The Reckless Afterlife of Harriet Stoker

by Lauren James

  “Those are the Tricksters,” Greg said. “It’s their market.”

  They looked like old-fashioned movie stars; all smoothed-back hair and artistic stubble. Their hair was completely white – a shockingly bright white. But there was something unnatural about their disproportionate handsomeness. It felt artificial, like a neon poisonous frog.

  The urge to flee gripped the back of Harriet’s neck, seizing up her muscles. They couldn’t notice her, her hindbrain was telling her body. She had to hide.

  “The Tricksters?” Harriet said, her voice a little shaky. One of them turned his head, his eyes landing on hers. “Are you sure this is safe?”

  “I promise.” Greg pressed one hand to her elbow.

  She breathed out. If he thought this was safe, then she was going to be all right. “What’s that feeling, then? It tickles.”

  “Tricksters collect energy from fear,” Greg said, under his breath. “That feeling is their power feeling you out, that’s all. It’s harmless.”

  “I’m not sure about this…” Harriet looked back at the doorway. “I think I should go.”

  “You don’t want to waste your time with that lot upstairs.” His hand touched her forearm. “If you want to get things done, the basement is the place to be.”

  “Maybe I should go and talk to Rima first…”

  Greg squeezed her shoulder reassuringly, his fingers touching her neck. Harriet went dizzy, her thoughts going cloudy. When she could focus again, Harriet couldn’t remember what she’d been so worried about.

  “Let’s just go and say hey,” Greg suggested. “They’ll be able to help, I promise. You trust me, don’t you?”

  He was right. These were exactly the kind of people she had wanted to find – the real people in charge. It was good that she was afraid – a sign that she was pushing herself as far as she could go. Her gran would never run away from anything. She was stronger than that, and so was Harriet.

  She let Greg lead her over to the Tricksters, where he made a tinny cough to get their attention, hovering in front of them.

  Eventually, the taller Trickster deigned to look at him. “Yes?”

  “Hi, Rufus. Vini.”

  The second Trickster didn’t look at them but inclined his head slightly.

  All of Greg’s confidence seemed to have dried up now. “This is, er, Harriet Stoker. She’s new, she fell—”

  “We know,” Rufus said, sounding bored.

  “Right. You’re very well informed.”

  “Get to the point.”

  “I want to discuss a trade.” Harriet tried to pitch her voice at the assertive tone her gran used when she was trying to gain control of an argument. Something about these men reminded her of her gran. “I need information. In exchange, I’ll give you time using a mobile phone. It has some music on there, and a few episodes of a TV show called Loch & Ness. It also lets you access the Internet.”

  “The Internet is, er—” Greg started explaining.

  “We know,” Rufus said again, cutting him off.

  “… for porn,” Greg trailed off, under his breath.

  “What kind of information do you need?” Vini asked.

  Harriet wondered what question she could ask that would give her the maximum amount of information. If this was her only chance to make a deal, she had to get the most out of it. “I want to find a way of choosing my power when it manifests.”

  For the first time, Rufus moved, turning his head to exchange a glance with Vini. He had been absolutely, inhumanly still until now.

  “We want the phone,” Vini said. “Not just time using it. Permanently.”

  Harriet pretended to consider this. She had come prepared to barter. The phone would run out of battery soon, so she didn’t want to give it away completely if she didn’t have to. “I’d rather lend it to you by the hour. Just to make sure I’m getting the information I need.”

  His eyes glinted. “Give us the phone afterwards, if you think we’ve helped you. We know how to do this.”

  “How do I know I can trust you?”

  Rufus cleared his throat pointedly at Greg, whose hand squeezed the back of Harriet’s neck.

  “They’re on your side, I promise,” he whispered in her ear.

  Harriet grinned dopily at Greg. “Fine, it’s yours,” she told Rufus.

  As she shook their hands, Harriet noticed Rufus had a neat rectangular tattoo on his forearm. It looked suspiciously like a spreadsheet. Was it a record of black-market trades?

