‘Drink it slowly.’
How stupid does he think I am?
I take a sip; follow it with another. The water’s at once soothing and agony as it rattles down a throat dry and ulcerated, then starts coming back up. It’s an effort to keep it down, but I’m stubborn.
‘I said, drink it slowly.’
I grunt at him. He reaches over and pulls the water from my grip. ‘Get that in your belly first, and then you can have some more.’
I grab for the bottle, then hunch over, clutching at my stomach. Try to swallow. Too late.
Towel Guy's friend glares at me, and tosses me a roll of paper. ‘The others, they were the –’
‘What others?’
He glares at me again. ‘Clean that up,’ he says.
Towel Guy sighs. ‘Fuck, Cal, let it rest, just let it rest.’
Cal’s lips twist petulantly. ‘It’ll stink up the bloody van, James. And it’s a rental. You’re doing the paperwork; too much paperwork as it is.’
James gives Cal the death stare. Cal stops mumbling and passes that stare onto me. This is going to be a fun little drive. At least I have some names now. Names in my business are important. A name soothed and calmed makes it easier to send a punter to the Underworld. Much harder to negotiate with the nameless. And what did he mean about others?
I wipe my lips, and drop a scrunched handful of the paper to the floor. Tap it gently over the mess. To be honest there’s not much vomit, it’s thin grey stuff, no more substantial than the little spew I had on the beach. I’m feeling a bit better. Got some strength in my limbs – not about to go for a run, but I could almost imagine making a dash for the door. Almost.
‘Leave him alone,’ James says. ‘The place this bastard’s been.’
Yeah, the place I’ve been.
I’m trying to piece together what happened. Where I am, and why? Last thing I remember was a great wave receding, dragging me away from Lissa.
And … there’s a void, a deep darkness that I know I should be able to see beyond. But I can’t, or I won’t. My memory feels as bruised and as fragile as my flesh; I'm scared that if I reach for it too hard I’ll tear it away, like the frayed tissue paper it is, or worse. I know I'll remember eventually, well I hope I will, but there’s almost as big a part of me that fears its return. Maybe there are some memories better off not having.
But I remember her eyes. Lissa’s steady stare, for all the hurt that I had inflicted.
Before that, of course, there was blood and thunder, a scythe that decapitated a god, and a Death to whom I owed a deep and terrible debt.
Time’s passed (it wasn’t summer when I left) but how much time I can’t tell.
Not too long, though; I recognised the make and model of the cars in the beach car park. No hover cars there (pity) or anything outrageously different. Nor have we slipped into any of the Apocalypse scenarios that all too often played on my mind. People are still using mobiles, and listening to old hits on the radio. Unless some Twilight Zone-style revelation is at hand, the world’s done what it always does, got on with moving on.
The most menacing thing I’ve seen in my, albeit brief, sojourn into the land of the living are these dour men with their little guns.
‘Where are we going? Where’s Lissa? What day is this?’
‘Lissa won’t want to see you,’ James says. ‘Trust me on that. But everything will be explained, once you’re contained – I mean safe. We’re going to Brisbane. It’s 9 February. You’ve been gone twenty months.’
Home. We’re going home. I can almost forgive them the guns for that. And why won’t Lissa want to see me? What’s happened?
Woah, twenty months! Now, they might be lying, but it doesn’t feel like a lie. The world’s moved on, maybe three models of iPhone, but not much more. Not as far as I’d feared. That’s something.
There’s not much talking after that. My head starts throbbing, and I manage a few more sips of water. James looks annoyed with himself, as though he’s said too much.
As we drive, the guys in the van grow increasingly tense. I don’t know what it is, but I’m wary, undermined by all sorts of hurt. My stomach’s rumbling, god knows when I last ate. But right now I need to focus. I need answers, and I’m beginning to think old James and Cal aren’t going to give me anything except a bullet in the head.
Maybe I’m far too suspicious of kindness. But I doubt it; my life has been a series of betrayals so why should that change now? I need to focus on getting out of here.
