The City Series (Book 1): Mordacious (48 page)

I turn over the earth in the yards. Except for our original yard and the raised beds of the Hipster Zombies, the non-concrete patches are years’ worth of interlocked roots that must first be dug up, broken apart to save the dirt, and then discarded. We’re composting it, along with any food left uneaten, although there’s none of that so far.

“I didn’t picture you as a farmer,” Eric says.

He leans against a lawn chair in jeans, a black T-shirt and his boots, arms crossed. In the past twenty-four hours, I’ve done my best to look forward to spinach, feel likeable, and disregard the Verrazano, but I’m having a harder time not concerning myself with this person who is not only always here, but also happens to look really good in a black T-shirt.

“Join the club,” I say.

“I’ll get a shovel.”

I point to the shed. “There’s everything you need to be a farmer in there, as I’m sure you’re aware. Except a tractor and a hat.”

“
Nary
a straw hat? Forget it, then.” He makes a V for victory at his use of today’s word.

“You suck,” I say. “I was just planning how to use it.”

“Ah, but you didn’t.”

He jumps to avoid the clod of dirt I toss at him on his way to the shed. Once back, his shovel goes in, his boot tamps it down, and a chunk of earth double the size of mine flips over. The muscles in his arms move in alternating patterns. I try not to, but I can’t help a couple of surreptitious glances. On my third glance, Leo has appeared at the border of the yard.

“Hi,” I say.

“Hello,” he says. “Can I dig?”

“It’s hard work.” He nods. I search for something his size in the shed. We’ve rounded up every garden implement in the yards, but the shovels are taller than him. I bring back a trowel and the shortest shovel we have. “The shovel’s kind of big.”

“That’s all right.” Leo stabs repeatedly at the grass and doesn’t make a single dent, but I respect that he gives it the old college try.

“Why don’t you use the trowel?” I ask.

Leo frowns. “I want to use a real shovel.”

I shrug and continue digging. A few minutes later, the shovel handle clunks on Leo’s head and then clatters to the concrete of the adjoining yard. “Stupid shovel! I hate that shovel!” he screams.

Eric kneels by Leo with a trowel. “Hey, bud, it’s okay. It’s a little big for you. We’ll try to find you a smaller one soon but, for now, maybe you should use—”

“It’s not a shovel!” Leo yells, fists at his side and shoulders by his ears. Tears are already present. He’s gone from happy to tantrum at breakneck speed—a sequence of events I know well. Eric attempts reason, assuming Leo is into rationality at the moment, but he’s wrong about that. Who knew I had so much in common with a five-year-old? Everyone, probably.

I walk to the shed for another trowel, then return to the grass and use it to dig up some roots. It’s a pain in the ass. “Hey, squirt,” I say.

Leo turns to me with little angry eyebrows that force me to smother a laugh. “What?”

“I’m using a trowel over here and it’s so much better. Shovels suck big time.” Eric shakes his head. Maybe I shouldn’t have said that last part. Live and learn.

“It is not better,” Leo says.

“Okay.” I sit on the ground with my back to him. “Sure does work, though. I’ll just be over here digging with my trowel. Happily, I might add.”

Eric gets back to digging. Two minutes pass. After another minute, Leo asks with a sniff, “Can I use one?”

I turn. He’s edged closer, still pouting but done with the melodrama. “I don’t know. Are you going to work?” He wipes his nose on his sleeve while he nods. It’s disgusting, but I’m getting somewhere. “No more screaming like a banshee?”

“No,” he says.

“Then get over here.”

Leo kneels in the grass beside me. It’s not much of an improvement over the shovel, but little bits of grass fly up when he gets it a millimeter under the surface. And now that I’m kneeling, I’m at perfect height for conversation. He starts with a discourse on bugs and then switches to weapons. This kid is armed to the teeth with imaginary bows and guns and even a flying vehicle. I find that as long as I make the appropriate response noises, I can zone out until there’s another pause.

“Want to hear about what my new bow can do?” he asks.

“Sure.”

“So, one has a laser beam. Wait, no, it only has a laser beam when it shoots your heart. So it goes into your heart and
then
shoots laser beams. And it can follow your heat so you can’t run away.”

“That’s quite a weapon,” I say, and go back to thinking about the absence of lunch. I liked lunch. Lunch was great, especially when it was pizza.

