“How old are you?” I asked.
“What kind of question is that?” She scoffed. “I’m the same age as you, dumb dumb!”
That couldn't be true! I jumped up and turned to the mirror. Sure enough, short and scrawny, my face appeared rounder and still plump with baby fat.
“How old?” I asked.
“Duh,” She said. “Eight! We’re both eight. And I’m older by two months. Count 'em; she held up one foot then the other; two!”
I shook my head. “This can’t be. There is no way this can be!”
“You’re acting funny.” She said as she searched through her backpack. “Maybe you tried to open that closet with your head, first?”
“I must have,” I whispered. “So we’re boyfriend and girlfriend?”
“Again, duh.” She said. “We hold hands every day on the bus, except for today, and last week, and the several other days this month! Why have you been so sick all the time?”
“I’ve been sick?” I asked.
She stopped and stared, raising a blonde eyebrow.
“Have you been playing hooky?” She asked. “I knew it! You got the new PlayStation before I did, didn’t you?”
“What?” I asked.
“Where is it?” She cried, “And here I brought mine over to cheer you up! You dumb dumb!”
She grabbed her back to leave, and I cried, “Wait!”
“Give me your best excuse!” she said.
“I don’t have one. I have a hard time remembering any of this.”
“You must’ve hit your head pretty hard.” She set her bag down and leaned over, brushing the hair from my eyes. “I don’t see a bump. And you need a haircut. You’re cuter with it short.”
“I am?” I asked.
“Yes!” She pulled a gray game console from her bag.
This had to be some crazy dream.
She set down the game console on the floor before my TV; a fat, rounded device. Nothing like my actual HDTV in my room.
“Is your Uncle Beauregard still taking us to Danteland?” She asked.
The name sounded familiar. Did she mean an amusement park?
“I don't know.” I shrugged.
I sat down on the edge of my bed and tried hard to remember. I couldn’t even picture my Uncle’s face, let alone if he was taking us somewhere like that.
“I can’t wait! I’m so excited!” She did a happy dance, pointing her fingers into the air.
“Me too.” I lied, as I tried to figure out what Twilight Zone episode I'd landed in.
The last thing I could remember, we were sixteen and in high school. No one liked me, I had no friends, and I certainly didn't have a girlfriend.
I couldn't even remember talking to Tiffany, except when she asked me to come to the alley. What had happened after that? Everything seemed so foreign now. Did I fall into a coma, and just wake up? Maybe I'd gone crazy.
“Tiffany.” I started, but she shot me a glare. “Tiffa, I need to ask you something serious.”
“What?” She sounded scared. “Are you breaking up with me?”
“No! Nothing like that!”
“Don’t scare me dumb dumb!” She grumbled.
She must’ve sensed my concern, because she crossed her legs, and leaned close, giving me her full attention.
“What is it?” She asked. “You know you can ask me anything.”
“This is going to sound crazy. So bear with me until I’m done. But this all happened several years ago, if at all. We are in some weird time anomaly. We’re both sixteen years old. We go to High School. And—”
Then a horrible image flashed into my mind. Tiffany held a gun and backed into the shadows of a dark place. A moment later there came a flash and a gunshot. She'd shot herself because a Corpse bit her.
I fell to my knees and grabbed my head, digging my nails in, trying to make pain take the image away. Why would I have that image, unless it happened?
“Zach? Are you okay?” she grabbed my hands, trying to stop me.
Then came an explosion of feedback as if a microphone and speaker were too close together. It screeched, and I felt everything around me falling, falling, falling. Everything went dark. Another explosion.
I opened my eyes and found myself in my old living room, sitting in different clothes; Shorts and a t-shirt. Tiffany sat next to me crying, and my mom spoke loudly in the other room, nearly screaming.
“Beau!” She cried in anger. “You are not taking Zach again! Not this time!”
