by Donna Hosie
“I think we should get some food before Alfarin starts to eat El,” sniggers Medusa. I’m trying my best not to laugh at the expression of panic that’s growing on Elinor’s red face.
“There’s a fast-food restaurant not far from here,” says Medusa. My map is open on her lap. I push her off my stomach and snatch it away from her. I’m in charge here.
“There’s a fast-food restaurant not far from here,” I announce. Medusa slaps me across the head as she climbs to her feet.
“I love this city already,” gushes Alfarin, packing away his axe. “It has food that is fast, and has provided a beautiful bed for my axe to sleep in.”
The four of us waddle away from the park. I think Elinor and Alfarin are wearing seven layers each, but they’ve been in Hell a lot longer than Medusa and me, so they need a lot more warmth. The living barely spare us a second look. We all find the vibrant colors hard to take in at first. We’re so used to shadows and fire that this rainbow city hurts our adapting eyes. Elinor also find the hundreds of cars too noisy, and after a while she resorts to walking with her fingers in her ears. Alfarin is particularly excited by the crosswalks, having spent many an hour poring over books from the library about anything mechanical. He spends several minutes playing with the walk sign, until an irate Italian man lowers the window of his yellow cab and threatens to do something to Alfarin that would absolutely guarantee the driver would end up in Hell.
The smells of hot dogs and crispy fried chicken lead us down a side street. Alfarin stares in wonder at the colorful menu displayed on a huge window. I swear I’m going to eat everything on it at least twice.
“Never in all of Valhalla have I seen such a wondrous sight!” he cries, turning to me. “May I have the honor of providing tonight’s meal?”
I slip Alfarin some cash. “Go for it, big man.”
Alfarin slaps his chest and throws open the double doors of the fast-food restaurant. Nothing smashes, which is a novelty. Several diners look up from their cheeseburgers as an enormous, barrel-shaped man with long blond hair strides up to the counter dressed like an Eskimo.
“Why do I think this is going to go badly?” mutters Elinor under her breath. Her fingers are massaging the back of her neck again.
“He’ll be fine,” Medusa assures her. “Let’s go find a seat.”
A large woman with an even bigger chest is serving behind the counter. Her red-and-white-striped shirt—which is stretched so tight the seams look as if they’re going to explode at any second—bears the logo HAPPY TO SERVE. From the scowl on her round face, she doesn’t look it.
Alfarin unzips and throws back his fur-lined hood.
“Wench, give me a bucket of chicken,” he demands.
The next sound is Elinor’s head hitting the white plastic table where we’ve just sat.
“What did you just call me?” snarls the fast-food server in a deep southern drawl very similar to Septimus’s.
Alfarin slaps some cash down on the counter as Elinor jumps up. She starts rushing across the tiled floor, but before she reaches our Viking friend, she slips on a discarded pickle slice, flies into the air, and comes crashing down on her back.
“Chicken, wench,” demands Alfarin again. “My name is Alfarin, son of Hlif, son of Dobin, and this money is my ticket to food. Now, provide for my friends or I will slap your buttocks to prove my displeasure.”
“Who are you calling wench, you fat son of a bitch?” yells the woman, shaking her pudgy fist. “Get the hell out of here before I call the cops!”
Medusa is trying to haul a disoriented Elinor to her feet. I’m laughing so hard I don’t dare move for fear of peeing my pants.
“Forget me,” groans Elinor to Medusa, “just get Alfarin out of here.”
It takes several minutes to drag Alfarin’s enormous frame out of the fast-food restaurant. He only consents to leave when the woman he has offended starts hitting him with a greasy fish spatula.
“I did nothing wrong!” exclaims Alfarin. “In our halls, all of the serving women are called wenches. It is a compliment.”
“I think chocolates, flowers, and calling someone darling are more acceptable here, ye big oaf,” says Elinor with exasperation.
“Get out, get out!” screams the woman, who is now brandishing the spatula at all of us.
“You get ’em, Martha,” drawls an elderly customer with crinkled black skin and a shock of gray hair. “You show ’em nobody messes with my girl and her buttocks.”
