by M. Z. Kelly
His laughter was gone, his voice was barely audible. “I might as well tell you before my soul bro burns me. I drive a truck.”
“Tell ‘em what kind of truck,” Darryl said, breaking into his own fit of laughter.
“It’s a…”
“A turd hearse,” his bro said.
“A what?” I asked.
Darryl answered. “My bro pumps out porta potties.” It was now his turn to laugh until he spilled his drink down the front of his tuxedo shirt.
Amy held up her own drink and clinked glasses with mine. “Looks like we really hit the jackpot. We got us a big baboon and a shit chauffeur.”
“We must have a sign on our foreheads that reads Loser Men Wanted,” I said.
“Now you dudettes are getting personal,” Darryl said.
“Dudettes,” Amy said, looking at me and shaking her head. She looked back at our dates. “Did you two knuckleheads really expect us to believe that you were an accountant and an environmental scientist?”
Darryl sighed. “We thought maybe there was a slim chance.”
Merrill’s voice took on a more serious tone. “Actually, my bro and me have other career aspirations.”
“Don’t get the wrong idea, or anything,” Darryl said. “But we want to be professional mane managers.”
Amy looked at me, back at the bros. “Huh?”
“We want to be hairdressers to the stars,” Merrill said. “I once touched J. Lo’s hair, but it wasn’t on her head.”
I put a hand over my mouth, trying to suppress my laughter. “How did you manage that?”
“We know a guy, who knows a guy who cleans up after TV shows. Jenny from the Block’s makeup artist and hairdresser left a hairbrush behind.”
“We’ve got J. Lo’s DNA,” Merrill beamed.
Amy regarded them. “Tell me something. Are you two gay?”
Darryl looked at Merrill. “I knew this was gonna happen.”
“We’re as straight as a sunny day in May,” Merrill said.
“I’ll bet.”
“It is possible to be a straight hairdresser.”
“And gorillas can fly.”
“How long has it been since you two actually had a date?” I asked. “And I’m talking about with a real woman.”
The bros exchanged glances. Merrill said to his brother, “Was it 2015?”
Darryl shrugged. “Give or take a couple of years.”
Amy looked at me. “I don’t fucking believe this.”
“What about you two?” Darryl asked. “How long since you’ve dated?”
Maybe it was because I was exhausted and had downed the last of my wine, but I laughed and said to Amy, “Was it in this millennium?”
She sighed and said to our dates. “I just separated from my husband. I haven’t had a date in over a decade.”
“What about you?” Merrill asked me.
“It’s been…” I laughed. “Not counting finding a strange man in my shower and closet recently, let’s just say that it’s been sporadic.”
After hearing about Mojo, Darryl said, “We get it. You two are big losers, just like us.”
We spent the next hour comparing notes with our dates, laughing about who really was the biggest loser. By the time we finished our last drinks of the night, I wasn’t sure if Darryl and Merrill were straight or gay, and it didn’t matter. Amy and I decided that we actually like them—but only as friends. After both men were thoroughly lubricated, I’m just talking about alcohol, Amy made her damsels-in-distress play.
“Maddie and me are moving tomorrow and could really use some help with a few boxes.”
Merrill brushed a hand through his frosted hair. “I’ve got a truck and I’m free all day.” He looked at his bro.
“I’ve got a bad back,” Darryl said, “but maybe I could help out with a couple of light boxes.”
Amy gave them her address, telling them they could load up her belongings before going by my place. After we told them goodnight, Amy and I walked to the subway line. While we waited for our train, I said, “Do you think we’re hopeless?”
She considered my question for a long moment. She laughed and said, “Just between you and me? Probably. But let’s keep it our little secret.”
TWENTY-THREE
“What do you think they’re going to do with us?” Christina whispered to Maria when the other girls had dozed off.
“I’m not sure. We just need to try and be strong and stay together.”
