beginning to see her as someone who was sick—not a monster.
“You’re lying,” I said. “She obviously knows you. Who is she?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know!”
“Matt, who is this guy?”
Matt glanced at him. “Just met him tonight. He’s Trish’s new boyfriend.”
“Trish?” I said to the woman behind the armchair.
“I—I don’t know. At least, I’m not sure. I never met her, but I think … I think she’s his ex-girlfriend. Beth, I think. But Carson, you told me she moved away—”
Carson, staring at the woman on the floor, looked like he was about to have a screaming fit. He was still shaking his head.
I was ready to throttle him. I wanted an explanation. Maybe he really didn’t know. But if he was lying … “Carson!”
He flinched at my shout.
Sirens sounded down the street, coming closer. The paramedics. I hoped they could help her, but the sick feeling in my stomach hadn’t gone away.
“I’ll meet them on the street,” Matt said, running out.
“Beth,” I said to the woman. I caught her hands, managed to pull them down so they were resting on her chest. I murmured at her, and she quieted. Her skin color hadn’t gotten any better. She didn’t feel cold as death, but she felt cool. The salt hadn’t sent her back to any grave, and it hadn’t revived her. I wasn’t sure she could be revived.
A moment later, a couple of uniformed paramedics carrying equipment entered, followed by Matt. The living room should have felt crowded, but apparently as soon as the door cleared, most of the guests had fled. God, what a way to kill a party.
The paramedics came straight toward Beth. I got out of the way. They immediately knelt by her, checked her pulse, shined a light in her eyes. I breathed a little easier. Finally, someone was doing something useful.
“What happened?” one of them asked.
How did I explain this?
“She was going to leave,” Carson said, suddenly, softly. Responding to the authority of the uniform, maybe. He stared at her, unable to look away. He spoke as if in a trance. “I didn’t want her to go. She asked me to come with her, to Seattle—but I didn’t want to do that, either. I wanted her to stay with me. So I … this stuff, this powder. It would make her do anything I wanted. I used it. But it … changed her. She wasn’t the same. She—was like that. Dead almost. I left her, but she followed. She kept following me—”
“Call it poisoning,” said one paramedic to the other.
“Where did you get this powder?” I said.
“Some guy on the Internet.”
I wanted to kill him. Wanted to put my hands around his throat and kill him.
“Kitty,” Matt said. I took a breath. Calmed down.
“Any idea what was in this powder?” one of the paramedics said, sounding like he was repressing as much anger as I was.
Carson shook his head.
“Try tetrodotoxin,” I said. “Induces a death-like coma. Also causes brain damage. Irreparable brain damage.”
Grimacing, the paramedic said, “We won’t be able to check that until we get her to the hospital. I don’t see any ID on her. I’m going to call in the cops, see if they’ve had a missing persons report on her. And to see what they want to do with him.”
Carson flinched at his glare.
Trish backed away. “If I tried to break up with you—would you have done that to me, too?” Her mouth twisted with unspoken accusations. Then, she fled.
Carson thought he’d make his own zombie slave girlfriend, then somehow wasn’t satisfied at the results. She probably wasn’t real good in bed. He’d probably done it, too—had sex with Beth’s brain-damaged, comatose body. The cops couldn’t get here fast enough, in my opinion.
“There’s two parts to it,” I said. “The powder creates the zombie. But then there’s the spell to bind her to you, to bind the slave to the master. Some kind of object with meaning, a receptacle for the soul. You have it. That’s why she followed you. That’s why she wouldn’t stay away.” The salt hadn’t broken that bond. She’d regained her will—but the damage was too great for her to do anything with it. She knew enough to recognize him and what he’d done to her, but could only cry out helplessly.
He reached into his pocket, pulled something out. He opened his fist to reveal what.
A diamond engagement ring lay in his palm.
Beth reacted, arcing her back, flailing, moaning. The paramedics freaked, pinned her arms, jabbed her with a hypodermic. She settled again, whimpering softly.
I took the ring from Carson. He glared at me, the first time he’d really looked at me. I didn’t see remorse in his eyes. Only fear. Like Victor Frankenstein, he’d created a monster and all he could do when confronted with it was cringe in terror.
“Matt, you have a string or a shoelace or something?”
“Yeah, sure.”
He came back with a bootlace fresh out of the package. I put the ring on it, knotted it, and slipped it over Beth’s head. “Can you make sure this stays with her?” I asked the paramedics. They nodded.
This was half science, half magic. If the ring really did hold Beth’s soul, maybe it would help. If it didn’t help —well, at least Carson wouldn’t have it anymore.
The cops came and took statements from all of us, including the paramedics, then took Carson away. The paramedics took Beth away; the ambulance siren howled down the street, away.
Finally, when Matt and I were alone among the remains of his disaster of a party, I started crying. “How could he do that? How could he even think it? She was probably this wonderful, beautiful, independent woman, and he destroyed—”
Matt had poured two glasses of champagne. He handed me one.
“Happy New Year, Kitty.” He pointed at the clock on the microwave. 12:03 A.M.
Crap. I missed it. I started crying harder.
Matt, my friend, hugged me. So once again, I didn’t get a New Year’s kiss. This year, I didn’t mind.
LIFE IS THE TEACHER
Emma slid under the surface of the water and stayed there. She lay in the tub, on her back, and stared up at a world made soft, blurred with faint ripples. An unreal world viewed through a distorted filter. For minutes—four, six, ten—she stayed under water, and didn’t drown, because she didn’t breathe. Would never breathe again.
The world looked different through these undead eyes. Thicker, somehow. And also, strangely, clearer.
Survival seemed like such a curious thing once you’d already been killed.
This was her life now. She didn’t have to stay here. She could end it any time she wanted just by opening the curtains at dawn. But she didn’t.
Sitting up, she pushed back her soaking hair and rained water all around her with the noise of a rushing stream. Outside the blood-warm bath, her skin chilled in the air. She felt every little thing, every little current—from the vent, from a draft from the window, coolness eddying along the floor, striking the walls. She shivered. Put the fingers of one hand on the wrist of the other and felt no pulse.
After spreading a towel on the floor, she stepped from the bath.
She looked at herself: She didn’t look any different. Same slim body, smooth skin, young breasts the right size to cup in her hands, nipples the color of a bruised peach. Her skin was paler than she remembered. So pale it was
