Dia of the Dead (15 page)

“I’ll pass.”

“Suit yourself.” Reagan shrugged. She sat the brush down on the coffee table and came back over to me. She placed a hand around my forearm and the other on my bicep. I flinched but it didn’t stop her.

“This may hurt a bit,” she warned. “No…i
t
wil
l
hurt. A lot.”

Before her words registered in my brain, she yanked and twisted my arm, jamming my shoulder back into its place. I yelped in pain as fresh tears streamed down my face. Reagan released me from her grip and dusted her hands together.

“All done,” she said with a smile.

I wanted to thank her—I really did—but I was afraid that if I opened my mouth, all that would come was a colorful variations of a word that began with “b” and ended with “h.” I clenched my jaw and nodded my appreciation with a pained expression. She shrugged again and joined Brendan on the couch.

I looked down at my arm. Reagan had left reddening handprints on my skin. I tried moving it. It was better than before but it still hurt like hell when I tried to rotate it. It would probably be a few more days—if not weeks—before it would be back to normal. I fumbled with the flap to the pocket with the scarf and had a difficult time getting it open.

“Let me help. What are you trying to get?” Kaci asked setting the freeze pop she was still holding onto the floor at her feet.

“I have a scarf in there,” I said. “I figure my arm is wrecked and I can use it as a sling.”

“I’ll get it.” Kaci opened the pocket and fished out the scarf, pulling it out like a magician with a trick up her sleeve. She shook the large square of sheer floral fabric and held it up to her chest.

  “What am I supposed to do now?” she asked, a puzzled look on her face.

“I’ll show you.” Brendan stood up and took the scarf from Kaci. He folded it in half, creating a triangle from the cloth.

“Stand up a little straighter, Di
a,
” he said. “I wanna make sure it’s tied tight enough to support the weight of your arm.” He moved forward, pinching the ends of the scarf between the thumb and forefinger of both his hands.

I straightened up and he leaned in, his hand lightly brushing against my neck as he tied the scarf in a sturdy knot. The place where his skin made contact with mine tingled. I fought the urge to giggle as he positioned my arm in the opening of the scarf. His touch caused a rash of goose pimples on my arm. I looked away from him as he readjusted the scarf to shift the burden on my arm’s weight so that it could sit more comfortably on the opposite shoulder.

“There. You should be good for now but it needs to rest. Don’t move it too much.”

“Thanks, Brendan.” I smiled. 

He smiled back.

“Now that Humpty Dumpty’s back together again, what’s the next move?” Reagan asked from the couch.

“I don’t know,” I sighed. “I think we should try to get somewhere safe and I don’t think that’s here at Bixby Studios.”

“I’m not leaving this room,” Reagan said. “The zombies are out there and not in here so I vote we stay put. Why risk ending up like the others if we don’t have to?”

“They’re not in here…ye
t,
” I said. “If we stay, we still run the risk of ending up like the others. What if the current zombie count doubles or triples while we’re in here? We’ll never make it out then.”

“Do we even know what the zombie count is now?” Kaci asked. “We’ve honestly only seen a few.”

“We’ve only seen a few but there’s always the possibility of more. Have you guys noticed how quick the turnaround time is now? It took Amber a while to change and now it seems like those who are attacked are changing in the next instant.”

“But how?” Brendan asked, running his hands through his dark hair as he paced back and forth.  His face grew redder and redder as he walked.

“Yesterday, everything was okay. Our friends were still people, partying and having fun. Today everything’s gone to shit. Dammit!” He punched the wall once, then again, looking around the room with wild eyes, huffing and puffing.

I took a step away from him, feeling a little uneasy about his outburst.

“Cat’s out of the bag, Teen Hulk. Your little girlfriend and her sidekick here know about your rage issues now,” Reagan smirked.

Brendan shot her a dangerous look, his chest still heaving.

