Through the Zombie Glass

Chapter 11 Rot in Peace

The next morning, I climbed into Reeve’s Porsche and bucked my seat belt. Our ten-minute drive to school couldn’t end fast enough. I was ready to hide in the back of my first class and fall asleep.

She clearly concurred, gunning the engine as she shot from the garage. I wanted to rapid-fire questions at her, now that we were alone, but I was too tired. I leaned against the door instead, the sunlight streaming through the window warming me, lulling me.

Singing along to the radio, she merged into traffic. There were shadows under her eyes, and for once, she wore wrinkled clothing, as if she’d just rolled from bed and called it good.

I happened to know that she had.

As promised, I hadn’t left Bronx alone. I’d waited for Reeve to exit Ethan’s house. And she had, at 3:00 a.m. Ethan had driven her home, dropped her off in the same spot he’d picked her up and kissed her on the mouth before driving away. Bronx hadn’t said another word. His body language had said plenty, though.

Ethan was lucky to be alive.

The first moment I’d been alone, I’d called Dr. Bendari to reschedule, but the number had been unavailable. I had screeched with frustration, knowing I’d blown my best chance to talk with the only person with concrete answers.

Then I’d chastised myself for letting an emotion get the better of me.

Walking. Sedative.

“Wishing you hadn’t gotten the tattoos?” Reeve asked.

“Of course not,” I said. “Why?”

“Well, look at yourself.”

I gazed down. I was absentmindedly rubbing my thumb over the daggers. Oh. Well. “They comfort me.”

Reeve gasped and stomped on the brake. The car jerked to a stop, throwing me forward as much as the belt would allow.

“What the—”

“Bronx,” she screeched, tearing off her belt and stepping into the daylight.

Just in front of her car, right in the middle of the road, was Bronx’s old, rusted truck. He leaned against the hood, arms crossed.

I should have expected this.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she demanded.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he spat. “Sneaking out in the middle of the night, meeting some strange guy and going to his place. Do you know how dangerous that is?”

“How did you—argh! It doesn’t matter.” She grabbed a rock and threw it at him.

Reflexes honed, he ducked.

She shook her head, as if she couldn’t believe what she’d just done. More calmly, she said, “He’s not some strange guy, he’s my boyfriend, and what I do with him isn’t your business.”

“Everything about you is my business.”

Her back went ramrod straight. “Screw you. I’m not doing this with you, Bronx. Not anymore.” She turned.

He grabbed her arm, spun her around. “Did you sleep with him?”

Very calmly, she said, “I told you. What I do with him is none of your business.”

“And I told you everything about you is my business, but neither of us seems to be listening.”

The forced calm vanished as she jerked away. “You can’t do this to me. Can’t pretend you care. Tomorrow, after I’ve dumped him, you’ll change your mind.” She shoved him, a puny action, really, when comparing a six-foot-five gigantor to a five-foot-five fairy princess, but he released her anyway.

“Does Daddy Dearest know about him?” he asked quietly.

She pointed her finger in his face. “No, and you won’t say a word. You don’t get to play any part in my love life. We’ve been sniffing around each other since junior high. You were so sweet to me at first. You made me things. You were my first kiss. Then suddenly you wouldn’t look at me, wouldn’t even talk to me—until I turned my sights to someone else and tried to move on. You’d come on strong, and I’d always fall back into your arms, but it wouldn’t take long for you to start ignoring me all over again, and I’m tired of it.”

I shouldn’t be listening to this. I would have hated it if anyone had heard my arguments with Cole, especially the final one.

Trying to distract myself, I turned up the radio. Taylor Swift, “I Knew You Were Trouble.” Fitting. I texted Nana. Can we talk later? Just U & me?

If my emotions started to go haywire, I’d adios.

Her: I would love that.

Me: I’m sorry I’ve been so weird lately, & I’m sorry about the fight w/the girl.

Her: We can talk about the reason at dinner. And just to make you happy, I promise I won’t spend too much on groceries.

I laughed.

