I sat on the couch and looked at the (dead) zombie. I never, ever wanted to get away from a place more than I wanted to get out of that attic, but I couldn't make myself get up and make the long walk to the door at the top of the stairs. The only thing I had the strength for was sitting on a filthy, broken couch that was so dusty I didn't know what color it was under all the dirt. That, and looking at the zombie I'd killed.

I suppose part of me was waiting for it to get up and come at me again. Like Jessica would get up and come at me if I'd gone through with it, if I'd ignored her wishes (as, truthfully, I'd been tempted to do) and made her a vampire. She wouldn't be Jessica anymore if I did that; she'd be a slobbering, crazy vampire. Fast forward ten years, by then maybe she'd have a little bit of control over the thirst. Then her new life would begin: being more careful about meals. Never aging, but getting old just the same. Pulling further and further away from the mortal Jessica, my friend, the older she got. Getting sly, like Eric and Alonzo.

Alonzo. He had made a vampire without a single thought to the consequences: for Sophie or for himself. He had killed her and gone on his way, and he had to pay. That was it, that was how it was: he fucked up, and he had to pay. What if it had been Jessica, dead in some alley in France how many years ago?

And how could I have gone to her room and asked her to let me do that? I deserved a zombie hiding in my attic. I deserved a hundred zombies.

"Why do you think it was here? How did it get in, and get all the way up here without anybody seeing?" Cathie was chattering nervously and looking at me the way you looked at a recent mental ward escapee. "What do you think it wanted?"

"I don't give a ripe shit," I said, and stood.

It took a long time to find the door.