“What, are you afraid of them?” Benny yelled.
“Keep your voice down. ”
“Why? You afraid a zom will come after you? Big, tough zombie killer who’s afraid to kill a zombie. ”
“Benny,” said Tom with thin patience, “sometimes you say some truly stupid things. ”
“Whatever,” Benny said, and pushed past him.
“Do you know where you’re going?” Tom said when Benny was a dozen paces along the road.
“This way. ”
“I’m not,” said Tom, and he began climbing the slope of a hill that rose gently from the left-hand side of the road. Benny stood in the middle of the road and seethed for a full minute. He was muttering the worst words he knew all the while he climbed up the hill after Tom.
There was a narrower road at the top of the hill, and they followed that in silence. By ten o’clock they’d entered a series of steeper hills and valleys that were shaded by massive oak trees with cool green leaves. Tom cautioned Benny to be quiet as they climbed to the top of a ridge that overlooked a small country lane. At the curve of the road was a small cottage with a fenced yard and an elm tree so gnarled and ancient that it looked like the world had grown up around it. Two figures stood in the yard, but they were too small to see. Tom flattened out at the top of the ridge and motioned for Benny to join him.
Tom pulled his field glasses from a belt holster and studied the figures for a long minute.
“What do you think they are?” He handed the binoculars to Benny, who snatched them with more force than was necessary. Benny peered through the lenses in the direction Tom pointed.
“They’re zoms,” Benny said.
“No kidding, boy genius. But what are they?”
“Dead people. ”
“Ah. ”
“Ah … what?”
“You just said it. They’re dead people. They were once living people. ”
“So what? Everybody dies. ”
“True,” admitted Tom. “How many dead people have you seen?”
“What kind of dead? Living dead, like them, or dead dead, like Aunt Cathy?”
“Either. Both. ”
“I don’t know. The zombies at the fence … and a couple of people in town, I guess. Aunt Cathy was the first person I ever knew who died. I was, like, six when she died. I remember the funeral and all. ” Benny continued to watch the zombies. One was a tall man, the other a young woman or teenage girl. “And … Morgie Mitchell’s dad died after that scaffolding collapsed. I went to his funeral too. ”
“Did you see either of them quieted?”
“Quieted” was the acceptable term for the necessary act of inserting a metal spike, called a “sliver,” into the base of the skull to sever the brain stem. Since First Night, anyone who died would reanimate as a zombie. Bites made it happen too, but really any recently deceased person would come back. Every adult in town carried at least one sliver, though Benny had never seen one used.
“No,” he said. “You wouldn’t let me stay in the room when Aunt Cathy died. And I wasn’t there when Morgie’s dad died. I just went to the funerals. ”
“What were the funerals like? For you, I mean. ”
“I dunno. Kind of quick. Kind of sad. And then everyone went to a party at someone’s house and ate a lot of food. Morgie’s mom got totally shitfaced—”
“Language. ”
“Morgie’s mom got drunk,” Benny said in way that suggested having his language corrected was as difficult as having his teeth pulled. “Morgie’s uncle sat in the corner singing Irish songs and crying with the guys from the farm. ”
“That was a year, year and a half ago, right? First spring planting?”