by Jason Arnopp
Disheartening. When an incoming call buzzes my pocket, Bex greets my universal sign language for ‘need to take this call’ with nonchalance – she has a new drink and some eye candy. Guy candy. One drink into her holiday, I’m dispensable.
A male Italian voice fills the line. Not Cavalcante. And surely not any other detective, unless they’re somehow calling from the bottom of a lake.
This voice is angry and . . . wet. Each syllable swims into the next.
‘Jack. Jack, is that you . . .’
This guy sounds familiar in a way that creeps me out. ‘Who’s this?’
‘You know who. Tony, the translator guy.’
I don’t know what my face does at this point, but it wrenches Bex’s full attention back to me.
‘Jack, you bastard,’ says this alleged, supposed Tony. With a throat full of gurgling drain water, he says, ‘You screwed my life.’
Hand on heart, at first I think he says ‘wife’. When I ask him to repeat himself, it sounds no better.
The guy must be using some kind of voice-filtering app: every breath is a dripping sponge, clenching and unclenching. ‘I’m being punished,’ he says, ‘and it’s all because of you.’
My rationality finally snatches back the reins. ‘Oh, very good. The dead guy phones me up. Spooky! Well done, mate – you do sound like Tony. Not bad at all.’
His voice trembles as he says: ‘She can do anything, Jack. Anything. She can take you anywhere, any time she likes.’
‘Okay . . . who’s she?’ I say, feeling stupid for even playing along. ‘The cat’s mother?’
‘She left hospital, then came for me, to control me. To make me do things . . . oh my God. My own son. I had to free myself. But even now I’m not free, and this is all your fault, you bastard.’
I guffaw down the line and wink at a puzzled Bex. ‘So Maria turned you into a filthy paedo? I thought that was my fault.’
‘I saw you in the record store, Jack. Has that happened yet? And then the bathroom. It was cruel, but I had a chance to get even and I took that chance. What is the date?’
I gulp bourbon, the words ‘record store’ echoing around my skull. Bit weird, that. Either this maniac was there in the store, or it’s a lucky stab in the dark. Either way, I’ve had enough of him.
‘A big shout-out,’ I say, ‘to whoever ends up listening to a stream of this wacky prank. Check out Jack Sparks dot co dot uk and buy a T-shirt.’
‘Tell me what date,’ snaps the caller.
‘I’ll tell you to fuck off.’
A storm front of menace rolls back into his voice. ‘Better watch out, Jack. You gonna get what you deserve.’
‘Ooh, a speedboat?’
A bubbling inhalation, a saturated outbreath . . . and when he speaks again, the voice changes entirely. My ear fills with the deep, dark tones of Maria Corvi.
‘In your dreams, Jack Sparks.’
The phone line dies, taking her prickly laughter with it.
Bex drums the table, waiting for news. Two fresh drinks sit beside the others.
I can’t speak for a while. I light a cigarette, while trying to get this stuff straight, to work it all out. Finding myself at a loss, I settle for leaning back and blowing twin smoke plumes through my nostrils.
Bex raises her glass, solemn. ‘Let’s get hammered.’
So there’s a guy out there pretending to be someone who killed himself. A guy who threatens me, doesn’t know what day it is and does a nice sideline in impersonating Maria Corvi.
I knew this book would attract cranks, but on this level? It’s astounding what some people will do for a supporting role in a Jack Sparks book. For all I know, ‘Inspector Cavalcante’ and this latest joker may even be the same guy. Some wag who caught wind of the Italian exorcism drama and decided to have some fun. The stupidity hurts my head.
I nod furiously at Bex as we clink drinks. ‘What could possibly go wrong, Miss Lawson?’
Bex leans forward to whisper her reply. I want it to be ‘Well, we could end up in bed.’ Instead, of course, she says, ‘That guy over there – do you think it’s Zakk Wylde?’
Come 3.33 a.m., my head is a rotten melon with a machete handle sticking out of it.
I wake from the usual Maria dream, my surroundings monochrome.
Beside me on the bed, there’s a long black shape.
