“You can’t just keep doing this.”
You can, but you refrain from saying so and the constable sits down heavily on your little green sofa and puts his hands on his knees. He watches Olive’s puppy roll onto its back, little tail wagging. There are no more tire treads on its back, no more blood on its muzzle. Olive is holding her puppy and it licks her face, bright eyes dark with inner light. its tongue will smell like roses forever, and Olive’s mother will be back in a month for a tune up.
Olive’s mother is also pushing a hefty tip into your hands while glaring at the constable.
“Thank you for your business,” you give the mother her receipt and Olive picks the puppy up and carries it out the door happily, the small barks are just slightly the wrong tone. But you couldn’t salvage his voice box or organs, so you made it work. Olive doesn’t seem to notice.
The constable doesn’t stop them from leaving, but he stands angrily up once they’re gone and stomps to the door, turning the lock so you can’t let anyone else in. Your roommate Terry- who happens to hate cops enough to be mean- ties back his locs and goes to make you a snack in the kitchen because if he looks at the constable for more than another minute he may get petty and walk around shirtless so the constable can see his bullet holes.
“You can’t keep doing this,” the constable rounds on you, blocking your exit to the kitchen. You pause, as if surprised to see him. It is entirely staged, but he doesn’t have to know that. To him you seem like you hadn’t even noticed him.
“I assure you all my paperwork is in order with the county.” You look meaningfully to your doctor’s license on the wall.
“You’re playing god.” He has a hand on his gun, so he must be new. The last two constables in your jurisdiction stopped after you threatened to bring yourself back to life if they shot you. “You’re a devil.”
You’ve already dealt with the fire department (you made them sugar cookies in the shape of skulls) and the local ER (they made YOU cookies) but the police just don’t seem to want to get onboard.
The constable steps toward you.
From under the hardwood table emerges the dogs. Both of them are huge former fighting dogs trained to kill long before you met them.
Of course they’ve mellowed in the last hundred years, but the constable doesn’t have to know that.
He backs toward the door as your rottweiler Eloise comes around the side of the table, eyes glowing with the eerie light that never goes out. It always scares people, but it means nothing. She backs him into the doorway.
Her little stump tail wags as the constable closes the door behind himself.
You breathe a sigh of relief. Eloise jumps on the couch and the pitbull TuTu flops down at your feet as you sit. You give both their cool heads some scratches, which they seem to appreciate. The german shepherd named Molly in the next room finally pushes the door open with her nose and proceeds to take up the rest of the couch. Which is about when Terry comes in with a plate of Oreos.
“Aren’t you tired of being nice?” He asks. “Don’t you just want to go ape shit?”
One of the downsides of necromancy is that whatever mood you were in when you raised the dead seems to stay with them. Which is why your schedule is so hard to pin down. If you’re in a bad mood you wouldn’t raise a dearly departed pet, but in a moment of frustrated weakness you raised Terry in front of the whole police department.
Woops.
Served them right though, and it bought you a few decades of peace.
You split the Oreo in half and Terry drops a newspaper clipping on Molly’s back. He crosses his arms and waits patiently as you pick it up.
You read slowly as you eat your Oreos in silence.
And this new constable thinks you’re the monster in this town. You scrunch your nose, appetite forgotten, and stand up, opening the closet and pulling out your velvet cape from Halloween.
You don’t feel like dealing with the police for the next century. You grab the newspaper clipping and swirl your cloak around your shoulders.
Terry hands you the red eyeliner.
You text Augusta from down the street that you won’t be able to see her about her cat until next week and grab the leashes for the dogs.
Terry is already waiting with the car keys.
It’s time to put the fear of God in the police after all.