The New Dead by Christopher Golden

Author:Christopher Golden
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780312559717
Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Danny McDanielson worked as a short-order cook in the diner down the street from city hall. Being a short-order cook meant that no one took him seriously, and while he tried to pretend it didn’t bother him, it did. A young poet, not bad looking, with Johnny Depp hair that he was always peeking out from under, he struggled to keep his burgeoning feelings of inadequacy to himself. When the corpse had fallen from the sky, Danny was one of the few people unable to rush out and gawk. His girlfriend of the last three years, Jennifer Bugles, the same one that fawned over his morbid poetry and tousled his scarecrow mane of hair to no end, had been in the process of breaking up with him. She didn’t know why; it seemed like the right thing to do.

“Hey, Danny. You know that screen that appears at the end of Ms. Pac Man when you die?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s Game Over for us.”

“Why?”

“If you have to ask, I can’t tell you.”

“What?”

“Are you trying to make this difficult?”

“Huh?”

“Oh gee, right, Danny. You know what? Screw you. I’m out of here.”

Hurt, stunned, Danny didn’t know what to say. But there was not much he could say when Jennifer came back into the diner minutes later with her new beau, Trevor Moses, a dude who had patches of facial hair, piercings, and tattoos. Danny could hardly stomach the image of Jennifer standing there slightly bent at the hips while this man thumbed the G-string poking out of her jeans shorts. He would never forget the smug grin on Trevor’s face either. It was as if a gold tooth were glinting at him. “What are you looking at, geekazoid?” Danny withdrew to the kitchen and tried to let it all fade to black.

The diner was empty this early evening. Danny was feeling tired. It was hot in the kitchen and hot outside. Perspiration dripped from his face, horseshoed the pits under his T-shirt and at the small of his back. With Charlene Guttersnipe, his demanding boss, out on an errand, he decided to take a break. Normally he would go out the back door and sit on the stoop wishing that he were a smoker, but he wasn’t. Instead he took his notepad and pencil outside. He often used this notepad to draw pictures and work on turns of phrases, however unlikely they might be.

He sat on the stoop trying to think, but nothing came to him. He had heard some of the talk about the body that landed on the spire, and now that hours had passed and everyone had forgotten about it—that was how this town was—this was his opportunity to go see it. He was curious. With his apron still on, he walked the several blocks to city hall. There, he squinted up at the spire. The glare of the sun sawed his eyes. He couldn’t see. He needed to get closer.

Using the emergency stairs inside city hall, he walked to the roof. When

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