“I think we all need to take a moment to chill,” Kaci announced. “Emotions are running high. Everyone’s worked up. How about we all take five to collect ourselves? Yeah? Then we can reconvene and figure out how to get the hell outta here like rational, reasonable, non-insane people.”

Reagan rolled her eyes but retreated to the opposite end of the room, away from Brendan. He stood by Kaci’s vanity with his eyes closed tightly, his brow furrowing and relaxing as he counted quietly to himself. He seemed to be regaining control.

Kaci ushered me over to the area near her mini fridge.

“What the hell was that?” I whispered to her as quietly as I could.

“Brendan Baker’s anger issues.”

“Anger issues?”

“He has these fits where he gets all flustered and starts breaking things and yelling at people about nothing. One time he flipped out on an assistant over a bottle of water not being cold enough. He like smashed up his dressing room because of it. Mr. Bixby sent him to anger management and paid a crap ton of money to keep it under wraps. All to protect Brendan’s ‘boy next door’ image.”

“Why didn’t you tell me about this before?”

“I didn’t want to shatter the illusion of your crush. It sucks when you realize the person you’re crushing on isn’t as perfect as you thought they were.” Kaci paused and looked down at her feet for a moment before looking back up at me.

“That’s what you were trying to do with Mason, right? You didn’t want to say anything to ruin my crush on him. You wanted me to see his true colors on my own, right?”

“I—uh—um—I“ I stammered trying to come up with an answer for Kaci as she stared at me with those green eyes. I had to tell her the truth.

“I didn’t want to hurt your feelings by talking badly about him, but Mason was a sleaze.”  I felt a pang of guilt in the pit of my stomach for speaking ill of the dead. Kaci’s eyes traveled down to her feet again.

“I think everyone’s had enough time to cool down. Maybe we should get back together to think of a plan to get out of here,” I said.

Kaci nodded, not looking at me and walked to the center of the room, motioning for everyone to come together. I joined her as did Reagan who didn’t seem to have left her attitude in time out. She still wore her snarl and her arms were folded across her chest. Brendan was the last to join us. He approached slowly, looking down at his shoes. He ran his hands through his hair again before looking up at us and exhaling. His face had begun to return to its normal color though his cheeks were still flushed.  

“I’m sorry for my behavior,” he said sheepishly. “It was out of line and I’m sorry if I frightened you.”

“Thanks for the rehearsed apology,” Reagan said. Brendan shot her a look but remained quiet.

“Guys. Chill,” I said, looking at the two of them.

Brendan cleared his throat, seeming more in control. “What do you think caused all of this? It seems like once we figure that out, we’ll know what we’re dealing with.”

“I still think it was those Z pills Mason had at the party. You heard Blake. He’s been getting calls from customers about their friends acting weird after taking them. Then look at him. He said he’d been taking them for a while. He took one in front of us and next thing you know, he’s puking black gunk like everyone else,” I reminded him.

“But what if he’s fine?”

“I doubt it,” Reagan mumbled.

“Maybe we should try and find him,” Brendan suggested.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Kaci said, rubbing her arm.

“I don’t either,” I added.

“Me neither. In fact, I think that’s the dumbest idea ever.”

“Then what do you think we should do? Huh, Reagan?” Brendan snapped, stepping closer to her.

“I have no idea but it shouldn’t be something that’ll put us in more danger.” Reagan stood her ground.

“We can’t stay here,” Brendan huffed.

“No shit,” Reagan snapped back.

Both of their faces had begun to turn red again. I stepped in between them

“Guys. We’re in this together. While I don’t think we should go looking for Blake, we shouldn’t stay here either.  Maybe we should try to get in touch with our families, see if they’re okay then get outside. I—“

A muffled scream for help came from the hall. Without thinking, I opened the door to see what was going on.

The screaming from the hall was drowned out by the sound of our screams.

