Battle of the Network Zombies (3 page)

A living cage.

Pine needles sprang from pores in the bark. And all through this Birch sang, his cadence rising and swirling around us like a blanket. To say I was impressed would be an understatement; he’d won me over; I was, in fact, almost a fan.

Which is totally weird for me, I think you know.

It turns out Birch wasn’t a complete waste of air.

Damn close.

But not totally.

When he was done, the thing was subdued and totally imprisoned. The singer turned and winked. “Catch you bad-asses later.”

“Oh no, you don’t.” I stepped into his path.

“Ah.” He sighed and nodded his head. “You want to come home with me. It’s all right. It happens to all the women I touch with my song.”

He reached out and slipped his hand across my face, smooshing my lips with a rude ploying thumb. I jerked away.

“You
must
be joking.”

He shook his head. “No. And you needn’t be embarrassed. I can almost smell your wetness.”

“That’s not arousal, you idiot. That’s rot.” I looked around and saw my mother scowl at the comment and purse her lips in heavy judgment.
¹¹
My head swiveled to alert Gil that Ethel was at it again. To prove it. But as is so often the case, the vampire was busy looking at something else entirely. My stomach turned. Gil was assessing the nymph’s ass.

Birch chuckled at my comment and returned to the destruction of our banquette to collect his bag and the disheveled carcass of the creature that lay nearby.

“Seriously. If you could do all that, why didn’t you pull out your magic song when the yeti first attacked.” I glanced over at the creature. Its claws clung to the branches, eyes seeking out Birch and following his movement across the room.

“I thought there were more of them—they usually travel in herds, like women at shoe sales. I can handle one yeti.” He paused, lost in a memory. “But two and I’d have been so much mulch.” He pointed at the pile of torn bodies strewn around the strip club floor.

“I totally get self-preservation, so I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.”

“Thank you, madame.”

“
‘Moiselle!’
Mademoiselle!” Of course, Birch was no longer paying attention. He simply pivoted in his Italian loafers and slunk from the room.

“See you soon,” he called behind him.

Gil followed his motion with actual interest.

“What are you lookin’ at?” I asked.

“I’m lookin’! He’s got a nice can. For fuck sake.”

“A can? What is this, the 70s?” I asked, momentarily forgetting that Gil was technically the same age he was in those sexy years of polyester, pet rocks and coke-fueled orgies in artist’s lofts.
¹²

“Yep.” He brushed himself off and we walked over to Ethel, still dazed and spread-eagled on the floor. Gil held out his hand and Mother took it. “Let’s get you into something more comfortable.”

“Seriously?” I looked back at the cage, half-expecting the yeti to come charging from between broken branches, but it was still inside, hunched down like a big dollop of vanilla pudding.

The prone woman at first waved off Gil’s offer with an uncharacteristically pained expression and then yielded to his support with such a sigh I expected the stigmata to appear and squirt blood from her hands like a hose. Gag. Gil hoisted her slim frame into the protection of his underarm and led her around the truck bed and toward a door behind the hostess kiosk.

“Are you going out with Wendy and me?” I called after him.

He spun, jerking Mother around with him, a scowl of judgment plastered on his normally handsome face. “How could you even ask that, with all that your mother’s been through?”

I don’t know why it surprised me. Really. I should have expected it, but when I turned my eyes in Ethel’s direction, she wore a smirk the size of a cantaloupe slice, gushing with her usual hateful gaminess. My fists balled instinctively and I took a step toward her, more as a threat than any real prelude to the beating she deserved.

Gil gasped and looked at Ethel, who instantly put on a pathetic pout for his benefit then curled her lips into a perfect mimicry of a cat’s anus when he turned his gaze back to me.

“Really, Amanda, you could work on your empathy a bit,” he said.

I’m pretty sure my mouth sagged open like a blowup sex doll, stuck on there like it was permanent. Gil could have probably tossed his entire judgment between my lips without getting any on my cheeks.

I seethed.

“Oh and no. I can’t make it,” Gil said as he led my mother into the backroom. “I have a blind date.”

“A blind date? Who do you even know to set you up beside Wendy and me?”

He nodded his head in Ethel’s direction and slammed the door behind them.

