Zombie (5 page)

The bathroom door squeaks open as feet shuffle across the tile. Whispers spit from lips, eager and immediate. I lift my feet from the floor to the toilet seat and hug my knees to my chest.

“Check the stalls,” a guy says.

“No one’s here, Paul,” the other guy says in a deeper voice.

“Please.”

The first stall door slams opens. Whether the door was pushed or kicked, I can’t tell, but judging by the force, the heavy sound, I’d say kicked. With aggression. The second door slams open. Followed by the third.

“See,” the other guy says. “Nothing.”

“Don’t forget to check the last stall.”

“You’re so paranoid.”

“I’ll feel better once I lock this door.” Then, a loud
click
echoes as the bathroom door locks into place.

Class, please note, the following will be on the final exam. This situation is not only theoretically, but also technically referred to as
being fucked
. This is not to be confused with
getting fucked
.

A hand grips the top of my stall and pushes it open, but not all the way and the guy never looks in. He walks back across the bathroom.

“Paul?” he says.

Paul shushes him.

“Paul?” he says softer.

“What?”

“How was your summer?”

“Not long enough,” Paul says.

“Go on any trips?”

“The beach. Twice.”

“With?”

“My parents,” Paul says. “Some friends.”

“Which beach?”

“Ocean City. You?”

“I worked for my father all summer.”

“Doing what?” Paul asks.

“Landscaping.”

I focus on keeping my breathing as quiet as possible, keeping my feet from squeaking on the toilet seat. They’re quiet now, and the more I listen to the silence, the more I can hear myself think and know I am going to do something to give myself away.

I close my eyes and think
please go away, please go away, please go away
, but they don’t go away and are no longer silent.

They crash into the stall next to me.

They grab and grunt and go at each other.

Their stall door closes and locks and Paul says, in a way that I know he is smiling, “Zink, let me show you what I learned on my summer vacation.”

T
he rest of the day blows by in a blur with classes and lectures and roll calls and seating assignments in neckties and khaki pants, all the while I can’t get that girl with the deadly red hair out of my head.

My teachers for the most part are old and irritatingly excited that school has started, except for one who doesn’t show for class at all—my English teacher, Mr. Rembrandt. How random is that? First day of school and already there’s a substitute in the room, putzing around with nothing to teach. In each class, the teachers seat us alphabetically in some way around the room, but in English the substitute lets us sit wherever we want. Of course, I wind up between two winners. On my left, there’s this Super Shy Kid who refuses to look at me or say his name when I introduce myself as I sit down. He even flinches when I dig into my bag for a pen. Fragile bitch. And then on my right, there’s the Dirtbag Boy who needed some serious cosmetic surgery. Maybe a chemical peel and a power scrub and a round of dermatologist appointments. Pimples so big they could be seen from space. I can only imagine what the Plaids are going to do to these sad suckers.

The substitute isn’t like any substitute that I’ve ever seen before, either. Not only is he the on-call for the entire school—here every day, waiting to sub for any teacher that calls out sick or comes in late or leaves early for a family emergency—but he’s also the head coach of the varsity football team. He says his name is Dennis Vojzischek, but we should call him Mr. Vo. He doesn’t look like a football coach, but more like a thick-necked, post-college
stockbroker in a pinstriped, three-piece suit, slicked back hair, and brown leather briefcase open on the desk. A white pocket square peeks out form the breast pocket of his sport coat. He takes off his coat and hangs it on the back of a chair, revealing his vest fully buttoned up and a Windsor knot exposed. He doesn’t say much during class, except to call out our names and instruct us to read quietly. There’s no trace of an accent, despite his foreign-sounding last name. He’s soft spoken, but his voice is crystal clear, hitting every syllable hard. He never sits, but instead walks up and down each row and along the walls, his spit-shined shoes clicking with each step. At the end of class, he makes a fist and holds it in front of him.

“This is a Catholic school, gentlemen. Yes?”

No one answers.

He lowers his fist, flexes his fingers, and then raises his fist again. “This is a Catholic school, gentlemen, yes?”

“Yes,” we say.

“Yes, sir,” he says.

“Yes, sir,” we say.

“And in a Catholic school we have prayer. In this Catholic school, we pray to St. John Baptist de La Salle and we pray to Jesus Christ. You will pray every day you are here. You will pray in every class of the day. Someone will say
St. John Baptist de La Salle
.” He punches his fist at us. “You will say
pray for us
.” He retracts his fist. “Someone will say
live Jesus in our hearts
.” He punches his fist back out. “You will say
forever
.” He lowers his hand. “So let’s try this one time and then call it a day. St. John Baptist de La Salle.”

We respond, “Pray for us.”

“Live Jesus in our hearts.”

We respond, “Forever.”

“I’ll tell Rembrandt you men did fine work today.” He snaps his briefcase shut on the desk. “Get out of here.”

