Eye
of the Beholder
by Stacey Graham
Anna left the theater with the theme song swelling her head.
Escaping through the fire exit door, she skirted around couples
holding hands as they whispered about the credits. She had candy
stuffed into her bag and a soda stain on her skirt. Who would care
if she stuck to the shadows? Stepping out of the alley, she
attempted to hug the dirty brick walls lining Times Square and
avoid the tourists dressed in their best vacation gear, price tags
still attached to the collars.
Eyes fixed on the filthy oil and God-knows-what stained concrete
beneath her feet, Anna crossed Broadway, her hands clutching the
cheap purse she’d bought on Canal Street weeks before. The smell
of formaldehyde still clinging to the fabric, the bag reminded her
of her last boyfriend—small, stinky, and not worth the money
she’d spent on it—but she loved it. It was unfortunate that
the chemicals used in making the bag had created an adverse
allergic reaction, seizing Anna’s ability to breathe and slowly
suffocating her a few days later. When she awoke in the morgue,
she held the purse in a death grip, not content to release the
faux Coach bag she’d died for, even in the half-life of the
undead.
Through the excessive noise of the car horns and music of a
half-naked cowboy, Anna’s eyes strayed from the pavement to a
pair of lovers, caught in the harsh illumination of the street
lamp that clashed with the gaudy lights of Times Square, their
hands wandering and lips smashed in unnatural angles against skin.
Anna lingered too long watching, mentally betting against herself
on how long it would be before one of them took a breath, one that
didn’t include the other’s carbon dioxide. Her head turning
back a moment too late, her body crashed into the figure dead
ahead. As her cheek assaulted the soft gray wool of his suit
jacket, she felt her skin tear away, leaving a rough spot that
would take forever to patch up in the morning.
Awesome, she thought. How much more putty does a girl
have to go through to leave the house lately? Clutching the
torn skin on her face with her fingers, Anna turned to apologize.
Zombie maintenance was getting expensive. Soon she’d be filling
the holes with Spam in order to make it to the corner store, she
thought with a wry grin.
Download the
rest of Eye of the Beholder at Ravenous Romance in Hungry
For Your Love |