Bob Fingerman - Pariah

On the next landing the right window was gated, but the left-theirs-slid open, vulnerable as ever. About a year earlier he and Eddie had crouched in silence out here, stifling giggles as Eddie videoed the couple next door doing it. It wasn’t that they were that great looking, but it was still exciting. Eddie would play that tape often; he called it his “hunting trophy.” Dave stepped into the dark apartment. The sky had turned colorless but was bright, so his eyes adjusted quickly.

“Eddie?” Dave called again.

“Don’t come in here,” a husky voice responded.

“Eddie?” Dave ignored the admonition and raced into the apartment, tripping over a pile on the floor. His knees hit the bare floorboards hard and he yelped in pain, then rolled onto his side to massage the injured joints. Both were abraded and wet with blood. He clenched his eyes shut as he rubbed them, stars swimming inside his closed lids. “Ouch, Jesus.”

“I told you not to come in here.” It was Eddie’s voice, but he sounded different.

When Dave opened his eyes he looked directly into another pair, only these looked glassy with indifference. He blinked a few times, then jerked bolt upright and scooted backward away from the unblinking visage.

“Gerri!” he yawped.

Though dim, there was sufficient light to see that Gerri was dead, yet still she clutched the husk of her late Yorkie.

“What happened to Gerri?” Dave whispered.

“I did.”

“Whattaya mean, Eddie? What happened here?” Dave stood up and looked down at Gerri’s body. It was folded in half at the waist and pearly gelatinous spume speckled her rangy bare buttocks. One of her flaplike teats spilled out of her torn housecoat. Her neck was twisted at an unnatural angle and blood leaked from both nostrils and the corner of her mouth. Purple hand-shaped bruises clasped her shoulders. Dave looked up from the cadaver at Eddie, who from the waist down was bare, blood smeared on his hands and across his groin.

“Why don’t you have your pants on, Eddie?”

“You’re one to talk.” Eddie said.

“What did you do, Eddie?” Dave asked. It was a formality. It was obvious what he’d done.

“I was wandering around, y’know, burnin’ off some rage. I decided to visit the old crib, grab some copies of Sports Illustrated -like that one with the chick with the seashells on her boobs-and anyhow, who’s sittin’ on our old couch but the Wandering Jewess. Some rat was bitin’ on her ankle and she’s just sittin’ there, so I stomped the little fucker. See?” He pointed at its furry remains. “So I ask her if she’s okay, right? I tried a little, what was your special word? Tenderness . Anyway, one thing led to another. Listen, with a harpoon of cum built up you don’t think so straight, bro. Pussy is pussy. I needed to get it in there and this bitch was all there was. Zotz is bonin’ the merry widow, D. Doesn’t leave much for the rest of us swingin’ dicks.”

“Was it consensual?”

“Guy does one year prelaw and he thinks he’s Alan Dershowitz.”

“Jesus Christ, Eddie.”

“Hey, least she died with a smile on her face.”

On Gerri’s dead face was a rictus grin nobody in his or her right mind would describe as a smile.

“Oh, Eddie. ”

“Hey, hey, hey. Don’t take that tone with me. The Comet needed to get his freak on with some genuine la fica , okay? You jealous? That what this is? You know, fuck this bitch, all right? I put it to her good and she didn’t make a peep. No struggle, nothing. So, yeah, I guess it was consensual. She didn’t complain a bit. Least she could’ve done was moan or something. Shown some appreciation. Like anyone ever paid her any mind. She should be fuckin’ flattered The Comet paid her withered snatch a visit.”

Dave was about to say something when Gerri sat up and let out a noise that shrank his balls-something between a hiss, a growl, and the toilet backing up. Her head jerked on its shattered neck, the jaw opening and closing, tongue lolling. A small amount of blood and bile spurted out and she was up on her feet.

“Fuck, that was quick!” Eddie shouted. “Oh fuck man, fuck !”

Nude or not, Dave knew something had to be done before she got her bearings-fresh ones moved fast . He grabbed an elephant-foot umbrella stand near the doorway and smashed Gerri in the face, snapping her head backwards. The sickening sound of her top vertebrae shattering lurched the meager contents of Dave’s stomach into his mouth, but he tamped it down and swallowed, hammering her back. Even with her head resting against her upper back and hanging upside down she kept uttering foul bestial grunts, blood-thickened saliva oozing down into her flaring nostrils. With her head on the wrong way Gerri groped blindly and Dave pummeled her with the stand, which spilled umbrellas with each blow. How many umbrellas were in the damned thing? Big ones and small ones fell to the floor, which was also now drenched in Gerri’s various leaking fluids.

Finally he drew back the elephant foot and rammed her in the chest, sending her toppling back toward the rear windows. Steering her spastic body wasn’t easy, but after several more strategically aimed blows she crashed through the window and plummeted to the ground in the alley that had claimed Mike Swenson. Dave looked out the window and saw Gerri twitch a few times, then stand and limp off to merge with the other brainless things shuffling around down there. Satisfied she wouldn’t be joining them again, Dave dropped the battering ram and slumped to the floor.

“Wish you’d been that hardcore on the ice, bro,” Eddie said.

“Yeah, thanks for all your help.”

“Hey, The Comet’s impressed, buddy. I’m giving you props. That was awesome.”

“Yeah. Just leave me alone, okay?”

“Fine. What ever . Just tryin’ to give a compliment is all, bro. No need to get all menstrual and shit. The Comet’s outta here.”

Eddie pulled on his shorts and left through the front door as Dave retched onto the floor, his spew mixing with Gerri’s congealing blood.

The Comet.

The Rapist.

The Murderer.

Dave felt like one of those battered wives on C OPS . The ones who kept telling the arresting officers-often through split lips and sporting impressive shiners-how their men were really good men. “He’s a good man, officer! He’s a good father, officer! I love him, officer!” On went the cuffs and these scumbag deadbeat drunken pieces of white trash would get thrown in the backs of the cruisers looking glad for the vacation away from the wife and kids. The patrol car would drift away from the double-wide and poor beaten wifey, with her missing front teeth and eye swollen shut, would bawl at the absence of her man.

Dave knew just how those dopey broads felt.

“God dammit , stop bitin’ on me.”

Two days after the rain the mosquitoes came, spawned in pools of still water. The tenacity of some life-forms was incredible. Dabney refused to leave his spot, but the bites were a stiff price to pay for the hour or so of jubilation. He sat in his lean-to and swatted at the pesky bloodsuckers, swearing under his breath. After a while he couldn’t bear to sit still any more and got up and walked to his perch. Though the sun hadn’t fully set-and when it had the skeeters would really get to their deviltry-it was too dark to see whether the undead were being fed upon, too. The thought made Dabney’s mind race. If fleas and such could spread plague, if bugs bit on the zombies, then bit on a human, could that spread the contagion or whatever it was? Dabney thought about the West Nile virus and how the city had trucks drive around spraying poison through areas beset with mosquitoes. The only result he could recall was lowered birth weights in the areas the insecticide had been deployed.