Peeps

“That’s where she lived, according to the two guys upstairs. Loud and freaky in bed, they tell me.”

I coughed into a fist, again damning my fugitive memories. “You know who lives here now?”

“Guy called Max. He works days.”

I knocked hard. No answer.

Lace sighed. “I told you he wouldn’t be home.”

“Glad to hear it.” I pulled out another of the items requisitioned that morning and knelt by the door: The lock was a standard piece-of-crap deadbolt, five tumblers. Into its keyhole I sprayed some graphite, which is the same gray stuff that gets on your fingers if you fiddle with the end of a pencil, and does the same thing to locks that Bahamalama-Dingdongs do to repressed memories—lubricates them. Two of the tumblers rolled over as my pick slid in. Easy-peasy.

“Dude,” Lace whispered, “shouldn’t you get a warrant or something?”

I was ready for this one. “Doesn’t matter. You only need a warrant if you want the evidence to stand up in court. But I’m not taking anyone to court.” Another tumbler rolled over. “This isn’t a criminal investigation.”

“But you can’t just break into people’s apartments!”

“I’m not breaking. Just looking.”

“Still!”

“Look, Lace, maybe this isn’t strictly legal. But if people in my job didn’t cut a few corners every now and then, everyone in this city would be infected, okay?”

She paused for a moment, but the ring of truth had filled my words. I’ve seen simulations of what would happen if the parasite were to spread unchecked, and believe me, it’s not pretty. Zombie Apocalypse, we call it.

Finally, she scowled. “You better not steal anything.”

“I won’t.” The last two tumblers went, and I opened the door. “You can stay out here if you want. Knock hard if Max comes out of that elevator.”

“Forget it,” she said. “I’m going to make sure you don’t do anything weird. Besides, he’s had my blender for four months.”

She pushed in past me, heading for the kitchen. I sighed, putting my lock-pick away and closing the door behind us.

The apartment was a carbon copy of Lace’s, but with better furniture. The shape of the living room refired my recognition pistons. Finally, I had found the place where the parasite had entered me, making me a carrier and changing my life forever.

It was much tidier than Lace’s apartment, which might be a problem. After seven months of living there, an obsessive cleaner would have swept away a lot of evidence.

I crossed to the sliding glass doors and shut the curtains to make it darker, trying to ignore the clatter of pots and pans from the kitchen.

“You know,” I called, “you’re the one who’s going to have to explain to Max how you got your blender back.”

“I’ll tell him I astral-projected. Butt-head.”

“Huh?”

“Him, not you. He had my blender all summer. Margarita season.”

“Oh.” I shook my head—infection, ca

I pulled out another little toy I’d picked up that morning—an ultraviolet wand—and flicked it on. The demon’s eyes on my Kill Fee shirt began to give off an otherworldly glow. I swept the wand across the same wall that, back in Lace’s apartment, had held the words written in gristle.

“Dude! Flashback!” Lace said, crossing the living room. She smiled, and her teeth flickered as white as a radioactive beach at noon.

“Flashback?”

“Yeah, your teeth are glowing, like at a dance club.”

I shrugged. “Don’t go to clubs much since I … got this job.”

“No, I guess you wouldn’t,” she said. “All that sexual transmission just waiting to happen.”

“Huh? Hey, I don’t have anything against—”

She smiled. “Just kidding, dude. Relax.”

“Ah.” I cleared my throat.

Nothing glowed on the wall in the ultraviolet. I held the wand closer, casting weird shadows across the stucco mountainscape. No pattern of a hurried paint roller appeared. I cut into a few spots at random with my fingernail, but nothing bright shone through.

The other walls were just as clean.

“So does that thing make blood show up?” she asked.

“Blood and other bodily fluids.”

“Bodily fluids? You are so CSI.” She said this like it was a cool thing, and I gave her a smile.

“Let’s try the bedroom,” she said.

“Good idea.”

We went through the door, and my déjá vu ramped up to another level. This was where I had lost my virginity and become a monster, all in one night.

Like the living room, the bedroom was impeccably clean. Lace sat on the bed while I sca

“This goo you’re looking for, it isn’t still … active, is it?”

“Active? Oh, you mean infectious.” I shook my head. “One thing about parasites—they’re great at living inside other organisms, but once they hit the outside world, they’re not so tough.”

“Parasites?”

“Oh, pretend you didn’t hear that. Anyway, after seven months, you’re totally safe from catching it.” I cleared my throat. “As am I.”

“So, what’s with the glow stick?”

“I’m trying to see if the same thing happened here as in your apartment.”

“The wall-writing dementia festival, you mean? Does that really happen a lot?”

“Not really.”

“Didn’t think so. Lived in New York all my life, and I never saw anything like that on the news.”

I shot her a look, the word news making me wonder if her journalistic instincts were kicking in. Which would be a bad thing.

“What disease is this again?” she asked.

“Not telling.”

“Please!”

I waved the wand at her, and several luminous streaks appeared on the blanket underneath her.

“What’s that?”

I gri

“Dude!” She leaped to her feet.

“That’s nothing compared to the skin mites.”

Lace was rubbing her hands together. “Which are what?”

“Microscopic insects that hang out in beds, feeding on dead skin cells.”

“I’ll be washing out my blender,” she said, and left me alone.

I chuckled to myself and turned the wand on the other walls, the floors, inside the closet. Other than Max’s blanket and a pair of underwear under the bed, the UV didn’t get a rise out of anything. Picking at the stucco didn’t help; nothing had been painted over in this apartment.

Max was a lot neater than most single men, I’d say that for the guy. Or maybe Morgan knew not to eat where she slept.

Suddenly, my ears caught a jingling sound. Keys in a lock.

“Crap,” I said. Max was home early. “Uh, Cal?” Lace’s voice called softly, her vocal cords tight.

“Shh!” I flicked off the wand, shoved it into my pocket, and ran into the living room. Lace was standing there, clutching her wet blender.

“Put that down!” I hissed, dragging her toward the glass doors that led to the balcony.

I heard the lock’s bolt shoot closed. A lucky break—I had left the apartment unlocked behind us, so whoever was coming in had just relocked the door, thinking they were unlocking it.

Muffled Spanish swearing filtered through, a female voice, and I realized that Max’s apartment was spotless because he had a cleaner.

I yanked the sliding glass door open and pushed Lace out into the cold. When it was shut behind us, I watched the thick curtains swing lazily to a halt, hiding us from the living room. Pressing one ear to the icy glass, palming the other to mute the roar of traffic, I listened. My heartbeat was ramped up with excitement, adrenaline making the parasite start to churn, my muscles tightening. Through the glass came the sound of a graphite-lubricated dead-bolt shooting free, and the door creaked open.

“Mio!” an a

I turned to Lace, whose eyes were wide, her pupils huge from the excitement. On the tiny balcony, we were only a foot apart, and I could smell her perfectly—the jasmine hair, a salt smell of nerves. We were too close for comfort. I pulled my eyes away from her and pointed at the next balcony over. “Who lives there?”