Yeah, sure, whatever, he said. He seemed distracted, but Caleb figured that was to be expected. Lucas moved to go to the back room to punch in and put on a smock, but Caleb caught him gently by the arm first and leaned in close so that only Lucas could hear.
Hey, just keep an open mind tonight, all right? No matter what you see. Just be cool.
Lucas didn t look like he knew how to take that. Right. Okay. Then he went around to the back. Caleb waved to Phil as he went to the door. Have a good night, man. Phil didn t wave back, although when Gloria waved he at least acknowledged it with a nod.
What was that all about? Gloria asked as they stepped out into the parking lot.
Don t really know, Caleb said. Then a thought occurred to him. Or maybe I do. He didn t seem too happy last night about having to work with the newbie tonight. Lucas kind of came off as closed minded, and Phil was planning on having Sue stop by tonight.
Gloria nodded as they made it to the edge of the parking lot and stopped under the glowing OneStop sign. They make a cute couple.
Cute s not the word I would use for it, but they do couple.
That s not a visual I needed.
You re the one that thought they were cute.
So are we going to stand around flapping our yaps or were we going to go do something? Gloria asked.
Well, first thing we need to do is go back to my apartment, Caleb said.
Gloria s eyes went wide. Whoa, hold on, I don t know what you thought was going to happen tonight
We need to go to my apartment because I forgot my duffel bag, dumbass. Again he felt like smacking himself in the forehead. This was definitely not the way he should be talking to his date. If Gloria hadn t been that upset by his first flippant comment, this one at least made her glare at him. Remind me again why I m hanging out with you tonight?
Okay, that wasn t good on several levels. Not only had he already managed to piss her off less than a minute into their first date, but she now didn t even seem to be calling it a date. If he didn t do something this night wouldn t end well. He racked his brain trying to think of some way to placate her that might have worked in the past, but it had been some time since they had worked with each other and her visits to the OneStop Mart since then had been sporadic enough to not be helpful at all.
Sorry. I m just Just what? Did he really want to admit he was nervous? It might soften her up quite a bit if he made just that small confession, but he couldn t bring himself to swallow that much pride. Instead he just let his words trail off, and there were several seconds of incredibly awkward silence.
Right, Gloria said. Let s just go get your duffel bag and then find some place to hang out or something. Something in her voice made Caleb think that she just wanted to humor him for a while and then leave. He might as well just call it off right now and go home to listen to Led Zeppelin records by himself and play video games. That s certainly the way it would all end anyway, so there was no use denying the inevitable.
Except that was stupid, and he hated himself for thinking like that. If he could stop the world from ending three times a week at the store in between refilling the soda cooler and placing the ice cream order then he could sure as hell at least get through an already less-than-perfect date. Couldn t he? That said some very disheartening things about him as a person if he couldn t.
They both walked back to his apartment in silence. Caleb tried to think of something to say that would bring the mood back around to something better, but he found himself with few things to talk about. He could talk about work, but would Gloria really want to hear any of that? She would probably be bored to tears talking about the newest hot doglike product for the roller grill, or the latest flavors of Mountain Dew in stock, or the homeless goblin junkies he had found trying to sleep in the bathroom last week. He knew he would be in her position at least. So he didn t say anything at all, and the tension just felt like it got worse with every step. With the sun fully down, the Hill had completed its nightly transformation and there were signs of things not quite human all around them. Down the street on one of the corners three women in skimpy and tacky dresses made passes at the occasional passersby. Two looked human, while the other was only eight inches tall and had dragon-fly wings poking out her back. A car drove past with gansta rap blaring from the speakers, and although it went by too fast for Caleb to be positive, he thought the people inside might have all had red skin and horns sticking out on their foreheads. Caleb and Gloria passed by an alley where two figures stood in the shadows, and from the shambling movements of the nearest one he could tell that it was a zombie. It lunged at the second figure, a man in a trench coat, and both Caleb and Gloria stopped, ready to spring into action and stop the attack. But the second figure simply opened up his trench coat and pulled out a baggie from inside. The zombie slowly handed the man a fistful of money and then pocketed the baggie. Caleb couldn t be sure in the poor light, but if he had to guess he would say that the baggie had contained pieces of brains. It was much easier for zombies these days to get their fix from dealers than to worry about the hassle of forming mobs and shambling after their prey.
Caleb s apartment building was a simplelooking three story structure, one of hundreds of plain buildings on the Hill. Caleb pulled out a key as they walked up to the front door, but he saw some idiot had apparently left it unlocked. That was an incredibly stupid thing to do anywhere in the city, but it was doubly so here. Even the people who never went out after dark and never realized who or what was actually on the Hill knew far better than to do something like this. He looked back at Gloria, but she didn t appear to notice that anything was strange. Caleb opened the door and peered into the first floor hallway.
Gloria, what do you have in your duffel bag tonight?
Just the usual stuff, she said. Something about his posture or his words must have worried her, because she frowned. Why? What s up?