For one, these guys certainly aren’t Pomps. Not even Pomps in bad suits. They don’t feel like them, or move like them. You grow up in the business, you just know. I mightn’t be a Pomp anymore, but I recognise my kind. Or, if I’m wrong, the game’s changed drastically in the past year or so. These guys don’t look like they’d know the first thing about dealing with the dead, and the palms of their hands are smooth – not a scar anywhere. We call those scars Cicatrix City; they’re part of the job, the cutting, the blood, the banishing back to the Underworld of Stirrers. But then again, perhaps Stirrers aren’t a problem anymore. We’d come to an agreement when I was Death. Maybe they’ve given up on infiltrating and devouring our world.
I take another tiny sip of my water, and then the bottle’s empty – not bad for an hour and a half, and not another vomit.
The van slows. Takes on an inner-city rhythm, all those stops and starts, and I know we’re close. Whatever I need to do, I’m going to have to do it soon.
James tilts his head, listening to an earpiece; he turns away from my line of sight and mumbles something. I look over at Cal. ‘Is there any more water?’
Cal purses his lips. ‘You can have some more when we get there. Maybe food.’ He sniffs, and winces. ‘Definitely a shower.’
‘I’m really thirsty,’ I say. Cal looks away.
Something nudges my arm. What is this, some sort of good cop, bad cop routine? James holds out another bottle of water; I take it from him. Have a couple of sips, not much. I’m going to need it for later.
I don't wait too long. I can't risk delaying. ‘Stop the van.’ I clutch at my stomach, looking even more pathetic than I feel, which is harder than it sounds, believe me. ‘I’m – I’m going to be sick.’
Cal glares at me, doesn’t even attempt to conceal his disgust.
I gag. ‘Really. Really going to be sick.’
He looks over at James. ‘Do it,’ James says. So James is the senior one here.
Cal scowls, bangs on the roof. I feel the car pull to the side of the road, and he shuffles to the door.
As it slides open, I take my chance. I swing out at the back of Cal’s head with my fist. I wince at the connection to the softness beneath his skull; it’s a low blow hitting a man that way. But you do what you have to do. He moans, tumbles forward onto the footpath.
I hurl the mostly full bottle of water straight into James’s groin. He clutches at his balls, dropping forward, and I kick him in the head. A clumsy sort of move but I am the king of clumsy moves; it connects, splitting the rotting leather of my shoe, my foot throbbing. But it hurts him more. Have to keep telling myself that these were the guys pointing guns at me.
He drops with a soft grunt, and I barrel through the doorway. Cal’s getting up and I stomp on his back, he goes down again. Hard. I slam the door shut and run.
‘Not again,’ Cal moans behind me. ‘Ah, fuck.’
But I’m already away. And I know where I am. I’m back home all right, in the CBD. I blink away the hard light of a Brisbane summer, and with my eyes clenched to a decent level of squint I keep moving.
I sprint-hobble down Ann Street, pushing past backpackers and early afternoon commuters, waiting for a bullet to slam into me, but nothing comes.
It never comes. And while that doesn’t exactly mean that they’re not crooks, it’s a tick in their favour. Not that I’m about to turn around and talk this through.
I’m already darting off Ann and down Edward Street, heading
towards the mall.
I might be dressed in a torn shirt, stinking of the sea, and sweat, and my own death, but I can still lose myself here. After all, this is my city. And it’s good to be back.
I hit the mall, slip into the Myer Centre. I don’t have any money, but I am close to work. I can’t stop grinning.
George Street and Number Four (my workplace, my second home) are less than two hundred metres away. Of course they’ll expect me to go there. And that’s exactly where I’m going, but I’ll take my time. No matter how much I want to see Lissa, I can’t rush it. And I am aching to see her; it pulls at me with a tidal surge. But everything is too easily taken away.
James said Lissa didn’t want to see me.
I can’t imagine that’s true, but it’s given me pause. So, maybe I can imagine it after all.
Four
I rub my head. Two pigeons have had a go at me. Flown right at my head. First there was that seagull, now this. And I used to have such a good relationship with birds – well, crows and ibis mostly. What makes a pigeon aggressive? Magpie, yes, but pigeon? I'm standing next to a rubbish bin that's stinking in the summer heat. At least people (and pigeons) are keeping away.
