See Jack Die (Part 1 in the Paranormal Series) (See Jack Die Series)

by Nicholas Black

  Then he slaps me on the back, “Big shoes to fill, Jackie boy! And I thought med-school at nineteen was rough. You had better nut-up. We don't need the next savior being a pussy.”

  “Ricky!” Ms. Josephine barked from the other room.

  “Sorry,” he apologized. To me he whispered, “How does she do that?”

  I shrugged, shaking my head.

  Basically, we surmised, I am supposed to make it where these souls can go to heaven. Oh, that should be as easy as beating God at a game of chess.

  Ricky laughed, “Jack, you were born for this. Think about it. You lost all of your memory. That means you don't have anything holding you back. You are a fresh, new soul . . . kind of.”

  Well, I said, they kind of think I'm a savior. They will kind of be expecting a great deal from me. I'm kind of out of my league, here.

  Then Ms. Josephine appears, right before I start cursing, again. Right before I try and talk myself out of this whole mess. She's carrying what looks like a necklace, with a small pouch attached.

  She walks around the bed and then tells me to stand up. I still don't have a shirt on, and you can see bleached outlines from where she had painted me up for my first crossing to Deadside. Those voodoo symbols of protection and stuff, they're etched into my skin. I will never, ever, get a date. Ever.

  “Dat's just protection for a couple of weeks. Da ingredients, dey leave deir mark on da skin for a while,” she explained. And the entire time she's telling me this, I have this feeling that spider guts and chicken blood, and whatever else was in that paint, has probably scarred me for life.

  Then, giving me that knowing glance that the doctors always give me, she said, “Trust me, child. I'm only tryin' to keep you safe . . . and livin'.”

  Good, I say. Because I like both of those, a lot. She then places the necklace over my neck. The band was made out of some kind of black, fiber—maybe hair, maybe not. When I looked up at her she said, “Don't ask.”

  Then I felt the weight of the pouch that is hanging down, tugging at my neck, and I touch it with my fingers. There's something inside the pouch, and I start to ask about the contents.

  She shakes her index finger at me, “Now you really don't want to know what's in dere. Just remember dis, if you get separated, too far from your body, you open dat bag, and you eat everything dat comes out of it.”

  I know this will just be horrible, so I try not to ponder the ingredients.

  “How will he have the necklace once he crosses?” Ricky asks.

  “'e will 'ave a necklace exactly like dat one,” she promised. “It will cross over wit' 'im.”

  Ricky then asks her if we could just make a bigger pouch, and pack a pistol in it. That would take care of a bunch of problems.

  “Why is it your generation want to shoot everythin'? Nothin' but kill, kill, kill.”

  Ricky laughed, “Turn-key parenting, Playstations, Ritalin, and lead-based paints.”

  That actually got a laugh out of her.

  “Anyway, Jack . . . don't you never take dat off. It gives you Anvizib. Invisibility.”

  When you say never, do you mean—

  “Never, ever, for any reason at all.”

  Very well, then. I'm a savior. Wear the necklace. Stay away from the screamers, and set all of the Land of Sorrows free. And to think I was worried that this would be difficult.

  “Now, since we only got a couple of 'ours, why don't da two of you go and get cleaned-up.” She looked down at me, smudged bug goo all over my body. “You need a bath, child. We're goin' to da movies later.”

  “You're coming with us?” Ricky asked, surprised.

  “What,” Ms. Josephine said, looking almost offended, “ . . . you don't tink Ms. Josephine like to watch a good film every now and den?”

  Chapter 39

  Jack's apartment.

  6:21 pm . . .

  After taking a long, hot shower, I found myself standing in front of the mirror, again. The same mirror where this mysterious girl—Kristen—first touched me. Where she spoke to me through my aromatherapy soap. I can still see faint smudges from where I did a poor job of cleaning off the markings.

  There is a warm fog all around me, hazing up the edges of the mirror, from the shower. I feel like I'm in a cloud. After using a painful dried-up vegetable—what Ricky calls a loofah—most of the voodoo ink is gone from my body.

