by Kat Turner
Pallbearers loaded Travis’s casket, and Eve climbed into the passenger seat. Emerging from the hearse offered a certain flair, a presentation, and besides she didn’t feel like driving.
Odors of leather, berry air freshener, and citrus wood polish from the coffin swirled through the vehicle interior, scents of everyday life symbolizing a routine facing disruption.
After getting through this burial, she’d go home, buy a ticket, and pack. Then, if luck took her side, sleep. Then wake up, call Jonnie, and ship out. Jesus, it was happening. It was real.
And she better get busy figuring out how to even begin thinking about assisting him with his problem. She pulled on the hem of her skirt, losing herself in thought.
“You alright? You seem distracted.” Gil, the driver, was a mild, unassuming man in his thirties with sloped shoulders and a receding hairline. One of those people with a knack for blending into the background, Gil cleaned the funeral home on Saturdays and did odd maintenance jobs as they arose. The sleeves of his too-baggy, rented suit hid his knuckles, giving him a childlike appearance.
“Yeah, I, uh…never mind.” Not like she could tell Gil the truth or make up an excuse. Everyone familiar with the predictable, lock-step nature of Eve’s life would see through lies.
Gil fired up the ignition and took off, leading the line of cars. “There’s something in the air.” He tilted up his head like a hungry baby bird and flared his nostrils, hanging a left on a residential avenue leading to the cemetery.
Sweat glued the backs of her knees to smooth upholstery as the car crawled down a road flanked by parallel-parked vehicles. She squirmed in her seat, the movement releasing a musty mothball smell from the old cushion. Why did she suddenly feel ill at ease? A wet trickle slipped between her shoulder blades.
“I don’t know about that.” Upswing turned her statement into a question, neutralizing any attempt to convey authority. Epic fail for the boss lady.
“It’s true. Human energies are attuned, like cycles. Living and dead. So our moods, as a species, rise and fall together. Collective consciousness. Hauntings and possessions are most prevalent at these times. Dips in the frequency, intervals of negativity, cause them. Some spirits are opportunists, taking advantage of the low points in the energetic emotion cycles.”
Lacey’s wholesome face flashed in Eve’s mind. Worry ricocheted through her, a dense racquetball threatening to explode into full-on fear. By the time Gil stopped in front of the cemetery, a chemical-green plot spotted with weather-beaten headstones and plastic flowers stuck in bronze cups, she was unsettled without a distinct reason why.
“Someone’s been going to Paranormal Society meetings.” She forced the words out through tight lungs, unsure if she intended her statement as a ribbing, a simple acknowledgment of fact, or a question. Disorienting fog clouded her mind. An ominous feeling hung over her head like ectoplasm, spreading outward.
He killed the ignition, turning to her. “You feel it, don’t you? Negative mojo? The feeling that something is coming, and it isn’t good?”
Silent beats played. His twinkling, bottomless blue eyes looked at her. Into her. He saw her. Saw dark shit she kept to herself. Gil reached into the backseat, grabbed an umbrella, and handed it to Eve.
Eve eyed Gil’s offering. “The forecast didn’t mention rain.”
“Like I said, something is coming.”
Whatever. Needing to be done with this guy, she snatched the umbrella in a clammy palm, jumped out of the hearse, and slammed the door.
A splash of dishwater clouds dulled the sky, and several gray squirrels skittered down trees and across grass. The bland temperature rounded out a mild, unmemorable afternoon. Still, Eve twitched. Her eyes darted, like a hand could erupt from a grave at any second.
Heels she’d forgotten to change in favor of more suitable shoes sank into soft sod while she hiked through the manicured cemetery lawn. Tombstones gave off spookier-than-usual vibes, many toppled and bleached from age and weather. A foil pinwheel stabbed in the ground near a grave spun in the absence of wind, reflecting bits of sunlight. Eve’s heartbeat kicked up, and she clenched a death grip around the object in her hand.
Sighing out her dumb jitters, she continued her awkward slog to the burial site. She told herself she felt off-kilter and self-conscious because she hadn’t worn proper footwear, a conclusion incapable of bringing peace. In an absent gesture, she poked at soil with the metal tip of her umbrella, an unfocused and queasy sensation junking up her thoughts.
One white tent protected a dozen relatives and a well-dressed pastor, Bible in hand, standing around the grave. The hole marking Travis’s final resting place was a six-foot-deep depression identical to the ones that had marked so many others’ final resting places. Eve scoffed for her own benefit. There was nothing in the air.
Heeding protocol, she stood amidst the mourners.