Bex is lying on her back on the crisp white linen, fully clothed. Just as I am.
Behind the air con’s churning whirr lies a different sound. Takes me a while to work out that Bex is snoring.
I clamber off the bed with a grimace, then pad through to the bathroom and stand in the doorway, flicking a switch. The sound of electrocuted flies heralds striplights blinking into life and scorching my retinas. Lumbering in, the vinyl-plank floor cool under my bare soles, I thank my past self for taking the time to stockpile potent stateside painkillers. I dry-gulp what I imagine the maximum dose to be.
As I perch gingerly on the side of the bath, willing the pills to work, a flashback montage rises up through the gallons of booze we sank at the Rainbow and beyond. Polaroid moments resolve themselves.
Me and Zakk Wylde both grinning dutifully as I photograph him with a delighted Bex on the patio.
Some guy in a white vest yelling along the Sunset Boulevard sidewalk because we left Bex’s suitcase behind on that same patio. ‘You wanna get your shit blown up, man?’ asks this crowned king of rhetoric.
Me telling Bex how Hunter S. Thompson lives on through me.
Bex telling me some stuff about Lawrence. God knows what. Both of us taking it in turns to ride a rotating mechanical bull at the Saddle Ranch restaurant. Howling with laughter as it hurls us on to the heavily padded ground. Beer after beer, always with a JD chaser. Because them’s the rules.
Me telling Bex how much I resent Hollywood using the video to hitch a free ride on my back.
Christ. Hungry tongue-kissing on Sunset Boulevard, my back against a wall. Bex’s body heat radiating though me. Two adults regressing into drunk teens, the picture completed by my hands clamped on Bex’s denim derriere. A toothless old woman hobbles by, lugging carrier bags stuffed with junk. She says, ‘If I were you, I’d buy a gun first.’ Her strong Southern accent makes it sound like ‘If ah were yoo, ah’d buy a gern first.’
The two of us laughing about the old woman all the way back to the hotel, the lust spell broken.
Shrieking at traffic, jaywalking outrageously. Furious horns parp.
That’s where my memory pinholes shut. We must have crawled up here and passed out.
‘Jack . . .’
An urgent whisper from nearby. I fully expect the bathroom door to frame a confused Bex, her hand outstretched for painkillers . . .
Instead, the doorway remains a static rectangle, framing only the wall outside.
I step out of the bathroom, still expecting to bump into Bex.
But she’s still in bed. Still snoring.
She said my name in her sleep! Surely a good sign, along with all that kissing.
‘Jack . . .’
That same whisper. An icy shard of sound, cutting through the air con. Or is it actually part of that endless drone? A sonic quirk, cheating my ears? Fools call me self-obsessed all the time, but am I really so far gone as to hear my own name whispered by an air-con unit?
‘Jack . . .’
Well, I’m now sure about one thing.
I’m facing the bed and yet the whisper came from behind me.
I swing around and home in on a sickly strip of yellow light. The one that runs beneath the entrance door.
Two telltale black smudges interrupt the yellow. Two giveaways that someone is standing right outside my door.
Our door.
I picture Maria Corvi out there. Can’t help it. The deranged, starry-eyed Maria Corvi, whispering my name.
I saw her in Hong Kong, so why not in LA?
Connections, connections, so disturbingly plausible.
Behind me, B
ex’s fragmented breath.
Above me, cool air rushes from slatted vents.
Before me, that door, still with those smudges beneath it.
With a head this sore, I’m in no mood for nonsense. I soon cover the short distance to the door.
And yet . . . and yet I hesitate to peer out through the spyhole embedded beneath the Fire Emergency map.
‘Jack . . .’
My name flits through the wood at me. Yes, through the wood for sure.
Is this another hallucination, waiting to happen? When I look out through the spyhole, will Maria Corvi’s yellow eye glare back at me, wide, glinting, accusatory? She’s missing and could even be dead. Is this my guilt resurfacing? And if so, could I really still feel guilty about a double murderer? I know what Dr Santoro would say . . . basically any old balls to back up his pet theory.
