The Claim Horror Story

I walk past a homeless zombie on the street, and he lets out this awful, howling moan that’s so bad I stop and look back. He’s deep into his second death, flesh oozing and crawling with maggots, skin hanging loose and showing bone. We lock eyes. He sniffles at me. I almost want to give him a strand of hair or a bit of fingernail because I feel sorry for him, but I can’t. If zombies get a piece of you, they’ll follow you home, begging for more. They’re desperate for what they’ve lost. It’s like that story about giving a mouse a cookie.

So when the zombie blinks up at me with weepy, disjointed eyes, I just say, “Sorry, man, don’t have anything,” and turn and hurry back on my way. He groans as I go, low like a stomach rumbling. No one pays him any mind.

I’ll be just like him in a few months.

The thought still makes me shiver, even after a year of trying to accept it. If I press on my stomach, I can feel the tumor sitting there, like food that won’t digest. It started in my ovaries, which feels ironic, but in a twisted way, it makes sense. I spent so long hating the parts of my body that made me a girl; it’s like they started to hate me back. Now it’s a war inside me, and I already know which side will win.

I’m out of breath. I stop under a street lamp and light a cigarette, letting the nicotine calm me down. I hope the tobacco finds my tumors and they destroy each other inside me. I’d end it now, but knowing what comes next has kept me alive this long. The decay is bad, but it’s the loneliness that really kills you the second time. It’s the certainty that you’re rotten to the core, because good people don’t die twice. Good people get Claimed.

A guy on the street pauses to tear off a fingernail (left pointer finger) and toss it to me. It takes me a second to realize he thinks I’m undead. Yikes. Didn’t realize I looked that bad already.

“Fuck off, dude,” I say around the edge of the cigarette. “I don’t want your nasty nails.”

He flushes, obviously startled. He’s freckly. Baby-faced in a way that tells me he’s never had to worry as I have. “Sorry,” he sputters. “I thought you were—”

“You ever seen a zombie smoke a cigarette?”

“Well, there’s a first time for everything. You never know. Um.” He fishes out a crumpled dollar bill and offers it to me apologetically. “Is this better?”

I roll my eyes. “Why do you assume I need your money?”

“Well—” He starts to say something, then seems to think better of it. “Is there anything I can do to help you, then? You seem— sad. I don’t know. Sorry.”

Is sad better than undead? I’m not sure. I offer him an ugly smile, making sure to show my nicotine-stained teeth. “You can Claim me when I kick the bucket.”

He thinks about it for a moment, then says, “Sure.”

I say, “What?”

He juts out his chin, stubborn in his decision. “I’ll do it.”

“Yeah, but—” The cigarette has gone out. I spit it onto the sidewalk and crush it beneath my heel. Weird Guy winces. He probably leads anti-littering campaigns on the weekends. He seems the type. “You know what Claiming is, right?”

“Yes.”

---

---

“‘Kay. So you know it’s not something you can just do on a whim. You gotta actually know the person.” A while back, in the ‘70s, a bunch of Good Samaritans tried to start a movement to Claim the bodies languishing in morgues all across the country. It didn’t work— the dead still came back to life, and this time, they didn’t decay. They just lay there and screamed and screamed and screamed for days until the government sent in a SWAT team to shoot them all dead again. The world learned its lesson after that.

“I know,” Weird Guy says, “So let me get to know you. What’s your name?”

He’s so damn earnest about it, shivering in the snow beneath the streetlamp, that I slip up and say, “Nerve.”

He blinks. “Nerve?”

“Yeah. I picked it myself. You got a problem with that?”

“No,” he says, but I can tell he’s still a little freaked out. When I ran away from home, I needed a name that would protect me. I like that Nerve means both anxious and brave. I’m both. Plus, if people focus on my name, they don’t ask about my body, what I’m doing with my life, or where my parents are. For the record: I’m trans and have cancer, I’m just waiting for it to end, and my parents kicked me out when I was sixteen.

“I’m Liam,” Weird Guy says, and I snort. It’s so normal. I don’t know what I expected. “I’m excited to get to know you, Nerve.”

“Oh, fuck off. It was funny at first, but this is dumb.” I shake my head and start walking away from him. He chases after me.

“But I was serious! I want to help!”

“You don’t even know me!” I call over my shoulder.

“Exactly!” he says. “I can’t Claim you if I don’t know you, so let’s find somewhere warm to sit and talk—”

I turn around to face him. His pity makes me sick. “I don’t want to be Claimed by you,” I snap, scowling with red-rimmed eyes. “You’re just gonna make the rest of my short life even more miserable. So fuck off and volunteer at a soup kitchen or something.”

He pulls up short. His face is flushed pink and white and red, like a candy cane. He looks hurt, and I feel bad for a moment, until he says, “You’re part of my life now. You don’t get to leave it just like that.”

“Fucking watch me.” I storm away.

