Dad looked up at Mary, who drew in a sudden intake of breath.
The entire right side of Dad’s body was drenched with blood. He looked up at her with wide eyes, his face pale. He mouthed her name.
“Mom!” Mary yelled. “Mom, Dad’s hurt!” Mary darted back down the hall to her mother’s room to get her up, so she wasn’t aware of her father as he made his way up the stairs, his dead eyes wide open and unblinking as he was guided to the warm, living flesh of his family.
Living at home had its disadvantages, but one of the perks was not having to get a career-minded job while he worked at trying to build his low budget film production company from the ground up.
Mike Lombardo was in his basement living room/office, sitting at his desk performing the final edits on his horror film Dr. Chud. He yawned. He and his partner, Milano, had been working non-stop since they shot the final scene earlier that evening in the back yard. They’d stuck their friend Bob in a gas mask for the final scene and all had gone well. Now it was the task of assembling three hours of raw footage and editing it down to an hour of good narrative.
Bob was sacked out on the sofa, snoring softly. Milano was sitting next to him, glassy-eyed. He shifted his stocky frame in the chair and Mike could tell he wanted nothing more than to crash. Bob just didn’t give a shit; he could sleep anywhere, at any time, and had done so accordingly.
“Just one more scene,” Mike said. He was wearing a black T-shirt with the Dr. Chud character on the front. Dr. Chud was going to be a recurring character for future films, and Bob was the perfect actor to portray him. He was a little guy, for one thing. The Dr. Chud character was written to be slight in stature, and Bob fit the bill perfectly. And despite the fact that Bob was a horrible actor, when he donned the gas mask it transformed him — he was actually a good actor when he was in costume. Maybe it was because his inhibitions were down and he could actually let loose and play the character. Whatever the case, Mike had been forced to rewrite his screenplay to remove Bob’s dialogue from much of the film, since he was such a horrible actor. Restructuring the screenplay had allowed him and Milano to build Dr. Chud’s backstory in a different way but the end result still worked. When you operated on a budget of less than a few thousand dollars, you had to work with what you had. That meant relying on your friends to play pivotal roles in your films, even if they couldn’t act.
Milano cocked his head toward the ceiling. “Sounds like the rest of your family is up now.”
“Huh?” Mike said. He had multiple files open in Adobe Premiere. Let me just finish this and we can catch some sleep. We can take a look again tomorrow and if it still works, we’re done. If it doesn’t work, we’ll just do a few more edits. No problem.
“Your family,” Milano said. He yawned again, took off his glasses and began polishing the lenses with his T-shirt. “Your dad was outside yelling about something, then he came in the house. Then Mary started yelling about something. I figured they were arguing.”
That stopped Mike cold. He looked at Milano. “Mary never argues with my parents.”
“I know. That’s why I thought it was weird.”
“I haven’t heard anything.”
“You’ve been too focused on trying to finish this.” Milano gestured at the PC. “Seriously man, it’s late, and we’ve been at this for over twelve hours. Let’s call it a night and — ”
The door to the basement opened and they turned toward the sound. Mike immediately moved to save the last edit. Milano scooted out of the way and Mike could hear the fumbling footsteps of several people trumping down the stairs. Probably both his parents wanting to talk to him about Mary. What the hell was going on?
Milano’s scream came just as Mike caught his first glimpse of what had entered his basement digs, and he screamed in surprise too.
His first thought was that his folks had been badly injured in some kind of fight. They were bloody, their clothing ripped, but then he saw the dead eyes in his father, saw the gaping wound in his mother’s throat, saw that his sister’s stomach had been ripped open and they weren’t complaining at all, they were heading straight for them like some kind of goddamn–
— zombies —
And before he and Milano could collect their wits and yell out a warning to a slumbering Bob, Mike Lombardo’s family swarmed in like attack dogs.
By the time Naomi and Jim made it to Brendan Hall at five minutes till four it was already too late. Their drive to the Juvenile facility had been made in vain.
They weren’t going to release Tim to their custody after all.
The bastards were really going to press criminal charges against him.
A Lancaster city detective explained the charges as he led them into a small conference room. Despite being awaken from a sound sleep, Naomi and Jeff were wide awake upon hearing their son had been caught driving around with Gordon Smith after curfew (Naomi was more surprised by Tim sneaking out of the house than the curfew violation). He wasn’t being charged with curfew violation, however. As the Lancaster City detective explained, when Tim Gaines was picked up they ran a computer check (standard procedure) and got a hit.
There was a warrant out for Tim’s arrest.
The detective had explained that the decision had been made late last night to file charges of criminal mischief, vandalism, desecration of a cemetery and theft of a corpse due to the Reamstown incident. “The arrest warrant was signed by Judge Wilkes,” the detective said. “That’s why your son was brought directly to Brendan Hall instead of returned home.”
“Who was the arresting officer?” Naomi asked.
“Officer Frank Clapton.”
“Did he tell Tim why he was being taken here instead of being brought home?”
“Office Clapton didn’t want to upset him any more than he already was,” the detective said.
“So you can’t release him to us?” Naomi asked. Jeff was standing beside her, wide-eyed and shuffling to and fro with nervous agitation.
“I’m afraid not,” the detective said. The detective they were speaking to was in his late thirties, slim, with sandy hair and a slight mustache. “He has to be arraigned and the judge has to set bail.”
“I can’t believe this,” Jeff muttered. Naomi felt Jeff’s frustration and it took all her will power to avoid snapping at the detective.
“I’m sorry,” the detective said. He was calm, soothing. It was obvious he’d been through hundreds of similar conversations with worried parents. “Your son will be okay. He’s got his own holding cell, so he isn’t in any danger. We don’t put violent youth offenders in the same cells as other youth offenders.”
“You damn well better not,” Naomi muttered.
“When will they set his bail?” Jeff asked. “And how much do you think it will be?”
“I don’t know. It could be as early as nine this morning, could be as late as this afternoon.”
“Can we see him?”
“Yes, but not until visiting hours.”
“When the hell is that?” Naomi was seething.
The detective sighed. “I apologize. I realize you’re under a lot of strain and — ”
“You don’t know the least of it!” Naomi snapped.
“Honey,” Jeff said. He took her lightly by the elbow in an attempt to calm her down.
Naomi held up her hands to stop him. “It’s okay! It’s okay!” She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down. She looked at the detective, trying her best to keep herself under control. “When are visiting hours?”
“Ten A.M.,” the detective said. “It’s possible he’ll be transported to the courthouse before then. If you’d like I can have you alerted to when he’s transported so you can arrange to be there.”