Currency of Souls

by Kealan Patrick Burke

  Or whatever he is.

  “Is this what you do for fun?” I ask.

  He looks surprised, maybe even a little insulted. “Fun?” He scoffs. “Hell…I wish that were the case, Tom.”

  “Then why?”

  He scoots forward a little, an intense look on his face, one eye like a white marble, the other in shadow. “I don’t enjoy what I do anymore than you enjoy livin’ in your own skin when your spirit’s already shriveled up and died inside it. I do this because I have to, not because I want to.” He sits back, drums his fingers on the arm of the couch. “You want to know what I am. I can’t tell you that, and not because I ain’t allowed to, but because no one’s ever explained it to me. What I can tell you is what I used to be. It may surprise you.”

  I shrug as if I couldn’t care less, but I’m interested. “A preacher?”

  He grins and his cheeks vanish. “A salesman.”

  “Let me guess—bibles.”

  “You need to abandon the religious angle, Tom. I was a door-to-door carpet products salesman. Damned good one too. In my spare time I liked to paint. Still life’s mostly.”

  I frown at him. He laughs and it sounds like a gust of winter wind through the eaves. “I know. Hard to picture, ain’t it?”

  “No shit. And when was this?”

  His smile fades. “Can’t remember.”

  I’m appalled to find myself feeling sorry for him. I have to remind myself why I’m here, and whose fault it is. But that’s not so clear, no more than it’s ever been. I can’t be sure Cadaver wasn’t toying with me by planting the seed of doubt in my brain. He hasn’t said Kyle took the bargain he was offered. He hasn’t said he didn’t either. The fact that I’m alive is about the only thing keeping me from being convinced the latter holds true.

  “Had a wife, and two children too,” he continues, as wistfully as his artificial voice will allow. “Can’t recall their names, or their faces. I know I cared about them a great deal though.”

  “So how did you get demoted to this position?” I’m hoping to get a rise out of him, simply so I won’t have to feel sympathy for the old bastard anymore.

  It’s his turn to shrug. “Can’t rightfully recall that either, but I’m sure it began with the scandal. See, I mentioned I was good at my job. Turns out I was maybe a little too good. I could talk the talk like no one else in the company. Had a ninety-six percent success rate you see, which means almost everyone who opened the door to me bought whatever I was sellin’. Which is good, unless it’s discovered that what you’re sellin’ emits toxic fumes, which when inhaled, causes seizures, and eventually a very painful death.” He shakes his head. “Sold an awful lot before the company recalled it, Tom. That’s an awful lot of dead folk.”

  “And that’s why you’re—”

  “No idea. You could say the death of all those people wasn’t my fault, but we might have to argue about that. I’ve had plenty of time to think it through, and I suppose there could be any number of reasons why I ended up doin’ what I do now. Could be because I shot my father to keep him from beatin’ my Momma to death with a shovel, or because I shot a few bluejays with my BB gun when I was a kid. At the end of the day, don’t really matter why. I still am what I am and always was: a salesman sellin’ death to whoever opens their door to me.”

  “And that’s what we’ve done? Opened our doors to you because we fucked up our lives?”

  “Because you fucked up the lives of others. Why do you think you’re involved here? We both know you didn’t murder your wife, but you keep tellin’ yourself you did. Why?”

  “I figured you’d already know.”

  “Humor me.”

  “Why should I?”

  I search for words, but like the answer he’s seeking, I can’t wrench it free of the dark that’s coiling inside me like oil in a spinning barrel.

  “Who’s the victim of your sins, Tom? Kyle?”

  “Maybe.”

  “No.” The word is flat, dead, delivered like a hand slammed down on a table. “It’s you. You’re the victim. You’ve let yourself drift on a tide of bad judgment, let this town suck the marrow from your bones and the ambition from your heart because it was easier’n puttin’ up a fight. You’re a quitter, Tom.”

  I’m a little stunned at the vehemence in his artificial voice. Whatever the motive behind his little rant, I’m inclined to believe he’s just accused me of an unforgivable crime, not on some malignant whim, but because he desperately wants me to know. Because I have to know.

