Born Lucky: A YA St. Patrick's Day Story Read online

poke my head out and he’s standing there, green track pants on, green shirt on, even the wig.

  “Perfect,” I gush, dipping my fingertips into the can of green grease paint I brought and carefully applying it all over his gray skin. There’s not much showing, his hands, his neck above the crew neck collar of his green T-shirt, his face. I cover it liberally and then dab out the rest until every inch of him, head to toe and back again, is covered in green.

  “Do you have a mirror?” I ask.

  He shakes his head, touching his green face with his green fingers. “Don’t muss it,” I fuss at him, then reach for my purse. I keep my compact in one hand and smear the green paint all over my face with the other. It’s heavier than I thought, and I know it’s going to give me zits and I’ll break out in a few days.

  But, then again… not if this all works out like I hope it does.

  I put the compact away and cover my own hands, and look up at him, slipping my fuzzy green wig on. It’s like clown hair, curly and floppy, but green. “Now we match.”

  He sighs. “Not quite,” and I know he means about the whole living versus living dead thing.

  “Okay, okay,” I say, leaving my backpack behind. “Are you ready?”

  He pauses at the door, fingers hovering over the handle. “Are you sure about this?”

  I turn to him, putting a green hand on his green shirt. “I’m not trapping you, Calvin.”

  He cocks his head, a little grease paint dabbing on the lighter green of his T-shirt. I imagine we’ll both be covered in this crap by the end of the night. “How… how did you know my name?”

  I jerk a thumb back to a coat rack by the door, where his Z.E.D. nametag hangs from the front of his jumpsuit. But I knew it long before tonight, and something in his eyes – his cold, gray eyes – tells me he already knew that.

  But he nods, and we walk through the door. It’s dark out now, and a half-moon dots the cloudy sky above. Even though we’re on the outskirts of town, and will have to walk through several heavily wooded areas to get to Nightshade proper, you can hear the festival atmosphere in the air already. Bagpipes, of course, distant but clear.

  I guess it makes sense. Ever since Halloween was outlawed after the Great Trick or Treat Outbreak of 1217, St. Patrick’s Day is pretty much the new Halloween.

  It didn’t hurt that it was an Irishman who invented the new copper nightstick that is all the rage now, and helped turn the tide in the Great Zombie Versus Militia War of 1218. So, add Irish as heroes plus no Halloween and what you get is one very energetic St. Patrick’s Day tradition.

  We walk through the woods, silently, side by side. The closer we get to town, the louder the music gets. It sounds live, spotty on the wind, getting louder or softer depending on which way the breeze is blowing.

  March is still chilly in North Carolina, and I kind of wish I’d brought a hoodie. But then we wouldn’t match, and that would kind of defeat the purpose.

  “What about the checkpoint?” he asks, halfway to town, strings of little green lights strung around the light posts.

  “They’re usually mobbed by now,” I say, from experience. “So it shouldn’t be an issue.”

  “How do you know so much about St. Patrick’s Day?” he asks, shoulder brushing mine on accident as we swerve between the tight trees on the edge of town.

  Because I’ve been planning this for a whole year, I think, but don’t say. Out loud I tell him, “My roommate at the shelter is one of the organizer’s of this year’s event.”

  He nods but, like the nametag moment, I don’t think he quite believes me. We walk and, as we near the checkpoint at the edge of town, he inches closer to me, our shoulders brushing against one another more and more frequently.

  The music is louder now, and I realize the guard at the gate shack is playing some as well. There is a cluster of partygoers, older kids, mostly, from the outskirts of town. They cluster around, cheering, jeering, most of them drunk already.

  We inch closer, the guard laughing at something a cute blonde in a tight Sexy Leprechaun costume has said. He’s laughing so hard, so long, staring at her bazongas that, just like that, we slip past.

  He waits until we’re closer to town to say, “Wow. I thought you were kidding.”

  I look over at him, goofy green clown wig bouncing all over, face covered in green, and smile. “Feel better now?”