  What is not gone, however, are all of the burn marks that the stuff left. All over my arms and chest and back are the faint images of the markings which were used to protect me. Every now and then I find myself shivering, partly from being cold, and partly from thinking about my little sunset voyage to the movie theater.

  And partly, thinking about her. Kristen. I haven't seen her in a while, and I find myself worried she might not be there tonight. I'm afraid that I might get stood up by some dead chick that I barely know. Odd thing is . . . I'm starting to miss her. I have a crush on a zombie. That might get me kicked off of e-harmony.com.

  Now I'm washing my hands with the vanilla bean soap bar—the one Kristen chose. And smelling it, it's like the closest thing I can get to smelling her. To touching her.

  I wonder, as I lather up my hands, if she sees all of these impossible things in me. Does she see a saint?

  A savior?

  The man who will free them all?

  I don't know. I'm worried that maybe she sees what I see. An accidental savior. A reluctant saint. An unlikely prophet of neurotic behavior and non-sequitur thoughts.

  Let's face it, I am the guy voted least likely to save the Netherworld. I don't even watch monster movies. I haven't celebrated one single Halloween—that I can remember. And until last week, the mere mention of ghosts and phantoms was enough to get me rolling my eyes. Ghosts, space aliens, and male multiple-orgasms—impossibilities.

  I would be a good scientist because I am a natural born skeptic. Maybe that's a lack of imagination on my part? I don't know. But this, and me, they don't seem to go together. Maybe I'm the wrong guy. Sure, I managed to crossover to the Deadside. But all of that could have been a dream. A vivid, intense dream—just the way my caseworker explained, just before the badness happened.

  I still could be that guy with a developing tumor.

  The patient with a degenerative brain disease.

  The nut-bag with advanced schizophrenia.

  Those things could all, any one of them, be blossoming in the windmill that is my brain. I might be locked-up, this very second, being pumped full of Thorazine while doctors figure out what went wrong.

  Maybe, in my head, there is too much devastation—like in Burma where those kids were covered in mud, their lives crushed, staring blankly.

  Or, maybe my injury, it was so bad that I lost all of my humanity. I can't relate. I don't have the capacity to empathize.

  Because, I don't have divinity in me. And no matter what anyone says, I don't feel like any prophet, or saint, or savior. Those things, they aren't me. I don't know what I am, but I know what I'm not. And I don't think it is fair to lay that load on somebody.

  As we speak, I might have my hands strapped behind my back, waiting for another round of electro-shock therapy. I might be—

  “Hurry up,” Ricky yelled, interrupting my pity party. “I need to back one out before we go!”

  What? I say, as I rinse my hands off.

  I can hear him sigh, “I've got one honking for right-of-way!”

  Gross.

  “I'm prarie-dogging, here,” he further explains.

  Yeah, I beg him, please . . . no more metaphors. I get it.

  When I opened the door, he is holding his stomach. He pushes by me grumbling something about how long I've had that pizza in the refrigerator.

  The green parts, I say as the bathroom door slams in my face, those weren't peppers. But he doesn't reply. He's doubled over in pain, most likely. And I realize that keeping pizza in the refrigerator for more than a week is not a healthy idea.

  It's time to get d
ressed. I have a date with death.

  Chapter 40

  AMC Theaters, Northwest Highway and I-35.

  Tuesday evening, 7:26 pm . . .

  We're in the back row, at the very top of a stadium theater. This was not our plan. However, nothing after me seeing the spooks has been following any kind of a plan. So this is par for the course.

  The original idea was that we'd stay in Ricky's truck and I'd lay down in the back, do my little self-drowning thing, and viola! But, as we realized upon pulling into the crowded parking lot, that was not going to be an option. They have full-time security vehicles patrolling the parking lot.

  So, we piled an IV bag full of normal saline, some needles, a thermometer, a few insta-heat packs, and a flashlight, into Ms. Josephine's large purse. Ricky didn't say it, but I know his hydrogen sulfide syringe is hiding around here somewhere. I so hope they don't check her things, otherwise they'll think we're into some really kinky stuff. And there's no way we would ever be able to explain this.

