by Ike Hamill
“Life is about change, and adaptation. We adapt to survive. You’re going to have to get on board with that.”
“I do things my own way,” said Lynne.
LYNNE HAD A SURPRISE WAITING for her when she got home that night. It had been another long day—cases, disguises, and the obligatory debriefing at the field office. The last thing Lynne expected was an interrogation from her housemates.
Carrie was standing when Lynne came through the door. Barry was on the couch with his legs tucked under himself, looking miserable.
“Why didn’t you tell us?” asked Carrie.
“What?” Lynne sighed.
“You couldn’t tell us what your new job was? You had to be all mysterious? Now we find out that you’re working for some shady organization, trying to bring the end of civilization? Now you show up looking like a completely different person. What’s wrong with you lately, Lindsay Benson?” Carrie demanded.
“Don’t call me that,” said Lynne. “Nobody calls me that.”
“You’d better explain yourself.”
“Whatever,” said Lynne. She dropped her squirming cat to the ground and started to follow him to the kitchen. Carrie stepped in her way.
“Seriously,” she said. “I want to know what you’re doing.”
“What am I doing? I’m working,” said Lynne. “Do I bother you about how you make your living? You’re a shill for broken health-care system that denies preventative care so you can earn more on fixing the problems. And what exactly do you know about my job anyway? Get out of my way.”
Carrie held her ground—“All’s I know is that Gregory says you’re going to bring the day of reckoning. This is a man who knows things, Lynne. He knows a hell of a lot more than you, that’s for sure. It’s about time you listened and admitted that you don’t know everything after all.”
“Hey,” Barry said from the couch, “we don’t even know that Lynne is the one he was talking about. He didn’t even know her name. It could have been anyone.”
“It’s her,” said Carrie. She narrowed her eyes at Lynne.
“Yeah, he’s looking for me, and he says I’m evil, right?” asked Lynne. “But why would you take the word of some acquisitive self-proclaimed prophet over someone you’ve known forever? It’s just like you to always take someone else’s side.”
“Why do you always look down on everybody? You’re always trying to be so much more than all your friends,” said Carrie.
“Can you blame me?” asked Lynne. “Am I supposed to aspire to be an ignorant, asexual drone, moving through life like an automaton, like you?”
“That’s enough,” said Carrie. “You need to get out. Barry and I decided.”
“What? This is my place! Barry? Are you seriously going along with this?” asked Lynne.
“I like your hair,” he said quietly. He shrugged and looked away.
Carrie frowned and said, “We already talked to the landlord. He said that since we’re paying the rent we can kick you out if we want.”
“I get paid next week,” said Lynne. “I’ll have plenty of money again.”
“Blood money,” said Carrie.
“Oh, fuck you,” said Lynne. She pushed past Carrie and stormed off to her room. Domi darted through the door just before she slammed it shut.
Outside the door, she heard footsteps approach. Carrie’s voice was much softer and nicer now—“You have until morning to clear out.”
LYNNE TOSSED AND TURNED. This time she wasn’t just nervous or afraid, she was also hurt and sad. Carrie always loved to argue, but Lynne never expected Carrie to turn on her like that. She never expected Carrie to side with the rest of the world and evict her from her house and her life.
The clock radio painted the ceiling blue-green with its light. Both of the windows were cracked open. Domi was curled up in the space between her arm and her body. Lynne listened to the crickets and waited for the sounds of the little boy to creep up outside her window and warn her away from Donna, but he never came. A lightning bug landed on one of the screens and lit up her world with tiny bursts of yellow light.
Sometime before dawn, a light sleep drifted over Lynne. She dozed for a dozen breaths before her eyelids would flutter again. Her jaw ached from the worry over Carrie. When the sun came up fully, Lynne woke. Domi was purring with his nose now pressed against her nose. He breathed in when she exhaled, making a tiny vacuum to suck up her breath. Lynne looked up at the sunlight on the ceiling and thought about her options. She wanted to fight. She wanted to battle Carrie and make her move out, or rather, make her admit how wrong she was, and then make her move out. Lynne played through dozens of scenarios in her mind, but she got stuck whenever she got to the point where Carrie should have apologized. Even in her daydreams, she couldn’t make Carrie sound sincere or remorseful.