Her: BTW, do you want to tell me why I found a note in your room saying “Did this to myself”? WHAT DID YOU DO?

Uh-oh.

Me: Almost @ school. Gotta go. Love you!

Hey. Not a word of that was a lie.

“—can’t be with you the way I want,” Bronx was saying, drawing my attention back to the conversation.

“Why?” Reeve demanded. “For once, give me a straight answer. You do, and I’ll never see Ethan again.”

Bronx pressed his lips together.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Bitterness tinged her tone.

Reeve stomped to the car. Bronx stomped to his. His tires squealed as he turned the vehicle around. Dirt sprayed as he shot forward.

“That boy,” Reeve said, her body trembling.

“He cares about you.”

“Yeah, just not enough.”

I reached over, patted her hand. “Believe me, I get it.”

She tossed me a sad smile before resuming the drive.

A few minutes later, she was parking in her usual spot. The lot could be overflowing, but no one, not even teachers, would dare encroach on her territory. Not because of her or her father’s money, but because of Bronx. I heard someone made the mistake of parking here only once; Bronx had hot-wired the car and crashed it into the trees the students had spray-painted gold and black to proudly display our school colors.

Silent, we strode over the tiger paws mowed into the grass and headed inside the building.

Trina and Mackenzie were leaning against a locker, snarling at anyone stupid enough to approach them. When I walked past—never said I was smart—they pushed away from the wall and flanked my sides, shouldering Reeve out of the way.

“You have to talk to Cole,” Trina began.

“I never thought I’d say this,” Mackenzie said, “but I want you to do more than talk to him. I want you to seduce the hell out of him. I don’t know how much more post-Ali drama I can take.”

“O-kay. Cue my exit,” Reeve said, branching away from us. “See you at lunch, Ali.”

“Yeah. See ya.” I sighed. “What’s the problem?”

Trina twisted the ring in her eyebrow. “For starters, he’s meaner than my stepdad’s Yorkie.”

“Your stepdad has a Yorkie?”

Mackenzie slashed a hand through the air. “Forget the tiny terror dog. Cole lashes out at everything we say, and has for weeks.”

For weeks?

Until two nights ago, he’d shown me only his gentler side.

“He busted Lucas’s nose during training,” she continued. “Last night, he punched a window and needed eight stitches.”

Last night? While he’d been with Veronica. “It has nothing to do with me,” I assured them. If I’d had claws, I would have scraped them over the lockers.

Calm.

“I happen to think it has everything to do with you,” Trina said. “I’ve seen the way he watches you when you’re not looking.”

“And I swear vessels burst in his forehead every time Gavin mentions your name,” Mackenzie said, nodding.

“Guys. Cole broke up with me. I told him I’d work on being his friend, and I will, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to stroke his...uh, ego and make him smile.”

“Fine,” Trina replied. “We’ll stop trying to convince you to sex him up, but you still gotta talk to him. You’re the only one he’ll listen to.”

“I don’t think that’s true.”

She ignored me, saying, “He disappears for hours at a time. No one knows where he goes. He’s paranoid we won’t keep detailed records about what we find on patrol. He gets phone calls from blocked numbers and steps out of the room so no one will overhear his conversations. Before, he kept us in the loop about everything.”

So he was still spying on the slayers. But what was it, exactly, that he was trying to uncover?

I reached my destination, freed the lock on my locker and stuffed my bag inside. “I’ll talk to him about his weirdness, but that’s all I can promise.”

Mackenzie shocked me to my bones when she hugged me. “Thank you. We, like, seriously owe you one.”

As if our conversation had summoned him, Cole turned the corner and strolled down the hall toward us. He was wearing a red baseball cap and had his hands in his pockets. I couldn’t see his newest wound. He walked past us, nodding at Trina, then Mackenzie—avoiding me. My chest constricted.

“Or maybe I won’t be talking to him,” I muttered, and took off for my first class.

Just before Cole turned the corner, he looked back at me; our gazes locked. I tripped over my own feet. No vision. But I saw hunger. Fury. Regret. Remorse. Fear. Then he was gone.

