Chapter 10
Three soft knocks.
Nothing like before.
I went to the peephole.
He stood alone.
Same pajama pants.
Same undershirt.
There was blood on it now.
Not much.
A streak along his left side.
I didn't open the door.
"Mr. Dombrowski?"
His head lifted.
"Gabe."
"Are you hurt?"
"No."
"The blood?"
"Not mine."
I believed him, maybe because I wanted to.
"What happened?"
He looked exhausted.
"They're in the second-floor hallway."
"Who?"
"Them."
"How many?"
"I don't know."
"How did you get back up here?"
"East stairs."
"Are they following you?"
"No."
"Where have you been?"
He lowered his eyes.
"Helping Walter."
I tightened my grip on the hammer.
"Is he alive?"
Dombrowski didn't answer.
"Mr. Dombrowski."
"No."
"Did the woman kill him?"
"I don't know."
"What do you mean?"
"She bit him."
There it was.
No video or friend-of-a-friend. A man downstairs whom Dombrowski personally knew.
"Then what?"
"He got sick."
"How fast?"
"Fast."
"An hour?"
"Less."
My mouth went dry.
"What happened to him?"
Dombrowski looked toward the stairwell.
"He got up."
I stared through the peephole.
"He wasn't dead?"
Dombrowski's eyes met mine through the tiny glass lens, though he couldn't actually see me.
"He was."
The refrigerator hummed behind me. A car alarm chirped outside. Small, normal sounds that suddenly seemed obscene.
"How do you know?"
Dombrowski's face tightened.
"I checked."
I didn't ask how.
He continued, quieter.
"No pulse. Nothing. Walter was dead."
"And then?"
"He opened his eyes."
Something cold moved through my stomach. Neither of us spoke.
Then I said, "Come inside."
Dombrowski shook his head.
"No."
"Why?"
"I got blood on me."
"Did you get bitten or scratched?"
"I don't think so. He grabbed me. I don't know."
That changed things.
My hand stopped on the chain.
Dombrowski noticed.
He gave a tired nod.
"See?"
I hated that he had noticed.
"If your skin isn't broken—"
"I checked. Nothing I can see. Still no."
"Where are you going?"
"Home."
"You can't go downstairs."
"It's my home."
"Stay up here."
He almost smiled.
"You got room?"
"Yes."
I did.
One bedroom, a couch, a floor. Plenty.
"Come in."
He looked down at himself.
Then toward the stairs.
"No."
"Why?"
"I need my pills."
"What pills?"
"Heart."
Of course it was something ordinary.
"How long can you go without them?"
"I took them tonight."
"Then stay."
"I need them in the morning."
"You can deal with morning in the morning."
Dombrowski considered it.
Then a shout echoed from the east stairwell.
His head snapped toward the sound.
I whispered, "Get inside."
He moved toward my door.
I reached for the chain.
Then another sound came from behind him.
A door opening.
Marcy's.
She looked out.
"Mr. Dombrowski?"
He turned.
That hesitation mattered.
Something struck the stairwell door.
Hard.
Marcy gasped.
Dombrowski stepped away from my apartment.
"Inside," I hissed.
The stairwell door shuddered again.
He backed toward Marcy's instead because it was closer.
She opened wider.
Dombrowski hurried inside.
She slammed it.
I kept watching.
The stairwell door stopped moving.
Nothing entered.
Not then.
I stepped away.
I should have felt relieved.
Instead I felt worse.
Walter had died.
Walter had gotten back up.
There was no reasonable category for that.
I sat at my kitchen table.
For several minutes, I stared at nothing.
Then I whispered the word I'd spent the last three hours dismissing.
"Zombie."
It sounded ridiculous in my apartment.
My clean kitchen. My laptop on the desk. My shoes beside the door. My half-finished water.
Still ridiculous.
Just not impossible anymore.