I stand in the shadows across the road from Number Four. Brisbane’s office of Mortmax Industries from whence the business of death in Australia is run, and all that. I watch Pomps enter and leave in wonderful suits and dresses. Elegant gothic, the sort of thing you’d wear to a funeral, or to help the dead into the Underworld. You’ll meet us one day, and you’ll appreciate the effort we put into our attire. Well, most of us; my dad had always been a bit of a slob, but he could pull it off.
I’d started there as a fourth-generation Pomp, guiding souls to the Underworld. I’d worked there as a Regional Manager, essentially Australia’s Death; I’d even become the World’s Death, the Orcus Entire. Now I am none of those things, I am just a man. Which is equal parts what I wanted, and suck.
Everything that I care about in the world is behind that front door. A quiet dread has risen inside of me, and I can’t seem to make myself cross George Street and step through the thing.
This isn’t the first time that I’ve hesitated out the front of Number Four. Once, what seems so long ago, I’d peered through the glass, and I’d pomped in quick succession two murdered souls who turned out to be friends. They'd scrambled through me, their souls raw and terrified. That time I'd turned tail and run.
I take a deep breath and sprint across the road. A car engine clicks into noisy gear somewhere, but I’m already across the two lanes of traffic, slamming my weight hard against the door, and it yields, swinging in, but not without cost; there’s always a blood price.
The door’s bite is sharp, it always bites the toll that one must pay to enter here. Mind you, it's still cheaper than parking in Brisbane. I look at my palm as the door shuts behind me – nothing, not a mark. Odd.
I take a couple of steps into the lobby – no one at the front desk (how unprofessional!) – when someone crash tackles me. I go down hard. The breath knocked out of me. Karma for my little attack on Cal and James.
‘Got it,’ Tim says.
‘It, Tim? It?’ I smile; this is all some sort of joke. ‘I’m back, and is this the sort of wel –’
My cousin smacks me, open-handed, in the mouth. ‘You don’t talk.’
That hurt!
‘Thought it was never going to come inside,’ he says to someone else. ‘I thought that maybe I’d have had to go out and get it.’
‘Why does this keep happening?’ Lissa’s standing above me, her gaze dark. There’s no love in those eyes, just a raw sort of pain. But it’s still my Lissa, strong as ever (stronger after the gift – curse, whatever – of my power), still dressed all in black, a classic Mickey Mouse badge pinned to the lapel of her jacket. My head rings as I take all of her in. I touch my lip, pull my hand away; sore, but no blood. And her face doesn’t soften at all. I open my stinging mouth to speak. She raises her palm to silence me. Smooth, it’s smooth as the day she was born – so she’s still RM then. All the scars from her pomping days are gone. But some scars run deeper than the flesh.
She steps away from me. ‘Get the fucking thing up.’
‘Lissa. My Lissa, I –’
Another backhand from Tim to the mouth. ‘I said, you don’t talk.’
That’s it! I can take a lot of stuff, but my cousin hitting me, no fucking way. We’ve had our fights; I’m not frightened to hit him back. I swing a fist at his head, and he knocks it casually away and punches me beneath the sternum. The guy’s been working out, or I’m weaker than I thought I was.
Down I go again.
I'm yanked to my feet. Handcuffs close tight around my wrists.
‘Put it with the others,’ Lissa says – there’s that ‘it’ again – and at a gesture from Tim, two burly Pomps drag me to the lift. I open my mouth to speak, another blow to the sternum. I’d throw up for real, if there was anything left in me to throw up.
Tim grabs the back of my shirt, steadies me roughly. ‘You don’t learn, do you?’
I try to pull away; can't. ‘What are you doing?’
‘What any good Ankou is expected to do. Protect the interests of my RM.’
Tim had been an excellent Ankou when I was Regional Manager; I have no reason to think he wouldn’t be one now. But how is this protecting his RM’s interests?
I'd ask, but I'm tired of being hit when I open my mouth.
Down we go, two, three floors. I’m pushed out into a hall, land on my knees.
‘Hey,’ I manage to say. ‘Hey!’
