Breathers (12 page)

Milkshakes. Big Gulps. Double lattes.

Bagels. Vegetable soup. Ham and cheese croissants.

Whoppers. Big Macs. Jumbo Jacks.

You'd think they'd care more about actually eating their food than throwing it at a defenseless zombie who's picketing back and forth on Soquel Avenue in front of an abandoned mortuary like an arcade shooting-gallery target, carrying a sign that says:

ZOMBIES FOR CITIZENSHIP.

And I'm not even counting the health-conscious Breathers who stopped by to unload a bag full of organic produce, cage-free eggs, and silken tofu on me.

I've been out here for less than an hour and already I look like a movie screen at a fraternity rush selection meeting. I'm surprised no one's called Animal Control yet, but I guess they're all having too much fun throwing their uneaten fast food and coffee at me to worry about protocol. Besides, even though I look like the archetypal zombie, I'm not particularly threatening. I mean, how menacing can I be covered in Slurpee and bean curd and seasoned curly fries?

A pair of crows have started circling me, scavenging the splattered fast food detritus, the supermarket smorgasbord dripping from me onto the abandoned mortuary lawn. I'm not sure what made me pick this location—the public exposure, the absence of Breather foot traffic, or the fact that corpses used to call this place home—but the crows kind of add a nice touch, being harbingers of death and all. The problem is, I'm not sure if the crows are more interested in the food that's collected at my feet or if they're more interested in me.

“Freak!” comes the shout from a passing Ford Mustang, followed by a Reuben sandwich from Erik's Deli that nails me on the side of the head in an explosion of sauerkraut and corned beef. As an afterthought, a cup of Texas Jailhouse Chili hits me in the crotch.

Next time, I won't bother to eat lunch first.

With the variety of fare that I've been hit with, it makes me wonder if the Breathers who drive past are throwing random food they just happen to have in their cars or if they're zipping over to 7-Eleven or Burger King or Safeway just to get something to throw at me. Considering most of the food that's been cast my way is uneaten, and that more than a few of the same vehicles have returned with fresh supplies, I get the feeling it's not just a spur-of-the-moment thing.

In a way, I'm encouraged that they would go to the trouble of making a special trip just for me, though I'm concerned my message of protest might get lost in the excitement of Pelt the Zombie. At least I hope I'm making an impact. Kind of like one of those television commercials you can't stand but you just can't seem to forget.

“Zombies suck!” yells another motorist, who unleashes a Taco Bell burrito that hits my sign with a
splat
and then slides off.

I glance down at the burrito, partially dressed in its wrapper, a few bites taken out of it, beans and salsa spilling out
onto the grass. Like I'm impressed. Maybe if he'd thrown a Gordita Supreme or an Enchirito. But a partially eaten, seventy-nine-cent bean burrito? Please.

Right now, I'm not concerned about getting attacked by gangs of teenagers or frat boys or rednecks. During the day, Breathers tend to shy away from blatant acts of zombie violence. Most of the mob mentality takes place after sunset, when courage is fed by beer and whiskey and the cover of night. Breathers are like that. They don't want to have to confront the unpleasant realities of their nature beneath the glaring light of the sun. They'd rather deal with them after dark, where they're harder to see and easier to ignore.

In the middle of a Monday afternoon, my physical safety isn't much of an issue. I'm not going to get dismembered or torched. Pretty much all I have to worry about are food projectiles and incendiary comments. Of course, eventually some tattling Breather will get on a cell phone and call Animal Control.

When I first hear the sirens I don't think anything of it. The Dominican Hospital is less than a mile away, so ambulances and emergency vehicles pass by here every day. But as the sirens grow louder and the flashing lights appear around the curve and the crows abandon their supper in a flurry of wings, I realize the emergency is me.

I don't even bother to try to escape. What's the point? It's not like I can outrun anyone. And it would just make things worse. So instead I set down my sign, pull some stray sauerkraut out of my hair, and walk toward the sirens to display my cooperation. If I'm going to get taken away in an anti-zombie harness, at least I can do it with dignity.

Just before the Animal Control van screeches to a stop in front of the mortuary, someone launches an original size Jamba Juice that hits me in the chest and erupts, coating my face and hair with Matcha Green Tea Blast.

hy are we here?” asks Helen.

Helen used to counsel other zombies in her private practice before she became one herself. Her prior experience is the main reason she was allowed to head up the local chapter of Undead Anonymous.

While most UA chapters are run by zombie moderators, we're not completely autonomous. Helen has to report any new group members to the County Department of Resurrection, and once a month a Breather liaison stops by to make sure we're decomposing on schedule and behaving like good little zombies. But they usually don't stick around very long.

I think it has something to do with the smell.

Or the way Carl fingers the knife wounds in his face.

We're halfway through our ninety minutes, most of which we spent discussing the theft of Tom's right arm and what we can do to get it back. But our options are pretty much what they were with Walter. Which means we either accept what happened and move on, or we risk more than just losing a limb. Or at least more than getting stoned with fast food and chauffeured off to the SPCA.

This evening's message on the chalkboard shouts:

WHY ARE WE HERE?

Jerry leans over to me. “Dude, I'm here because I drank a bottle of Jack and smoked three huge bowls.”

Tell me something I don't know.

“Jerry, do you want to share with the group?” asks Helen.

Jerry's cheeks are raw from his road rash, so he looks like he's constantly blushing. “I was just saying that I wouldn't be here if I would have been wearing my seat belt.”

“Maybe,” says Helen. “Maybe not. But that's not why we're here.”

