Prawn of the Dead, page 9
Chapter 6
I blinked before my eyes went wide. Okay, I’d just been awakened by a phone call from a frantic Leon, who’d kindly called last night and offered to open the store for us so Mom could sleep in after a long day yesterday.
He’d been carrying on about people with guns and TV reporters out in front of the store, and I hadn’t wasted a second to even brush my tangled hair before I threw on my ratty bathrobe and ran across our yard to the front of the store.
Now, as I stared in utter confusion, my head spun. “What the…?”
“Do you see what they’re doing to my garden by the store window, Lemon? Come spring I’ll have nothin’ but weeds if they keep tramplin’ them like they’re running with the bulls! I’m going to get my broom and shove it right up their keisters!” Mom yelled for the benefit of the crowd who’d gathered outside the Smoke and Petrol in the misty-cold rain.
It was seven o’clock in the morning, for gravy’s sake. I’d barely wiped the sleep out of my eyes, and I was already going to have to prevent a mass homicide by way of broom.
In a daze, I tucked my bathrobe around me a little tighter to get to where Mom was. As I picked my way through the sea of rowdy strangers, I noted three or four television vans from various networks in Seattle, the station’s reporters dressed sharply, microphones in hand.
Yet, I didn’t recognize a single soul, and nothing was registering in my sleep-addled brain. Who were all these people, and why were they all outside our convenience store with toy guns and fake crossbows dressed up like extras from Shaun of The Dead?
As the rain pelted my face and wind whipped around me, turning my hair into something I’m sure resembled a big, fuzzy brown cotton ball, I tried to figure out what the bloody heck was going on.
But I wasn’t afforded much of a chance. The moment these people realized someone new had entered the picture, the intensity of their overall vibe of impatience changed to urgent.
“That’s her!” someone yelled, before the crowd pushed forward with grunts and shouts, moving like one enormous entity in a swarm of accusations and pointing fingers. And they were headed in my direction.
I realized in seconds they meant me when someone shoved a microphone under my nose and asked, “Can you tell us about the killer zombie, Miss Layne?”
My mouth fell open as I tried to wrap my head around the question.
“Miss Layne? What can you tell us about the murder of Myron Fairbanks and the allegation he was killed by a zombie? What does it have to do with your mother?” the male reporter with hawk-like eyes, hair resembling blond plastic and a slick navy-blue suit with a contrasting deep purple tie prompted.
“Zombies! Zombies! Zombies!” the throng of people roared, holding their plastic weapons high.
“Miss Layne? Can you give us your take on the alleged zombie roaming around Fig Harbor?” the reporter persisted urgently, his glazed, intense eyes boring holes into me.
I finally found my voice—and my outrage. “The what? Did you just hear yourself ask me that question? Does any sane, reasonable, dare I say, responsible reporter ask someone about zombies? Would Dan Rather ask a ludicrous question like that? Aren’t there bigger, less ridiculous, far more important fish to fry? Like the war in Afghanistan, or hunger, or anything that doesn’t sound like it’s been ripped from a filthy tabloid? Shame on you, whoever you are, Mr. Hack Reporter! Now, get off my property, or I’m going to have you arrested for trespassing! Allll of you!” I bellowed, using my finger as a brush to broad stroke every last one of these sensationalistic, bloodthirsty vultures.
I think I’ve mentioned I don’t like confrontation much, but I’m also not terribly afraid to confront, either. Much like Jessica Fletcher, if I feel threatened, or if I think my family is threatened, I’m all sorts of angry, caged circus bear.
Of course, that was the very moment Mom burst from the interior of the store, clearly having gone inside to find her broom because she held it high in get-off-my-lawn fashion. Her bright blue eyes alight with the fire of her anger, she began waving it around like a baseball bat.
“Get on out of here, the lot of you, or I’m gonna knock your blocks off!” she roared, her face still puffy from sleep, her hair smashed to one side of her head.
Naturally, to onlookers and gawkers alike, she looked half out of her mind with her wild eyes and striped housecoat, only fueling the image these sensation hogs sought.