I could only imagine the kind of suitor the old witch would pick out for Gil, probably some saccharine vampire accountant who couldn’t follow a joke if he had George Carlin’s ghost interpreting. It’d be just our luck that Gil would hit it off and the rest of our outings would be soured by the new boyfriend’s dead stares and uncomfortable silences.

And that’s what I thought about until I turned back to the empty cage and started screaming.

Wednesday
10:00–10:30
P.M.
Demon Date

“What y’all screaming about?”

I didn’t recognize the voice, but the twang was as southern as chicken on a biscuit, or tea so sweet it makes your teeth ache—both of which, I’d been perseverating on during feedings. Fantasizing is not uncommon for monotonous diets. Looking up, I witnessed a discretely clothed young woman in a tan trench, with her hair pulled back into a tight bun like an actual dancer, though no one would ever mistake Hairy Sue for a ballerina.

I pointed at the cage of branches. “It’s empty.”

The girl shrugged nonchalantly. “What was in there?”

“It’s escaped!” I started to yell and then reined it in lest I draw the thing’s attention again.

“What has? What are y’all talkin’ about?”

“The yeti! Did it go back there?” I pointed to the stage entrance.

She shook her head, said, “A yeti? Well, Mother Mary in a mock turtleneck you don’t see one of those every day.”

Now, I’ve heard a lot of mixed-use religious exclamations in my time, in fact, one of Ethel’s favorites, “Jesus Christ on a cracker,” popped out of my own mouth from time to time. But this one, invoking a poor clothing choice, really didn’t work for me. Maybe a muumuu might be better. Mother Mary in a muumuu. It had a nice irreverent tone.

She continued, “Is that what was making all that racket? I wouldn’t know, I’ve been changin’, takin’ off all my makeup and stuff after my show. Did you see it?”

“Oh, I saw it.” I pictured the thing’s chicken skin jiggling on its hairless belly, the rows of nipples, the massive claws. I hoped I wouldn’t see it again, though the more the girl talked the less concerned I became. The yeti was too big to just slip past her; it was probably on its way back to the forest, though how it would get there unnoticed was beyond me.

“Did you like it?” Hairy Sue winked, her lips pursed or pouting—I couldn’t quite determine the level of suggestiveness she was going for.

“What?”

“My show. Did you like it?”

I grimaced, not sure how to respond. Then opting for the straightforward route, “I gotta ask.” I paused. Hairy Sue was nodding already, serious in her consideration. “How did you figure out the whole bush thing? I mean, those guys seemed to be really into it.”

“They’re creamin’ for it, four nights out of seven. I’m not sure why. The longer I let it grow, the more tips I get. Could be somethin’ innate. Or maybe them pheromones cling better to the pubes.” She shrugged and followed me to the door. “My last show for a while. I’m going to be on a reality show. In fact, I’m packing as soon as I get home.”

“Oh yeah?” I muttered absently.

“
American Minions
. You know, with Johnny Birch. He’s a regular here.”

“Yeah. I figured.”

Now I’d seen every inch of the girl and she looked completely human. She smelled like meat with a hint of butter, nothing out of the ordinary and certainly not bodyguard material unless she was a ninja. I figured I’d better not engage with her anymore, professional distance, and all.

“Good luck with that,” I said and she bounced off into the parking lot. I swear I heard her pea brain rattle around in the hollow of her skull. It could have been a passing car, I suppose, but the odds were pretty good in my favor.

I followed her out, but oddly enough, wasn’t relieved to be out of harm’s way, or the clutches of my fiendish mother.

“Oh, come on!” I slapped my purse against my thigh. “Are you serious?”

The man cramming a jimmy down the Volvo window tilted his head up and eyed me vigorously. His hair was scruffy blond and framed his face in that unkempt way that’s supposed to be charming, and would have been if the accompanying sneer hadn’t stripped away the allure. A cigarette bobbed from between those lips. Smoke curled around his pasty jaw like an arty charcoal and trapped like a fog in the forest of unruly curls. He nodded in my direction and went back to the business of breaking into my car.

Each jarring of the metal shim squealed and echoed, shivering its way up my already-cold frame, mixing with the anger. If I’d been alive the goose flesh would have been visible, even in the shadows.

Haven’t I had enough tonight, without having to deal with a thief?
¹³

“Hey!” I tromped up to the man. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

He shifted the cigarette from his lips to his teeth and mumbled through a clenched jaw. “Vance Ventura, repo artist. You got the keys? That’d make my life a whole lot easier, if you had them. I got a thing later on; don’t want to be late. First impressions, and all.”

