The first sound I hear when consciousness commences is someone vomiting. A man retches and there is a wet splattering sound against the floor.
“If you can’t handle it, you should just leave now,” comes a deep voice, familiar yet unfamiliar.
“You know it’s too late and I’m in it too deep,” rasps another man’s voice, out of breath. The vomiter.
“Then keep your shit together.”
“I couldn’t help it,” the vomiter replies irritably, “I saw her fingers move and my stomach just went. It’s creepy.”
Are they talking about me? I try to open my eyes but find them too heavy. I try to open my mouth but it’s completely dry. My tongue feels stiff and cottony. My body feels like lead. With the greatest of effort, I wiggle the fingers of my right hand.
“Oh, god,” says the vomiter, sounding sick again, “She’s doing it again.”
“Just try and remember you’re a scientist,” snaps the other man. Then, suddenly, his voices changes to honey and he says my name.
“Claudia? Baby, it’s me. It’s Kyle. Can you open your eyes?”
Kyle’s voice sounds different. And my eyes, though I can feel my eyelids a little more now, still won’t open.
“Maybe you shouldn’t expect too much,” comes the vomiter’s voice, gently now.
“Just shut the fuck up, OK Rob? It just has to take a little while.” Kyle’s strange-sounding voice goes back to sweet cream. “Claudia? Can you hear me? Please try and speak to me.”
I manage a groan, more of a rasping deep in my throat.
“You hear that, Rob? You hear that? She’s responding to me!”
Rob’s groan sounds a bit like my own. Kyle ignores him and continues to speak to me.
“Claudia, baby, I love you. Please try to say something to me. Try to say my name.”
I groan again, working hard to loosen my tongue.
“C’mon, baby, just one syllable. Speak to me. Say my name. Kyle.”
He says it carefully as if I’m a baby learning to speak. I grow frustrated and try again.
“Wrowwwwwww,” I manage. As my tongue limbers up, so do my eyelids, and I can see a little bit of light.
“Kyyylllle,” he tries again. Really, like I’m a parrot or something.
“Waaaaah-errrr,” I push out.
“Kyyylllle.”
“She’s saying ‘water,’ asshole.”
“Then get some fucking water if you’re so damn smart,” Kyle spits. I hear movement as Rob gets the water. Thank you, Rob, whoever you are. I feel Kyle push something between my lips, then drops of water on my tongue. An eyedropper.
“You see that, Rob? You see it? She’s back. She’s thirsty. She can move; she can talk. We were successful where no one else has ever been.” Kyle’s voice is triumphant.
“So you’re gonna share this with the world?” Rob’s voice is dry.
“Hell no. What would people think? The religious groups would burn us at the stake! I’m no philanthropist. I’m not in this to share. My money, my cause. I didn’t spend a fortune to bring loved ones back to other people. Just mine to me. You’ve been well-paid, partly for your work but mostly for your discretion.” Kyle’s last words come with a slightly menacing tone. The drops of water on my tongue still come steadily, and I feel strength returning to me. I crack my eyelids a little bit against the glare of the overhead light and look up at the blur that must be Kyle.
“Look, Rob, she’s opening her eyes.”
Rob groans and begins to retch again. Kyle ignores him and leans closer to my face. His breath is hot, stale.
“Claudia, my love,” he whispers, “I’ve waited for this for so long. I’ve missed you so much. Don’t let Rob’s bad manners offend you. Neither he, nor anyone, has ever been witness to something like this before. No one has ever thought it was possible. But I knew I could do it. I knew I could bring you back from the dead.”
Dead.
Even as he says it, I know it is true. Without a doubt. I push my eyes open wider and force them to focus on Kyle. And he has aged. The last I saw Kyle he was much younger. Thirty. This Kyle is older, bald, and fiftyish. His forehead is heavily wrinkled from frowning. His eyes look sunken. No wonder his voice is different—it’s aged, too.
Even without seeing what I’m seeing, I know it is true. I remember. The darkness. The pills. Then darkness again, only blacker and more consuming. The heat.
I’d killed myself, and my husband has brought me back.
“Ooooooooooowlooooooooonggggggg?” I gasp out, feeling as if I might explode.
“How long?” he replies, stroking my hand, “Twenty-three years. You’ve been away from me for twenty-three years. But I’ve kept you near me. I’ve had you cryogenically frozen. You still have the body of a twenty-eight-year-old.”
A twenty-three-years-dead twenty-eight-year-old, I think hysterically to myself. But I could feel for myself that my body has not rotted. My flesh tingles.
“Kyyyllle,” I slur, and I can only think of one thing to say, “I……waaannntttteddd….”
“You’re back, Claudia. You’re alive again. You’re with me.” Kyle is stroking upwards from my hand now, towards my upper arm and in towards my breasts.
“I’ve missed you so much,” he murmurs, running his hand down my stomach. I want to bat his hand away, but my arm is still too heavy. Twenty-three years, and Kyle still, apparently, does not know when it’s not a good time.