Noise from the kitchen got Lynne out of bed. Carrie always slept in after a late shift, but Barry often woke up early to have some time alone. Lynne wanted to bid him farewell before their house was torn apart forever.
Lynne put on her robe and slippers and unlatched her door as quietly as she could. She shuffled almost halfway to the kitchen before she heard the voices from the living room. Lynne left her slippers in the hall and continued to the corner with bare feet. They were whispering. Lynne couldn’t hear the entire conversation, but she didn’t need to.
Carrie was describing Lynne, her family, her upbringing, her new change in hair color, everything. A bored-sounding man probed further with bland questions.
Lynne poked her head enough around the corner to get a glimpse of the man at the front door. He wore a blue ill-fitting suit jacket and black pants. Lynne didn’t get a look at his face, she was afraid that if she moved too far around the corner the man would spot her and sound the alarm. She pulled back and followed the hall back to their small kitchen. Another guy in a suit stood outside the kitchen door with his back against the glass.
She had only two options left for escape: the bathroom window, or one of the windows in her bedroom.
Lynne made her way back to her bedroom and pulled the door shut behind her. She couldn’t tell if she’d made any noise. All she could hear was her own heart beating in her ears. Domi was still curled up on the pillow where she had left him. Lynne stripped out of her pajamas and pulled on jeans and a t-shirt and her old sneakers from the closet. Her new ones were stuck next to the door, next to the big guy with the bad suit. Money went into one pocket, keys in the other. Her phone, on mute, was stuffed into her back pocket. Lynne gripped the bottom of the sash and slid open the window slowly and carefully.
One of the screens was already out—she’d removed that when she’d sent the cat after the little boy. That thought jogged her memory. She grabbed Domi, whispered in his ear and then dropped him out the window. With any luck, he’d follow her to the car and they’d make a clean getaway.
One leg out the window, Lynne was straddling the sill when she saw the first guy. He was just past the end of the yard, mostly hidden behind the trunk of an adolescent maple tree. She pulled her foot up from the ground, thinking she’d duck back in before he spotted her, but he was already speaking into his hand and coming across the yard. She pushed out through the window, nearly tore her jeans, and went sprawling towards the dewy grass.
She windmilled her arms to stay upright, and sprinted towards the corner of the house. That’s when she saw two more guys. They rounded the house side-by-side. Lynne pulled up and scrambled to run back the other way before the woods-guy could cut her off. Three more were jogging to her from behind.
They didn’t say a word; didn’t order her to get down, or tell her to stop. They just swarmed. These guys were dressed much better than the guy inside. His mismatched suit had suggested a bumbling incompetence. The apparel of the outside guys was all about confident expertise.
Lynne tried to dart back towards the house, but her feet came out from under her—old sneakers on the wet grass. She landed square on her ass. Her teeth clicke
d together hard. She narrowly missed biting off the end of her tongue. The men were on her at once, each pinning down an arm or a leg, or covering her mouth with a pungent cloth. It smelled like strong apple cider, or grain alcohol mixed with fruit punch. When she tried to twist away to draw fresh air, the man on her right arm pressed down harder.
Her elbow crunched backwards under his weight. Consciousness drifted away on the drug-soaked cloth, but she retained enough sense to feel the bones in her forearm break. In fact, she thought she felt tendons popping from the ends of muscles or tearing away from bones. It seemed like a distant trouble though, not something of immediate concern.
“Make sure she stays alive,” one of men said. It was the last thing Lynne heard before her eyes fluttered shut.
Her shirt rode up as the goons carried her across the lawn.
