Mick’s eyebrow remained stuck in the middle of his forehead. “Snark-who?”
Doc nodded, scratching a thick white sideburn. “The world is angry right now, angrier than I’ve seen it in all my years.” He leaned on the bar and stared hard into Mick’s and Rob’s eyes. “And I was around during the Nixon administration, but recession or not, if we don’t start lookin out for one another, we’re never gonna make it. Too many monsters out there.”
Rob and Mick nodded in silent affirmation and took a long pull from their bottles.
Kourtney pressed a button on a gun behind the bar, ejecting a stream of fizzy Coke into a red plastic cup. She plopped a straw into it and turned around. “All I know is there’s no way texting and driving kills more people than smoking does.”
“I can’t wait to start smoking!”
Rob and Mick froze mid-drink and slowly rotated their heads to the seven-year-old seated around the corner of the bar.
“Alex!” Kourtney gasped, clapping a hand over her chest. “You are not smoking ever!”
Alex stopped drawing and looked up. “How’s come, mom?”
Her icy glare landed hard on Doc. “Because smoking is for losers!”
Alex shifted on the bar stool to adjust the leather holster around his waist. “I just hope I don’t die from second-hand smoke,” he said heavily, returning to his artwork.
Doc rolled his eyes and swept a hand through his slicked back salt-and-pepper hair. “Here we go,” he mumbled.
“Oh honey, you’re not going to die,” she said softly, crossing over to him and flashing Doc a dirty look along the way. “I’ll deal with you later,” she whispered.
“Can’t wait,” he said dully, pushing through a wooden door with a porthole window behind the bar.
“Here ya go, bud,” Kourtney said, setting the Coke in front of him and slipping a folded up one dollar bill to him beneath the bar. “Nicely done, squirt,” she whispered, kissing him on the head. Alex took the money without looking and casually deposited it into his jeans. Kourtney squinted at the drawing on the dark wooden bar. “What is that?”
“A hearse.”
Kourtney’s eyebrows dipped. “A hearse?”
Alex nodded, inflating the tires with a black Crayola marker.
“Why are you drawing a hearse?”
He shrugged. “Saw it on TV. Reminded me of dad,” he said bleakly.
She sighed and tucked a loose strand of brown hair behind an ear.
“I wish he was still alive,” Alex said, the marker going back and forth like a polygraph needle when someone is lying.
Kourtney forced a tight smile. “I know you do, honey. So do I.”
He stopped coloring to take a drink from the frosty Coke, his cheeks sucking inward as the clear straw turned dark brown. Just after he swallowed a large burp rattled his lips. “Can I be Michael Myers for Halloween this year?”
She frowned. “Michael Myers? How do you even know who that is?”
“I saw it on TV,” he grinned. “But I wanna be Michael Myers when he was little, in a clown costume with a bloody knife.”
She laughed and tousled his hair. “One thing’s for sure, kiddo, you’ve sure got your daddy’s blood runnin through ya,” she said, wiping down some greasy menus.
Rob and Mick watched the boy begin coloring again, their mouths agape.
“Never turn your back on that kid,” Mick leaned in and whispered.
Rob snorted, watching Alex switch out the black marker for a red one. “I just hope they don’t let him have scissors in school.”
Mick snorted. “If your daddy was killed in a hunting accident you’d turn morbid, too.”
Kourtney looked their way. “What was that?”
Both men raised their eyebrows and shook their heads, quickly turning to the nineteen inch standard-definition TV behind the bar, where a Twins game was all knotted up in late innings. The TV was nearly as dusty as the walleye mounted above it.
Two heavy-set women waddled up and set four empty glasses on the bar with a startling clatter.
“Four more, ladies?” Kourtney asked, depositing the glasses into the sink.
“Please, sweetie,” the one with blonde hair and brown roots said. “Can barely keep up with these girls tonight!” She turned her gaze upon Mick and Rob and examined them from top to bottom, like a cocky detective. “These jokers behavin themselves?”
“Hardly,” Kourtney said, scooping ice into four clean rocks glasses.
The red headed friend laughed sharply. “If their eyes were laser beams, the backside of your britches would have more holes than a golf course.”
Kourtney laughed and grabbed a half empty bottle of Jack Daniels.
“Sound jealous, Michelle,” Rob grunted, staring at her in the mirror behind the bar.
Michelle laughed, making her red curls shake. “You’re damn right I am!” She glanced at Alex and leaned into Mick’s ear. “I wish you’d ride me half as much as you ride your damn bike.”
Mick chuckled. “Ain’t enough Viagra in the world to make that happen!”
“Oh, you two wouldn’t know what to do with this much woman,” the blond said, running a hand along her curvy figure.
Rob grunted. “Have to put some of it in a truck because all of that ain’t fittin on the back of my bike,” he snickered, pushing his empty bottle to the edge of the bar.
“Don’t take any of his crap, Marge,” Kourtney said, sliding four Jack and Cokes across the shiny bar-top.
