Free What We Left Behind by Peter Cawdron Page B

just laughs.
    “What? Girls can’t shoot?” I ask.
    David grins and is silent, but I catch him swapping a glance with Jane. There’s some unspoken banter going on, and I suspect he’s seen Jane’s marksmanship, or lack thereof, and is silently ribbing her. The look on her face seems to dare him to bring it up, and I’m intrigued by the playfulness between them. They’re madly in love.
    I clean off the zombie’s driver’s license with a bit of spit and look at the picture before handing it to Steve.
    “She looks pretty,” I say.
    Deanne Oreallis was no more than twenty-five, judging by her photograph. She had red hair and pale skin. A small smattering of freckles line her cheeks, making her look cute. It feels insane to realize her sweet, innocent face was transformed into the zombie corpse before me.
    Steve hands Deanne’s driver’s license to Jane, who says, “Huh,” as she hands it on to David.
    “Such a shame, isn’t it?” I say. “So much has been lost. Such a waste.”
    “I wonder if he knew her,” Steve says. “The shooter, I mean.”
    “Probably not,” David replies. He crouches down and gently places the driver’s license on the grass behind her skull as though it’s a gravestone. In a way, I guess it is now, although it will probably wash away with the first rains.
    As he stands up, David says, “Rest in peace, Deanne.”
    We walk on along the trail in silence for a while. No one seems to want to talk about Deanne, but I think what we did was important. All too often, we see zombies as the enemy of humanity, and they are, but once they were just like us. They were human. They had feelings, friends, heartaches. No one chooses to be a zombie. And no one ever mourns the loss of a zombie. Somehow, I feel a little more human having stopped to consider a life lost, and yet even a name and a photograph isn’t enough to do her life justice. At least someone paused to think of her as more than just another monster.
    “Peanut butter,” David says after about ten minutes. “I miss peanut butter.”
    “Me too,” Steve says, and with that Deanne is forgotten.
    I know what Steve and David are doing. Thinking about death is no way to live. I don’t think they intend to discard the memory of Deanne. It’s just that life moves on.
    “What about you?” Steve asks, turning to me.
    “Shouldn’t we be keeping our eyes peeled for zombies?” I reply.
    “Come on,” Jane says.
    “Okay,” I say, stalling for a moment and not wanting to embarrass myself by saying something dumb. I speak rapidly, firing off words, wanting to get through them as quickly as possible in case someone thinks I’m being stupid. “Music. Boy bands. Kick-ass girls singing about love. Hip-hop and modern rock.”
    Jane says, “Wouldn’t it be great to have a dance?”
    Steve blurts out, “I play guitar.” As the word “guitar” passes from his lips, he seems to withdraw, almost as if he said too much or uttered something taboo.
    “Really?” I ask, turning toward him, glad the focus is off me.
    “We have got to find a guitar,” Jane says.
    “Absolutely,” David adds.
    Both David and Jane are enthusiastic. I think I know what Steve’s thinking. I suspect he’s thinking, “Oh, dear God, now I have to actually play in front of these guys—what if I suck?” I take his arm and say, “I would love to hear you play guitar.”
    Steve doesn’t answer. He smiles sheepishly, which makes me wonder if he’s a better guitar player than he thinks he is.
    I say, “I wonder if we could set up some kind of dance when we get back? The music might have to be acoustic with some upturned tins for drums, but it would be a lot of fun.”
    “You know what all those dance songs are really about, right?” Jane asks.
    “Ah, no,” I reply.
    “Sex.”
    “Get out of here,” I shriek.
    “They are!” Jane insists.
    David and Steve are conspicuously quiet.
    “Tell her, Steve.”
    Steve waves Jane away, shaking his head but