Chapter 7

Chapter

Seven

ZOMBIES

Fly away, pretty moth, to the shade Of the leaf where you slumbered all day; Be content with the moon and the stars, pretty moth, And make use of your wings while you may. . . . . But tho' dreams of delight may have dazzled you quite, They at last found it dangerous play; Many things in this world that look bright, pretty moth, Only dazzle to lead us astray.

Thomas Haynes Bayly

B randon's sofa smelt like beer and sweat. It had been seven nights and no visit from Mare. If he were real, like he'd insisted, this was the equivalent of going on a date and not having the guy call you back for a week.

And yes, he'd left me sore and reeling.

Each night I stared at my closet, wishing it were Halloween in the seventies and he was going to jump out in a ghost face mask.

Instead, nothing but black greeted me in my slumber. He never came. Fall asleep and wait for me . Well, I did, and the waiting hadn't paid off for seven full nights.

If Mare were real and this was real, then I was really annoyed.

He'd left me with the visions of ghost face fucking me on Halloween night. Remnants of ghost splinters ached my back as I recalled Jason and his hockey mask. He'd been angry, insisting he was real, that I was somehow hurting him… and then nothing for seven days.

Well, you know what, Mare? I'll go watch a stupid show with Brandon and his friends. That would piss him off. He mentioned Brandon a lot, how he was jealous, well, if he were as real as Brandon, this would set him off, and he would visit me in my dreams again. If only to be a jerk, I didn't care.

Maybe I was baiting him.

Brandon's friends mingled with several coworkers I recognized. He returned and took a seat next to me, passing me a red plastic cup of beer. I wasn't supposed to have alcohol with my meds, so I simply held it awkwardly and smiled. Was this how flirting went? I wasn't sure, but he was smiling back, and he rested his arm on the back of the couch behind me.

I waited for days, hoping for a familiar nightmare or for Mare's voice to resound in my mind again like it did that day in therapy. Nothing. If he were real, he was a jerk.

If he weren't real and somehow my delusions were fading… my shoulders tensed at the possibility, and suddenly I really wanted to watch something mindless.

"So, what episode is this?" I asked.

Brandon took a sip of beer straight from a glass bottle. "Well, in this episode, zombies will try to kill people."

Another coworker chuckled and added, "And the people will try to kill the zombies."

"Shush, don't spoil it for her!" Brandon teased, and I forced a smile. Flirting was annoying.

I fake cheers'd. "Looking forward to it."

A girl and a guy stood in the corner, giving me a sympathetic look. I hated that look and reached for my headphones around my neck. "The service was really nice," the girl said with a small, pitying glance. Ignoring her, I put my headphones over my ears and let the automatic static setting dull the noises around me. Thankfully, subtitles were on. As if we even needed subtitles for pointless bloodshed.

The episode was mindless and gory. A fine distraction, I guessed. Though somewhere in the middle of the main dirty man grabbing an axe and chopping a green zombie in half, my beer cup was half full. Had I drank it?

Oops.

The show ended and partiers dispersed, leaving me and Brandon on the sofa, though somehow, he'd gotten closer to me than I'd realized. "I should get going," I said as he eased nearer.

"No way am I letting you go. You're a lightweight, I can tell, and even that one drink was too much. Sleep over. Come on, I'll let you take my bed." He stood and extended a palm, helping me up. The room spun. Wow, half a beer made me dizzy? He was right, somehow, I was completely out of it. There was no way I could drive.

"Okay," I agreed, following him and leaning on his arm for support as he took me to his room and sat me on the bed.

But he didn't leave.

Then his shirt was off, and he was next to me.

"Glad I've finally gotten you alone." His breath was rancid with alcohol. "You know I always had a crush on you in school. But never could get near you." Everything in me wanted to push him away, to demand he get out, but my limbs felt heavy and hard to move. Even the words stop, don't, got lost in my throat. He eased a hand under my shirt, touching my stomach. "Don't worry, I'll take good care of you, Lucy."

This was happening, and this was scarier than any nightmare I'd encountered. I braced myself for what would come, when all of a sudden, he jerked his hand away and cupped his forehead.

"Fuck, my head is, it's?—"

He fell over on the bed with a sharp groan as I lost the battle to my sinking eyelids. Darkness overtook me.

And then screams rattled in the distance.

My preferred nightmare had arrived.

