Rot & Ruin (Rot & Ruin, #1)(34)

“Who is she?” Benny asked.

Shutters dropped behind the artist’s eyes. “It’s just a card, kid. They’re sold in every settlement in California.”

“I’ve been out to the Rot and Ruin.” When that didn’t seem to do much, Benny added, “With my brother, Tom.”

Nothing.

“Tom Imura.”

The artist studied him, stalling by taking a long sip of his coffee.

“I need to know who she is,” Benny said.

“Why?”

“Because I believe in her. Because she’s real. My friends think she’s dead or that she’s just a ghost story. But I know she’s real.”

“Yeah? How do you know that she’s real?”

“I just know.”

Sacchetto drained his cup. “D’you drink coffee, kid?”

“Sure.”

“I’ll brew another pot. This might take a while.” He wasn’t smiling when he said it, but he stepped back to let Benny enter. The artist paused to look at something that caused his whole

body to tense, and Benny turned to see the Motor City Hammer, crossing the street toward the livery stable. However, the Hammer was looking directly at Sacchetto, and he wore a peculiar

smile on his ugly face.

The artist’s house was clean but not neat. Sketches were thumbtacked to the walls; partially finished paintings stood on half a dozen easels. A wheeled wooden table held hand-mixed pots of

paint. They passed through into a tiny kitchen. Sacchetto waved Benny to a chair while he went to fill the coffeepot. Every house in Mountainside had an elevated cistern that drew upon the

reservoir and rainwater to feed the faucets and toilets. Because of some quirk of luck during the influx of First Night survivors, Mountainside had twenty-three plumbers and only one

electrician. In terms of electricity they were a half step out of the Stone Age, but there was always water to flush the john and fill the kettle. Benny was cool with that.

“Tom Imura, huh,” Sacchetto murmured. “I can see it now, but not when you were here the first time. I knew Tom had a little brother, but I always assumed he’d look more Asian.”


Benny nodded. Both of Tom’s parents were Japanese, so Tom had straight black hair, light brown skin, black eyes, and a face that showed only the expressions he wanted it to show. Benny’s

mother had been a green-eyed, pale-skinned redhead who looked like every one of her Irish ancestors. Benny got an even split of the genes. His hair was straight, but it was medium brown with

red highlights. His eyes were a dark forest green. His skin was pale, but he took a good tan. However, where Tom’s body was toned to a muscular leanness, Benny was merely lean.

“We’re half brothers,” he explained.

The artist digested that. “And he took you out into the Ruin?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I guess I’m his apprentice now. I’m fifteen.”

“Did he take you to Sunset Hollow?”

“No, but he mentioned it. Or … someone mentioned it to us. I don’t know what it is, though.”

“If Tom didn’t tell you, then it’s not for me to do it,” said Sacchetto, taking two clean mugs from the cupboard. Before Benny could press him on it, the artist said, “What did you see

out there?”

“I don’t know if I should talk about it.”

“Kid, here’s the deal. You tell me about the Ruin, about what you saw out there. About what Tom showed you, and I’ll tell you about the Lost Girl.”

Benny thought about it. The smell of brewing coffee filled the little kitchen. The artist leaned back against the sink, arms folded across his chest, and waited.

“Okay,” said Benny, and he told the artist everything. It was the same story he told Nix. The artist was a good listener, interrupting only to clarify a point and to press him for more

precise descriptions of the three bounty hunters who had been torturing the zoms. Sacchetto was on his second cup of coffee by the time Benny finished. The coffee in Benny’s cup was

untouched and cold.

When Benny was finished, the artist sat back in his chair and studied Benny with pursed lips.

“I think you’re telling me the truth,” he said.

“You think? Why would I lie about stuff like that?”

“Oh, hell, kid. People lie to me all the time. Even when they don’t have a reason to. Folks that want an erosion portrait but don’t have a photo of their loved one tend to exaggerate so

much, the picture comes out looking like either Brad or Angelina.”

“Who?”

“Doesn’t matter. Point is, people lie a lot. Sometimes out of habit. Not many people are good at telling the truth. But what I meant just now was that nearly everybody who comes back from

the Ruin, lies about what they’ve seen.”

“What kind of people?”

“You see? That’s the kind of question that makes me think you’ve actually been there. Most people would ask, ‘What kind of lies?’ You see the difference?”

Benny thought he did. “Tom says that people here in town want to believe their own version of the truth.”

“Yes, they do. They don’t want to know the truth and even when they say that they do, they don’t ask the right questions.”