Diana Rowland - My Life as a White Trash Zombie

Ed gave my arm a squeeze—the unbroken one, thankfully. “Take care of yourself, Angel. And don’t take this the wrong way, but I’d rather not meet you like this again.”

I grinned. “I’m cool with that.”

He gave me a parting smile, then left me to fend off a barrage of questions from the three remaining men.

I gazed morosely at the contents of the little fridge in my room. Actually, gazing at the contents didn’t take long since the damn thing was empty, but I crouched there with the door open for several minutes anyway, as if my stash would magically regenerate if I wished hard enough. The cold air flowed out onto my bare feet but I might as well have been wearing socks for all I felt it. I absently rubbed my fingertips together, dully annoyed at the faint lack of sensation. My stomach gave an unpleasant twist—like I needed the reminder that I was a few hours past my usual, every-other-day feeding schedule. Great. Everything else faded, but I could still feel the damn hunger.

Used to be that I wanted the edge taken off the world. Hell, that’s why I’d turn to pills or pot or booze. But this was different. It was like the longer I went without brains, the more dead I became.

And that scared the living shit out of me.

After Ed had left me in the ER I’d been subjected to a barrage of questions that made Ivanov’s “interrogation” look like a poetry reading. Derrel was clearly worried and distressed, Allen was annoyed and suspicious—and kept muttering under his breath about the loss of the van—and Dr. Duplessis was somewhere in between. I told my story as best I could, keeping it as close to the truth as possible while leaving out the bit about the zombie. To my relief the faint shadow of suspicion in the coroner’s eyes faded as I finished up my version of what happened. And when my piss test came back clean—thank god—even Allen seemed to unbend enough to show actual concern.

Unfortunately, I still ended up with three days off from work. It wasn’t even punishment either, which was the totally bizarre thing about it. It was with pay , and the coroner most likely thought he was being super nice, giving me extra time to make sure I was all right. Normally I’d have been thrilled to get time off with pay. I mean, the coroner was being incredibly cool to do that for me, especially since I was so new. Usually you had to be there for three months before you could get any type of paid leave. And what was I supposed to say? “Gee, thanks for giving me paid time off, but that’s not why I need to come to work. I need to dig through dead bodies’cause I’m starving, yo.”

At least it was only three days. If I hadn’t tanked up on some brains out at the accident scene, I’d have probably been forced to stay out for a couple of weeks to hide how fast I could heal up when properly fed. And then I’d have been like that other zombie. A chill went through me that had nothing to do with the open fridge.

I closed the fridge, stood. I was back on call tomorrow. One more day. I could last until then, right? I wasn’t even smelly yet. Well, not too much . I counted the days: I’d slugged down my last brains day before yesterday, and I was supposed to go back to work tomorrow. Three days without brains. I’d never gone that long before.

Unfortunately, I’d burned through my stash faster than I’d expected getting healed up. I’d been able to bullshit the ER doc, but my stupid body had let me know that it felt like shit. I wasn’t tough enough to fight my appetite when it was clawing at me like I’d swallowed a wolverine.

But how long did I have? I needed a goddamn manual. And why the hell couldn’t Anonymous Letter Dude give me some clues and pointers? Okay, I ate the damn brains. I’ve figured out that I need to keep this job. Great. You win. Now, could I please get a clue?

The “one month” mark was in a few days, and still no sign or word from whoever’d arranged the whole thing with the job. I’d really been hoping that at some point I’d get a “Way to go!” or “I knew you could do it!” or even a “Hi, my name is blank, and I’ve been your mentor.” I scowled. Not a mentor, though. A mentor would have given me some actual advice and instruction on how to handle this whole brain thing. Not just a stupid “If you crave it, eat it” note.

I really hoped I wasn’t expected to figure this crap out on my own.

I peered at myself in the mirror. What would I look like all rotted and gross like that guy had been? There were shadows under my eyes, and I looked as if I’d been awake for way too long, but I didn’t have parts falling off. Yet. I shivered, then stuck a Band-Aid onto my forehead where the cut on my head had been. I didn’t want people wondering how I could have healed up so fast. I still wasn’t sure what I was going to do about the fact that there wasn’t a scar. Maybe get my hair cut so I had bangs that covered my forehead? I made a face. Bangs. Ugh. I’d rather have parts falling off.

My dad wasn’t home so I checked my money situation and then headed out. I had an attack of responsibility and used a good portion of my last paycheck to do stupid things like paying bills—even paid the cable bill, which had been cut off. Hopefully this would get around having to give money to my dad, especially since I wasn’t so sure he’d actually pay bills with the money anyway.

My stomach grumbled at me after I dropped off a payment at the power company and I wavered badly on whether to try and sneak into the morgue to snag some brains. The big problem was the fact that I had to use a key card to get in—which meant that it would be logged in the system. Coming in once or twice off-shift wouldn’t be a huge deal, but it would definitely be noticed if I made a habit of it. Especially since the previous van driver had been caught stealing. The last thing I wanted was any more attention.

It’s only one more day, I reminded myself. It’s not worth the risk.

I caught a scent of fried chicken as I passed a diner on the corner, and my stomach gave another lurch. I almost laughed in relief. This was hunger… not Hunger. I still needed to eat regular food—something I’d almost forgotten to do when I was healing up from the wreck. Hell, I tended to forget it a lot when I was low on brains, and forgetting had the unfortunate effect of making me even more ravenous for brains since I was basically starving myself. It didn’t help that food tended to be kinda tasteless if I wasn’t tanked up on brains.

Maybe I can start a new diet craze , I thought with a snicker as I turned in to the parking lot for the Piggly Wiggly. Become a zombie. Cut your appetite in half . For real food, at least.

Pausing my cart by the meat section, I peered down at the various selections of animal flesh. Did it have to be human brains? If I could get the same effect from animal brains, that would make this whole thing a helluva lot less fucked up and a helluva lot easier. Animal brains would be easier to get, right? Though I couldn’t see myself actually killing an animal. Yeah, I was a bit of a redneck, but I got squeamish putting worms on hooks. Would I still be? I wondered suddenly. I used to throw up at the slightest gross thing, and now I was handling brains like a pro. Yeah, but actually killing something is a whole ’ nother thing entirely.

“Can I help you?”

I jerked my gaze up to see the butcher giving me a bored and questioning look. “Um, yeah. Do y’all ever sell, um, brains? I mean, like, animal brains?”

He didn’t look bored anymore. Now his expression was more along the lines of “are you fucking nuts?”