Dead Wife

by Corinne Engber

Horrific Scribes Extremity Rating

In the basement with your best friend, you bring her back to life.

It’s shockingly easy. The hardest part was digging her up, and even that didn’t take very long, not with the two of you. It was the first time Brandon had ever shown up early for anything—fresh from work in stained coveralls, purple thumbprints pressed deep under his eyes. You stood smoking in the cemetery parking lot, expecting to wait fifteen minutes or more, but five before two, there he was: a pair of headlights in the dark.

The whole thing was his idea. He’d been seeing this witch, on and off, who told him how to do it. Bring something back, just once, for a second chance. You called bullshit, of course—Brandon could barely count to twenty without taking his socks off, and you were sure he’d been had—but then he told you about the cat. He showed you the pictures backwards: an unflattering close-up of a satisfied orange tabby curled up on his flannel sheets, followed by several dimly-lit snapshots of a tarp and a pile of bloody fur. It works, he said about a dozen times, and because he’s Brandon, you believed him.

Though, to be honest, you would have believed anyone if it brought her back.

So, the night after the funeral, while the earth was still soft, you retrieved her. She was in bad shape: the funeral director assured you that restorative cosmetics had come a long way, that she would look very peaceful, but you opted for minimal intervention and a veil over her ruined face. You also insisted on a female mortician, didn’t like the idea of her leered over by some strange man. Even in the unfinished basement below the kitchen, with her embalmed, fluidless body lying inert on the plastic sheeting, you clip the suture truss yourself. Her jaw stays closed: held shut by rigor mortis.

Brandon holds the rabbit in both hands. He is shaking, near tears at the sight of her, and why shouldn’t he be? You all grew up together, spent every summer and school year in the same little town. After the crash, he beat you to the hospital, though only because you were away for work. You do your best not to resent him for that.

Give it to me, you tell him, and he obeys. The rabbit squirms in your hands. When the time comes, you do it quickly, without the cruelty of hesitation. Brandon watches; he was better suited, had been dispatching and dressing animals since he could hold a knife, but you insisted. 

One-handed, you excise what you need. You pry open what remains of your dead wife’s mouth. You push each organ, still warm, down her rictus throat. At your side, Brandon reads aloud from a long text message. You think his voice is faltering, but it isn’t; the words he was given are hardly words at all. You imagine him alone, grunting, cramming frog organs into a dead cat’s mouth like a reverse high school dissection, and you nearly lose yourself to hysterics. This is ridiculous, you tell yourself. It’s sick. It’s desecration.

You don’t stop.

Brandon finishes his chant and draws a symbol in the air with his finger. Nothing happens. It takes a while, he tells you.

You’re exhausted, and your fingernails are rimed black with blood. How long?

Tomorrow at the earliest.

Then I’ll call you tomorrow.

Brandon recognizes the dismissal and tromps up the basement stairs into the kitchen, taking them two at a time like when you were kids. You wait until the sound of his engine disappears and cover your dead wife’s body with the edge of the tarp. You go to bed.

In the morning, you wake to a knock on the door. You stumble through the house, bleary and aching, and look through the peephole. No one is there.

From the kitchen, the knock comes again.

You startle, come fully awake. Scrambling barefoot over the tile, you cross the threshold and grapple with the door beside the pantry, remembering Brandon’s cat, remembering how he described it twining between his legs, its meow thick and greasy from lack of use.

The door swings open. Your dead wife stands, whole, at the top of the stairs.

Nora, you say. Oh my God, Nora.

She smiles. Hey, you.

You take her in your arms. She smells like sour dirt, formaldehyde, new skin. Her white gown hangs off her body and puddles at her feet. She nestles her face into your shoulder.

Oh my God, you say. It worked. It worked.

She says: I love you.

Your heart swells. You say it back.

In the bathroom, you undress and bathe your dead wife. You comb clots of dirt from her long hair. You dress her in your clothes, and when you lay her down in your marital bed, you ask if she remembers the accident. Your dead wife shifts beneath the quilt, props herself up on one elbow.

