The shot demolished the window, but did nothing to the intruder. The man climbed through the window, stood on the bed, and fell unmoving to the floor in front of Aldous. Though his fear had not abated, Aldous kneeled next to the prone form, pressed the gun into the man’s armpit and lowered his face to suck the dying man’s soul.
Just before their lips touched, Aldous recognized the face. The face belonged to a young Justin Wheeler. The intruder was himself, before he had killed and become Aldous. Aldous tried to pull back, but the prone figure was too quick for him. His hands shot up, grabbing Aldous’ head and pulling their lips together. Off balance and still weak, Aldous was easily trapped into the kiss.
Instead of the ethereal feel of a soul flowing into him, Aldous felt something more physical. It started with a liquid, blood perhaps, but was followed with something solid and serpentine – like a tongue, but longer. It was like deep-throating a seven foot python.
The younger Aldous poured up into the older Aldous. The young body shriveled beneath him, and Aldous felt his body swell with the added flesh, not just in his belly, but all over – from fingers to toes to head. It was only a matter of seconds before the act was complete. Nothing was left of Justin Wheeler. Aldous fell face first to the floor. He was in agony, his body felt swollen to the point of bursting. Feebly he rolled over. His hands looked puffy.
He looked away from his hands. There were faces at the windows, dozens of them. They started coming into the cabin. Some came through the shattered window, some entered through the door. The cabin was full, yet still more people were appearing at the windows.
One by one they poured themselves into him. Eventually Aldous recognized a face; it was one of his victims. Someone whose soul he had taken years before. Suddenly he knew what was coming.
One by one his victims packed themselves into his body. The swelling had stopped after the first invasion, but with each new insertion Aldous felt his body become fuller, like he was becoming an onion, a stack of layered shells, and with each invasion there was a growing sense of pressure. He felt like he was going to burst – a feeling that increased with each member of the grim parade.
By the time Joan visited Aldous, he was stuffed to the point of immobility – rigidity. None of the others had spoken, but she seemed to feel the need. “You fucking son of a bitch.” She kicked him. Aldous felt his stretched skin crack open at the point of impact. “My life was just coming together, and you took it away from me. I had friends, I had money, I was about to graduate, I had a job lined up.” She sat on his chest and looked in his eyes. “You took it all away, and look what you gave me for an afterlife. For the most part the company in here sucks. I guess that’s because you mostly killed people that nobody would miss. People like that tend to not be very personable, you know? The last chick is okay, but we don’t have much in common except that you killed us.”
Joan crushed his nose with the bottom of her fist. He felt cracks radiate out from the blow; he was splitting like an over-ripe tomato. She leaned close. “You asked me for a kiss once, and so now that you aren’t enjoying it, I guess it is time for me to give it to you.” She sealed his lips with hers, and he felt her tongue probe gently. It swelled inside his mouth, and slithered down his throat. As she added herself to the onion stack of skins that Aldous was becoming, the rips in his flesh grew.
Then the cop came. “You should just kill yourself. It would make it easier on everyone,” he said, almost dispassionately. He hit Aldous twice on the head with his nightstick. Aldous felt his skin rip with each impact. Then the cop poured himself down Aldous’ throat.
Everything was still in the cabin. Aldous still couldn’t move. As near as he could tell he wasn’t even breathing. He wondered why only the last couple had spoken to him. He wondered if it was because they were the most recent, maybe they weren’t fully digested yet.
Aldous realized there was one soul not accounted for. The last soul he consumed. The gator.
“You may have noticed a trend here. Each one has pushed you a little further out of yourself … all that is left of you is a shell … and me. Can you keep them all in?”
As the voice spoke, Aldous felt skin ripping all over his body, giving way to the pressure from within. The tearing eased the pressure, freeing Aldous to move. He held one arm up where he could see it. His skin had shredded in a grid pattern, which reminded him of something. The pressure was gone, though everywhere he looked on his body the skin was torn into the same checkerboard.
Slowly Aldous stood. When he saw his reflection in one of the windows, he recognized the pattern of tears – his skin had torn into reptilian scales. When he looked at his reflection, the gator looked back.
Friday February 21st
2:00 p.m.
As was rapidly becoming his habit, Jeremy jumped when there was a knock at his door. He ran through his list of reassurances to himself. Aldous was probably dead. If he wasn’t dead he was in hiding, and wouldn’t risk coming out of it. If he did want to attack Jeremy again, he almost certainly wouldn’t knock on the door. It was more likely that it was the cops coming to tell him that Aldous had been captured than the madman come to kill him.
It wasn’t the cops. It wasn’t Aldous, either. It was a buxom, vivacious redhead. The thought crossed Jeremy’s mind that this was not a bad development. The redhead asked, “Is this where I can find the Whisper Garden?”
“Well, yes it is. May I ask who referred you?”
“That’s what I want to talk you about. I want to be one of your referrer er ers.”
