Dead Romantic by C. J. Skuse Page B

and that was why I needed him to nail the lid down tonight. And even though he knew he might get in trouble with his dad who didn’t trust him with watering the flowers, let alone nailing down the lids, he did as I asked him. I hugged him in relief. He hugged me back. And even though we weren’t hugging for a real reason, it was the nicest thing that had happened all night long.
    Louis walked me out of the funeral parlour and we said one of those awkward goodbyes where we didn’t quite know whether to do a handshake or another hug.
    â€˜I can’t thank you enough for, well, you know, letting me in and everything.’
    He shrugged. ‘It was no sweat, really.’ He smiled and looked at his shoes.
    â€˜Will you get in trouble for nailing the lid down?’
    â€˜Probably. So, will you be okay now?’
    I nodded, pretending to wipe my eyes with a tissue. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’
    â€˜Yeah. Triple History, isn’t it?’ I said, rolling my eyes like I really hated it, even though I didn’t actually mind it too much.
    He frowned. ‘There’s no point going in for it though. You won’t be able to concentrate and you’d have to leave at ten anyway for the funeral.’
    â€˜Oh yeah, yeah of course, of course. No, I don’t suppose I’ll bother.’ I mentally stapled it to my brain: don’t forget to show up at the funeral tomorrow morning. Wherever it was. Sniff.
    â€˜Mr Atwill won’t mind, under the circumstances,’ he said.
    â€˜I guess not,’ I said as he put his hand up to wave and then walked across the road and into Fat Pang’s, which was buzzing with people and colour and light. On the doorstep, he turned to look at me and I made out I was starting to walk in the opposite direction. But once his back was turned, I stopped and watched him go inside. He walked over to a long table beside the wall with the huge fish tank in it. He sat down next to Damian, who looked especially Yumsville in his black suit with his shirt wide open. He was leaning back in his chair chatting to some blonde girl with black roots. Louis sipped his Coke and seemed more interested in the fish tank and I couldn’t help myself smiling.
    â€˜So, that’s Part One,’ said Zoe, climbing into the driver’s seat and carefully closing the door behind her.
    â€˜What’s Part Two?’ I said. ‘The head?’
    â€˜Yes, but we should get some serum into him first to retard decomposition.’
    â€˜What’s decomposition?’
    â€˜Rotting. He will have been taken out of the freezer at the funeral parlour around four for family viewing. That means he’s been thawing ever since. If I get the serum into him tonight, that will give us at least a few more days’ grace, provided he is kept at low temperature.’ She started up the engine.
    â€˜I thought you only inserted the serum before you electrocuted?’ I asked her as the van rolled out of the street and waited at the traffic lights to the seafront. ‘We’re not going to electrocute him without a head, are we?’
    â€˜No, of course not,’ said Zoe. ‘We need to do things a little differently with this one. The serum can be injected at any time before electrocution takes, but I want to give it longer to work in this specimen, so that it has less chance of going wrong. Like with the hamsters and your dog.’
    â€˜They didn’t go wrong,’ I said. ‘The hamsters and Pee Wee are all alive and well thanks to you.’
    â€˜Yes, but they’re flawed. They’re not perfect versions of their former selves.’
    The van turned onto the seafront. ‘Pee Wee looks okay to me.’
    â€˜Have you seen what the hamsters have done to the college? A hamster should not be able to chew through concrete walls, Camille. And normal little dogs don’t behave like Pee Wee.’
    I looked behind me. The curtain-wrapped