* * *
I drove home that morning with the blood bag in my coat pocket. It’d been chilled since whenever it’d left its original donor—but right now, knowing I had it made it feel hot against my thigh. I’d been busy ever since I’d saved Anna, practically—I’d either been at work, as a patient or working, or been distracted with some guy. Maybe if I hadn’t been so keen on getting laid, I’d have already solved my own mystery. Then again, who knew I would be called to vampire court? You couldn’t not get laid, especially by a man like Asher, worrying about every bizarre possibility.
I’d wait up for Anna tomorrow. I put the blood bag in my refrigerator, beside my expired milk and prepackaged turkey slices.
Who was I to ever criticize Mr. November now?
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
That night, the hard part was sitting in the dark. Well—the hardest part had been getting to sleep that morning. After I’d woken up and the sun had fallen, I’d thrown the bag of blood outside. Its clotted contents looked like a buried autumn leaf against the tire-treaded snow.
And now I waited. I was used to staying up all night, but I usually had things to do, and bright lights to do them under. Minnie was asleep, and the sound of her soft breathing taunted me.
I didn’t know if Anna would want fresh blood, if the plastic would somehow ruin the taste, if she wasn’t into biohazards. I just knew that I’d stay up all night and hope for the best.
Snow drifted down like endless static on an old TV screen. I’d been lost in the chaos of it all, my body in a hibernatory trance, staring out the window. Any sign of the blood bag was long gone, as were the outlines of the cars across the lot. And then near dawn, just as I’d begun doubting my sanity, thinking that I was in some sort of perpetual waking dream, I saw her.
She moved through the snow quickly, still wearing the grimy shift I’d last seen her in. Her hydration was better now—she was still thin, but no longer hollow. Her frizzy blond hair was so light it was hard to see against the snow. She made her way across the quiet lot, dug the bag out, and smelled it. Then she fastened her fingers at its edges and pulled it apart to lap at the frozen blood inside. She looked like a raccoon munching on a wrapper stolen from a Taco Bell Dumpster. Then she turned toward me, as I was watching her from the darkness of my room. She shoved the bag into her mouth and bolted away.
Overhead, I knew the moon I couldn’t see through the clouds anymore was barely half full.
* * *
The next night, I was finally assigned the gentleman in room five. I got the report and then looked at the chart myself.
He was a zombie … firefighter? That was a bit odd. We’d only had two zombies on the floor while I’d been here—Mr. Smith was the second of them, and I’d never been assigned the first.
But I had a mission tonight, above and beyond mere nursing. I needed to get more blood. I walked into the darkened room, tubes in hand. If I got his blood now, I could toss it in my purse on break. The monitor was still in standby, casting a faint glow over him where he lay on the bed. I knew what smelled different about this room now; it was the scent of warm earth.
“Hello, Mr. Smith.”
He smiled in the dim light. “Hello again, ghost nurse.”
I snorted. “Well, neurologically, you’re intact. Mind if I turn on the light?”
“Feel free.”
My hand found the switch and I got my first look at a real live—dead?—zombie.
Mr. Smith was tall, stretching almost the entire length of the bed, with wide shoulders. The parts I could see of him outside of the sheets and his hospital gown—his arms, his neck, and his face—were all covered by almost-healed smooth rippling scars. Between the dark color of his skin as it was and the slightly lighter color of his skin as it healed, he looked like a dark pond on a windy day.
“I remember you,” he said. His eyes were a light golden brown, and the skin around them crinkled when he smiled.
“I remember you too.” I smiled back. “Thanks again—and sorry for waking you up.”
“I don’t really sleep.” He sat up straighter in his bed.
As I walked into the room I formed my plan. I would do the blood draw last, so I could hurry away and hide. I hadn’t heard about any IV sites, but I had a butterfly needle for the draw. I didn’t really like poking someone unnecessarily, but it wasn’t like he could get an infection and die from a needle stick now, was it? I reached for the blood pressure cuff, to start my set of vitals, and held it aloft. “Which arm?” I asked. A lot of patients with heavy scarring had a side they preferred, one which the cuff’s squeezing hurt less.
Faint eyebrows rose. “I believe the previous nurse was having you on.”
“How so?” I un-Velcroed the cuff.
“I don’t have blood pressure.” The corners of his lips quirked into a smile. “I have blood, but to the best of my knowledge, it doesn’t really go anywhere.”