Caleb continued looking down the hall. He could hear a television playing behind one of the doors, something that might have been a pair of voices in argument behind another. Nothing out of the ordinary at all. Just another quiet night for clueless mundies. I guess it s nothing. Just having trouble leaving the job behind on my day off, maybe.
Gloria made some vaguely affirmative noise, but he noticed that she kept one hand on her duffel s zipper as she came in with him and they climbed the stairs to his floor.
Caleb tried to relax. He had to be overreacting as a way to take his mind off the tension between them. Maybe if he tried starting polite conversation, this time keeping a tighter control on his little barbs, then he could help things. He looked at her as they reached the second floor. Did you come up with any ideas on what you wanted to do tonight?
I don t know. There s the Club McPhisto, but I ve never been comfortable going there since the time I ordered a Bloody Mary and they made it with actual blood. I know it sounds lame, but we could always try Stubby s Bowl-a-rama if you re up for something cheesy and oh hey would you look at that. Caleb blinked at her a couple times, not sure what exactly that was supposed to mean, until he realized that she was staring straight ahead. Caleb looked too.
He had worked at OneStop for a long time now, longer than would have been healthy for his sanity even if it had been a normal convenience store. He d thought he d seen enough to never be surprised by anything again. But that was all at work and away from the sanctuary of his sleepy little apartment building. He never thought any of the things that he had to deal with at the store would be at his door. Or rather through his door, apparently. The door to his apartment was smashed into thousands of pieces and scattered all over the hallway.
Chapter 6
After a short steady flow of customers for the first twenty minutes of the shift, the OneStop Mart now only had one customer loitering over by the magazine rack. Phil did the nightly cigarette inventory while Lucas went to the bathroom. Phil was alone for less than a minute when he heard the howl of distant wind and looked at the other side of the c
ounter to see a black mist forming.
He set down his clipboard and waiting patiently behind his register.
The mist coalesced into a form that stood over seven feet high. It might have had a vaguely humanoid shape, but it was difficult for Phil to tell under the thing s thick dark cloak. It didn t appear to have any feet, and instead of hands it had bloodstained ivory claws at the end of thick, hair-covered digits. Beneath the thing s hood where a face should have been there was nothing but a formless swirling void. It reared up and held its claws out in a menacing manner. An unearthly shriek issued from where its mouth should have been, a terrifying noise that rattled the store s windows.
Phil waited, trying not to show how bored he really was. The customer at the magazine rack didn t even look up.
The thing was quiet for several seconds, and if it had eyes Phil thought it would probably be blinking at him in confusion. Then it shrieked again. Phil waited until it was finished before he spoke.
Would you mind not doing that? If you break those windows with your opera impression then you re the one who s going to have to pay for them.
The thing put down its claws. Phil wished he could say that this was the first time he d ever seen a formless void in a cloak look dejected, but he would be lying.
So I don t scare you? it asked.
You re new around here, aren t you? Phil asked.
Uh, yeah. Just moved in down on Grant Street. Why you ask?
Because that kind of schtick really isn t going to work in this neighborhood.
But how can it not? I m the Boogeyman. I strike fear into the hearts of children and the weakwilled the world over.
Phil didn t try to argue with him. It wouldn t do any good. Everyone that came into the store thought they were so unique. I am the Alpha Werewolf for the whole western United States! I am the Queen of the Damned! I am Elvis reincarnated! The thing was that every werewolf seemed to think they were the alpha, and there were no fewer than four queens of all who were damned within a ten block radius. As for the Elvises, well, most of those people were just nutters. The real Elvis only came around once every eight or nine months.
Seriously, guy. Not going to work, Phil said. Now was there something I could help you with?
The cloak s shoulders slumped. No, I guess not. The boogeyman turned and started floating for the door, then stopped and came back. Unless you have any of those sour apple gummy ring things? Those are awesome.
Phil pointed down one of the aisles at the candy, and the boogeyman floated off to grab them. Not long afterwards, Lucas cautiously stepped out of the bathroom.
Do I want to know what that shrieking was? Lucas asked.
Boogeyman, Phil said as he went back to doing the cigarette count.
Oh. Um, right, Lucas said. Just the freaking Boogeyman. No sweat there. None at freaking all. He stayed over by the nacho cheese dispenser to watch as the boogeyman rifled through the candy.
Phil supposed there were things he should have been training the newbie to do, but his mind was too busy with other stuff to care much at the moment. Lucas could stand there for a few minutes not doing anything if he really wanted. At any other convenience store Phil would have been concerned that the security cam would catch them slacking off, but the camera here in the store hadn t worked ever since it had become haunted. Not that the whole store was haunted, just the security camera. Phil supposed there was a story there but no one had figured it out yet.
Of more concern right now was what to do when Sue showed up. He was worried about how Lucas would react when he found out that Phil was dating a zombie, but there was also the reason he had wanted Sue to come by tonight in the first place. He wanted to talk with her about where they were in their relationship, where they stood with each other, where it was going and if what either of them felt was real. All things that would have to be dealt with eventually, but they couldn t talk about it just yet, because Sue s tongue was mostly rotted away. Until they figured out a way around that, communication was going to be tough.