As soon as the thought comes, I feel bad. Here he has just rescued me from the infinite abyss and I’m peeved that he wants to touch me again after so long. He’s probably just checking to see if my body heat is returning. In my head, I hear his younger man’s voice reprimanding me.
What also returns is Rob, who must have gone to rinse his mouth. He is a skinny younger man with thick glasses, shaggy hair, and a hard expression on his face.
“What the hell, Kyle? You bring your wife back from the dead just to get to third base with her?”
Kyle turns away from me.
“You have something to say, Rob?” His voice is ice.
Rob’s response comes rapid-fire. “Yeah, I’m saying you’re more demented than I thought. And that’s saying a lot, considering all this Frankenstein shit we’ve been doing in your subterranean lab for the last nine years. And all nine years you’ve been a fucking dickhead to me. I can deal with you being a freak. I’m a biochemist, some of my best friends are freaks. But I’m sick of you using me for my knowledge and my work and treating me like a first-year student assistant who’s a thorn in your side.”
“You puke at the first sign that the experiment’s worked and don’t expect to be treated like a first-year student assistant?”
“I puked because I saw a corpse that I know has been dead for twenty-three years move its fingers. Forgive me if that’s a little hard to handle.”
“I’m the one who knew her in life and I was able to take it without getting sick. I’m the one who’s close to her. You should be the cool, objective one.”
“It wasn’t cool objectivity that brought her back. It was your mania. You are the one who’s been keeping me working for years underground without being able to tell my wife what I’ve been doing. It was my work and my formula and my ideas, but you’re right to take all the credit. You drove me on when I would have quit years ago. If I didn’t need the money, I would have put an end to this a long time ago.”
“You don’t feel the slightest bit of elation that you’ve achieved what no one in the history of the world has?”
“I feel dirty, Kyle. I feel like I have no right to play God. I feel like I could have used my time and energy and brain power for a better cause than reanimating one corpse for one billionaire.”
“Don’t talk about her like that! She can hear you!”
“You’re insane,” Rob continued. “You’re insane and you’re an asshole. I’m done. You got what you wanted. Your dead wife is back. You got your money’s worth. My work is done. I never want to see you—or that again.” He gestures at me.
“I said not to fucking talk about her like that!” Kyle shouts, and lunges at him. He grabs Rob by the throat with one hand and punches him in the face with the other. Stiff as I still am, I wince.
“Get your fucking hands off me!” Rob yells, panicked. He twists from Kyle’s grip and pushes him away. “You’re crazy. You’re fucking crazy,” he gasps, backing off and pressing his hand over his eye. He scrambles to the door, yanks it open, and disappears, slamming the door behind him.
I’m afraid Kyle will go after him, but he turns back to me and takes my hand again.
“Aww, baby, I’m so sorry you had to see that. I wanted everything to be perfect for you when you came back. That guy was no one. He’s not important. All that matters is we’re together again. I have you back.”
I’m too stunned to say anything. I just stare in astonishment at this man who used to be my thirty-year-old husband. I’ve known Kyle the self-centered, Kyle the patronizing, Kyle the insensitive, Kyle the hypocritical, but Kyle the violent is new to me.
“I can see it’s still hard for you to speak. It’s ok, sweetie. It’ll take a little while for you to loosen and warm up. Twenty-three years is a long time to be frozen, haha!” Just like Kyle, with the tactless jokes that aren’t even funny.
But Kyle’s foibles should be the last thing to get to me. At least I’m not burning anymore. If I’d been frozen for twenty-three years, I’d never have known it.
Kyle is still speaking to me, his voice marshmallowy. “Why don’t we get you out of this depressing laboratory, huh, Claud? I’ll take you upstairs and lay you down somewhere better than this table. Our bedroom is just the way it was before you had your accident.”
“Pills,” I murmured before I knew what I was saying.
“Yes, baby, you accidentally mixed the two medications the doctor told you not to mix.” Kyle begins wheeling the table I’m on across the room. “Ok, we’re in the elevator. Going up,” he says cheerfully. The door slides shut.
“Here we are,” Kyle says as the door opens again and he wheels out my table. It is indeed my home. He wheels me to the bedroom and it’s the bedroom I remember. He lays me down on the bed and opens a window. The cool night air feels incredible, wonderful.
“Theeeerrrrre. Comfy?” Kyle asks.
“Yeah.” I reply, though I still feel a bit leaden.
“I’m just so happy you’re back. I’ve missed you so much. I’ve waited for so long. You’re still as beautiful as you were before your accident,” Kyle says as he resumes stroking my hands.
“Killlled mmmmself.”
“Shhhh, don’t say things like that. Use those lips to kiss me instead.”
I’m weary and foggy and don’t really feel like kissing this paunchy, bald man who used to be Kyle, but I’m not in much position to refuse when he leans his head down and presses his lips to mine. Hard. Then, believe it or not, tongue. I try to pull back but my head is against the pillow, so I have nowhere to go. Kyle loosens the robe he has around me and pulls it open. The cool breeze from the window feels marvelous on my flesh for a moment, before Kyle climbs on top of me.
“Am I hurting you?” he asks solicitously.