Rumors spread throughout the halls about Rembrandt for the rest of the day. Rumors that his flight was delayed, returning from a rehab facility for heroin addiction in Phoenix. Rumors that he was seen downtown in Fell’s Point tearing through the local bars on the
harbor, working on a three-day booze bender. Rumors that this is typical first day of school behavior. That he always misses the first day of school every year as a way to put his students behind schedule, which forces them to buckle down and focus on their reading and critical writing.

The final bell rings and students flood the hallway, clamoring to escape back to summer. The hallway smells of cheap cologne and biting body odor—clusterfucked with bodies slamming into each other, swinging book bags like medieval weapons.

Honestly, it reminds me of one of my favorite zombie movies of all time—
Night of the Living Dead
.

George A. Romero’s
Night of the Living Dead
series has six entries of the franchise to date. I like them each less than the one before it.

The sequential order is:

The cowriter of
Night
, John Russo—a dickbag—rebooted the series with his own dickbag vision. Hence,
Return of the Living Dead
, a splintered and less affecting sequel to
Night
. Russo then went on to make four more with utterly dickbagish titles:

The final list is as follows:

At my locker, the Plaids pass by but leave me alone, partially, I think, because I make myself disappear by standing still. I try a couple of combinations to see if I can recall it from memory. I can’t and after a few failed attempts I leave everything behind. I don’t have any homework yet anyway.

Outside, the girls from Prudence re-emerge on the patio off the cafe again and walk in front of me toward the lecture hall building where the theater is. I follow them as it’s on my way to the front circle where Dad is going to pick me up. I keep a safe distance. I don’t want them to think I’m perving all over them. The girl with dark red hair shoots me more nasty glares, not smiling even a little bit. I check my shirt for embarrassing stains. I feel the outline of
my hair to see if I have some kind of cowlick or menacing swoop action happening. But I feel nothing. The girls merge together with a small group outside of the building, reading a sign taped to the door:
AUDITIONS CANCELED TODAY AND RESCHEDULED FOR TOMORROW
.

At the front circle, I check my cell phone and have a voicemail from Dad. He says something’s come up and he can’t pick me up. He says for me to take the 55 bus home. He goes on to say a lot of things, but what he doesn’t ever say is
I’m sorry
.

J
ackson took the 55 bus home from school when he went to Byron Hall, and it looks like the tradition will continue. I ride the 55 home just fine and am surprised to find Dad’s car parked out front. He’s been protecting his secrets a lot lately and while he may think he’s got them all buried away, they always find a way to come tumbling out in a messy, messy flood.

Truth has a way of bitch-slapping you right in the balls when you least expect it.

Tricia sits on the deck next door, stretched out in red wrap sweater on a chaise lounge chair, reading a magazine through sunglasses the size of two grapefruits. Her dog Travis lies on the deck next to her chair. He’s one of those small fat round dogs that looks like a human head with feet.

She greets me with a smile and tells me that I look sick. She’s reading the September
InStyle
, an issue I don’t have yet. I tell her that I’m fine and feel normal and that nothing is wrong. Tricia talks about the weather—how pleasant it’s been lately and how the end of summer never used to be as cool as it is now and how I should never talk about the weather with a girl that I am interested in because weather is a state of environmental change, not conversation.

“You really don’t look well,” she says.

“I really don’t feel well,” I say. “I think I’m coming down with something.” I blow hot air onto my wrist before placing it on my forehead.

“Oh, sweet Jeremy,” she says, sitting at the edge of the chaise
lounge chair now. “Come here, hon. Let me feel your forehead for you.” She signals me to come even closer to her. “I’m not standing up, so you have to kneel down,” she says.

I kneel on the wood deck. Travis sits and licks my fingers. Tricia places the back of her hand on my forehead. There’s perfume on her soft skin—lavender or almond milk, I think. Our house used to smell like this when Mom lived with us. Tricia holds her hand to my forehead long enough for me to have a quick fantasy about her.

“Why aren’t you back at school?” I ask, pulling away from her. “Harvard, right?”

“No fever,” she says, pushing herself back on the chaise lounge chair away from me.

Is there such a thing a being
beyond embarrassment
? Please note that
embarrassment
can be easily avoided with a simple medical procedure called a
lobotomy
. Not only would this help me not look like such a fucknut in front of girls, but it would help me not to sound like one either. Some slight incision in a particular brainal lobe and I’d be good to go—
lobotomized
. Make me a legitimate zombie, for real.

“What are you thinking about right now?” she asks.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

Travis continues to lick away, like he’s going for my bones.

“Try me,” she says. “I have a pretty big imagination.” She places her glasses back over her eyes and closes her magazine, setting it on the chair next to her.

“I can’t,” I say. “I wish I could, but I really can’t. Maybe some other time?”

The porch door to her house swings open and her father, a real fatso, stands fatly in the doorway. Tricia turns toward him, offering him her profile only, not her eyes. He doesn’t say anything and just fats there waiting for her with the door wide open.