Chapter 6
Gregory Wakes
Two Years Earlier…
WHEN THE PALLBEARERS SKITTERED AWAY from Gregory’s rocking coffin, Marta wondered if she was having an elaborate dream. Instead of running away, like two of the strong men she’d enlisted to carry the coffin, she stood her ground. A angry banging came from within the silver coffin. It was the cheapest box they would sell to her, and when the lid sprang open it tore one of the hinges off.
Gregory sat up.
Marta heard a commotion and glanced back to see that about half of the people she’d invited—mostly co-workers of Gregory’s—were running towards the parking lot.
“Gah, momf,” said Gregory. He pulled a long gob of cotton from his mouth.
The pastor tried to sit down in a chair that wasn’t there. He sprawled on the grass next to a flower arrangement. When he bounced back to his feet, spry for an old man, he clutched his bible to his chest, turned, and walked away. He stole a couple of glances back at Gregory as he fled. Gregory turned from the gravesite and leaned on the edge of the coffin so he could step out on to the grass. His feet had socks but no shoes. He leaned over and coughed a couple of times, hands busy at his chest.
Marta took a half-step forward. “Gregory?” she asked. She was about twelve feet away, on the other side of the hole from the coffin. Her husband put his hand on her shoulder and positioned himself behind her.
Gregory’s eyes swept over the thin crowd. Eyes slipped from his as soon as they became the focus of his attention. Their gaze returned soon enough, as soon as he wasn’t looking at them, that is.
“Why did you do this?” asked Gregory. He motioned to his chest and then spread his arms to include the coffin and the gravesite.
“Do what? We didn’t do anything,” said Marta. Her voice cracked around the edges and tears spilled from the corners of her eyes. She felt intensely guilty. She put her hand over her husband’s hand, which still rested on her shoulder.
The last time she’d seen Gregory standing, he’d been at his mailbox. Marta had watched him through her kitchen window as he crossed his lawn, put a letter in the box, and raised the flag. She turned away–just for a second–and when she looked back, Gregory had fallen down next to his mailbox. She didn’t move for a moment. She just watch his still body on the ground. He lay half on the grass and half on the street with his face turned to the sky. Her hand moved to her belly, which still felt empty. She rubbed her hand down her distended abs; they used to feel tight.
When her husband walked in to the kitchen, she had snapped out of her stupor. The two of them had run out to the mailbox to try to help Gregory. Now they stood in the cemetery, watching him rise from his coffin.
“This,” said Gregory. “Why did you do this?” He pulled open his shirt to reveal the big rough slices in his chest. They were rough-sewn back together, but not in any tidy way. Marta could tell that from where she stood.
“Oh,” said Marta. She still didn’t understand what he meant. It dawned on her suddenly. “You’re a donor,” she said, excited to have an answer. “They harvested your organs. You wanted that. It was checked off on your driver’s license, and you had the living will and everything, so we knew exactly what your wishes were. They didn’t do the wrong thing, did they?”
“I’m not dead,” said Gregory. He had to repeat himself a second time until the puzzled looks resolved on the faces of the onlookers.
“Well, you were,” said Marta. Now she was beginning to feel a little defensive. She’d stepped into the void and taken up all the responsibilities his relatives should have attended. But Gregory didn’t have any relatives; he was the last of his line. He’d made all his embalming and plot arrangements ahead of time, but Marta organized the whole funeral. “You were dead and you wanted to donate. It was all your decision.”
“But I’m not dead,” he said. He leaned on the coffin and tried to get his hand down the back of his pants. “Is there something in my ass?”
Marta blushed—“I don’t know. Why would I know that? It was your choice of funeral home. We didn’t change that at all. I just arranged for this little ceremony. You didn’t ask for it, but I thought it would be nice. We paid for it.”
“I don’t care,” said Gregory. He pulled another wad of gauze from the back of his pants and threw it on the ground. “Could one of you call me an ambulance? I don’t feel very well.”
Nobody answered. One of Gregory’s former co-workers continued to video the strange awakening and two others stood with their phones pressed to their ears, but nobody answered.
“Paul?” Gregory singled out on man in a dark brown suit. “Paul? Could you call nine-one-one for me?”