It had taken him a moment, but Jeremy finally recognized her as one of the Tarot readers from Jackson Square. Great, he thought, he was going to have to give his spiel and not even get paid for it. Such is the price of being in business.
Jeremy said, “C’mon in,” and started into his routine, identifying the objects on the hall table, his own little museum of psychic fraud. The redhead was just a little too short for the devil in the mirror trick, the devil faded into view, but since she was looking up at it, the effect wasn’t her face being replaced by the devil. It looked more like the mask fading into a display case.
The redhead giggled, “Don’t worry about it honey, I’m sure it’s a cute trick.”
He led her into his office and started giving his spiel about randomness and chaos theory, and how some people believe the dead can talk to us through apparently random sound.
The redhead interrupted him. “Sugar, the dead have different motives than the living and I doubt they would want to spend their time talking to us. For that matter, I don’t think I would listen to any of them that did want to talk to me. But that’s okay, why don’t you tell me how you really think it works?”
Jeremy shrugged and said, “Personally I think that the human brain hates randomness, and is good at finding order even where there isn’t any. I think the brain fills in what it expects to hear.”
“That’s better. Doesn’t it feel good to tell the truth about it?”
“Yeah, but I don’t think that it’s nearly as marketable. Who wants to pay a hundred bucks to listen to white noise?”
“So you’re running a scam?”
“Did you come to try to convince me to get out of the business?”
“Sweetie, just because you might think you are a fraud doesn’t mean that there is nothing to what goes on here. Now answer my question, do you think you are running a scam?”
“No, I just set up expectations for the experience. I never tell them that what they hear is the voices of spirits. I just tell them it might be. Like I said, I think the brain hears what it expects to hear. If I get people in the right state of mind, they are more likely to get what they are paying for, and so far all of my customers have been satisfied. Several of them have told me that the garden gave them the answers to their problems.”
“You’re telling me things I already know.”
&
nbsp; He looked at her suspiciously. “Do you mind if I ask how?”
She laughed. “Honey, it’s my business to know things. I’m a psychic.”
“So you didn’t hear about me anyplace, you just knew?” Jeremy’s inner skeptic was rising.
“I am psychic, but I didn’t have to use my gift to find you. I had a couple of clients who had also been clients of yours. They came to me gushing about how great the garden was. I got curious, so here I am.”
“So if they had such great experiences, why were they going to you?”
She laughed again, a rather endearing sweet whoop of a laugh. Jeremy found himself liking her. She said, “Honey, people in trouble usually need the same good advice over and over before it does any good. They’d come here, they’d hear what they needed to hear, they’d think it was great, and then their problems would get hold of their thoughts again, and they’d start doubting, so they’d seek a second, or third, or fourth opinion.”
Jeremy thought about some of the times he had given advice. Sometimes people didn’t take good advice after it had been confirmed six or seven times. “So do you want to experience it firsthand?”
“That is why I’m here.”
Jeremy led the redhead down the hall to the garden. He left her behind and went back to the office where he sat down at his desk and picked up a guitar. He sighed. The Whisper Garden was starting to feel like work. Even though he probably would have been at home all day anyway, he was beginning to resent the fact that if he wanted to make money, he had to stay home. His house was feeling more and more like a prison to him. Sure he was making eighty dollars an hour, after the referral fees, but that number went way down if he thought about how many hours he was sitting around waiting to make those eighty bucks. Two hours for one hundred sixty dollars is really good. Ten hours for the same is not so great, better than minimum wage, better than flipping burgers but maybe not better than waiting tables. Sixteen bucks an hour is nothing to jump for joy about.
About fifteen minutes later the psychic bubbled back into the room.
Jeremy asked, “So, what did you think?”
“I think that people should learn to stop hating each other and live together in harmony.”
“Is that what the garden told you?”
“Oh, no … but I do think that.”
“So what did you think about the garden?”
“It was impressive. Whether you want to believe it or not, you definitely have something more than just a couple of babbling fountains going on in there.”
“So you’ll be sending me referrals?”
“I don’t think so. You won’t be in business long enough for it to be worth it.”
Jeremy had no idea what to make of that comment. Was it a threat? Did she know about some sort of legal trouble he was going to get in? He said, “Excuse me?”
She explained, “You’ve only been doing this a couple of weeks, but the routine is already getting you down. Even though you are the original, and certainly the best, nothing this cool will go for long without imitators, so if you keep at it, before long you are going to have some competition, and you’ll have to lower your price. Besides, it is almost time for you to move.”
“Time for me to move? Why would I want to do that?”
“For one thing, you don’t feel safe here anymore. You should probably see a counselor for some post-traumatic stress counseling, but even with that, this house won’t feel like home for you for a long, long time. For that matter, the city as a whole is losing some interest for you. You are going through a rough period of your life … undiscovered country. But most importantly, there is the matter of the girl. You are falling in love, and should do whatever it takes to keep her, or you’ll regret it for the rest of your life. Where she goes you must follow.”
