Laughter of the Undead Read online

  I grimaced, “I know, but if we’re about to lose the house, we’re also about to lose the food.”

  “Fine, just . . . ” he held them out, “. . . trade you.”

  I handed him the bag and took my jacket, holding my breath through the pain.

  I couldn’t stand and put my shoes on, not without certainly falling over, but there was no time.

  “We have to go! Now!”

  We had no time.

  So we ran.

  My ribs ached and my feet froze, but I managed to keep pace with Levi as we stumbled down the steps and through the snow, trying to get as far away from the house as we could before—

  BOOM!

  We weren’t far enough.

  The explosion sent a blast of boiling air colliding into my back, flinging me forward like a rag doll on a string. I landed hard on the ground, rolling, what little breath the pain had allowed me got knocked clean from my chest.

  The world went black. When I opened my eyes all I could hear was ringing. I lay on my side, arms under me at awkward angles with half my face buried in the snow and dirt. I tried to sit up, dazed, but fell back onto the ground, gasping and coughing. From my position on the ground, I watched the house where I grew up burning. I covered my head with my arms as another soundless explosion ripped through the air, scalding heat and bits of embers smacking into me.

  The ringing in my ears grew louder, but I could move now, could almost breathe. I pushed myself up with one arm. I made it to my knees before a third explosion ripped through the air blowing me backward.

  I made it to my feet this time. I blinked rapidly, stumbling like a drunk man. I crouched, and could feel it vibrate in my chest but couldn’t hear it.

  “Levi!” I shouted soundlessly. I couldn’t find him through the smoke and heat waves wafting off the fire engulfing what had once been my home.

  I took a shaky step forward.

  Out of the haze, a crawling, coughing figure appeared. I rushed as best I could to help Levi stand, but he made it to his feet on his own before I got there.

  “Are you okay!” I shouted barely able to hear myself. He looked at me, disoriented as if he had just as much trouble hearing as I did.

  BOOM!

  The fourth explosion sent us both flying into each other, and onto the ground. The world spun before I could tell how we had landed. Levi lay half across me, half on top of me, looking as dazed as I felt.

  “You okay?” I coughed, my hearing returning a bit every second.

  He propped himself on his arms coughing as well, hands on either side of my head.

  “Yeah, you?”

  Saying I was fine would have been a lie. My every inch screamed in protest, and my back burned, and Levi’s weight on my chest wasn’t helping my breathing situation.

  “I will be if you move,” I croaked out. Levi seemed to remember my ribs and pushed himself away.

  “Shit, sorry.” He didn’t move far just collapsed alongside me in the snow.

  I sat up, my back throbbing and burning from the explosions.

  “How the hell are we still alive?” I managed.

  Levi sat as well, rolling his shoulders and wincing. “I don’t know. I guess we got far enough away before it blew.”

  “That son of a— ” I punched the ground, ignoring the fact that punching the ground in any situation hurt, let alone when every inch aches.

  The words I wanted to use to curse Garrett and everything he’d just ripped away from me tripped over in my mouth, leaving me wordless.

  Levi put a hand on my shoulder and squeezed it comfortingly. “At least we’re all okay.”

  Okay was a stretch for me. All I wanted was to curl up in bed and cry. Cry because I was hurt. Cry because someone hated me so much for literally no reason. Cry because I’d just lost my house.

  My home. My world had started inside those walls, and my parents' worlds had ended. Those walls were no longer standing and I didn’t have a bed anymore.

  So I didn’t cry. Instead, I took a deep breath, drawing some kind of stability from Levi’s hand. “Yeah. We’ll figure this out.”

  Somehow I had still managed to cling to the food bag and my shoes. My feet were so cold I could barely feel them, but still, sitting there in the snow, I dried them with my sleeve and shoved them into the tennis shoes Levi had grabbed for me. He also gave me my coat, the leather one, and I pulled it on over my pajama shirt, which was just a shirt that was several sizes too big. Neither it nor my pajama pants were made for this weather, made for the snow, and they certainly were not made for sitting in the snow. My back and ass were soaked and freezing.

  Levi pushed himself to his feet first and offered me a hand, which I took, shivering and let him pull me upright.

  “We need to find Izzy,” Levi said, stuffing his hands into his jacket pockets, shoulders hunched as a frigid blast struck us, despite the burning house close enough to feel its heat. “Any idea which way she could have gone?”

  “No,” I shook my head, “but how far could she have made it?”

  Together, we spun in slow circles, stretching our eyes against the blinding white snow and the oppressive black smoke filling the sky over our heads.