I latched on to her arm and turned her away from the crowd as quickly as possible, taking the broom from her remarkably strong hands and leaning it up against the store.
“Mom, please, I’m begging you, go back inside, lock the door behind you, and call Justice and Chief Burrows. Don’t give me a hard time about this. Just do as I ask and don’t make a scene. And don’t speak a word to these vultures. Please?”
For probably the first time in my mother’s life, at least since I’ve known her, she actually did what I asked without qualm. She didn’t do it without some seriously angry body language and narrowed eyes, but she did it, scooting back inside the store and locking the door behind her.
She also didn’t do it without throwing up her middle finger to the crowd behind me, which in turn made the crowd roar their approval. But for Mom, it was a tame act of defiance in comparison.
Swirling around, I faced the folks who’d come to gawk and finally began to understand the bigger picture as I gazed at them, their expressions wild and…what’s the word I’m looking for?
Hungry. Yes. That’s the one. They looked rabidly hungry, as though they’d been waiting for this buffet to open up and hadn’t eaten in days.
And then everything began to make sense. Zombies…
A hole in Myron’s head + Cappie’s hysteria at the police station yesterday + zombies = mayhem.
Somehow, the story Cappie had made up about zombies had gotten to the press. That had to be the explanation. Also, these people were strangers to me. I couldn’t identify a single face, which meant he’d also managed to leak the story to the public.
That’s when it hit me like a ton of bricks. His YouTube channel had to be the culprit.
Like I’ve said, Cappie thinks the government is out to get him at every turn, and that includes the Internet (which he’s convinced had been invented as another way for the soul-sucking robots to play Big Brother), and he has a YouTube channel where he offers up his whacky theories and tips on how to stay out of “The Man’s” line of fire.
Now, I know what you’re thinking. How the flip do you keep yourself on the down low when you’re virtually advertising yourself on the Internet?
But Cappie has a crazy theory for how to avoid that, too. He thinks if he holes up in his camper behind his daughter Noreen’s—covers himself head to toe in a tinfoil wrap resembling a HAZMAT suit and uses only a battery-powered flashlight (as a precaution on the off chance the power lines above Noreen’s are tapped, and his anti-government rants will be heard. Cappie thinks tinfoil deflects everything government), he can make videos about his doomsday prepping and government conspiracies and no one will haul him off to jail for speaking out against The Man or catch him for tax evasion.
Taxes I’m convinced he hadn't paid since at least the eighties when he moved here to Fig and set up shop when his daughter Noreen was in her last year of high school.
After he’s done making the videos in his secret-not-so-secret Bat Cave, he gives the footage to a high school student and gets him to upload it so as not to leave any digital footprint, never once considering if the government wanted to catch ol’ Waylan, they’d just follow his all-but-neon-lit trail on the Internet right here to Fig.
A blind man could find him, for Pete’s sake. He’s the most colorful figure in Fig Harbor, and his ramshackle camper looks like something straight out of a paranoid delusion.
But no one has the heart to tell Cappie he’s likely nothing more than a speck of dust on the government’s screen—to do so would take away everything he lives for, and while he can really test your patience with some of his kooky ideas, he’s a Figger through and through.
He’s just living his life on the fringe, the way he wants to live it, and as long as he isn’t hurting himself or anyone else, and he’s healthy, most everyone leaves him alone as long as Noreen keeps an eye on him. Cappie’s like a landmark in Fig, our mascot in seventies wear, of sorts.
So we all put up with his shenanigans and pacify him. But today—today was not the day for his antics. I had no desire to indulge his outlandish notions or behavior. Especially with the way it could affect my mom. In fact, if I get my hands on him, I’m going to give him a good what for.
I’ll bet my eyeteeth he’s made some whacky video accusing the government as the party responsible for Myron’s death. And obviously, there are plenty of people willing to buy into his hype about zombies invading Fig.
When one young gentleman stepped forward from the crowd to approach me, my conviction turned to fact. He wore a T-shirt that read “Daryl Is My Spirit Animal,” with a picture of the famous Walking Dead star Norman Reedus splashed across the front of his chest.
