The Happy Zombie Sunrise Home

Chapter 9 - Clio

Festooned with rhubarb, I sallied forth.  I was in a cheerful frame of mind: a short phone call in the evening had assured me that Okie was still alive and well and on her way, though she sounded a little breathless. She’d claimed that she’d followed my advice – or most of it – and was now safely locked into a moving vehicle driven by an intrepid Z-Liner operative, with Sumatra under control in the back; that the unpleasant persons in a state of decay who had been attacking her had been left far behind; and that she was proceeding with all possible speed toward the U.S./Canadian border.

There was something new in her tone of voice. It was how she’d pronounced the word “intrepid.” I hoped I would not have to deal with a case of puppy love, complete with simpering and giggling. I would wish for a more suitable mate for my Okie. True, the Z-Line drivers were competent, but they led risky lives. Unfortunate to welcome back a husband – to unlock the door, to enfold him in your loving embrace – only to realize too late that his heart had ceased to beat, that the slobbering was not caused by lust, and that the stunned vacancy of the gaze was not an excess of passion. In such a case one would have to prove more than usually nimble at slipping from the encircling arms and scrabbling fingers, and more than usually dexterous with the kitchen implements. A cast-iron frying pan followed by the tendon-severing Japanese knife might be called for.

But why borrow trouble? I told myself. Just let Okie arrive safely.

Meanwhile, the sun was shining, the birds were making noises, and I was on my way to the bank, to collect the cash with which to pay the Z-Liner, and pick up some Slugs-Be-Gone™ at the gardening store, should occasion offer. I’d woven a number of rhubarb stalks into a wreath to wear around my neck, and several other stalks were inserted into the brim of my hat. Each stalk had been lightly crushed to release the tangy, sour raw-rhubarb aroma. It would never be a perfume, but it was definitely a smell.

I carried the long gutter-excavating tool for extra defense, and in my handbag I’d concealed a hammer, a chisel, and a potato gun, fully loaded. I’d acquired that potato gun some time ago in order to discourage cats from transforming the garden to a litter box, but I’d lately found that a forcefully propelled potato could stop a shambling faux-dead person in his or her tracks, if the hit was a direct one, dead on the forehead. Or on the dead forehead, whichever.

I had also taken the precaution of unfreezing several packets of mini-wieners, in case a distraction was needed; and I was toting one of my fresh-baked rhubarb pies, in a plastic bag. But I would not sacrifice that pie except as a last resort. It was not intended for eating, needless to relate: it was for hurling. Unladylike to hurl a pie, true. But these are not ladylike times.

As I came down my front steps, I noted the three bikini-clad blondes who had finished off poor Frank, my erstwhile neighbor, in his own swimming pool the previous day. They had made their way out of the grounds and were shambling toward me like a beauty contest gone seriously off the rails. Already their features were softening like wet blotting paper and blurring together as if their makeup artist had been drunk.  Old habits die hard: as they shambled, they attempted to smile artlessly, and they also – grotesquely – thrust their blood-bedabbled chests out and wiggled their hips.

I fired a warning shot from the potato gun, striking the foremost in the upper left frontal protuberance. Then I waved a stalk of rhubarb aloft. “Rhubarb!” I cried. They stopped in their tracks and sniffed the air uncertainly.

“Rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb,” they muttered indistinctly, like a crowd scene in a high school production of Shakespeare. They’d lost most of their language, as the poor things do – otherwise they’d be saying “Hi there!” and “Oh my god!” – but evidently this one important word remained, so deeply ingrained was it among their decaying neural pathways. After a few moments of swaying, they turned and lurched off in the opposite direction. It was true, then, as Dexter’s notes had inferred: rhubarb was a deterrent.