  I’ve heard some people say that when they were faced with extreme danger their lives flashed before their eyes. That’s who Cadaver is, or at least a part of what he is. He’s a reminder of all you’ve done, and should have done. He’s an accountant who keeps track of how much you’ve squandered and how much you owe. He’s a debt collector of the most ruthless kind because he deals in the currency of souls.

  “You’re a failure.”

  I’m getting angry, and that’s about par for the course. I can’t walk away from this like I’ve walked away from everything else, and with no distance to put between me and the man judging me, and no gun to shove between his eyes to force him to reevaluate, I have no choice but to defend myself with words.

  “Is this supposed to make me see the light? Change my ways? Am I supposed to leave here with an arm around my boy, both of us skipping to the tune of The Andy Griffith Show, all because I was fortunate enough to heed the wisdom of a mass-murdering parasite? Fuck you old man. You brought Hell to this town just as much as Hill did. You infected it, infected us, and then have the gall to sit there like God himself judging everyone you’ve set out to destroy. Why not just wave a magic wand and blow the fucking place off the earth and be done with it. Why drag it out like this unless you like the suffering, unless it’s how your limp dick gets to twitching?”

  Cadaver seems unaffected by my outburst, but right now I want to wring his scrawny neck, or at the very least rip that goddamn box out of it so he’ll stop talking.

  “I’ve done nothin’ in this town the people didn’t ask for, Tom. I’m as cursed as everyone else, maybe even more than they are. I don’t get to make choices. I just get to grant power to people who make them too freely, and without thinkin’ them through. And I don’t get to change them.” He frowns. “So no, I don’t expect you to see the light. That star burned out a long time ago. But whether or not you choose to understand what I’m tryin’ to tell you, you’ll learn to appreciate the message when the choice is taken away.”

  “Riddles.” I stand, muscles trembling, hands clenched into fists I want so badly to use but know I won’t. I can’t. “You’re speaking in goddamn riddles. What do you want from me? From Kyle? How do we end this? Do we have to die, to burn? Is that it? Tell me!”

  Cadaver rises, a skeleton beneath plastic skin. The smell of his cologne will from this moment on remind me of death. “How these things turn out depends on the choices that are made. Sometimes it happens that everythin’ turns out fine. But not often. It ain’t in our nature to consider others when we’re sufferin’ ourselves. And unfortunately for Milestone, everyone gets to bargain if they want it, even the monster hidin’ among you.”

  I’m standing as close to him as I am willing to get. His one good eye holds me as sure as if it were a loaded gun. “Tom, you were a good man once. You lost your way. Tonight you’re goin’ to lose everythin’ else, and for that I’m truly sorry.”

  He’s trying to scare me. It’s working.

  “What about the coins, the loan? What about—” Frantic, I dig in my pocket until I have those two cold discs grasped in my hand, then I hold them out for his inspection. “—these?”

  “What about them?”

  “You said they were a loan.”

  “I did.”

  “What if I give mine to you? What if…?” Unsure what I’m doing, but praying it achieves the desired result, I shove one of the pennies under his nose. He backs away, looking slightly annoyed.
“What if I let you have mine, me, right now, whether or not Kyle took the bargain? What then?”

  “You misunderstood, Tom.”

  That’s not what I want to hear.

  “Just listen—”

  He puts a hand on my wrist, forcing me to lower the coin from his face. “It was a loan for you. The coins ain’t some kind of barter for your soul and Kyle’s. They don’t represent souls at all.”

  “Then what the hell are they?”

  “Time. I let you borrow time.”

  I feel something being yanked away from me, the knot in the tug o’ war rope vanishing into the darkness in the corners of a room that smells of death/cologne and furniture polish. The man looking at me from the glass over Cadaver’s shoulder is a monster. His eyes are gone. My eyes are gone, but I’m not blind enough to miss seeing the picture this old man has drawn for me.

  “He couldn’t sell you out. I knew he wouldn’t, no matter what I offered him. He’s one of the few good ones, Tom, so I broke the rules for him. I gave you the pennies. Both were his. I gave you time to save him.”

