Undead Much

  Undead Much?

  Stacey Jay

  CHAPTER 1

  Okay, this was it. The BIG mo­ment.

  After two months of tra­ining so hard, we ba­rely had the energy to sho­wer be­fo­re we fell in­to bed-let alo­ne ra­va­ge each ot­her the way two te­ena­gers in lo­ve sho­uld to­tal­ly be ra­va­ging each ot­her-Ethan and I we­re alo­ne on Sun­day night, the last night of win­ter bre­ak.

  “I fe­el li­ke I ha­ven’t se­en you in we­eks,” Et­han mumb­led aga­inst my lips, le­aning in­to me un­til my back to­uc­hed the in­si­de of the car do­or.

  “I’m so glad tra­ining is over un­til spring bre­ak.” A part of me ac­tu­al­ly wis­hed Juni­or En­for­cer tra­ining was over fo­re­ver, but I didn’t tell him that.

  Ethan lo­ved ha­ving the chan­ce to le­arn from what we­re ba­si­cal­ly the sec­ret-ser­vi­ce of­fi­cers of the zom­bie Set­tling world. He wan­ted to jo­in the­ir ranks when he tur­ned twenty, and the ex­pe­ri­en­ce he was ga­ining wo­uld pro­ve in­va­lu­ab­le when it was ti­me to put in his ap­pli­ca­ti­on.

  Be­si­des, he didn’t se­em to ca­re that the only re­ason the En­for­cers we­re han­ging aro­und Ca­rol, Ar­kan­sas, was be­ca­use of his fre­akishly po­wer­ful girlf­ri­end, so the le­ast I co­uld do was ke­ep my mo­uth shut abo­ut how gru­eling I’d fo­und the past few months. A lot of boyf­ri­ends wo­uld not be co­ol with a girl be­ing so much bet­ter than them at so­met­hing. And I was bet­ter, way bet­ter. I was pro­bably the most po­wer­ful six­te­en-ye­ar-old zom­bie Set­tler in the his­tory of the U.S.

  On the days when it hel­ped me put to rest a kid who’d craw­led out of his gra­ve with ma­j­or is­su­es or to kick black-ma­gi­cal­ly ra­ised zom­bie butt, I re­al­ly ap­pre­ci­ated the gift. The rest of the ti­me… I kind of wis­hed I was nor­mal. Or at le­ast a nor­mal Set­tler of the De­ad. May­be then my en­ti­re body wo­uldn’t hurt at the end of the day af­ter an ho­ur of pom squ­ad prac­ti­ce and three ho­urs of tra­ining with Kitty and her te­am of En­for­cer to­ugh guys.

  And may­be Et­han and I wo­uldn’t ha­ve had to wa­it months for the chan­ce to be alo­ne to­get­her for mo­re than half an ho­ur.

  “This scarf has to go,” he sa­id, tug­ging the fluffy whi­te fab­ric from my neck and thro­wing it to the flo­or­bo­ards. “But I lo­ve this Fris­bee hat. Did I tell you how much I lo­ve this hat?”

  “A few tho­usand ti­mes. It’s cal­led a be­ret.” I la­ug­hed, then sig­hed as he tra­iled lit­tle kis­ses down my neck. Neck kis­ses. Who knew they wo­uld be so… fa­bu­lo­us?

  “Now,” he mur­mu­red, “if you co­uld just say so­met­hing in French whi­le we­aring that hat and do­ing that… thing you do…” I pres­sed my lips to his neck, drag­ging my te­eth over his skin just the ti­ni­est bit as I pul­led away. “Ye­ah, that thing.” The way his vo­ice tremb­led ma­de me fe­el oddly po­wer­ful and ner­vo­us at the sa­me ti­me.

  But it was a go­od ner­vo­us. Everyt­hing Et­han ma­de me fe­el was go­od. Go­od, go­od, go­od, go­od. So go­od, I co­uldn’t be­li­eve he was re­al­ly my boyf­ri­end, that I was the one he cal­led every night to say “I lo­ve you” to be­fo­re he tur­ned out the light.

  Still, the who­le “talk French to me, baby” stuff was pu­re guy we­ird­ness.

  “I think you’ve got is­su­es with the French thing.”

  “Oh ye­ah?”

  “Ye­ah. You might ne­ed the­rapy.”

