Zombie Blondes (15 page)

It’s a relief when the cold air rushes against my skin. The sweat drying into salt crumbs as the wind blows on me and I can’t wait to get home and let a warm shower wash it all away. I walk as fast as my legs can manage given the way my muscles are burning with each step. I keep the image of the bathtub in my mind the way a wanderer in the desert keeps dreaming of an oasis, the rust-stained tiles lingering in the air like the promise of presents on Christmas morning.

The image shatters and trickles away the second I see Greg leaning against the brick wall outside the boy’s locker room. The security light above his head switches on as the shadows cloud over, tricking it into believing it’s night already. Its white light makes him look ghostly, bleaching his skin like an overexposed photograph and all I can see are his eyes. Beautiful eyes like a girl’s that burn with electricity with a frightening glow that pulls me toward him.

I scratch my fingers through my hair to comb it into some sort of attractive mess. He smiles at me, pushes himself from the wall, and starts to walk in my direction. I swing my
backpack off my shoulder and stuff my uniform deep into its black hole. I’d rather suffer later and have this moment be perfect. Besides, the bag can be washed after all.

“Hey,” he says, stopping in front of me.

I stop, too, and say “hi” as shy I’ve ever said anything. I’ve never been very good with boys. Flirting with them, I mean. Not ones that I actually think are attractive, anyway. I’m able to do it perfectly with the ones I’m not interested in, or the strange kids who always fall in love with me, like Lukas. There’s no pressure there because I don’t really care much about the outcome. But when it’s a boy that I sort of secretly like, I end up standing with my hands behind my back and trying to look everywhere but at him.

Greg’s not too good at it, either, though.

I can tell right away. He keeps tapping his foot against the parking lot blacktop. His hands move back and forth from his coat pockets to his jean pockets and he also tries to look anywhere but at me.

“Are you going to the diner with everyone else?” he asks. He stares at the figures on the other side of the lot heading in the direction of town. It gives me the courage to look at him knowing he’s not watching me.

“I don’t know,” I tell him. “I don’t really feel up to it.”

“Oh,” he says, “that’s cool.” He shrugs his shoulders and everything but he’s not able to hide his disappointment. It’s obvious he’s been waiting there for me to come out. He’s probably been planning this since lunch, thinking that he’d walk with me and then we’d sit together, talk, and fall in love and now I’ve ruined his daydream.

“Then I’ll walk you home,” he says, saying it like a command
and making his eyes as big as can be so that there’s no way I can say no. I don’t know why, but I sort of like not being able to resist him. There’s something exciting about the way he talks to me. And besides, I’m not sure I don’t want exactly what he wants.

“Really?” I ask.

“Really.”

“Okay, yeah.” My stomach feels like it’s turning inside out when I think about being alone with him in my driveway. I stifle a nervous laugh by biting my lip and start to walk in the direction of my house, careful to brush my arm against his so that I can feel the brief contact of our sleeves rustling together when the fabric touches.

A few of the football players pass us on their way to the diner. They point and laugh. I hear them whisper about how Greg’s finally got himself a girl. And I’m really glad he doesn’t take any notice of them. He doesn’t stop and try to show off or act tough, just keeps walking at the same pace as me until we leave them behind.

We don’t talk for the first few blocks. Not really, anyway. He asks me typical questions about my first practice. I keep my answers to one word. Okay. Fine. Things like that. Then he coughs a fake cough before asking me if I have a boyfriend.

I shake my head.

Watching my feet as I walk because I don’t want to look at him and give away the jitters inside me that are leaning toward wanting one.

“What about that kid you’re always hanging out with at lunch?” he asks.

“Lukas?” I ask, pretending to be surprised so I can hide how excited I am that Greg’s been noticing me enough in the lunchroom to know who I sit with. “He’s not my boyfriend. He’s just a friend,” I tell him. “At the moment, not a very good one,” I add, thinking about how Lukas would react if he saw me walking home with one of the zombies of Maplecrest.

“I’m sorry,” Greg says, lowering his head to show he means it.

