Dutch

by Madhuri Pavamani

  I leaned close and pressed my lips to hers, uncertain of what more to do with my mouth—did I open or close it, be gentle or more demanding? I had no idea, but it mattered little because Kajal knew exactly what to do and under the cover of that banyan tree she snaked her hand up the back of my neck and curled her fingers into my hair as her lips parted and her tongue slashed against mine. My fifteen-year-old body exploded, the sensations too much, too real, too intense, but Kajal didn’t care. She looked down and smiled and then handed me her handkerchief like it was no big deal.

  And I totally fell in love, on the spot, hard.

  We belonged to each other until we could not, sneaking out of houses and dinners and vacations to be together, to kiss, to explore, to make love. No one knew because we were great pretenders and had learned the art of discretion long before we learned the hollows and valleys of each other’s bodies. So when she died in an auto-rickshaw accident, no one thought to tell me because no one knew she was the love of my life, my first, my everything. Instead, I learned of her death from the procession of tears before her house and the attendant wails and screams that accompany any life cut short.

  I raced back up the road to my family’s compound that afternoon with tears in my eyes and a confession on my tongue, yelling for my mother, only to find a black Mercedes idling out front and my packed bags sitting on the steps. An omen if there ever was one. A tall, thin, Jamaican cat with yellow-stained eyes stepped out of the car and turned to me with a smile on his lips that did not evoke joy. My father followed and as the two men stood next to each other, chatting low, my mother joined them with my sister trailing behind.

  “Dutch,” my father finally spoke, ignoring my tear-stained cheeks, “this is James Sussex, one of the Keepers of The Gate. You belong to him now.”

  And just like that, my fucking father, Khan Mathew, goddamned piece of shit, handed me over to that psycho. Two days later I made my first kill and after a week of further horrors and grotesqueries, I was a hardened shell of the boy who ran up the road crying over his dead first love. But my introduction and initiation to The Gate was far from complete.

  “Mathew! Get in here,” James bellowed, and I jumped.

  “You were looking for me?” I asked as I entered his office overlooking Piccadilly Circus, one month into my new life, still learning my way around the madness of it all.

  “No, you dumb fuck, I just like the way your name rolls off my tongue,” he snapped, “yes, I was looking for you.” And he threw me a folder with some papers inside. “Your next assignment. It should be easy, she’s new. Kajal Chaudhry.”

  I immediately scanned the contents of the folder, making sure it was my Kajal Chaudhry, and then I took off after her, finding her easily in the streets of Guadalajara, as if my soul was somehow tied to hers. She was laughing with a vendor, speaking fluent Spanish, and looking as beautiful as when I last saw her alive, before we kissed and parted ways on our walk to school.

  “Kajal,” I called out and she turned, a strange look in her eyes, filled with love and horror, because she knew what I was and I knew what she was and what we now meant to each other.

  “Dutch,” she breathed as she backed away from the vendor and from me, then took off running down a narrow alley. I stood dumbfounded for a moment, wondering why she would ever run from me, and then I took off after her, racing through narrow passageways, listening for her footfall with my newly awakened Keeper senses, finding and catching her easily.

  “Please!” she begged when I grabbed her arm and pulled her to me and even though we were both so young, we suddenly were not at all, I was a killer and she was my prey. Or so she thought. She kicked and fought me, desperate to escape my embrace, terrified I was going to do something horrible to her. Sick with the realization that she believed I would hurt her, could hurt her, I let her go, then leaned against the wall and sobbed.

  I had never cried like that, gut-wrenching, raw pain, but I could not help myself. I was out of sorts with my new life, the violence and horror, the cycle of death and more death, everything was off-kilter and unpredictable, including my emotions. I fled her sight, weaving through the alleys and side streets, roaming the city deep into the night, wishing to escape my new self and find the old me around some corner, playing football with some street kids, just waiting for Dutch Mathew of 1 Rambala Way to slip back into myself and carry on like The Gate never happened.

  But The Gate had happened.

  I was driven to an estate deep in the backwaters of Kerala, I was told about my mystical magical powers that manifested themselves on my sixteenth trip around the sun, and I was taught to hunt and kill Poochas. I learned I was descended from Gate royalty and that my family was incredibly powerful within this shady new world. My father ran the show. He was the head of The Ren, the leaders of The Gate, creators of our rules, overseers of our world. My mother and sister were Junta, the elite Keepers and enforcers of the rules, and I, their only son, was a Keeper, killer of Death’s beloved Poochas.

  Welcome to the family business, son.

  The business of torture and pain and death, of blood and brains and guts, of hideous things that go bump in the night. That was my new reality and why Kajal looked at me so—because somehow she knew my secret and believed I had become a monster.

  “Dutch.”

  I stopped and looked behind me into the dark alley and when my eyes adjusted, I saw her and something inside me broke all over again. I pressed my body against the wall, trying to make myself less monstrous, and simply watched her because I wanted her to know I would never move toward her in anger. And I needed her to not be afraid.

  “I would never . . .” I started to speak into the darkness.

  “I know.” She pressed her fingers to my lips but I removed them because I wanted her to hear my words.