The sky was a muggy green, and the air was thick with sweat and blood. I stopped running for a moment, panting with my hands on my knees. Brandon stopped next to me, grabbing my shoulders and shaking me. Terror marked his dirt-stained features.

"Lucy?" He shook my shoulders and cried. "What the fuck is happening? Where are we?"

I'd never seen Brandon in a nightmare before. When I had seen people I recognized, they played a part in the scene and I was just putting the pieces together, playing catch up to the setting I'd landed in. Brandon wasn't acting like a player in this nightmare… he was acting like an outsider.

I looked around at the muddy and overgrown field. A forest swayed in the distance. "I don't know, I always just figure it out as I go along."

"The last thing I remember, we were on my bed, and now we're being chased by- by?—"

"By who?"

"Them." He pointed in fear. Spinning on my heel I saw dozens of horrific, gurgling, bloodied zombies charging toward us. They smelled like sulfur and carried various sharp objects.

"I hate zombies," I groaned to the sky. "Mare, come on," I whined, knowing I'd have to play his game if I wanted any hope of seeing him. And why was Brandon here? Oh, Mare was just being more and more irritating, wasn't he?

Brandon stumbled backward, eyes wide. " Mare ? This is just a dream, right? Why does it feel so real?"

I shrugged, feeling more and more like Brandon was a sentient participant in this nightmare— like somehow Mare had looped us into the same scene. Why would he do that? Didn't he want to be alone with me? How would I explain this to Brandon when we woke up?

The incoherent moans intensified as they gained on us. I pulled on Brandon's shirt to snap him out of his fear stare. "Come on, we have to run."

We ran to the trees, but the zombies were just as fast as us, if not faster. Brandon found an axe. A rogue zombie lunged for him, and he cut it in half, crying as he did so. Black blood splattered his face.

We made our way deeper into the forest when Brandon shouted, "Lucy, watch out!"

But I was too late. A zombie grabbed my ponytail and pulled me backward. I fell, hitting my back against a tree stump. Lightening-sharp pain shot through my back. Brandon didn't make a move to help me, instead giving me a small shrug. "If one of us has to die, then so be it. I mean, it's just a dream, right?"

Asshole.

I squirmed out of the way of the zombie's spit-dripping bite, and Brandon turned to run as more descended upon us. Suddenly, right when he took a step away from me, a hissing sound broke out, and he swished, his body flung and hanging upside down from a tree. "Fuck, I stepped in a trap— Lucy, help!" he screamed, waving his arms. Crawling through the mud I grabbed his fallen axe in time to spin onto my back, slicing through the abdomen of the pouncing zombie on my trail. Guts spilled all over me. Stinky guts.

I pressed my back to Brandon's upside-down chest and clutched the axe as they encircled us. Frothing at the mouth, looking grotesque and horrifying. Mare was going to let us die, wasn't he? This was my punishment for going to Brandon's house, wasn't it?

"Okay, Mare, you win," I said through gritted teeth as I shut my eyes and braced for the dull teeth of a dozen zombies to gnaw through my brain.

Brandon sputtered and sobbed. "What the hell is happening, Lucy? Is this my payment for what I did?"

Just then, someone dropped in front of me. He turned and tilted his head in that familiar way, only his face was hidden behind a ski-mask. I pointed. "Look out!"

Mare pulled out a dagger and cut the head from the first zombie. Two more attacked and died in the same way. He then pulled a machine gun from off his back and leveled the forest with shots. I covered my ears at the responding sounds of screams and gunfire, watching as zombie after zombie collapsed to its gruesome death.

My ski-masked man turned to me then and grabbed my chin. "You're in so much fucking trouble, Lilac."

I tried to pull away from his hold, but he only gripped my chin tighter, making it hurt, proving he was real somehow. "You're the one who's ignored me for a week. What is this? Why is Brandon here?"

Mare scoffed behind his black ski mask and lifted his arms. "You think I'm doing this?" He pointed to Brandon and tilted his head. "But him I can control— oh yes, I brought your sick little boyfriend here."

"He's not my boyfriend," I argued, crossing my arms. "And what do you mean you're not doing this? Of course you are. You think I want to have nightmares about zombies and ghost face and Jason trying to kill me?"

"I don't care what you want. Move," he ordered. He pulled Brandon by the hair as he dangled helplessly. "You drugged her drink, you spineless fucking coward. You haven't changed a bit… Now you die. Now you come live with me— forever."