“Well, not all of us can have gorgeous bodies,” Marge replied, winking at Kourtney and dropping a twenty on the bar. Kourtney blushed and took the money. Mick and Rob waited for her to turn to the cash register before letting their eyes bore holes into the seat of her tight fitting jeans.
Michelle leaned in between them. “You wouldn’t know what to do with that either,” she said softly.
The bell hanging from the front door jingled as it burst open with a bang. Their heads snapped over to see Woody, Rachel and Rory standing next to a wooden coat rack carved into a weathered fisherman, donning a yellow slicker and matching hat. Sweat and blood dripped from their arms and chins as the ragged looking trio caught their breath. Woody’s chest, shirtless and covered in red scratches, rose and fell like someone who had just finished a marathon. His mouth opened to speak but nothing came out.
Rory’s eyes scoured the stale smelling room, darting from one bewildered face to the next. When he was certain the bar’s patrons weren’t the living dead, he helped Rachel to a stool at the end of the bar. Blood oozed from a nasty gash over a knee she favored with each painstaking step.
Kourtney slammed the register shut and set Marge’s change on the bar without looking. “What happened?”
“Call 911,” Rory said, carefully setting Rachel onto a round bar stool with cracked vinyl. She plopped down with a final groan, dropped her face into her hands and began crying.
Kourtney’s forehead creased as she came down to the end of the bar. “What happened?”
“Three people are dead out at the lake. Just call the police.”
Kourtney hesitated with her mouth hanging open, staring at Rory like he was nuts.
“There’s no time to explain!” he shouted, dropping onto the stool next to Rachel.
Kourtney jumped and went to a beige phone on the wall behind the bar.
Woody took the stool on the other side of Rory, feeling the weight of the stares upon them.
“What happened, Wood?” Mick asked, his mouth hanging open just as wide as everyone else’s.
The two women sitting by the front window exchanged glances and craned their necks to hear over Bon Jovi’s Raise Your Hands.
Woody exhaled a long breath and stared at his battered reflection in the bar mirror. He barely recognized the man looking back at him. Normally, his tan set off his white coral necklace but tonight they blended.
“Woody!”
Woody’s bloodshot eyes snapped over to Rob.
R
ob leaned forward, looking past Mick. “What the hell is going on?”
“I don’t know,” he murmured, his eyes as glassy as a bucket of cool water. “Something…came out of the lake.”
Everyone’s eyes narrowed at the same time as they slowly shuffled closer to Woody, reminding Rory of those things.
“Was it the boogeyman?”
They slowly turned to Alex, who was staring at Woody with grave eyes. He set a red marker (which he had just used to draw a pool of blood beneath the hearse) onto the bar. “He’s come back, hasn’t he?” he asked, brushing his hand against the cap gun stuffed inside his holster.
Woody swallowed dryly and turned to Marge. “Can I get a quick drink of that?”
Her eyes dropped to the Jack and Cokes in her hands. “Sure, honey.”
Woody grabbed a glass, pushed the straw aside and finished the drink in four large chugs. “Thank you,” he sighed, handing her the empty glass.
Marge took it and frowned at the ice cubes rattling around in the bottom. She looked back up, her face drooping further. “What the hell happened out there, Woody?”
He took a deep breath and shook his head. “Dead people came out of the lake. They dragged Kate, Ashley and Clutch back into the water with them. We’re pretty sure they’re all dead.”
Marge nodded slowly, examining him with dubious eyes. “I see.”
Rob got up from his stool and started for the front door.
“Where you goin?” Mick called out after him.
“Get my gun,” he said dryly, pushing the glass door open and stepping into the dimly lit parking lot.
Doc came through the wooden door behind the bar with two cases of Miller High Life bottles in his beefy arms. He set them on top of a long cooler with a grunt and followed Alex’s wary eyes to Woody. Doc’s forehead - shiny from too much Brylcreem – folded. “What’s wrong? Ya run out of beer already? It’s not even midnight yet.”
Kourtney hung up the phone. “The police are on their way.”
Doc’s face twisted in the light from a neon Corona sign. “Police?” He went around the bar, his eyes finally falling upon their wounds. “Good Lord, what happened?”
“Boogeyman got em, grandpa!”
Chapter Ten
“Jake Fletcher? Bullcrap!” Deputy Myer huffed, studying Woody through thin eyes. Fleetwood Mac’s Gypsy was the only thing to interrupt the shocked silence that followed. “What’s this all about, Rory?” He turned to Rory, resting his hand on his sidearm. “You’re back in town for…what, two days and you’re already causing trouble? That ain’t like you.”
Rory shifted on his bar stool, feeling like a child with the deputy hovering over him. “Just take us down there and we will show you.”
Rachel frowned. “I’m not going back there! No way!”
“It’s okay, sweetie,” Kourtney said, leaning over the bar and patting Rachel’s hand. “You don’t have to go anywhere.”