“Oh.” The lab tubes in my pocket felt heavy, and I felt my face flush. “Damn.”
“You were … looking for some?” he asked, tilting his head forward.
“Actually, yes. Sorry.” I frowned at myself. How was I going to get Anna to come closer tomorrow night when I was off shift again?
“I could … give you a finger?” He held up his right pinkie. “I don’t need all of them. One won’t hurt much.” I blanched, and he laughed out loud. “I’m teasing. It would grow back—but I’m teasing.”I forced a grin. “Heh. Sorry.”
“You apologize too much.”
“Sorry—” I began instinctively.
“See?”
I rolled my eyes. He was right, but what did he know about me, and the things I had to apologize for? He wasn’t Igor-ing around, stealing blood.
I looked around the room. He’d been here for long enough to have photos on the walls—rows of uniformed men stood in front of large red trucks. A cafeteria tray sat on the shelf on the far side of the room. I walked over and picked it up. A rime of brown-gray sauce and a gnawed portion of a bone remained. “What was dinner?”
“Long pig?” he guessed. I looked askance at him and he waved his arms in a negating fashion. “I’m not sure. I eat what they send me.”
For a moment, I imagined him lumbering after me, slow-shuffling horror-movie style. He was far wittier than a movie zombie, but he was still technically undead. I lifted the tray—it had a good weight. I could hit someone over the head with it if I needed to. I turned around and kept the tray between us.
“How is it that you’re a firefighter, if you want to eat people?”
“I don’t want to eat everyone. I really only need flesh to regenerate. Which is why I’m here, so I can eat under qualified medical supervision.”
“So this?” I asked, dipping the tray.
“I have a don’t ask, don’t tell, policy.”
I supposed that, given the number of surgeries being performed in the hospital at any one time, and the number of people dying here—some of whose identities were unknown and some few of those who likely had no next of kin—it was possible that we did have enough extra flesh to go around, as disgusting as the thought might be.
“But why be a firefighter?”
“I’m almost indestructible. What else should I do?” He shrugged. “I get to have a well-paying job and save a few lives. I get burned a few times, heal up a few times, and then move on to a new town.”
“You’re the Bruce Banner of zombie firefighters?”
His lips broke into an easy grin. “A comic book fan?”
“My brother used to read them a lot.” I shrugged with the tray. I didn’t mention how fast he’d sold them when he’d found other pursuits.
“I only saw the movies.” He jerked his chin at me. “What’s the last movie you saw?
“It’s, uh, been a while.” Was he flirting with me? I’d only ever had patients who were detoxing flirt with me before, and they’d never been very subtle. More of a “Hey, nurse, can we fuck?” between periods of trying to run naked down the hall.
“That’s too bad,” he said. He was grinning even wider.
“Well!” I said, walking again toward the door. “I guess there’s not much that I can do for you tonight, Mr. Smith.”
“Call me Ti.”
“Ti,” I said, then managed to balance the tray on one hand and open the door behind me with the other. “So—just hit the call light if you need anything,” I said, all in one breath. “I’ll be right outside.”
“All right…” He squinted, his eyes searching my chest for my badge. “Miss Spence.”
“Call me Edie,” I blurted out, and made my escape.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
“So, Gina—what’s Mr. Smith’s story?” I tried to sidle around to the were-corrals without anyone noticing. It wouldn’t do for Charles or Meaty to hear the tone of my voice.
“Just read the chart. Wait—why are you not reading the chart?” She stopped her own charting and clicked her pen. “Ohhhhhhhhhhhh,” she said, her inflection a wave. I sighed. It would be nice to someday live in a world where what I was thinking wasn’t always written on my face.
Gina grinned and rocked back in her chair, suddenly all business. Girl business.
“Frequent flyer. This is the third time he’s been here. He’s a nice guy, I’ve helped out with him sometimes. He just needs a place where human is on the menu to hide out while he heals,” she said and shrugged.
My stomach wanted to turn. But in comparison to everything else I’d seen or done in my nursing career so far—like, say, that I’d had stolen blood sitting in my fridge the previous night—I didn’t think I could throw any culinary stones. “Anything else?” I pressed.
“Nope. Keeps to himself. I don’t even know his first name.” She shrugged. “Mr. Smith is one of those made-up protective names—” she said.