“Wait!” He grabs my arm and presses a business card into my palm. “Call me. If you change your mind.”

Who carries around business cards anymore? Pretentious assholes, that’s who. I want to tear it to shreds right in front of him. Still, it looks like he’s on the verge of finally leaving me alone, so I just nod like I’m seriously considering any of this and tuck it into my pocket. Then I turn and nearly sprint away before he can stop me.

I don’t throw away the card, though, and I’m surprised to find that I don’t regret it, because I need to call the number on it sooner than I thought.

See, I’ve been crashing on the couches of not-quite-friends for the past few months, but then last night one of them brought her girlfriend’s sister home. Apparently, the girlfriend’s sister had a dog, and the dog got priority over me, an actual living person. I would’ve been fine to sleep on the couch with the dog, but the girlfriend’s sister made a big fuss, and honestly, I think it was just an excuse to kick the weird transvestite out, but whatever. I had nowhere to go, and it was fucking December.

“…and that’s the only reason I called you,” I finish, taking a swig of my apple cider. Liam and I are sitting in the sticky corner booth of an all-night diner. The lights keep flickering on and off. It’s really annoying.

“You want to crash on my couch?” Liam says.

“Well, I was hoping you could just lend me cash for a hotel room, but sure, whatever.” I try not to get my hopes up. I couldn’t believe he answered when I called. The business card was for an attorney’s office, but he’s too young to be an attorney. Maybe he’s an intern. I almost ask, but then I remember I don’t care.

“No, couch is better,” Liam says. “Stay as long as you need.”

“Your girlfriend would be okay with it?”

“Boyfriend,” he corrects. “And I’m single at the moment. So it’s fine.”

“Cool. Sorry for assuming.” I finish my drink. It leaves a wet ring on the table. “Listen, man, I appreciate the favors you’re doing me, but don’t think of this as me agreeing to be Claimed by you. I don’t wanna be owned by anyone.”

“So you’d rather rot,” he says. “You’d rather give yourself an awful second death than a peaceful first one. Just because you hate the idea of being vulnerable with someone.”

“Yes.” I grit my teeth and spit out the word. Nerves nerves nerves nerves nerves.

“Okay. Your choice, I guess,” Liam says, shakes his head, and pays the tab.

We go back to his place. It’s nice, not as fancy as I thought it would be. Just a typical first apartment for someone in their twenties. He sets up the futon for me and asks how many pillows I want. I have no idea how to answer that. He tucks in the corners of the blanket. It’s that small kindness, those tucked-in corners, that finally makes me break and ask, “Why?”

He looks up at me. He’s got big brown eyes, deer eyes. “Why what?”

“Why are you being so nice to me? At first I thought it was pity, which is pretty normal, but this feels like more than that. It’s almost like you’re some kind of angel, so there has to be a reason. My best guess is either religion or serial killer, but you don’t seem like the cult type.” I’m rambling, and Liam cuts me off.

“You want to know the truth?” he asks.

“Lie to me if it’s nicer.”

He laughs softly, shakes his head. On the coffee table, there’s a stack of business cards, the same one he gave to me yesterday. He picks them up and thumbs through them. “My father,” Liam says. The corners of the cards crumple in his hands. “He was abroad when it happened. Heart attack in Europe. I couldn’t get to him in time. So he went Unclaimed, and he came back, and— you know how it goes.”

I do. Because the thing is, no matter how good or bad you are, you still die. There’s no secret to immortality hiding in sin or sainthood. Everyone dies. And if you have one person who knows and cares about you enough— just one— then they find your body at the morgue, Claim it, and your life ends there. If you’re so universally loathed that no one can be assed to come get you, then you become a zombie, and moan and weep until your body decays, and you die again. Second time hurts more, or so I’m told, but it’s also the last time. Thank fuck for small mercies.

“So anyway,” Liam says, blinking hard, “I realized that I don’t want anyone to go Unclaimed after that. Not if I can help it. And then I met you, and I guess I saw my chance.”

“So it’s not pity,” I say, lighting up a satisfied cigarette, “Just trauma. Good to know.”

“Don’t smoke indoors, please,” is his halfhearted response. I make sure to tap ash on the coffee table before I snuff out the cigarette.

“Your turn,” Liam says, looking at me.

---

---

“Uh, my turn to what?”

“Well, I told you my deepest trauma. It’s only fair that you do the same.”

“Nice fucking try. Knowing things about people is how you get to Claim them.”

“Lie, then. If it’s nicer.” There’s a challenge in his voice. Fine.

Deadpan, I say, “My deepest trauma is being kicked out because my roommates liked a corgi better than me.”

Liam doesn’t laugh like I want him to. He just says, so gently it makes me want to puke, “How many times have you been kicked out?”

“Sixty-nine million, four hundred and twenty-thousand.” A beat. Whatever. It can’t hurt to give him this. “Twelve. First time was the worst.”