"He what?" I questioned, looking at Brandon in shock.

Brandon tried to fight but looked ridiculous. He was no match for Mare in strength or stature, even if he weren't red-faced and hanging by his ankle. "It helps uptight girls loosen up. She wanted it, she's always wanted me."

With a growl, Mare took the end of his gun and hit my co-worker brutally across the face. His nose bled as he swore and cried. "Looks like I'm doing the waking world a favor by ridding it of you. You'll never go near what's mine again."

Brandon was getting his ass kicked and was probably going to die, but my heart fluttered as I looked up, catching Mare's murderous violet gaze behind his black ski mask. "Am I yours?"

"You're mine," he hissed, dropping the gun and grabbing me by the throat. "Don't you ever fucking disappear on me again. We aren't done here yet."

Confusion seeped through me. "I—I thought it was you. Don't you bring me to you?"

"There is only so much I can control, Lilac. The rest is… you know, Lilac. You know ."

I shook my head. "I don't know, Mare. I really don't."

He extended a hand. "Come on."

Taking his palm, I followed him to the adjacent tree, Brandon kicking and screaming behind us. There were hidden steps notched in the bark, and Mare held my hips, helping me find my footing before we climbed to the top.

"A treehouse?" I smiled, looking out over the dystopian landscape. "This is kind of nice, even though you're a jerk."

He pulled off his ski mask, leaving his jet-black hair ruffled and his jaw impossibly sharp. "Me, a jerk? You wound me. For I am freshly gutting a pig for all eternity for you as we speak. Don't you hear his cries?"

I did hear Brandon's cries, and I wondered if the zombies would, too. "You're evil."

"Quite." With those full lips, so delicious, so inviting, he leaned forward in offering of tenderness and passion. An offering I'd taken time and time again and wanted again. I wanted him in the treehouse while zombies stalked my coworker… but instead, I forced myself to push him back.

"Where do you come from?" I asked. "Maybe if I can make sense of you, of this, I'll know what to do next."

Mare let out a small sigh, running his hand through his tousled hair. "I come from the same place as you."

"How do I stay with you? If you can make Brandon stay, can't you make me stay?"

My phantom leaned back, glancing down the tree trunk before fishing into his vest and pulling out a pack of cigarettes. "So many things that I'm not allowed to tell you, Lilac. This only works if you sort it out on your own. But at least you're beginning to wake up to what's truly happening here." Taking a lighter to the tobacco between his lips, he puffed as the cigarette ignited. "Now, you answer me. Why do you accept a life of lies when you're capable of swimming through the night stars for me?"

I knew what was coming next, felt it in the shift of the wind and the drop of his perfect expression. Crawling between his legs I cradled myself in his strong arms and held tight. "Stay," I begged. Was I pleading with him or with myself? I couldn't tell.

"Oh, Lilac…" He brushed his lips against my ear, making the hair on the back of my neck stand at attention. I regretted asking questions instead of making out with him. "You still don't realize it, do you?"

A gurgled scream quivered in the distance, mixing with wet moans and crunching sounds. Zombies had found Brandon, dangling like a chicken on a wire. Dread tightened my chest as he wailed, and the cries and grunts zeroed in at the bottom of our treetop escape.

"What don't I realize?" I asked, watching Mare stand and pull his gun off his back. What terrors did I leave him to when I woke up? Did he ever get hurt? Why would he keep finding me each night if he knew it would always end in pain for him? "Does it hurt?" I asked, tears filling my eyes as he loaded his gun, pausing with his ski mask on his forehead.

"Yeah," he replied. "Hurts like hell." But his eyes weren't looking at the zombies climbing our tree, they were fixed to me.

I repeated, fear and lucidity threatening to pull me from my sleepfulness. "What don't I realize?"

Mare tugged his mask over his chin, a dark knight once more, and cocked his weapon. A zombie stabbed a knife into his boot, and he winced as I screamed in panic. Those sharp violet eyes found mine in quiet goodbye. "You don't realize just how bad it's about to get. How lost you'll be if you don't face what's right in front of you."

Something exploded in a bright wash of hot orange.

I opened my eyes in Brandon's bed and rolled over, cold with sweat. Brandon's mouth was open, so were his eyes… and blood pooled from his eyes and nose. He wasn't breathing.

Brandon was dead.