No, she tells you. In the absence of grime, her face is even more beautiful than you remember. Gone are the dark circles and crows’ feet, the nascent jowls bracketing her mouth. In their place, only unblemished skin. No, I don’t remember.

You say: Do you want me to tell you?

Do you want to tell me?

You don’t. The conversation lapses. You watch your dead wife pick up the half-finished novel from her bedside table and examine its cover. She removes the bookmark from the middle and starts from the beginning.

Your dead wife is exactly as you remember her. She enjoys the same television shows, folds your laundry the same way—in thirds, Marie Kondo-style. She even retains her braying laugh, which had before the accident only just begun to grate. A week after the resurrection, you and Brandon and your dead wife pick a booth in an unfamiliar café. She sits across from you, stirring her coffee with long, intact fingers.

How do you feel, Brandon asks her. He smells sleepless, unwashed. His hip brushes yours, trapping you in the booth.

I feel great, says your dead wife. Better than I have in my whole life.

She sounds like she believes it, too. You have no real cause to doubt her; she glows from every pore, a halo of thin hairs illuminated by the late morning daylight behind her. The only true change is a pale ring around each pupil, as if she were staring into a fluorescent light.

Brandon shifts against you. You press yourself further into the booth’s wooden wall. Of course, you feel grateful to him. He’s your best friend—you couldn’t have brought her back without him—but in this moment, you wish you were alone with Nora. It’s been a long time since you felt this way. You take Nora’s hand across the table, rub her knuckles with your thumb. It feels nice to touch her.

Brandon asks if she wants to hear about the accident. Before she answers, you say: no. She doesn’t. And for that matter, neither do I.

Your dead wife cocks her head to one side. I know what I need to know, she says, and she does. Despite your discomfort, you told her what the police told you: a drunk driver blew through a red light and t-boned her car, which rolled six times into a ditch. When the paramedics came to cut her from the wreckage, the sunroof was opaque with blood.

Probably for the best, Brandon says, sipping his open Monster. His eyes are bloodshot around the edges. Then: I tried it with a cat first.

Oh my God, you say. Don’t tell her about the cat.

What kind of cat, asks your dead wife.

An orange one.

What happened to it? She sounds a little nervous, but Brandon smiles.

She lives with me now, he says. Her name is Thatch. Every morning, I wake up to her lying on my chest.

Now you are squirming in your seat. What Brandon has not mentioned is that Thatch was his neighbor’s cat—a mean, ugly thing, half-feral from neglect. He hit her by accident with his truck and, feeling guilty, kept her in his chest freezer until he got drunk enough to try bringing her back. He named her after Margaret Thatcher. You know, he told you. Just like in Pet Sematary.

Your dead wife wants to meet the cat. She jokes: I want to see if her eyes look like mine. You tell her she won’t be able to tell the difference, that regular cats have eyeshines. She leaves with Brandon in his truck anyway. You drive home. An odd feeling tickles the back of your mind, but you don’t know what it is yet.

The first time you have sex with your dead wife, she initiates. She surprises you: prior to the accident, her already tepid libido had taken a remarkable downturn. But now, she takes your phone from your hand and straddles you on the recliner, guiding your fingers between her legs. She is soaked and open, drawing you in. You fuck her on the floor. It feels like the first time—grasping, a little shameful. She bites your shoulder hard enough to leave a mark. You check the spot in the mirror later, wondering if she drew blood.

When she wraps her arms around you, you flinch. What’s the matter? she asks. Afraid you’ll turn into a zombie?

Ha ha, you say, kissing her nose. Later, in private, you dab the mark with peroxide. You watch it heal over several days but worry even after it disappears. For the first time since the resurrection, you wonder if what you did was wrong. Surely it can’t be this easy. Surely there must be a cost.

But a month goes by, and you do not wake up to your dead wife gorging herself on roadkill or standing over your bedside with a knife. Each day, she is just as lively as the last. Livelier than you remember her, so different that, when you risk taking her out to the grocery store, an old coworker passes you both in the aisle without a second glance.

