You're Dead: Chapter Two (special preview)

Just as we were about to walk towards Stepford Steppes Stevie’s phone went off. She had me wait a second while she checked the alert. “Oh fuck no!” She slammed the door shut right in my face and ran back around to the driver’s seat.

“Freddie can wait! This is bullshit!” Stevie drove out of that parking lot so fast I thought I would see swat cars chasing her.

I lifted myself up, having fallen between the seats and into the aisle when she slammed the door on me. I looked up out the window then turned to Stevie. I was confused enough as it was. I was a whole telenovela in terms of my emotions. This felt like nothing in comparison.

“What’s going on?” I grunted as I got back into the passenger seat.

“Notification on my security cameras.” Stevie was seething. She had her teeth grit, her shoulders tense, and both hands on the driving wheel. Her hands were clenched so tight that the knuckles had gone pale.

It was surprisingly easy to feel concerned for someone else. That concern was a bubble that bounced like a squishy ball outside my chest. “Someone is breaking into your house?”

“Not someone,” she laughed. “This is a something. And he’s been warned before.”

All sorts of ideas for what it could be drifted around my mind. If ghosts and grim reapers could exist, who knows what else was out there? Bigfoot? Lochness? Maybe Elvis was still alive? Stevie punched the gas that I felt the force of the food truck shifting.

“I swear on my grave if he touches anything!” Stevie growled through grit teeth.

We drove by the hospital, and I could barely see anything as fast as we were going. But sitting on the stoop outside the hospital, I saw my sister. She was smoking, which she had given up ages ago. It made me angry to see her smoking, I wanted to yell out the window at her to stop. It only dawned on me as we drove away that she was smoking because she had just seen the last of me.

I slouched back in my seat and heaved. That globby, floating sensation of nausea pulsated around me. I was dead and my sister knew I was dead.

Stevie pulled up outside her house. I didn’t really look at it, I just followed along behind her. My mind was elsewhere, even as she ran through the open front door screaming in spanish.

“Oh hey, Stevie!” The speaker then hit the floor with a thud.

I walked in, seeing moths gathered around every light fixture. They fluttered about, trickling around the room. I was so focused on them, I barely saw Stevie roughhousing her intruder while yelling a stream of insults in spanish at him.

The moths shifted, moving from the lights and coming towards me. They hovered around me, landing on me. I could feel their wings and the soft slip of the dust that fell from them. It was a strange comfort. I had never cared for moths in the past, but now they were the only thing I could feel.

“I told you not to come back here! You make a mess of everything! Get your own home!” Stevie yelled, catching my senses.

Stevie pushed a man and he fell right in front of me on his rear. He looked up at me, his head tilted back. “Hey, there’s a soul here.” He turned around as he stood up to face me. “Did you put off a soul just to come beat me up.”

“I didn’t want you starting a fire again, Booker! Besides, she can wait,” Stevie scoffed. She went into the kitchen, turning off the stove then moving things from the top. “I use this for work! This isn’t a toy for your ramen hacks.”

Booker was still looking at me. He had long dark dreadlocks pushed back by a colorful and fluffy headband. His skin was dark, which made his honey colored eyes stand out like headlights in a fog. If that weren’t enough, he was the tallest person I had ever come across.

“These look familiar.” Booker reached out, taking my hand which held the moth scissors.

I recoiled, pressing my hand back to my chest.

He furrowed his brow then his eyes opened wide. He abruptly turned towards Stevie. “Where’s Mara?”

Stevie huffed as she strutted from the kitchen. “Gone.” She opened a door and started fanning the moths out. “You always make such a mess where you go! Where’s Iggy?”

Booker approached her. “Gone? What do you mean gone?” He may have been tall, but compared to the buff Stevie he was a string bean.

Stevie pointed at me. “That was her last soul before retirement. I was taking her to Freddie before you broke into my house!” She stormed back into the kitchen. “Now tell me where Iggy is! Last time he ate all my fucking ceral!”

“Oh boy, Freddie isn’t going to be happy about you,” Booker laughed.

I narrowed my eyes at him. “What?”

Booker frowned, his eyes were pretty, but struck fear into me. “Just warning you, but you are in for a world of hurt.”

My already anxious soul couldn’t handle much more. Moths gathered thick around my head and shoulders, still trying to comfort me. “Why?” My voice cracked.