A Date with Deadboy

Deadboy had a date and this presented so many, many problems. It was true that he had wanted the date, had asked for it . . . but now the whole complexity of the situation was starting to dawn on him.

He sat on the bare-backed chair in the derelict house and listened to the wind howling through the ruined roof. He would sit like this for hours when he wasn't at school, when there was nothing to do. He'd stare into emptiness, motionless like an appliance on stand-by.

Four hours remained until the date. Perhaps he should get ready.

He got up and walked over to the cracked mirror he had propped against the wall. He might have guessed it: a nasty crack had formed in the skin on his forehead. Shiny white skull peeped through. Today of all days! He picked up a tube of mortician's wax and squeezed some onto his fingertips. Then he pressed it into the rent, smoothing it over like Polyfilla. He'd need make-up to camouflage it, plenty of make-up, but it wasn't the end of the world.

And there were so many other things to worry about. Ever since his death, his body had started to change. His skin had begun to give off an unpleasant odour. He could douse himself in deodorant but the deathsmell just kept creeping through. His joints had stiffened and his body now moved in an even more ungainly way, which made him feel self-conscious. With practice he could suppress the jerkiness and his tendency to lurch, but he needed to concentrate on it all the time, and sometimes this wasn't possible. His saliva glands no longer functioned and occasionally his voice would crack or become a guttural croak in mid-sentence. There had been so much to get his head around.

Methodically he made his preparations for the date. He took off his clothes and hosed his bony body down. The water was ice-cold but luckily he could not feel it. He dried himself with a towel and applied copious quantities of deodorant and aftershave. Then he got out the make-up kit, which he had purchased with much embarrassment, and touched up any patches of skin that had become discoloured or cracked. He dabbed a little rouge on his face to improve his deathly pallor. It was most important not to overdo this. He didn't want to give Melissa the wrong idea.

At least it was too cold for the flies. He hated the way they buzzed around him in the summer months and crawled over his flesh. He couldn't actually feel them but somehow he always knew they were there. Buzzing flies hardly set the atmosphere one desired on a date.

He picked out some clothes he hadn't worn before. His old clothes had soon became suffused with the deathsmell and he had had to burn them. These ones he'd bought specially. He hoped they conformed with current fashions, but since his death he'd really lost track of such things. He dressed slowly, sometimes having to force his rigor-stricken limbs into sleeves and trouser legs. He had to do up his belt using the last possible hole to prevent his trousers slipping from his wasted frame. He gargled with three cups of mouthwash, hoping it would mask the gaseous stench that would occasionally bubble up from his chest cavity.

And then, finally, he was ready. He checked his watch: he was going to be late. How had that happened? Checking his watch regularly was one of many habits he had lost. Time just didn't seem to mean as much any more. Large chunks of it just slipped by without him noticing.

He hurried out of the house and dragged the wooden board back in front of the missing door. He tunnelled his way through the overgrown front garden, climbed carefully over the wall and started walking briskly along the pavement. 

They'd arranged to meet outside one of the burger restaurants in the mall. He felt uncomfortable as he made his way through the throngs of shoppers. What if someone spotted there was an outsider in their midst? The more people he was surrounded by, the more he was reminded of his otherness.

He spotted Melissa standing in front of the burger restaurant. Her arms were folded and she already looked peeved. He hurried over to her, managing to catch her eye before he got there. She didn't look especially relieved to see him. He wondered how he should greet her. He couldn't exactly shake her hand. She seemed to be proffering her cheek for him to kiss, which was odd. He leaned forward and tried to make a kissing sound with his bone-dry lips. He felt like a character in one of those arty French films. He apologised for being late.