Return of the Jed Page 7

  That wasn’t Luke’s voice, unless he’d taken a hit of helium, which he loved. This was so not the time or place to be playing with helium.

  “But first we need to get your friend and his dog over.” A girl. Not just a girl. The girl from doggy jail.

  “Tread’s easy,” Luke said. I felt myself lowered to the ground, at the base of a stucco wall that looked a mile high. There, near the top, was Tread, being pushed by Luke. Someone else was straddling the wall. He grabbed Tread, and with a high-pitched yip, my dog disappeared.

  “Easy,” Luke said. He looked at me. “Ready to go for a ride?”

  “That would be fun,” I said, because I had no idea what he was talking about.

  I lifted from the ground like a rocket, thrust provided by the many hands gripping my legs and butt. It was a perfect launch, reaching escape velocity in seconds. It was so beautiful.

  But re-entry? Not so much.

  Chapter Thirteen

  A pair of unfamiliar arms lifted me to my feet after my hard landing.

  “That is some serious disability,” a girl’s voice said. “But look on the bright side. When you start driving, you’re going to get the best parking spots.”

  “I have arms. Just not with me.” And I planned to reattach them as soon as we were safe.

  “Time to shut up and follow.” So much for small talk.

  We dodged through low brush, moonlight just bright enough to make out the landscape. I picked up the pace to stay closer. Out of the corner of my eye, I picked out a shadow low to the ground, moving alongside me.

  Tread kept up easily, which I expected since he’d only lost his tail, not half his appendages.

  “Almost there,” the girl said as we raced through the desert. For me it was more of a hurried gait, but the girl was kind enough to let me stay within fifteen feet or so.

  Until she disappeared. I had no idea where she went, or where I should go, so I put my head down, leaned forward, and went from quick walk to jog.

  That’s when the ground disappeared. As gravity pulled me down, my mind rushed to explain this particular dilemma. Did the earth just break up with me? Or had I simply left solid ground in my other pants?

  My chest thumped hard against dirt and dust.

  There it was.

  The world spun around me, my legs flailing in ways suggesting they would soon depart. When the world finally stopped, my view was filled with stars.

  Thank goodness they were real stars, not the fake stars generated by severe head injuries. And they were beautiful. I couldn’t help but smile.

  “Kid, hey kid.” The same voice, more annoying this time. “Snap out of it.”

  Something was in the way of those stars. A fuzzy blob. Move, you stupid blob, you’re blocking the view. I pushed at it but it stayed there, being a jerk.

  I kept shoving but it refused to move.

  “I’m not sure what all that wriggling means,” the girl said. “But I wish you would stop because it’s kind of freaking me out.”

  My eyes focused on the blob. A face. Right, I was running and everything just collapsed.

  I fell. That’s what happened. Then I tumbled about a mile into the deepest canyon on the face of the planet. I lifted my head to see two things: how far I’d fallen, and if I’d retained the more valuable portions of my body.

  I could barely make out the top of the cliff in the moonlight. By my foggy-brained calculations, I had fallen at least six feet. Maybe seven. Or about five thousand feet fewer than it felt like.

  Now my body. Torso? Check. Legs? Check. Feet? Check. Though the right one was turned backward. Arms? Dang they were still missing in action.

  The blob said something again. “I, uh, …” My brain wasn’t ready for a conversation.

  That voice was becoming clearer. And more annoying. It was the girl.

  “You back?” she said. “Because I have some really bad news, and I don’t want you to freak out.”

  Once again, hands dug under my shoulders and lifted, helping me sit up.

  If I had hands, I would have pressed them to my skull because I had such a headache. So I was not happy when someone lucky enough to be hand-enabled chose that moment to slap me across the cheek.

  First thing I was going to do when I got my arms back was rub my butt because it really throbbed after that fall. But then I was going to punch someone because I was so tired of being abused, even in a misguided attempt to snap me out of it.

  I came around enough to notice a second person staring at me as if I were a zoo animal. And not a cool animal like an elephant. It was more of a “What the heck is that?” look a mole rat would get.

