Bob The Zombie Page 3

  "I can imagine." He winked at me and I nearly facepalmed when I remembered I was talking to a green man. The smile he was wearing transformed into a frown "You zombies sort of lose everything when you're brought back, don't you?"

  "Yeah. At first you think everything will be fine, but it takes a little while for the decomposition to begin. The magic that reanimates us holds it at bay. The stronger the necromancer, the longer we appear alive and normal. As their magic wanes, Mother Nature busts in to take what is hers. It's never a pretty process, and for those people who love us I can imagine it is psychologically devastating as we turn from our normal living selves into a walking, talking corpse. Our eyes cloud over, our skin turns weird colors, our stomachs distend because of gasses, and mold starts growing here and there. Sometimes we get depressed and want to lay in bed with the covers over our head, but we can't do that because of the risk of maggots. We can't drown our sorrows in alcohol or drugs, we can't kill ourselves, it's pretty much just sit and accept that your life is over and this new hell has begun." As I spoke Griffin looked at me with a frown.

  "Wow. That has to be heartbreaking for you. I may not be part of your horde, but if you ever need anything, please know I'll be there for you." I could tell he was being sincere, mostly because he was a nice, caring fellow. More humane than humans for sure.

  "Thanks, man. I appreciate that." Awkward silence filled the truck. Griffin reached over and turned on the radio. 'Leroy Brown' was on and we both started singing along to it, breaking the silence and cementing our new friendship.

  "We're looking for 622 Liszt Street." Griffin kept watch out his side and I stared out of my window, both of us belting out the oldie, but goodie.

  "There it is." I pointed ahead to the sign that read Liszt St.

  "Good eye."

  "Thanks." We went back to singing along and searching for the house. I couldn't see the address, but when a dilapidated old gothic Victorian emerged ahead of us, I was pretty sure we had the right place. The number on the sidewalk out in front confirmed it.

  "Who the hell would live in a place like this?" Griff asked as he swung open the creaky, rusty, old iron gate.

  "The Addams family? The Munsters? Bob Dole?"

  "Bob Dole?" Griffin raised an emerald eyebrow at me. I shrugged, and he chuckled. We headed up the broken, weed choked, cement path to the house. I stepped up on the bottom wooden tread and my foot went right through. The board was almost completely rotted away.

  "Watch your step." I pulled my leg out and inspected it. Don't know why, not like I'll die if I get tetanus or anything.

  "Thanks. Phew, this house is almost as decomposed as you are."

  "I wonder if staples would work on it?"

  "Probably just turn the place to dust and piss off the termites." Griffin grinned and gingerly stepped up to the porch. He reached out to touch the doorbell and jumped when it rang out loudly through the house and property. "Reminds me of the Addam's house even more now."

  I half expected Lurch to open the door and so was surprised to see a young woman that was thin as a rail and pale as a ghost.

  "Yes?" She didn't even appear to notice us, and as a zombie, standing next to a green man, it set off some warning bells and reminded me of my black days of depression.

  "Hello, Miss. We're looking for a necromancer who brought a skag of ghouls back from the dead." Griffin skipped the formalities and went right to the point. The young woman gasped, finally seeing us for what we are.

  "Oh, sweet Jesus! You're here to kill and turn me, ain't you?"

  "No, definitely not, we just need you to rein in your ghouls. They ruined my bar today."

  "My ghouls?" She looked surprised and a bit addled. I wasn't sure she was the one we were looking for, when a sudden awareness shined in her eyes. "Oh, those monsters that followed me home from the cemetery. They're not mine. They crawled out of the ground and followed me home like puppies. I told them to leave but they wouldn't. You look like one. Are you one?" She looked at me quizzically.

  "No, I'm a zombie. My name's Bob."

  "Oh. What's the difference?"

  "Well..." I trailed off and looked at Griffin. I didn't know what to say. It seems she had no idea of what she was or what she had done. He sighed and nodded to me slightly, letting me know he was going to take over. Pretty sure they heard my sigh of relief all the way over in China.

  "Are you Christine Whitaker?" He asked her gently.

  "Yes. What does that have to do with the difference in these creatures?"