  “ . . . touch you in anger or hurt you in any way, no matter what I have become. I love you, Kajal,” I whispered desperately.

  “I know, I’m so sorry,” she cried, “I just panicked because you’re a Keeper and now I am Poocha and I still love you so much yet we’re locked in this ages-long fight to the death when all I want to do is curl up in your arms and feel your breath against my skin and your lips on my throat.”

  I wanted to comfort her with my touch and my heat and my love but first I needed to confess. “I’m also your Keeper, you’re my assignment.”

  She shuddered but did not move away from me and I knew then that she loved me as much as I loved her and maybe my plan to save us both would actually work and we would thwart the powers that be and escape all of the madness and sadness and death. Silently moving toward me, she studied my face with her eyes and then her fingertips, tracing lines and hollows that just months earlier had not existed.

  “My beautiful, not-very-Indian Dutch,” she whispered and kissed me, “how much changes in so little time. And in such unfair fashion. I feel as if I kissed you, Death made me an offer I could not refuse, and now this. It is so dangerous for you and I to be together. It goes against everything we are now supposed to believe.”

  “I only believe in you.” I held her face in my hands and kissed her mouth and her eyes and her nose. I kissed and touched her everywhere because I couldn’t believe I was once again kissing and touching her wherever I wanted. “And I have a plan, so fuck all of them.”

  She was my assignment, so it was easy—no one else from The Gate was looking for her, so she could go about her business and I would periodically report back on her “deaths” at my hands. No one would ever be the wiser since no one would come behind me to check my kills. They would simply take my word for it—I was a Keeper for god’s sake, from a renowned and incredibly powerful family of The Gate, I certainly wouldn’t be suspected of fucking my Poocha.

  I spent the remainder of the night convincing her it would work and we would be safe to love each other forever, as if her rickshaw had never crashed and that perverse Mercedes never rolled up to my house. The next morning we parted ways, plan
ning to meet in a few days back at her apartment.

  I checked in with James, spent a few days wandering the streets of Guadalajara, took a painting class, made a delicate silver chain with the help of a silversmith, and finally walked up the twenty steps leading to Kajal’s apartment. Before I could even knock, she opened the door and was upon me, touching me everywhere, kissing me, laughing. Our clothes were forgotten as we rediscovered each other’s bodies and spent a sleepless night wrapped around each other.

  The following morning I draped the chain I’d made around Kajal’s neck, kissed her, and departed, knowing I would see her in a week. It gave me time to return to London, check in with my parents in India, and then head back to Mexico for “death” three. As I ran up the steps to her apartment, I didn’t think a thing when she failed to greet me at the door, using the key she gave me to let myself inside. I called her name, flipped on the lights, and froze.

  “Well, well, well. Motherfucking lover boy decided to join us after all.” James sneered as he walked a menacing circle around Kajal’s trussed and hanging body. “Do I look like an idiot, Mathew? Is your father a fucking clown?”

  I shook my head, eyeing Kajal all the while. She was bound and gagged, but she didn’t look scared, she looked pissed. I wondered what James had done to her prior to my arrival.

  “I’m not going to ask if you’ve killed this Poocha bitch because I know you have done no such thing because I know the lovely”—and here James ran his fingers through Kajal’s curls and down her throat as he leaned close and hissed—“Miss Kajal Chaudhry is the love of your very short life. Your parents know this, too. In fact, it was their idea to assign her to you as a test of your worth, a test you so epically failed.”

  “Unfortunately for Miss Chaudhry, your failure is going to cost.” Here he whipped out a short blade that lay hidden between his fingers and began cutting. I moved toward them as Kajal’s screams filled my ears, only to receive a roundhouse to the back of my head before being promptly tied to a chair by shadowy characters lurking in the background. “Next time it will be you on the other end of this knife. And you, my friend, do not have nine lives.”

  That evening James tortured and killed two souls, both Kajal and myself. I was just cursed to continue walking among the living. Kajal’s fate was determined the second she became my assignment, my test—I was foolish to believe otherwise. Her face was known by The Gate and, more important, my family, and if I didn’t bring about her remaining eight deaths, she would become James’s charge, a possibility too horrific to contemplate.

  It was the sickest catch-22 anyone could conjure, and it devastated me to know my parents had plotted and planned it all. If my entrance into The Gate forever changed me, my parents’ role in Kajal’s deaths, my father’s in particular, was the last nail in the coffin of my humanity.

  I spent the next few months imprisoned, forced to watch as Khan and James took turns torturing and murdering Kajal, then cleaning and sharpening their blades to do it all over again. I raged and begged her to hide, run, become lost in the ether, but she would hear none of it. She returned every time, because she knew if she didn’t, something even more horrible would happen to me. Kajal listened as I apologized over and over for everything I was and would be and she shouted that she wanted to hear none of it. She insisted I remember I was beautiful and loving and good and that I never ever let the darkness win. I promised all of those things for her because I loved her like I loved nothing else. I then watched helplessly as she died all sorts of heinous deaths, designed to haunt my memories forever.

  I did that eight times.