  He spoke. “Marisa, I don’t think you should be slapping someone who’s disabled. The Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Double Amputees is going to be all over you for that.”

  “He’s not disabled. He’s undead. Big difference.”

  Finally, a familiar voice, which brought me around faster than physical abuse.

  “Luke,” I said. “Where were you?”

  I felt a cold breeze against my neck, then the familiar scent of decay. I knew it was Tread before I felt his rough tongue scrape my chin.

  “Tread took off in another direction so I had to chase him down,” Luke said. “I knew you’d miss him a lot more than these.”

  He dropped his backpack, and there they were. My arms. My small, lightly muscled, and very beautiful arms.

  “My arms!” I squealed, sort of like a girl, not that there’s anything wrong with that. “Just put them on fast before the anger that’s been building in me goes away. Because I really need to punch someone.” After I rubbed my butt, but I wasn’t going to tell them that.

  But first, I felt my right foot snap into forward position. I silently thanked Luke, best zombie repairman who ever lived.

  He pulled out my arms one at a time and laid them on the ground. He turned the pack upside-down, several rolls of duct tape and the staple gun tumbling out.

  “Wow, those look incredibly real,” said the kid who thought I was disabled.

  “They are real,” Luke said. “Only the best duct tape and staples for my main man, Jed.”

  “No, not those things. These things.” He pointed at my arms, which looked none the worse for wear.

  “They’re real too. Jed kind of insists on it. They belong to him, after all.”

  “You mean real like they’re mechanical and can work like most arms, because it’s amazing how they look like flesh and blood.”

  “Flesh, yes,” I said. “Blood, not so much.”

  “Incredible,” the boy said.

  As Luke brushed the dirt and dust from my shoulder joints to prep for reattachment, I took a good look at these two kids who just happened to come by the kennel at the same time we did.

  The boy, still focused on my arms, was maybe ten or eleven, and out way past his bedtime. He had a round baby face, giving him that adorable look that probably attracted bullies. He wore a long-sleeve shirt, cargo shorts, and flip-flops. The look said, “This may not go together, but I picked it out myself, and that’s what counts.”

  The girl was maybe thirteen, fourteen tops. Short blond hair peeked from underneath a baseball cap. She wore a dark T-shirt, jeans, and black boots. And she kept staring at me.

  “You got a problem?” I said, emboldened that I’d soon have arms again.

  “Those arms,” she said. “They’re not prosthetic. They really are real. Like skin and bone and muscle.”

  “Yeah, just the way they were when they were ripped from my shoulders.”

  “And the tape and the staples, that’s how you put them back on.”

  “Yes. Unless you have a better way. And don’t suggest glue because it leaves stains.”

  “So it’s true,” she said.

  “What’s true?” I asked.

  “What my dad said.”

  “If your dad said you’d meet an incredibly go
od-looking kid trying to save his dog today, then yes, it’s true.”

  “No. He said that there was a zombie dog, which I didn’t really believe. He never said a thing about a zombie kid. You’re not going to bite us, are you? Because we just did you a solid, saving you and all. Turning us into zombies would be a lousy way to say thanks.”

  “I’m not that kind of zombie,” I said. “Forget everything you know. Luke, would you mind filling them in?”

  I closed my eyes as Luke told my story. Luke was the best zombie repairman, and he was a great zombie explainer, a walking Wikipedia of the undead.

  Besides, I didn’t feel like answering questions when I had so many of my own.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I couldn’t believe Luke and I were headed toward a treehouse. A real honest-to-God house in the trees, like you see in cartoons and old-time movies made before color was invented.

  Once Luke made the final adjustments on my arms, using way more duct tape than usual so I crackled every time I moved, Marisa led us to a place she swore was safe.

  We walked a mile or so until we came to a group of trees near a small spring. One of them towered over the rest, and the girl led us to its base.

  “Follow me,” she said.

