest.

  “Did I knock you down?” he asked.

  “’Fraid so,” she said.

  “I knew it was only a matter of time before I got you in bed with me,” he said.

  Harried smiled, an easy contented smile like he hadn’t seen at any other time, the whole day. Her blood-drenched bosom rose and fell against his side.

  Little Bob ran to the edge of the mattress and leaped onto it with them. Harriet got an arm underneath him, scooped him up, and rolled him into the narrow space between her and Bobby. Little Bob grinned and put his thumb in his mouth. His face was close to the boy’s head, and suddenly he was aware of the smell of little Bob’s shampoo, a melon-flavored scent.

  Harriet watched him steadily across her son, still with that same smile on her face. His gaze drifted toward the ceiling, the banks of skylights, the crisp, blue sky beyond. Nothing in him wanted to get up, wanted to move past the next few moments. He wondered what Harriet did with herself when Dean was at work and little Bobby was at school. Tomorrow was a Monday; he didn’t know if he would be teaching or free. He hoped free. The work week stretched ahead of him, empty of responsibilities or concerns, limitless in its possibilities. The three of them, Bobby, and the boy, and Harriet, lay on the mattress, their bodies pressed close together and there was no movement but for their breathing.

  George Romero turned back to them, shaking his head. “That was great, when you hit the pillar, and you left that big streak of gore. We should do it again, just the same way. This time you could leave some brains behind. What do you two kids say? Either one of you feel like a do-over?”

  “Me,” Bobby said.

  “Me,” said Harriet. “Me.”

  “Yes please,” said little Bobby, around the thumb in his mouth.

  “I guess it’s unanimous,” Bobby said. “Everyone wants a do-over.”

  THOSE WHO SEEK FORGIVENESS

  by Laurell K. Hamilton

  Laurell K. Hamilton is the best-selling author of the Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series, which began with Guilty Pleasures and was continued most recently with Blood Noir. Another popular series of Hamilton’s is the Meredith Gentry series, which began with A Kiss of Shadows and will continue with Swallowing Darkness later this year. Hamilton has written a number of other novels as well, such as her first, Nightseer, an epic fantasy, as well as the media tie-in novels Ravenloft: Death of a Darklord and Star Trek: The Next Generation: Nightshade. Her short work has appeared in magazines such as Dragon and Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Fantasy Magazine, and in the Sword and Sorceress series of anthologies.

  “Those Who Seek Forgiveness” is the first story Hamilton wrote about her iconic character Anita Blake. In her collection, Strange Candy, Hamilton says that the cemetery in this story is based on the cemetery where her mother is buried. “It was a place I knew very well, because my grandmother, who raised me, took me often,” she says. “I guess it was inevitable that I would write about the dead; my childhood was haunted by death. Not real ghosts, but the ghosts of memory and loss.”

  “Death is a very serious matter, Mrs. Fiske. People who go through it are never the same.”

  The woman leaned forward, cradling her face in her hands. Her slim shoulders shook quietly for a few minutes. I passed another box of tissues her way. She groped for them blindly and then looked up. “I know you can’t bring him back, exactly.”

  She wiped at two tears, which escaped and rolled down flawless cheekbones. The purse she clutched so tightly was reptile, at least two hundred dollars. Her accessories—lapel pin, high heels, hat, and gloves—were all black as her purse. Her suit was gray. Neither color suited her, but they emphasized her pale skin and hollow eyes. She was the sort of woman that made me feel too short, too dark, and gave me the strange desire to lose ten more pounds. If she hadn’t been so genuinely grief-stricken, I could have disliked her.

  “I have to talk to Arthur. That’s my husband… was my husband.” She took a deep breath and tried again. “Arthur died suddenly. A massive coronary.” She blew delicately into a tissue. “His family did have a history of heart disease, but he always took such good care of himself.” She finished with a watery hiccup. “I want to say good-bye to him, Miss Blake.”

