Dana stepped through the doors, eased them shut, and stood motionless.
It was a big room.
Roland might be here. Might be looking at her right now. Frozen with terror.
This is it.
Dana’s heart pounded furiously. Tremors of excitement shook her body. Drops of sweat slid down her sides, tickling.
Several windows along the three walls let in hazy gray light, but vast areas of the room were black.
Dana looked at herself through the fuzzy holes of her cap. The flour gave her skin a dull gray hue, not the glow she had wanted. But good enough. Maybe better, in fact. Bright enough to let her be seen, but only dimly.
What you can’t quite see—that’s what is really scary.
So how does a ghost walk? she wondered. They probably don’t. In movies, they generally swoop through the air. But zombies kind of stagger around with their arms out.
Dana lifted her arms as if reaching for her next victim and took long, stiff-legged strides toward the center of the room.
Shit, this isn’t a zombie walk, it’s Frankenstein.
Frankenstein’s the scientist, stupid, not the monster.
Yes, Roland.
She stopped strutting and changed her gait to a slow lurching stagger.
Perfect.
So where the fuck are you, Roland? If you’re too scared to scream, let’s at least have a few gasps or whimpers.
Are you crouched in a corner, wetting your pants?
Dana slowly turned around, searching for his huddled shape in the gray near the windows, trying to find him in the black areas.
He isn’t here, she decided. Even if I can’t see him, he for sure would’ve seen me by now. He would’ve done something—yelled or maybe run for it.
Dana turned toward the front of the restaurant, lowered her arms for a moment to smear the sweat rolling down her sides, then raised her arms again and shuffled forward.
Over to the left, the room branched out. Dana saw a vague shape that might be a bar.
He’s probably hiding behind it.
She took a few steps in that direction and a rush of excitement stopped her.
Roland’s sleeping bag.
Mummy bag.
One dark, puffy end of it was barely visible in the gloom from a front window.
I can’t see him, but he can see me. If he’s looking this way. If he’s awake.
For a few seconds, Dana couldn’t force herself to move. She stood there, shaking and breathless, feeling as if her legs might give out.
This’ll be good, she thought. This’ll get him. The shit-head’ll wish he’d never been born.
Go for it, she told herself.
She lurched toward the sleeping bag. Her legs felt like warm liquid, but they held her up. She let out a low moan.
That’ll get his attention.
When she stopped moaning, she heard him.
He was taking quick, short breaths.
Awake, all right.
She stood over him, no more than a yard away, peering down but still unable to see anything in the darkness. No, maybe that was a face—that oval blur. If so, Roland was sitting up.
Bending at the waist, she reached toward him.
A shriek blasted her ears.
Every muscle in Dana’s body seemed to jerk, snapping her upright, hurling her backward. She waved her arms, trying to stay up, then fell. The floor pounded her rump.
A light beam stung her eyes.
She shielded her eyes with a hand. “Take it out of my face.” The beam lowered. She pulled off the cap. The light was on her chest, moving from one breast to the other. It dropped, streaking down her belly and shining between her legs. She threw her knees together, blocking it. The light returned to her breasts. She covered them with one arm and used the other arm to brace herself up. Her chest heaved as she struggled to catch her breath.
“So,” she gasped, “did I scare you, or what?”
In answer, the light tipped downward. Roland was sitting on top of his mummy bag, his legs stretched out. The lap of his faded blue jeans was stained dark.
Dana grinned. “You wet your pants.”
“I wanta go,” Roland said in a shaky voice.
“Hell, you already went.”
“You won, okay? You won. Let me loose.” He turned his light toward a nearby card table with bottles on top. “The key’s up there.”
“Key?”
The beam moved again, this time to his left hand. It was cuffed to a metal rail near the bottom of the bar.
“Holy shit,” Dana muttered.
“My insurance. That’s how I knew I’d win.”
“You cuffed yourself?”
“Get the key, okay?”
So that was why Roland had insisted that she come in at dawn to get him—so she could unlock the handcuffs.
“Where are the Polaroids?” she asked.
“In my pack.”
“Give me the flashlight.”
Roland didn’t argue. He lowered it to the floor and pushed. It skidded toward her feet. Dana sat up, stretched forward, and grabbed it.
Getting to her knees, she shined the beam on Roland. His gaunt face, dead pale, looked even more cadaverous than usual. Squinting, he turned away from the glare.
She aimed the light at his crotch.
“Peed your fucking pants,” she said. “Did you really think I was a ghost?”
“I don’t know,” he mumbled.
Dana chuckled. Then she crawled to the pack, searched it, and found an envelope. Inside the envelope were the photographs. She flicked through them, counting. All ten were there. She set the envelope on the floor and took her camera from the pack.
“What’re you doing?” Roland asked.
“Just recording the moment for posterity.” Standing up, Dana faced him and clamped the flashlight between her thighs aiming it so the beam lit his wet jeans. She raised the camera to her eye. “Say ‘cheese.’” She took three shots, the flash bar blinking bright. “Now take off your pants.”
He shook his head.
“Want me to leave you here?”