  “Where?” I envisioned her opening a secret door, revealing a bunch of elves making cookies. Mmm, cookies. I’d forgotten how hungry I was.

  “Up,” she said. She lifted her left foot and planted it against the tree, raising herself effortlessly toward the branches.

  As she disappeared into the canopy, I peered closer at the trunk. There was just enough moonlight filtering through the leaves to make out wooden planks nailed into the tree by someone unskilled with a hammer. The planks, spaced about a foot apart up the tree, would have been a perfect fit on the Planet of Uneven Things. They tilted this way and that, and even though it looked as if a dozen nails held each in place, they wiggled when I shook them, curious if they would hold my weight.

  “You coming?” said the girl’s voice from above.

  “You sure there isn’t a better way?” I asked. “Maybe the cookie elves built an elevator. An elf-evator.”

  “Elves? What are you talking about? Get up here.”

  I looked back at Luke, who peered over my shoulder as I tested each plank. “Catch me if these give way,” I said.

  “The ladder or your arms?” he asked.

  “Either.”

  “No, you know my rule. Let falling zombies be. Only those in the way get hurt.”

  He was right. Falling zombies didn’t get injured. People trying to catch falling zombies got injured.

  I looked again at the slats. The girl had gone up just fine, but she weighed at least twenty pounds less than me. Maybe if I pushed slowly and made sure I shifted—

  “Geez, the undead can be such babies,” Luke said, brushing by me, scooping up Tread, and climbing one-handed up the trunk. Seconds later I heard his trademark “This is suh-WEET,” meaning there was a creepy oddness to it that he loved. That or he’d found doughnuts. Luke loved him some doughnuts.

  I followed, stepping quickly to lower the risk of plank failure, but they handled my weight just fine. The makeshift ladder led to a hatch cut out of the center of a wooden deck about ten feet wide. It was surrounded on three sides by a wood railing about three feet high. The fourth side was a wall with a window cut out about halfway up, where a telescope was mounted on the ledge. Tread was curled up in the corner, creating an almost perfect scene.

  “Move it, stiffy.” A hand on my butt gave me a shove.

  “What did you call me, Spunky McGee?” I asked the boy as he climbed through the hatch.

  “Spunky McGee?” he said. “That’s the best you can do? Then it is true what they say about zombies.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “They’re all brain-dead.”

  “I know someone who will be brain-dead in a minute if—”

  “Shut up the both of you,” the girl said, stepping between us. “And my little brother’s name isn’t Spunky McGee. It’s Ryan. Though I kind of like Spunky McGee.”

  Ryan grimaced, and I knew he was about to complain because that’s what little brothers do. Before he could, she put up her hand in a way that said, “Shut it” before formally introducing herself.

  “I’m Marisa.”

  I took her hand and shook, the layers of tape on my shoulder shifting. “I’m Jed, and this is Luke.”

  Marisa shook Luke’s hand and looked at me.

  “Jed? And you really are a zombie, just like Luke told us? Because if you’re not, I’d suggest a doctor skilled in microsurgery rather than a dude with a backpack full of duct tape.”

  “I’m a zombie, and the duct tape will do just fine, based on years of personal experience.”

  “I’m amazed. I never thought there would be anoth-, ur, I mean a zombie. You know. One zombie. Nice to know you exist.”

  An odd way of putting it, but I let it pass.

  “I’m happy I exist too, thanks,” I said.

  “Me too, most of the time,” Luke said. “Except when you fart, when reality sinks in—to clothes, nearby furniture, the walls.”

  “Funny stuff, Luke.”

  “That is funny,” Ryan said. “You said ‘Fart.’ Fart fart fart.”

  “Shut up, Spunky McGee,” Marisa said.

  “Don’t call me that!”

  “I’ll call you whatever I want.”

  “Shut up!

  “You shut up!”

  “No, you shut up!”

  “Both of you shut up!” I said. “Someone is going to hear us, and I’ve already had enough running and climbing and escaping for one night, thank you very much.”