  “Kiss the­rapy.” He wig­gled his eyeb­rows, but even that le­vel of go­ofi­ness co­uldn’t det­ract from his yum fac­tor. He’d cut his dirty blond ha­ir so it didn’t hang down in front of his fa­ce qu­ite the way it had when we first met, but he was still Gre­ek-god gor­ge­o­us. And now I co­uld see his ama­zing gre­en eyes even bet­ter than be­fo­re.

  I sta­red in­to tho­se eyes, grin­ning li­ke a fo­ol as I put a stop to the eyeb­row wig­gling with my fin­ger­tips. “You are such a dork.”

  “That’s why we’re a per­fect match.”

  “Are you cal­ling me a dork?”

  “To­tal dork. A re­al­ly hot dork, but-”

  “Well, that ma­kes it all bet­ter.” I wrap­ped my arms aro­und his neck, gig­gling as he tug­ged me thro­ugh the nar­row ope­ning bet­we­en the front se­ats and in­to the back of his Mi­ni Co­oper.

  It was fre­akishly small back the­re, even with the se­ats fol­ded down, and ne­it­her of us is par­ti­cu­larly short, but I co­uldn’t ca­re less. I hardly no­ti­ced that my legs we­re fol­ded in­to a pret­zel when Et­han pul­led me on top of him.

  Man, he felt go­od. So so­lid and warm and the kis­ses… God, the kis­ses.

  The­se we­re what kis­ses we­re sup­po­sed to fe­el li­ke. Li­ke yo­ur lips we­re on fi­re-in the go­od way, not the “I just ate three jala­pe­сo pep­pers on a da­re” way-and the fi­re was spre­ading to every inch of yo­ur body. Even if we hadn’t left the car run­ning and the he­at on, I wo­uldn’t ha­ve no­ti­ced the cold. I co­uldn’t no­ti­ce anyt­hing but him, and his lips, and his hands. I lo­ved his hands, tho­se hands… that we­re slowly mo­ving up the back of my swe­ater… and sort of sli­ding be­ne­ath my bra strap.

  Oh. Crap. Was this it? We­re we go­ing the­re? Was I re­ady to go the­re? I me­an, heck yes, not­hing felt as go­od as kis­sing Et­han, so I was su­re do­ing ot­her things with Et­han was go­ing to be pretty fab too. And I tur­ned six­te­en over two months ago, so I was pro­bably over­due for so­me gro­ping, but-

  Gah! Gro­ping? Co­uldn’t I think of a bet­ter word, so­met­hing at le­ast re­mo­tely ro­man­tic or sexy or so­met­hing?

  “You fe­el ama­zing,” he sa­id, be­fo­re his ton­gue slip­ped past my lips.

  “Mmmm.” I mo­aned my ag­re­ement. Not ag­re­e­ing that I tas­ted ama­zing, of co­ur­se, but that he did. He tas­ted li­ke cof­fee and ca­ra­mel from the Star­bucks we’d snag­ged on the way out to his grand­fat­her’s farm, and li­ke… Et­han. Yummy, per­fect, won­der­ful, hot, ni­ne­te­en-ye­ar-old-in-col­le­ge Et­han who was no do­ubt ti­red of ta­king it slow with his ne­arly-three-and-a-half-ye­ars-yo­un­ger girlf­ri­end.

  Yep. He was de­fi­ni­tely ti­red of ta­king it slow.

  He eased apart the ho­oks on my la­ven­der de­mi-cup bra with a prac­ti­ced lit­tle flip of his fin­gers, ma­king my he­art ra­ce for re­asons that had not­hing to do with hor­mo­nes.

  Ge­ez! Co­uldn’t he strug­gle with the thing for a few se­conds? Just to of­fer a lit­tle com­fort of the “don’t worry, I’m not wa­a­ay­yyy mo­re ex­pe­ri­en­ced than you are” va­ri­ety? No, he had to un­ho­ok my ho­oks from the­ir lit­tle circ­le things with an ease that left no do­ubt he’d do­ne this many, many ti­mes be­fo­re. Or at le­ast many mo­re ti­mes than I had.

  Which was no­ne. Ze­ro.

  God, what sho­uld I do?

  On one hand I was re­al­ly fe­eling the full-body ting­le­ness of be­ing with Et­han. But on the ot­her hand, I was fre­aking out. I me­an, we hadn’t be­en ab­le to go on a re­al da­te in we­eks, not sin­ce we’d exc­han­ged Christ­mas pre­sents at his mom’s ho­use and then go­ne to a mid­night sho­wing of It’s a Won­der­ful Li­fe at the com­mu­nity cen­ter.