  "Well, Christine, I don't think anybody has ever told you this before." He took a deep breath preparing himself for the task of shattering her world completely. "You're a necromancer. You have the power to bring the dead back to life. To answer your question, the difference between zombies and ghouls is that ghouls need their necromancer to call on them occasionally or they run wild. They forget the person they were and become akin to wild beasts, attacking anyone who crosses their path. Zombies retain the full soul of the person who was reanimated, they don't need a sorceress to hold their consciousness together the way ghouls do."

  "You think I'm a necromancer? That's silly, I'm no sorceress. You must be mistaken. I don't know why those things followed me home or what the deal is, but it's not my fault." She had the look of a frightened animal and I was a little afraid we'd scared her into bolting. I got my foot ready to stop the door from closing, should she decide to do so.

  "Miss Whitaker, ghouls don't follow people, they usually just eat them. They will absolutely follow the person who raised them, but they sure as heck don't tag along after normal folks like some putrid puppy." Griffin's tone softened and I could feel the peace and tranquility he was emoting. When she turned to him and gasped, I realized she understood he was creating or at least enhancing those feelings.

  "Christine, is everything ok?" One of her neighbors hollered. It seemed to shake her out of her reverie.

  "I'm fine, Kathleen. Thanks for asking, sweetie. These fellas are old friends of my Nan. You remember her, the actress?" She smiled sweetly and I was glad the neighbor couldn't see the stark fear in her eyes.

  "That explains why that one looks like one of those things from The Walking Dead. Is he part of the show?" She looked eager and I grimaced, sure she was about to request an autograph or ask for a picture with me.

  "No ma'am, just came from a zombie run a few towns over." I hollered to her with what I hoped was a polite smile. I hated those zombie runs. Seriously people, we don't limp (unless we limped in life) and we aren't slow moving idiots caring for naught but brains.

  "Oh, I've heard of those runs. Well, I'll see you later, Christine. Yell if you need anything, ok?" She cast another suspicious look at us.

  "Thanks, Kat. I will see you later." Miss Whitaker held the door open and ushered us into her living room. She gestured for us to sit on an old camel back sofa, made of mahogany and upholstered in a lush purple velvet.

  Griffin and I sat down and I was surprised by how comfortable the couch was. Christine saw my shock and smiled at me, a smile that actually reached her eyes.

  "I had the inside of this place, and most of the furniture, restored last year. When I get enough money I'm planning to have the outside restored." She sat across from us on a Queen Anne style chair which was upholstered in a silk that matched the color of the couch perfectly.

  A thought occurred to me, and I voiced it "Christine, if you don't know the ghouls, how did they get hold of your credit card?" Griffin looked at me, his mouth slightly open in surprise. Apparently he hadn't thought about it, until this point.

  "I told them to leave me alone and gave them the card as payment to stay away from me. They were scaring me. I thought maybe it would work."

  "So, you just handed over a credit card to a bunch of creatures you didn't know? I'm supposed to believe that you would give ghouls you had no connection to, the power and access to wipe out your bank account and ruin your credit rating? I don't think so." Griffin's face mo
rphed into a snarl of disbelief.

  "Fine. Look, I didn't know what I was. I swear. When I accidentally raised those things I gave them the card and told them to leave me alone and that if they overused it I would cut them off completely."

  "That would kill them." This woman wasn't the sweet, unassuming waif we'd thought her to be, that's for sure.

  "I-I-I didn't know that." She looked genuinely shocked.

  "Well, you need to call them. At least once a week, so that they stay in line and you can nurture the essence of life you gave them."

  "No problem, just give me their phone number and I'll give them a ring." She sighed, her relief evident.

  "No, not phone. Call, in the same way you raised them. You need to think about them and send your power out to them." Griffin told her. His brow was furrowed and he was trying to think of what else he needed to tell her. I was just surprised he knew the ritual for raising. Most necromancers keep their secrets close to the chest. They don't like them getting out, it makes finding apprentices more difficult. If the youngsters knew the hows of raising, why would they bother to shadow a necromancer for two years to learn?

