Free After Midnight by Joseph Rubas Page A

Some were perfectly arranged in neat piles, but others lie strewn about like blasted rubble.
    I looked over my shoulder. Far below, the tops of dark pines fell away to a distant river, gleaming silver. On the other bank, a white church spire rose in rural beauty. I was surprised how clear the view was.
    "Okay," Jimmy said, startling me, and dropped Joey. I let go, rubbed my hands on my coat as though they were foul, and stepped back. Jimmy bent, unzipped the bag, and pulled the shovel and gas can out.
    "You just hang out," he told me, "I’ll dig dummy’s grave."
    "Okay," I said, pulling my gun from its shoulder rig. I looked warily around me.
    Jimmy rolled up his sleeves and started digging. I stood over him, watching, smoking, and nervously sweeping the mount with the gun.
    "Alright," he grunted about fifteen minutes later. He pulled Joey out of the bag and rolled him into the shallow pit with his foot. "You fill it in while I go get some rocks," he told me, and then left me alone.
    Now totally calm, I finished my cigarette and then started hefting clods of dirt onto Joey. I looked over my shoulder when I heard Jimmy coming. "You want all the dirt in?"
    "Yeah. Whaddya think?"
    "I dunno. The shit's magic, ain't it?"
    "Fuck you," Jimmy said, taking offense to the sarcasm in my voice. "Get outta the way." He took the shovel from me and did it himself. I stood aside and smoked another cigarette, watching him and thinking. I didn't think he was lying to me, let's just get that out up front, but...how the fuck was I supposed to believe that a dead guy was going to get out of the ground? I didn't, I couldn't . What was this, some kind of elaborate rite of passage or something? Hell, maybe those voices in the woods really belonged to guys in the family. Maybe they were trying to make me shit myself. They were doing a good job.
    It wasn't right. The look of absolute terror on Jimmy's face when that thing started screaming...that was real. Jimmy's an awful actor, and an even worse liar. Tony told me a few times that if Jimmy ever got caught the cops wouldn't even have to use a polygraph to know he wasn't being honest.
    If that wasn't it...then what the fuck?
    Was he being serious? Was Joey really going to come back?
    When Jimmy was done he piled the rocks in a crude pyramid on top the grave. "Done and done," he said, dusting his hands like they were two chalk erasers. He dragged a few pieces of wood from the night, arranged them much like the rocks, and then touched a bundle of dry grass off with his Zippo. The fire, though feeble, was much better than the ghastly glow of the moon.
    "We might hafta wait a while," Jimmy said, easing down with a grunt, "it varies, but it usually takes twenty minutes or so."
    "So…you're being serious? I mean...this is gonna happen?"
    Jimmy sighed. "No, we're just standin guard so the animals don't get him. Of course it is. Why the fuck you think we drove 50,000 miles into the middle of nowhere?"
    I grasped for a reply.
    "You think I'm shitting you, but just wait until this faggot comes back. You'll see then."
    We were quiet for a while. "What am I going to see? What the hell's the point in all this anyway?"
    "The point," Jimmy said, lighting a cigarette, "is that this dickface gets to get whacked more than once. Just blastin him ain't good enough."
    I guess that made sense. Sort of. "But…how do you kill what’s already dead?"
    "Shut up with the questions, will you? You'll see."
    For a long while we smoked in silence, gazing into the soul of the fire and lost in our own thoughts. More than half an hour must have passed before I heard the furtive rocky scraping at my left.
    Even then I don't think I really believed that Joey was going to come back. I just couldn't make myself truly accept it. When I first heard it, I guess I thought Jimmy was trying to light his Zippo. I was looking up at the moon, so I didn't see him.
    "Ah, there he is."
    Inexplicably, my heart sank. I looked at Jimmy, who was