Your dead wife doesn’t seem to notice but laughs when you bring it up in the car.

Really? she asks, laughing. She didn’t recognize me? 

The laughing doesn’t stop. Your knuckles whiten on the steering wheel as your dead wife sticks her head out the window and crows at the sky.

I’m free! she yells. I’m free!

Your dead wife’s parents want nothing to do with her; you haven’t seen or heard from them since the engagement party. The number they left upon moving, the one you tried to call before the funeral, is long since disconnected. You don’t mention this. It would only upset her.

If your dead wife has friends who miss her, you haven’t met them. Before the accident, she rarely left the house, citing a preference for solitude, but now she chats with everyone she sees: cashiers, construction workers, waitresses and movie theater ushers. She takes up oil painting at a local maker space, and your new first fight occurs when she comes home near midnight, her sketchbook full of men.

It isn’t that you don’t trust her. You tell her this afterwards, standing in your bedroom. You ask her to turn and face you. When she does, it is not with the sad acquiescence of the woman you married.

I don’t care if you trust me or not, she says. Every tooth is on display, the ring around each pupil like white fire. You’ll treat me the same either way. 

Before you can react, she’s around the bed, her hand down your boxers, her mouth on your neck. In your surprise, you forget your jealousy. You know she can’t hurt you. You give in.

Brandon meets you on your lunch break. He’s fifteen minutes late.

Sorry I’m late, he says, sitting down too hard. The china shakes on the table. You imagine he’s more accustomed to lunching in diners, the cutlery water-spotted and bound in paper napkins. Though it’s early afternoon, he orders a beer.

What’s up? he asks. Haven’t seen much of you lately.

Right to the point, a better apology for wasting your time. You grapple with how to start. Finally, you say: It’s about Nora.

Yeah, I figured, Brandon says. Foam speckles the stubble on his upper lip. What’s going on?

She’s different.

Brandon raises his eyebrows. Different how?

Though there is no one listening, you lean in closer. She’s just… different.

In a bad way?

No, you say, quickly. I mean. Not exactly. Nothing’s really wrong and she seems happy, but… I dunno. I’ve got a bad feeling.

About her being happy. Brandon takes a long pull of his beer.

You know that’s not what I mean. Listen, you said the cat’s personality changed when you brought it back, right? It was mean and then all of a sudden—

The chair squeaks when Brandon leans back in it. Maybe it’s none of my business, he says, but I was hoping the second chance would inspire you two to shake things up a little.

You hate it when he inserts himself like this, speculating on your marriage. You say: What do you mean, shake things up?

I dunno, Brandon says. Try new things, travel. Rekindle the romance. Oh, come on, he adds when you stare. I’m not an idiot. I know things weren’t going so hot before. But now you get something nobody else gets—a do-over. Be serious, Jane. Did you really think we brought Nora back just so she could slot into the same old routine?

You could punch him. You imagine doing it, vividly, right here in the restaurant, but he’s taller and bigger than you are, and you haven’t been able to pin him since you were kids. You lean in, hissing: she’s my wife. We didn’t bring her back for you.

This hurts him. You know it does; that’s why you said it. Brandon likes Nora, has since before either of them knew any better. He probably still holds a candle for her, in that dopey little kid kind of way. He hasn’t said anything, of course, but you know he resents you for winning.

The satisfaction of needling him doesn’t last. He doesn’t give anything back, no fuel for the argument. Besides, he’s your best friend—without him, you’d still be drinking in that empty house. You try to salvage the conversation.

I didn’t mean that, you say. I’m just afraid something’s wrong. Like we did something bad bringing her back.

Brandon finishes his beer and stands up from the table. He doesn’t look angry. Mostly, he looks sad.

Maybe we did, he says, and leaves.

The unsettled feeling grows worse. This new Nora has appetites. At dinner, you find yourself watching her eat long after you finish—pasta and bread and blue-rare steaks topped with compound butter. She asks you to go out dancing on a weeknight. When you refuse, she goes anyway, comes home flushed and paws you awake. I want you, she breathes in your ear, ignoring your protestations. I want you so bad.