  Sweat trickles down my neck even as a chill dances across my back. “How much time?”

  From the room directly overhead, something crashes to the floor. The light sways slightly. Grains of plaster float down between us like sand from a cracked hourglass.

  I feel a vibration in my bones, terror twisting my gut.

  Helpless, I look at Cadaver.

  “That much,” he whispers.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I run, taking the steps two by two though the sweeping angle of them seems designed to slow me down. As my feet make sounds like gunshots on the steps, I feel a part of me rip away, a part of me that wants to go in the other direction, back downstairs to Cadaver, to kill him, so there’ll be nothing left to face when I return. In the split-second instances when my mind cuts away from the sight of my own filthy boots pounding polished wood on this fucking endless staircase, I can almost feel his body come apart beneath my hands, blood and bone, or maybe just dust and oil spattering the walls, wet and satisfying beneath my shaking hands. I’m ripping that box from his throat, taking no care with it, just yanking it free and delighting in the sight of the gaping void it leaves behind as his head lolls atop withered shoulders. I’m hurting him. I’m showing him agony. I’m showing him how I feel, how I felt long before I first stepped foot in that goddamn tavern.

  I’m tearing him apart. Returning the favor.

  But then the steps run out and the landing isn’t nearly long enough for me to get my thoughts in order, to force myself to be calm. Three strides and I’m at the door I’m guessing is the one from which that thumping sound came. I don’t wait a second longer.

  I throw open the door.

  It’s a bedroom.

  Bed, neatly made.

  Sink in the corner, dripping.

  Sunlight making shadows that lay flat upon the floor.

  Window overlooking the yard.

  There’s no one here.

  Cursing, I head for the next door, the echo of that sliding thumping sound bouncing around my brain. I know what that sound was, but I’m going to dismiss the certainty and tell myself I’m letting terror mislead me. But deep down inside where reality is a small dark plot of land under an indifferent sky, I know the truth. I feel it. Right now, there is no tiny dirt road I can sidle down to avoid that big sprawling highway that runs only one way—straight into the mushy black heart of truth, the true nightmare of this situation. I can’t get away. Never could. But I could have gotten Kyle out of this and didn’t.

  Still, Be there; be alive. I won’t let you down. Not again, I repeat in a mantra inside my head, a head that feels as if it’s become a porcelain vase dropped from a height.

  My hand finds the door knob.

  Please. Just a little more time. One more chance. One more penny.

  I open the door.

  The hinges shriek.

  There’s light coming in the window.

  My mouth’s dry.

  There’s light coming in the window.

  I can’t see for the tears.

  There’s light coming in the window.

  And there’s a long thin shadow swinging in front of it, touching my own feet, which I let drop me to the floor. They’ve held me enough, held me longer than that creaking rope is going to hold my boy.

  I can’t look at him. Won’t.

  Then I do.

  Help him down, goddamn it. He’s still alive.

  I’m back on my feet in an instant, hugging my boy’s legs, my arms tight, lifting, lifting. Trying to unbreak his neck; trying to unchoke him. He rises, but doesn’t make a sound. Christ…he doesn’t make a sound.

  No words, no breath. No life.

  He’s dead and gone.

  Slowly, so slowly, and gently, I let him go until the rope is tight once again and his body twists in a breeze that isn’t here.

  Another man, another father, might persist, try to free him, try to save him, wailing and moaning all the while, crying out to God, promising retribution for this heinous injustice.

  But I’m not another father.

  And God isn’t listening.

  I find myself looking at my son’s shoes, note that they are cleaner than mine, though we’ve walked the same paths tonight. Guess that probably means something. All I take from it is the fact that they’re cleaner, and that the laces are untied, same way they always were when he got done with a day’s work. He never could tie laces right, but he sure did a hell of a job with that noose.

  His belt buckle is silver, a rearing horse locked inside an oval, and it glints in the sunlight, until the body swings around to the shadows again, then that silver mare turns black.

  The floor hurts my knees as I let it draw me down again. Bare wood. I want to claw it to splinters, but I’ll wait. I have to wait to see if I choke to death like my boy because the feeling in my chest makes me believe that’s what’s going to happen. Someone has their hands around my throat, but there’s nobody here but us.

