The Dead Parade (20 page)

“
Franco,” She repeated. “Are you here? Are you au-alright?”

Elmer shifted his weight and snapped Franco’s neck. Then he loosened his grip, letting the corpse settle. He could smell the last breath the old man released; it smelled nice, like mint. With the back of his hand he wiped a string of blood from his face, smudging it along his arm.

He never intended on killing these people––these old people. But sometimes life is funny; sometimes things get handed to you on a blood-drenched silver platter, sometimes life offers a deliciously wonderful gift. Or two.

Thank you, he thought.

But like all atheists, he had nobody to thank.

75

James was on security tapes, identified, sought after and waiting conviction. So when the police arrived at Debra’s door, she allowed them to search her ap artment. When they asked questions, she gave answers, telling them about the phone calls, the car accident and her limited knowledge concerning the murders. She didn’t really care one way or another, and figured it made no difference. The police were not wondering who did it––they were wondering how and why and where is the suspect hiding.

Debra drove to the cottage thinking these things and more. An arrogant, loud-mouthed officer had told her to stay close to home, enjoying his authority and grinning like he owned the planet. Debra quickly agreed, and assured the man that she was not going anywhere––not that her word meant anything.

As she drove the empty back-road highways, she kept her eyes on the rearview mirror. She assumed the cops were following her and that keeping an eye on the suspect’s girlfriend was standard police procedure. Maybe it was and maybe it wasn’t, but either way, she was not being followed. There was nothing behind her but the road. But Debra––being a mildly creative person––constructed scenarios inside her mind: the sky was loaded with helicopters, a roadblock awaited; she was being monitored by satellite.

Of course, none of these things were true. Debra was alone.

She watched the road meticulously, with her stomach tied into a ball of nerves. Still, there was no police chase, no roadblocks, and no swat-team flying helicopters in the satellite-monitored sky. She was free to run, free to hide, free to tie a noose and hang––and for what––a boyfriend that was going to jail, a relationship that was about to end, a love that didn’t exist?

She deserved better.

Tears formed in her eyes. She felt the first of many sobs and a quiver inside her chest. Crying was inescapable. She had earned it, or to be more accurate, she had been given this grief without request. It was a gift from her problem-ridden asshole boyfriend, a gift she did not want.

The pain was hers now. Tears came in thick beads. They dripped from her face and blurred her vision. Her chest was heaving; her throat began making those awful, horrid noises that can only come from anguish. The make-up she applied so carefully had become a smudged, nightmarish mess. And as she cried, she began to hate him. She hated what James had done and what he had reduced her to. It was his fault she was like this. Everything was his fault.

How could they spend a life together now? It was impossible. The damage was done. The future they planned had fallen apart.

“
You’re such a jerk,” she whispered between sobs.

Then the lights of her car hit something unusual.

Crouched into a ball at the side of the road was an animal. No. Wait. Not an animal––a young woman. And she wasn’t crouched; she was sitting. Sitting at the side of the highway with bruised legs that were spread wide. One hand covered her naked chest. Her other hand was held up in a sad, struggling wave.

Debra drove past the woman and her sequence of odious thought was lost.

76

After two high-pitched screams in a row, Officer Gentry leapt from his chair and pulled out his gun. He opened the door to Mia’s condo looking strangely comical, like a character from a 1970’s TV show that was exaggerating his movements for the camera. He saw Mia standing near the kitchen; her hands were shaking and trembling. Then came a third scream and Mia backed away from the room.

“
Oh God,” she said. “Look.”

Gentry ran to the kitchen and saw Mia’s mother lying in a runners pose. Her neck was twice broken and her head was cocked against the wall. A rope of blood had drained from her mouth, leaving an almost blacken opaque-like lumpy puddle.

Seeing this, Gentry’s stomach turned. He had never seen a dead body, at least, not in the line of duty.

In the corner of the room Mia’s father William was fighting a losing battle. He had a shattered leg and several broken fingers. Unseen razors shredded his face. He tried to speak but his voice had taken on a rumbling, machine-like quality, reminiscent of a lawnmower coming to a gagging halt.

“
Do something,” Mia whispered.

Officer Gentry turned towards her; his face was pale and grave. “What can I do?”

“
Stop it,” she said. “Stop this from happening.”

Officer Gentry hesitated; he was afraid. This wasn’t a chapter in any police book he read, nor was it the topic of dispatch discussion. This was a whole new thing. And he was a paycheck cop, not an unsung hero.

Gentry pointed his gun towards William and the violence suddenly ended. William’s hands dropped to the floor and Mia ran to his side. A second later cold air brushed by Gentry, who felt goose bumps cultivating his legs.

“
Oh dad,” Mia was saying. “Are you alright?”

The Bakisi was standing on the counter now, sizing up Mia and Gentry. They didn’t know they were being watched; they didn’t know what was happening.

Neither Mia nor Gentry had considered the notion that ‘something unknown’ was with them. Mia was too shocked and Gentry figured William had killed his wife and then sliced himself up somehow. Of course, this didn’t quite fit; it wasn’t what he’d seen. But then again, what he saw was impossible. And he was tired. And his wife was making him crazy. And his mind was playing tricks on him. And his shift was almost over. And he wanted to go home.

With so many excuses ready for action, Gentry’s memory turned against him. He tried to find something logical to believe in. He tried to find a suitable answer––the perfectly square peg for this flawlessly round hole. There was a battle. And William was in the corner with blood across his face and chest; he had broken fingers and a shattered leg. How could a man do that to himself Gentry wondered, and why on earth would he?

As Gentry lowered his gun, William opened one of his eyes. The other eye was puffed shut and would not open. Ever.