  "That's how I resurrected them? I didn't even know them, so how could I have brought them out of the ground?" She looked puzzled and lost.

  "Did you feel badly for the people buried in that cemetery? Maybe you felt a strange sensation at the same time?"

  "Well, yeah, it was a cemetery. Of course I felt badly for the folks entombed there, I'm not a monster..." She trailed off, paled and brought a fist up to her mouth to cut off a sob.

  "You aren't a monster." I reassured her, "You're magical. You gave those guys a second chance at life, sort of." Ok, I'm not very good at the reassuring thing.

  "Oh, God! Are you happy, Bob?" She asked me with tears in her eyes.

  "Yes, very much so. I got to say goodbye to my mom properly. If I hadn't been raised, my last words to her would have been harsh ones. We'd gotten into a fight about me not doing enough to help out around the house and dropping out of college. Being raised allowed me to make those amends." It was the truth, sort of. I was big on the sort ofs tonight.

  "You still see your mom?"

  "I just called her before we came here." I smiled and hoped it didn't look similar to the grimace that it felt like.

  "Oh. So these ghouls, this skank? They'll be happy, too?"

  "Skag." I corrected gently, trying not to chuckle. I was also trying not to tell her the truth. I hated my unlife, for the most part. I wish to hell and back my mom had never called a necromancer.

  "Skag. They'll be happy though?"

  "If you call them once a week, they'll be just as happy as anybody else, living or dead." Griffin skirted the truth like a politician and it was all I could do not to applaud him for his fine verbal dancing.

  "Can I try it with you guys here, so that if something goes wrong you can help me?" She looked terrified and chewed on her lower lip nervously.

  "Great idea. Just send your power out and think of them. If you speak, they will be able to hear you, once a connection has been made." As Griffin gently walked her through what to do, I stood and moved around the living room a bit. It was a beautiful home. It looked like all the original woodwork and fireplace were still intact. She had done a beautiful job restoring it, I felt like I had actually entered the 1890s. She even had the original gas fixtures converted to electric. The original fuse panel was on the wall and it was all glass. It was really neat to see all the innards on display. Christine caught me looking and smiled.

  "This was the first house in the neighborhood to have electricity, so my great- great-grandparents had the panel put in the living room so everyone could ooh and ahh over it. It was a big deal back then."

  "I can imagine." I smiled at her and continued looking at the little knick knacks that lined the mantle and the bookshelves. Some were period appropriate, then there were things like her cell phone charger and iPod dock. It was an odd mix, but it worked somehow. All of it gave off the essence of the woman who owned the house. A woman who was currently sitting with her brow scrunched up trying to concentrate all of her energy on calling the ghouls to her. I continued looking around while Griffin gave her lessons on how to perform this bit of magic.

  I wondered how he knew what to do, but I figured as a green man it was just a part of him. Nature spirits, like green men and mermaids, have natural magic flowing through them. Some are empaths, some expaths, but all can feel the world around them in a way that no one else will ever really be able to. Except for the woman I mentioned earlier, she's got so much magical oomph that it would make even a green man cry, but I digress (I've always wanted to say that.) this isn't about Holly Andrews. This is about helping my buddy Griffin and my community. I turned my attention back to the witch and Griff.

  "Christine, you have to focus." Griffin was talking to her softly and she just growled.

  "All I can feel is him." She pointed at me and I felt awful I was distracting her so badly.

  "Sorry." I hung my head and moved for the door.

  "No! Wait, Bob, she needs to be able to learn this with the distraction of feeling other dead things around her. Christine, you need to focus your energy on finding the ghouls. Look for something like invisible strings attached to you. Do you feel them?" At her nod, Griff beamed and continued, "Pull on the strings, pull each one until the ghoul attached comes into your mind's eye."

  Her eyes squinted tighter and she began pulling with her hands, though I don't think she noticed that part.

  "I got one!" She opened her eyes and cheered.

  "Great job! Keep going until you've caught them all. Then you'll be done for the day. You will have to do this at least a couple times a month to keep them in line and make sure they don't turn feral."

  "I can do that." She smiled and closed her eyes, presumably to call the other ghouls to her. Griff got up and came over to stand by me. For a moment we stood watching her pull with her hands, grinning broadly every time she called a ghoul to her.

