* * * * *
In the back of the building, we were met by the night morgue attendant. Ben simply flashed his badge and told him that we needed to view the remains of Debbie Schaefer. The pallid young man never even uttered a word and simply handed a clipboard to my friend so he could sign us in. That completed, he mutely led us into the cold storage area, flipping on the overhead lights as we entered.
The right wall of the tiled room was lined with rectangular stainless steel doors. Each of them was a gateway to an individual compartment where a corpse would spend its stay with the medical examiner. On the opposite wall there were two large sinks, each equipped with a table capable of holding a body. Here were also such things as examination gloves and implements I wasn’t the least bit interested in knowing the purpose of.
At the back of the room was another set of doors that led, as I was told later, to the garage which was accessible from the back of the building. This was where recovered bodies were brought in and would begin their journey through the various stages of the postmortem process.
The attendant took us to a wheeled table positioned near the individual storage compartments. On it was a rubberized body bag, an identification tag affixed to the heavy-duty zipper pull. The faint malodor of decay had been noticeable ever since we entered the back area of the building. Upon entry into the cold room, the intensity of the strange funk began to increase several fold. Now as our proximity to the remains was within a matter of feet, the foulness was thick in the atmosphere.
“That’s great, thanks,” Ben told the attendant who was just starting to pull on a pair of latex gloves. “We can handle it from here.”
The young man stopped in the middle of sheathing his hands. Frozen in place like a statue, he simply stared at Ben as if waiting for him to say that he was only kidding.
“Really.” My friend nodded and coughed, wrinkling his nose at the smell. “We’ll call ya’ when we’re finished.”
I was right there with my friend, and I’m sure Felicity wasn’t far behind. My stomach was already starting to churn, and it was all I could do to keep from screwing up my face in disgust.
Giving a slight shrug the attendant pointed toward the sinks and, displaying perceptible effort, muttered, “Gloves.”
With the one syllable utterance out of the way, he left us alone in the chilled room.
“That was a little bizarre,” Felicity commented quietly after the young man disappeared out the door.
“If ya’ ask me, all of ‘em that work here are fuckin’ nut cases,” Ben asserted as he stepped across the room and began pulling a pair of oversized latex gloves onto his hands. With a nod, he indicated for us to do the same then turned his attention directly on my wife. “You said there were some precautions we need ta’ take for this?”
“Do you think he’s going to come back anytime soon?” She cocked her head toward the door.
For some wholly bizarre and unknown reason, I took great notice of the way her hair almost shimmered in the light when she tossed her head. The perfection of her auburn mane as it cascaded down her back in a fiery plume of loosely spiraling curls. The way it softly brushed against the ivory skin of her neck when she tilted her head to the side.
“You mean Mister Personality? Not likely,” he answered.
“It would be best if he doesn’t,” she continued. “Because what I need to do might look a bit strange to someone who doesn’t understand.”
“What, like he’s not strange enough on ‘is own?” Ben offered a rhetorical answer.
“Aye, but that’s beside the point.”
I watched her closely—observing the way the layered cut of her hair framed her face and accented her dainty features. I was amazed that I had never noticed it in such intense detail before.
“So how strange are you gonna get?”
“Not terribly. I just need to cast a spell.”
“Cast a spell? I thought you guys didn’t do shit like that.”
“No,” Felicity explained, “we do cast spells, just not the way most people think we do.”
“So you’re not gonna whip out some bat wings and crap like that, right?”
“Just some salt, Ben.”
She used the back of her hand to brush a tousle of her feathery coif back from the side of her face, and I was entranced as she let it linger there.
“Salt?” he queried with a shake of his head.
“Salt.”
“Where are you gonna get salt?”
Felicity rummaged about in one of the many pockets of her photo vest, and when she withdrew her hand she was holding some individual condiment packets of the substance. “Not exactly sea salt, but it’ll do.”
I felt a rush of excitement course through my body, and my skin literally prickled with the energy of overwhelming desire. I wanted to simply reach out and touch her.
“You always carry that stuff around with you?”
“Pretty much.”
“What, so ya’ can do shit like this?”
“No, not really. I just happen to like salt and you don’t always get any when you order at a busy drive-thru.”
I was beginning to have trouble containing the intense burst of longing for the woman in front of me. I couldn’t turn my gaze away, and if I continued to stare I was certain to embarrass myself.
“Yo, Rowan!” My friend’s urgent and concern-tinged voice slapped me hard in the face, breaking the trance. I felt his hand on my shoulder as he started to shake me lightly. “You all right? You aren’t goin’ all Twilight Zone, are ya’?”
“Wh-wh-what? No… No, I’m okay,” I managed to stammer as I blinked.
I had no idea what had just happened. I did know that I wasn’t about to tell the two of them that I had been standing there having some sort of disconnected, uncontrolled psychosexual fantasy about my wife’s hair. That was odd enough in and of itself, but considering where we were and what we were supposed to be doing, I was certain they would have me committed immediately. To be honest, I probably wouldn’t blame them if they did.
