by Markus Zusak
I love you, I feel like saying, but there's no need for that.
The sky flows with fire, and I'm dancing with Audrey. Even when the song ends, we hold on a little longer, and I think it's about three minutes we danced for.
Three minutes to tell her I love her.
Three minutes for her to admit she loves me back.
She tells me when we let go, but no words of love exit her mouth. She just kind of closes one eye at me and says, "Well, Ed Kennedy, huh?"
I smile.
She points her finger. "But only you, though, right?"
"Right," I agree. I stare at Audrey's bare feet, her ankles, her shins, then make my way up to her face. I take a photo of her in my mind. Her tired eyes and morning mucked-up hair the color of straw. The smile gently scratching her lips. Her small ears and smooth nose. And the last remnants of love, holding strangely on....
She let herself love me for three minutes.
Can three minutes last forever? I ask myself, but already I know the answer.
Probably not, I reply. But maybe they last long enough.
I pick up the radio and we stand for a little while longer. She doesn't invite me in, and I don't ask.
What needed to be done was done, so I turn and say, "Well, I'll see you, Audrey. Maybe at the next card game. Maybe before."
"Soon," she assures me, and with the radio tucked back under my arm, I begin the walk home.
Twelve messages have been delivered.
Four aces have been completed.
This feels like the greatest day of my life.
I'm alive, I think. I won. I feel freedom for the first time in months, and an air of contentedness wanders next to me all the way home. It even remains as I walk through the front door, kiss the Doorman, and make us some coffee in the kitchen.
We're halfway through it when another feeling finds its way to my stomach, winds up, and spills.
I don't know why I feel it, but any contentment vanishes instantly as the Doorman looks up at me. We hear a latch open and shut from outside and a person rush off.
I walk slowly out the door, down the porch steps, and onto the front yard.
My letter box stands there. Slightly crooked. It looks guilty.
My heart shakes.
I walk on and shudder as I open the letter box.
Oh no, I think. No, no. No!
My hands reach in and my fingers take hold of one last envelope. My name's on it, and inside I can already see it.
There's one last card.
One last address.
I close my eyes and fall to my knees on my front lawn.
My thoughts stammer.
One last card.
Without thinking, I gradually open the envelope, and when my eyes find the address, all thoughts are cut down and left there to die.
It reads:
26 Shipping Street
The address is my address.
The last message is for me.
part five: The Joker
The street is empty and silent.
The Joker laughs at me.
Everything's quiet but for the silent laughter of the clown in my hands. He roars.
The grass is covered with sweat, and I stand alone with the wild card between my fingers. I've been watched all along, but never have I felt as vulnerable or scrutinized as right now.
Inside. I panic. What's waiting inside?
"Get in there," I say, and I walk across the sweat-soaked grass. Of course, I don't want to go inside, but what other choice do I have? If someone's in there, there's nothing I can do about it. My feet print the cement porch with wetness.
I walk through to the kitchen.
"Anyone there?" I call out.
But.
There's no one.
In.
My kitchen.
In fact, there's no one in my house at all except the Doorman, the Joker, and me. I all but check under the bed, even though I know it wouldn't be the style of what's been happening. They'd be drinking my coffee or taking a leak in my toilet or having a bath or something like that. There's nothing and no one in my house. Silence pervades everything until the Doorman yawns and licks his lips.
Hours pass until I have to go to work.
"Where to?"
"Martin Place, please."
With each pickup I grow more numb, and for the first time ever, I don't speak to a person all day. I don't discuss the weather. I don't talk about who won on the weekend, the state of the roads, or any disposable conversational crap that fills the void inside a taxicab.
That's the first day.
The second's the same.
On the third day, something happens.
I'm on my way back home when I nearly crash at a roundabout. A kombi in front of me attempts to go, but I look right instead of staying focused on the van. It stops abruptly, the brakes yell at my feet, and I manage to stop a few inches from the kombi's number plate.
I had the Joker on the passenger seat.
It springs forward.
It lands on the floor.
And laughs.
Have you ever stretched your legs or touched your toes and tried for too much? That's how the days and weeks feel now as I work and wait for the Joker to unveil itself.
What will happen at my shack, at 26 Shipping Street?
Who will arrive?
On February 7 a hand reaches at my door, and I half rush, half stall on my way there. Is this it?
It's Audrey.
She walks in and says, "You've been quiet lately, Ed. Marv says he's been trying to call you, but you haven't been home."
"I've been working."
"And?"
"Waiting."
She sits down on the couch and asks, "For what?"
In no rush, I stand and walk to the drawer in the bedroom and pull out the four cards. When I return to her, I go through them one by one. "Diamonds," I say, "done." I let go and watch it flutter to the floor. "Clubs, done." Again, the card hits the carpet. "Spades and hearts--both done."
"So what now?" Audrey can see the paleness of my face and the jaded look of the rest of me.
From my pocket, I pull the Joker.