William said, “We’re not alone.”

Then Gentry made a decision, the wrong one. He pointed his gun at William’s chest and said, “Sir. Don’t move.”

“
What?” Mia barked in anger. “Are you crazy? My father’s hurt and my mother’s dead! Call the hospital!”

As Gentry considered her words, the Bakisi attacked.

77

James dreamt as he slept. Inside his dreams he could see those he had killed, and those he watched die. He also suffered a discovery of fatality, a discovery of bereavement. The journey started at Johnny’s house…

* * *

The gun went off and Johnny died. He sat there in the chair for a moment, unmoving. He didn’t fall; he lifted his head. His eyes were red and bulging. Smoke drifted from his nose and the bubbly hole on the flipside of his skull. A stream of blood, teeth, and charred tongue, ran from his mouth, his gums, and down his chin. It seemed to flow forever––like a film clip, edited and looped.

Then the image changed; the loop changed.

Johnny stood up. He stepped away from the chair that had become soaked in blood. A lump of soft, wet tissue fell from the back of his skull. As the meat hit the floor his feet began moving with strange uncharacteristic ineptness, as if his intellect had fallen below any logical level, below the echelon of instinct. He walked past the police officers that stood in his living room drinking coffee, taking notes and snapping photographs. They didn’t see him; no one could see him.

Only James could see Johnny, the living corpse.

Johnny fumbled his way outside and walked along Tecumseh Street alone. The street was quiet, the air was still, sound was non-existent. There was something on the road ahead: Doctor Anson. A car had run him down; his chest was crushed.

Johnny laid his hand on Anson, then kept walking.

Anson’s dry unmoving eyes opened. He stood up, put a hand to his chest and hobbled along behind Johnny. His back was clearly broken; he was in agony.

On the road ahead a crowd had gathered. Johnny and Anson entered the swaying mass of men, woman and children, walking past an excited dog, a lanky black man that was dialing a number on his cell phone, and two teenagers that seemed ready to fight. They walked past a fat man that rubbed his giant knuckles into an open fist. They walked past a man with green eyes that was close to hysterics. Still, there was no sound. Not even a trace of noise could be heard. James could see that people’s eyes were focused on a single house; the bungalow James had crashed into. The fire had been put out. Only the smallest threads of smoke filtered into the heavens through the blackened wreckage.

Johnny and Anson stumbled up the hose-wet driveway. The crowd didn’t look, didn’t notice. James––the only person that could see the dead staggering into the bungalow––watched from a perspective that swung from viewpoint to viewpoint, changing with independent will. Sometimes he would be above Johnny and Anson, a bird’s eye-view. Other times he would be in front, watching the blood flow down Johnny’s face. But now––as Johnny and Anson entered the home––James seemed to be floating behind them. He watched the streaks of smoke drifting through Johnny’s skull.

The men slumped past officers, firemen, and a man that looked like a politician. They entered the living room through the clutter of the front door and stood near the wreckage.

James could see the car, the debris, and the nearly incinerated bodies of two children that were lying among the soot in strange undefined heaps. He could see the children’s mother, her fried corpse.

Johnny touched his hand upon each of them, one at a time. The skeletal remains revealed the mysteries of their ruins. The bones and blackened innards that had endured the fire came together. Bodies without flesh began standing, shifting, walking.

James continued floating; he watched from a new angle.

The dead walked into a room where two more children lay: a four-year-old boy and a five-year-old girl. James hadn’t seen these two before; this was new. They were not burned. No, these two children had suffocated; they had drowned inside the poisonous air.

Johnny laid his hand upon each child, first the boy, then the girl.

With Johnny’s touch the children opened their frozen eyes, aloof with unquestioning death. Behind the stone glare James saw a congregation of fear. It was a fear unknown to the living, a fear that was as deep as the sky above the sky and the universe that encased it. The children, alive but dead, were afraid and pathetic. Their faces and hands were charred from the smoke. Dried tears had carved lines of semi-cleanliness in their cheeks.

Johnny held the youngest by the hand and all seven of them left the house. They moved through the crowd, crossed the street, and entered a backyard.

Stan and Emily were lying in a bloody, tangled pile. Stan’s throat had been torn from his neck and his right leg had been broken. Emily’s eyes had been pushed into her brain; her bottom lip hung severed from her face.

Both husband and wife awoke from their slumber and followed in silence, limping in Johnny’s shadow, and guided by Johnny’s hand.

Nine bodies now, they walked through the backyard in a cracked row and crawled the fence in anguish. They crossed the schoolyard and entered the school. Inside the gymnasium four more waited in death. A thirteenth and fourteenth rose from the hallway. A fifteenth came from the schoolyard; a sixteenth and seventeenth joined from the parking lot.

Then came Nash, the tattooed man that had been pulled through the car window. His neck had been broken; his head was twisted in circles and pulled free. It hung by a thick, meaty thread. His face banged off the small of his back as he walked. Blood poured on the ground behind him, leaving a messy trail.

The dead walked across town; they entered Debra’s complex.

Johnny extended his hand twice more.

As Tina stood, the Johnny Cash wannabe opened his eyes. With a broken spine he lifted himself to his feet. The pair followed this grisly spectacle holding hands, for Cash had no center of balance, and Tina––no eyes to see.

There were twenty-one bodies in all, moving in a scattered cluster. Johnny no longer gathered corpses, no longer hunted the dead. That part of the journey was finished now; a new chapter had begun.

They walked from town together, leaving Martinsville behind. They walked the empty roads and the dark highways. And James recognized those long terrible roads, those thin, empty highways. It was the path to Debra’s cottage.

The dead were coming.

The dead were coming tonight.

78