His denim jacket was ragged, and the scruff on his face suggested he hadn’t showered or shaved in a little while. But it was his glassy-eyed stare and zombie makeup that had me putting my dukes up.
“We have a right to know if zombies are invading!” he hollered, so the people in the back of the crowd could hear.
“It’s the zombie apocalypse, just like that guy Cappie said!” someone else cried, sending the mass of people into a roar of shouting approval.
And then they all began to chant, “Brains! Brains! Brains!” Growing louder by the second as the Daryl lover spurred them on with a shaking fist held skyward.
“Move, you bunch of ding-dongs, or I’ll show you your brains when I beat them out of you!”
I sucked in a gulp of damp, cold air filled with relief. Coco had arrived. It was only the two of us against probably fifty or more people, but it was better than facing this alone until the police arrived.
She used the tip of her umbrella to push her way through the throng, poking unsuspecting bystanders with a shove and a grunt. “Move, you nutbuckets! What kind of animals raised you? Can’t you see a lady wants to pass? Now let me through!”
Coco shoved her way forward, her red-and-gray scarf tied in a loose bow around her neck against a teal blouse and a dark gray skirt. She all but collapsed into me, but that didn’t last long before she righted herself in her heels, turned toward everyone, and lifted her umbrella high, popping it open right in one reporter’s face.
She gave it a hard shake right under his nose, hard enough that droplets of water sprayed onto his suit. “I said you all better skedaddle and skedaddle now! Go back to wherever it is you came from because we don’t want you here in Fig Harbor. Now get out of here—the police are on the way!”
“It’s a free country, lady. We can go wherever we wanna go. The government’s not gonna keep us in the dark anymore. We have a right to defend ourselves. We’re gonna find the zombies and kill ’em all!” an enraged voice from way in the back somewhere responded.
“This is crazy!” I whisper-yelled in Coco’s ear. “They think a zombie killed Myron!”
My port in any storm, Coco clucked her tongue in admonishment. “Here’s the irony in this, Lemon. You’re always complaining about my penchant for turning nothing into something. But just look, would you? All thanks to Cappie. Did you see that video? He’s bonkers. I mean, I knew he was way left of center, but some of those videos he talks that sweet boy Turner Booth into uploading? They’re nuttier than squirrel dung. We should be grateful he only has two hundred subscribers. Who knows what would’ve crawled out of the woodwork if his audience was any bigger.”
I knew it. You didn’t have to have a sleuthing bone in your body to know Cappie was responsible for this uproar. I also understood how one YouTube video gone viral could go one of two ways. For our barbecue and the store, that sole, random tourist review meant hordes of people, flocking to the store and sales galore, leaving us with a terrific cushion for the winter months.
For Fig it meant hordes of zombie hunters who’d lost touch with reality.
I pressed a hand to my suddenly aching head and winced. “Dang it. I’m gonna kill him, Coco! Who are all these people?”
“Well, judging from the comments on Cappie’s YouTube channel, they’re part of a club that hunts zombies. You know, like Bigfoot enthusiasts and such—except zombies? Like, they genuinely believe the apocalypse is just around the corner and zombies are coming. Hearing what happened to Myron and then Cappie and his governmentally engineered zombie theory, well, this is the result.” She pointed to the crowd.
“You’re joking…” I mumbled even though I knew she wasn’t.
“Swear it’s true. They bantered back and forth all night long in the comments before they decided on a road trip to Fig. And as you can see, some of them even dressed up for the occasion. According to some of their tweets, dressing up like a zombie will make them appear like they’re part of the herd of zombies they think they’ll find, thus making them zombie-proof.”
I’d heard and even experienced the Bigfoot enthusiasts once before here in Fig, but zombie hunters? I shook my head. I couldn’t focus on how they’d gotten here right now. Only that they were here and mucking everything up.
“Look, Mom’s calling Justice right now for help, but I need to get out of here, or I’m going to end up all over the local news channels in my ratty bathrobe.”
Coco rolled her eyes at me and plucked at the lapel of my robe. “Couldn’t you have at least put on the one I gave you for Christmas? It’s the perfect color red for you, and it doesn’t look like the moths have been dining on it for the last century.”