"This," I state. And I beg her. I nearly weep as I say, "Tell me, Audrey--please tell me it's you. Say you've been sending me these cards." I plead with her. "Tell me you just wanted me to help people and..."
"And what, Ed?"
I close my eyes. "Make myself better--make me worth something."
The words fall to the floor, to the cards, and Audrey smiles. She smiles and I wait for her to admit it.
"Tell me!" I demand. "Tell--"
She folds.
She tells the truth.
The words flow almost unconsciously from her mouth.
"No, Ed," she says slowly. "It wasn't me." She shakes her head and faces me. "I'm sorry, Ed. I'm so sorry. I wish it was, but..."
She doesn't finish her sentence.
Finally, it comes.
Another knock rattles at my door, and I know this one feels right. It's late, the hand is harsh, and I place my shoes on my feet before I go to answer it.
Breathe deep, Ed.
I do.
"Stay here," I order the Doorman when he meets me in the hall, but he follows me back to the door.
When I open it, there's a man in a suit.
"Ed Kennedy?" He's bald and has a lengthy mustache.
"Yes," I say.
He comes closer to the doorway and says, "I have something for you--can I come in?"
He's friendly enough, and I decide that if he wants to come in, I should allow it. I step aside and let the man past. He's tall and middle-aged, and his voice is steeped with politeness and assertion.
"Coffee?" I ask, but he declines.
"No, thank you."
This is the first time I see the briefcase in his hand.
He sits and opens it, and inside he has a wrapped lunch, an apple, and an envelope.
"Sandwich?" he offer
s.
"No, thanks."
"Good decision. My wife makes an awful sandwich--I couldn't bear to eat it today."
Quickly he turns to business, handing me the envelope.
"Thanks." I speak with trepidation.
"You going to open it?"
"Who sent you?"
I shoot him through the eyes, and the man is taken aback for a moment.
"Open it."
"Who sent you?"
I can't hold myself any longer, though. My fingers work their way inside the envelope, and the familiar handwriting greets me.
Dear Ed,
The end is near.
I think you'd best be getting down to the cemetery.
"The cemetery?" I ask, and I know that tomorrow is exactly a year to the day that my father died.
My father.
"My father," I say to the man. "Tell me--was it him?"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Why not?" I nearly take hold of him.
"I--" he begins.
"What?"
"I was sent here."
"By who?"
But the man can only bow his head. He speaks the words with purpose. "I don't know. I don't know who he is...."
"Was my father behind it?" I talk at him. "Did he organize all of this before he died? Did he..."
I hear what my mother said to me last year.
You're just like him.
Did my father leave instructions for someone to organize this? I remember seeing him walk the streets at night when I was in my cab. He did it to sober up. I'd pick him up once in a while as he made his way home from the pub....
"That's how he knew the addresses," I say aloud.
"Sorry?"
"Nothing," I answer, and no more words are spoken because I'm out the door. I'm running up the street and out to the cemetery. The night is that blue black color. Clouds like cement are paved in sections to the sky.
The cemetery looms up, and I turn to the area where my father's grave is. Some security guards are standing close by.
Or are they?
No.
It's Daryl and Keith.
I slow to a standstill, and they watch me. Daryl speaks.
"Congratulations, Ed."
I catch up to my breath.
"My father?" I ask.
"You are like he was," Keith enlightens me, "and just like him, you were most likely to die the same way--a quarter of what you could have been...."
"So he sent you to do this? He organized it before he died?"
Daryl answers the question, wandering closer. "You see, Ed, you were always an absolute no-hoper--just like your old man. No offense."
"None taken."
"And we've been employed to test you--to see if you can avoid this life." He points casually to the grave.
"The only problem is"--Keith steps in now--"it wasn't your father who sent us."
This takes a while to sink in.
It's not Audrey. It's not my father.
Crowds of questions stream through me like lines of people exiting a soccer ground or a concert. They push and shove and trip. Some make their way around. Some remain in their seats, waiting for their opportunity.
"What are you doing here, then?" I ask them. "How did you know I'd be right here at this exact moment in time?"
"Our employer sent us," Daryl replies.
"He told us you'd be here," Keith chimes in again. They're working well tonight. "So we came." He smiles at me, almost sympathetically. "He hasn't been wrong yet."
I try to think, to make some sense of all this.
"Well," I begin, but it appears that I have no more words to extend the sentence. I find them. "Who's your employer?"
Daryl shakes his head. "We don't know, Ed. We just do what we're told." He begins to wrap things up. "But, yes, Ed, you were sent here tonight to remind yourself that you don't want to die the same way your father did. Understand?"
I nod my agreement.
"And now we have one last thing to tell you, and then we'll disappear from your life forever."
I prepare to listen hard. "What is it?"
They already begin to walk away. "Just that you have a little longer to wait, okay?"
I stand there.
What else can I do but stand there?
I watch Daryl and Keith walk calmly into the night. They're gone and I'll never see them again.
"Thank you," I say, but they don't hear me. It seems a shame that they never will.