After driving for a couple hours, Peter and Danny had brought them here, wherever here was. All Maria knew was that she and the others girls had all been locked in the same room. She had no idea if they were still in the city, but she had smelled the salty air when they’d stopped and thought they might be somewhere near the ocean.
As the night wore on, Maria finally fell asleep. She had a dream that she was a little girl and had gone to a park with her mother, but had somehow gotten separated from her. She had wandered around lost for a long time, calling out, but not getting any response.
The shadows of night were descending and the weather was turning cold when she saw a figure standing at the edge of the park. Thinking it was her mother, she had gone over. Then she realized it was Peter and she began running away from him. He’d chased after her, reaching out and wrapping his hands around her neck.
She was choking, the darkness closing in around her, when she heard Christina’s voice and woke up. “Someone’s coming.”
Maria sat up and rubbed her eyes. She now also heard the sounds. A door had opened somewhere, and there were quiet voices. Then someone began walking toward their room. A couple minutes later, the door swung open and Peter was standing there.
“It’s time for your punishment,” Peter said, motioning to her and Christina.
She and Christina shrank back against the wall, refusing to leave the room, as the other girls began crying. Peter called out for Danny, who eventually came into the room and pulled them out. They were roughly pushed down the hallway in what, Maria realized, was a house with several bedrooms.
Christina heard voices being raised. Then came a loud explosion, followed by other loud popping sounds. She realized someone was shooting.
A door to one of the rooms came open. She and Christina were pushed inside, even as they heard gunfire from somewhere in the house. The room was dark, and it took some time for their eyes to adjust to what they were seeing. Then, all at once, both she and Christina realized there were two men standing there.
One of the men whispered something to his companion and then came over to them. He bent down, fixing his dark eyes on both of them. “If you want to live,” the man said, “you must do everything I say.”
TWENTY-FOUR
“We don’t mean to rush you or anything,” Aunt Lucy said the next morning, as I was preparing to move out. “You’re welcome to stay a few more days.”
“Seriously?” I said. “After Mojo was cross-dressing in my closet last night?”
Aunt Lucy looked at Uncle Marvin, then back at me. “What do you mean?”
“He claimed he was doing measurements for making over the basement while hiding in my closet and wearing my bra and panties.”
Lucy looked at Marvin again, this time with her mouth open.
“Maybe I need to have a talk with the boy,” Marvin said.
I put tape on the lid of the last of the boxes that I’d moved up from the basement and said, “Or maybe you should just get him a blowup doll or a fake pussy.”
“Madison!” Aunt Lucy said, acting like she was upset by my comment.
The thought I’d had before about there being more to the story about my perverted cousin surfaced again. “What’s the real reason you’re letting him move in here?”
My aunt and uncle exchanged glances again. Uncle Marvin said, “The boy just needs a place…”
“Tell me the truth,” I said, cutting him off. “The boy, as you call him, is a perverted whack job, who no one is safe a
round.”
Marvin’s puffy cheeks deflated. “Okay. I guess it’s time you knew.”
“Knew what? What’s going on?”
“Mojo’s…he’s my son by a prior relationship.”
“Your son.”
Aunt Lucy came over to me. “We didn’t want to say anything, dear, but Marvin’s love child has a few problems.”
“That’s the understatement of the year.” I looked at my uncle. “What the hell aren’t you telling me?”
“Mojo, he’s…I mean his mom and me…”
“Just tell her,” Lucy said to my uncle, her features hardening.
My uncle’s shoulders slumped. “His mother…she’s Babarosa.”
“Who?” I asked.
“We had a fling.”
I looked at Aunt Lucy. “Who the hell is Babarosa?”
“She’s a porn star,” Aunt Lucy said, glaring at her husband.
Uncle Marvin shook his head, his gaze moving off. “It’s a long story about a lost weekend, and…”
“I don’t want to hear it.” I said, glaring at my uncle. “Why didn’t you have the balls to tell me this before?”
He shrugged. “He’s my son, and I only wanted….”
