Then he pulled a rag from his pocket and wiped her face. ‘All pretty again,’ he said, smiling down at her. The cloth rubbed her neck and collar bones and the top of her left breast. She didn’t like being touched by him, but it felt good to have the itchy fluid removed.
Grabbing the front of her blouse, he dragged her off the hood. She was hardly able to stay on her feet as he rushed her alongside the car. He shoved her onto the passenger seat, picked up her legs and flung them in, then slammed the door.
He hurried around to the other side. He climbed in behind the wheel, started the engine, and shot the car backward. The tires squealed as he skidded into a tight turn. He sped toward the parking lot exit.
After a glance at the rearview mirror, he slowed the car. He turned it around and drove back to where the others were waiting.
Finley grinned through the passenger window. ‘That was great, guys. Let’s head for the Mess Hall.’
Finley led the way with Cora, Vivian and Baxter in her car. Abilene and Helen travelled in Harris’s car. They left the town of Belmore behind, heading eastward into the wooded hills.
‘Where’s she taking us?’ Harris asked.
‘It’s only about a half-hour drive,’ Abilene said. ‘Some place she found that’s really off the beaten track. Figured we shouldn’t do the nasty scene in the park.’
‘We’re lucky we got through our scene without visitors,’ Harris said.
‘Would’ve been even more embarrassing.’
‘It was pretty strange, doing that in front of an audience.’
‘You both sure seemed to enjoy it, though,’ Helen said from the back seat.
Harris smiled over his shoulder at her. ‘I can think of worse ways to spend a Saturday morning.’
Soon, they followed Finley’s car onto a dirt road that twisted through the woods. Harris slowed down to stay out of her dust cloud. The car lurched and bounced. Branches squeaked against its sides.
‘Hope we’re almost there,’ Harris said.
Abilene nodded, but she was in no hurry to reach their destination.
Five minutes later, the road dead-ended. Harris stopped short, apparently waiting for the dust to settle a bit. Up ahead, the doors of Finley’s car swung open. Cora and Vivian climbed out of the back seat. During the trip, they’d changed into their zombie costumes.
Along with Helen, they were supposed to be earlier victims who’d been tortured and murdered by The Reaper, then left behind as meals for the woodland creatures. They were to show up for revenge just in the nick of time to save Abilene’s character. But in the story, there were six of them and they were a mess. The Reaper had mutilated them: scalped one, skinned another. He’d gouged eyes, cut off noses and breasts. Mother Nature’s scavengers had then gotten to the girls: ants, maggots, coyotes, birds. By the time the zombies came staggering to the rescue, some were missing limbs and all were filthy, ruined cadavers in various stages of decay. They were all naked, too.
Finley had known when she chose the story that such things couldn’t appear in her film. First, she didn’t have the time or resources for any elaborate special effects. Second, nudity was out. There was no choice but to have zombies that looked much too healthy and wore clothes.
The girls had been left to their own devices about what to wear.
Vivian wore an old sundress, ripped here and there with a razor blade, its skirt half tom off. Cora wore panties (two pairs, actually), and a tattered T-shirt. The garments of both girls were filthy with dirt and large amounts of stage blood that had been applied last night and now looked stiff and brown.
‘Maybe I’d better change,’ Helen said as Harris pulled the car forward. He parked, and Helen stayed inside while he and Abilene climbed out.
‘You gals look pretty good for a couple of stiffs,’ Harris said.
Cora smirked at him. ‘We sure look better than you and your pals did, that Halloween.’
Abilene smiled as his face turned red. ‘Talk about embarrassing moments,’ he muttered. ‘Jeez. I wanted to crawl into a hole and die.’
Abilene laughed. ‘Oh, you were so cute.’ Suddenly, she remembered what they’d found in the man’s house later that night. The thing in the wheelchair.
As Finley and Vivian came back from the trunk of the car with a couple of make-up kits, Helen joined the group. She wore a blouse and jeans. Yesterday, they’d been white. Today, they looked as if they’d been used to mop up the floor of a slaughterhouse. The legs of the jeans were tom. Half the blouse was ripped away, including most of its left sleeve. The remnant of that sleeve was empty, Helen’s arm hidden inside the blouse. With the proper camera angles to keep the bulge out of sight, she ought to look as if she’d lost the arm.