“But Sherry.” He said. “I must. Don’t you understand? If Grandfather doesn’t see him—”
“I don’t want you to go.” Tiffany cried out, throwing her arms around my shoulders and hugging me tight. She buried her head in my chest and soaked my shirt with tears.
“I don’t understand,” I said. “What’s going on?”
“Haven’t you been listening?” She said, looking at me with puffy red eyes, and that child-like face. “Your Uncle is taking you to Texas. For good this time.”
“This time? For good?” I whispered.
Hadn’t I always been in Texas? I thought I had been born and raised in Milpeg. I had never traveled outside of the state before.
“He was supposed to take us to Danteland!” She cried, “Don’t you remember? Now he showed up and wants you to live with him! Put you in a different school. We won’t ever see each other again!”
“This has to be a mistake! Aren’t we in Texas now? Haven’t we always been?
“Zach,” She sniffed. “You’re talking crazy again. Just like the other day when you started saying we were in high school. We’re only in 2nd grade.”
“This isn't crazy!” I jumped away from the leather couch. “This cannot be happening.”
“Watch out!” She cried.
I tumbled over the wooden coffee table, and my head slammed into the wall.
“Are you okay?” Tiffany came to my aid.
From the other room, the shouting continued, but I couldn’t make out a single word. Tiffany rolled me over and kneeled over me, checking my forehead.
“I’m okay.” I said, “At least I think I am.”
“You think?” She asked, breathing in-between gasping tears.
Static discharge filled my ears. I blinked, and Tiffany stood in the school hallway, a teenager once more.
She shook her head. “Dead.” The word began to repeat like a record.
Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead.
“What’s going on?” I screamed.
I bolted upright, breathing heavy. Darkness still shrouded the room, and I laid under a thick blanket. Despite the coldness, someone slept next to me, keeping me warm. I looked over and saw a girl. She had hair, not blonde.
“Not Tiffa.” I breathed, but I couldn’t remember this girl. She rolled over and looked up at me.
“You climbed into bed with me?” She asked.
I shook my head. “Who are you?”
“What?”
My head began to ache, and a rush ran through me.
“Jessie,” I remembered aloud as all my memories of the past month came rushing back.
“Are you okay?” She grabbed me with a burning hot hand.
I breathed in deep. “Yes, for the most part.”
“You had a nightmare?” she asked.
“It was about Tiffany,” I said. “It was so strange.”
Jessie sat up. “Maybe it was her spirit trying to reach out to you?”
“Do you think?” I started to ask, but she wrapped her arms around me and felt like a furnace.
She shook her head, holding me like a parent holds their scared child. “You feel guilty about what happened. Don’t blame yourself.”
“I do blame myself. I don’t think that will ever change.”
“She wouldn’t want you to,” Jessie said. “You were childhood friends after all.”
“What?” Frantic, I grabbed her. “What did you say?”
“Calm down; you’re scaring me,” she said startled.
/> “S-sorry.” I let go. “But you said something. Can you repeat it?”
“I said,” she sighed. “She wouldn’t want you to blame yourself.”
“After that!”
“I didn’t say anything else.” She cocked her head. “Just calm down. Go back to sleep on the sofa; it’s not safe sleeping next to me.”
I didn’t even remember getting in bed with her. I remembered falling asleep on the loveseat. But everything seemed so fuzzy. It had to have been the dream. I must’ve moved in my sleep.
I looked at Jessie, and she rolled back over, pulling the blanket up to her chin. She shivered, and the bed shook. I'd had enough regrets. If I didn’t spend this night keeping her warm, I'd never have the chance. I didn’t care if she turned and chomped into me, what did I have to live for? At least, she would have died in my arms, and I could live out my remaining time knowing that.
Lying back down, I draped my arm around her and hugged tightly.
“Zach, what are you doing?” She asked. “What if I bite you?”
“Then I’ll die a happy,” I answered with more truth than ever before.
“You can’t mean that,” she argued.
“Trust me. I do.”
