"But she"s dead."
Mrs. Kobylka unlocked and opened the door and peered at Kirk through the screen, hands on her hips. "She"s your responsibility."
"But what do I do with her?" Kirk said, raising his voice. "Isn"t there some way to make her... like she was? I mean, dead. The way she is now, it"s just not right."
"Like I told you, you asked for it. And I told you there was no undoing it, too. You didn"t listen to me when I talked to you?"
"But there must be some magic, some spell"
"Are you ready to pay the price?"
Kirk"s jaw dropped. "Is that what this is? A scam? You want money now?"
"I"m not talking about money." She shook her head in disgust and dismissed them with a wave of her gnarled hand. "You go away now. This is your problem, not mine." She stepped back and closed the door, locked it loudly.
"I don"t have much money," Kirk said, "but I"ll give you what I"ve"
"Go away or I call the police!" Mrs. Kobylka shouted behind the door.
"Oh, s.h.i.t, that"s the last thing we need," Randy said. "Come on, let"s go."
Kirk did not want to leave; he wanted to talk some sense into that infuriating old woman. But she sounded pretty serious about not talking to him anymore more.
"I"m calling the police right now, you don"t go away!" she shouted.
She sounded pretty serious about that, too.
As Kirk and Randy turned on the porch and went down the steps, Liz ran up the broken path. She wore a sickened expression on her face, elbows bent, and shook her hands as if they"d been burned.
Liz said, "She"s starting to say she"s hungry again!"
They got in the idling car.
Natalie turned to Kirk and gave him another of those hideous smiles. "I"m hungry, Kirk," she said in that moist, strangled voice. She grabbed his arm and pulled his hand to her mouth.
Liz screamed and Randy made a frightened wailing sound.
"No!" Kirk shouted as he jerked his hand back. "No, you can"t eat us, okay? Jesus." He scooted as far away from her as possible and fastened his seatbelt. He decided not to fasten Natalie"swhat difference would it make? He said, "Let"s get out of here."
Liz started the car, and her voice trembled as she said, "Where do we go now?"
"The Mt. Shasta Mall," Kirk said.
"Are you on crack?" Randy said.
"Hungry," Natalie said.
Liz suddenly pounded on the steering wheel and screamed, "She says she"s hungry, dammit! She"s gonna start f.u.c.kin" biting all of us in a minute! What are we gonna do? Jesus Christ, I don"t wanna be a f.u.c.kin" zombie. I wanna go home."
Randy took her in his arms and held her, murmured rea.s.surances to her as she cried. "We could leave her here on Mrs. Kobylka"s porch," he said to Kirk after a while. "She"ll end up doing something with her, don"t you think?"
Kirk shook his head. "I"m afraid she"d send Natalie right back to me, or make trouble for us. I was serious about the mall."
Natalie leaned over and reached for his wrist. "I"m. Hungry."
Kirk pulled his hands in close and pressed himself against the side of the cab away from her. He said, "We"re gonna lose her in the food court."
The Mt. Shasta Mall had been refurbished a couple years ago with a new main entrance, a large food court, and new storefronts. Along with the mall"s new look had come a new Christmas decorationa gigantic reindeer that appeared to have been made of snow-white twigs stood in front of the mall covered with white lights. For the last two Christmas seasons, while under the influence of mood-and-consciousness-altering substances, Kirk, Natalie, Randy, and Liz had found the reindeer at once frightening and side-splittingly funny.
Liz drove slowly through the parking lot looking for a s.p.a.ce. Christmas shoppers were out in force and the lot was packed.
"We"re just gonna take her in there and leave?" Randy said for the third time.
"Someone will recognize her eventually," Kirk said.
"They ran a picture of her in today"s Searchlight," Liz said. "With the article about her body being stolen."
"It was in the paper?" Kirk said.
"Yep."
"Well, there you go. Someone will recognize her."
"And they"ll call the police," Liz said.
Kirk said, "Yeah."
"And they"ll call an ambulance, and they"ll take her to a hospital," Randy said.
Kirk said, "Yeah."
"They"ll find out she"s dead."
Kirk shook his head. "That won"t be our problem."
"They"ll wonder where she came from," Liz said.
"They"ll know where she came from," Kirk said. "The Richmond Funeral Home. They"ll know she walked out because they"ll see her walking. And yeah, they"ll know she"s dead. So what? If they find her here alone, it won"t involve us. Maybe she"ll become famous. Maybe she"ll get a guest spot on Fear Factor and they"ll make guys kiss her. Whatever happens, all we have to do is sit back and pretend it"s news to us, because we had nothing to do with it, right?"
Liz found a parking s.p.a.ce so far out into the outer edge of the lot that the mall seemed to be on the distant horizon.
"You know," Randy said, "that"s not a bad idea. It might work."
They got out of the car. Natalie wanted to hold Kirk"s hand. He refused at first, but Randy said, "Hey, it"ll help her to blend in."
Finally, Kirk took her hand and they started walking toward the mall. Kirk walked beside Randy and leaned toward him to whisper, "This is disgusting."
"What is?" Randy said.
Pale vapor puffed from their mouths in the cold when they spoke.
"Holding her hand. It feels so... I don"t know, so..." Kirk started laughing.
Randy laughed with him.
The Vicodin had kicked in.
"What"re you guys laughing at?" Liz said on the other side of Randy.