  I slumped down next to Tread and ran my hand down the length of his body, pausing over the tire track along his ribs. He lifted his head and wagged his tail. Well, he would have if his tail were still there. Instead, his rear end just wiggled a bit.

  “I have no idea what happened, where we are, who you guys are, how you know about me, or even what time it is,” I said. “All I know is I am tired and hungry and probably in so much trouble I can’t even believe it.”

  Marisa knelt next to me and put her hand on my knee. “We saved your butts, Mexico, Ryan and Marisa, overheard my dad, and, let’s see.” She pulled her phone from her back pocket. “2:17 a.m.”

  “Did you really just keep track of all my questions and answer them in order?”

  “Yes,” Marisa said. “I’m like that.”

  “I’m speechless.”

  “Marisa, do you cook too?” Luke asked. “Because I promised myself I’d marry any woman who could make Jed speechless. That’s not just sexist. It’s also because I love to eat.”

  “It is sexist, but you’re kind of cute,” Marisa said. “Just not cute enough to be sexist.”

  “Sorry,” Luke said. “It was a joke.”

  “I know. Just giving a little back is all.”

  Luke grinned in a way I hadn’t seen since Burger Bucket’s short-lived Free Fry-days promotion (Luke’s enthusiasm resulted in potato shortages throughout the Tri-City area).

  “That’s all fine, but I’d really love to know what’s going on and how you happened to be at the kennels tonight.”

  “You’re pretty pushy for an undead guy.”

  “I’ve been told that. I get cranky when my arms and I spend a lengthy time apart.”

  “Fine,” Marisa said. “Let me start from the beginning. Early this afternoon … wait, it would be yesterday afternoon because it’s tomorrow today … anyway, Ryan and I were hanging out in the basement and … oh man, it just hit me.”

  “What hit you?”

  “Your name. Jed. And you’re a zombie. That makes you Undead Jed. Did your parents plan that? Because that’s awesome.”

  “Long story,” I said, wondering how much better life would be if my name was Devonshire or Manchester, something you c
ould never rhyme with dead or corpse or stiff or any number of words having to do with death.

  Then again, stupid names would probably get me just as beaten up. It was a losing situation.

  “Besides,” I continued. “You owe me a story first. In the basement, go on, you and Spunky—”

  “Hey!” Ryan shouted.

  “OK, sorry, you and Ryan were in the basement.”

  “Right. Playing hide and seek because there are so many cool places to hide down there. Only it’s off-limits because my dad’s office is there. I’d narrowed Ryan’s hiding places to either the convertible sofa, because he can actually fit in it, or this crawlspace at the back because he knows how much it creeps me out. That’s when I heard the door open …”

  Chapter Fifteen

  This is what I learned from Marisa:

  She and Ryan had been playing hide and seek in the basement, and she was pretty sure he was in the crawlspace, otherwise she’d hear giggles from the sofa. That’s when she heard the familiar squeak of the hinge from the top of the stairs. She knew it could only be one thing.

  The voice floating above confirmed her worse fear.

  “Yes, it’s true. Am I sure? Because I saw it. Yes, with my own eyes.”

  Footsteps descended, and Marisa squeezed into the crawlspace, tagging Ryan (for the win) and motioning him to be quiet. They were not allowed in the basement, so they played there only when their dad was gone. This time, he’d returned far earlier than expected.

  “There is one slight problem.” Her dad’s voice, coming down the stairs. “We don’t have complete access.”

  Marisa peeked from her hiding area and saw her dad sitting at his desk, staring at his computer screen. Only mouse clicks broke the absolute silence.

  Marisa’s dad leaned toward the monitor, blocking most of it from her view. But she saw the front end of what was either a diseased dog or a healthy chupacabra.

  “They have no idea what they’ve got,” her dad said. “I want to keep it that way.”

  Marisa noticed the earpiece blinking blue, explaining why he wasn’t holding a phone to his ear. He was on Bluetooth. “No, no, stay there,” her dad said. “I’ll get you what you need.”