  Their ice-cold skin made pins and needles spread through her hand. They were sucking out her energy, like Qi had done. As quickly as she could, while still looking polite, she pulled her hand away.

  Vini put a hand on Greg’s shoulder. “You should go outside now.”

  Looking more than a little relieved, he backed away. “I’ll, er, be outside,” he said to Harriet. “Catch up with you later.”

  Harriet closed her eyes, taking a moment to settle herself and focus on whatever was about to happen. She couldn’t let herself panic again, not if they fed on fear. She’d come this far; she had to keep going. These Tricksters were nothing compared to how disappointed her gran would be if she didn’t get home soon.

  “So,” she said, and then cursed herself for breaking the silence first. It betrayed her nerves, and they would leap on any sign of fear. Whatever agreement might be in place, they would break it in a second if they saw an advantage. “Tell me.”

  “You don’t eat fear like us,” Rufus said. “But—”

  “Doesn’t she?” Vini interrupted. “Are you sure?” He leant forward and took Harriet by the chin, staring deep into her eyes. She held herself very still.

  “No,” Vini said a full six minutes later. “You’re right. She’s something else.”

  They were very close. Suddenly, she was aware that they were licking their lips. She imagined herself as prey, being hunted, and then, just as quickly, pushed the thought away.

  Instead, she tried to imagine herself as a predator, strong and equal to them and not at all afraid. It was too late. They were both breathing in her fear, fingers grasping her wrists and wide teeth catching at the edges of their smiles. Pins and needles frayed away her skin where they touched her.

  “Stop it!” she said, her voice tight and high. She pulled her arms away. “That was not part of the deal.”

  “Apologies,” Rufus said, stepping back. “Vini,” he added sharply.

  His brother moved away from Harriet, still watching her hungrily.

  “The only way to choose your power is to take one from another ghost,” Rufus said, pitching his voice low.

  Harriet swallowed a lump in her throat. “How do I do that?”

  “You’ll need to take their energy. All of it, if you want the power to be yours permanently.” His gaze was boring into her.

  “All of it,” Harriet repeated, feeling faint. “All of it?”

  “Every last atom,” Vini confirmed. “Or it won’t be permanent.”

  Were they saying what she thought they were? “How do you know? Have you tried?”

  In unison, they shook their heads. Vini’s right earlobe was torn, the skin dangling from the lobe like an earring. She carefully avoided staring at it.

  “Then how do you know it will work?”

  After a long pause where she thought that neither of them was going to bother answering, Rufus said, “Because it’s been done before.”

  This time, Harriet was the one to step closer to them. Her fear had gone. “By who?”

  “You’ve met Leah and Claudia by now, I presume?”

  Harriet was so shocked that she actually gaped at them. “Leah?”

  “Not Leah.” Vini smirked. “The baby. Claudia.”

  Our powers aren’t random. They represent part of us – something we value, whether that’s our culture, personality, strengths or beliefs. My power comes from my desperation to have control. Rima wants to be friends with everyone and everything – including every an
imal she meets. Felix doesn’t know how to talk to people, so his power lets him make sure he’s never put in a social situation he can’t fix.

  And Harriet? I guess we’ll have to see what her power is, when it manifests. But I have my theories.

  Most of the time, the powers you think will be the most valuable are not very useful at all, and boring ones turn out to be surprising. Rima’s power, for example, is very desirable. Ghosts can be tattooed using porcupine quills and black squid ink taken from a shapeshifter’s animal forms. People are constantly asking Rima to trade supplies on the black market. But nothing can convince her to trade with Rufus and Vini.

  There’s a long history of ghosts on this site, with more powers than you can imagine. There were five of us, in the beginning – one of the beginnings, anyway. A family, bonded through blood and bone and fealty. Nothing like Rima and Felix and Kasper, who found and chose each other. That kind of family is easy and gentle, but it’s weak, too. A bond that’s grown from friendship can be broken. Blood is more powerful. Blood bites back. Blood defends itself.

