Duet

by O'Gorman, Brian

  Her head nodded forwards and she slept. She began to snore gently. Greg went to shake her awake again, he had a million more questions for her, but his hand paused. She had said that he needed to get back to the hospital, that Louis could be in danger, that Bentley had lost his mind. He turned and started to make his way back towards the exit. Just before he got there, Tina appeared in front of him. After what June had said to him he felt slightly uncomfortable and a little excited.

  “Did you get what you needed Greg?” she said smiling at him.

  He paused for a moment, his mind ticking over what June had said to him. If he didn’t hit on Tina right now, would it be because June had said that he wouldn’t? Or would he not do anything because of the fact that he wanted to stay loyal and faithful to his beautiful wife. Could everything that June had said been the ramblings of a crazy old woman? It was pretty likely, but there was a part of him, the policeman part of him that needed to know.

  “Oh, yes thanks, more than I needed. She is sleeping now, but I will come back tomorrow and talk to her again if that’s alright by you.”

  “Oh…yes, that’s fine. I will be working tomorrow so I will make sure you get to see her,” said Tina, her smile unwavering.

  “Excellent, thank you. Perhaps you could show me round the place, let me see some of the bedrooms if you fancy,” said Greg. He watched Tina’s reaction carefully. Just for a moment, a fleeting moment, her smile faltered and colour began to run up her pale cheeks.

  “Sure…It would be my….pleasure…” she stammered.

  He left the building, his heart thumping. If he had just plucked Tina’s fantasy out of her head and made it a partial reality, then that meant that June was telling the truth. How else would she have known all those things about him, his wife’s name, that they were planning a family.

  But it isn’t possible, there is no such things as ghosts, or mind readers. It’s all a trick.

  She had known Bentley’s name, even though he had only been attacked a few hours before, how was any of that possible? He must have believed at least some of it, because here he was rushing back to the car to make his way back to the hospital to make sure that Louis wasn’t alone with Bentley when he woke up. There was too much truth in what June had said, even though his belief systems were screaming at him that it just wasn’t possible and it wasn’t logical. He was spooked by it all. He got into the car, fired up the engine and sped away making the tyres spin on the loose gravel of the driveway. A sweat was beading on his forehead and he was trying to scramble his radio off his shoulder to get in contact with Louis. He felt like such an idiot for allowing her to talk him into leaving her alone with Bentley. He had to make it back there before he woke up, he had to warn Louis before it was too late.

  11.

  Louis slept soundlessly. Her arms were folded across her chest and her chin was resting on her chest. A thin trail of drool was lazily making its way from her bottom lip and down her chin. She wasn’t aware of anything that was going on around her. She didn’t even stir when one of the nurses came in to take Bentley’s blood pressure and to change his drips. The nurse saw Louis sleeping in the chair and smiled at her. She knew exactly how louis felt and she mused that she would do the same if she was in the same position. Nursing carried some bloody long hours and sometimes for very little reward. It was so often the case that the patients they were trying to help were short tempered and abusive. Sometimes it was due to the fact that they were in pain or were afraid and they were the ones that usually apologised afterwards when they were back from the brink of death’s door. Some of them were just simply obnoxious, or highly intoxicated. The drunk ones were certainly the worst, they were the ones that got either handy with their fists or loose with their morals. Many a time she had been the recipient of a slap on the arse or a squeeze of the tit and she would respond by being just that little bit too rough with the needle when she was taking blood or would accidentally spill water on them. There were many ways to get even and she knew every single one of them. She had wondered, right now looking at Louis sleeping in the chair, just what it would be like to trade in a career in medicine for one in the police force. Right now it didn’t seem like such a bad career move. But, Bentley had been a pretty easy patient to care for since they had put him out of it. She hadn’t seen the full extent of his injury because she wasn’t on shift when he was brought in. Having read his notes, she didn’t really want to see it either. She changed his bags for more fluids and pain relief and started to wrap up his good arm in the blood pressure monitor. She had to squeeze herself into the gap between Louis’s chair and the bed to get the equipment on. The blood pressure collar had just begun to inflate when Bentley’s eyes popped open. The nurse didn’t see it at first and carried on taking the reading. His eyes were glassy and unseeing at first and then some semblance of reality came crashing back in. He drew in a large breath which attracted the attention of the nurse.

  “Hello Bentley how are you…” was all she managed to get out before Bentley let out a horrifying, braying scream. The scream tore Louis from her sleep and she scrambled to her feet as best she could with only three quarters of her brain functioning. The nurse recoiled and tripped over the leg of the chair Louis had been sleeping in and began to pinwheel her arms to try and regain her balance. Louis had enough presence of mind to put out her arms and catch the rather attractive nurse before she lost her fight with gravity. Louis put the nurse deftly into the chair and then turned her attention to Bentley. The bed that Bentley was in was empty and Louis scanned the room, momentarily flummoxed by the disappearance of the patient. Then she saw him. He was hunched up in the corner of the room. He had managed to wedge himself down the side of the bedside cupboard. The drips that were stuck into his arms had been dragged along for the ride. One of them had come loose and a thin jet of blood was jumping out of the small hole in the top of his hand. The bleeding hand was clutching the mummified arm that had been injured in the water. His head was turned to that it was against the wall. His nose was comically squashed against the wallpaper and a steady stream of tears were running down his face. Louis walked round the bed in a deliberately large circle so that Bentley could see where she was and that she didn’t mean him any harm. He showed no signs of registering that she was even there. She continued her path until she was just a few feet away from him and then she went to her knees so that she could look even less threatening. His eyes flicked towards her just for a moment and then his bottom lip began to tremble.