Myer took a step closer and squinted at Rory, holding his tongue for what seemed like several minutes. “Well then tell me this…why didn’t these…things follow you into the woods? What’re they some kind of new fangled water-zombies?” he said, making his fingers dance across the air like he was playing an invisible piano.
Rory looked around the bar. The faces staring back at him were eager for his reply. “I don’t know.”
Myer inched closer, encroaching upon Rory’s personal space like a well-trained cop knows how to do. “Well, I’ll tell you what I know. I know you smell like a bar,” he said softly, his voice filled with righteous indignation.
Mick chuckled. “Look around, Enis. You’re in a bar!”
The deputy’s head spun around so fast his cheeks jiggled. “What’d I tell you about that Dukes of Hazzard crap, Michael?” he scowled.
Mick lifted his eyebrows and shrugged his shoulders. “That it’s your favorite TV show ever?”
“Your inspiration for life itself,” Rob added.
Myer stared at them for a moment longer before swinging his icy glare back to Rory. He shifted in his stance and cocked his head. “Tell me somethin, ace, you been smoking the evil weed tonight?”
“W-what?” Rory stammered. “No, Jason, I haven’t.”
“Oh yeah? Then how come your eyes are so bloodshot.”
“Allergies.”
Myer laughed, his belly bouncing inside a skin-tight Minot Sheriff’s Department t-shirt that was black and hid the swelling pit stains beneath his armpits. “Allergies! All of ya?” His eyes swept down the line to Rachel and Woody.
Rob dropped his head and chuckled. “Maybe he’s allergic to the fun police, Roscoe.”
Myer turned to him with a scowl. “How bout you, Rob? How much you and Mick had to drink tonight?”
“After this crazy story, not nearly enough,” Mick said, clanking his bottle against Rob’s.
“Yeah, and I catch either one of you ridin those bikes outta here tonight I’m gonna bust the both of ya.”
Rob sat up straight and drunkenly saluted the deputy. “Aye, aye captain!”
“Hey, you gotta pay for them snazzy uniforms somehow,” Mick scoffed, wiping beer from his mustache with a hand that only a mechanic could have.
“Jason, come on now, quit harassing our customers,” Kourtney said, adjusting her ponytail. “Unless you want to start payin for all that Mountain Dew you put away every week.”
Myer turned back to Rory and removed his black Minot Sheriff’s Department ball cap to reveal sweat droplets glistening below his receding hairline. He took a calming breath and released it, rubbing his forehead. “Listen, Rory, I’m the only one out here patrolling for fifty miles around,” he said, lowering his voice. “To top it off, I’ve got a three-month-old baby girl with a cold at home and an irritated wife who hasn’t slept in two days. I don’t have time for zombie fairytales.”
Rory traded glances with Woody and turned back to Myer and spoke slowly. “They’re not fairytales.”
“Bullcrap!” he yelled, spraying Rory’s face with warm spittle. “You on mushrooms, too? Cuz I’ll bust the whole darn lot of ya.”
Rory got to his feet, rising to Myer’s level. The deputy instantly closed the gap between them, bridging their noses.
“You can at least go take a look.”
Myer bumped him with his big belly. “I’ve seen about all I need to see right here,” he said, the smell of peanut butter floating out with his words.
Rory pushed back, caught up in some bizarre sumo wrestling match with the local deputy sheriff. “How about you try doing your job for once, Jason? It’s really not that hard,” Rory said through gritted teeth.
Myer grinned at him. “Least I’ve got a job, Rory.”
Rory laughed and turned to the others. “Yeah, if you call stakin out the Dunkin Donuts a job!”
Rob and Mick laughed.
Myer paid them no attention and held his ground, clinching his fists at his side. “You gotta big mouth. You know that?”
Rory chest bumped him a step back. “Bet ya think it’s purty, too, don’t ya?”
“All right, now just take it easy, Rory!” Doc cut in. “Jesus Christ, Jason, you’re already here. Might as well quit your bellyachin and go take a quick look.”
Myer snorted, making his belly shake. “Take a look for what? Some unicorns and leprechauns prancing around the woods? They’re just stoned, Doc. That’s all.”
Woody tossed another sideways glance to Rory and then took a long sip from a cold bottle of water.
Doc leaned his thick forearms on the shiny bar top and stared into Myer’s eyes. “Deputy, I’ve known these kids damn near their whole lives and they wouldn’t make something like this up. They’re good kids. Now, look at em! They’re covered in scratches and scared to death. If they were partying out at the lake and came all the way in here, asking us to call the police, then there must be a good goddamn reason for it.”
The deputy laughed sharply and took a few steps back. “Come on, Doc! Don’t
tell me you believe this zombie crap. Heck, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say…”
“Jason!” Doc barked, startling the deputy into a stunned silence. “You get your ass in that patrol car and go check it out or I’ll call Hooper down here.” Doc stared the deputy down with hardened eyes, eyes that had seen a lot of weird shit in this place over the years. And one thing Doc Newcomb didn’t put up with was weird shit.
Floodwater Zombies Page 9