for a time, and we had melted snow to drink, but in the end the animals fled the heights and it was just our small group up on the mountain.”
I watched his face, though he’d looked away into the distance so he wouldn’t have to see the look on mine. I gave him blank cop face, because I’d learned that people will tell you their horrors, but you can’t be horrified by it. You have to be their blank witness, because what they fear most is that you will see them as monsters, or broken, if you know the deepest, darkest stuff in them. I tried to make sure that this man I’d called from the grave wouldn’t feel more of a monster than I’d already made him.
He was quiet so long I had to prompt him. “What happened then, Mr. Warrington?”
“We ran out of food, and the snow was ceaseless. It was like being buried alive.” He laughed then, but it had more bitterness in it than sweetness. “And then Charlie died. We put him out in the snow to preserve him, but some predator that we’d missed in our hunting found him, dug him up, and ate part of him.” He looked at me then. “Have you ever been hungry, Ms. Blake?”
“If you mean starving, then no.”
“That is a blessing for you, then.”
“It is,” I said.
“I’d known hunger as a child, but not like this. My stomach didn’t hurt anymore, there was no ache of emptiness. It was almost peaceful. We were starting to sleep whenever we stopped moving; even talking became too much. We’d be talking to each other and suddenly drift off in midsentence. It was as if we were already partially dead and the sleep was merely a preview, but then we saw Charlie all torn up and . . .”
“You saw meat,” I said.
He wiped a hand across his face, the broad shoulders rounding, and I realized he was crying softly, silently, so that he could only nod. He finally mumbled, “God forgive us. God forgive me.”
I almost said what I was thinking, which was, You’ve already died once; whatever God thought of your actions has already been decided, but I didn’t. I so did not want to have a discussion about theology with someone I was going to put back in his grave tonight, because if his soul was here in him, then had I just dragged him out of heaven, or rescued him from hell? Or, if you believe in reincarnation, how could I possibly have ripped him out of whatever body he was currently incarnated in? It was all beyond my pay grade as a Christian. I needed to sit down with my priest and see if he was open-minded enough to talk about it. Or someone’s priest. There had to be some clergy somewhere that I could talk with about all this. I prayed that I’d find the right person to discuss things with, and added an extra prayer that I’d be able to do the right thing by the man, or zombie, standing in front of me.
He was looking at me now with tears still wet on his face. “Your silence speaks volumes, Ms. Blake. I understand your disgust with me.”
“It’s not that, Mr. Warrington; I’m just thinking about other things a little too hard.”
“You do not have to save my feelings, Ms. Blake. I deserve whatever you think of me.”
“It’s not my job to judge your ethics, Mr. Warrington. I have too many skeletons in my own past to be high and mighty about anyone. I’ve never been that hungry in my life; who am I to judge you?”
“You are very understanding, Ms. Blake. I am most grateful.”
I shrugged. “I do my best.”
“I believe that you do.”
I smiled. “You described yourself as ravenous right now, Mr. Warrington. How does that compare to the hunger you experienced in the mountains that awful winter?”
He thought seriously before answering, which I appreciated. “I feel empty. My stomach is beginning to hurt, with that ache you get when you’ve gone too long without eating. It’s early stages, but I shouldn’t be feeling this way with everything I ate tonight.”
“You threw all of it up,” I said.
He shook his head. “It’s not the same thing as going hungry, Ms. Blake. My body should know it ate tonight, and it doesn’t seem to have counted any of that good grub I just had.”
“I’m afraid that there may only be one kind of food that