“It always is,” Liam says. I turn to him, surprised, and he clarifies: “We moved around a lot when I was little. I was an army brat.”

Huh. “Me, too.”

“Look,” he smiles encouragingly, “We do have something in common. And you told the truth. That wasn’t so bad, right?”

I can practically feel my face close off and go expressionless. “I need to take a piss. You got a bathroom?”

He sighs like he knows he fucked up. “Second door on the left.”

“Thanks.” I flick my cigarette stub at him as I stand up.

His bathroom is nice, too. Everything about him is nice. I want to smash the mirror over the sink and fill my hands with broken glass. But I don’t. Instead, I turn on the tap and wash my hands, once, then again. It doesn’t get the nicotine stains off my nails, but it feels good. I haven’t had hot water to myself in a long time.

The face in the mirror really does look dead. I can see why Liam thought I was a zombie. It’s not just my pale, grim skin, but something in my eyes. There’s a heavy grief there, ready to spill over. Ugh.

I run my hands through my too-long hair, and I’m almost ready to step back out and face Liam again when a sharp throbbing pain stabs into my gut. I know this feeling, so I manage to make it to the toilet just as I start retching. The motion makes my whole body shake. I clutch the edge of the toilet for support.

Liam raps on the door. “Are you okay in there?”

I’m too busy puking my guts out to answer. Bile and blood and bits of whatever I ate last night splatter into the bowl. When it’s finally over, I slump against the cool porcelain, breathing hard.

The door opens a crack. Liam peeks in, concern etched on his face. “Jesus, Nerve. Let me help you up.”

“Get out,” I croak.

He doesn’t listen. He kneels beside me, one hand on my back, rubbing slow circles. It’s the first time anyone’s touched me gently in months. I hate how much I need it.

When the shaking stops, he helps me to my feet. I lean on him more than I’d like. He doesn’t comment.

Back in the living room, he makes me tea. Chamomile. No caffeine. I sip it slowly, feeling the warmth spread through my chest.

“You don’t have to do this,” I say finally.

“I know.”

“I’m gonna die anyway.”

“I know.”

“So why bother?”

He sits across from me, elbows on knees, hands clasped. “Because I can. Because you’re here. Because maybe, just maybe, knowing someone cares enough to Claim you makes the first death less terrifying.”

I look into my tea. “I don’t want to be a burden.”

“You’re not.”

“Liar.”

He smiles, small and sad. “Maybe a little. But I’ve got room for burdens.”

I don’t know what to say to that. So I don’t say anything. I just drink my tea and let the silence sit between us, warm like the mug in my hands.

Weeks pass. I stay on his couch. He doesn’t push. We talk about stupid things: movies, music, and the best way to make grilled cheese. He learns I hate mushrooms. I learn he’s allergic to cats. We don’t talk about Claiming. Not directly.

But I catch him watching me sometimes, when he thinks I’m asleep. Not creepy-watching. Just… checking. Making sure I’m still breathing.

One night, the pain is worse than usual. I wake up screaming. Liam’s there in seconds, holding my hand, telling me to breathe. I do. Eventually.

When it passes, I whisper, “I’m scared.”

“I know.”

“I don’t want to come back screaming.”

“You won’t.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I’ll Claim you. I promise.”

I look at him. Really look. He’s tired, with bags under his eyes, but steady. Solid.

“Okay,” I say.

“Okay?”

“Yeah. Claim me. When it happens.”

He exhales, like he’s been holding his breath for months. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet. I might change my mind.”

“You won’t.”

I roll my eyes. “Cocky.”

“Hopeful.”

It happens on a Tuesday. Quiet. No drama. I’m sitting on the couch, watching some dumb reality show, when the pain hits like a freight train. I gasp, clutch my stomach. Liam’s beside me in an instant.

“Nerve?”

“It’s time.”

---

---

He nods. No panic. Just calm. He helps me lie down and props pillows under my head. Gets a wet cloth for my forehead.

“I’m here,” he says.

I nod. Tears sting my eyes. “Tell me something good.”

He thinks. “You’re brave. Braver than anyone I know.”

“Liar.”

“Truth.”

The room blurs. My breathing slows. I feel it coming: the end.

“Liam?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks. For… everything.”

He squeezes my hand. “I’ve got you.”

And then it’s dark.

When I open my eyes— if eyes open after death— there’s no decay. No hunger. No second screaming. Just peace.

Liam’s there, holding my hand still. He’s crying, but smiling.

“You did it,” I say. My voice is faint, but there.

“Yeah. I Claimed you.”

I feel it—the connection. It’s not about being owned. It’s just about being known.

“Was it worth it?” I ask.

He nods. “Every second.”

I smile. Or try to. “Don’t be a stranger in the afterlife.”

He laughs through tears. “I won’t.”

And then I fade. Not into decay, but into something softer. Something claimed.

The end.