“Well, you’re certainly winning
me
over.” I made no move for my keys, of course, but scanned the parking lot for witnesses.
¹⁴

“It’s Vance.” He actually chuckled.

I clearly didn’t get the joke.

The “survivors” of the yeti attack huddled around a burn barrel, warming their hands like hobos and no doubt comparing war stories, as though they just fought their way from “the thick of it.” Never mind the fact that they screamed like little girls and blocked up the exit like a toilet in a Mexican jail cell. A couple of cars over, a man sat in his car hotboxing a cigarette, his tortured face blinking red with each inhalation. Another man steadied himself against a wall at the Daisy Chain motel across the highway, one foot on the ground, the other kicking the wall back—the international pose for street hustlers (and I’m not talking about the kind that throw dice).

Sure.

I know what you’re thinking. And yes, it is pretty risky going for a public bite, but can you imagine me without a car? Not in a town like Seattle. For Christ’s sake, it rains here. Have you seen what kind of atrocities nature wreaks on high-viscosity rayon?

He had to die.

“Could I talk to you over here for a minute?” I motioned to a gap in the trees and an overlook of the Aurora Bridge beyond, sauntered a bit to get his attention—never underestimate the power of a hip swivel—turned and eyed him over my shoulder. He followed.

I watched a waterfall of ghost suicides plummet from the Aurora Bridge. The reenactments were really quite lyrical, a mid-century oil come to life. A near-constant cascade of amethyst streaked the darkness below the bridge. I suppose it happens during the day, too, but you can’t see them as well as the night shift.

Vance Ventura’s eyes seemed to focused on the same vista. He cocked his head before speaking, but didn’t look at me. “You’re wasting your time if you think a blowjob is going to keep me from taking your car tonight.”

Fucker.

“Wow, you’re pretty astute, Vance. I guess I’ll have to go with plan B, then.”

“Which is?”

I shot a glance through the trees and back into the lot. Once certain no one was interested in our little liaison—after all, it didn’t involve butter churns—I unhinged my jaw. The bones cracked against drying muscle, stretching my mouth wide as a lioness’s. I moved for him, twisting quickly to make for his neck, before the shock of the vision subsided and he’d stumble away or scream. But as I pressed him, an arm shot up between us and collided with my breastbone, forcing me backward.

“Mighty big mouth you got there, Grandma. The better to eat me with, right?”

I stumbled a bit and glared.
What did he say?

“Seriously? A fairy tale reference?” I noted his fingers as they elongated into claws and his eyes flooded crimson like portholes on a sinking ship. I should have seen it coming. He
was
watching the ghosts take swan dives, after all. I dismissed my instinct without even thinking.

I really am off my game
.

Allowing my mouth to shift back into human form, I kneaded at the ache in my jaw and my pride, of course. Figures I’d run into something inedible while so freaking hungry.

Ventura’s lips curled from his teeth in dry jerky slips, revealing not the fine bone of vampire fangs, but hearty, thick canines swathed in a yellowed ruddy calculus—Vance could use a good hygienist. His jaw punched his face outward, the skin loosening to reveal overlapping layers of what looked like scales, but turned out to unravel like rose petals loosening from a bud. They fluttered revealing a clear muzzle. This was no werewolf. Not a shapeshifter at all. The floral aspect seemed to imply something older.

What’s with all the woodland creatures?
I thought.
Three in one night? And so fucking weird, too.

I hate nature.

“So what the hell are you?”

Vance retracted his ability, in a quiver of petals (I guessed), and returned to the same sandy-haired good looks and cocky smile. He shrugged off the question, as though it were none of my business. “Can I get those keys now?”

“You’re a real asshole. You knew what I was going to pull. Why didn’t you just save me the trouble?” I shoved my hand in my purse and dug. “I don’t have another car, you know.”

He yawned, twisted his wrist around to get a look at the time. “Thank God for that, I’d probably have to repossess that one too.”

“Bastard.” I launched the keys at him, hoping to peg him hard enough to leave a dent.

But he snatched them out of the air, denying me even that paltry satisfaction.

“A pleasure doing business with you, Miss Feral.” He tossed the keys in the air and caught them again.