  And then I’d had to be ho­me right af­ter, so the­re’d only be­en ti­me for a lit­tle kis­sing. Sho­uldn’t the­re be so­me sort of le­ar­ning cur­ve, a way to ease in­to this? I’m re­al­ly an easing kind of per­son. I don’t jump in­to the de­ep end-I wa­de slowly in from the shal­low part of the po­ol, gi­ving myself ti­me to adj­ust.

  Whe­re was the ti­m
e to adj­ust?!

  Ethan pa­used. “Me­gan, I-”

  Sud­denly the­re was a knoc­king at the win­dow.

  I scre­amed a pi­er­cing, girly scre­am that ma­de Et­han win­ce, but I co­uldn’t help it. Gi­ve me cre­epy flesh-hungry Re­ani­ma­ted Corp­ses and I can get my Buffy on with the best of them. But in­ter­rupt me whilst ma­king out and I am far mo­re the hyste­ri­cal-scre­aming-and-clutc­hing-at-my-clot­hes, des­pe­ra­tely-trying-to-re­ho­ok-my-brath­ro­ugh-my-swe­ater type of girl.

  “Um, sorry. Didn’t me­an to fre­ak you out in the­re.” The vo­ice out­si­de was ma­le, but it didn’t so­und li­ke an­yo­ne I knew.

  He was de­fi­ni­tely a yo­ung guy, ho­we­ver, which me­ant we’d es­ca­ped be­ing dis­co­ve­red by Et­han’s se­venty-ye­ar-old grand­fat­her. Thank. God. I re­al­ly didn’t want to lo­ok Pop-Pop in the eye whi­le my bra was still un­ho­oked.

  Not that a comp­le­te stran­ger was a much bet­ter op­ti­on.

  “But, um… I’m he­re,” the du­de out­si­de sa­id. “So are you co­ming out?”

  “Who the heck are you?” Et­han as­ked.

  Excel­lent qu­es­ti­on. Who was he and why was he way out he­re at the ed­ge of town, lur­king in so­me old man’s back pas­tu­re at ni­ne o’clock on a Sun­day night? Et­han and I had be­en su­re even the cows wo­uld be shac­ked up so­mew­he­re warm.

  “Me­gan? That is Me­gan Berry in the­re, right?” the guy as­ked.

  “You know this guy?” Et­han grab­bed the flash­light he left rol­ling aro­und in his trunk, bran­dis­hing it li­ke a we­apon as he tur­ned to­ward the win­dow.

  “I don’t think so.” I sig­hed with re­li­ef as I fi­nal­ly ma­na­ged to get my bra back in po­si­ti­on. Call me crazy, but I felt a tho­usand ti­mes mo­re pre­pa­red to de­al on­ce the girls we­re pro­perly strap­ped in. Even a pos­sib­le stal­ker didn’t se­em as scary when se­cu­rely un­der­gar­men­ted.

  I no­ti­ced Et­han was lo­oking frust­ra­ted. Or angry. Or so­met­hing. Ge­ez, you’d think I’d in­vi­ted the stran­ge du­de to co­me hang out with us whi­le we suc­ked fa­ce.

  Gro­ped. Suc­ked fa­ce. Yuck. I re­al­ly ne­eded to work on my desc­rip­ti­ons of kis­sy-kis­sy be­ha­vi­or.

  “Stay he­re, I’m go­ing to check out yo­ur fri­end.” Et­han had pop­ped open the do­or and was sli­ding out in­to the night be­fo­re I co­uld pro­test. That du­de was not my fri­end.

  Not that it wo­uld ha­ve mat­te­red. This wasn’t the first ti­me I’d no­ti­ced Et­han’s hint of a je­alo­us stre­ak. Tho­ugh it usu­al­ly thril­led me to see him get all scowly when one of the ot­her Set­tler boys chec­ked me out du­ring En­for­cer drills.

  I me­an, Et­han was the hot­test boy li­ving-as far as I was con­cer­ned-and kno­wing he felt the sa­me way abo­ut me was un­be­li­evab­le. I’m no dog, but ne­it­her am I mo­del ma­te­ri­al. I’m ave­ra­ge he­ight, with ave­ra­ge long frizzy brown ha­ir, which must be ta­med with a scal­ding hot Chi to ac­hi­eve any le­vel of smo­oth­ness, and pretty de­cent brown eyes with a hint of gold aro­und the iri­ses. I’m a lit­tle too skinny, es­pe­ci­al­ly af­ter all the tra­ining and dan­cing the past few months, and my fi­gu­re is not­hing to wri­te ho­me abo­ut. I me­an, I ha­ve eno­ugh chest to ke­ep strap­less clot­hes in pla­ce, but still ne­ed cre­ati­ve pad­ding to form any “lus­ci­o­us lady lumps” un­der my swe­ater.