  He starts to answer when a shot rings out, and he flinches, crouching low, eyes wide as I join him. There are people near us, doing the same thing, gaudy plastic gold shamrock necklaces clinking as they hover and shake. Then someone laughs, then someone else, and more “pop-pop-pops” sound and someone else says, relief splashed all over his voice, “It’s fireworks!”

  We stand and Calvin says, “Fun.”

  “I’m… I’m sorry about that,” I say, because I’ve been so selfish, I haven’t stopped to think what it might feel like for Calvin to come out with all of… us.

  “It’s okay,” he sighs, wig flopping as he nods. “I’m used to it.”

  I see my shelter up the street, and grab his hand. “I want to show you something,” I say, and he lets me guide him along. The crowd is thicker here, we’re getting closer to downtown.

  The restaurants are open past curfew tonight, and people in green felt hats and green and white stockings stumble around, pinching those stupid enough not to wear green.

  The Oxford Street Shelter for Displaced Women is really just an abandoned hotel, left empty when so many of Nightshade’s citizens died in the Great Carolina Outbreak of 2016.

  I live there now, on the third floor, in a room of my own. It’s depressing as hell; the room, the floor, the whole damn place. We stand in front of it, the only place in Nightshade NOT hopping tonight.

  “Is this where you live?” he asks.

  I nod, looking over at him, sad as I can.

  “Where… where are your parents? Your family?”

  I answer half his question, anyway: “Long gone, Calvin. Like all the other girls who live here.”

  I take his hand and lead him across the street, blocked off for the party, jammed with people drinking out of cheap plastic beer mugs and jingling their blinking shamrock necklaces. The coffee shop I like, Dolly’s Donuts, is over there, across from the Shelter. We go inside and it’s empty because, duh, no alcohol.

  It’s quiet, after the crowded street and live bands and laughing crowds. The woman behind the counter nods as I slip my credit badge across the counter. “Two iced coffees, two shamrock donuts, please.”

  She smirks, a new face, probably because none of the regular cashiers wanted to work tonight. “You’re lucky, got the last two.”

  I smile as she slides my badge through the computer terminal and peels off five quick credits. I only have about ten left, but I’m hoping after tonight I won’t need them anymore. At least, I don’t think they take them where I want to go.

  Calvin stands beside me, awkwardly, stiff as a board, as if the Reanimation Patrol are going to be here any minute. “Relax,” I tell him as we carry our tray over to a table for two in the corner. “I told you, nobody cares who comes out tonight. The whole town’s tired of staying alert. They just want to blow off steam, if only for one night.”

  He nods, sliding the coffee and donut in front of him even though we both know he can’t eat it.

  “I wish they served, you know…” I say, around a mouthful of thick cake donut smeared with bright green icing.

  “Brains?” he chuckles, then looks around as if anyone – meaning no one, since we’re all alone – might hear him.

  I shrug. “I feel bad eating all alone.”

  “I’ve already fed this week,” he says. When I arch an eyebrow, coffee halfway to my lips, he explains, “They make sure all the Z.E.D. workers are properly fed.”

  “How… how do you eat it?”

  “You’re poking fun?” he asks. The green has faded a little, from his face, or maybe it’s just the bright coffee shop lights hi
ghlighting some of the cold, gray skin I missed back in the warehouse.

  “No,” I say, reaching for his donut. I mean, if it’s the last food I’ll ever eat, I want to be full, right? Even if it is full of carbs and spastic sugary green icing? “I’m genuinely curious.”

  He shrugs, toying with his straw. “They blend it for us, like a smoothie.”

  We both make a face at the same time. “Is that… enough for you? I thought you guys needed live brains or something?”

  “They’re supposed to be ‘live’ brains, but… personally I think they water them down.”

  I chuckle, shoving my empty donut plate away. “Maybe that’s why you’re so grumpy.”

  He sighs, shoving his iced coffee my way. We trade, when the cashier’s not looking, so it looks like he’s eaten something. “Why are you so interested, anyway? Honestly, this is the weirdest night of my afterlife.”

  I snort, even though he’s seriously serious. “I just, I’m not trying to be rude. I thought I could, I dunno, get to know you better or something.”

  He smirks, skin green gray now. It’s like the grease paint is seeping into his dead pores or something. Jesus, I never thought of that.