Her eyes glow like a cat’s in the dark, so you fuck her from behind. She pushes back, draws you in to the base with room for more. She’s running wet, halfway there from the word go. Her hair is damp and greasy at the roots. Her scalp smells like dirt.

Not for one moment do you forget that she was dead. Dead dead: mutilated, exsanguinated and rebuilt with mastic. You buried her in that white dress, white coffin drenched in white roses. This woman underneath you reaches back to grab your thighs. Your flesh stings. You can barely move.

You come so hard you cry.

Afterwards, she holds you, wipes herself with the edge of the sheet. Phew, she says, haha. Good thing you can’t knock me up, huh?

This stings, would sting even if you weren’t so raw. Beneath the duvet, you clutch at the mattress. That isn’t funny, you say.

She looks over, just eyes in the dark. It isn’t?

You go cold. The old Nora never wanted kids, never even brought it up. You have no idea what this one wants.

I didn’t mean to upset you, she says. I was only joking.

Despite your anger, you can’t get up to leave. Not in the middle of the night, not with fatigue fogging your mind. I know, you say. I’m just tired.

She hesitates, deciding whether to push or grovel. The old Nora might have, but this isn’t Nora. This is something else.

Finally, she says: Good night.

You sleep and dream, all night, of rabbits with overgrown teeth.

You tell your dead wife that work is sending you on a business trip and spend two nights in a motel. You don’t do much, just get drunk and chainsmoke while watching daytime TV, but it helps to get some space. You feel a little guilty for lying to her but no guiltier than any of the other times. In truth, work rarely sends you anywhere, and never overnight. The only reason Brandon beat you to the hospital after the crash, you think, watching the ceiling tiles spin, is because he never does anything. He still works with his dad, still drinks in all the same bars you used to sneak into. He plays video games and musical beds—nothing permanent or real. His life is untethered. Painless.

Do you envy him? No, you do not, not even for his virility. He’s your best friend, but God is his world small. Not like yours. Where he stagnated, you clawed yourself free from that shitty little town, went to school, made something of yourself. You have a good job, a house you own and fixed up yourself. A wife.

Almost sober, you sit up in bed. What is she doing right now, you wonder, this new Nora? Grilling? Painting? You feel a sudden pang for her, so intense that it blots out the revenant of your misgivings. 

What are you doing? Only a few months ago, you would have given anything to have her again. Was that so easy to forget? Have you really grown so complacent? So bored, already?

Did you bring her back just to take her for granted again?

You check out of the motel and get on the road, devising an excuse for your early return. Maybe your boss had a family emergency, you think, or the client bailed last minute. Or maybe an explanation was unnecessary—before the accident, Nora rarely questioned you about your whereabouts. She had always been so forgiving, so trusting. Your almost-sober mind conjures the desert landscape of her body. She’s probably hungry for you.

An approaching truck taps its horn when you drift into the other lane. You startle, thinking of the old Nora, hanging upside down in her car. Just pieces.

You slow down. Obeying every traffic law, you drive the four hours back, following the familiar curves of your neighborhood. At the end of your street, you stare through the coming dusk at the squat front lawn.

Brandon’s truck is in the driveway.

What is Brandon’s truck doing in your driveway? You have plenty of time to catastrophize as you inch down the dead residential street. A hopeful, generous part of you says: maybe there’s a leak. Maybe it rained, and the basement flooded, and Nora called him instead of a plumber. Or maybe she got lonely and nostalgic in your absence—but then why wouldn’t she call you? Had she and Brandon gotten close since the accident? Had they been close before?

You don’t remember parking or walking to the front door. That generous part of you, still chattering: maybe they’re visiting. Sitting on opposite sides of the sectional, opposite sides of the room, reminiscing about school. The door squeaks when you open it.

Nora and Brandon are on the couch, but they aren’t sitting. At the sound of the door, both their heads snap toward the open threshold: two deer, stock still on a dark country road. Caught.