  Just me.

  Just me, and my boy, who’s wearing a brown noose pulled so tight it’s sawed almost clear through the skin.

  Just me and my boy, who’s sticking his tongue out at me like he did when I teased him about the girl he used to walk home when they were in second grade. How many years ago was that? What was her name? Nancy something. Ellis, maybe. Damn it. Pretty girl too, but she moved on. She didn’t want to, and I guess Kyle didn’t want her to either. But wish in one hand…

  “Shit in the other,” I say aloud, wondering if my voice is enough to make Kyle swing some more, because aside from that creaking rope, the room is deathly quiet, deathly still, which I suppose is only appropriate.

  On the floor, there’s a chair, lying on its back, one its runners broken. I wonder if Kyle changed his mind as he stood atop that chair until the chair decided for him. Sorry, son. Too late now. Your old man hasn’t spent your time wisely.

  I won’t look at his face, though it begs me to.

  I won’t.

  I’ve taken the blame for my wife’s death though I wasn’t even in the car. I got out, she drove away, and two hours later we pulled my Lexus out of the Milestone River. I never told Kyle that. Never told him that we found Alfie Tomlin, the banker, in the passenger seat either. No, I kept that stuff to myself because once she was gone, I was all he had left. I was what he needed. A target. Someone to blame, to hate, and I let him.

  I let him.

  You’re the victim, Cadaver said. Not Kyle.

  He lied, of course. For all his sympathy and confessions, he lied to me. I’m not the victim. I’m not the one swinging from the rafters or burned to death.

  I’m alive, and though I’m about to make myself a promise that I’ll rectify that before the sun goes down, I’m going to forget about Hell and devils and men with no voices and miraculous resurrections and ghostly spouses, and the cosmic or celestial balance that has made us all its slaves. I’m
going to put out of my mind all thoughts of betrayal and lies and sin and hate and love.

  Fuck all that.

  Right now I’m going to restore the only balance that matters a goddamn right at this very second in my life.

  And I’m going to enjoy every minute of it.

  * * *

  I expect to find him gone, fled like the yellow son of a bitch I know him to be, and when I storm into the parlor, he’s nowhere in sight. Rage is making me shake harder than a man in an electric chair, but when I turn, there he is, the front door open, poised, waiting, as if for me to accompany him. Like we’re about to take a nice pleasant walk of the grounds. The daylight doesn’t reach far into the hall. Maybe he’s holding it back. Maybe it doesn’t know how to penetrate the sickness, death and misery he wears for a coat.

  “You killed him.”

  He clucks his tongue, and I’ve just decided that’s the first thing I’m going to rip from him.

  “You know that ain’t true.” It’s hard to hear him over the sound of my own blood roaring through me. “Maybe not in your head where the fury’s flowin’ from, but deep down you—”

  Fists clenched tight and held by my sides, I start toward him. “I’m through listening to you telling me how I am, what I am, and what I’m supposed to do. And you’re all done messing with folk’s lives. You’re going in the ground today, Cadaver, right next to Eddie and the whore and the only choice I’m giving you is whether or not you want to be dead or alive when I do it.”

  I need him to be unsettled, to look shaken. I need him to be afraid, but he isn’t. Nothing about him has changed much, except maybe for his shoulders, which have drawn in a little as if he’s waiting for the first blow. But there’s no fear in him. Nothing. He just looks sad, like none of this is a surprise, as if he saw the whole damn thing in some fucking crystal ball.

  “You know somethin’?” he asks, when I reach him. “I would very much like if you could do that. But you can’t, and you ain’t the first to offer. Not by a long shot. And every time I hear it, I feel somethin’ I’m not allowed to feel, somethin’ I’ve all but forgotten how to feel. The very thing you and everyone else in this town squanders with every breath you take: Hope. So by all means, Tom, do your worst. Make your last stand in a town that has nothin’ left in it for you to protect even if you continue to pretend it does. Put me in the ground for a spell to teach me a lesson you still, despite all you’ve lived through, haven’t learned yourself.”