Jeremy felt like the conversation was taking a fairly creepy turn. It is one thing for someone to say they’re psychic, but it is something else when they start hitting close to home. She wasn’t right about everything, he still loved New Orleans, and Sarah wasn’t going anywhere, but his house hadn’t felt like home since that night with Aldous. Cautiously he asked, “How do you know all this?”
“A lot of being a psychic is just paying attention. Everything else, the garden told me.”
Inspiration struck him. “You aren’t telling me anything you couldn’t have read in the newspaper.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You gave an interview about falling in love?”
“No, but that wouldn’t have been too hard to figure out from what has been printed.”
She shrugged. “Probably not, but I don’t bother with the media; I’d rather get the real story.”
Jeremy was silent for a moment. On the one hand he liked her and found her very easy to believe. On the other, he really didn’t believe in the whole psychic thing.
She broke the silence. “You know, you haven’t even asked my name.”
“Sorry, I have a lot on my mind.”
“I know, sweetie, that’s okay. I’m Kyra.”
“Pleased to meet you, Kyra.”
“I know that too. I’m down at Jackson Square every day. Drop by anytime.”
There was a gentle tap at the front door followed by the sound of a key. It was Sarah; she had started knocking before entering after scaring Jeremy on band practice night. She understood that Jeremy was still jumpy, and they had agreed that if she knocked first he would be less likely to freak out at the door opening. She stepped through the door dressed in full angel regalia.
Kyra said, “Well, sugar, I’ve got to be going,” and gave Jeremy a hug. She turned to Sarah and said, “You’ve got a good one here,” and then walked out the door.
“Who was she?” Sarah’s tone had an icy edge to it, but Jeremy didn’t notice. His mind was on some of the things Kyra had said.
“Just a small medium,” Jeremy said, amused at his own pun.
“What is that supposed to mean?” This time Jeremy caught the tone.
“She is one of the Jackson Square psychics. She came here to see about being a Whisper Garden referrer.”
“Why did she hug you?”
Jeremy shrugged. “I’m not sure. I kind of got the feeling she is one of the type that hugs everybody.”
“She didn’t hug me.”
“You hadn’t just spent half an hour talking to her.”
“You didn’t introduce us.”
“I didn’t have a chance. She was scooting out the door as you got here.”
“Uh huh.”
Jeremy knew he was in trouble, but he couldn’t figure out why. Maybe it was just his day to be in trouble. One of his friends had once told him that when you are in a relationship, sometimes you are just in trouble and there is nothing you can do about it.
Sarah dropped a plastic bag. “I just wanted to drop off some clothes for tonight. I guess I’ll see you then.” She stepped out the still open front door and shut it behind herself.
Jeremy considered going after her, chasing her down and finding out what was wrong. But his feelings were kind of hurt. He let her go.
Friday February 21st
7:00 p.m.
Jeremy was playing guitar in his office when there was a tap at the door followed by the sound of a key. He had been in the office most of the afternoon. It had been a fairly profitable day. At one point he even had two clients show up at once.
Sarah came in and said, “I just wanted to apologize for the way I acted this afternoon.”
He shrugged. “I wasn’t going to say anything about it.”
She walked over, sat in his lap and hugged him. “I know you weren’t, and that is part of what makes you such a sweet and wonderful man.”
The truth was Jeremy wasn’t going to mention the events of the afternoon out of fear that Sarah might still feel like he had been doing something w
rong, but considering the way the conversation seemed to be headed, he didn’t feel any need to mention that detail. So, dipping as deep into his pool of wisdom as he could, he said, “A lot of the time when someone gets upset over something that doesn’t make sense, they are really upset about something else. Is that what was going on this afternoon?”
She hugged him tighter and said, “Yup. I had just gotten some big news, and I was excited and scared and sad and happy all at once. I really wanted to talk to you about it, but when I got here that woman was here, and everything just kind of welled up and crashed together and I got upset. I didn’t really think you had gone out and picked up some cute redhead for an afternoon fling, but that is what it felt like. So I got all mad and made a fool out of myself, and I’m sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ve already forgotten it. So what is your big news?”
“I got accepted into grad school.”
“I didn’t even know you had applied.”
“Well, that is what a lot of people do when they are about to get their bachelor’s. Were you surprised when Kelly or Steve got accepted?”
“I guess I just hadn’t thought about it. It sounds like great news. Why were you sad and scared?”
“I was afraid of how you might react.”
“Why?”
“Jeremy, I got accepted to grad school in Kentucky.”
“Oh … that’s kind of far away.” Jeremy’s mind was racing, but he was trying to keep anything resembling a troubled expression off his face.
She looked into his eyes. “Do you see why I’m scared?”
“Because you’ve never been that far away from home?”
“Jeremy, this is one of those times I need you to say the right thing.” Her tone had a slight edge to it.
He decided to back off from any attempts at levity. “Is it because of me?”
The Whisper Garden Page 19