Project Lazarus by Michelle Packard Page B

forest without a weapon.  The idea came to her.   She collected a nearby branch that had fallen from one of the trees.  She looked up there was nothing but blue sky.  What was that to her?  What was that notion of killing?  Was she like that before?  She didn’t think so.  Where did she go?  When did she come back from?  Why did she return as a killer?  It was a strange string of questions and a heated argument she pursued  in her head.
     
    Jake Mustam.  She held the branch in her hand, claw like nails extended from her lanky fingers. She was normal, herself, but some of the characteristics of the dead stayed with her.  The nails and hair, filled with protein keep growing, even after death.  Her hair, still in a ponytail was to her waist and her once short and neat violin playing manicured nails were perfect tools, long and sharp.  Would they return back to normal soon like the rest of her?
     
    She couldn’t risk it.  Instantly, she knew what those nails were for.  They were for brandishing a weapon.  She clawed and scraped at that branch for hours.  Her mind possessed with the idea of killing Jake Mustam, she worked the branch into a fine point.  She scratched vigorously with her nails until she made a fine point.
     
    She studied it.  Her eyes in awe, she was never this clever when she was alive.  No, she was innocent and trusting.  She believed in people.  She was honest.
     
    She twirled the weapon in her hands and tested the fine point with her finger.  Fresh blood spilled out.  She smiled, in a wicked way that was so foreign to her, it felt as if, she had traveled to another world and returned to find herself as someone new.
     
    Confident, assured, no longer the door mat everyone had taken for her, she was pleased.  She watched the blood gushing from her finger as the object dug in deeper, her psyche widened with a force she immediately recognized as power and knowledge.
     
    She would poke his eyes out first.
     
    Her compass was unforgiving, like an internal GPS system in her head, it led her straight to Jake Mustam’s home.
     
    She burst through the door like a possessed robot warrior.
     
    “You murdered me,” she screamed, “come out and face me now Jake Mustam.  It’s Amanda Cole, Jake.  You murdered me.”
     
    Empty silence answered her voice.  Echoes rang out in the still of night.  Nearby houses began turning off lights. No one wants to know trouble when it comes knocking.  Neighbors never hear or see anything and these days they won’t open the door to help you when you’re running and crying for your life.  Somehow, even though she disappeared for two years, she knew all of this.
     
    Light went out quickly but some went on.  There were always the curious cruel morbid souls who had to feed the need to know.
     
    She found the switch on the wall.  The light was dim but illuminated the room and brightened and heightened her already illuminated mind.  For a moment, she knew she was a killer.  Jake was a killer.  Now, she returned as a killer herself.  A killer. A cold blooded killer.  Although, he had motive.  She had none.
     
    She thought like a killer.  She felt like a killer.  She was a killer and she walked into Jake’s home to kill him.
     
    She could smell him.  He was somewhere just out of sight. 
     
    “Clever boy.  You murdered me.  You left me in that shallow grave dead.  You killed me Jake Mustam.”
     
    The screaming, curdling her blood to a boil was simmering the vengeance inside of her.
     
    “You got away with it you bastard.  You got away with it.  And you’ve been living your life knowing all this time you took mine.  And I know why you did it Jake.  You were cooking the books at Paydon’s Construction.  You were stealing the money.  I never confronted you.  I kept your secret.  But you covered your tracks.  They thought it was my husband, Jeff,  you son of a bitch.  They thought it was Jeff.  The husband always