Why is Tim being such a prick? The lighting’s dim, the hall smells of engine oil and new paint. There’s a hint of the Underworld too. Not in the scent, but the way the world moves. I’m not Death or a Pomp; the ground’s slippery, hesitant, it’s two things at once. Hell and Earth. It’s what happens when you situate your building on a seam between worlds. Reality’s decisiveness is abandoned. I'm feeling dizzy.
‘Get up.’
I try, but I can’t. I'm worn out, bruised and beaten; it shouldn't be happening this way. Tim sighs. ‘Boys, help him up.’
They wrench me to my feet, and drag me to a single door at the end of the hall. I can feel its weird energy, and I recognise it once; it was the door to a room used to contain a Death. It was used to imprison my old boss, Mr D, and then me. I should have thrown the fucking thing out when I had the chance. Certainly didn’t expect to see it again. It’s the sort of door that actively discourages escape. I don’t have those sorts of powers anymore. But they’re obviously not going to risk it.
‘What did I do wrong?’ I ask Tim, as the other guy unlocks the door.
I must sound even more pathetic than I think, because he looks at me almost as though he’s my cousin again.
‘It’s nothing personal,’ he says. ‘Please understand that. We’re not monsters … you’re the monster.’
The door opens. The handcuffs come off. And I’m pushed by the small of my back into a room in Number Four I didn’t even know we had.
The door shuts, deadbolts click. And I’m alone.
Except I’m not.
Here are the others. Sitting up against opposite ends of the room are two Steven de Selbys, one in a Clash T-shirt, the other an Okkervil River tee. Clash and Okkervil look at me. Frown, like a bad smell’s entered the room. Something intolerable. Something they may have called to them. I know these faces, I know these expressions, and both try to cover it at once.
‘Oh, it’s you,’ they say.
Took the words right out of my beat-up mouth.
*
‘It’s done,’ Tim says. He puts a hand on mine. ‘Are you right?’
I pull my hand away; I don’t need, or want, to be comforted. ‘Are you?’
‘Fuck no,’ he says. ‘After the first one, after it attacked you, became that fucking shadow thing. I –'
‘This has to stop.’
‘We’ll make it stop,’ he
says. I know Tim’s craving a cigarette. His eyes have the glassy sheen of an addict’s, focused on that sweet nicotine. ‘Soon as we know what’s happening. If you spoke to the Death of the Water. I know he’s a prick, but …’
I swell to my full height, and more, and Tim backs away. ‘I will do no such thing,’ I say. ‘That monster will gain no pleasure from this pain.’ I feel the blaze of darkness that is the Hungry Death inside me. I’ve only a thirteenth of its power, the rest shared among the other twelve Orcus, but it’s enough. ‘Leave me,’ I say.
And Tim, being the good Ankou he is, does. Off to buy a packet of cigarettes and chain-smoke the hell out of them, no doubt.
I don’t blame him one little bit.
Five
I’d almost feel sorry for the new guy if he wasn’t the impostor that they think I am. He straightens at the door, lip torn but bloodless, the wound already closing. There's an expression of pain on his face that I’m too familiar with, and that has nothing to do with physical hurt. How does it do it? How does it look so like me?
I’m not as heartless a prick as I think I am, because yeah, I do feel sorry for it. After all, it thinks it’s me. And that’s not such a good thing to be right now.
‘We have to get out of here,’ he says.
‘You would say that,’ the other me says, the one in the Okkervil River T-shirt with the Accordion Boy on it, a classic T-shirt I like enough to feel annoyed that he’s wearing.
‘Shut the fuck up, Okkervil,’ I say, and slap him in the face.
‘Why’d you do that?’
‘You know why.’
‘But –’
I slap him again. ‘Shut it!’
The new me is considering escape. It’s wondering how it might be possible through that Iron Door; Christ, was I really ever that naive?
But I know I was. Two weeks I’ve been in here. Two weeks since pulling myself from the waves. I’d evaded a couple of guys in cheap suits, who I don’t think expected me to be as effective as I was at getting away from them. Goes to show you shouldn’t confuse weakness with will to freedom. I may have looked beaten but I wasn’t. I have to keep remembering that. I can see that memory in the new guy’s face, and it makes me burn. I don’t know whether to hate him for it, or to kiss him.
The Memory of Death Page 2