Badass Zombie Road Trip (15 page)

A sudden high-pitched scream cut the clerk’s words short.

“What the hell was that?” the clerk asked.

Jonah didn’t have to ask. He was pretty sure Hell had everything to do with that scream. Jonah was the first out the door, around the corner and at the back of the store before the clerk could even get his fat rump from behind the counter. The unfortunate sight that greeted Jonah was one he had hoped never to see.

Lying supine in front of the dumpster, in a pool of ever-widening red, was the female clerk. To Jonah’s horror, Dale was crouched over the woman, poking at the unresponsive body. From mouth to waist, he was covered in bloody gore, his shirt soaked crimson, his arms and hands coated with glistening red. Whether it was human or rat, Jonah couldn’t tell with just a glance.

“Dale!” Jonah gasped. “What did you do to her?”

“Nothing!” Dale shouted as he leapt to his feet. More headlights flashed by as a customer pulled up to the store. The zombie rushed Jonah, grabbing him by the shoulder and steering him to the car. “Time to go.”

Jonah protested as Dale pushed him away from the bloody scene. “She’s hurt. We need to help.”

“She’ll be fine.” Dale said, as he walked toward the car with Jonah in tow. “But I won’t be if someone sees me standing over her looking like this.”

No sooner had he spoken than the male clerk rounded the store, ran past the guys, and discovered the gory scene. “Mary? Oh shit! Mary! What happened?”

Dale shoved Jonah, and they picked up their walk to a trot. The newly arrived vehicle parked at the gas pumps, and out of the Cadillac rolled four males, all dressed to impress and in way better shape than Jonah and Dale. Jonah lowered his gaze to the ground as they jogged past the burly men toward the Focus on the far side of the lot. He regretted not parking closer.

“Somebody stop them!” the clerk shouted at their backs. “They attacked my friend! I think she’s dead!”

“What?” one of the men asked.

“I think he said those guys killed some woman,” another one said.

By this time, Jonah and Dale were back at the Focus. Whoever had been lingering near the car—whoever Jonah had assumed was Dale—was long gone. If there had been anyone at all.

“Help!” the clerk shouted again. “Call nine-one-one!”

Jonah risked a glance and saw two of the young men heading toward the Focus, while the other two went to assist the now-frantic clerk. Dale ran to the back of the car, where he ducked low, as if hiding from the looming confrontation.

“Dale!” Jonah yelped. “What are you doing?”

“Taking care of you,” Dale growled. “Just get in and start the fucking car.”

Jonah did as he asked. Dale ran around the car and leapt in the back just as the thing roared to life. In a matter of seconds, they were speeding away from the scene. The young men ran after the car for a bit, waving their arms, shouting pleas and obscenities, but Jonah had no intention of stopping for love or money. Or obscenities.

It was a few miles before Jonah had regained his composure enough to demand explanations. He watched the mirror in silence as Dale rummaged around in the luggage until he found a clean tee. The zombie wiped himself as clean as he could, then put on the fresh shirt before squeezing into the front seat.

“Way to go, shithead,” Dale grumbled.

“Me?” Jonah asked in revulsion.

“What happened, man? You said you’d keep the clerks busy!”

“I thought I saw you at the car already.” Jonah wondered whether he had imagined the figure by the car or if, perhaps, someone else wanted him to think Dale was already waiting at the vehicle. Before he could follow this line of thought any further, Dale snapped at him again.

“I said give me ten minutes! I thought I could trust you.”

Jonah puffed up with righteous indignation. “Trust me? You’re the one who attacked that poor woman!”

“I didn’t attack her!”

“If you didn’t attack her, then why was she bleeding?”

Dale went quiet.

“Dale?” Jonah asked. “What happened back there?”

The zombie mumbled something incoherent.

“Dale?”

“She found me eating live rats, okay? She saw me, Jonah. She saw what I was doing, and she freaked the fuck out. Happy?”