“And there’s another one that shoots fire. But only when I shoot it at the bad guys.”

“That’s definitely who you should shoot.” I listen for another ten minutes and then stand. “Hey, Leo, my back is breaking. I’m going to use a shovel while you tell me about your arsenal.”

“What’s an arsenal?”

“All the weapons you own are called your arsenal.”

He prattles on. With Eric’s help, this small patch of ground is turning from green to brown quickly. I take a break to sip from my water bottle.

“Can I have some?” Leo asks.

It probably makes me a horrible person, but I don’t want his mouth on my bottle. Little kids are always sick with something. I’m about to offer to get him his own when Eric hands him his. Leo wraps his entire mouth around the spout and tips his head back, which results in anything he didn’t swallow falling back into the bottle when he lowers it.

“Keep it,” Eric says to Leo. “That bottle is now officially yours.” Leo places it by his side and goes back to digging.

“What? You don’t like backwash?” I ask.

“I love the kid, but some things are just too gross to be overcome by love.” He bends to break up a large chunk. “I have something for you when we’re done.”

I assume he’s talking to Leo, but he taps my foot with his shovel. I look up from the last patch of green. “You mean me?”

“Yeah, you. Don’t you want it?”

The thought that he has something for me makes me warm all over, but, while I like presents, I’m not very good at receiving them. “I guess.”

“Don’t get too excited, now. We wouldn’t want you to keel over.”

I concentrate on digging. “What is it?”

“It’s a surprise.”

“I don’t like surprises.”

“Why doesn’t that surprise me? Don’t worry, it’s good.”

I dig up another clump with a nod. I should say something that makes me seem less ungracious. “Sorry. I…I don’t like to not know what’s coming. How things end. Sometimes I have to read the end of a book before I’m done or look up the synopsis of the next episode of a TV show because I can’t take it. And, yes, I’m aware that it’s crazy.”

“Is that why you love
Murder, She Wrote
? Because Jessica Fletcher always gets her man?”

My laugh comes without warning, but I still wag a finger. “You have just broken our agreement. And, if you’d remembered correctly, you’d remember that I said I would
even
watch
Murder, She Wrote
. As in it was not my first choice.”

“Oh, right. That was
Unsolved Mysteries
.”

“Don’t joke about that show,” I say. “I loved
Unsolved Mysteries
.”

“But that makes no sense. There is no end. They’re
unsolved
mysteries.”

“It was different. We knew going in there was no end, but we could work together to find it, and then Robert Stack would give us the update and it was the most satisfying conclusion ever.”

“You are a very strange bird,” he says. I throw dirt on his boots.

When we’re finished, I change out of my digging pants that are so stiff they can practically stand on their own. Once it rains, we’ll do laundry. Once it rains, I’ll be clean. I’ve never wanted rain so badly in all my life.

There’s a knock on the bedroom door. “Come in,” I say.

Eric strolls in with one hand behind his back. He feels looming in this room now that it’s mine again. Not in a bad way—in a
Hi, I’m a man in your room
way. He holds out a small brown paper bag. “It’s not a lot, but I saved them for you. I had to share with Leo.”

I take the bag and hold it by my thigh. “Thanks.”

“Aren’t you going to look inside?”

“Now?” He nods. My stomach flips while I inspect the bag that holds no clue as to its contents. “I don’t like opening presents in front of people. Even if I like it, I get weird. Then I convince myself the person thinks I’m only acting as if I like it. It’s awkward for everyone. It’s better to give me a few minutes to get the reaction right.”

He leans against the doorframe with his hands in his pockets. An eyebrow rises along with a corner of his mouth. “You have some serious issues, you know that?”

“This is not news.” I grip the bag in my palm. Maybe I can figure out what it is before I look inside. Prepare myself. But all I can feel is a jumble of little hard things and maybe something soft. “Is it rocks?”

“Why would I bring you rocks?”

“Fine. I’m going to open it.”

“And I’m going to watch you like a hawk.”

I tip the bag toward the window light. Inside is a mixture of Starburst and Skittles and Gummi Savers—almost all orange. My mouth drops. “They’re really for me?”

“No, I’m just showing you my orange candy. Now give them back.”