Paul slid his hand into his pocket and pulled out his phone without taking his eyes from Gregory. He was pretty close to Gregory, about ten feet, so at first he simply held his phone in Gregory’s direction. When the undead man reached for it he pulled back, frightened.
“Just call then,” said Gregory.
“Gregory?” asked Marta. She gathered her hands in front of herself. “Can you just tell me… what did you see? What was it like? Do you remember?”
Gregory glanced around the group once more. He saw the people watching who looked away; the people on their phones; the guy recording the scene. He later denied any guile, but his answer would turn out to be very shrewd for his financial future—“It was wonderful. I’ll tell you soon.”
Chapter 7
Serving
Two Years Later (Present Day)…
CAROL OPENED HER EYES. It was so dark that she could barely see the ground. She moved the shovel through a tight arc. The action felt automatic. Almost-forgotten callouses on her hands woke up and prepared themselves under skin worn thin. Carol wiped the sweat from her forehead and closed her eyes again. With them closed she could see her baby—her real baby—and that made her happy. Donna’s face had turned ugly very quickly as the months passed, but somewhere Carol’s real daughter was a darling little infant angel with pudgy cheeks and rubber-band wrists.
In her mind she drank in the image of her little baby daughter while her body worked. She really only had to open her eyes every few minutes to get her bearings. The digging could continue on autopilot without her senses involved. When she felt a cold chill over her heart she knew Donna was watching. The next time Carol opened her eyes, Donna would be standing there, hovering near the edge of the pit, assessing Carol’s progress. Donna’s face was nothing like a real child’s if you took the time to look. Her eyes knew too much, her nostrils flared whenever she sensed suffering, and her mouth worked at unspoken words behind her closed lips.
Carol slung each shovel load over her left shoulder, always the same way. Someone else worked back there hauling the dirt up out of the hole and into the darkness.
After a while, a little boy would come along and tell her to get out of the hole. She’d climb the rough ramp that she’d cut out of the clay with her shovel and follow him to a dark corner of the dark, windowless warehouse. He’d hand her something and motion for her to eat. She had to close her eyes again, even to think about eating the limp hunk of flesh. It was cooked, but cold. T
he first time she realized it was a big chunk of snake, she had regurgitated immediately, spraying her bare feet with gray and red bits of snake flesh and scales. The second time she tried to choke it down, she was too hungry to pass it up. By the third trip to the cold snake corner, Carol was revolted to find she craved the snake, since it was the only thing offered.
There were no bathroom breaks, and no sleep breaks, but somehow she didn’t seem to need them.
Carol flung another shovel full of dirt over her left shoulder and smiled at the mental image of her laughing baby. She imagined leaning in really close so she could rub noses with her sweet girl. It was so real that she could feel it. While her nose touched the baby’s unbelievably soft skin, Carol gazed into her imaginary baby’s sweet blue eyes. Those eyes were so pretty, and so unlike Donna’s slate-gray eyes. The edge of her shovel hit gravel. It was an unpleasant, screeching, rasping noise, and it reminded Carol of something. The rocks sounded like rain when they hit the ground behind her. The sound brought Carol partly out of her trance.
Carol started to remember. She remembered the last day she’d spent in her house. That day two government people—a man with a mustache and a woman named Lynne—had chased Donna into the woods.
Carol flung another shovel-load of gravel over her shoulder. She remembered something even farther back—getting up in the middle of the night to carry Donna out into the woods. Donna sat on a blanket while Carol dug an earlier hole. This hole eventually became the foundation of a little cabin built of sticks and bark and moss. Donna had never spoken, but somehow told Carol what to do.
Carol dug another scoop and the metal shovel complained against the sharp rocks. The sound made her back teeth hurt. Instead of moving the shovel more carefully to minimize the noise, Carol stabbed at the ground, screeching and scraping even more. It killed her ears, but it kept her out of the trance, and let her think. Without that sound she would just slip back into the trance and think about her lost daughter. Just invoking the thought brought the image back, but Carol fought it away. She’d had enough of fake memories.