Zombie Tag by Hannah Moskowitz

Author:Hannah Moskowitz
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-03-21T16:00:00+00:00

2

THE NEXT MORNING at breakfast, my parents drag the whole story of Zombie Tag out of me. We’ve been playing it constantly for weeks, but they’re acting like I’ve been keeping it some big secret. But I guess I didn’t want them to find out, because I knew I’d get these concerned looks and this lecture about how zombies are very serious and not something I should joke about, and do I really want to be the kind of kid who makes games out of serious things?

“What’s next?” my father says. “Anemia Tag? Endangered Species Tag?”

I say, “It’s just a game, Dad. It’s fun to bite people and talk about brains and stuff.”

My mother watches me, shaking her head slowly while she bites her lip. I feel like I’m a very sad book she’s reading, or a kid in one of her classes who answered a question really, really wrong.

Dad says, “You know, Anthony’s father spends hours in the office—away from his family, Wil—trying to make sure that game of yours doesn’t become a reality.”

I wish my dad had a job that cool. Mr. Lohen is this big-time public official who’s on the news all the time talking about our personal safety and the discoveries he’s made and the treaties he’s written. He’s always talking in this soothing voice and reassuring the public that we don’t need to be worried about whatever people are worried about this week. Then he shakes hands with the president and signs all these important documents while people take pictures.

Mr. Lohen gets to meet all these creatures the rest of us aren’t even sure exist. Anthony swears his dad touched a unicorn once, when he was in Greenland visiting the prime minister. It’s weird how much Anthony brags about his dad since he doesn’t even like him. Meanwhile, I like my dad a lot but he doesn’t give me anything to brag about, because all he does is file papers about Time-Based Travel, which isn’t even going to be real for years and years. The people who will use it won’t know that he worked on it. Sometimes I think there’s nothing in the whole world as stupid as having a job. At least Mr. Lohen gets to do his on TV.

Mom keeps touching my hands. “Wil. Honey.” Then she can’t decide what she wants to say. She’s stuck between all these different speeches. Do I give him the “We should go back to the doctor with the soothing voice” speech or the “You should eat less red meat” speech or the “Dead people don’t come back” speech?

Ever since six months ago, when my older brother Graham died in the bathroom looking for his inhaler, my mom’s been kind of in charge of making sure none of us gets on with our life too well. Just when we think we’re doing okay, she mentions his name with a wistful sigh or whispers about how dinner would taste so much better if there were four of us here to eat it.

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