  I smiled reassuringly. “We all have things left unsaid when death comes suddenly. But it isn’t always best to raise the dead and say it.”

  Her blue eyes stared intently through a film of tears. I was going to discourage her as I discourage every one of my clients, but this one would do it. There was a certain set to the eyes that said serious.

  “There are certain limitations to the process.” My boss didn’t allow us to show slides or pictures or give graphic descriptions, but we were supposed to tell the truth. One good picture of a decaying zombie would have sent most of my clients screaming.

  “Limitations?”

  “Yes, we can bring him back. You came to us promptly. That helps. He’s been buried only three days. But as a zombie your husband will only have limited use of his body and mind. And as the days go by, that will grow worse, not better.”

  She stood up very straight, tears drying on her face. “I was hoping you could bring him back as a vampire.”

  I kept my face carefully blank. “Vampires are illegal, Mrs. Fiske.”

  “A friend told me that…you could get that done here.” She finished in a rush, searching my face.

  I smiled my best professional smile. “We do not do vampires. And even if we did, you can’t make an ordinary corpse into a vampire.”

  “Ordinary?”

  Very few people who came to us had even a remote idea of how rare vampires were, or why. “The deceased would have to have been bitten by a werewolf, vampire, or other supernatural creature, while alive. Being buried in unconsecrated ground would help. Your husband, Arthur, was never bitten by a vampire while alive, was he?”

  “No,” she half laughed, “he was bitten by my Yorkshire terrier once.”

  I smiled, encouraging her turn of spirits. “That won’t quite do it. Your husband can come back as a zombie or not at all.”

  “I’ll take it,” she said quietly, all serious and very still.

  “I will warn you that most families find it advisable to lay the zombie to rest after a time.”

  “Why?”

  Why? I saw the happy family embracing their lost loved one. I saw the family sick, horrified, bringing the decaying corpse to be put down. The smiling relative reduced to a shambling horror.

  “What exactly do you want Arthur to do when he arises?”

  She looked down and shredded another tissue. “I want to say good-bye to him.”

  “Yes, Mrs. Fiske, but what do you want him to do?”

  She was silent for several minutes. I decided to prompt her. “For instance, a woman came in wanting her husband raised so he could take out life insurance. I told her most insurance companies won’t insure the walking dead.” She grinned at that. “And that is what Arthur will
come back as—the walking dead.”

  Her smile faltered, and tears came again. “I want Arthur to forgive me.” She hid her face in her hands and sobbed. “I had an affair for several months. He found out, had a heart attack, and died.” She seemed to gain strength from the words, and the tears slowed. “You see that I have to talk to him one last time. I have to tell him I love him, only him. I want Arthur to forgive me. Can he do that as a… zombie?”

  “I’ve found that the dead are very forgiving of the living, when they die of natural causes. Your husband will have ample brainpower to speak. He will be himself at first. As the days progress, he will lose memory. He will begin to decay, first mentally, then physically.”

  “Decay?”

  “Yes, slowly, but after all, he is dead.”

  The relatives didn’t really believe that a fresh zombie wasn’t alive. Knowing intellectually that someone smiling and talking is the walking dead is one thing. Emotionally, it is very different. But they believed as time passed and as he or she began to look like a walking corpse.

  “It’s temporary then?”

  “Not exactly.” I came from behind the desk and sat next to her. “He could stay a zombie possibly forever. But his physical and mental state would deteriorate until he was not much better than an automaton in tattered flesh.”

  “Tattered… flesh,” she whispered.

  I touched her hand. “I know it’s a hard choice, but that is the reality.” Tattered flesh didn’t really touch the white sheen of bone through rotting flesh, but it was a term our boss allowed.

  She gripped my hand and smiled. “Thank you for telling me the truth. I still want to bring Arthur back. Even if it’s just long enough to say a few words.”

  So she was going to do it, as I had known she would. “So you don’t want him for weeks, or days, only long enough to talk.”

  “I think so.”