I tucked the collar of my worn but comfortable bathrobe around my chin and huffed. “Because that’s exactly what I thought when I rushed out here still half asleep. This was the first thing I grabbed when Leon called me in a panic. Be glad I’m not out here in my skivvies. Forget my bathrobe. We need to get out of here. Now, on the count of three, we’re going to make a break for the back—”
The sound of sirens cut me off as Justice screeched into our store parking lot, the chief and two more cars right behind him.
I grabbed Coco by the arm and pointed her in the direction of the path leading to the back of the store, where our meat smokers were located. “Go now!”
While the attention was off us and on the arrival of the police, we escaped toward the back of the store, my slippers clapping against the ground in tune with Coco’s heels as we kicked up water and mud.
Just as we rounded the corner in a skid, Coco screamed—so long and so loud, I think she shattered one of my eardrums.
As I peeked over her shoulder, I gasped and shoved her behind me.
There it was. Plain as day, leaning up against the back of the store as though it were some kind of forgotten garden tool.
A severed arm.
Chapter 7
I, too, fought a scream, until my brain caught up with my eyes and I identified what we were seeing. In the midst of our four meat smokers, leaning up against the store’s brick façade, there was a fake severed arm, complete with fake tendons, veins and some pretty realistic blood dripping down the biceps and along the elbow.
I lunged for it as Coco screamed a warning. “Cheese and rice, don’t touch it, Lemon!”
But I grabbed it and pointed it at her with a laugh. Coco’s plenty tough until it comes to some blood and guts, something Justice and I tease her about with endless amusement.
I tweaked her arm, forcing her to loosen her kung-fu grip on mine. “It’s a fake, Coco. Probably one of those Cappie subscribers from out front, playing a practical joke on us.”
Her whole body shivered in a violent ripple as she shook her hands out and did a weird dance, hopping from foot to foot, revulsion on her face. “Ugh! That’s not funny! It’s disgusting—get it away from me!”
I used it to bang on the back door, making Coco squeal in horror. “Mom! Leon! Let us in!”
On tiptoe, I peered into the window of the back door to see Leon making his way toward us, his face white as a sheet when he opened the door and jumped back. “What is that?”
I scratched my chin with the fake arm’s fingers. “A severed arm. It’s a fake. Forget this, are you okay?”
He made a face, his hazel eyes round with shock as he tugged us both inside the storage area where we kept all our shipments of inventory. “Get in here, you two! Those people are nuts!”
“Leon, I’m so sorry!” I gripped his arm and patted it. He was just a kid—a kid who certainly didn’t need extra cash badly enough to put up with this kind of nonsense.
He nodded his sandy-blond head and motioned us in, slamming the door and locking it behind us. “I swear, it’s all-out insanity out there, Miss Layne. One minute I was getting ready to open the store, the next, there’s a crowd of people and news vans outside all screaming about zombies and brains. I’m sorry I woke you, but I didn’t know what to do. What the heck’s going on?”
As I explained what I deduced was happening, I began heading toward the front of the store, where my mother was likely planning a return attack.
I forgot I still had the arm in my hand as I scanned the front of the store for my mother.
She shrieked, backing up against the counter. “Lemon! Put that down! Severed arms have all sorts of germs. Haven’t I taught you better?”
I dropped it on the floor between us and almost laughed. “It’s fake, Mom. Probably a prop from one of those crazies outside. Are you okay?”
She straightened instantly, her eyes hard blue chips of determination as Coco wrapped an arm around her. “I’m fine, Sugarbuns. But I won’t have this hullabaloo going on outside our door. It’s bad for business. You know how slow it gets in the winter, Lemon. We can’t have those yahoos running around out there, carrying on about zombies!”
I ran to the front windows and began unrolling the bamboo blinds, blocking out the angry mob Justice was now corralling. “I agree, but we also can’t let anyone in here until this is cleared up. I’m making an executive decision and closing the store, maybe for the next few days. But at the very least for this morning, until Justice and Chief Burrows can get rid of them. No one can use the bathroom until the forensics people finish gathering evidence anyway. Agreed?”