  I knew she had to have made it out of blast range, she’d had such a long head start, but she also had my brother, who can be a hindering presence at the best of times. Even though I knew they had to have made it out okay I couldn’t help but worry.

  At this moment I caught a glimpse of a light green spot vaguely resembling a person. I recognized Izzy’s jacket by the color. Relief flooded over me.

  “There!” I pointed her out to Levi. We headed in her direction at a fast limp. Levi must have been more hurt than he let on when we’d collided in the snow, but he let me use him as a crutch anyway, despite how he limped too. I was in no position to protest though. I don’t know if I could have walked without him.

  As we got closer, the green shape came into focus to reveal that it was Izzy. She knelt in the snow and shielded my little brother, watching my house burn to the ground.

  “Izzy!” I called, cupping my hands around my mouth to amplify my voice.

  She turned and a relieved look spilled across her face. “You guys are okay!” She stood as we got closer, and when we reached her she flung one arm around each of our necks in a tight hug.

  “I’m so glad you’re all right. I couldn’t find you and I thought you’d died.”

  I hugged her back. It hurt, but I hugged her anyway.

  “We’re okay,” Levi told her, “a little sore but okay”

  Izzy pulled back and turned to me. “What about you? Are you any more hurt than before?”

  “Well, I feel like I have a sunburn on basically my entire back, but otherwise it would have taken talent to put me in any worse of a state than I am in now.”

  Levi scoffed, “A talent you clearly have. If there’s a way for you to get hurt, you’ll find it.”

  I made a face at him before turning away and kneeling, slowly and painfully, in front of my brother.

  “Hey, buddy,” I took his tiny hand so he would look me in the eyes, “are you okay?”

  He nodded, tears pooling in his eyes, pressing his dinosaur under his chin. “Why did the scary boy blow up our house?” he asked in a quavering voice, huge tears spilling over and trailing down his soot-covered cheeks. I wiped tears away with my thumbs and pulled him in for a hug. He started sobbing and clung to my shirt with his little hands.

  I stroked his hair.

  “It’s okay, Tommy,” I whispered. Levi and Izzy looked on awkwardly. Izzy had her hand buried in her pockets and Levi crossed his arms over his chest watching the fire. “It’s okay.”

  Tommy threw his stubby arms around my neck. I rubbed his back gently. He was trembling, but at the moment not making any sound. I buried my nose in his hair, whispering over and over. “You’re okay. It’s okay. Everything’s going to be okay.”

  Maybe if I said it enough, I’d start to believe it
.

  After a few moments, when Tommy’s shaking faded, and his familiar baby scent of lavender and home grounded me, I hoisted him up and stood, letting him keep his face hidden in my shoulder.

  “What now?” I asked. Izzy let out a hard breath, puffing out her cheeks and releasing the air slowly.

  “I have no idea,” Levi said.

  “We should wait till the fire dies,” Izzy put in, “then we’ll go back and see if there is anything we can salvage.”

  “Yeah,” I rasped, “good idea.”

  We stood silent in the snow. It wasn’t actively snowing now, but the sky was gray as if it wanted to. We waited, shivering, while the fire got lower and lower, running out of house to burn and oxygen to keep it lit in the cold, thin air.

  My house was gone. I had just lost what little I had left. We were stranded in the snow with no shelter, no food, and only two guns to protect ourselves from the horrible monsters.

  But I hadn’t lost everything. I still had Tommy, I still had Izzy, and I still had Levi. They weren’t much, but they were more than I could have expected. I had faith that together we could do this. Together we could survive the laughter of the undead.

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  Coming Soon

  Lost And The Living

  Book 2 in The Half - Gone Trilogy

  Acknowledgments

  Since long before I could read, I loved to construct stories in my head that would never see the page. I never would have gotten to this point without help. So, thank you.

  To Mrs. White, for helping learn to write on the page as well as in my head, by getting me the help I needed. You’re the reason I am where I am.

  To Mrs. Highers for letting me write during her class and encouraging me when I got caught.

  To Mr. Dittes for letting me take over Writer's Club, and helping other people realize writing is fun.

  To Ryan, for letting me rant about it endlessly at two in the morning like seven years ago— none of these characters would exist without you.

  Thank you to anyone who’s ever read, or at the very least listened to me rant about my characters. To Mom, Dad, Eowyn, Grandma, Aunt Jill, Madasyn, Abbey, Emma, Bella, Heather, Zach, Jarett, The Shawns, and Haley. Thank you for supporting me in every way, and in this.

  And above all, to all the books that made me remember why I loved to write.