Someone laughed, breaking me from the spell he’d woven. Dazed, a little angry with myself—calm, dang it—I looked to see what was so funny. Wren and Poppy stood with a group of girls making fun of a tall, skinny redhead with freckles and braces. Wren and Poppy weren’t laughing, but they weren’t stopping the taunts, either. The redhead was doing her best not to cry.

I stomped over and, to a chorus of “Hey” and “Watch it,” shoved the girls out of the way. Glaring, I said, “You have five seconds to leave, and then I get mad.”

I wasn’t ever going to be a sedative, was I?

They might not know how good I was with my fists, but they certainly knew the people I ran with, and, paling, they left without another word. Poppy cast a remorseful look over her shoulder. Wren, too. Only she mouthed, Thank you, baffling me.

“Thank you,” the redhead said, then swallowed a sob. “My shirt... I didn’t bring a jacket today, so I can’t cover up.”

It was white and soaked with water, revealing every stitch on her bra. “Why don’t we trade?” I didn’t want her sitting in the cold and the wet and thinking about what had happened. “Your shirt goes better with my jeans.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

She brightened, and we raced to the bathroom.

“Thank you so much,” she said after we’d made the switch.

“Don’t worry about it.” Shivering, I darted to class to avoid a tardy I couldn’t afford.

To my surprise, Justin was waiting at the door. “Hey, Ali.”

“Hey.”

He opened his mouth to say more, closed it. Opened it. Snapped it closed. Finally he settled on “How are you?”

“I’ve been better.” I headed toward my seat, and he followed me. “You?”

“Fine. I’m fine.”

I studied him, saw dark circles under his eyes, gaunt cheekbones and lips that had clearly been chewed. He wasn’t fine. “I know you told me nothing abnormal had been happening to you. Is that still the case?”

His brow furrowed, becoming a slash of anger. “Want to tell me what’s been happening to you? Because something has, right?”

I still wasn’t sure what his motives were, but at the moment I had nowhere else to turn. “Possibly.”

“Possibly?”

I sat down. “That’s all I’m willing to say.” For now.

He sat down beside me. “Okay, but I can’t help you if I don’t know what you’re dealing with.”

“Will you actually help me, though?”

His shoulders wilted, and he said, “I guess I deserved that.”

Yeah, but I didn’t have to be so crabby about it, did I? “Do you know someone by the name of Dr. Bendari?”

“No. Why?”

Crap. So...maybe Dr. Bendari wasn’t with Anima, after all. Maybe Justin was lying. Or maybe Justin just hadn’t met him. “Forget it.”

“Ali. Please. Talk to me.”

How many times was I going to hear those words?

The bell rang, saving me from having to reply. “Later,” I said. Maybe.

Lunchtime arrived. I’d successfully managed to avoid Justin after first and second period. Trina and Mackenzie, too. But not Cole.

He cornered me in the girls’ bathroom.

I was washing my hands as he stepped inside. A classmate of mine was in the process of closing a stall door when she spied him and squealed.

“Out,” he said, and she took off, leaving me alone with him.

My heart thundered as I dried my hands with a paper towel. “If you plan to yell at me for hurting your girlfriend, let me save you the trouble. My anger got the best of me, but it’s not going to happen again.”

“She’s not my girlfriend.”

“It’s okay if she is. You don’t have to try and spare my feelings. I’ve moved on.”

He did not appear grateful.

I tried to bypass him, deciding to talk to him about Trina and Mackenzie’s allegations later, in a place without mirrors. He stepped into my path. “Stay,” he said.

“Orders?” I glared up at him. “You know I’m not afraid to punch you, right?”

“Do what you want to me. I’m not leaving until you’ve listened to me.”

Sometimes I really hated my curious nature. “What?”

When I backed off, he leaned against the sink, raked his gaze over me and frowned. “You’re wearing a different shirt.”

“Yes,” was all I said, struggling with the sudden need to cover my chest.

“Why?”