  “Me­gan? Did you he­ar me? You sho­uld co­me out and see this.” Et­han stuck his he­ad thro­ugh the re­ar win­dow. He so­un­ded mo­re shoc­ked than je­alo­us, which sho­uld ha­ve let me know right away the­re was so­me Set­tler we­ird­ness go­ing down. Wasn’t the­re al­ways? I me­an, co­uld we ever spend a night to­get­her wit­ho­ut de­ad pe­op­le be­ing in so­me way in­vol­ved?

  No, of co­ur­se we co­uldn’t.

  Still, I was le­gi­ti­ma­tely surp­ri­sed to see a de­ad guy stan­ding next to Et­han, stom­ping his sne­ake­red fe­et in the re­ma­ins of the snow that had fal­len the night be­fo­re, lo­oking ama­zingly li­fe­li­ke for a zom­bie. His sho­ul­der-length ha­ir-brown or black, I co­uldn’t qu­ite tell in the mo­on­light-was cle­an and soft lo­oking and his exp­res­si­on ex­ci­ted and fri­endly. In fact, if I hadn’t be­en ab­le to smell the funky gra­ve odor clin­ging to his je­ans and over­si­ze stri­ped swe­ater, I wo­uldn’t ha­ve tho­ught he was de­ce­ased at all.

  “Hey! Me­gan, go­od to me­et you. I’d re­cog­ni­ze you anyw­he­re. That’s so­me mo­jo you’ve got go­ing. I ca­ught yo­ur energy the se­cond I li­be­ra­ted myself from that crypt.” He smi­led, re­ve­aling two daz­zling rows of su­per stra­ight te­eth and re­ac­hed out to grab my hand. The guy had be­en very cu­te when he was ali­ve, in a sort of sag­gy-pants­sto­ner way. “I’m Cliff.”

  “Cliff?”

  “Clif­ford Joseph Fran­kin­cen­se Har­ves­ter, re­por­ting for duty.”

  “Duty?” I re­pe­ated, so shoc­ked I co­uld ba­rely bring myself to squ­e­eze his hand and pump it up and down a few ti­mes be­fo­re de­tang­ling myself. Man­ners are go­od and all, but the smell of fresh gra­ve just do­esn’t co­me out of clot­hes wit­ho­ut so­me ma­j­or ef­fort.

  I wo­uld ha­ve dod­ged the hand en­ti­rely, in fact, if I’d ever had a zom­bie chat me up the way Cliff was do­ing. Usu­al­ly the na­tu­ral­ly Un­set­tled we­re kind of out of it un­til a Set­tler ga­ve the cue to start blab­bing. Even then, the ma­j­ority of pe­op­le who we­re tro­ub­led eno­ugh by un­fi­nis­hed bu­si­ness from the­ir li­ving days to crawl out of the­ir gra­ves and se­ek in­ter­ven­ti­on we­ren’t in the mo­od for id­le con­ver­sa­ti­on.

  They ca­me, they gro­aned and shuf­fled, I as­ked them what was up, and they con­fes­sed the­ir is­su­es. Then I pro­mi­sed to ta­ke ca­re of the­ir bid­ness and sent them back to the­ir eter­nal slum­ber. End of story. All ni­ce and tidy and re­la­ti­vely easy-except for the gra­ve-se­aling pro­cess. Now that I was a se­cond-sta­ge Set­tler, I had to fol­low them back to the­ir pla­ce of rest and se­al them in with a spe­ci­al ce­re­mony so no one co­uld re­sur­rect them with black ma­gic.

  After ha­ving be­en ne­arly kil­led by Re­ani­ma­ted Corp­ses-RCs, as Et­han li­ked to call them-back in Sep­tem­ber, I to­ok gra­ve se­aling very se­ri­o­usly. Re­al­ly, I to­ok just abo­ut everyt­hing very se­ri­o­usly. Le­ar­ning that yo­ur best fri­end had be­en plan­ning to kill you for ye­ars do­es that to a girl. My for­mer BFF, Jess, was now in a Set­tlers’ Af­fa­irs pri­son in Lit­tle Rock awa­iting tri­al and sen­ten­cing, but that didn’t re­al­ly help me fe­el any sa­fer. If I’d be­en stu­pid eno­ugh to be best fri­ends with a witch who wan­ted to watch black-ma­gi­cal­ly ra­ised zom­bi­es munch my flesh, my sa­fety wasn’t so­met­hing I co­uld ta­ke for gran­ted.