Phil knew that other people were weirded out by his relationship with Sue, and as much as the constant disgusted looks pissed him off he could still understand where everyone else was coming from. He had felt the same way not long ago. Zombies were just one of the many minorities that called the Hill their home, and while Phil had always been a live and let un-live sort, he still hadn t wanted much to do with them. Sue had become a regular customer at the OneStop a couple months after he had started here, but he hadn t known her name then. She had just been another zombie, one that Caleb had found quite annoying, in fact. She had a fondness for Slim Jims but never had quite enough change to buy one. She would come in and try to pay for them with buttons and bits of moldering lint from her pockets. Phil had found Caleb s consternation with her to be funny until it had become obvious that she had a crush on Phil. Then Phil hadn t been amused anymore.
She had started following him around on the occasions where he was out at night without having to work, and when he did work she would come into the store and loiter for long periods of time. It hadn t helped any that, temporarily, she d been imbued with ancient mystical energy and been able to make him aroused on command. But as much as he had wanted to be annoyed at her for all that, it had also piqued his curiosity. The same mystical energy had regenerated her slightly for a time, and although it had been impossible to not think she was a zombie, she at least gained back some of her original appearance and personality. It hadn t been a lot, but it had been enough for him to learn who she was and how she had died. And once he had learned then he had begun to fall in love with her.
Her full name in life had been Susan Emily Buchowski. Born on April 18th, 1960, died on the Hill in the summer of 1984. She d been a dancer in life, struggling to make it big in Hollywood. The opportunity had presented itself to appear in a music video by one of the biggest stars of the day, a video that was supposed to feature a large group of dancing zombies. Apparently the dancers in the video hadn t known why they were filming the video so far from Hollywood, but Phil had come to find out that the director had wanted to add some authenticity to the video by adding in actual zombies, and the Hill had been the perfect place for that.
The video eventually went on to be very famous, but it created the myth that zombies could dance. In the real world zombies couldn t dance at all, and they usually got very upset when they were reminded of that fact. Filming a video of dancing zombies only made the real zombies angry.
Most of the dancers had been wiped out in the resulting zombie rampage, with only the singer, the director, and a few of the extras making it off the Hill alive. The few survivors who had been willing to talk to Phil about it had told him they owed their lives to Susan Buchowski. She d been scared, of course, but her courage and quick thinking had saved them. Unfortunately she hadn t been able to make it out alive herself, and in the resulting cover-up she had been buried in a shallow grave in Leechman Park. She d left behind her mother and a brother, but no boyfriend. She d been alone for most of her life.
Putting a real name and story to her had changed how Phil felt about her. As a zombie she was only vaguely aware of her surroundings, and the relationship could sometimes feel one-sided. But in her moments of lucidity he could see in her one remaining rotted eye that her feelings for him were becoming just as deep as his. That didn t make this all less complicated, though.
In his duffel bag under the counter tonight Phil had brought along a couple of old and worn books he d borrowed from a local pimp-slash-necromancer. It was his hope that he could find something in them that could recreate Sue s ability to speak. And from there, well, maybe it was too much to hope right now that he could bring her back to life, but he could at least try to somewhat restore her. That could be his gift to her.
But she probably wouldn t be in yet for about an hour. He had to focus on his work for now, as pointless as it might seem. And that meant training the newbie.
Hey, Lucas, he said as he put dow
n his clipboard. Come over here. There s a few things I should show you about the register.
But you don t want me to actually you know Lucas gestured at the boogeyman, who was floating back to the register with him arms full of bags of sour candy. You can t honestly expect me to erm
He s a customer, Phil said. Just serve him already.
Lucas didn t do as he was asked. Instead he just stayed in his corner, staring in horror at the boogeyman as it laid its purchases on the counter. Phil sighed as he began ringing up the candy himself. He could tell that this was not going to be a good night.
Chapter 7
Gloria s fingers ran down the row of records on Caleb s makeshift cinder-block-and-board shelves, selecting one at random again and pulling it out.
Houses of the Holy , she said. Pristine condition. I ve got to say, I never took you for a vinyl sort of guy.
They sound better than CDs and MP3s, Caleb said, only partially paying attention to her. And they have more personality.
You ve got hundreds of them, Gloria said as she put the record back. She pulled another and looked at it, Iron Maiden s Seventh Son of a Seventh Son. Although there s no accounting for taste, I guess.
Caleb ignored the barb and continued to look around the main room of his studio apartment. He would rather Gloria help him look to see if anything was missing, but it wasn t like she would know if anything was gone anyway. Besides, if he were in her position he would have gone right for the records, too.
The strange thing was that, other than the door, the apartment looked just fine. He didn t have much in his main room to begin with, just a bed, a couch, an entertainment center, and his record collection. His television was decent and his game systems were the best available, and a few of the records could probably fetch great prices on Ebay. But none of it was missing or damaged.
I m missing something here, Caleb said. This isn t right, and as soon as I figure it out I m going to hit myself really hard for not getting it
New Title 4 Page 4