“It’s okay,” I tell him. “I’m starting to think it’s not such a bad thing.” I’m starting to think Lukas isn’t all together upstairs. Now that I’ve gotten to know some of the kids he’s always warning me against, I realize how wrong he is. They’re as normal as kids anywhere else. Maybe they’re right to call him a freak. Maybe he really is just one of those bullied kids who goes on a shooting spree once they finally snap.

I push the thought from my mind.

I don’t like thinking that way about him. It’s not fair.

“How do you like it here, anyway?” Greg asks, trying to change the mood as he skips a few steps to kick at a leaf pile on the curb.

“Okay, I guess,” I lie. Though it’s getting closer to the truth with each friendly smile he gives me.

“Why did you move here? You have family here or something?”

That makes me laugh. Not because it’s funny, but because it couldn’t be further from the reason. “We don’t have family anywhere. No aunts, uncles, cousins, or grandparents,” I say. “Just me and my dad.” And that makes me laugh, too,
though not the good kind of laugh because not even my dad is here. So really it’s just me. I might as well be an orphan for the next week.

“If you stay here long enough, you’ll have more family than you’ll want,” he jokes. Telling me that living in a small town has its drawbacks that way. “But I guess it’s good, too. We all look out for one another. Protect our own, you know?”

“Like a team,” I say.

“Yeah, like a team.” He smiles, happy to see that I really do understand what he’s trying to tell me.

I step closer to him, wanting suddenly to feel protected and part of the same team as him. His skin looks like a soft sculpture in the first shadows of nighttime. Perfectly smooth except for his chapped pink lips that crack when he stops smiling. I reach in front of me and rest my hands against his chest. He has to wrap his arms around me to hold me up and I can feel how strong he is as I lightly press my mouth against his chin.

The moon pokes through the sky as we stand near my house in each other’s arms. My mouth softening his dry lips with a kiss that I never want to end, that I want to go on and on like the ocean off the coast of Virginia, somewhere in my memories.

I’m still daydreaming
about Greg an hour after watching him follow the sidewalk back into town. I wrap my arms around a pillow as I lie on the sofa imagining myself kissing him over and over again. Kissing him with
my eyes closed like in a dream. There’s something about the way he kisses that’s unforgettable. That stays with me as the clock ticks away into the evening. It’s like part of me was swallowed up and changed inside him and I feel different now. Like a series of tiny stars are exploding beneath my skin and tickling me with their sparks.

My dad says that’s another part of the teenage-girl sickness. He’s diagnosed me with it weekly for the last four years of my life. “First symptoms of a full-blown crush,” is what he tells me whenever I tell him about something magical that happens between me and a boy I like. It makes me angry the way he never takes it seriously. But then again, I’ve had friends whose dads take those things way, way too seriously and I guess I’m sort of glad it’s the other way around with mine. Still it gets on my nerves that he never believes in true love, and that most of the time he’s right about it just being a passing phase.

He’d be wrong about Greg, though. Even if I’ve only known him for one day, I know my dad would be wrong.

I hold the pillow closer, hugging it until all the fluff is squeezed out and then I relax my arms. I open my eyes and see the clock staring me in the face. I know I have to get up and make some food. I still have homework that can’t be ignored. I need to wash that uniform before it grows moldy, and the shower I promised myself is still waiting for me. But I know if I get up my whole body will ache. I know the phantom feeling of Greg’s arms will fade and leave me truly alone.

The return of nightly noises outside the house is what finally forces me to stand up. A scratching sound moving
clumsily over the dead leaves on the frozen ground. I watch the ceiling for headlights traveling across the room but there’s nothing. It doesn’t startle me quite the same as it did yesterday. Even if it is people looking for my dad, I’m not as worried anymore because I have people to protect me. I’m part of a team now.

I get up from the sofa in a quick motion that brings back the memory of practice in the form of a shooting pain that dulls every inch of my spine. I do my best to shake it off and walk to the front door brave and steady because I don’t care who it is, I’m not running away anymore. I’m not hiding and I’m not going to be frightened. I open the door as wide as I can and face the darkness, standing up to the wind that rushes against me, doing its best to deter my confidence.

A pair of glassy eyes meets me in the doorway.

“It’s you.” My voice comes out somewhere in between relief and hatred at the sight of Lukas hunched over on the porch. “Hasn’t anyone ever told you not to sneak around a girl’s house and scare her half to death?” I tell him, exaggerating about how afraid I actually was.