Oh, fuck this.
I shove my eye right up against that tiny brass ring.
Nothing and no one stares back through the fish-eye lens. This room’s at one end of an empty corridor, which stretches away, lined with doors, the straight lines curved. All that downlighting on the walls may seem pleasantly subtle and boutique-stylish in the evenings, but it now looks downright sinister.
I try to remember how tall Maria Corvi was. If she was standing outside, right up against the door, would I be able to see her?
Maybe not.
I step back from the door, far enough to review the yellow strip.
Two smudges, still there.
An involuntary shiver gets the better of me. Now, I don’t believe Maria Corvi is standing out there, dead or alive. It’s just that steeping yourself in supernatural concepts makes these thoughts rise from primeval depths. You find yourself fearing what countless ancestors feared before you, ever since the first ambiguous shadow was cast upon a cave mouth’s wall.
The irrational fear gene lives on in us all. It’s irritating, but these things need to be handled the same way as when you’ve taken a bad drug. Simply tell yourself how these crazy thoughts and anxieties are just down to the drug, nothing else.
Then arm yourself, just in case.
Damn all those airport security scans that rid you of potential weapons. The best I can muster right now is a full bottle of room-service Cabernet.
Moving in slow motion, I grip the smooth doorknob.
I’m torn between opening the door fast, which might wake Bex, or taking a more gradual approach, which would give a homicidal teenager more time to decide exactly where to skewer me with a rusty nail.
With one hand, I make a caveman club of the wine bottle. With the other, I twist the doorknob.
There’s a heavy-duty grinding sound as I swing the door open.
No one’s outside. Why yes, I do feel stupid, thanks for asking, but at least Bex is still asleep. I put the bottle down, then step outside.
Closing the door hushes the room’s air con, leaving a stark silence out here. Only TV talk-show murmurs can be heard from one of the other rooms.
What am I doing? I’m still drunk and really should be sleeping it off. I suppose I want to find an actual real-life person who, for reasons best known to themselves, has decided to whisper my name through my hotel room door.
I want to know why I keep seeing and hearing things that make . . .
‘Jack . . .’
. . . no sense.
This new whisper (which does sound like Maria if you think about it. Or Translator Tony. Or Camera Boy. Hush, stupid lizard-brain) comes from the far end of the corridor.
My bare feet slap the carpet as I run towards it. Never expected to be led away from our door, so didn’t grab shoes, but I can’t resist this siren call. Halting at a T-junction, I consider my options.
To my left, the silver glint of room-service trays outside every third door punctuates a long strip of carpet. At the very end of this corridor, I squint back at myself from a full-length wall mirror.
To my right, the corridor passes more doors and a bulky ice machine half buried in an alcove, before hitting another junction.
‘Jack . . .’
Decision made. I hurry off to the left, following the sound. My mirror image stomps towards me, growing larger, its body language more determined.
Two turns later, the corridor broadens into a square space prettified by vased flowers. Two lift doors along one side and a fire door on the other. My name gets whispered from beyond the fire door and so I burst through it, determined to catch the fucker out.
The stairwell’s stone floor freezes the soles of my feet. Brightly lit stairs coil down six floors. No sign of movement anywhere. No sound of footsteps.
And yet the sporadic whispering continues below, leading me down ever faster until I’m taking three steps at a time. Risking broken toes to get ahead of the game. Because that’s how this feels, like some kind of teasing childhood game, a playground rerun. If someone wants to press my buttons, they’re pressing well.
Down, down I go. Up, up goes my heart rate.
At ground level, I’m confronted with a door marked ‘Lobby’. I sit back on a low step and catch my breath. My T-shirt’s stuck to my back. When I flex my shoulder blades, they squelch. Still, the headache’s gone.
‘Jack . . .’
This from the other side of the lobby door, obviously.
Can you see where this is going? You probably can. You’re smart: you’re reading a Jack Sparks book, for Christ’s sake. But I still have no clue.
