It was physical, see, because every muscle in her body seemed to jerk simultaneously. Almost as if the floor had just shifted under her feet. Now she seemed tense and agitated and I thought maybe she was starting to get frustrated again, right? I mean imagine going from a rational, thinking person into someone who can’t even control their own mind. Something like that is bound to be an emotional roller coaster, ya know? So I tried again. “Clarice.”
“Know.”
At first, I thought it was the same question she’d been repeating, only with a sharper edge to it. But then I noticed how her fingers flexed like she was squeezing invisible stress balls, how her lips were pulled back into this snarl that looked more animal than human. Her pupils got so fuckin’ wide, man, that you could barely see the irises surrounding them.
That’s when I knew some part of her had recognized me. A part of her that was less than thrilled with our last encounter.
“No.”
Then I realized that it wasn’t a plea anymore, it was a flat statement of fact.
“No, no, no, no!”
She was breathing so heavily that her shoulders almost seemed to bob around her eyes and her movements had become less languid. Before, she’d seemed as if the last ounce of her energy was about to leak out through one of her overactive sweat glands, but now everything was done in these quick jerks. If you ever touched an electrical wire to the muscles in a frog’s leg during biology class, then you’ve seen how abrupt the resulting movement is.
And that also means you’ll have a pretty clear picture of how Clarice Hudson was moving.
So I get this bad feeling way down in my soul, right? Almost like I’ve just brushed up against a creature of immeasurable evil on some alternate plane of existence. I got the fight or flight reflex kickin’ into overdrive and my hand has dropped back into my pocket without me even being aware of it.
I was running my finger along the smooth metal, trying to get an estimate of the blade’s length by touch alone when that bitch growls at me, man. Literally fuckin’ growls at me.
My stomach kinda sinks when I realize that my pen knife’s not gonna to cut it, dude. No way that blade is goin’ back far enough to do any major damage, especially if she’s in full on attack mode. Most I could hope for is to blind one eye before she’s scratching that infection right into my blood stream.
So I do what any sane, rational man would. I run like my ass is on fire.
Those giant potted plants, gum ball machines and photo booths, all the stores and merchandise—the shuttered carts that look like little gypsy caravans—all that shit is nothin’ more than a blur around me. My feet are smackin’ against that floor so quickly it almost sounds like a drum roll. Before I even get halfway to the elevator I’m already huffin’ and gaspin’ like a pervert caller. I mean, my idea of exercise in putting in ten frames of Wii Bowling. I ain’t used to this shit, man.
At the same time, though, I know that if I even so much as slow down, I’m a dead man. I can hear that infected bitch behind me, see? I can hear her footsteps clattering through the mall and, from what I can tell, she’s not so much as even… Well, I was gonna say breakin’ a sweat. But we know that’s not true, right? Let’s just say this chick was fast, man. I mean, she’s still growling and it seems like its getting closer by the second. So that fuckin’ tortoise can suck it, man. Slow and steady wins the race, my ass… if that sack of virons wants a piece of me, then she’s gonna have to damn well work for it.
In my mind I got this picture of her leaping from trash cans to the wire benches, scampering up the sides of walls, dropping to all fours with her arms and legs being nothing more than a blur. ‘Course I know that type of shit isn’t really goin’ down, she’s running just the same as I am. But those kind of images have an emotional impact, ya know? They cloud the mind, make ya do stupid shit… stuff like lookin’ over your shoulder when you should be watching where the fuck you’re going.
See, when I was checking to see how close she was, I had just enough time to notice how it seemed her entire face had been devoured by a sneer. Then my shin banged against something that felt like metal teeth and my body’s tumbling forward. My chin bangs against one of the escalator steps hard enough that it cuts right through the fuckin’ skin, man. But I ain’t got time for that shit, I’m scrambling up the escalator, trying to keep moving and get back onto my feet all at the same time… the irony that I was the one on all fours wasn’t lost on me, either.
She musta careened into one of the trash cans at the bottom or something because all of a sudden I hear this loud bang that echoes like a gunshot. I don’t take time to look, though. I’m back to my feet now, right, and I know that every second I’m still alive gets my ass one step closer to my car.
That bitch recovered from her wipeout pretty damn quickly because I can hear her racin’ up the escalators just about the same time that I make it to the top and start hauling ass toward the book store.
Just then this dude seems to pop up outta nowhere. One minute I’m focused on the exit and the next this big dude in a referee shirt is blockin’ the way.
“Hey!” he hollers out to me. “Hey, you! Stop!”
Now this guy looks like he might actually have played some football at some point in his life and I don’t wanna tangle with him. All I wanna do is get to my car, get the fuck away from the mall, and then maybe go home and have a heart attack.
But Mister Referee isn’t budging. In fact, he’s got his knees bent, his hands up like he’s playing forward line or whatever the hell they call it, and he’s bobbing his head back and forth like he’s tryin’ to plot my trajectory.
You know that scene in The Wizard of Oz where the good witch tells the rugrats they can come outta hiding and all these munchkins start poppin’ up all over the damn place? Well, that’s what that mall was like, man. All of a sudden, you’ve got people pokin’ their heads outta every store, craning their necks in an attempt to see what all the commotion is about. So besides having this crazy broad practically breathing down my neck and a shoe store referee blocking my only means of escape, I now had an audience as well.
I knew I couldn’t turn back, ya know? The second I did that, Clarice fuckin’ Hudson would be all over my ass. And, to tell the truth, I would much rather take my chances with the ref, at least that dude didn’t seem to be infected yet. So I did the only thing I could… I just kept right on running.
Right as the referee was looming before my field of vision, he kinda dropped down lower, into this crouching stance. And, somehow, I knew exactly what he was planning. Maybe I picked it up from all the football my dad used to watch, or maybe it was that survival instinct I mentioned earlier. Shit, I don’t know how I knew, but I was absolutely certain that within two or three more steps, he was gonna try to clip me at the knees and take me down. And, as you can imagine, that was something I wanted to avoid at all costs.
You know what they used to call me when I was a kid, man? Toad. Know why they called me that? Well, I was in better shape back then and even though I was always the last one picked for teams, I was also the last one standing when it came to dodge ball.
Fuckin’ dodge ball man, what kind of sadist designed that particular piece of equipment? I mean, it’s bad enough that you’ve got these over-inflated projectiles whizzing at you. But to texture them like that? That shits stings worse than a patch of nettle, man, and I’ve always had this aversion to pain. I developed this knack, see, for just jumping right over that cruel, red ball. I’d hop into the air, spread my legs wide, and it would zip right under me. This same particular skill set also came in handy when playing Leap Frog. Which is where I actually got the nickname from.