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They watched a movie on the television. Laughed at the funny parts. Caught up on the gossip of friends. The nurse came in to turn down the blankets and adjust the IV. She took one look at Gina and told Amy that she could stay the night if she wanted.

The nurse padded out of the room.

Gina looked at Amy. Her eyes were glassy.

“Do you remember what we talked about?” Gina asked.

“Remind me,” Amy said, even though she hadn’t forgotten. She had to make sure that Gina was serious.

“About turning me,” Gina said.

Amy nodded.

“I was thinking. You could turn me and then, once it’s done, I could kill you.”

Amy had never thought of that. She had assumed that if Gina turned, that would be that. She would never get her wish and she would be condemned to roam the streets of New York City for a hundred lifetimes. Only now she would have a true friend.

They looked at each other. Ready.

“Would you?”

“Would you?”

Amy let her face change. She bared her teeth.

Gina slipped her hand under her pillow and pulled out a can of hair spray and a Zippo. Amy could see the glint of a very large kitchen knife that lay there, available at a moment’s notice.

They eyed each other, waiting for what seemed an eternity for the other one to say the words, to give permission, to make the move.

One of them was going to live and one of them was going to die. But not exactly in that order.

And then, as if by magic, or by complete mutual understanding and love for each other, the absolute knowledge that they would never condemn their truest friend to their lot in life, they both moved at the same time as they put their weapons away.

Amy settled back into her chair and read a magazine and lived, as undead a life as it was.

Gina settled back into her pillows, closed her eyes, and died peacefully, in her sleep.

Sit the Dead

by Jeffrey Ford

Luke was in his room at the computer, looking at used cars. His cell phone rang. He answered with it on speaker.

“Darene,” he said.

“Gracie died,” she said.

He pictured the deceased, hairdo like a helmet, overweight in flowered stretch slacks. Her earrings were disco balls; her face, a half inch of powder and pale green lipstick. He’d met her at a barbecue in Darene’s backyard. “You’re in for it, kid. God bless ya,” she’d said to Luke, and kissed his cheek green.

“That sucks,” he said.

“Is that all you have to say?” asked Darene.

“I only met her once,” he said. “I’m sorry you feel bad, though.”

“My father’s inviting you to sit the dead.”

“Sit the dead . . . ,” said Luke.

“It’s a family ritual.”

“I don’t have to touch her, do I?”

“Don’t be a tool,” she said. “You just have to go and sit with the body in the church for a few hours.”

“Like a wake,” he said.

“Yeah, but nobody else but you and one other person will be there.”

“You just sit there?” he asked.

“Two members from our family have to sit with Gracie till they take her to her grave. It’s a family tradition going all the way back.”

“Sounds weak.”

“Your shift starts at midnight.”

“Me and you?”

“No, you and Uncle Sfortunado.”

Luke closed his eyes and shook his head.

“This means my family is officially accepting you,” said Darene. “My father says it’s a test of your manhood.”

Luke laughed.

“I can see you’re not mature enough,” she said.

Two nights earlier they were at the lake on the picnic bench. She sat on his lap facing him, her legs on either side of his. There was a cool autumn breeze, but she glowed with warmth as they kissed.

“Okay, sign me up,” he said, “but my parents are gone for the weekend with the car. I’m stranded.”

“I’ll pick you up at eleven thirty,” she said.

He turned off the computer and went to take a shower.

Luke always got stuck sitting next to Uncle Sfortunado at the Cabadula family parties. After a while the reason for it became clear to him—no one in the family wanted to. The ancient patriarch often spoke in some foreign tongue, and when he did talk English, he mumbled cryptic sayings involving animals—“The moon in the lake is