“Sorry,” he mumbles as insincerely as possible.

The door swings slightly in my hand and I’m really close to slamming it shut. I can’t believe him. I can’t believe the nerve he has creeping around after the way he acted all day and then make it sound like my fault. Moping about like I’m the one who needs to apologize!

“What do you want, Lukas?”

His shoulders slump and his back curls to make his long body into the shape of a question mark as he shrugs. “Nothing really,” he says. Kicks at a few stray leaves that
have blown onto the brick steps. Shoves his hands deeper in his pockets and glances up at the porch light. “Just wanted to see if you were okay.”

“I’m fine,” saying it in a way that suggests that though I’m fine, there’s something wrong with him. “I don’t need you to protect me,” I tell him. Trying on purpose to be mean because I’m beginning to think that it was him creeping around yesterday, too. I’m starting to think he’s the only thing in this town that I need protection from.

“It’s already happening,” he says under his breath.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

He stands up straight and looks me in the eyes for the first time. Speaks clearly for the first time and says, “It means it won’t be long before you’re not you anymore.”

“You don’t even know who I am!” I raise my voice because I’m not about to go through this again. I’ve had it with him telling me who I should be and who I shouldn’t be.

“Don’t you get it?” he shouts back. “I’ve seen this happen before. You’ll get so swept away with being popular that you won’t see it coming. By the time you realize what’s happening, it’ll be too late. You’ll be one of them.”

“Yeah, well, maybe that’s not such a bad thing.” Telling him he’s just jealous because I’m fitting in. “You’re just mad because I don’t want to be a freak like you.”

He rushes at me and grabs my arm before I can shut the door. Staring at me with crazy eyes and spitting his words. “Hannah, you’ll be dead! You’ll feed on corpses like maggots do! Is that what you want? Is being popular worth that?” Screaming so that his voice hurts my ears.

“If that was true, you’d already be dead,” I shout. “They’d
have killed you a long time ago for being such a freak!”

“You don’t think they’re not going to kill me?” he yells, gripping my wrists tighter so that I can’t pull away and slam the door. “You don’t think they’ll kill me as soon as they’re not worried about you getting suspicious?”

I yell at him to stop.

To let go of me and leave me alone.

He only clenches me tighter. Shouts louder as if it will sink in as long as his words drown out every other sound in the world. He’s still yelling when the car drives by. And I’m still trying to fight him off when it pulls into my driveway. Lukas doesn’t notice the hum of the engine, the click of the car door, or the quick rush of footsteps hurrying up the walkway.

An arm latches around Lukas’s neck and cuts off the words in one sudden strangling sound. He lets go of me and clutches at the arm sealing the air off from his lungs as he gasps for breath. The sheriff applies more pressure and drags Lukas a few feet away. He finally stops struggling once the sheriff throws him to the ground like tossing away the trash.

I cover my mouth as he towers over Lukas with his arms folded and his boots ready to kick him if he dares to move. I’m not sure whether to rush out and help him or if I should throw my arms around Maggie’s dad and thank him for rescuing me. So I just stand there. Confused and useless.

“You all right?” the sheriff asks in a low voice. His face is split down the middle, half hidden in the shadows while the other side is bathed in electric porch light.

“Yes,” I say into the palms of my hands. But I can feel my heartbeat racing throughout my body and everything has
happened so fast that I’m not sure if I’m all right or not.

But he doesn’t seem too interested in my answer, anyway, turning his attention to Lukas. Bending down so that when he speaks, Lukas will feel the heat of his words. “A real tough guy, huh?” he sneers and Lukas coughs up spit on the ground as he tries hard to catch his breath.

“Don’t hurt him,” I shout and they both glance at me. Both of them as surprised as me when I say “please.”

The sheriff steps away as Lukas stumbles to his feet. The terror in his eyes upsets me and even though I have every reason to never want to see him again, I can’t help but feel sorry for him as he starts to jog away. Picking up the pace as the sheriff shouts out a warning for him not to come back. The sound of his feet, running faster, echoes off the empty houses as he passes them before ducking into the woods that cut through to his house.