Struggling—and failing. I covered my chest with my hands. “Is that why you’re here? Because my reasons don’t concern you.”

His frown deepened. He shook his head, as if to get back on track. “I’m worried about you and want to discuss it like rational people.”

“I don’t have anything to say to you.”

“Why? You said we could try and be friends.”

Lesson learned: it was better to think before I spoke. “Fine. Discuss away.”

He muttered something under his breath before saying to me, “Ankh told me you’ve been eating bagels at his house.”

Wait. “This isn’t about what happened on patrol? Or Veronica?”

“The bagels,” he insisted.

What was with the freaking bagels? “Yes. I have been eating bagels. Last I heard, that wasn’t a crime.”

“It is when it’s all you’re eating.”

I anchored my hands on my hips. “Why do you even care about this?”

He ignored the question, saying, “You didn’t bring your lunch and you weren’t planning on getting anything in the cafeteria today, were you? I know, because you didn’t get anything last week, either. You’re going to starve.”

He made it sound worse than it was. “I’m saving to buy Nana a house of her own.”

“Then bring food from Ankh’s. He has more than enough.”

“I’m living in his home free of charge. I’m not going to be any more of a burden and take more from him.”

“You’re not a burden.”

“So you say.”

“Ali.”

“No,” I said.

“Take from me, then.” He withdrew a brown leather wallet with a chain at the end. “Please.”

I violently shook my head. What the heck was happening here? “I don’t want your money.”

“Ali,” he repeated, his tone ragged. “Friends share.”

“We’re not that close anymore.”

He flinched. “You have to eat.”

“I will. I promise.”

“More than bagels,” he insisted.

I nodded, anything to move this conversation along. After school, I’d walk to the convenience store close to the Ankhs’ and buy bread and deli meat.

“Not just later, but now, at lunch,” he said, as if he’d heard my thoughts. “Please.”

Please.

His concern was doing something to me, weaving one of his spells around me, making me forget the world around me, the problems, taking me deeper and deeper into an obsession that had only gotten me hurt. I wanted out. I needed out.

“It’s better that we broke up, you know.” I said the words for my own benefit. “Our connection was so fast, we never took the time to get to know each other. Not really. And how would we ever have known if we truly cared about each other or if the visions had simply convinced us that we did?”

He smacked a hand against the mirror and leaned toward me. Glaring, he snapped, “I knew how I felt.”

Past tense. Why did that hurt? “I know how you felt, too. Not strongly enough to fight for me.”

A muscle ticked below his eye as he straightened, backed me into the black-and-gold-tiled wall. The warmth of his breath fanned over my face, as sure and sweet as a caress. His gaze took in every detail of my expression, lingering on my lips. Lips suddenly aching for the kisses he’d denied me during my recovery.

“We both know why I walked away,” he said. “We both know what’s going to happen.”

“Yes, so what the heck do you think you’re doing, closing in on me like this?” Good. I’d shaken off the melancholy and welcomed a bit of mettle.

“I don’t know,” he snarled, and I was suddenly face-to-face with Cole the Yorkie. “I never know anymore.”

For my own good, I forced myself to say, “That’s your problem, not mine.” Then I angled around him and walked away.

This time, he let me go.

I was getting good at not looking back.

In the cafeteria, I spent three precious dollars on a mediocre hamburger. Cole was at the table by the time I eased beside Kat and Reeve, and he watched me eat half...and try to save the other half for later.

Scowling, he planted himself at my side, scooting Kat out of the way, then unwrapped the burger and put it back in my hand. I suspected he would try to force-feed me if I resisted, so I ate the rest. My stomach nearly wept with gratitude.

He pushed a Gatorade in my direction. His? Half the contents were already gone. I’d forgotten to buy a drink, I realized, and gratefully swallowed one mouthful, then another.

“Thank you,” I said, trying not to care that he cared.

“That’s what friends are for, right? Even if they’re not close.” He put his mouth where mine had been and drained the rest.