“He’s a fucking pervert, and you’re crazy for letting him live here,” I said, as the doorbell chimed. “I’ve got to be going.”
***
By noon, Darryl and Merrill had packed up Amy’s and my belongings, and followed us to Funk’s Fields. When we pulled to the curb down the street from the cemetery, I saw that a large crowd was filing into Balfour Memorial Chapel.
“Shit,” I said. “It looks like they’re having a funeral.”
“Why do people have to die and mess up our lives?” Amy said. “How the hell we gonna move in? It looks like there must be a hundred people here.”
“Not to mention a dead body.” Inspiration struck as we got out of the car. “Hey, maybe Thorndike can help.”
“Yeah. I’m sure Igor is real happy that we’re moving in.”
An Uber driver pulled up behind us, and Max got out of the car. We said hello to her and asked her about her belongings. “I don’t have much to move. Just got a few boxes at the shelter that I’ll get later.” Her dark gaze moved over to the chapel. “Looks like a big crowd.”
We explained about the funeral before meeting up with Darryl and Merrill on the sidewalk, where we introduced Max.
“You’re all really going to move into a…a cemetery?” Darryl said, scratching his gelled head, after he and Merrill said hello to Max.
Merrill looked at Darryl. “This is seriously demented, bro.”
“The rent’s cheap,” Amy said. “And we get to hang with a guy who makes monsters out of dead bodies.” She waved a hand. “Come on, we’ll introduce you.”
We moved up the street, where we unintentionally ended up in a line of mourners filing into Balfour Chapel, with no way to get past them.
“Are you friends of the deceased?” a woman dressed in black asked me as we slowly trudged our way up the steps into the chapel.
We were all dressed in blue jeans and T-shirts. I felt like a complete fool, but said, “Ah, yes. We go way back. I can’t believe he’s gone.”
The woman’s eyes narrowed on me. “You mean she. My sister was a beautiful woman.”
“Of course,” Amy said, trying to cover for me. “It’s just that without her makeup…” She glanced at me, back at the decedent’s mother. “We’ve all had those days when no amount of makeup helps. You know, days when you look like death warmed over, that sort of thing.”
If looks could kill, Amy and I would be in coffins.
“This isn’t going to work,” I whispered to Amy, after the woman had moved on. “We’re not dressed for a funeral.”
“We would have worn our T-shirt tuxes if we’d known about this,” Darryl said. He looked at Merrill. “This reminds me of the time we ended up on that gay cruise.”
Merrill looked at Amy and me. “It’s not what you’re thinking. I’ll explain later.”
We continued to file into the chapel and saw that the building was entirely filled with mourners. We went over to Thorndike, who was standing in an alcove a few feet from the coffin, and asked him about the service.
The little mortician nervously fussed with the buttons on his black coat, and his dark eyes swept over the mourners. “The funeral’s for a woman named Mary Jean Seymour.” He lowered his voice. “I’m afraid the family’s pretty upset. She dropped dead while…” He cleared his throat. “…in flagrante delicto with her neighbor. Her husband found the body.”
After some chit chat about the decedent, Amy changed the subject. “We need to move in today. Is there another entrance to the caretaker’s quarters?”
Thorndike scowled at us. “Mr. Funk told me about this unfortunate situation. He also mentioned that you’d be available to assist with security. You need to help out with the service, then we’ll see about your move.”
“Looks like you got things under control,” Max said, as the last of the mourners had filed in.
He shrugged. “It’s a big crowd. You never know.” He motioned to a minister who had arrived for the service. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to go lift the lid.”
I looked at Amy, raising a brow, before realizing that “lifting the lid” involved opening Mary Jean’s casket. We watched from an alcove as several family members went over and paid their respects to the dearly departed. That’s when things turned ugly.
“It doesn’t even look like her,” we heard a woman say.
A murmur rose up in the crowd. Several other people came over to the coffin. The woman who had earlier said she was the decedent’s sister put on her glasses and bent over, examining the body. She said to the minister and Thorndike, “What’s going on here? This isn’t my sister.”