A few more days pass and I realize there's nothing else I can do now but wait. I've almost given up when I'm waved down by a young man in jeans, a jacket, and a cap on my way home from work one morning at dawn.
He gets in the backseat.
The usual.
I ask him where to.
The usual.
Then I get the answer.
"26 Shipping Street."
Not the usual.
The words paralyze me and I nearly pull the car to a stop.
"Just drive on," he says, but he doesn't look up. "Like I told you, Ed. 26 Shipping Street."
I drive.
We travel in silence until we make it to town. I'm driving cautiously, with nervous eyes and a badly beating heart.
I turn onto my street and pull up at my place.
Finally, the person in the backseat removes his cap and looks up so I can see him for the first time in the mirror.
"It's you!" I shout.
"Yes."
Something greater than shock or surprise has stolen every thought or reaction I might have had--because in the backseat of my cab is the failed bank robber from the start of this story. His ginger whiskers are still there, and he's as ugly as ever.
"The six months are up," he explains. He sounds friendly this time.
"But--"
"Don't ask questions," he interrupts. "Just drive on. Drive me to 45 Edgar Street."
I do it.
"Remember this place?" he says.
I do.
"Now 13 Harrison Avenue." And one by one, the failed bank robber takes me to each place. To Milla and Sophie, to the father and Angie Carusso, and to the Rose boys.
"Remember?" he questions me each time.
In the cab, I revisit each place, each message.
"Yes," I tell him. "I do."
"Good. Glory Road now.
"Clown Street and your ma's place.
"Bell Street.
"And you know the last three."
We drive the streets of town as the sun climbs higher in the sky. We go to Ritchie's, to the playground with the unkempt grass, and to Audrey's place. At each destination, remembering takes its turn in me as I drive. At times, it makes me want to stop and stay.
Stay forever.
With Ritchie in the river.
With Marv at the swings.
And dancing with Audrey in the silent fire of morning.
"Where now?" I ask when we return to my place.
"Get out," he tells me, and now I can't help it.
I say, "It was you, wasn't it? You robbed the bank knowing that--"
"Oh, could you just shut up, Ed?"
We stand by the cab in the morning sun.
Methodically, he pulls something from his jacket pocket. It's a small, flat mirror.
"Remember what I told you, Ed--at my trial?"
"I remember." And for some reason, I feel a warmness in my eyes.
"Tell me."
"You said that every time I look in the mirror, I should remember I'm looking at a dead man."
"That's right."
The failed thief steps away and stands in front of me. A small smile lands on his face, and he holds the mirror up to me. I stare right into myself.
He says, "Are you looking at a dead man now?"
In a flood inside me, I see all those places and people again. I hold the kid on her porch and go by the name of Jimmy to a marvelous old woman. I watch a girl run with the most glorious bloodied feet in the world.
I laugh with the thrill on a religious man's face. I see Angie Carusso's ice-creamed lips and feel the loyalty of the Rose boys. I watch the darkness of a family lit up by the power and the glory, let my mother unleash the truth and love and disappointment of her life, and sit in a lonely man's cinema.
Looking into the mirrored glass, I stand with my friend in a river. I watch Marvin Harris push his daughter on a swing, high into the sky, and I dance with love and Audrey for three minutes straight....
"Well?" he asks again. "Are you still looking at a dead man?"
This time, I answer.
I say, "No," and the criminal speaks.
"Well, it was worth it, then...."
He went to jail for those people.
He went to jail for me, and now he walks away with a few last words.
"Goodbye, Ed--I think you'd better get inside."
And he's gone.
Just like Daryl and Keith, I will never see him again.
As calmly as I can, I walk inside. My front door was open.
On my couch there sits a young man who pats the Doorman very quietly and happily.
"Who are--"
"Hi, Ed," he says. "I'm glad to finally meet you."
"Are you--"
He nods.
"You sent--"
He nods again.
When he stands up, he says, "I came to this town a year ago, Ed." He has fairly short brown hair, stands a bit smaller than medium height, and wears a shirt, black jeans, and blue athletic shoes. As each minute passes he looks more like a boy than a man, although when he speaks, his voice is not a boy's at all.
"Yeah, it was about a year ago, and I saw your father buried. I saw you and your card games and your dog and your ma. I just kept coming back, watching, the same way you did at all those addresses...." He turns away for a moment, almost ashamed. "I killed your father, Ed. I organized the bungled bank robbery for a time when you were there. I instructed that man to brutalize his wife. I made Daryl and Keith do all those things to you, and your mate who took you to the stones...." He looks down, then up. "I did it all to you. I made you a less-than-competent taxi driver and got you to do all those things you thought you couldn't." We stand now, staring. Waiting for more words. "And why?" He pauses, but he doesn't move back. "I did it because you are the epitome of ordinariness, Ed." He looks at me seriously. "And if a guy like you can stand up and do what you did for all those people, well, maybe everyone can. Maybe everyone can live beyond what they're capable of." He becomes intense now. Emotional. This is everything. "Maybe even I can...."