Kiss of Life (7 page)

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the front porch one day, beating on the door with his arms. Tayshawn had called him George, and the name stuck.

The sounds George made as he gnawed on the rodent were not pleasant. Tak watched him eat, and wondered if George would be able to talk if he tried.

"Nice table ...manners," Popeye said, speaking in front of George as though he were too stupid to understand. Tak held his comments and waited for George to complete his meal. He suspected that George wasn't as stupid as Popeye thought. George could obey instructions for the most part, and seemed perfectly willing to allow any zombie who was around to order him about like a servant. Especially Tak.

George took another bite and flung the broken body over the tombstones. It went surprisingly far. He dragged the muddy sleeve of his jacket across his face and slouched toward them.

"Had enough, George?" Popeye said. He leaned over to Tak. "Can you smell him? I think I can ...smell him. I think he has actually renewed my sense of smell."

"I can smell him."

"He smells ...dead."

"It isn't Z, anyhow," Tak said, which Popeye thought pretty funny.

"George," Tak said, "Go back to ...the house. The sun will be up ...soon. Go back to the house and ...wait ...for us."

They watched him dragging himself over the old graves toward the woods.

"I might be ... an artist," Popeye said with admiration, "but that boy ... is
art."

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Phoebe woke up in a bad mood. She could feel herself emitting a dark cloud of negativity; it poured from her in thick, invisible vapors.

Her terrier, Gargoyle, looked up from the foot of her bed, turned, leaped, and scampered away before her fog swept over him.

She didn't have the energy to argue with Mrs. Garrity when she said that Adam was "too sick" to go to school that day. "Dead kids don't get sick, Mrs. Garrity," is what she should have said, and then she should have asked if she could speak to Adam. Instead she sighed and walked out to the end of her driveway to catch the bus, pushing her hat down lower over her ears against the cold that seemed to be seeping into her.

The bus was seven minutes late. The first thing she heard when she stepped on was Colette's shrill, catlike laughter. Because she wasn't in the mood, she took a seat in the front across from a freshman boy with glasses. He was obviously terrified of her. Phoebe, was self-aware enough to notice that many of the younger kids regarded her with fear. Margi said they gave her the hairy eyeball because of her goth stylings and perfect skin; Phoebe was inclined to think it had more to do with her presence at Adam's murder--either that or being the cause of the murder. She looked over at the boy, who clutched his backpack and stared straight ahead.

Bride of Frankenstein, they called her. She was sure of it.

"Phoebe, Phoebe!" she heard Margi call from the back of the bus.

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Phoebe ignored her. She made sure that she was the first one off, sliding into the aisle while the younger boy remained crouched in his seat.

"Where's Adam?" Mrs. Rodriguez asked her at the start of algebra, and if Phoebe had possessed the power to petrify, she would have used it then. She mumbled that she didn't know.

"Tommy isn't here either," Mrs. Rodriguez said. "Do you have any idea where he is?"

Phoebe had to hold back the answer that came to mind, which was to ask Mrs. Rodriguez if she thought she was the den mother for the morgue.

"It isn't like Tommy to miss a day of class," Mrs. Rodriguez said. Phoebe shrugged and went to take her seat. She glanced over to where TC Stavis sat, studious in his attempt to avoid looking at her.

I'm the Gorgon, Phoebe thought, looking over at him, squinting. My stare is death.

TC leaned over his algebra book and seemed to flinch.

Later in the lunchroom Phoebe unwrapped a lackluster lunch of milk, carrots, lukewarm macaroni and cheese, and an apple with a bruise as big as the Tycho crater. Margi came and sat down next to her with such a haphazard flop that she made Phoebe spill milk on the front of her blouse.

"Hey, hey," Margi said as Colette and Karen took chairs on the opposite sides of them. "Baby's in black again."

"Well, I
was
in black," Phoebe said, frowning. "But now I'm in milky black." She rubbed the front of her shirt with a napkin.