They were too busy trying to stop laughing to tell her.
Inside, the mall was busy and noisy. They wandered past the food court, which was to the left of the entrance, and soaked in the atmosphere. Christmas music played over the sound system and there were bright holiday decorations everywhere. Santa sat in an enormous red-and-gold throne in the center of the mall surrounded by toys and children stood in line to sit on his knee.
Kirk had almost forgotten it was the Christmas season. Losing Natalie had knocked all the holiday spirit out of him. But suddenly, there in the mall surrounded by decorated trees and garlands of plastic holly, with the Christmas music playing and the lights blinking, in the company of his two best friends, holding the hand of Natalie"s walking corpse, it somehow felt like Christmas.
Kirk turned around and said they should head back to the food court. They were almost there when Liz said, "Oh, let"s go into Hot Topic!"
Hot Topic was a popular store, but it was very small and cramped with merchandise. It was crowded with teenagers, as always, and Randy, Liz, Kirk, and Natalie had to shoulder their way through the store. They were browsing the t-shirt selection when they began to hear the comments.
"What the f.u.c.k is that smell?" someone said.
"Jesus Christ, what is that?" someone else said.
They heard someone gag.
Kirk realized Natalie was stinking the place up fast. He met Randy"s eyes and Kirk jerked his head toward the front of the store. He turned to Natalie. She was staring at her right hand. He tugged on her left and said, "Hungry," she said, and Kirk felt panic blossom in his chest.
On their way out of the store, moving as quickly as they could, they heard other remarks mixed with laughter.
"s.h.i.t, did you see that chick?"
"She looked dead!"
"What was I thinking?" Kirk said once they were out. "We never should"ve gone in there."
"That was close," Randy said.
They went across to the food court. It was a cathedral of fast food in which voices echoed off the cavernously high ceiling. It was a clash of aromas: Chinese food, Italian food, Mexican food, Greek food, hamburgers, hotdogs, donuts, Coco, and rotting flesh, all in one place.
"I want an apple fritter," Liz said.
"Okay," Randy said. He turned to Kirk. "You want a donut?"
Kirk shook his head.
"Uh... does she?" He nodded toward Natalie, who was staring at the ceiling.
Kirk rolled his eyes. "That"s not what she eats."
Randy"s eyes widened and his cheeks paled. "Oh, yeah. I almost forgot. f.u.c.k. I was gonna have a donut, but now I"m not so sure."
"Well, go get mine and we"ll find a table," Liz said.
All the tables in the food court were occupied. Liz spotted two women and three kids leaving one of the tables near the front, by the tall windows, and they quickly claimed it.
Once they were seated, Liz said, "Jesus, I can really smell her, Kirk. The Vicks worked pretty well for awhile, but I think mine"s worn out, because she"s really getting to me."
"Don"t worry, we"ll go as soon as Randy comes back."
"Where"d he go?"
"To get your apple fritter."
"I can"t eat an apple fritter now. She"s making me sick to my stomach."
"But," Kirk said, "thanks to the Vicodin, you don"t really care, do you?"
Liz grinned. "No s.h.i.t."
Natalie was staring out the window looking more stoned than the three of them combined when Randy came to the table with a white bag. Kirk stood and nodded at Liz, who got to her feet. Together, they walked away from the table and left Natalie alone in the food court.
- SIX -.
It"s not Natalie. It"s only her body. Kirk had to keep telling himself that as he walked away from Natalie. He looked over his shoulder. She was looking around slowly now. She looked confused, but she did not look confused in the way Natalie used to when she looked confusedthere was no resemblance. This Natalie looked confused the way a mentally handicapped child might.
Outside the food court, Kirk led them to one of the banks of plastic molded chairs. Kirk and Randy sat down with Liz between them and they both sat forward with forearms on thighs.
"She"s nothing like Natalie, is she?" Kirk said.
Randy shook his head and Liz said, "No, she"s not. But there were times... I don"t know, like, for a split second, there were a couple times when it was Natalie. But it happened so fast, it could"ve been my imagination."
"Why are we still here?" Randy said.
Kirk shrugged. "I don"t know. We should probably go."
But they did not leave their seats. They liked sitting there, and they felt so good. All three of them wished Natalie could be there with them. The smelly, purple-lipped corpse in the sungla.s.ses and watch cap was a small piece of Natalie, and they were reluctant to leave her behind. They sat there and watched her.
Natalie scooted her chair away from the table and stood, looked around. She did not seem to notice that they were goneif she did, it did not appear to matter to her. Her lips moved. She was talking to herself.
"What"s she saying?" Randy whispered.
Kirk said, "I think she"s saying, "I"m hungry," over and over."
"Oh, s.h.i.t," Liz said.
Natalie struck with the speed of a snake. She threw herself on a very fat woman in her thirties carrying shopping bags in both hands on her way out of the food court. Kirk, Liz, and Randy shot from their chairs and ran through the crowd toward her as the fat woman shrieked. Fortunately, the fat woman dropped the bags and struggled while Natalie took great bites out of the air in the general area of the fat woman"s neck. When she screamed the second time, there was horror in the sound, and Kirk realized she must have gotten a good look at Natalie, or maybe a whiff of her, or both.
Kirk and Randy each grabbed one of Natalie"s elbows from behind and pulled her off the fat woman.