down the names of several on a nearby notepad. The terminology was largely unfamiliar to me, but I could read through the lists and copy the information.
Carefully scrutinizing the shelves, I was able to find most of them: a bottle of erythromycin, packets of something called Zithromax (which sounded like a comic book superhero), and some similar odd packages called Bactrim. I crammed as many as I could into a plastic bag and squirmed out under the counter.
I paused to think, my mind and heart racing. I might not get another chance to be Outside again. What else did I need? I wandered down the battery aisle. Several chargers and batteries that worked for cell phones were arranged on a plastic display. I knew that Mrs. Parsall’s cell battery had been getting low. I’d taken a good look at it last night before we went to bed, memorizing the model number printed on the back. I found two extra batteries and a car charger that were supposed to work for that model.
Last, I went down the dog food aisle. I scooped all the cans of dog food that would fit into the backpack. I hesitated, then went back for a second backpack and filled that with dry food. I knew as well as anyone else that when food went short, the animals would suffer most. Not if I could help it.
On the way out, I emptied my pockets of all the bills I had and placed them next to the cash register. I had no idea how much the medicines cost, but knew that it wouldn’t anywhere near cover the damage I’d done to the store.
I glanced longingly back at the pharmacy counter and the pet food display, briefly thought of loading up with everything I could carry. But I knew, deep down, that I should not take more than I could pay for.
Still feeling guilty, I stepped through the shattered door to my bike. I nestled one backpack in the basket and slung the other on my back. I began to push away from the curb, when something caught my eye.
Something red and white and delicious.
The glow of a Coca-Cola machine beckoned behind the door of the Suds ’n’ Duds, the bar and Laundromat next door. I’d always thought drinking and laundry were a strange combination, but I had noticed that many people Outside required constant stimulation. Odd.
I looked away from the Coke machine, my tongue sticking to the roof of my mouth.
But I couldn’t help glancing back at the seductive glow. Like a moth to the flame, I drifted toward it. In the bottom of my pocket, I fingered some loose coins. They clanked together, slipping against my sweaty palms.
The doors opened at my touch, and I stepped inside. Unlike the drugstore, the Laundromat advertised that it was open twenty-four hours. The washing machines and dryers lining the walls and aisles had long since fallen silent, and the fluorescent lighting buzzed and flickered overhead. I had never used machines like that. We used simple tubs, washboards, and lye soap. I couldn’t imagine not having anything to do while laundry did itself. The cracked tile on the floor looked grimy, and I smelled a combination of stale beer and perfumed laundry soap. I stepped around abandoned plastic baskets full of clothes on the floor to stand before the warm red glow of the Coke machine.
I fed the machine a dollar in quarters and nickels, then punched the glowing button to release the soda. The machine clunked inside, and I reached down to retrieve my treat from the receptacle.
But nothing came out.
Gritting my teeth, I reached up into the mouth of the machine, trying to feel if it had gotten stuck. My fingers wiggled in air and darkness.
I stood back and pressed the button again. Nothing happened. The machine had eaten my money.
I dug into my pocket. I only had two dimes left.
My hands balled into fists. This might be the last chance I ever got to taste a Coke. Whether it was because of what had happened Outside, or my parents’ rescinding of
I slammed my hand against the face of the machine. It was the first time I’d ever struck anything or anyone out of anger. The blow echoed against the plastic, startling me with the force of it traveling up my arm to my shoulder. But the machine was unmoved. It continued to hum as if nothing had happened, smugly digesting my change in the face of my pathetic assault.
Shoulders slumped in defeat, I turned to walk away. The drugstore had caved under the force of my criminal will, but the Coke machine was virtuous. Inviolate.
I paused, glancing over the rows of battered washing machines to the bar. It wasn’t much, just a long counter with chipped, mirrored shelves of bottles behind it and wobbly stools before it. But it was apparently enough to keep the folks entertained while they were doing their laundry. A television perched above the bar was tuned to the soft snow of static. They must have served some food here too, since flies swarmed over a paper tray of french fries abandoned on the counter.
My eyes narrowed. There might be Coca-Cola there.
And, after all, I
I circled behind the bar, scanning the bottles and cans. The spirits were colorless, brown, amber, and red. I didn’t know why one would drink something called “extra dry.” Nor did I understand why someone would drink something violent, as suggested by the “brut” on the label. And “Irish Rose” sounded entirely unappetizing. Flowers, in my experience, tended to taste bitter. My gaze roved over cans stuffed into a small refrigerator under the bar. Just beer and wilted lemons.
I frowned. I’d tasted beer once before and hated it.
I really wanted a Coke. Just a Coke.
At the end of the mirror behind the bar stood a shiny steel metal door. I grasped the latch. It was cold—I expected that it was a refrigerator of some type. A walk-in cooler that might contain what I was looking for.
Cold air blew into my face as I opened it, and my breath made ghosts in the fog. Something inside smelled funny, but I chalked it up to rotting food. I reached inside for a light switch, and a weak fluorescent light flickered on overhead. It illuminated metal racks on wheels full of beer, a couple of kegs on the floor . . .
. . . and a familiar stack of red and white cans, tucked behind one of the movable racks. I grinned in triumph.
A spider web brushed across my face, and I rubbed it away.
I should have paid attention to that, to that sensation that made me shudder. I pawed at my face and took two quick steps inside, trying not to imagine the spider that had created the string now caught in my hair.
I reached for the cans of Coke, victorious adrenaline surging through me. But that adrenaline soured, curdled as I became aware of something sticky on the floor that was sucking at my shoes.
I stared down.
A brown stain spread across the concrete floor to a drain. At first I assumed that some of the cans had frozen, exploded. But as I pushed the rack aside, I saw that it had trickled from a body on the floor.
Not just a body. I had seen dead bodies before, at funerals. Those bodies were neatly dressed in their Plain clothes, pale and sunken, usually old. Since we didn’t embalm our dead, we buried them quickly, with little ceremony. Plain dead were peaceful, solemn.
This was . . . not peaceful. A man in a T-shirt and jeans lay on the floor. His head had been torn off, missing. I saw only white vertebrae glistening in that mass of gore that had been his neck.
I jammed my fist in my mouth. I was too terrified to scream, too shocked to do anything but utter a squeak.
And then I heard the clang of the cooler door slam shut behind me.
I scuttled back, tripped on a bucket. I fell down, backwards, on the floor, in the stain. I scrambled to my feet, whimpering in terror. I shoved at the door, but it was locked.
I sobbed, slammed my fist against it. The sound echoed just like my blow on the Coke machine and was just as ineffective. I tried to control my breathing. There had to be an emergency release, some way to get out . . . my shaking fingers worked around the seam of the door, feeling for a lever or a switch.
Something made a scraping sound above me.
Swallowing hard, I looked up.
Behind the fluorescent light, I could make out shadows. I shaded my eyes from the weak light with my hand. I was able to distinguish shapes—shapes of people. They were suspended upside down from the ceiling, curled up in balls or dangling with limbs dragging in spider webs of silk that drizzled down in the darkness, holding the forms there in an ethereal embrace.
