Chapter 17: Get Down with Zombies

I step outside and light a cigarette. The sky is full of sunshine — hard, blue sunshine that does nothing to chase the shivers out of my bones. A dead gray street surrounds me. Shadows skulk in the windows. Leftover Halloween decorations still haunt the building next door: Skeletons with paper bones taped to windows. Faded grins and dusty capers. Mush-mouthed jack-o’-lanterns mug from ledges. Witches on strings sweep cobwebs out of the sky.

The cold air makes me need to pee. I decide maybe I’ll find a bar, take a leak, and kill my hangover. I’m sick of being hung over. It’s been a week since I called Tabitha out of desperation, and I've been drunk every day since then. Tabitha likes to drink. It's her favorite pastime (aside from gluing cow faces onto the heads of Victoria's Secret models ... and studying crime-scene photos). Now that I'm back with Tabitha, that means I'm getting drunk every night. Fucking every night. Feeling hungover every morning. I may need a break.

Weirdly, I'm getting a little burned out on getting drunk and fucking Tabitha.

“She’s using you,” Craphole Joe says as I slam into this dark little pit called The Gold Standard.

“Yeah, you’re just serving as a dildo until something better comes along,” Jumper says.

“Shut up,” I say.

GET DOWN WITH GAWD BEFORE GAWD GET DOWN ON YOU, God Talk Radio says. In bed, I reply in my mind as the door slams shut behind me.

X

I stumble outside three hours later with my veins loaded full of beer. My thoughts are sloshing around in my skull and there’s no doubt this time that I’m drunk.

I turn to go up the street and hey … is that one of the zombies from Eli’s party? The one with the screwdriver in his neck?

He’s lurching toward me with his lips ripped back to show his teeth and his eyes bugged out and rolling around in his face. His hands thrust out of ripped-up sleeves, his nails rusty red and splintered from rending flesh. White earbuds plugged into his ears are feeding him thoughts.

“Sup,” he says, trying to play it cool as he closes the distance between us. Like he's just another guy.

I see through his ruse.

The bunnies, sensing danger, snarl and cluster around the zombie, driving him back until he gives up and shuffles away.

The bunnies are very protective of me. They may hate me — they may mock and ridicule and abuse me — but they respect the fact that I’m their only conduit to the world. Without me, they’d be nothing, which is probably the only reason they haven’t already killed me.

“Fucking zombies,” Dumper says.