With his one free hand, Roland opened his jeans and tugged them down to his knees.
“You don’t believe in underpants?”
Dana snapped three more shots, then gathered up the photos that had dropped to the floor. She tucked them inside the envelope and put the envelope and the camera into his pack. She put her stocking cap in with them, swung the pack up and slipped her arms through the straps.
She shined the beam on Roland, who had pulled up his pants and was zipping the fly. “Adios.”
“Unlock me,” he said, squinting into the light.
“Do you think I’m nuts?”
“I went along with it. You promised. Now come on.” He wasn’t pleading. He sounded calm.
Dana thought about it. She really wanted to leave him here. But that would mean coming back tomorrow or sending Jason over to set him free. Also, he would end up winning the bet. A hundred bucks down the toilet.
“I don’t care about the pictures,” he said. “You can keep them.”
“Mighty big of you. I’d like to see you just try to take ’em off me.”
“Then what’s the big deal? Get the key.”
“Maybe. Stay put while I get dressed.”
“Very funny.”
She left him there. With the aid of the flashlight, her return to the kitchen was easy. Her foot had left smudges of blood on the linoleum. She wrinkled her nose at the sight of the mess she had stepped in.
Using the wool cap, she began to brush the flour off her body.
The gag had certainly worked.
Scared the hell out of Roland.
Wet his pants.
Funny how he hadn’t tried to hide that, just flashed the light down there to show her the damage as if it were nothing.
In fact, he’d been awfully calm about letting her take the pictures. Even pulled his pants down without much protest.
>
After having the headless ghost come at him, everything else must’ve seemed easy.
Maybe he’s in shock, or something.
Probably is.
On top of which, he’s scared shitless I’ll drive off and leave him. He knows he damn well better cooperate. Without the key, he’s stuck and he knows it.
Dana shined the light down at her body. Most of the flour was off, but her skin was still dusted white. She would need to take a shower when she got back.
After dressing, she slipped the envelope containing the photos into a rear pocket of her jeans. She pulled the poncho over her head and picked up Roland’s pack.
Her dorm room was without a kitchen, so she had no further use for the flour. She left the open bag on the floor and returned to the cocktail area.
Roland still sat with his back against the bar and his legs stretched out. He looked as if he hadn’t moved at all while she was gone.
“So,” Dana said. “I guess you’re ready to leave.”
He nodded.
“I don’t want pee on my car seat.”
“I’ll sit on my sleeping bag.”
“I’ve got a better idea. How about if you walk back to campus?”
“It’s raining.”
“Yeah, well, you can use a shower.”
“Just give me the key.”
Dana stepped to the table. “I knew you wouldn’t last out the night,” she said. The small key to the handcuffs glinted among the bottles and glasses. She picked it up. “The cuffs were a pretty neat idea, though. You would’ve won for sure if I hadn’t come along. But you lost, all right. I always knew you were a chicken. I guess you knew it, too, or you wouldn’t have cuffed yourself in. Huh? You knew you didn’t have the guts to stick it out.”
She twisted the cap off a bottle of vodka. They key was small enough to fit through the bottle’s neck. She dropped it. The key made a quiet splash. A moment later, it clinked against the bottom. She screwed the cap back on and tightened it with all her strength.
“Do yourself a favor,” she suggested. “Drink your way down to the key. It’ll help take the sting out of your hike.”
Dana tossed the bottle onto his lap.
At the door, she smiled back at him and said, “Cheers.”
The door bumped shut. Roland, in the darkness, clamped the bottle between his legs and twisted the cap off. He tugged his T-shirt up. Dumped vodka onto his belly until the key fell onto his bare skin. Flung the bottle away. Peeled the key off his belly and unlocked the cuff at his wrist.
Dana, walking quickly through the rain, was only a few yards from her car when she figured that Roland had probably succeeded, by now, in removing the handcuffs. It would still take him a while to gather up his sleeping bag. She glanced back, anyway.
Roland!
He looked crazy sprinting toward her, his head thrown back and his mouth wide, his arms windmilling as if he were trying to swim, not run.
In his right hand was a knife.
Dana raced for the car.
She thought, that was damn quick of him.
She thought, what’s he doing with that knife?
Where are my keys?
In the ignition.
Lucky. No fumbling.
She grabbed the door handle and pulled. The force of her pull ripped her fingers from the handle and she remembered she had left the car by its passenger door.
She whirled around.
Roland was almost upon her.
“Okay, look, you can ride back with me!”
He stopped. His lip curled up.
“Hey, Roland, come on.”
He clutched the front of her poncho, jerked her forward, and rammed the knife into her belly.
Roland pulled the knife out. He shoved Dana backward, keeping his grip on the poncho, and lowered her to the pavement. She sat there, moaning and holding her belly.
Roland sat on her legs.
He punched her nose and she flopped back. Her head thumped the pavement. She didn’t lose consciousness, but she didn’t struggle. Rain fell on her face. She blinked and gasped for air.
Straddling her, Roland plucked the front of the poncho away from her body, poked his knife through it, and sliced the plastic sheet open to her throat.
