Dedication
This novel is dedicated to my parents for putting up with me through it, the duPont Manual Class of 2016, Camellia Sells for being there, NaNoWriMo for giving me the opportunity, to those that said I couldn't and even more to those who never doubted. And of course to my cat Gandalf who kept me company on those late nights.
The Morning After
That... that was a wall... this sluggishly passes through my drunken brain as I peel my face from the wall and drop it to the floor. I'm gonna feel this for a few days. Maybe my long lost cousin is right. Zombies shouldn't drink. The next morning, I stumble over to my face, pick it up off the ground and plaster it back on, wincing as the light registers in my deadened eyes. I should call Val. I find my phone behind the couch and call up Val to see if she can tell me what happened last night. Her phone picks up with a crash followed by a, "Mrow?" on the other end of the phone. It's her cat, Ghastly. The most infuriating little beast in such a small body. Ghastly loves Val but hates me and the feeling is mutual. I hang up on the nasty thing as if doing so could somehow spite him even though I know he probably is just sitting on the phone and going to fall asleep. I'll call her cell, she must be out. These are such weird contraptions, me and Val found them one day, relics of before the war. People used to have them a lot, we don't really need them now though. We still use them on occasion though. After some programmed propaganda about the strength of the Nazis it rings and some birds that are way too happy for this ungodly bright morning, chirp off in the distance. It seems odd, almost mechanical, their tune repeating over and over again. That's when it hits me, Val's ring-tone is birds chirping. I hang up frantically, stopping the soft chirps from my room. This only confirms my fears, leaving where my heart should be at beating out of my chest as I creep over to my room. Every creak and stray bottle magnified so loud around the apartment, after what should have been an eternity I finally come to the door and peer around it. There she is, so beautiful, black hair splayed out across the bed and a dreamy smile on her face. What have I done?...
Nothing happened... no. Impossible. Val is just a friend, nothing happened. This runs through my brain which has suddenly found a new propensity to think things. She must have just crashed on my bed last night and I took the couch. Yeah, that's what happened. I mean, I love her, like a lot. But... she's just a friend. We've known each other for a long time and we're really close but she'd never hook-up with me... right? I mean, honestly, what kind of self-respecting vampire would lay with a zombie like me? None, that's right. Okay. Having abated my fears ever so slightly I detach myself from the wall I had pressed myself against. No sooner than I step away, do I feel the ice cold skin of her arms as they wrap around me from behind and smell the oh-so-sweet smell of a long lost memory that is unmistakably her. Her head presses into my back so I turn around to see her sleepy green eyes staring up at me. Oh crap... It totally happened last night. Wait, no, she would never have let me near her like that. She kisses my neck, right where it seems she left two fresh bite holes, whispers, "Good morning Cabbage, thanks for last night", and presses her head into my chest. Oh Cthulhu, what did I do?
Now, this is odd for me to say, being actually dead, but I have never felt so dead and numb inside as I do right now when my fears have come to fruition. I screwed up... big time. I mean, I love her... but I didn't want it to happen like this.... This wasn't supposed to happen.... Who started it? Me or her?... Why can't I remember anything? What exactly happened?... My brain churns, or at least the mush that is left of it does, looking for answers that aren't there.
She squeezes me tight then lets go, saying, "I really needed someone to snuggle with, I wasn't in a good place. It means a lot that you took care of me. We both knows those guys weren't going to." Hold up, what? Does she mean what I think she means? My mind can't decide whether to be happy, confused or disappointed and so I just lean in and give her another hug, just to smell her again and say, "Anytime." Val is just a friend, right?
"You alright there?" she furrows her brow and puts her icy hands on my face, "What's going on in that mind of yours?" Oh no, she can tell I'm freaking out. She smiles and pats my cheek, "Hopefully nothing too bad." Why does she do this to me? Turning around, she grabs a plastic Halloween cup and checks it briefly before filling it with water from the sink. "Do you remember anything from last night?" um... no. crap, what do I say? Why is she so casual about all of this?
"Not too much... still feeling a little dead", I say as I reach back to scratch the back of my head, trying to act like I'm not racking my conscience for a real answer on what went down.
"Right... Because that's why you feel dead...." She turns back to me, rolling her eyes and taking a sip from the cup, the fangs painted on it lining up just right with her face. Of course she had to pick up that one. I chuckle and she flashes me a glare. Ah hell. "Something funny, Taxi Driver?"
"No, nothing, nothing funny at all. Just the cup... has fangs", I stammer out. How can she control my emotions like this? She smiles coyly. I swear, she must love messing with me like this.
"Uh huh. Alright Cabbage, whatever you say," Val taunts with a flash of her teeth, having emptied the cup, "How about this, you take me home and I'll tell you a little bit about what happened last night after work. Deal?" Like I could ever say no to you.
"As you wish." I say, smiling and grabbing my keys off the counter. "Let's go." I turn around to walk out and she's already standing by the door, tapping her foot impatiently at me. "Someone's ready to go."
"Only been waiting on you for an eternity. You're soooo slow." She smiles at me, feigning a sweet innocence. Gee thanks. She opens the creaky old door and I follow her down the hall and onto the street where my beat up old taxi waits, its dusty yellow paint peeking out from behind faded graffiti and the worn taxi sign on top somehow still clinging on for life. I open the door for Val and close it behind her as I walk around the front, running my hands over the aged hood tenderly. It might not be pretty, but it's mine. Sliding in next to Val, I turn the key, feeling the engine turn over and roar to life.
"Alright, now to get you back to your house." I pull out onto the street and begin to drive away. The windows are down and the cool breeze whips into the car and through Val's hair as we pass groggy and weary strangers on the street, hobbling back to their rat-holes after the events of last night's parties. Werewolves, zombies, and beasts of all kinds walking the same walk of shame back to their homes. The only ones missing from this are the soulless ghouls, no one really knows what they do at night. The cities skyscrapers give way to broken suburbs, relics of an urban sprawl from a population much larger than ours, and on to the countryside where the vampires live. As a zombie I just live in an apartment in the city, nothing fancy like the werewolves' frat houses, or a ghoul's... wherever it is they live. But vampires, they get castles. I always wondered at this. Vampires don't like sun yet choose to dwell in castles out in the country. I suppose it doesn't matter much anymore really with the sun dulled as it is from the war. No one knows how long it's been since the war, but sometimes it looks like it was just yesterday. And vampires never invite others inside, they're largely solitary, especially the older ones. Younger ones like Val may make some friends but even then it's rarely outside their own kind. Another reason Val and I are such weird friends. I take her home most every day when she hails a taxi after a long day working at the Coffee Kilter. She doesn't even need a taxi as vampires can move much faster than my taxi ever could. Regardless she always plops down herself in the passenger seat, her kilt flapping in behind her. And I drive, way out past where the sidewalks end, while we talk. Sometimes just about her day and how things are, sometimes about silly stories like human monster-hunters, and sometimes about more serious things like our living death, vampire life, and the memories we wish we had. I love listening to her talk, about anything really. Her voice is so enchanting. And then I pull up to her fortress of a house, looming up on a hill. It's always so sad because I know I have to say goodbye. When I pass the stone gargoyles that crane their necks to watch my taxi creep up to the great doors of her house, my heart drops because I know she'll disappear behind the