I move the bag behind me. “Never! Thank you. You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know.” He cuts his eyes skyward with a dreamy sigh. “That’s what makes me so great.”

I burst out laughing.

“See?” he asks. “You did fine. I know you like them. You do, right?”

I nod and take another peek inside. It’s a bag of candy, but it’s more than that, at least to me. It means he thought of me and remembers something about me and then, in the state of our candy-less world, saved them for
me
. I don’t have to tell him all of that, but I should do more than nod. “Honestly, it’s the best present I’ve gotten in years.”

His face lights up. It’s that simple. Only a few words. “You’re easy to please.”

I check to make sure no one has appeared on the dresser over my shoulder. “Hi, my name is Sylvie. I think you’re confusing me with Grace.”

“And I think you misjudge yourself.” His smile grows broader, highlighting the faint beginnings of what will someday be laugh lines. He walks into the hall. “Enjoy it.”

I clutch the bag and wait for the punchline, but he’s gone. It’s just me and my candy, which was given to me by a seriously pleasant guy who professes to think I’m easy to please. He must be blind, and I must be crazy, because I almost believe that he believes it.

Chapter 64

Eric

There are new people to feed and a longer wait for the outhouse the last couple days, but no one seems to mind. Everyone loves Leo, especially Maria, who dotes on him, dropping chocolate chips into his oatmeal and reading him books she found in nearby houses. It has to be torture, not knowing where Penny and Ana are. Every time I think about what might have happened to Cassie, I force myself to think about something else. Anything else. There’s a lot to do but not much distraction from your own thoughts. Digging up grass isn’t brain surgery.

The streets in the direction we planned to look for food are still full of zombies. I suggest going to Guillermo’s instead. “I haven’t seen his place, and we should bring them the seeds. Paul wants to see it, too.” Sylvie and Grace practically throw their shovels to the ground. “Don’t want to force you or anything.”

“Oh, I’d rather dig,” Sylvie says. “I’m going for you and Paul.”

“You hear that?” I say to Paul.

He thrusts his shovel into the dirt with a grunt. She’s tried twice today to include Paul, and he is less than responsive. I’ve tried to chalk it up to losing Hannah, but he’s nice enough to Maria and Jorge. To Grace and Sylvie, he’s been quiet and grumpy. I can’t blame it entirely on Grace telling him off because I sensed a change in him the minute he met them. I think he
wants
to dislike them, and it kills him that Leo thinks they’re the cat’s meow.

“We’ll change,” Grace says, and ruffles Leo’s hair on her way to the back door. Leo follows them in, rambling on about something, and Paul stabs the earth again.

“What’s up with you?” I ask him.

“Nothing.”

“Don’t give me that bullshit, Paulie.”

He straightens, face stony and chin jutting, then bends to dig again. “This is it, bro. Life. Right here. This is what I’ve got.”

“You have Leo,” I say.

His mouth tightens; it was the wrong thing to say. “Thanks for the reminder. I know I have Leo. Another fucking thing to worry about. While you…” He shakes his head.

“While I what?”

“Forget it.” Paul drops his shovel and walks away. I let him. Paul won’t discuss it until he’s ready, and going after him will only make him dig in his heels.

***

Sylvie stands in our exit house, chisel in her gloved hand and leather coat hugging her waist. It’s Ana’s coat, and Ana knew exactly what would flatter a figure. “The purple really livens up your outfit,” I say.

Sylvie sets her hands on her hips and cocks her head. I can’t put my finger on it, but something’s changed. She’s at ease in a way she wasn’t before—still skittish but less guarded. Possibly because I plied her with candy. “That’s exactly what I was going for. It’s all the rage this seas—”

“Let’s go,” Paul says. Sylvie opens her mouth and then closes it. She and Grace exchange a look and walk out the gate.

Paul keeps his distance inside the houses but moves close on the streets to keep Grace and Sylvie between us. I don’t think they notice—probably a good thing with the way Grace reamed him out—although I’m grateful he’s not acting like a total dick.

Sylvie and Grace are up stoops, in and out of houses, and through yards efficiently. They stay together and, though it’s obvious they know this route, they’re vigilant. I don’t think they needed me to follow them to Brooklyn Heights. If they couldn’t get through, I’m willing to bet it had nothing to do with their abilities. But that doesn’t mean I won’t follow them if they decide to return while I’m still around.