I was, to say the least, more than a little disturbed by the incident, but I tried not to let it show. I made a mental note to mention it to Helen Storm during my next session with her. I was really beginning to wonder if my sanity had finally fled in a futile attempt to save itself.
“Aye, help me out here,” Felicity demanded as she struggled to move the wheeled table out from the wall.
Ben stepped over to help her, and after a brief moment of mimicking her struggle, he located the parking brake and released it. The two of them moved the gurney out and, at my wife’s direction, centered it in the room before locking it down once again.
“What else ya need me ta’ do?” Ben asked.
“I’m a bit disoriented,” she returned as she looked around, trying to gain her bearings. “Which direction is east?”
“Shit, ummmmm,” he muttered as he spun around as well, slowly motioning his arms in various directions while mumbling aloud to himself. “Clark runs east and west, building faces Clark. Highway would be there… Headquarters…” he stopped and pointed at a wall, “this way.”
“Okay.” Felicity nodded as she directed her attention toward me and motioned for me to come over. “Rowan, you come stand here, then.”
I did as I was instructed, still feeling somewhat wistful at the sight of her and that auburn mane.
“Ben, you stand on the other side here,” she instructed.
“Okay.” He moved into position. “What now?”
“Just be quiet and don’t open that bag until I tell you to.”
“This isn’t gonna get all hinky, is it?”
Felicity had already stepped behind him, facing toward the east and was tearing open the salt packets. “Just be quiet and do what I tell you to do.”
“Yeah. Great,” he answered in a flat tone then mumbled, “Jeezus, I can’t believe I’m doin’ this.”
Felicity carefully began sprinkling the salt along an ar
c as she walked slowly clockwise around us. She would stop only briefly at each of the quarters—south, west, and north—and give a slight nod of her head, silently acknowledging the elements. By the time she made her way back around to the east, she had emptied a half dozen of the small paper packets onto the floor in a rough circle, leaving only a small opening unsalted. Though it was not visibly perceptible, the energy of the purified barrier was something I could easily feel.
In a fluid motion my wife moved smoothly deosil—or clockwise—around us a second time. Holding her arms outstretched, she moved silently until she was once again before the small opening where she started. After a slight pause she repeated the circuit twice more.
“What the hell’s she doin’?” Ben whispered the question to me from across the wheeled table.
“Cleansing the work area,” I replied in my own hushed tone.
As Felicity came to rest at the end of the third revolution, she brought her arms down, around, and back up in front of her as if gathering something unseen into a bundle. Then she forcefully pushed her palms outward, casting the invisible detritus she had gathered through the opening she had left just for this purpose. Immediately upon completing this task, she sprinkled the remains of a salt packet on the floor at her feet, effectively closing the now purified circle.
“Is that it?” Ben voiced.
“Shhhh!” my wife warned as she remained at rest—arms at her sides, facing east with her back to us, and her head bowed.
He started to retort but halted before uttering a sound as I slowly shook my head and mouthed the word, “Don’t.” Instead he simply rolled his eyes and allowed his shoulders to fall slightly.
I could sense that Felicity had fallen into an easy rhythm with her breathing, taking deep lungfuls of air in through her nose and exhaling softly out through her mouth. In an almost symbiotic reaction, my own breathing slipped into time with hers.
After a short meditation, she slowly raised her arms from her sides, palms upward, then allowed her chin to rise from her chest, bringing her face upturned toward the ceiling.
“Lord and Lady spin about,” she began in a quiet, singsong voice, “Watch over us this night throughout. In the dark, one journeys long, in search of answers hidden strong. Please guide him through and guard his fate, for on this side, I shall wait.
“Please lead me through these passing hours, and grant to me your protective powers. For here and now are spirits still, kept at bay by my own will. From head to toe, above and below, watch over him as west winds blow. From earth to air, sky to ground, keep Rowan safe and well and sound.”
Chilled silence filled the room as her last words faded. Ben stood staring at me, mute but questioning with his eyes. I’m not entirely sure what he had been expecting to happen in conjunction with this bit of SpellCraft, but he seemed almost disappointed. His face visibly betrayed his reaction to what must have been anticlimactic in a host of ways. The sort of letdown that comes from seeing real WitchCraft firsthand, but only after first being saturated with years of too many Hollywood special effects and inaccurate portrayals by the entertainment industry.
I couldn’t place all of the blame in their laps, however. Even though they were only partially connected with my spiritual path, one could be certain that the bizarre psychic phenomena that seemed to plague me on a regular basis had helped to cloud his perceptions as well.
“Like I’ve told you before,” I whispered in answer to his unasked question, “casting a spell for a Witch is pretty much just like praying is for a Christian.”