I palm open the door and enter the super-chic lobby, where the faux-marble floor does little to warm my feet. Across the other side, at reception, a tall, blond receptionist chats to someone out of sight in a back room. Some bloke in an evening jacket and jeans, probably a night-owl guest or drug dealer, is slumped on one of the artfully misshapen sofas, engrossed by his phone.
The adjoining bar area lies dormant and dark. Its fancy metal stool legs jab skywards, furniture dreamed up in an H. R. Giger power nap. Moonlight stroking shelved bottles of vodka and gin and . . . oh, who cares.
I’m just killing time on the edge of it all. Head cocked at an angle. Hair an asylum-escapee mess. Shoes nowhere to be seen.
Listening, waiting . . .
Waiting . . .
‘Jack . . .’
I track the voice past fountains that spurt dutifully even at this hour, lit with garish blue and pink light, into a short corridor branching off the lobby. It ends with a service door, wedged open by a bucket and mop.
‘Jack . . .’ says that infuriating voice, from the darkness beyond the door.
Maybe I am Scooby-Doo after all. Maybe this is the janitor fucking with me.
I steal a look back to the lobby. From here, I see no one and no one sees me. I drag the heavy door wider open, step over the bucket and duck inside.
Ancient wooden steps cascade down. The light switch doesn’t work, but the bottom of the staircase is dimly lit, so I grip the glossy wooden handrail. These chips in the rail’s varnish surely mirror the state of my sanity in pursuing this.
I test each new step with one foot before applying my full weight to it. Which seems so wise but does me no good. Halfway to the bottom, the meat of my right sole sinks down on to something sharp, skewering the muscle. I bend double, panting, dog drool oozing from my mouth. Standing precariously on one foot, I pinch out the drawing pin, its tip wet.
Once the staircase is behind me, subdued overhead light leads the way into the hotel’s shoddy underbelly. These hot, rough-walled service passages smell dank.
With each new step I survey the concrete floor, for fear of more pins. Or worse, broken glass.
‘Jack . . .’
My shadow jerks and contorts on the wall as I pick up speed.
Soon, there’s no more light to guide me, so I fire up the trusty Zippo.
The damp heat becomes more imposing and I notice a few pipes on the right-hand wall. Ten steps later, those pipes multiply to imitate the London Underground map. I see a junction box. Gauges with flick
ering dials.
A penny rolls in from the shadows of my mind, ready to drop.
Up ahead, the passage is set to widen. The right-hand wall of pipes ends at a corner.
The low hum of a generator draws louder, closer with each step.
At the end of a ceiling-cord hangs a bare bulb, caked in dust that dulls the light it gives out.
I am gooseflesh.
I’ll admit that something unnameable prevents me from going on. Something clenched and fearful in my guts. Utterly ridiculous but true.
After a few deep breaths, I hold up the Zippo and stride around the corner.
The penny lands, spinning wildly.
I am standing in the boiler room from the video.
There’s no one else here with me. No humanoid shape on the ground. No ethereal figure looming over it. Of course not.
There’s just that pattern of pipes and gauges and boxes on the walls, which makes my head swim with déjà vu.
I take it all in for some time, just staring, as sweat trickles into my eyes. The Zippo grows hot in my hand.
The only sound emanates from that generator, relentless.
My trance is broken by something in the corner of my eye. Something that looks a lot like a big shadow, flitting in front of the lift door.
Of course, when I refocus over there, all is still. Just a trick of the—
From behind me comes an urgent rattle of footsteps.
I swing around, my gooseflesh developing gooseflesh of its own.
The Zippo flame reflects in two pairs of wide eyes.
The first pair belongs to a tall, blond guy with a name badge pinned to his grey waistcoat. This, then, is Brandon, who was manning reception. Behind him stands a short Hispanic woman clutching a bedraggled mop as a defensive weapon. Apparently the Sunset Castle doesn’t deem maintenance staff worthy of name badges.
‘Told you,’ she mumbles to Brandon, looking me up and down. Lingering on my dirty feet.
Brandon spreads his hands palm up, calm but firm. ‘Sir, why exactly are you down here?’
‘That,’ I tell him, ‘is a fucking good question.’
Part II