"Here, let me help you," Margi said, grabbing another

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napkin and thrusting it at Phoebe's chest. Phoebe slapped her hand away, the sharp sound of it making the dead girls laugh.

"Jeez," Margi said, a wry smile on her face, "ease off on the jiujitsu. I was only trying to help."

"Yeah," Phoebe said, "thanks for that 'help.'"

"Still thinking about the trial, huh?"

"No," Phoebe said.

"Adam really freaked, huh?"

"No!" Phoebe said, her voice rising above the boisterous din of the lunchroom. "No, he did not 'freak.' Who told you he freaked?"

"Um," Margi said, looking back to Karen and Colette, but she didn't find any help there. Karen took the lid off a cup of sliced strawberries. "I heard it from Norm. Who heard it from Gary, who I think talked to Morgan Harris, who must have gotten it from TC."

"TC," Phoebe said. "A necessary link in the daisy chain of idiots."

Margi knew that she was being included as a link in the "daisy chain of idiots," so she let the comment slide. "What really happened?"

"I don't know why I even talk to you sometimes."

Margi crossed her eyes. "Because I'm such an insightful listener?"

Phoebe turned to look at Margi, who had now added a wagging tongue to her crossed eyes, completing her performance art piece of congenital idiocy. The dead girls kept their silence, as though they could sense the storm brewing inside Phoebe.

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And then a strange thing happened; looking at Margi's display, Phoebe felt the dark cloud dissipate. "Oh, Margi," she said, laughing.

"See?" her friend said.
"That's
why you hang out with me." "That must be it."

"Come on, Pheebes," Margi said, leaning over so that Phoebe could feel the points of Margi's spiky hair tickling her cheeks. "Talk about it. Let it out. We're your buds."

"I know you are," Phoebe said. Karen and Colette looked as though they would breathe a sigh of relief if they could. "You really are."

The questions came at a rapid clip, tumbling on each other like a free-verse poem. "What did he say?" "Is he okay?" "What did Pete say? "Was it really so bad?"

Phoebe held up her hand. "Did they really say that Adam freaked?"

Margi nodded. "Kinda."

"I didn't hear anything," Karen said, holding out the cup of strawberries so Colette could try to smell them. "No one talks to me. I just assumed ... it went badly because you looked like you wanted ... to kill everyone."

Phoebe sighed and rolled the bruised apple on the table with her fingers. "He didn't 'freak.' Martinsburg's lawyer asked a million questions, and was being as condescending as he could. Adam tried so hard, but he just couldn't speak."

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"Oh, man," Margi said, "poor Adam." "I felt so bad for him," Phoebe said.

Karen looked like she wanted to say something, but she put a slice of strawberry on her tongue instead. "What did he do?" Margi asked.

"He tried to answer a question. He did answer it, but his answer wasn't...understandable. And it was loud."

"I still ... do that," Colette said, "sometimes."

"Really?" Margi said. "I thought that was you trying to sing."

"Shut ...up." Colette shot Margi a dark look.

"It doesn't matter," Karen said.

"What do you mean?" Phoebe was stunned.

"Well, Phoebe," she said, "of course it matters to Adam, and to you. But it wouldn't have mattered how ...eloquent ...Adam was on the stand. That boy wasn't going to get punished, no matter what."

"He got community service," Phoebe said. "And he has to get counseling."

"Big deal," Karen said, selecting another slice of strawberry. "Counseling. And they didn't even let Tommy speak. It wasn't ...easy for him to go, you know."

Phoebe looked at her to see if she was being accused of something, but Karen's strange eyes were guileless. "I would have liked to see him get a tougher penalty too."

"Like a beating," Margi said. "Or worse."

"Some would agree with you," Karen said. "Only they would not be ...joking."

She smiled and licked the strawberry juice from her lips.

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"Are you okay?" Phoebe asked, watching Karen slice into an orange with the edge of her fingernail.

"Well, that's a funny question, isn't it," Karen said, husking the fruit with a sudden violent twist of her hands. "Considering the circumstances."