“Fuck off.”

Gravel ground under his soles and the Volvo’s parking lights flashed. He was in and whipping the car from the Hooch and Cooch lot before I even stepped foot onto concrete. I started to dial Marithé, since it was her inability to follow directions that kept me hanging in the Hooch and Cooch in the first place (not really, but it’s nice to have someone to blame in these cases). I didn’t really want to hear her resounding lack of empathy, so I pounded Wendy’s number into my phone.

“Hold on.” Wendy picked up mid-conversation. “Make sure to pick up every last bead, I nearly busted my ass on a handful the other day and if I had, it would have been back to Nicaragua with a certain jeweler.” She cleared her throat. “Hey girl, what’s up?”

“Consuela getting uppity?”

“Her name is Abuelita, like the hot chocolate with peppers or whatever the fuck they put in it.”

“Whatever. You gotta come pick me up.”

Wendy had decided to further embrace her “undeadness” through a line of supernatural jewelry called Skids. She hooked up with a glorified bead stringer and Nicaraguan immigrant named Abeulita, apparently, through Deadspace dot com, and the two had turned Wendy’s apartment into a factory of sorts. It wasn’t exactly clear how she paid the little woman, or if she did at all, but I had to hand it to my girl, she was uncharacteristically accommodating, even to the point of gathering down comforters from local thrift stores to make Abuelita comfortable in her special spot next to the oven. And boy, did she need the down. You could see your breath in there since the heat was shut off—well, if you had breath, or if you had breath that wasn’t supposed to be visible to begin with, like
moi
.

“Where are you?”

“Hell.”

Wendy snickered.

“I’m only half-joking. I’m at the Hooch and Cooch. Had a meeting that turned into a bloodbath.”

“Are you sure you’re not doing a little moonlighting for Mommy?”

Always the smartass
. I was in no mood. “Just get over here. It’s too depressing to tell you over the phone. Just get over here.”

“Sorry. I can’t right now. Abuelita needs me to do a supply run and since I haven’t gotten her a bus pass yet, it’s all up to me.”

“Well then you won’t get to hear about the TV show I’ll be doing with Johnny Birch.” I poked the end button like an eye and speed-dialed Scott, ignoring the near endless call waiting signals.

Poor Wendy, she loved nothing more than gossip.

“I need a ride and I don’t want any questions.” I bit off the last word.

“Is this some kind of role-playing sex thing?”

“
That
is a question, Scott.”

“Yeah, but—”

I shouted the address and tried to press the end button through the back of the phone. What? You act like I don’t have reason to be a raving bitch, when I do.

I so do.

Near the motel, a streetlamp pulsed its dying light through clinging mist and the hustler continued trolling for business, bending down as cars slowed and rubbing his thigh for the benefit of leering businessmen. The huddled masses seemed to be tiring of recounting the story to each other and shambled off to spread the story elsewhere. With no reapers to clean up the memories, it was just a fluke that no one had a camera. Of course, it’d just end up on some Discovery Channel exposé a handful of people watch over their uncomfortably silent dinners with the partner they settled with.

I was more interested in my next meal.

I glanced back at the hustler, and weighed the sinking pang in my gut—it burrowed there like a fat parasite—against the odds of becoming someone’s hood ornament.
¹⁵
Hunger won out. I scanned both directions. The major issue was the cement division separating the traffic. Never one for track and field—I avoided activity like the plague in high school—I didn’t think I’d be able to pull off a hurdle, so I needed enough time to stop and crawl over it like the lazy bitch I am.

It was now or never. Scott didn’t have the stomach to involve himself with a feeding, so I couldn’t wait for him to get there and expect him to be thrilled to wait by some tent city while I darted in for a quick nibble. Nor would I ask—I am a polite girlfriend, after all. We hunted together once and when he saw me dig in, he ended up puking and distant for three sexless days and nights.

That’s a record, at least for us.

It turned out I didn’t need to make a decision.

“Hey!” the hustler shouted across the highway. He’d waited for a break in the traffic or his irritating yowl would never have had the opportunity to abrade my sensibilities. Jesus Christ on a cracker, it was like feedback. “You got a light?”

“A what?” His words had melted together into a whiny unintelligible “yougawhy.”

“A light!” He snatched a cigarette from behind his ear and held it up.