  EIGHT, goddammit.

  Like I said, I wasn’t always like this.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  JUMA

  There were moments in each of our lives that defined us—where we stood at the precipice of that cliff and decided whether to jump or not, what was going to be our story, our fate, our journey. I’ve stood at that cliff, looking over the edge, not because I had nine lives but because I had a moment where I could have simply disappeared but chose to remain present and accounted for. Where I made a deal that would determine the rest of my days. Where a promise was made to keep me beholden. Where my life was given in exchange for my da’s.

  His time wasn’t up right then, not as my little five-year-old body lay dying on that gurney, my throat ripped open and blood everywhere, but his name was on her list. He was in her sights and Death was coming for him.

  Unless I was willing to trade my life for his.

  Unless I was able to serve her and spare him.

  Unless.

  Unless.

  Unless.

  I know why Death chose me all those years ago, as I lay still on that emergency room gurney and my da silently wept while my ma screamed to the heavens and the room exploded in a burst of frenzied energy because a surgeon’s child had died upon the operating table and not just any surgeon but their surgeon, their chief. I hovered above all of it, floating on this strange cloud of awareness and extreme serenity as their insanity never touched me, never invaded my head space, and she came to me, whispering promises of what she could do, could offer, could provide. All in exchange for my assistance when it was time and I was ready and she came calling to collect on her side of our bargain.

  Was I interested? Yes. Could I do it? Yes. Did I want to go back? Yes.

  Would I help her? Yes. Was I good at keeping a secret? Yes. Did I want to help others? Yes.

  Did I enjoy power? Yes. How about a little magic? Yes. And could I outrun the bad guys? Yes.

  I had been so eager so willing so needy so determined and she had loved all of that about me because I think she knew even then when I was just five years old so small so young so undeveloped that I was incredibly strong utterly determined passionately devout. She fell in love with my spirit because she knew I would never simply disappear, I would always remain. I would be present and accounted for, no matter how terrifying I found the Keepers no matter how many opportunities I was given to do differently to avoid the pain to escape the fear, I would always, always, always choose to stay.

  Because I loved her and because we made a deal: I belong to her and she spares my da.

  There were others who chose differently who experienced something so horrific they needed to be released and she would do just that but she knew I was different and even though I lived in fear of the pain and horror that would come with my demise, I would never ever ever be one of those, I would never leave, I would never quit.

  I would forever watch my back for the Keepers, those diabolical fucks who killed for The Gate, that shadowy organization who went to extremes to keep Death in check, made sure Death knew her place. I would do whatever she needed whenever she needed it done because I loved to help others and because we made a deal.

  I would accept every assignment every irritating Deader every heartbreaking return every personal failure because I knew my role was vital and because we made a deal.

  I would do everything she wanted required demanded because I was so damn good at what I did and because we made a deal.

  She knew who she was choosing that late afternoon in Atlanta all those years ago; it was purposeful and manipulative and so very her.

  And it was so very me to say yes because I liked to help others and because we made a deal.

  “Juma?”

  I turned at the sound of my name on another’s lips—my assigned Deader trying to get my attention, stir me from my thoughts, get me outside of myself instead of lost in the wondering of when my time would be up and how painful it would be and how many pleasure-filled touches and sucks and fucks I could experience before that point. That was one of the reasons I did it, of course, all the random sex and multiple nights wrapped around as much affection as possible and bodies pressed against mine and tongues and lips and fingers and kissing and hugging and licking and touching. I wanted a reserve of the good stuff to see me through the horror of the bad.

  And now my nam
e had come up and I had been assigned and it was vital that I collected as much of the good stuff as possible as often as possible to protect me during my time of need. How ironic then that I only sought craved desired the hands of one of the most fucked-up people I had ever encountered. I wanted no one else but him and his darkness, all over me, smothering my light, suffocating my shine, doing whatever he wanted to me, fully aware he could stand to do nothing at all.

  Of course he was what I wanted.

  “I’m here.” I shook myself of my temporary reverie and apologized to my newest and currently most eager assignment. “Just a little distracted is all. How about we get to this?”

  I smiled and she relaxed and we spent the rest of the afternoon with my team of Alighters, going over each and every one of her personal relationships, creating our story of the new memory to implant in all of her family and friends’ minds. My team agreed to work as duos, spreading out and covering the five countries where our Deader maintained the strongest presence: Malaysia, England, France, Belize, and the United States. They would slowly work through each of her relationships, beginning with her husband, wiping out memories and instilling the new ones. It was going to be long and detailed and exhausting and everyone in the room knew it.

  “This is going to suck,” I told the assembled group hours later, “because we’re dealing with one of the world’s best independent filmmakers and she knows a shit-ton of people. However, we are the best of the best so although it’s going to take forever and we’re going to have to cross more t’s and dot more i’s than we’ve ever had to before and it’s going to have to be perfect for it to succeed, I’m confident we can do it.

  “I have faith in you, people,” I concluded with a smile.

  “So long as you don’t get killed in the process,” Kobe Sax, one of my best Alighters, commented with a frown. “I heard you were assigned.”