Kill the Dead

I sit down on the toilet and she follows me in, closing and locking the door behind her. She drops down onto my lap, straddling me, and we’re kissing again. Her skirt is pushed up and she’s moving her hips up and down over the hard-on that’s been tucked away in my pants for eleven years. Maybe she’s part mind reader because she reaches down, unzips me, and lets my cock flip back against my belly. She reaches down and wraps her hand around it. “What about your pal Ritchie?” “You talk too much.” She lets go of my cock and stands up, reaches under her skirt and slips her panties off, balancing on one leg at a time with the sure and practiced motion of a sniper taking aim. “You should know I haven’t done this in a long time.” “Shut up.” She lowers her hips, grabs my cock, and slides me into her. The feeling is both familiar and strange, in the same way that everything happening is both familiar and strange. The good news is that bodies are bodies, and even if your brain is on overload, sense memory takes over when you feel her body start to move. After a couple of fumbling tries, we fall into a gliding rhythm and our bodies seem to sync up, Brigitte coming down deeper and deeper as I move up into her. My hands move back up her body, cup her breasts, and pinch her nipples. She leans back, pressing her hands and arms against the stall walls while thrusting down hard with her hips. Every few strokes, I put my hands on her waist and hold her there, deep inside her, then let her go and we fall back to our rhythm. We’re both panting and covered in sweat. Gutting Drifters was a walk on the beach. This might kill us. Something blares from across the room, bouncing off the tile walls. It’s a short loop of Johnny Cash singing “Ring of Fire.” Brigitte slumps for a second. “Shit.” She grabs my hair as her hip thrusts come harder and faster. She moans, wraps her hands around my neck, and kisses me hard. Her breathing gets ragged. Her nails dig into my shoulders. Just as Johnny reminds us one last time that it burns, burns, burns in the ring of fire, Brigitte presses down hard onto me and stays there. Her hands shake on my shoulders and she’s about to draw blood. Then she slowly relaxes, letting out a long, breathy “oh,” and starts breathing normally again. We stay that way for a while, her forehead resting against mine. It’s sweet at first. We’re both panting, but sweat keeps running into our eyes and burning. She laughs, brushes my cheek with her palm, and stands, reaching between her legs to slide me out of her. Brigitte unlocks the stall and goes straight for her phone. I don’t have to ask who has a “Ring of Fire” ringtone. I tuck my softening cock back inside my pants and go to the sink to wash up again. Brigitte is staring at her phone, reading a text. “The call wasn’t important, but the text is my people saying that the truck is nearby. We should be somewhere else before they begin their work.” “Fine by me.” Brigitte comes to the sink to wash next to me. She bumps her shoulders into mine. I bump back. It’s a very strange sensation, not having seen a naked woman in all these years and now being next to one whose profession is being naked, so she’s completely relaxed and in no rush to put her clothes back on. But she does. Still relaxed. Still content. And I know that half of her fun is knowing she has done and is doing serious damage to my brain. “Do you always finish off zombie hunts by seducing a virgin?” She smiles at me in the mirror. “How long has it been since you’ve done that?” “Eleven years.” “My God. Now you can tell your friends at school that you’ve seen a real live naked girl.” “I don’t talk to most of the people I know. The rest either aren’t human or they’re dead.” “You can tell Carlos.” “I kind of think he knows.” “You didn’t come back there, did you?” “No.” She smiles. “We’ll have to do something about that next time.” We go into the bar. The chairs are up and the lights are off. The front door is open. Carlos is out front smoking. I say, “I thought you gave those up.” “I started again. Tonight. I knew this thing, riding your coattails and making money off you, was too good to be true. I just didn’t think it would end with me almost getting eaten in my own bar.” Brigitte goes over and puts her arm around Carlos’s shoulders. “The secret world behind the world is always strange at first, but seeing James’s friends must have been strange, too, yes?” “That’s true.” “Don’t be afraid for your business. Customers will be back. By the weekend, you’ll be making more money than ever. People love the exotic, but they love danger even more. And danger they escape is the best of all.” “You think so?” “I’ve seen it with my own eyes. You’ll have a line outside. You’ll need a doorman and pretty girl waitresses.” He looks back at me over his shoulder. “I never liked the velvet rope thing, but I guess there’s worse fates.” “Definitely.” Like ending up in a Dumpster. Seen that twice today. None of the sushi out back is missing any limbs, so someone else lost a hand near Max Overload in the last couple of days. Wonder if it belonged to the eater or the eatee? “I have to go. Simon is waiting for me.” She turns to me. “I’ll call you. We have a lot to talk about.” She pecks Carlos and me on the cheek and gets into a cab waiting at a stoplight at the corner. “Interesting night,” says Carlos. “That’s one word for it.” “Don’t forget your burrito.” He hands me a brown paper bag. “Thanks. See you tomorrow.” “Don’t get eaten on the way home.” “That’s my mission statement.” By the time I make the corner, my adrenaline is dropping and all the pain I felt when I woke up is coming back hard. The bullet wound throbs and I slip into an alcove half doubled up. Even with the pain, I’m thinking straighter than before. I lean against the wall and chant some healing hoodoo. Nothing too heavy. I just want to turn the pain down a few decibels, but not erase it. I don’t want to forget I’m hurt, but I don’t want to be stumbling around like a cripple. It’s stupid I didn’t think to use the spell when I woke up. What is it about me that it takes a massacre to clear my head? I stop by Donut Universe on the way home and get coffee and a bag of glazed old-fashioneds. Waiting for my change, I remember New Year’s Eve and kissing Candy in the middle of the bodies, blood, and the smell of cordite the night we took down Avila and wonder why I seem attracted only to women who enjoy carnage.