Most of them were names for food and toys.
He stopped crying and tried to say one of those names.
“Tuh . . . Tuh . . . Tuh . . .”
That was all he could get. “Tom” was too difficult. Not always, just sometimes. It wouldn’t fit into his mouth now.
“Tuh . . . Tuh . . . Tuh . . .”
3
It was a strange moment when Tom Imura realized that his baby brother was actually trying to say his name.
Because saying it was also a warning.
A warning was a thought that Tom wouldn’t have credited to a kid that young.
Could toddlers even think like that?
A part of Tom’s mind stepped out of the moment and looked at the phenomenon as if it were hanging on a wall in a museum. He studied it. Considered it. Posed in thoughtful art-house stances in front of it. All in a fragment of a second so small it could have been hammered in between two of the Tuh sounds.
Tom.
That’s what Benny was saying.
No. That’s what Benny was screaming.
Tom jerked upright.
He turned.
He saw what Benny had seen.
Them.
So many of them.
Them.
Coming out of the shadows. Reaching.
Moaning.
Hungry. So hungry.
There was Mrs. Addison from across the street. She was nice but could be mean sometimes. Liked to tell the other ladies on the block how to grow roses, even though hers were only so-so.
Mrs. Addison had no lower lip.
Someone had torn it away. Or . . .
Bitten it?
Right behind her was John Chalker. Industrial chemist. He made solvents for a company that sold drain cleaner. He always brought the smell of his job home on his clothes.
Now he had no clothes. He was naked. Except for his hat.
Why did he still have his hat on and no clothes?