After school, Kat and I piled into Reeve’s car. The three of us had one class together, and Mr. Toms, the teacher, had allowed us to group up for a special humanitarian project. For it, we drove to Party Palace and bought a handful of Get Well Soon balloons.

“On a totally unrelated subject,” Kat said, “do you guys want to go threezies on a gift for Aubrey Wilson’s baby shower? And by threezies I mean your dad will pay the bulk of it, Reeve. We want to get her something totes amazeballs.”

“She mentioned needing a crib,” I said. Poor girl. She had just started showing, and her boyfriend had dumped her.

Reeve nodded. “Count me in.”

As we meandered along back roads, searching for the next object we needed to complete Kat’s “most brilliant idea ever,” I checked the clouds. The sun glared at me, making my eyes water, but I still caught sight of a rabbit and moaned. No, please no. Not tonight. I wasn’t ready to face the zombies—and my reaction to them—again.

Tonight I was supposed to stay at Cole’s gym and guard the bodies the slayers left behind. But. Yeah, there was always a but with me, wasn’t there? I’d be called out just as soon as the zombies were found—and they would most certainly be found.

Would I hear the voices again? Should I just call in sick?

“I’m sure we’re going to get a terrible grade for this,” Reeve said with a groan.

“If anything, we’ll receive a certificate for awesomeness,” Kat replied.

My phone beeped. I checked the screen and stiffened.

“What’s wrong?” Kat asked.

“Cole wants to meet with me,” I said without any inflection of emotion.

Inside, I churned.

I read the text again. My house. Five. Be there.

Dang it. I’d planned to have dinner with Nana before heading over.

“When? Where?” Reeve asked, and I gave her the details.

“Are you going to go?” Kat wondered.

Hands shaking, I texted Nana. Can we reschedule? I’m so sorry, but something’s come up w/Cole.

I waited, but a response from her didn’t come.

To Cole, I texted Why?

Cole (I’d deleted the part about McHottie): Do I really need a reason?

Me: 2 talk? Yes. We’ve said all we need 2 say.

Okay, so that wasn’t exactly true. I still had to drum up the courage to mention his odd behavior, as promised.

Cole: Who runs this show? Just be there.

Me: Fine.

Cole: Your enthusiasm is humbling.

Me: Go screw yourself.

Cole: I have. I prefer 2 have a partner.

I think I gasped.

“Yeah. I’m going to go,” I said. I wasn’t going to call in sick. I had responsibilities. I’d keep them.

“Hold everything.” Kat bounced up and down in her seat and clapped. “I think I see one.”

“Where?” Reeve demanded.

Kat pointed. “Pull over.”

Groaning, Reeve slowed the car, eased to the side of the road and parked. I freed one of the balloons and exited. The girls joined me, and together we approached the centerpiece of our project—a dead raccoon, its arms and legs stiff and pointing in the air.

“Gloves,” Kat said, holding out her hand.

Reeve dangled a pair just beyond her reach. “These are cashmere, you know.”

“I’m sure the raccoon will be thrilled,” she replied drily. “Even though I told you to buy latex.”

“I thought you’d appreciate something softer.” Sighing, Reeve relinquished the gloves, and Kat tugged them on. “I bought hand sanitizer instead.”

“Balloon,” she said next.

I handed it over.

Then Kat crouched over the poor dead animal and tied the ribbon to one of its wrists. There was no wind, so the Get Well Soon balloon stayed perfectly straight, flying proudly over the motionless animal.

“Your family will thank me for this one day,” she said with a nod.

“As if we’re really doing any good,” Reeve said.

“Hello, we so are. People need to be more aware of the creatures crossing the road, thank you, and this is our way of helping. It’s humorous—”

“And gross,” Reeve interjected. “And cruel.”

“And they’ll remember,” Kat finished.

We each snapped a few pictures with our phones, cleaned our hands, got back in the car and hunted the next Get Well Soon victim. I mean, recipient.

I couldn’t help comparing myself to the animals. A car crash. A part of me dying.

I prayed I had a better end but had a feeling I was going to have to adjust my to-do list yet again.