"You seem like something is bothering you," Phoebe said. "Is it something I said? Or is it the trial?"

Karen looked up at her, and for a moment Phoebe could swear she saw a coppery light in the glittering retinas of her eyes.

Karen lifted the orange to her face and inhaled deeply. She was even weirder than usual, Phoebe thought. She came to school wearing jeans and a heavy sweatshirt with a school logo on it, instead of her usual skirts or dresses.
Short
skirts, and
short
dresses, ones that showed a lot of her ice-white skin, even now when the weather was getting colder.

The light left her eyes. "I'm sorry, Phoebe," she said. "I'm a little off today, aren't I? But why is that, do you think? Don't you need hormones and blood sugar and all those chemically things to be moody?"

"Must be the ...formaldehyde," Colette said.

Margi's cackle cut across the whole cafeteria.

Karen turned toward Colette and broke the orange in half, offering it to her.

"I'm so glad you're ...progressing," Karen said. Colette refused the orange, and when neither Margi or Phoebe wanted a piece she set it on the napkin in front of her.

"Speaking of progressing," Phoebe said. "I was thinking that we should do something nice for Adam to try and cheer him up.

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Maybe we could have a party for him? At the Haunted House?"

"That's a great idea!" Karen said. "Really, Phoebe. I think having a ...party for Adam is a great thing. Being surrounded by people who love him ...can only help."

"I ...think ... it is a good thing ...too," Colette said, "I wish ...someone ...had done ...that for me."

Margi rolled her eyes, reaching for the orange slices. "You
had
to go there again. When will you give it a rest?"

Colette looked at her, the nervous ticking smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. "I will ...never ... be ... at rest," she said, which sent Margi off again. Colette's laughter was a lot different from Karen's, which sounded realistic. Her's sounded more like a choking mirthful hiccup, like the sound someone would make if they started laughing with a mouthful of milk.

"Hey," Colette said, still smiling, "did you guys ...see the newspaper ...this morning?"

Margi snickered, but neither Karen nor Phoebe had seen it.

"The ...boys ...played another prank," Colette said. "Their idea of...reprisal, I guess. Did you bring it?" she asked Margi, who was rooting around in her purse.

"Really?" Karen asked, too innocently, Phoebe thought.

"Yeah. It's ...hilarious," Colette said.

Margi produced a wrinkly square of newsprint and dropped it on the table. George stared out at them from the photo.

Phoebe laughed. "That's great! Better than marking up the school, anyhow."

"Tak and Popeye can be pretty clever," Karen said.

Phoebe saw right through Karen's enigmatic expression and

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was about to call her on it when Margi asked a question.

"Is Tak the guy with the perma-smile? And who is Popeye?"

"You'll meet them when you come to Adam's ...party," Karen said.

"Ugh," Colette said, "do they ...have ... to be there? I like their ...tricks, but ..."

"Don't you want to meet the artists?" Karen said. "Besides, it isn't like I can ...uninvite them. It's their home."

"I ...know, I ...know. They're just ...unpleasant ...sometimes. Especially to ...trads."

"They
are
pretty bold," Margi said. "Speaking as a traditionally biotic person."

"I just hope they don't go ...too far," Colette said.

"At least they're going ...somewhere," Karen said, waving her hand. "Tak probably won't want to come, anyway."

And that would be just fine, Phoebe thought. "Maybe we could decorate the Haunted House?" she said. "Sort of like you did for homecoming?"

"Okay, Phoebe," Karen said. "That sounds good."

"I'll invite Thorny," Phoebe said.

"What about the rest of the football team?" Margi asked. "All his old buddies?"

Phoebe thought of some of Adam's "old buddies": psychotic Martinsburg and the mindlessly violent Stavis. "I don't know ... I don't think many of them would be interested in going. Maybe Thorny would have some ideas."

"Let's call it... a wake," Colette said. "I really ...wish ...I'd had ...one."