Skewered by your best friend, your dead wife says: Jane?

You don’t know what to do. All the oxygen leaks from the room. Your lungs crinkle like plastic bags in your chest, and when you do manage to breathe, it hurts.

Nora—still dressed but only just—pulls herself loose. She’s blushing bridal, her white-ringed eyes glossed like a doll’s. Brandon babbles, on the verge of tears as he fumbles with his boxers. The outline of his erection pushes through his fly’s toothy mouth.

Fuck, he says. Fuck, Jane, I didn’t mean to—

All you hear is static. Your body moves without input from your brain, out of the foyer and into the kitchen. You go down the basement stairs, thinking, dimly: don’t want to ruin the carpet.

You double over the unfinished concrete floor, but it’s spit and bile and nothing else. Someone follows you down—Nora, locking the basement door behind her. She wants you alone, doesn’t want Brandon to follow, you think, and then bend forward again at the sound of his name in your head.

I’m sorry. Nora’s voice is quiet but not meek. I didn’t want you to find out this way.

You wipe your mouth and eyes. In the dim basement light, you can only just make out the tarp you wrapped her body in. All that remains of the rabbit is a smear on the concrete.

It isn’t that I don’t love you, says the thing in Nora’s body. I do. I just love Brandon, too.

This only makes it worse. You don’t want to know but can’t stop yourself from asking.

How long?

A while.

Since… before?

Nora hesitates. Then: I don’t remember. Does it matter?

Of course it fucking matters, but you don’t say this. All you can think of is Brandon’s swollen eyes, his shaking hands, the fierce fraternal way he held you in the hospital waiting room. All his faux-intellectual bullshit advice and Nora’s little jab about getting knocked up. This whole time, the two of them have been laughing at you.

I didn’t want to hurt you, Nora is saying. She sounds contrite, but her face is cool and steady. I love both of you so much. I didn’t know I could feel this way. It’s like my life before was a dream, and now I’m finally awake.

Your life before? Your vision shrinks to a pinprick. You mean your life with me?

It’s just shadows. She steps closer, her fingers twitching like she wants to touch you. But what we have now is real. This love, my body… it’s real and—

And you fucked my best friend.

She stops moving.

That’s what you did, isn’t it? Now that you’re talking, the words pour out like brackish water. That’s what’s real? You, fucking Brandon behind my back, telling me that you love him? Fucking Brandon? Brandon, who had to go to the ER in the third grade after he stuck a grape up his nose? Brandon, who borrowed a grand from me ten years ago and still hasn’t paid it back? That Brandon?

She’s calm: This isn’t necessa—

Who else do you love, Nora? Rage clouds your vision. Hey, you like my dad, right? You fuck him too? Maybe the cashier at the grocery store? What about all those models you were “painting,” you let them run a train on you because you’re so enlightened now? Ice princess in the bedroom for years but spend a little time underground and now all you want is dick? Is that it?

Nora’s eyes shine in the dark. She’s crying, but you don’t believe her tears for a second.

Jane, she says. Please, Jane. I didn’t mean to…

You say: You fucking cunt. I thought there was something wrong with you after we brought you back, but I was only half right. There’s always been something wrong with you.

Nora is quiet. She looks at you, inhuman in the dark, and you barely recognize her.

Then, she says: All I’ve ever done is care for you.

And then you’re on top of her. She screams, once, and you hit her. You haven’t hit anyone in years—your fury is too large for your body, too large for the room. The perimeter of your skin disappears. You pin her by the shoulders, straddle her, press her full force into the concrete. She fights. Her bare feet kick and scrape against the floor, but she isn’t strong enough to push you off.

Above you, Brandon pounds on the basement door. Jane?! he yells. Open the door! It isn’t her fault, it’s my fault! Don’t—

FUCK YOU, you shriek. GET OUT.

Nora calls his name, wet and desperate. The sound of it is unbearable. You cover her mouth, feel her teeth sink into your hand. Excruciating, white-hot, blue-hot—you pull back and she doesn’t let go. You pull harder; the flesh rips. A raw, grainy pain when your muscle meets air.