Only when the four of us have hurried back into the relative safety of Central Park do I remember the money that Alfarin slapped down on the counter. We can’t waste cash. Working in Hell’s accounting department has taught me that.
“Did someone pick it up?” I ask in a panic.
“I’ve got it,” replies Elinor. She pats her back pocket. “I grabbed it after the woman started throwing cheeseburgers at us.”
“I don’t understand!” cries Alfarin. “If I had slapped her rump, a smack across my face would have been expected. In fact, I would have welcomed it. In my day, this was how we attracted the opposite sex.”
“You have a lot to learn about women, Alfarin,” replies Medusa. “Just don’t go asking Mitchell to teach you anything.”
“What do you mean by that?” I demand.
“Let’s just say your taste in girls needs improvement.”
“I have excellent taste in girls, thank you very much.”
“Mitchell, I’ve seen you make out with a girl with an Adam’s apple.”
“So?”
“Girls don’t have an Adam’s apple, you fool!” shouts Medusa.
Elinor is making a funny snorting noise like a pig. She’s laughing so hard tears are falling down her bright-red cheeks.
I stop walking. Is Medusa saying what I think she’s saying? I look to Alfarin for support, but he’s too busy trying to get ketchup out of his beard.
“What do we do now, Mitchell?” asks Elinor, trying to be the peacemaker.
“We book a hotel and get room service,” I reply. “I’m starving, I’m cold, my eyes hurt, and that girl did not have an Adam’s apple. Her neck was just a bit lumpy. I think she died of the plague or something.”
“If you say so.”
“What hotel would you like to check into, Mitchell?” asks Elinor.
“I vote we check into the first one we come across,” says Alfarin. “Mitchell needs to rest before we cause any more trouble today.”
Only pregnant women and old people need rest. Even Alfarin thinks I’ve turned into a girl. Hungry and exhausted, Team DEVIL starts to walk toward the looming bank of stone and light that first welcomed us to New York City. On the way, we pass a large bronze statue of a man on a horse with a winged angel next to it. It looks suspicious, as if it has eyes that are following our every move. A solitary policeman is standing next to it. He looks at Medusa and sniffs the air. Then his mouth widens slowly and he grins; his teeth look twice as long as normal. A rotten smell, probably the city’s garbage, fills the night air.
“That looks like a hotel,” says Medusa. She points to a château-style building on the corner. “Why don’t we stay there, at least for tonight?”
The agreement is unanimous. I look behind us nervously, but the policeman is gone. All I can see is the outline of a large dog running off into the park.
Arm in arm, we troop up a red carpet and enter the building. I hear music coming from somewhere close by, and it takes all my resolve to not go searching for the piano that’s making it. Instead, I clutch my wallet. It holds the cash I stole from the office and my photo ID from when I was alive. I don’t know why I kept the ID; I certainly never expected to use it again. Maybe it was too hard to let go. But it’ll definitely come in handy today.
When we get to the front desk, I request the two cheapest rooms available: one for Alfarin and me to share and the other for Medusa and Elinor.
The pretty Asian desk clerk smiles at me as I hand her cash and she hands ove
r the door cards. Just like that, we have shelter at one of the most luxurious hotels in the world. “Now, if there is anything we can do to make your visit more pleasant, Mr. Johnson, please do not hesitate to ask the concierge. We hope you enjoy your stay at the Plaza,” she says.
Medusa is asleep before her head hits the pillow; Alfarin isn’t far behind. It looks as if the four of us will be sharing one room tonight, because there’s no way Elinor will go into the other room alone with me, and I wouldn’t ask her to. I’m a gentleman.
Elinor tiptoes around the room. It really is impressive, especially considering we’re in the cheap seats. The faucets in the white marble bathroom appear to be made of gold. The clothes hangers are all padded like pillows, which I think is ridiculous, but they send Elinor into spasms of joy.