  Ricky decided that we needed to find a movie that nobody would be watching. Cartoons are full of inquisitive kids. Action flicks are packed with people. Comedies are filled to the rim with goof balls yucking it up. So I recommended a romance film.

  “The Queen's Affair it is, then,” Ricky said as he purchased us three tickets. It's supposed to be some English film about a queen who sleeps with just about everyone in tights. It is 157 minutes long, and should have everyone bored to tears by about the third minute. I have to crossover, now, just to avoid this movie.

  Luckily, as we get there, the theater is relatively empty. So, here we are in the very top, back row, preparing for me to die for a little while. And why not. This is good Tuesday night fun. Ricky checked the Weather Channel and found out that sunset was at 7:39 pm. Knowing this, he had a few minutes to spare, so he raced off to the concession stand and came back with a bucket full of popcorn, several drinks, and a fat green pickle.

  I looked at him, shaking my head.

  “What? Just because you're racing off to hang out with the dead, doesn't mean I can't eat. While you're conquering the mysteries of the universe, I'm going to watch some British chick bang the royal court.” And then he turned instantly to Ms. Josephine and apologized.

  He took a sip of his drink, “I got Dr. Pepper for everyone.”

  I took my drink, swigged the sweet brown liquid, and took a deep breath. The book is nearby?

  “Right here, child,” Ms. Josephine says, patting her purse.

  I feel my neck for the reassuring necklace of curious ingredients. “Okay,” I say to them, “time to die.”

  “Hopefully not,” Ricky said, shuffling through Ms. Josephine's purse. He pulled out the saline bag, the tubes already attached. He then attached the fast patches from the cardiac defibrillator. He was careful not to attach them to the burn marks from the last time he jump-started my heart. “You want me to start the IV now, or wait until you're a quivering mess?”

  I wasn't keen on having him stick me with a large bore needle in the dark, but even less appealing was the thought of him doing it after I start to die—the for real die.

  Apparently he could sense my apprehension, and comforted me by saying, “Dude, as many of these as I've done, I could probably hit you from across the room with a sixteen-gauge catheter. With one eye closed.”

  Please don't do that.

  “Drunk and dizzy, even,” he added.

  No, that's fine. Maybe now is a good time, I said.

  So now he's on my left, shoving a needle that is bigger than a piece of industrial pipe into my wrist, while Ms. Josephine is on my right, gently stroking my other wrist. She's talking to me about keeping my mind open, and my heart free of doubt.

  She's saying how proud she is of me, and how I was meant for all of this—as if she had been reading my thoughts all along. She lowers her voice, still reassuring me and I hear Ricky say, “Okay, little pinch.” And then something that feels like a garden hose is inserted into one of my veins.

  “First time, every time,” he says smugly to himself. Then he nods to himself, turns to me and whispers, “Kick rocks, Saint Jack.”

  Ms. Josephine, she's still talking to me, her voice nice and soothing, but not even in English, anymore. It's French, I think. And it's creepy, yet calming . . . like French people.

  Now my eyes are closed, and I'm walking back down towards the dark water. Instead of messing with the countdown, she's talking to me in some kind of cadence that locks me in. Before I know it, I'm falling deeper and deeper. The warm water is up to my waist.

  My chest.

  My neck.

  And that's that. I'm drowning. I initially hold my breath for a few moments, then I force myself to let go. No point fighting it. Besides, I need to get used to this. So I summon all of my courage and open my mouth, taking a big breath of water.

  I cough and fidget for a few seconds, but this time around, dying isn't quite as painful. It's Death Lite, again. And before I know it, I'm swimming around, looking for sparkles of light that I know are the boundaries of my supernatural chest wound.

  My otherworldly autopsy.

  My horrifying rebirth.

  I cast my hands forward to reach the light, getting a good hold of the edges of my skin. And I pull myself towards the Deadside. The Land of Sorrows.