“No,” I say, truthfully. But I still don’t want you on top of me like that, I think. The twenty-plus-years memory of Kyle wearing me down when I didn’t feel like sex keeps me quiet.
“I love you so much. I’ve missed you. I’ve never remarried since your accident. I never touched another woman. I’ve devoted twenty-three years and millions of dollars to having you back.” He continues to murmur in my ear as he undoes his pants and tries to push inside me.
“Poor baby, still too dry. It’s ok, I have some lubricant here.” I feel him rub my genitals with something wet, and then he eases back onto me. This time, his penis slides in.
Kyle winces slightly. “Oof. Still a bit cold. I’ll have you warmed up in no time.”
I don’t want Kyle to warm me up. I want to feel that wonderful night breeze across my flesh again.
When it’s over, Kyle rolls off me and, like he used to before I died, immediately falls asleep. Snoring.
I lie there with my eyes open—sleep is the last thing I want. The breeze from the window feels better than sex with Kyle ever did, even when I was alive.
But I am alive. At least, I am alive again. Maybe this time around will be better than the last. Maybe I won’t have the depression this time around. Maybe I’ll even get up the nerve to finally leave Kyle. I can go away. I can have a whole new life. I just have to plan.
I do plan, late into the night, and as I plan, I try moving my arms and legs and torso. Everything is beginning to limber up. Whatever they treated me with to restore life to my body has been doing its job. Soon I am able to move more easily, though I still cannot get up from the bed.
Reasonably satisfied and quite worn, I allow myself to shut my eyes and relax. The next thing I hear, there are voices outside. Numerous voices. Shouts. Then banging.
Kyle stirs and opens his eyes. “What the hell is going on out there?” he grouses. He stumbles out of the bed and moves to the window. In the dim dawn light, I see his expression change from one of annoyance to horror.
“Christ, it’s a fucking mob,” he mutters, disbelievingly.
“Kyle?” I ask cautiously.
“It’s an actual mob.”
The shouts from below are louder now that Kyle has come to the window.
“Frankenstein!” “Necrophiliac!”
Kyle pales. “They know. Rob, that fucking rat, Rob. He told them.”
He turns to me. “Don’t worry, baby, it’ll be OK. I just have to go down and talk to them. I just have to make them understand. Don’t worry, I won’t let them get to you.” He kisses me and bolts from the room. He must be insane.
The chants and screams grow louder, and I do my best to roll myself out of the bed. I flop onto the floor with a thud and begin to drag myself to the large main window of the bedroom. Grabbing the low windowsill, I strain to lift myself enough to see outside.
Three floors below, a huge crowd yells and waves all manner of grab-and go weaponry. Guns, bats, crowbars. Kyle appears on the second-floor balcony and motions to the crowd. The yelling dies down a little, enough for him to be heard.
“I don’t know what you’ve been told,” Kyle begins in the self-righteous tone of a politician, “But there has been a major scientific breakthrough. I have discovered a means to reanimate the dead.”
The mob begins yelling again, a cacophony of angry voices calling my husband all manner of horrible names.
“Listen!” shouts Kyle. “My wife suffered a fatal accident twenty-three years ago. I’ve had her cryogenically frozen, and since then have been working towards having her restored to me.”
“Everyone knows your wife committed suicide to get away from you!” calls an angry female voice.
“It was an accident!” Kyle shouts, his face going red. The self-righteous bravado melts away. “It was an accident that I have worked twenty-three years to remedy. And I used my own funds. No one used your precious tax dollars to pay for the research and experimentation. This is my own business! Now, get off my property!”
A rock flies up and nearly hits Kyle on the head. He ducks just in time, and the rock sails past him and shatters the window behind him. It is enough of a taste of destruction to fuel the mob’s fury. They begin throwing more rocks, breaking more windows. They set fire to the bushes at the base of the house. I pull myself up further and lean out a little to see. Faces spot me from below.
“It’s her! Up in the window! It’s the dead woman!”
“Claudia!” Kyle shouts up at me, “Go back to bed. Close the window.”
“Bring her out here!” the crowd screams at Kyle. “Let’s see your zombie!”
“She’s not a zombie!” Kyle retorts. “She’s my wife! You’ll never get near her!”
I realize with slow horror that Kyle is right. He’ll never let me out of this house for fear of what people will do to me. The secret is out. Everyone knows.
I watch my plans of starting over in my new, miraculous life burn up like the bushes below. Whatever length of existence I have this time around, I’ll have to spend it the same way I did last time. Stuck. With Kyle. The night air, before cool and sweet, is now hot and smoky. I pull myself up a little further, lean out a little further. The fire in the bushes is spreading. The heat is familiar, even inviting now.
Zombie. That’s what they’ll call me for the rest of this life.
“Claudia!” Kyle yells up at me, “Get away from that window!”
Kyle, always with the orders. If he thought he owned me before, how can it be anything but worse now that he has reanimated me from the dead?
I lean out further. By now, most of my torso is out the window. The flames crackle beneath me, beckoning me back home. One shift of my weight and I’ll fall. And this time, I won’t leave a pretty corpse for him.