  Blood or bond? Harriet hasn’t decided yet. She doesn’t even know that she’s going to have to make a choice.

  She hadn’t even noticed the baby until the tricksters mentioned her. Now she thinks the baby is important. But she has no idea.

  Chapter 8

  FELIX

  “Mars bars, for sure,” Felix said, tilting his head up to take in the early morning sunlight. He was sunbathing on the moss-covered metal fire escape with the girls. It was one of the only occasions when Leah seemed anything other than ambivalent about life.

  “McCoy’s crisps, too! I would give anything to be able to eat food again,” Rima said, as she wrestled Cody. The fox nipped at her arm and jumped on her chest. “Oh, well done.”

  Felix reached out to rub Cody’s head. She licked his palm with a very pink tongue, as Rima twisted into another wrestling move. “That’s a half nelson,” she told the fox. “You know, I would have made the best professional wrestler.”

  “You would get out of breath opening a jam jar,” Leah told Rima decisively.

  “My haters never rest, apparently,” Rima told Cody, huffing.

  “I think you’d be a good wrestler. You have a very high pain tolerance,” Harriet said, admiringly watching Cody gnaw on Rima’s thumb.

  Harriet’s gaze followed the movement when Claudia reached out from where she was curled into Leah’s side to touch the silky material of Rima’s hijab with minuscule, soft fingertips.

  “You know, that’s not usually something that people look for in friends,” Felix pointed out.

  Harriet shrugged, unperturbed. She was staring at Claudia now. Not looking, but watching. Earlier, Leah had passed her baby over to Harriet to hold. She had stood stock-still, staring down at Claudia with stiff arms and a forced smile until Rima had taken pity on her and tucked Claudia under her arm instead.

  “I was studying Dentistry really,” Rima told Harriet, apparently under the assumption that she would otherwise genuinely believe that Rima had been doing a degree in Wrestling when she was alive. “But only because my parents wanted me to. I rushed through all my coursework so I could watch TV. What did you want to do when you were older?”

  Harriet looked up at the sky, wistfully. “I was going to work for Vogue one day. I’ve got a channel online where I post videos of make-up tutorials. Contouring and stuff, you know? I had some collabs lined up with other YouTubers – bigger ones, so I could get some more subs. I thought it’d be the kind of thing Vogue would be interested in.”

  “You should start a ghost Vogue,” Rima said, looking amused by the idea.

  “Kasper would love modelling for it,” Felix said. Kasper had modelled for a Rowing Society charity calendar when he was alive, which for some inexplicable reason had involved all the Soc members posing nude with baby animals. Felix had once walked into their shared bathroom, only to find Kasper and five of his friends waxing each other’s bums, while covered in tanning lotion. He’d backed out again immediately, then pre-ordered five copies of the calendar.

  Tragically, the issue hadn’t been delivered before he died. There was a parcel for Felix tucked into one of the postal pigeonholes down in reception. For decades, Felix had been wondering whether the package was the calendar, or if it was a package from his mum.

  When he was homesick during the first term of university, she used to send him envelopes full of things she’d ripped out of magazines and newspapers. Oscar had thought it was silly, but Felix had found it comforting. It showed she was thinking about him. Oscar had never got homesick, anyway. He was too busy having fun and skipping lectures.

  Felix missed his brother so much. He always got nostalgic in the autumn, near the anniversary of their deaths, and Oscar’s escape. Soon he’d come for his annual visit.

  It hurt in a good way, seeing how much he had changed. Becoming a man, a husband, a father – even a divorcee. Doing things that Felix would never have the chance to do. The hardest part of dying had been adjusting to surviving without Oscar.

  “Do you have a Vogue?” Harriet asked Felix.

  “I wanted to be a computer programmer,” Felix said, immediately. He was the only person in Mulcture Hall who had been studying Computer Science. Kasper, who had been reading Art History, had only been scheduled for a third of the number of lectures as Felix, which had been a constant source of irritation.

