Dead Corse Read Online Free

go back down your silver cord. Do you
see it?”
    “Yes.”
    “And nothing’s happening?”
    “No.” Oh hell. Nausea. And a lot of it. “I don’t know if astral
travelers can throw up, but I really want too right now.”
    “Dude, if you’re really stepping out of your body—how long have
you been out?”
    “What time is it?”
    “Uh, I don’t know. No watches down here. Which is what I was
working on. Making a watch that would work around magic. It’s really sort of
easy if you think about they physics involved but I really need the spell I’m
pretty sure is in this book I’ve been—”
    “Rhonda? You  
are
  Rhonda Orly, right?”
    “Yeah. How did you know my name?”
    “Just…stop talking.” I started breathing funny too and wondered if
my physical body was reacting the same way under the blanket in mom’s car.
“What do you know about astral traveling?”
    “Well what I started to say is that the longer or more often you
disengage from your body, the harder it’s going to be to get back in. You
really should time yourself more often—” she paused. “What do I call you?”
    “My name’s Zoë and I think I’m in big trouble. I need you to call
my mom.”
    “Call your mom? How old are you?”
    “Fine. I’ll try and get back to my body myself.” I did manage to
stand but it wasn’t a good stand. In fact, the lower half of my body was sort
of—missing. “Oh, this isn’t right.”
    “Damn Zoë. Where  
is
  your physical body?”
    I told her where it was, what it looked like and when she ran out
of the basement, I ran out of time.
     
    • • •
     
    I’d only ever been in the hospital a few times in my life. Once to
get my tonsils removed. And then once after I was attacked in Piedmont Park.
The park attack was the one that I didn’t like to remember. Mainly because
that’s what started all this shit.
    My point is when I came to I knew where I was even before I opened
my eyes because I could hear people being paged overhead as well as a familiar
beeping noise. The silver bar along the bed came into view first and then I saw
mom looking down at something. A shift of my head and I saw she was stitching
something on black cloth.
    “When are you going to learn I’m always right?”
    Closing my eyes I sighed. I felt—awful. Sort of like I still
wasn’t attached to myself. I cleared my throat before I answered and I still
sounded a little like Harvey Fierstein for a few sentences until I cleared out
the garbage. “What happened? Where am I?”
    “You’re in Grady Hospital and what happened was your body slipped
into a coma. Miss Orly managed to find the car and break in—you owe me a
maintenance appointment on the Volvo for that and don’t say you can’t afford it
because you can—and called nine one one.”
    Coma? Seriously? “How long?”
    “A day, which is long enough. Dr. Murdock said you should recover soon.
Your blood sugar dipped down into the danger zone.”
    “What does that mean?” I reached up to wipe at my face and
encountered a tube in my nose. Ew.
    “He’s looking into the possibility that you might be hypoglycemic.
He’s not sure yet.”
    “Ah. Great. So…” I pushed myself up in the bed. “I guess I owe
that chick a thank you?”
    “Yes.” She lowered her hands and the stitching to her lap and
finally looked at me. “Zoë, what happened?”
    Blink. “Why are you asking me? I went to her house, I looked
around and then when I found the stuff in the basement like you said to look
for and she was all robed up and chanting shit, I just got nauseous and my
whole body started to disappear.”
    “Your astral body.”
    “Whatever you want to call it. I was missing from the waist down
and that was spooky.” I looked around. “You got my laptop? I need to write up
my report and send it to that client.”
    “The one on Rhonda Orly?”
    “Mmhmm,” I pushed myself up all the way and looked around. “Where
are my clothes?”
    “Zoë—” Mom