I laid my head down on hers and closed my eyes. I felt like all had become right, and it may have been selfish, but at least, we were both happy at a time with almost no happiness left in the world.
LEVEL 23 – DING
Jessie groaned. On instinct, I rolled out of the bed, taking the blankets with me. On the way down, my head cracked on the nightstand. Dizziness swept away my senses. She slowly sat up in bed. The time had come. My heart raced as I searched for my gun, but I couldn't' find it.
The girl I loved had gone pale and green veins snaked up around her throat.
Through cracked lips, her mouth opened and closed, forming words. “Zach?”
I scrambled to my feet. “You’re alive!”
She yawned and stretched; her shoulders popped loudly. Still, she found breath but looked no different than a Corpse, save the rotting flesh. How she hung on, I had no idea, but I wouldn't complain.
“So hungry, so very hungry.” She whispered as her stomach growled loud enough to rival a Corpse's groan.
I chuckled, as I sat next to her on the bed.
“Oops!” she giggled. “Excuse me.”
“Let’s get you something to eat,” I said.
She stood, and started to fall, but caught herself.
I cried her name, but she waved it off.
“I stood up too fast,” she said.
I pulled on Wesley's trench coat, and rushed around the bed and gave her my hand, helping her steady herself.
As we walked around the bed, she stopped me. “I need a sweater. Maybe there’s something in the closet.”
I smiled. “You’re pretty scrawny now. I bet something will fit.”
She smiled and reached as if to punch my arm, but gave up half way and sat back on the bed.
“Can you take a look?” She whispered, hanging her head.
“Of course.” I pulled open the closet. Inside I found a giant collection of gamer T-shirts spanning all genres. I reached deeper into the closet and found a couple of hoodies stashed away. Through the dim morning light, I could see one to be bright pink with a morbidly demonic pony on it—a complete contrast to the color and the other turned out to be black with a red spider web across the breast.
“Pink monster pony, or gothy-emoish?” I asked.
“You hand me anything pink, and I’ll barf on you,” Jessie spoke through labored breaths.
I snatched the black hoodie and brought it to her.
“Good?” I asked. “It fits you, I think.”
“Yes,” She grinned. “This should suffice.”
I helped her in and then zipped up the hoodie. The sleeves were long enough to cover her hands, so she balled up the ends and hid them away. I offered her my shoulder, and we left the room.
We hobbled to the stairs, and I helped her down both flights and into the kitchen. I pulled out a chair at the large island and lifted her up into it.
“What would you like?” I asked.
“Meat.” She said, and I hesitated, leaving a heavy silence in the air.
Stepping away, I searched the cabinets for a can of meat and almost came up empty, but someone had shoved one in the back.
I set it down and filled bowls with dry chocolate cereal. Jessie looked at the can of meat and fingered it, twirling it around and then shoved it to the side.
“I was just kidding,” she said, her voice weakened.
“Sorry.” I picked up a single pebble of the chocolate and popped it in my mouth.
“Even a corpse wouldn’t eat canned meat.” She tried to giggle, but it came out as a cough
“Too bad there aren’t enough cans to shower ourselves in it,” I grinned. “Then Corpses would leave us alone!”
She gave a fake smile, and then we spent the next ten minutes eating in silence. Jessie barely had the strength to chew each bite, yet she would shove a handful in her mouth at a time. When she finally finished the bowl, she reached for the box.
“More.” She whispered.
“Right.” I poured it for her.
Out of the entire box, I had one bowl, she ate the rest.
“Is there anything else?” She peeked at me from underneath her hood.
I went to the cabinets but stopped short. A long drawn out groan came from nearby. I spun to face Jessie, who slightly shook her head. I rushed back to her side and drew my gun from my belt. The moan broke the silence again and a shadow passed by the window on the far side of the kitchen, then another shadow, and another.
“Let’s get upstairs,” I whispered.