“Plea—” she gasped.
He cut open the front of her sweatshirt and spread it apart.
Rain sluiced away the blood on her belly, but more blood poured from the gash. Her chest rose and fell as she panted. Roland stared at her breasts. Then he put his knife away.
Bending low, he stretched out his arms. He held her breasts. They were wet and slick, warm beneath the wetness.
He kissed the gash on her belly.
He sucked blood from it.
Dana shrieked and jerked rigid beneath him when he bit.
She stayed alive for a long time. It was better that way.
Her heart still throbbed when Roland tore it from her chest cavity.
He was almost full, so he didn’t eat much of it. He stuffed what was left into her chest, then crawled to her head.
He scalped her, cracked open her skull with the pry bar, and scooped out her warm, dripping brain.
The best part.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Just after sunrise, Roland returned to campus. He left Dana’s car in the lot behind his dorm, and hurried into the lobby. He rushed upstairs, along the quiet corridor, and got inside his room without being seen—lucky, since he was naked except for his windbreaker.
He dropped his backpack to the floor, then took off his windbreaker and inspected it for blood. He’d been very careful with it, knowing that he would need to wear it back to the dorm after getting rid of his other clothes.
They were with Dana, stuffed inside his mummy bag and hidden in bushes about ten miles south of the restaurant.
The windbreaker, inside and out, looked spotless. He dropped it over the pack, then checked himself. The rain had done a good job of cleaning him. Though all his fingernails had blood caked under them, he looked fine otherwise.
Roland put on his robe, gathered what he needed for a shower, put his room key in his pocket, and hurried down the corridor.
The rest room was silent. He made sure the toilet stalls were vacant, then unloaded his stuff onto a bench in the dressing area of the shower room and approached the sinks. Taking off his robe, he inspected himself in the mirrors above the sinks. At the back of his leg was a crust of dried blood in the shape of a circle where the thing had chewed its way into him. From there, a bluish bruise extended upward, angling across his right buttock to his spine, then straight up his back to the nape of his neck. His hanging black hair, he thought, was long enough to cover the neck area when he was dressed.
He stepped closer, shivering as the cold edge of the sink met the back of his legs. Turning sideways, he twisted his head around. He could see a slight hump at the back of his neck. It continued to about halfway down his spine.
Roland fingered the distended skin behind his neck. The lump felt much larger than it looked. He stroked it. The thing writhed a bit, and gave him a mild tingle of pleasure—only a hint of the ecstasy it had bestowed when he had fed it.
Worried that someone might come through the door, Roland draped the robe over his shoulders and returned to the dressing area. He dropped his robe onto the bench, gathered up his washcloth, soap, shampoo and toothbrush, and entered the shower room.
The hot spray felt wonderful on his chilled skin. He lathered himself and scrubbed. He washed his hair. After rinsing, he found that much of the blood was gone from under his fingernails. But not all of it. He used his toothbrush to get rid of the rest.
Back in his room, Roland stood in front of the built-in bureau and combed his hair straight forward as he always did before parting it down the center. This time, he parted it on the left. It made him appear more normal. Good. He no longer cared to draw attention to himself by looking weird. He wanted to blend in with the student body. At least until it w
as time to find a new van and hit the road.
No. Too soon.
You’d attract more attention if you suddenly changed.
For now, do everything the same as always.
Roland nodded and moved his part to the center where it belonged.
He put on a clean pair of jeans and socks, then a yellow T-shirt with bloody bullet holes printed across its front as if he’d been stitched by a machine gun. The T-shirt, however, let too much show. He put on another shirt over it—a black sports shirt with a collar high enough to conceal the back of his neck.
Roland yawned. He ached to sleep. Plenty of time later for that. Just a couple more things to do.
He removed the handcuffs and key from his pack, and hid them under some socks in his bureau.
Then he took out the envelope with the photos. The envelope was smeared all over with bloody fingerprints.
“Not too cool, Roland, old man,” he whispered.
He opened it. The photos weren’t stained. He separated them, slipping the shots of Dana into a fresh envelope, and returned them to Jason’s drawer.
He flipped through the remaining photos and grinned. Dana would’ve been pleased by the way they turned out. Roland in his pissed jeans. Roland naked from waist to knees. She would’ve had fun with these, using them to humiliate Roland.
Roland?
Me.
He frowned, puzzled that he had been thinking of himself by name.
After tearing the photos and envelopes into tiny pieces, he returned to the rest room and flushed them down a toilet.
Back in his own room, he stretched out on his bed and slept.
The door bumped shut, waking him. Sitting up, he rubbed his face while Jason tossed an overnight bag onto the other bed and hung up his suit.
“How was the wedding?” Roland asked.
“Not bad. The groom’s a real dork, but that’s her problem. Man, did I tie one on.” He sat on his bed and made a sour face. “What gives, anyway?”
“Huh?”
“I saw Dana’s car in the lot.”
“Yeah.”
“Where is she?” Jason lowered his head slightly. “Hiding under the bed? You been slipping it to her?”
“Oh, sure.”