Talia was too dead-set on what she came up with to let the words remind her of what had happened to Shea. “I have an idea.”
“I’m sure your idea could have waited.” Her tone sounded guttural and her eyelids were already starting to close.
“I think… I think I can bring Shea back!” Talia felt this with every fiber in her being that she could. There still had to be enough time.
Ednah sat up wide awake and shook her head. Gently, she pushed her legs to the side of the bed and said in an extremely calm manner, “No, honey, you can’t bring him back. Shea is gone.”
“I watched Frankenstein—”
The old woman held up a hand, interrupting her. “A work of fiction.”
“But I know I can help him,” she pressed, balling her fists so tight her palms were hurting.
“I’m sorry, child”—Ednah moved from the bed and reached out for Talia—“but we don’t have a large electric current machine sitting around, do we?”
Talia drew out of Ednah’s warm grasp. “That’s not funny, and I’m not a child. I’m hundreds of years older than you.”
“Yet you sure don’t act it.” With a yawn, Ednah sat back down on the bed.
“Fine, stay here,” Talia said with anger lacing her words. “I’m going to the cemetery to find a body for Shea.”
Not waiting for a reply, she left the room and hurried out to the garage to grab a shovel and ax before getting into her car. Starting the engine with a loud purr, she headed to the cemetery and held back her tears. It was only a few blocks up the road and no one was ever there, except for the dead.
Under the moonlight’s glow, two large metal gates pulled into her periphery. Talia parked the car in the gravelly lot and turned off the headlights. Quickly, she pulled out the flashlight from the glove compartment and grabbed the shovel and ax from the trunk.
The closer she got, the taller the gate seemed to grow before her eyes. The iron was of a murky black with sharp points and words spread across the top reading, Morgan’s Point Cemetery. A rusted handle and no chain bound it together. She adjusted the shovel and ax at her side and lifted the clasp—a grinding clink filled the air.
She let out a deep breath as if the dead would emerge out of their graves, but they didn’t. They remained buried. The only paranormal mystery she’d ever come into contact with was herself.
A slight fog and pine-like scent radiated off the tall trees. She held up the flashlight and scanned the cemetery, stopping on a large rectangular headstone with a crack down the center. An angelic stone angel rested on top, one of its arms missing.
With a hard thrust, Talia stabbed the shovel into the soil. Thankfully, the ground wasn’t frozen over so she wouldn’t spend days getting to the coffin, but it would be some time by morning. Shovel full after shovel full, she scooped out dirt. The night was already turning into day, and her arms and legs felt like gelatin, but she didn’t stop. Not until, finally, the end of her tool struck something solid.
Her earlier sadness had vanished with the new focus driving her entire being, and a new determination was there. Dr. Frankenstein and Dr. Moreau may have all been mad, but they were both geniuses who pulled it together. Talia had learned over the centuries that all fiction was rooted in fact. She was living proof of it.
Pulling herself out from the grave, she swiped the ax from the dew-covered grass. She rubbed sweat from her forehead and hopped back into the grave. With one strong whack, she buried the metal end of the ax into the wood. Again, Talia repeated the motion, and again, she hacked at it over and over.
“It took me a few cemeteries to find you, but I’m here,” a voice called.
Talia glanced up and tugged the flashlight from her back pocket, pointing the light onto Ednah’s face. “What are you doing?”
“I still think you’re crazy”—Ednah crossed her arms over her chest as she frowned—“and I still believe that this won’t work, but here I am just as Shea would have wanted. He was always such a crazy bastard.”
“The craziest,” Talia agreed with a smile. As she turned back around, she brought the ax down again and again, thinking about the time she and Shea stood in front of the train until the last second just because they could. Before she could delve further into that memory, the inside of the coffin caught her eye. She threw down the ax and let the rising sun highlight the old bones of a skeleton resting inside.
Ednah perched forward and peered down at Talia and the skeleton. The old woman pointed a painted pink nail at what was the ribcage. “Hmm, are you trying to bring a skeleton back to life?”
Tossing the ax and shovel onto the grass, Talia pulled herself from the grave. “No… I don’t know! I mean, how long does it take to decompose?”
“By the looks of that skeleton, I’d say it’s been decomposed a while.” Ednah pushed her glasses up her nose and focused on the tombstone. “Died 1964.” Hanging her head and shaking it in disapproval, Ednah continued to stare at the engraving.
Talia gripped her dark hair and dropped to her knees. “I don’t know! I’m not a scientist!”
“Well, you sure are trying to be one!” Ednah bit back.
“I can’t waste time trying to find skin to wrap around the skeleton, too.” Talia had been too desperate to get a body that she hadn’t been thinking straight and misread the year on the tombstone. Besides, she didn’t know what she thought she would find. Perhaps a perfectly put together body?
“We can fillet my own skin for it.” Ednah stared at her, face serious. “I’m sure it will grow back.”
“What?” Talia squeaked, her heart accelerating.
“I’m not serious.” Ednah scooped up the shovel and turned around. “But I could be…”
“That’s not funny!” Talia picked up the ax and followed her friend. The woman was growing closer to death, but she kept her sarcasm strong.
When they made it to the outside of the gate, Ednah closed the metal and pressed down the latch. “Instead of digging for these fresh bodies, why aren’t you snatching Shea’s?”
Talia closed her eyes and bit her lip, turning away from Ednah. “Because… Because I want to give him a new body. One that doesn’t hurt.”
“What an incredibly beautiful story,” Ednah said loudly. “Then how will it be Shea?”
Holding back an inner scream, she twisted around to face her frustrating friend. “I plan on inserting his brain!”
The old woman stabbed the ground with the shovel. “Oh, biscuits and gravy, you really are crazy!”
“It’s okay to curse, you know that?” Talia shouted at the top of her lungs. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”
Jolting forward, Edna covered Talia’s mouth with her wrinkled hand. “Stop! My old ears can’t handle it.”
“Please help me,” Talia mumbled through Ednah’s hand.
Closing her eyes, the old woman dropped her hand and stared at Talia fiercely. “Look, I’m not going to be an accomplice, but I’ll drive you to get Shea.”
“That’s an accomplice.”
“No, it’s me taking my friend to the funeral home, thinking she’s arranging a funeral.”