I grabbed Jessie’s arm and pulled her a little too roughly. Her chair fell, and I caught her but the wooden seat cracked against the ground, and the moaning outside grew silent.
“Crap!” I breathed.
We hobbled into the foyer, and I eyed the front doors.
“Try to get upstairs. I’ll barricade the doors.”
She grabbed the rail and began her climb. Rushing over, I grabbed a long table from the side of the room and pushed it against the doors. Also, I grabbed a few large and heavy vases and added them to the blockade. Just as I grabbed a sword from a family crest, and slid it in through the handles, something slammed the outside.
I stepped back and held my breath. More slams joined the first. The corpses were pounding on the door. Gun in hand, I made my way back to the stairs. They continued to pound, but it seemed the doors were holding.
“Come on,” Jessie gasped for breath.
She’d finally made it to the top. I glanced back at the door to reassure myself the wall of defense would hold.
“Where do we hide?” Jessie asked as I made it to her side.
“We need to stay near the stairs, so we don't trap ourselves. Let's try the library!” I said.
As we went in, I grabbed a heavy couch, bracing all my weight against the floor, and pushed it before the door. Downstairs the pounding continued.
Jessie sat down on a love seat and put her face in her hands.
“Hang in there,” I said.
She coughed; a deep hacking. I glanced around the room and looked at the tall windows. I went to the far one and sat on the window seat looking out into the cold. The sun hid behind some clouds, and the grass in the yard below still appeared frosted over.
“This has to be the coldest winter we’ve had.” I sighed, glad I had Wesley's coat.
Jessie didn’t say anything. I looked back to see her with her head still in her hands. I sighed and stood when my foot bumped something. Kneeling down; I found a black camcorder with an open preview screen. I fumbled with the buttons, and the power light came on. A cassette compartment popped open, and the tape had a label that read, 'Wedding Video.'
“Aha,” I said.
A video with a happy story, it would surely cheer Jessie up.
“I found something.” I held out the camera.
“What?” she asked, looking up, mostly hidden in her hoodie.
“A wedding video!” I grinned. “It must be a happy one! Let’s watch!”
I plopped down onto the loveseat beside her. I leaned forward and held the camera preview window so we could both see and hit the play button.
A static gray snow covered the screen for a few moments, then a video appeared and music played. The cameraman aimed from within a crowd standing in a grassy field; it looked like the backyard of the mansion, only filled with chairs, balloons, flowers and an arch that had beautiful golden ornaments. Six people stood beneath the archway; a priest, a man in a crisp black tuxedo, a woman in an expensive looking wedding dress, and three young girls, the oldest maybe thirteen. The shapely bride had long red hair running down her back.
“The woman is beautiful.” Jessie said.
“Not as much as you,” I said.
Jessie shoved me with her shoulder and giggled.
The couple had a great deal of love in their eyes. The man grinned as the woman said the words. “I do.”
He had such happiness in his eyes. I had never seen someone so filled with joy.
“They’re happy,” Jessie whispered. “I wish I could’ve experienced a wedding.”
A tinge of guilt ran through me; I'd only succeeded in making her sadder.
“Maybe I should turn it off.” I moved to close the preview pane.
“No!” She grabbed my hand. “I want to see more.”
“Okay.”
I left the preview pane open. The video showed the couple putting pricey diamond embedded rings on each other’s hands and the priest said the famous words, ‘you may now kiss the bride.' Something overwhelmed me at that moment. An urge beyond rebuking; I turned to Jessie and pulled back the hood. I looked into her eyes, and she looked at me with the same joy the couples had in theirs. I leaned in and put my lips to hers. My lips burned, but I didn't care. I took my hand and held her face, kissing her passionately. From her lips to her tongue, the heat almost inflicted pain, but at the moment, I couldn't have asked for more. What could have been a lifetime later, she pulled back.
“Are you crazy?” She said.
“It’s not that easy to get infected, I think,” I grinned.
Omega Virus (Book 1): Beta Hour Page 16