  "You think she'll keep up with it?" I asked.

  "Yeah, I do. It's hard realizing your life isn't what you wanted it to be. It's even harder when you realize you aren't the person you were meant to be. I think she'll do the work it takes to get her to where she feels most comfortable. I think she will find this has helped her life in ways she never expected it to." Griff smiled and nodded his head at her "I'll check in with her and help her deal with her powers. It's not going to be easy for her by any means, but at least she isn't alone in it. She will have me, and the ghouls, to help her get through it all."

  "What if the ghouls don't want to be leashed like this?"

  "Not really their call anymore."

  "Doesn't that worry you?"

  "No. Once called, they have to obey her, Bob."

  "What if she gets a bit power hungry and decides to use them?"

  "That's a bridge I'll cross when I come to it." His use of the word 'I' instead of 'we' let me know he planned on dealing with this situation alone. I opened my mouth to tell him he didn't have to, that I would be there to help, but my tongue fell out. I sighed and stapled it back on, noticing Griff cringed when I did so.

  It amuses me to see people's reactions to me pulling myself together. Sometimes folks smile, other times they vomit. Occasionally they laugh, or smile. Most often, they cringe or wince. They assume it hurts, but it doesn't. My nerves stopped working when I died. I can feel things, but pain isn't one of them, except brain freeze. The enemy of zombies everywhere is the dreaded Slurpee. So delicious we can't resist it, and yet every time we give in, we slurp so fast that we wind up with one of those horrible ice migraines. Totally worth it though. Seriously, have you ever tried a Pepsi Slurpee? It's like two frost angels are dancing up and down your tongue with unmitigated joy. There truly is nothing better on a hot day. An added bonus is that the cold helps keep the heat from making us smell worse. The more Slurpees we consume, the less the decomp works us, causing less disgust f
rom those around us. I'm not saying it stops the stench totally, (there is aforementioned deodorant for that) but it sure does help. Plus, like I mentioned, they're delicious.

  Griffin brought me out of my reverie by elbowing me in the ribs. I can't feel much pain, but there sure was a lot of pointy pressure behind it. He pointed at Christine who was smiling and looking like a completely different woman than the one who had opened the door for us. Gone was the pale timid creature who we'd first met and in her place was a sweet lively woman who seemed more sure of herself than she had before. I smiled. I'm all for a happy transformation, I just hoped all the power she was feeling, the one responsible for her new personality makeover, didn't turn bad and cause her to go to a dark place. Then again, I'm a bit of a fatalist in optimist's clothing. Hope for the best, expect the worst. I think I read that embroidered on a throw pillow somewhere. If not, someone ought to get to work stitching it.

  "Well, it was great meeting you, Christine, but we have to run. I have a bar to clean up and Bob here has a horde to get back to. Thanks for being so open and for calling the ghouls so they don't cause anymore trouble." Griffin shook the woman's hand, gripping it tightly.

  "Yeah, we will come by every now and again to help you out where we can." I grabbed a small pad of paper and a pen off the desk near the door and wrote down my cell number. I handed the pad to Griff and he added his number to it and passed it to Miss Whitaker.

  "Feel free to call anytime with any questions you have, I'll be there to answer them and help you out on your way through this difficult process. It's not easy coming to terms with a new power and whole new life. You're doing great now, but there will be times you will feel down and blue. Call me. I'll come by and cheer you up." Griff put his other hand over her clasped ones to show her he meant it.

  "Thank you both so much. I'm sorry the ghouls caused you such trouble. I am even sorrier I didn't know what I was doing when I raised them. It must have been awful for them to be yanked back into a world where they didn't have anyone to help them. I plan on being there for them now. I promise they'll behave. Before you ask, I don't ever plan to make any more. This was a one time accident." She looked as though she believed what she was saying, but then again, nobody really starts out bad. (No, I won't argue nature versus nurture with you right now, just keep reading.) She turned to me and took my hand. I was grateful for the gesture, most people won't touch me. I gave her a smile and stepped back, my hand remaining in her grip.