I’m busy counting our remaining cash when Medusa starts screaming and crying in her sleep. Her head thrashes from side to side and her arms fling out in front of her as she struggles to wake up from the terror she has fallen into. I’ve seen her do this before, and it isn’t pretty. Elinor and I both leap onto the bed as Alfarin tumbles out of the seat he was snoozing in. He has his axe in his hand and is about to start swinging. This is just as scary as Medusa’s screams, because Alfarin is still only half awake and liable to take someone’s head off if he isn’t careful.
“Ye were shouting in your sleep,” whispers Elinor. She’s stroking Medusa’s hair away from her sweaty face. I want to do that, because I’m Medusa’s best friend, but I let Elinor.
“Another nightmare?” I ask. I put my hand on Medusa’s shoulder. She leans into me and I wrap my arms around her bony rib cage. Her chest is rising in short, shallow bursts. If she were alive I’d be able to feel her hammering heart, but she isn’t, so I can’t.
“Ye relived it again?”
Medusa nods. Large teardrops are leaking from her brown eyes, but she doesn’t make a sound. No sobs, no whimpers. Medusa isn’t one to make a fuss unless she’s really upset.
Like when a friend tries to swap a friendship for a leather jacket.
“How did you die, Medusa?”
I wanted to ask again, but it’s Alfarin who speaks. To my surprise, she doesn’t tell him to get lost.
“I fell from the Golden Gate Bridge,” she says quietly. “I didn’t mean to let go, I just lost my grip. I only wanted to scare them into helping me.”
“Oh, Medusa.” I put my lips against her temple. It isn’t a kiss, because my mouth stays there. If I could inhale away her pain, I would in a second.
“And ye regret being there?”
My best friend pulls away. She clambers off the bed and straightens out her clothes, her back to us. She sniffles, wipes her eyes with the back of her hand, and fluffs out her corkscrew hair in the window’s reflection.
“I only regret that I didn’t take him with me.”
12. Sleepy Sheep
Checking into two rooms was a total waste of money. Medusa and Elinor are sharing the one bed, but Alfarin wants the four of us to stay together. I have no intention of leaving Medusa to her night terrors, so we remain in the one room and let the other go unused.
Medusa would go nuts if she knew I stayed awake just to watch her sleep, long after everyone else has dozed off. I’m not being a creep or stalker or anything like that. I’m just worried after she’s spent an hour locked in the bathroom with the Viciseometer. She was watching something in the watch face, I’m sure of it, though she says she was just cleaning fingerprints off it. She isn’t a very good liar. It’s another thing we have in common.
Medusa never believed me when I told her I’d died saving kittens. We’d both just had our third interviews for the intern job—that was when we first became friends. She rolled her eyes and walked away; I ended up running after her. The first words she ever said to me were curse words. I liked that. It’s a common misconception that boys like girls who fall at their feet. Well, we do like that, but only for that immediate moment. I would never hang out with a girl like Patty Lloyd. She’s gorgeous, but way too much work. Medusa is easy most of the time. A round peg in a round hole. She fits into my death effortlessly.
Death is crappy enough without friend drama. The four of us are soul mates, according to the girls. They do this kind of retrospective analysis. Medusa, and especially Elinor, like to get all deep and heavy and say things about fate bringing us all together, or destiny, or some other nonsense. Elinor is constantly going on about how the four of us were meant to be together in death.
I don’t believe in fate, or destiny in the stars, or any of that crap, because I think you make your own luck—or bad luck, if you look at my history with large vehicles. Medusa, Alfarin, Elinor, and I are together because we like each other. We each bring something unique to the group: Medusa is the smartest person I know; Alfarin the bravest; and Elinor the most rational.
I am the glue keeping us together—for now.
I stop watching Medusa and walk over to the Viciseometer on the writing desk. I don’t know whether to hide it or keep it in full view so we can get to it quickly in case of an emergency. Not a minute goes by when I don’t think I’m about to get busted by the Skin-Walkers, but in the city that never sleeps, there is only silence.
And that is just as unnerving.
When I say silence, I mean from outside the room. Inside, the noise is ridiculous. Alfarin and Elinor are clearly having a competition to see who can shatter the windows first with their snoring. Judging by the steam-engine honking coming from Elinor, I’d say she’s winning. It’s hard to believe someone so fragile can make such a noise.