Felicity had left her station at the eastern point of the circle and had now sidled up next to me. I felt her right palm press against my own and her fingers intertwine with mine in a vise-like grip. Immediately I felt the chaotic energy within my body connect with hers as she took firm hold of my ethereal self. She simply ignored my own earthly bond, fleeting and tenuous as it was, and forcibly grounded me through her own solid coupling with this plane of existence.
She looked into my eyes, silently daring me to even try letting go of her hand, and then glanced over to Ben with a look of extreme concentration furrowing into her brow.
“Aye,” she said with a nod. “Now you can open it.”
CHAPTER 8
If nothing else, I was most definitely no longer fantasizing about my wife’s hair.
The malodorous stench of decay spewed outward in a cloud of invisible but uniquely vile smelling gases. They escaped the body bag in an instantly rising plume that marched lockstep directly behind the zipper pull as Ben tugged it open.
The noxious vapor forced the three of us to cough and twist our heads away as it pushed its way into our nostrils. I felt a column of bile searing upward in my throat, and I swallowed hard to force it back into the depths from which it came. My churning stomach did a somersault and twisted into a tight knot as it threatened to evacuate what little contents it held.
I shifted my watery-eyed glance between Ben and Felicity and saw that they were in no better shape than me. My wife was seriously green, and Ben’s head was cocked away with his eyes tightly shut. He had already seen this at least once, and he didn’t appear to be particularly interested in a repeat viewing.
“Awww, Jeeeezzz…” my friend’s voice trailed off as he mumbled.
Two months, fluctuating temperatures, and even some of nature’s children had been hard at work on the earthly remains of Debbie Schaeffer. What was left of her body was still clad in the tattered leavings of a pair of blue jeans and a sweatshirt that bore the partial logo of Oakwood College.
The clothing had already begun along the same journey of decomposition as the rest and was heavily stained with the purge fluids that escape the confines of the flesh during decay. The fibers had already begun to break down in places, creating large holes in the garments. One side of the sweatshirt was particularly desiccated, revealing a substantial portion of her ribcage and even some remaining mold-covered flesh. One running shoe still hugged the remnants of her right foot, but the other was gone, leaving the left exposed and skeletonized within the disintegrating weave of a white cotton sock.
I suddenly remembered having once seen a cable television documentary about forensic pathology and a place in Tennessee nicknamed “The Body Farm.” While a plot of land where decomposing human cadavers are studied wasn’t exactly high on my list of things to recall, the sight before me triggered the forgotten memory and a handful of facts returned to the forefront of their own accord.
What came to me immediately was the recollection that there were basically five states the human body would go through post mortem—fresh/autolysis; bloating/putrefaction; wet decay/skin slippage and fluid purging; dry decay/partial mummification; and finally, skeletonization.
This young woman’s remains represented at least four of these five stages, and they were fully embroiled in seeing the process through to its conclusion. At the moment the gelid atmosphere of the cold room was holding them off only slightly, which is what triggered the next arcane factoid to bubble up from the depths of my memory—any and all of these stages could be hindered or hastened by a wide variety of factors such as temperature, humidity, and even body type.
Debbie Schaeffer had been dumped in the woods, fully clothed, and wrapped in plastic sheeting. To the best of the medical examiner’s determination, it had been sometime around the end of October or beginning of November. The temperatures had ranged from well below freezing, right up into the sixties and even seventies over the past two months. Rain had fallen. Sun had shone. Opportunistic predators from mammal to insect had come and gone. Mother Nature had worked to reclaim what, in the end, rightfully belonged to her.
This young woman had literally become a self-contained forensic pathology specimen suitable for inclusion in a textbook. I had to consciously remind myself that she had once been whole and full of life, not the putrefied and skeletonized mass I was seeing before me now. The visual evidence didn’t make it easy.
“Jeeeezz
z, white man,” Ben sputtered. “Ya’ wanna do your thing so we can close this up. I’m about ready ta’ spew.”
His words rattled in my ears and registered as little more than background noise because I was already doing my thing.
A calm like I had not felt in more than a year fell over me. I had all but forgotten what it felt like to be fully and completely grounded. I squeezed Felicity’s hand tight and basked in the vibrant flow of energy passing between us. Almost instantly I found myself wishing I could remain this way indefinitely.
I drew in a deep breath and sputtered as I immediately regretted the action. After a quick shake of my head, I pulled myself back together and focused on the task that brought me here.
Slowly, I brought my free hand up and reached outward. I could feel a growing static electricity-like attraction flowing between Debbie Schaeffer’s remains and me. The ethereal magnetism took hold, and like the opposite poles of magnets, it sucked my palm downward until it brushed against a tangled mass of blonde hair that had pulled away from the skull.
Where am I?
Darkness underscored by a faint, high-pitched whine.
I scream… Or do I? I hear nothing.
What is happening to me?
An explosion of blinding light.
Blink.
Psychedelic spots before my eyes.
Staring into nothingness.
Darkness.
A second bright blast.
Blink.
My heart races.
The kaleidoscope goes on.
Perfect Trust: A Rowan Gant Investigation Page 12