  “Ye­ah, I fi­gu­red it was a ni­ce night, and I’ve ne­ver wal­ked thro­ugh a fresh snow be­fo­re,” Cliff sa­id with a shrug.

  “So you ca­me to find me be­ca­use you ha­ve ne­ver ta­ken a walk in the snow?” Ne­ver in my en­ti­re li­fe-eit­her in the fi­ve ye­ars of Set­tling the de­ad when I was a kid, or in the past fo­ur months of be­ing back in the bu­si­ness now that my po­wers ha­ve re­tur­ned-had I ever he­ard a re­qu­est li­ke this.

  Usu­al­ly pe­op­le had re­al is­su­es. They wan­ted to tell so­me­one they had be­en figh­ting with be­fo­re they di­ed that they lo­ved them; they had un­fi­nis­hed bu­si­ness that af­fec­ted the li­ving or ma­de them fe­el gu­ilty in de­ath; and so­me­ti­mes they even had to get the na­me of the­ir kil­ler off the­ir chests and in­to the hands of the pro­per aut­ho­ri­ti­es.

  I’d had mo­re than my sha­re of mur­de­red te­ens in the past few months. Un­for­tu­na­tely, my ext­ra­or­di­na­rily strong Set­t
ler po­wer drew them to me li­ke fli­es to a ste­aming fresh pi­le of cow poo.

  Spe­aking of cow poo, we we­re bo­und to run in­to so­me if Cliff re­al­ly wan­ted to stroll. Lo­oked li­ke my new su­ede bo­ots-and my ro­man­tic da­te with Et­han-we­re shot.

  “Um, ye­ah. That’s not so­met­hing you want to miss out on. So I fi­gu­red I might as well crawl out of the old gra­ve and go for a stroll. You ga­me?” Cliff as­ked, then tur­ned to Et­han with a she­epish grin. “If you don’t mind, of co­ur­se. I’m as­su­ming you’re the boyf­ri­end?”

  “No, su­re. I me­an, ye­ah. But that’s fi­ne,” Et­han stam­me­red, ob­vi­o­usly thrown by Cliff as well. “I’ll wa­it in the car-you two go ahe­ad and stroll.”

  “Okay.” I smi­led at Cliff as I grab­bed Et­han’s hand and pul­led him back to­ward the car. “Just let me grab my co­at.”

  “No prob­lem. You li­ving pe­op­le get cold.” He la­ug­hed, a stran­gely in­fec­ti­o­us so­und that ma­de me want to la­ugh too. Go­od thing I didn’t, ho­we­ver, sin­ce Et­han didn’t lo­ok amu­sed. “I ha­ven’t be­en de­ad that long. I re­mem­ber fre­ezing my balls off at a fo­ot­ball ga­me last No­vem­ber. Who de­ci­ded No­vem­ber was a go­od ti­me for fo­ot­ball? I me­an, pla­ying it, su­re, sin­ce you’re bo­und to get hot. But watc­hing it? Mostly la­me. Un­less it’s on te­le­vi­si­on, and you’ve got lots of snacks for du­ring the com­mer­ci­als.”

  “This guy talks mo­re than you do,” Et­han mumb­led as he ope­ned the do­or and grab­bed my bright red pe­aco­at.

  “Thanks a lot.” I shrug­ged my co­at on and re­ac­hed past Et­han for my scarf.

  I got it that he was an­no­yed, but no ne­ed to ta­ke it out on me. I co­uldn’t help my job any mo­re than he co­uld. So I drew a lar­ger num­ber of Un­set­tled than the ave­ra­ge girl, and I hadn’t da­red ask anot­her Set­tler to co­ver for me be­ca­use I wan­ted to sa­ve up my fa­vors for nights the pom squ­ad had to dan­ce at bas­ket­ball ga­mes. It wasn’t my fa­ult I was still in high scho­ol. And ba­lan­cing sta­ge-two res­pon­si­bi­li­ti­es was a lot har­der than sta­ge three-the le­vel Et­han had be­en sin­ce his ni­ne­te­enth birth­day. He only had to be on duty a co­up­le nights a we­ek, and the rest of the ti­me he co­uld shut off his po­wer and not worry abo­ut dra­wing the Un­de­ad.