All at once, Jonah lost his inflated bravado and found himself very sorry for the zombie. Here was a man who was used to the opposite sex dropping to their knees at the very sight of him. But in this instance, in this terrible moment of exposed weakness, a woman found him disgusting. Dale must have felt belittled. Berated. Betrayed. Jonah knew this to be true, because it was how he felt around women all the time.

“So the blood?” Jonah asked, just to be sure.

“Yeah,” Dale said. “Rat, one hundred percent. None of it hers.”

“You promise?”

“I swear it. I didn’t lay a hand on her. She screamed, turned to run, slipped on the blood and hit her head on the concrete. That’s what happened. Hand to God.”

“I doubt God is interested.”

What struck Jonah as odd about the whole affair was the fact that the zombie even cared what the woman thought. The thing certainly didn’t care what Jonah thought. Jonah wondered if it was a force of habit for the zombie to consider the woman’s opinion, or just unfiltered pride pushing its way to the undead surface.

“If you didn’t hurt her,” Jonah said, “then why the big getaway? Why not stick around and explain?”

Dale grunted. “Really? You expect them to believe me with a shirt full of guts and gore and some lady bleeding to death on the sidewalk? They would probably put me up for the night just for being a weirdo.”

“Ah, I see. And I suppose that the fact that we were shouting each other’s names back and forth won’t lead them to us. Or the fact that my car has identifiable tags.”

The zombie’s grin flared in the glow of oncoming traffic. “I took care of that.”

“What does that mean?”

“I smeared blood all over the tags before we took off. There is no way they got your numbers.”

Jonah slumped against the steering wheel. “Jesus, Dale! Way to make us look like a bunch of murderers.”

“What? Now they don’t have your tag number. Just the car. And excuse me for saying this, but I mean it in the politest way possible: a dark red, four door Ford Focus isn’t exactly a one-of-a-kind masterpiece.”

“I suppose you’re right. I’m just tired.” A stomach rumbled, and this time it wasn’t the zombie’s. It was Jonah’s. “And hungry.”

“I’m not.”

Jonah cocked his head at the good news. “Then it worked?”

“Sort of.” Dale rubbed his belly, which was swollen once again, ever so slightly. “I feel full, but not satisfied. Like, let’s see, it’s like … Remember when I tried out for the wrestling team?”

“Yeah.”

“I made it in, but the coach wanted me one weight class down?”

Jonah remembered all right. “He put you on that cabbage diet. You had gas for a month straight. It was awful.”

“That’s what I feel like now.” Dale patted his full belly. “Like I’m on a stupid diet where I can eat all the cabbage I want. But, the problem is I fucking hate cabbage. Especially when it squeals and wriggles around while you’re trying to sink your teeth—”

“Okay,” Jonah interjected. “I don’t need all the details.”

“Suit yourself. Seriously, though, we should stop somewhere for the night. Even though I’m not sleepy, I could stand getting out of this car for a bit. But what I really want is a shower. Now.”

The sickly sweet tinge of blood in the air forced Jonah to agree. “Let’s get a few miles into Nevada first. Okay? I want to put some miles between us and … what just happened. We can make it back to Reno in no time.”

“Sure thing, buddy. Hey, I think we can make our gig tomorrow, if you still feel like it.”

“I don’t think we should worry about it. We have bigger things to deal with right now. I’ll call them in the morning and cancel.”

“Aww, man.” Dale stuck out his lower lip in a masterful pout.

“I’m sorry I ruined our big out-of-state job.”

“No worries. I’m just having a bit of fun. Besides, I’m too frustrated to play now, anyway. I bet you’re excited to finally get to see Reno, huh?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Jonah answered, though, in truth, Reno was the furthest thing from his overworked mind. He was too busy mulling over the zombie’s last few words and how they emphasized the real difference between the living Dale and the dead one.

As far as Jonah knew, Dale Jenkins always felt like playing his guitar.

Especially when he was frustrated.