“Of course it is,” Thorndike insisted. “It’s just that…the dead…they always look different.”
The woman placed her hands on her hips. An easel with a photograph of the deceased had been set up near the coffin. She pointed at the picture. “Mary Jean had brown hair.” She motioned to the coffin. “My sister always had a great sense of humor, but that…that woman…she has blonde hair and looks like…she looks like a circus clown.”
Several other people confirmed what she’d said. Thorndike continued to insist that the correct body was in the coffin. The crowd grew increasingly agitated as the little man waved for us to come over.
When Amy, Max, and I got over to the coffin, Thorndike took us aside and said, “You need to calm these people down, try and regain some order, so the service can begin.”
We went over and looked into the coffin. Not only did the body look nothing like the deceased woman in the photograph, just as her sister had said, she bore a strong resemblance to a circus clown. She had on a heavy coat of lipstick and eyeliner, but it looked like it had been hastily applied and smeared. Her hair was bleached a platinum blonde, not even close to the color of Mary Jean’s in the photograph.
I looked at Amy, raising a brow, before we walked back over to Thorndike. I lowered my voice. “Are you sure you’ve got the right body?”
Thorndike exhaled, perspiration popping on his receding black hairline. “It’s the best I could do. I didn’t have a photograph to work with and…you saw the number of parts I was dealing with downstairs. Things have been stressful.”
“Don’t tell me you put a bunch of body parts together and claimed they was Mary Jean,” Max said.
“I think it’s the hair and makeup,” the little man said. “I’ve never been good with hair.”
Max looked at Amy and me as some of the mourners began shouting. “What the hell we gonna do?” she asked. “We could have a riot on our hands.”
I said to Thorndike, “Is it possible that Mary Jean’s body is downstairs and you’ve got the wrong woman?”
He groaned, mopped his brow with his handkerchief. “Oh, my. I suppose there could have been a mix-up.”
I turned to Amy. “You have any ideas?”
“As a matter of fact, I do,” Amy said, nodding. She walked over, said a few words to the minister, and then addressed the gathering of mourners. “I have an announcement.” The crowd quieted down, giving their attention to her as she went on. “Before she passed to the great beyond, Mary Jean had a special request.”
The deceased woman’s sister stood up and shouted, “What are you talking about?”
“Your sister, Mary Jean, as you know, had a great sense of humor. She wanted…” Amy glanced back at the coffin. “This was all intended to be a joke.”
“A joke? This is her funeral. There ain’t nothin’ funny ‘bout my sister being dead.” The mourners began shouting again as the woman teared up.
Amy went on. “Please…just listen to me.” It took a few moments, but the crowd finally quieted down again. “Mary Jean wanted this day to be a celebration of her life. She wanted everyone to laugh and have a good time. While we go get her body—her real body—why don’t you all go into the reception area and have something to eat.”
“Where the hell is my sister?” the woman shouted. “And who the hell is…” She pointed at the coffin. “…that?”
Amy glanced at us, back at the crowd. “This was all intended to be Mary Jean’s idea of a joke. She thought you’d all find it amusing that she had a clown show up for her own funeral.”
The room grew so quiet that you could have heard a pin drop. I held my breath and waited for the crowd to react. There were some murmurs before someone finally chuckled. Other people joined in. Laughter then erupted from that entire crowd of mourners as they stood up and began heading for the reception area.
While the minister attended to the crowd, Amy, Max, and I took charge, slamming down the lid on the coffin.
Amy then said to Thorndike, “Let’s go find Mary Jean’s body.”
Darryl and Merrill rolled the coffin down the aisle to the back of the chapel. We then made the short journey to Thorndike’s embalming chamber full of body parts.
“This place looks like a serial killer’s basement,” Darryl said.
“Or a slaughterhouse,” Merrill agreed. He looked a little green around the gills.