A black-eyed, gray-skinned security guard—Thomas according to the nametag pinned to his uniform—stood in the doorway, reaching for us.  Brendan took the katana out from my belt loop and with a few quick moves, he had it out, its blade catching and reflecting the florescent lighting.  He rammed it into Thomas’ stomach with enough momentum to pierce clean through to the other side.  The sword sticking out of his body didn’t stop him from trying to rip out Brendan’s throat.

“Get out of here,” Brendan commanded as he struggled to avoid Thomas’ nails and pushed Thomas out of the room.

The rest of us squeezed through an opening between the zombie and the door—first Reagan then me. Kaci was the last out. Reagan got through with no problem while I was bumped into the doorframe, jarring my arm. I bit down hard on my bottom lip to keep from screaming. I swallowed the sound and scurried to safety a few feet away with Reagan. Kaci screamed from behind me. I turned around to check on her and saw Thomas had snagged a lock of her hair.  He jerked his arm, bringing her down to the floor on her butt. She screamed agai
n
.

Past Brendan, who still fought to protect himself and free Kaci, was Sloane. She squatted over someone cramming handfuls of bloody innards into her mouth with the arm that wasn’t hanging on by a thread. Who the guts belonged to was a mystery. Only the lower half of the body was visible,
the distance obscured their face. But they were wearing the same slate gray pants as Thomas, which meant they were part of the security team. 

I hope it isn’t Will.

Kaci screamed and pawed at Thomas’s hand trying to untangle her hair from his unrelenting grip.  Reagan ran to help, swatting at Thomas’s back while Brendan tried to remove the sword. It didn’t budge.  I ran over to Kaci. She cried and squirmed on the floor, trying to free herself. I kneeled in front of her and placed my hand on her cheek. 

“Kace, I have an idea but you’re not going to like it,” I said, my voice calmer than I thought it would be.

“W-W-what is it?” She cried.

“Pull away from him.”

“But my hair!”

“Hair is hair. It’ll grow back.  Is your hair more important than your life?”

“N-n-n-no,” she wailed.

“Shhh. Shhh. Shhh. Just calm down.” I wiped away one of her tears with my thumb and patted her cheek.  “Give me your hand.”

She placed a shaking hand in mine.

“When I say ‘go’, I want you to pull away from him. Okay?”

“O-o-okay.” 

I gripped her hand and positioned myself to pull.

“Go!”  I yelled and pulled the weight of her body. She helped, using her legs to push forward.  She screeched as she separated herself from Thomas with a rip. A clump of her strawberry blonde hair dangled from his fingers. I pulled her to her feet. A fresh torrent of tears flooded Kaci’s face as she brought her hand down from her head and stared at her bloody fingertips in disbelief.   

“Kace is free!” I yelled to Brendan who was still busy with the task of not dying. Reagan stopped hitting Thomas to join us a few feet away from Brendan’s struggle.

“Great,” he grunted. “I think I almost have it.” He wiggled the sword to loosen it from Thomas’s torso. It still didn’t move. Thomas clawed at him, his hands nearly making contact with his skin with each thrash. 

“Girls, move back,” Brendan instructed.

I took a few steps back, bringing a weepy Kaci with me. Reagan moved back as well. Brendan let out a sound that could only be described as a battle cry. He put both of his hands on the sword’s handle and with all of his might, he rammed it in to its hilt.  He kept moving forward, sending Thomas along with the sword back into the wall.  The blade pierced the drywall and stuck, pinning Thomas there. Brendan ducked and dodged Thomas’s flailing limbs and rejoined the group.

“I think she’s almost done with her snack, and it looks like she’s hungry for more.” He motioned back at Sloane who still crouched low but was no longer hovering over the body. 

She let out a wild growl and rushed toward us. We took off running down the hall toward the stairwell. I barely stayed one step ahead of her as we ran. Brendan led the pack, bursting through the doors to the stairs and we followed. I slipped through the door after Kaci, right before it swung shut. I wasn’t quick enough. Sloane caught the door in her hand and pushed it aside.