Aleksandar Hemon - The Making of Zombie Wars

Joshua filled up his glass with 1983 Château Margaux and rinsed his palate with it. If there was a perfect thing in the world, it was Château Margaux ’83, and no coalition of the willing could drive a wedge between them. He’d had his first wine in 1983: he was almost thirteen, Bernie had left an open bottle on the table; not even his vomiting later could dampen the memory of that first-kiss experience. He imagined sharing a bottle with Ana, her lips claret, teaching her to sniff it, to feel it on her palate, teaching her the tasting vocabulary. Noah slid into the chair next to Joshua and matter-of-factly said: “Camelfuckers.”

“Watch your language, young man,” Janet said sans conviction.

“Camelfuckers,” Noah repeated.

“Secret word, Noah! We don’t use it in front of other people. We talked about secret words, didn’t we?”

Mom looked up at Noah, then at Joshua, and rolled her eyes — this was some kind of signal to him, but he could not decode it. She’d moved to a downtown condo after the Wilmette house had been sold as part of the divorce settlement; she’d wanted to be able to walk to theaters and museums and Symphony Center; to date and have lunches with her fellow ballast board members. But lately she left her condo only to go to her hairdresser or book club. Janet was worried that she was depressed and developing an addiction to sleeping pills. Janet worried meant Janet called Joshua to complain.

“How’s your father?” Mother asked him.

“Rachel!” Janet said. She’d started calling her Rachel after she’d had Noah, the title of Mother now available to her as well.

“I don’t know,” Joshua said. “Haven’t talked to Bernie for a while.”

Janet was shaking her head to indicate her disapproval and worry. The Levins were a family whose communication system was founded on decoding secret words and silences. What was not actually uttered was always what mattered more. It was like poor-man’s psychoanalysis, except they were not particularly poor. The first time he’d taken Kimmy to a family dinner she’d quickly recognized, smart as she was, that they’d been reading her and talking about her in the Levin code. Moreover, Mother had randomly rolled her eyes; Janet had kept topping off Kimmy’s wineglass, intent on getting her loose and tipsy; Doug had ogled her shamelessly. What would the Levins say about Ana?

“He’s on a cruise,” Janet said. “I told you that.”

“With his big-tits babe?”

“Rachel! She’s older than you.”

“Where did they go, Joshua?” Mother said. “Where are they cruising?”

“Mom, please,” Joshua said. “I don’t know.”

“Israel,” Mother said. “The Holy blasted Land.”

“Wasn’t there another suicide bombing there last week?” Janet asked.

“He probably didn’t even leave the cruise ship,” Joshua said.

“He probably didn’t even leave her tits,” Mother said.

“Tits,” Noah said, smashing the top of his crème brûlée with a spoon.

“Secret word, Noah!” Janet said. “Could you cut it out, Rachel, please?”

“I hope they’re booked on the Titanic ,” Mother said. “I hope she ends up holding his hand as he turns to ice, like that boy in the movie.”

“Tits,” Noah said.

“All right, you’re in time-out, young mister,” Janet said.

Time-out meant that Noah was afforded more time to plan another irritating thing to do or say. It was clear from his impish grin that his mind was now thinly stretched between camelfuckers and tits . What is it with boys? How do they slide into fucked-upness so quickly, with such natural ease? Joshua refilled his glass with Château Margaux then put the bottle down. Janet pointedly picked it up to add wine to Mother’s and her glasses, as Marcel hurried over to snatch the bottle from Janet’s hand.

“Merci bien, monsieur!” she said with a courtly nod, thereby pretty much exhausting her French vocabulary. She’d convinced Doug to marry her in Paris; neither of them could understand what the official had been saying, so they hadn’t answered properly when she’d asked them if they’d take each other for better or for worse, or whatever they said in France. It’d been a running joke between Doug and Jan that they were not sure they’d been married. Doug, priapic as he was, had certainly behaved as if they were merely good friends from high school.

“De rien, madame!” Marcel bowed and smiled. It was not beyond Janet to appropriate Marcel for retributive intercourse, Joshua realized. Marcel walked away, bouncing on the balls of his feet, like an Olympic diver.

“So,” Janet said. “Seder at my place.”

“When is it?” Joshua asked.

“When is it!? You’re a real bad Jew, Jackie,” Janet said.

“Okay, but when is your Seder?”

“April sixteenth. You’ve got two weeks to Jew up.”

“Reading from the same script every year, thanking the Lord for getting our ass out of the situation he put us in in the first place — that’s not my idea of a good time.”

“God will smite you.”

“God doesn’t give a damn about me.”

“He sheds his wrath upon the nations that do not recognize him, and on the kingdoms and individuals that will not proclaim his name. I’d be careful.”

“Whatever.”

“And it’s a good story too,” Janet said.

“Cameltits,” Noah said, proud of his cleverness. He was Doug’s son all right. Janet grabbed him above his elbow and pulled him away from the table. She dragged him into the women’s bathroom, as he wailed like the little patient he was. Perhaps it was true that everything was Oedipal with boys. Perhaps Papa Freud was in fact right.

“You haven’t heard this from me, but Jan and Doug are separated,” Mother said. “He sent Janet an e-mail from Dubai, except it was meant for some other woman and was describing his crotch.”

“His crotch? You mean his penis?”

“Don’t ask me for details, Joshua, for God’s sake. I’m your mother.”

“So where’s he now?”

“Maybe still in Dubai. Or in some downtown hotel with a hooker. Dead, as far as Jan’s concerned.”

“Are they going to get divorced?”

“Jan’s mad more than ever before.”

“Is she okay?”

“She’s very mad.”

“Poor Doug. She’ll destroy him,” Joshua said, and immediately realized that he shouldn’t have.

“Poor Doug?” his mother growled, actually showing her incisors, but before she could say more Janet came back with Noah. His blond hair now was wet and pasted to his skull, with a neat straight line down the middle.

“Now,” Janet said, emptying the Château Margaux into her glass, lifting the bottle to ask Marcel for more. “Now we’re going to enjoy this goddamn lunch.”

INT. HOSPITAL — DAY

Major Klopstock, gun in hand, sneaks up the back stairs, barely lit by the streaks of sunlight from obscure windows and cracks. Every once in a while, he checks to see what floor he’s on. The undead LOW in distant hospital spaces. When he reaches the 25th floor, he carefully opens the door to look down the dark hallway, where all the lights are out. It appears to be zombie-free. He turns on his flashlight: it’s the neurosurgery floor. He moves soundlessly, pressing his back against the wall. He knows his way around that labyrinth. He opens a door to look in, but has to duck quickly as he spots a zombie munching on a brain from a glass jar. The undead one is too busy to notice Major K, who moves on.

Major K rummages through a file cabinet, looking for something in particular, throwing down what he has no use for. In the corner, he sees a small fire extinguisher. He puts it in his backpack.