****

Reno, Nevada

161 hours: 25 minutes: 42 seconds remaining

Before all of this, Jonah was excited about seeing a new city. Now, the most Jonah wanted to see of Reno was the inside of a hotel room, a shower stall, and a comfortable bed. Dale suggested shopping around for the best deal, but Jonah didn’t care if they charged triple the rates. He needed sleep, and he needed it now. The more he thought about the glory of getting a good night’s rest in an actual bed as opposed to sleeping curled up next to a hungry zombie in the tiny front seat of the Focus, the more trouble he had keeping his eyes open.

After grabbing a quick meal from a drive-through burger joint, Jonah stopped at the first inn they came across. As far as hotels went, the Shady Oak Rest was both affordable and comfortable. Their room had that lingering funk of stale air, antiseptic and cigarettes, despite the fact that it was supposed to be a nonsmoking room. A pair of twin beds dominated the space, leaving little area for moving about. But then again, Jonah had no intention of moving anything. He had every intention of lying very still for as long as possible.

The bathroom was also small, with the shower-tub combo no bigger than their facilities at home. The water pressure, however, was twice what he was used to, and it was glorious! Jonah whimpered and groaned in nearly orgasmic delight as he stood under the beating heat of cascading water, letting the worries of the long and troublesome day swirl away down the hotel drain.

Dale beat on the locked bathroom door and yelled, “Hurry up! It’s my turn!”

“I’m almost done!” Jonah shouted, though he had no plans of hurrying anything. It wasn’t his fault that Dale was more interested in checking out the available adult movie options instead of being first in the shower. The glorious, steamy, muscle-relaxing shower. Jonah wished, more than anything, that he could stay under that powerful showerhead for the next seven days and let the zombie worry about his own soul. Jonah moaned at the blissful thought of forgetting about the whole damned thing and just going home.

Another round of rough thumping sounded from the door. “And stop moaning in there, for fuck’s sake. It sounds like you’re jacking off.” A disgusted gasp rose from the thin barrier. “Is that it? Are you jacking off in there? Stop jacking off in the shower, man! I won’t take a shower in a stall you jacked off in!”

“Why break an old habit?” Jonah yelled, then smiled as the zombie expressed his revulsion from the other side of the door in various growls and snarls. But wish as he might, Jonah knew he couldn’t stay in the shower forever. For starters, he’d prune up beyond recognition. What a pair they would make then. Maybe they could incorporate it into their act. Jonah could see the headlines now. The withered wussy and the soulless zombie! Watch them, as they are both stupid enough to make a deal with the Devil! Jonah stopped his moaning and scrubbing as he pondered a fact he had made an extra special point to avoid for the last few hours.

He had, indeed, made a deal with the Devil.

His soul was, most certainly, in mortal peril.

He might not win.

He might very well, in fact, end up in Hell.

“What have I done?” Jonah asked no one in particular.

He rinsed off and shut down the shower to the steady thump of Dale’s protests. After wrapping a towel around his waist, he took a long look in the fog-resistant mirror, unsure of who was looking back at him. Less than ten hours ago, he was a carefree lad whose most serious concern was whether or not his best friend would piss away their gas money before they could make it home. But now? Now he didn’t know who he was. When Jonah at last opened the door, the zombie seemed ready to tackle him.

Instead of beating the tar out of Jonah for taking so long in the shower, Dale got a gander at Jonah’s worried look, and asked, “What’s wrong with you? I’m the one who’s been waiting forever while you’ve been spanking it with Rosy Palm and her five fucking sisters.”

“Nothing,” Jonah said. He pushed past the dead man and collapsed onto the bed, a dejected pile of worthless human being.

“If you say so,” the zombie said, and left Jonah moping face down on the bed.

“What have I done?” Jonah groaned into the mattress. The bed had little to say to this. No one seemed to care about Jonah’s soul but Jonah. He whimpered, low and sorrowful, before he repeated his woeful question, “What have I done?”

Again, no one answered.

Jonah crawled to the headboard and sat up, stretching his legs down the length of the bed. He leaned back with a soulful sigh, resting his head against the board as he stared up at the ceiling. Or rather, the wall above him. Hanging on that wall, just above the headboard, was a glaring symbol of his spiritual struggle. The antithesis of his unholy wager.