I’m too wired to sleep. I feel like one of those toys that you wind up by hand and then let go. They’re manic for five seconds and then they fall over and just make a whirring noise until the mechanism dies.
It’s been too easy. We got out of Hell without a hitch, and as a bonus for my duplicity, I have my three best friends with me. We weren’t arrested at the HalfWay House, and the Viciseometer worked on my first try. Apart from the issues with temperature, and Alfarin’s run-in at the restaurant, even New York has played nicely.
When the others wake up we’re going to have to start making decisions, like whose death we’re going to see first. Then it’s going to get a lot harder. I’m under no illusion about that.
Tonight’s confession from Medusa was horrible. It was the first time she’s ever told any of us how she died. She mentioned someone else; someone she regretted not taking with her. If there is a person on this earth who has hurt her, I swear I’ll travel back in time and kill him myself.
And if Elinor doesn’t stop that incessant noise, I’m going to hold her nose and smother her with a pillow. She doesn’t even need to breathe, and that snoring isn’t human.
Alfarin died when he was sixteen years old. He was killed in battle. His Viking clan was marauding through some English village and he was cut off from the rest of his family and attacked. A lot of his relatives are now in Hell. The ones who somehow got into Up There are never really talked about, or even mentioned. They’re regarded as having brought dishonor to the brethren. Alfarin was the heir of the Viking king. He would have made history if he’d lived long enough to take charge, I’m sure of it. His clan is convinced they saw Alfarin’s spirit appear to them after he died, so he’s treated like a hero in Hell. He is such a good friend; I’m really excited to see how he’ll be revered once he gets another chance at life. I’m sure I’ll be reading about him in history books as a legendary warrior.
Everyone should get that second chance, because when you’re young you get labeled and written off. When you’re alive, some people don’t really look for your potential. They only see it once it’s too late. The words spoken at funerals should be said when the person is alive to hear them.
Elinor suffered a horrible death. It’s really hot in Hell, but I figure burning to death is probably the worst way to go, because some serious pain goes into that. When you die, you want to be old and comfortable, having l
ived a long and interesting life. You don’t want the smell of your own burning flesh to be your last earthly memory. How Elinor has handled that and become the devil she is today—well, I don’t think I would have dealt with it anywhere near as well. I would have ended up in Hell’s lunatic asylum with all the other banshees. Elinor doesn’t talk about her death much because she finds it too traumatic. Medusa thinks Elinor looks at Alfarin in a funny way when we do get around to talking about it—which the four of us try really hard not to. I can’t say I’ve noticed, but then girls see things differently.
If I really can alter time with the Viciseometer, if I can stop myself from running out in front of that bus, I am going to do everything I can to live as long as humanly possible. I think one hundred and one is a good age to die. I’ll still have my own teeth and hair—that’s really important. I’ll be stinking rich and will have sold millions of records on iTunes, and there will be Facebook tribute pages with so many fans that my death will crash the site. I’ll definitely be a trending topic on Twitter when I die properly. I’ll pass away in my sleep, having eaten steak and mashed potatoes and a huge tub of strawberries for dinner.
I’ve just had a thought. It was the strawberries that did it. Technically, Medusa is older than me. She was born in 1951. She lived and died decades before I was even a twinkle in my parents’ eyes. So if we ever got together, she would be a cougar.
I start laughing. I can’t help it. It would be worth asking her out, just to be able to mock her for being a mangy old cat.
She doesn’t look like a mangy old cat, though. Medusa is infuriating and opinionated and ridiculously self-sufficient, but she’s my best friend and I swear if someone caused her death, they’re going to pay. She could have been the first female president or a world-famous chef. I would do anything for Medusa, but sometimes it’s just easier to mock her and toss her around and steal her potato chips.
And now I have a stabbing pain in my side. This is why guys don’t think about this stuff—it gives us ulcers. Thinking about feelings and trying to work out what goes on in a woman’s head is why men die early.