  “Bentley, my name is Sergeant Louis Nelson. I’m here to help you. Everything is going to be alright. Can you understand me?”

  Bentley flicked his eyes towards her again for a moment and then nodded gently. More tears spilled down his face as he did so. Louis was about to speak again when she saw the nurse approaching out of the corner of her eye. She held her hand out towards her, telling her to stop.

  “Go and get a Doctor, right now,” she said to the nurse. The nurse stood there, looking like she didn’t have a clue what Louis was talking about.

  “Move it!” Louis hissed and the nurse snapped out of her momentary trance and glided out of the room. Louis turned her attention back to Bentley.

  “Bentley, it’s going to be alright. These Doctors, they are going to fix you up. You will be as good as new, I promise you.”

  Bentley turned his head slowly towards the sound of Louis’s voice. The blood that had been streaming from his hand had slowed to a trickle. There was a faint recognition in the man’s eyes, but Louis knew, just by looking at him that whatever had happened out there was bad enough to break him and change him forever.

  “It wouldn’t let me go….” Bentley whispered.

  Louis shuffled forwards a little. She was nearly within touching distance of him now. Bentley recoiled a little as if Louis was a poisonous snake coiling up ready to strike.

  “Bentley, listen to me Bentley. I need you to tell me what happened. I have to know what is in that water so we can go and
catch it before it hurts anybody else.”

  “It wouldn’t let me go. It wouldn’t let me go…it….” Bentley’s voice was rising higher and higher, but at the same time it had taken on a gargling quality, as if Bentley had something caught in his throat. He let out a barking cough and a clear liquid began to run from his mouth.

  “What was it Bentley? Tell me what did this to you.”

  Bentley stared Louis in the face and then his eyes began to roll over white. Bentley’s body stiffened and he slumped down into the tiny gap at the side of the cupboard and began to shake violently. Louis jumped up and began to shout for help. He words were halted when she heard the gargling sound coming from Bentley again. Louis looked round and saw that his mouth was open and it was filling with water from the inside.

  Louis took a couple of slow steps forwards, unable to quite comprehend what it was that she was seeing. She should have been running for help or trying to get Bentley on his side so he didn’t drown, but she was almost hypnotised by what was happening. His mouth was gushing water, the floor in the corner of the room was beginning to pool. It was running towards Louis. She was about to bend down and touch the water. She had a maddening urge to find out if it was hot or cold or….

  A hand dropped on her shoulder and gripped hold of her vest. It began to drag her away. Louis began to protest and then she looked up and saw that it was Greg. He looked sweaty and out of breath.

  “Get away from him Louis, it’s not safe,” he said pulling her away from the choking man.

  “But….” Said Louis and then Bentley sat up suddenly and vomited a huge jet of water they both manged to duck out of the way and the jet smashed into the wall behind them. Bentley screamed, one last gargling scream and then his skin began to peel off his face, exposing the raw flesh underneath. Blood began to stream down from the exposed muscle and mix with the water that was on the floor turning it a dark shade of scarlet. He tried to close his eyes but his eyelids were being eaten away. One of his eyes popped out of his head and hung on his cheek. A thin milky fluid dripped from it and joined the grotesque mix of water and bodily fluids. As Louis and Greg watched him the flesh began to melt away, exposing his bones. First from his face and then down his neck until it reached his chest. His light clothing boiled away in a haze of foam and exposed the ribcage underneath. Some of his internal organs were squished against the bones. Greg though that for a fleeting moment he could see Bentley’s heart still beating within the cage of his chest. Blood sheeted down Bentley’s front and pooled in his lap. Then Bentley fell back into his tiny space between the cupboard and the wall. Louis and Greg got to their feet and surveyed the scene in front of them. It looked like Bentley had been bludgeoned to death with something blunt and heavy. There was a mix of blood and water spreading slowly out from Bentley’s corpse. Louis was about to speak when Greg gripped her arm.

  “Look at that,” he said.

  The water began to foam up as if it was reaching boiling point over a hot flame. They both took a few steps backwards until they hit the back wall. The foaming seemed to reach a crescendo and then it died away.

  There was no blood left, not a single solitary drop.

  12.