Nora’s head falls, bounces off the floor. There’s meat in her teeth.

You always hated me, she hisses. Deep down, you always have. Does it make you feel strong, Jane? Is that why you brought me back? So you could have something to stand on?

Your hands circle her throat. The tendons jump under your fingers, the white eyes bulging. No tears, nothing recognizable in the face. She is monstrous beneath you. Demonic.

Brandon rattles the door handle violently, bashing his shoulder over and over against the jam.

Jane! Jane, don’t—!

But it’s already done.

You don’t remember in the morning. You don’t remember the basement door splintering at the hinges, Brandon’s footsteps thundering down the stairs. You don’t remember staggering back from the body and its broken neck, or Brandon’s hands, or the shovel. In fact, when you wake: you don’t remember your own name.

Light filters through the pebbled glass windows onto the basement floor. The tarp beneath you crinkles when you move. Your sides hurt, and when you draw breath, something sticks in your throat.

With great effort, you roll over. A leaden mass shifts inside you. Strange: you don’t remember eating. You don’t remember anything. The tarp clings to your tacky fingers as you push yourself upright. Your stomach constricts, distraught at the movement, and the something in your throat touches the back of your tongue. You swallow, salivating fruitlessly. Eventually, it goes down.

Upstairs, someone is talking. Though the voice is muffled and gummy, you recognize it at once.

It’s Brandon. Warmth flows through you at once; Brandon is here! Your best friend! You can’t wait to see him, but, unable to stand, the best you can do is crawl towards the stairs and the sliver of light around the doorframe.

Who is he talking to? You can’t hear anyone else, but Brandon is clearly upset; crying, sobbing, and pacing the tile. You heave yourself up the bottom steps to get closer.

Brandon says: I didn’t mean to. It happened so fast and I… I didn’t know what else to do. Please, Lily. You have to help me.

In response comes the tinny voice of a woman, sounding very far away. She says: You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.

Brandon says: Please. You have to know what to do. You taught me the spell.

You piece of shit, Lily says. I only told you so you could bring the cat back. If I’d known you were stupid enough to try it on a person…

I know! Brandon’s voice breaks. I know! I messed up, really bad, but I didn’t have any other choice. Please, just… tell me if it’ll work.

How should I know? Lily hisses. This is so outside my wheelhouse, you have no fucking idea. Jesus Christ, Brandon, as if the first one wasn’t bad enough. I shouldn’t even be talking to you.

Don’t hang up! Brandon is panting. Please, please don’t hang up. I need you. I can’t… I can’t be alone.

Lily lets out a crackly, one-note laugh and says: Well, look on the bright side. If the spell takes, you won’t be. 

Lily—

Don’t ever call me again.

The line goes dead. Propped up on the bottom stair, you hear Brandon dial the number again. Again, again, and no answer. You hear him fling the phone, hear it shatter on the tile. You hear him start to weep.

Brandon, your best friend, is weeping. You have to go to him, comfort him, but it’s so hard to move. You try anyway: rolling your hips to get your knees under you, dragging yourself up the stairs one at a time. You feel so heavy. Halfway up, the sour mass scales your throat. Unable to swallow, you brace your forehead against the stair and gag.

It stretches your esophagus, takes its sweet time finding your mouth. When it finally falls out onto the floor—this wet, clotted lump—you don’t know what it is.

Above, Brandon stops crying. The door creaks, comes off its frame in one motion, and there he is.

Oh my God, he says. Oh my God, Jane.

You smile, but your teeth feel sticky. He flinches. You stop.

Jane. He’s crying again, big heaving sobs. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to… I just wanted you to stop, but then you didn’t get up, and I couldn’t bring Nora back a second time, so I—

He looks behind you, so you look, too. On the tarp lies a woman’s corpse, opened clavicle to groin. Field dressed and empty.

Later, Brandon will tell you what you missed. But for now, there’s only him: his puffy face shining at the top of the stairs. 

You look at him. You love him. It’s the only thing you know how to do.