  “What about you, Leah?” Rima asked her. “You must have wanted to be something when you were little. Even Kasper wanted to be a teacher.”

  Rima was constantly prying into Leah’s life even though she was very, very clear about how much she disliked it. Rima even kept a list of facts, which she’d told Felix once. It included:

  1. Leah had been alive at one point in time.

  2. Leah had died at another, later point in time.

  3. Leah had once had a mother and a father.

  4. Claudia also had a mother and a father.

  a. Leah was Claudia’s mother.

  b. Claudia was between zero and seven months old.

  5. Leah had hated coriander.

  6. She had been allergic to dogs.

  7. Leah’s power let her look into the future.

  Felix had been reluctantly impressed by the thoroughness of the documentation.

  Leah flopped over onto her stomach, pulling up the hem of her dress to sun her thighs. To Felix’s surprise, she started talking. “My – my family … we weren’t raised to have careers. Not girls, anyway.”

  “And you got pregnant when you were, what, seventeen?” Harriet said. “I guess that makes it hard to plan ahead.”

  Rima touched one finger to Claudia’s cheek. “It was worth it, though, for little Claudia,” she said eventually.

  Harriet’s gaze kept returning to the baby. “How have you avoided disintegrating, in all this time? Did you get more energy from somewhere?”

  Leah stared at her stonily. “We’re not that old.”

  Harriet blanched. She finally looked away. “Right. Sorry.”

  “Harriet and I were discussing this earlier,” Felix said, trying to break the tension like a bubble. “About what happens to us after we disintegrate, I mean.”

  Rima grinned. “Did you mention my reincarnation theory?”

  Felix rolled his eyes. “Of course I didn’t. It’s ridiculous.”

  “No, it’s not! It makes a lot of sense!” Rima turned to Harriet. “I’ve got it all worked out. We came from living human bodies, right? It makes sense that when we disintegrate, that energy goes to another human body and the cycle starts again. It can’t just disappear into the air. Right?!”

  “I think maybe that sounds a bit far-fetched…” Harriet said slowly. “It’s too magical.”

  Rima fluffed up in indignation. “We’re literally ghosts! How much more magical can you get?”

  “Yeah, but at least ghosts make sense. We’re still the same people we were when we were alive. But what yo
u’re talking about – being reborn? – we’d forget who we were. What’s the point of us being born again if we don’t remember our old lives? We might as well start from scratch each time. It doesn’t make any difference in the long run.”

  “If reincarnation was real, wouldn’t we all remember our previous lives?” Leah pointed out, shaking her head. “We live and we die, end of story.”

  “I don’t know—” Felix said, and then abruptly made himself stop talking. It was silly. “Never mind.”

  Rima nudged him. “What were you going to say?”

  “Well, it’s just that I had a cousin who used to talk about his past life when he was a toddler. He used to describe these vivid memories of places he had never seen. We assumed he was describing stuff from the TV. But what if he wasn’t? What if it was real?”

  Rima glowed. “See! I’m totally right. I knew it. You’re all suckers.”

  “Ugh,” Leah opened her eyes to say, and then, exhausted, closed them again. “Let’s change the subject. Why don’t you play a game or something.”

  “Ooh!” Rima said. “Felix – Kiss, Marry, Kill. Kasper, Ruf—”

  “Kasper,” Felix interrupted.

  Rima slowly closed her mouth. “I haven’t even said the other options yet.”

  “No need.”

  The corner of Leah’s mouth twitched.

  Rima said, “You’d … kiss, marry and kill Kasper?”

  Persevering, Felix said, “I stand by what I said. Unless Captain America is one of the other options.”

  Harriet made an “Ohhh…” noise, like she’d figured something out.

  The back of Felix’s neck went hot. He had been out for ages, but it still felt weird when he came out to someone new. It was such intensely personal information to just announce to the world. He tugged Claudia into his lap, tickling her until her cheeks dimpled and she started waving her hands and making tiny, adorable giggles.

  “You’re LGBT?” Harriet asked him. “I’m pan.”