  June Dobson was trying desperately to doze. She was still sat in her seat in front of the window. She felt like she dare not move from it, almost as if she was keeping watch for something to happen. Her thoughts were becoming more and more scattered as the day was progressing. She remembered the nice young police man that had come to see her. She had talked to him about the water, yes, she remembered that alright. She just wasn’t entirely sure about what it was that she had actually said to him. She didn’t know for sure just how much she had revealed to him about what she had known. There was enough coherent thought to know that she needed to rest up, that it would all become clear again. She wasn’t looking forward to the next time the fog lifted from her mind, because she knew that it would be time to go and see what was waiting for her out there in that reservoir. It was trying to call to her now, she could feel it trying to poke its way into her mind, but her jumbled mind made it impossible for it to get through. It was like a radio that was constantly being re-tuned to another channel to prevent a broadcast getting in. It was the only time in her life that she had been thankful for her sickness, it at least gave her a break. When things were scrambled, she couldn’t listen to the thoughts of other people, nor the self-pitying ramblings of those from the other side. Christ, they were a pain in the arse, always moaning about how they shouldn’t have died and that they had unfinished business blah-blah-blah. She had made an exceptional living using her gift and she had made believers out of those who were sceptical.

  At the height of her powers, just after she had turned thirty-five, she had managed to put together enough money for a deposit on a nice big house right out in the sticks, it was about ten miles from where she was sitting right at this moment. The nearest neighbours to her was at least five miles away, and that suited her just fine. She had got to a point where if she lived in a populated area the noise from all the thoughts and spirits she could hear would just become too much. It had become impossible to sleep properly with her picking up another screaming voice asking her what the hell was happening. When her husband Eric was sleeping next to her, she could hear his dreams if she focused in hard enough. But up in the hills, there was only her and Eric and it became so much easier to manage. But they had to keep earning a living to keep the place paid for, so June would allow a weekly session on a Friday night. Eric had come up with the brilliant idea of putting out an advert in the newspapers inviting people to write to her to request an appointment. That way she could carefully select who could come and talk to her and who was a crank looking to make a mockery of her.

  Every Friday they would come, no more than twenty guests at a time. They would be seated round the huge table in their equally huge dining room and they would be fed and watered and allowed to socialise. Eric would come and sit at the table and tell the guests how it was going to work. They would go and sit in the lounge area and wait to be called, one by one. Each would go and spend time with June. Sometimes somebody from the other side would bring a message for them, sometimes there would be no message, but she could hear their thoughts and their worries. Sometimes she could see where they were being led, sometimes she could see where they had been. Sometimes she could see all of it. But each one she saw left with a message. Nearly everyone she saw was open minded, they already half-believed before she had even uttered a word. Occasionally a non-believer got through the door. They were tough to read without the benefit of an open mind, but it didn’t mean that she couldn’t send them away with a message. Most of the time she could convert a non-believer into a half-believer, and that would always be more than good enough for her.

  Then there was the case of Francis Bowers.

  Francis was thirty-eight years old and she had come along with her daughter Caitlin. Caitlin was a half-believer and Francis didn’t believe at all, not even a little bit. In fact, she found the whole thing to be a gigantic waste of time and money. Just like most non-believers, she had the loudest voice of them all whilst they were in the dining room eating. She cracked bad jokes, spoke with her mouth full and drank far too much of the red and white wine that was being served at the table. By the time everyone had been moved through to the lounge to await their turn with June, Francis was beginning to weave slowly when she walked. She began to loudly complain about having to wait around for even longer and how she could have been at home with her feet up watching the soaps instead of listening to all this horseshit.

  Eric went into June’s room.

  “Can you see her first and then her daughter, then we can get her the hell out of here. She is beginning to piss off the other guests,” he said. He knew for a fact that Francis wasn’t beginning to piss off anyone, she had already crossed that line well over an hour ago.

  June nodded at him, “Send her in, I will make it quick and painful,” she s
aid and tipped him a wink.

  “I’m gonna nail you later June, gonna make that quick and painful too,” he said winking back and smiling.

  “Why change the habit of a lifetime?” she said and they both laughed. “Get out of here you old bastard and send the gobshite in.”

  Eric breezed out of the door leaving her alone for a moment. A small shiver ran down her spine, making the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. She had felt something similar many times before. It usually meant that she wasn’t alone in the room. She couldn’t hear them yet, but she knew they were there.

  “Easy now, there is no rush,” she said out loud. The chill dampened down a little.

  The door burst open and in came Francis. She began to wobble towards June who was positioned in the corner of the room nearest the window.

  “Close the door my dear and come and have a seat next to me,” she said.

  Francis paused a moment, shrugged and closed the door behind her. She made her way carefully to the armchair next to June and flopped herself down into the seat.

  “Don’t you worry yourself kiddo, I know you don’t believe any of this shit,” said June without taking her eyes off the view out of the window. The last of the sun was setting below the horizon and the colours in the sky were nothing short of incredible.

  “No offence honey, to me, if you’re dead then you’re dead, you don’t get to hang around and help anyone out, that just wouldn’t be fair. I think you should live life to the fullest ‘cos you are a long time dead,” said Francis.

  June chuckled. “I agree with you kiddo, no point living a life unfulfilled just because you believe that there is a life beyond the one you have now. Let’s say for a moment it’s true, do you think it will be anything like the life you have now? I don’t. A life without a physical form is one without pain and suffering, without hunger or thirst. But it’s also a life without steaks and wine and fucking and laughter. Doesn’t sound like too much fun to me.”