  Oh, the things you can get used to.

  Chapter 41

  AMC Theater, Deadside

  7:36 pm . . .

  I fall to the floor, and am hugged by the frigid cold. Not as bad as before, but bone chilling none the less. I see the familiar glow of the markings on my chest and arms, but this time they are relatively obscured by the shirt that Ms. Josephine gave me. On the living side it looked like something out of the 60s—blue with small amoeba's all over it—but here, it's a ripped-to-shreds old rag. And I like it. It's very . . . me.

  Can't have a saint running around the Deadside half naked. The neighbors would talk.

  I pick myself up, still feeling weak from my first sortie into the Land of Sorrows. Again, everything is warped and melted. Uneven and curved where it should be flat and straight. Gnarled instead of symmetrical. But I expect it, now.

  There is little, as a matter of fact, that I wouldn't expect.

  Still, there is no real color, only the different hints at color through the various grey and blue tones. I look around, and the theater that was filled with plush velvet seat cushions and reclining armrests . . . it's like something out of the apocalypse. The chairs are bent at odd directions, as if a bomb went off. The screen—where I just know some early Victorian Royalty is blinking seductively at somebody she shouldn't be, back on the Earth plane—it's torn to shreds as if it had been exposed to the elements for a thousand years.

  And the ceiling, it doesn't exist. Not really. There are giant, gaping holes in the ceiling and roof where the bluish dusk sky is peeking through. And, even though it couldn't really be darker in this place of dogs and wolves, I can actually feel the green sun sinking away. As if, with every inch it drops on the horizon, it takes with it a few degrees of heat.

  I turn around, just to make sure my body is still where I left it. Sure enough, there's dying old me, just waiting to turn into an ice cube. Ricky's gone. Ms. Josephine is just a pair of blind-woman's eyes.

  Ms. Josephine, I whisper, can you hear me?

  “. . . yes child . . . now go and find out what you must . . . I got a feelin' . . . ”

  When somebody who routinely bites the heads off of live chickens and has jars of poisonous insects just hanging around, when they get a feelin', chances are you had better pay attention.

  “Half an hour, tops,” I say as I turn and make my way slowly down the steps between the rows of seats. I reach up and feel for my necklace. Thankfully it's there, although I don't relish the idea of opening it—even in an emergency, the prospect of eating whatever the hell is in the pouch scares the crap out of me.

  As I go down the stairs I notice that, as befo
re, there is a forced emptiness about this place. I can feel the presence of something, being watched, waited for . . . something. I just can't put my finger on it. So I continue down. When I get to the bottom, I look up into the sky, partially obscured by the decaying ceiling of the theater, and I see no stars. Not one. And something seems to fly by the left edge of the hole I'm looking through.

  Something fleeting and fast.

  Dark and foreboding.

  I decide to not look outside for fear that something out there might really make me question my decision to crossover. Not that there weren't a bunch of other perfectly good reasons to not leap out of your own chest to chase some phantasm. Geez . . . when I put it like that I feel like a colossal moron for doing any of this.

  What kind of loser has two thumbs and a unexplainable crush on a dead woman?

  This guy right here.

  Anyway, I start making my way to the exit that would lead to the interior of the theater—you know, where I would be buying all kinds of sugar-coated loveliness. As I make my way past the threshold, where two double-doors would normally be, I see somebody. A short, fat guy with no hair, no color, and a twitch. He's the kind of nervous where I'd expect to see about 17 cigarette butts on the floor in front of him.

  I whisper, Hey . . . sir.

  And that just startles the shit out of him. He jerks over towards me, half dropping as he does so. “Oh, oh wow!” he says. “It's you. I mean, you're you. You're him. Here. John.”

  Very good, I say. That covers all the bases. I asked him if he knew where I could find Kristen.

  He jogged toward me, extending his plump little hand. “Stewart, you can call me Stewart.” As we shook he kind of jiggled. The way Jello pudding jiggles. I felt like getting on a running machine. I felt like watching my fat intake. Like taking my nutrition class over again.