I almost didn't make it to the meeting. After my “stupid little stunt,” as he called it, my father threatened to leave me at the SPCA for a week, which is the maximum time they'll hold on to a zombie with guardian hosts before turning me over to the county. From there, it's just a short trip to having my head in a roasting pan for some fledgling plastic surgeon's midterm.

Mom didn't offer up any arguments in my defense, but just stood back while my father berated me through the bars of my kennel. Eventually my father backed down on his threat, but only because it would have cost him an extra fifty bucks a day to keep me there.

I'm glad I didn't have to stay a week at the SPCA. The accommodations aren't all that bad and there's not much difference in taste between dry cat food and Mom's meat loaf, but I would have missed being able to see Rita.

Tonight she's sitting across from me, wearing the ΣX pledge pin in her left earlobe and a white sweater with a red silk scarf that looks like a river of blood beneath her pallid face. She's not wearing any gloves. Instead, she has her hands in her lap as she applies red nail polish to the fingernails on her left hand. Before the polish can dry, she raises her hand to her lips and licks each fingernail clean.

I suddenly wonder what it would be like to be her finger-nails.

“We all survived for a reason,” says Helen. “Can anyone tell me why?”

Silence answers her as each of us looks around the room at the faces of our fellow survivors. Even Carl manages to keep from making a snide comment.

Next to Rita, Tom raises his remaining arm and waves his fingers in the air.

I have to admire Tom for showing up to the meeting. It's not only demeaning and embarrassing to have one of your arms stolen, but psychologically painful. Even though Tom didn't have the use of that arm and can't feel the physical pain of its absence, he has the empty socket as a constant reminder of what he's lost. That and it's hard to keep your balance.

“You don't have to raise your hand, Tom,” says Helen.

“Oh, yeah. Right,” he says, lowering his arm. “Well, I figure we're here because we're not supposed to be dead.”

“Brilliant,” says Carl, snorting out laughter. “Leave it to the vegetarian to come up with a wacko answer.”

“Why do you insist on being such an ass?” asks Naomi. When she talks, the right side of her mouth hangs limp beneath her empty eye socket.

“Oh, I don't know,” says Carl. “Maybe it's because the extent of my social calendar is sitting in this room with all of you twice a week instead of feeling like I can go to the movies or take a walk on the beach or play a round of golf.”

Carl used to be a member of the Seascape Resort, where he played tennis and golf and attended weekly dinners and hobnobbed with the social elite of Santa Cruz County.

Naomi takes a drag on her cigarette and purposely blows the smoke at Carl. “Just because you're bitter doesn't mean
you have the right to take out your frustration on the rest of us. It doesn't serve any purpose.”

“What a wonderful transition,” says Helen. “Thank you, Naomi.”

Helen gets up and walks over to the chalkboard. I glance at Rita, who is licking the fingernails of her right hand now. Her tongue is red. I wonder if it tastes like Revlon or Estée Lauder.

Helen turns back to us and sits down. On the chalkboard, under WHY ARE WE HERE? she's written the words:

FIND YOUR PURPOSE.

“Tom, you said you thought we were here because we're not supposed to be dead,” says Helen.

Tom nods and looks around, his left hand massaging the empty socket where his right arm used to be.

“Would you like to elaborate on that?” she says.

“Sure,” says Tom. “You see, when I became a vegetarian, it wasn't really a conscious choice.”

“That's not surprising,” says Carl.

“Anyway,” says Tom. “I didn't become vegetarian for any causes or for health reasons. I just stopped craving meat. I didn't ask for it. It just felt like a random thing that happened to me, and so I went with it.”

“So what?” says Jerry. His lips have turned purple from the diet grape soda he's drinking. “We're all, like, not dead because we're supposed to stop eating Big Macs?”

“No. My point is that this feels different for me,” says Tom. “I didn't ask for this, either, but I feel like I survived not because of some random thing, but for a specific reason.”

“A purpose,” says Helen.

Tom nods.

I glance around the room. At Carl, picking at the knife
wounds on his face. At Tom, with his empty arm socket and half of his face gone. At Rita, licking her fingernails. At Jerry, grinning like an idiot, his cheeks red and his lips purple. At Naomi, her eye socket a dark, ragged hole.

“No one knows for sure why we survived while others have not,” says Helen. “But I agree with Tom. We're all here for a purpose, and each of us needs to find out what that purpose is.”

“If you ask me,” says Jerry, “my purpose is to introduce all of the ladies to a new definition of
stiffy.
“

Jerry is the only one who laughs at his joke, with a snort and a head bob and all of his teeth showing like medals.

The fact that Jerry's the only one laughing apparently amuses Rita, so she starts laughing. Then Tom joins in, followed by Naomi, and pretty soon everyone's laughing and the moment reminds me of a dream I had the other night.

We're all in a limousine, a super stretch job, like one of those Hummer limos. Jerry has a bottle of his beloved Jack Daniel's, which he pours directly onto his exposed brain so he can get drunk faster. Tom keeps removing his right arm and then popping it back into place like a magic trick, while Helen laughs and lifts up the back of her shirt to show off her exit wounds. Naomi is on a cell phone talking to someone and drinking champagne, a tiny, hand-painted Vacancy sign sticking out of her eyebrow above her empty eye socket. Carl is tending a barbecue grill, the smoke drifting up and out through the limo's sunroof. He cuts into a steak, then reinserts the knife into one of the wounds on his face. Rita is sitting directly across from me, no hoods, no turtlenecks, no scarves, just a black evening dress with spaghetti straps and a knee-length hem. Her exposed flesh is alabaster and covered with scars. And they are magnificent.