My kids are next in line. They watch the current lesson intently, sometimes standing on tiptoes to see, but they aren’t afraid. They are younger than the rest, and will probably be matched against someone too frail to put up much fight, but they don’t know this, and it’s not why they’re unafraid. When the entire world is built on death and horror, when existence is a constant state of panic, it’s hard to get worked up about any one thing. Specific fears have become irrelevant. We’ve replaced them with a smothering blanket far worse.
I pace outside the 747 boarding tunnel for about an hour before going in. I open the jet’s door quietly. Julie is curled up in business class, sleeping. She has wrapped herself in a quilt made of cut-up jeans that I brought back as a souvenir a few weeks ago. The morning sun makes a halo in her yellow hair, sainting her.
‘Julie,’ I whisper.
Her eyes slide open a crack. This time she doesn’t jolt upright or edge away from me. She just looks at me with tired, puffy eyes. ‘What?’ she mumbles.
‘How . . . are . . . ?’
‘How do you think I am?’ She puts her back to me and wraps the blanket around her shoulders.
I watch her for a moment. Her posture is a brick wall. I lower my head and turn to go. But as I step through the doorway she says, ‘Wait.’
I turn around. She is sitting up, the blanket piled on her lap. ‘I’m hungry,’ she says.
I look at her blankly. Hungry? Does she want an arm or leg? Hot blood, meat and life? She’s Living . . . does she want to eat herself? Then I remember what being hungry used to mean. I remember beefsteaks and pancakes, grains and fruits and vegetables, that quaint little food pyramid. Sometimes I miss savouring taste and texture instead of just swallowing energy, but I try not to dwell on it. The old food does nothing to quench our hunger any more. Even bright red meat from a freshly killed rabbit or deer is beneath our culinary standards; its energy is simply incompatible, like trying to run a computer on diesel. There is no easy way out for us, no humane alternative for the fashionably moral. The new hunger demands sacrifice. It demands human suffering as the price for our pleasures, meagre and cheap as they are.
‘You know, food?’ Julie prompts. She mimes the act of taking a bite. ‘Sandwiches? Pizza? Stuff that doesn’t involve killing people?’
I nod. ‘I’ll . . . get.’
I start to leave but she stops me again.
‘Just let me go,’ she says. ‘What are you doing? Why are you keeping me here?’
I think for a moment. I step to her window and point to the runways below. She looks, and sees the church service in progress. The congregation of the Dead, swaying and groaning. The skeletons rattling back and forth, voiceless but somehow charismatic, gnashing their splintered teeth. There are dozens of them down there, swarming.
‘Keep you . . . safe.’
She looks up at me from her chair with an expression I can’t read. Her eyes are narrowed and her lips are tight, but it’s not exactly rage. ‘How do you know my name?’ she demands.
There it is. It had to come eventually.
‘In that building. You said my name, I remember it. How the f**k do you know my name?’
I make no attempt to answer. No way to explain what I know and how I know it, not with my kindergarten vocabulary and special-ed speech impediments. So I simply retreat, exiting the plane and trudging up the boarding tunnel, feeling more acutely than ever the limitations of what I am.
As I stand in Gate 12 considering where to go from here, I feel a touch on my shoulder. Julie is standing behind me. She stuffs her hands into the pockets of her tight black jeans, looking uncertain. ‘Just let me get out and walk around a little,’ she says. ‘I’m going crazy in that plane.’
I don’t answer. I look around the hallways.
‘Come on,’ she says. ‘I walked in here and nobody ate me. Let me go with you to get food. You don’t know what I like.’
This is . . . not entirely true. I know she loves pad thai. I know she drools over sushi. I know she has a weakness for greasy cheeseburgers, despite the Stadium’s rigorous fitness routines. But that knowledge is not mine to use. That knowledge is stolen.
I nod slowly and point at her. ‘Dead,’ I pronounce. I click my teeth and do an exaggerated zombie shuffle.
‘Okay,’ she says.
I lumber around in a circle with slow, shaky steps, letting out an occasional groan.
‘Got it.’
I take her by the wrist and lead her out into the hallway. I gesture in each direction, indicating the small cliques of zombies wandering in the dim morning shadows. I look her straight in the eyes. ‘Don’t . . . run.’
She crosses her heart. ‘Promise.’
Standing so close to her, I find that I can smell her again. She has wiped much of the black blood off her skin, and through the gaps I can detect traces of her life-energy. It bubbles out and sparkles like champagne, igniting flashes deep in the back of my sinuses. Still holding her gaze, I rub my palm into a recent gash on my forearm, and although it’s nearly dry now, I manage to collect a thin smear of blood. I slowly spread this ink on her cheek and down her neck. She shudders, but doesn’t pull away. She is, at the bottom of everything, a very smart girl.
‘Okay?’ I ask, raising my eyebrows.
She closes her eyes, takes a deep breath, cringes at the smell of my fluids, then nods. ‘Okay.’
I walk and she follows, stumbling along behind me and groaning every three or four steps. She is overdoing it, overacting like high school Shakespeare, but she will pass. We walk through crowds of Dead, shambling past us on both sides, and no one glances at us. To my amazement, Julie’s fear seems to be diminishing as we walk, despite the obvious peril of her situation. At a few points I catch her fighting a smile after letting out a particularly hammy moan. I smile too, making sure she doesn’t see me.