With an involuntary twitch, she shifted on her feet, driving the damn shoe spikes farther into the ground. The pastor licked a finger and turned pages in his Bible.
Stoic people stood as still and ramrod straight as chess pieces. Could the officiant fucking start already? Get this over with? Eve bit a curlicue hangnail, abusing the hard sliver until she drew blood. What’s wrong with you?
The Jonnie situation, an impending upheaval to her boring life, had agitated her on a mundane day. Finally, the pastor began reading from a King James Bible, voice deep and assuring. Eve exhaled as her elevated pulse tapered to a normal resting state and the cacophony in her head ceased.
Pulleys lowered Travis. A woman in a gray suit threw yellow roses onto the top of the casket. Tears burst. Someone lit a pungent cigar. Eve found the smelly indulgence inconsiderate but forced herself not to plug her nose so she didn’t look like a diva.
A bowling pin crack of thunder shattered the din of soft crying and sentimental chatter. Umbrellas burst open in a choreographed snap of rainbow domes. Eve popped hers as cold pitter-patter turned to splats.
While rain went rat-tat-tat on her shield, a flash of white across the graveyard caught her eye. The size of a cucumber, it slunk out from behind an upright headstone and moved closer. Streams dribbled down plastic, muddling her view through translucent lavender as some creature made a beeline for her.
She squinted as the animal approached. Didn’t they typically seek shelter from storms? Chilly drops kissed her legs through pantyhose, making her shudder.
An albino squirrel ambled to the gathering. The pastor continued preaching as the rodent encroached, steps decisive, so close now she could see its beady red eyes.
Red patches marred its haunches, its back. Mange riddled the poor thing. Her mouth dried. The inexplicable unease she’d felt earlier crept back over her. A slow, understated terror, like something was, indeed, in the air.
“I just wanted to thank you again for everything. For handling the services in such a classy, humane manner.” This from Mrs. Williams, rheumy-eyed and sniffling into a tissue. Smiling poop emojis patterned the widow’s umbrella, an absurd detail that should have tempered Eve’s distress with its silliness.
“Why did God put Daddy in the bye-bye box?” a child whined, pulling at the widow’s coat.
“Hush,” Mrs. Williams scolded.
Eve slid her gaze from Mrs. Williams to that damn squirrel. Closer, closer it came.
“Of course. Is there anything else I can do for you?”
In reply, Mrs. Williams launched herself into Eve’s arms and wailed. Eve hugged the woman with one arm, the other precariously angling her own umbrella while blocking the widow’s from stabbing her in the face. The squirrel was around five feet away. Eve’s body temperature dropped. The edges of her perceptual field blurred.
“American health care is a joke,” Mrs. Williams murmured into Eve shoulder. “Here, have some more chemo. Poison not working? Here, have this radiation. Slash and burn, their primitive fucking methods made him sicker. And now he’s gone.”
Inhaling cloying perfume,
Eve averted her stare from the animal as she turned her thoughts and attention to the grieving customer. People handled male morticians with a certain detachment, treating them like somber, serious undertakers best left to do their grim tasks in peace. They expected Eve, though, to play the role of counselor. Emotional labor made up a large part of her job. This was fine, and she had to focus on providing her services at the moment. “Your anger is completely natural and normal.”
The fucking squirrel, though, was not natural, normal, or fine. It advanced, a ratty thing. Red blotches like huge zits ruined its alabaster pelt. Why was this animal acting so weird? It approached her like it carried out a mission. Like it had intention. Purpose. Self-awareness.
“Thank you. I am angry. I’m fucking furious. I want to scream.” And scream, she did. The widow’s shriek pierced Eve’s eardrums with bright, stabbing pain, but the squirrel bothered her more.
It stopped at the edge of her toe. Eve stroked the wailing widow’s back.
Her perception quivered in abject horror, so acute it eclipsed a physical response numbing her. The white caging of its little ribs peeked out beneath ripped skin. Red meat ribbons hung from bone. Its once-fluffy tail was a knobby skeleton’s finger. A gleaming, striated facial muscle, obscenely red and visible where fur should have been, twitched in its jaw. Brown dirt clumps and slivers of Kelly green grass stuck to what remained of its coat. The squirrel was rotting. Had the thing crawled out of the ground? Was it an actual zombie?
Eve jerked her head back and forth, parched lips trembling. Did anyone else see this monstrosity? But the guests carried on like normal, making idle chit chat. The pastor milled about. Should she alert the widow glommed onto her torso? Would that accomplish anything?
“Fucking bitch.” The monster spoke in a grainy, snarling male voice, mouth moving to enunciate syllables and reveal yellowed hooks of rabbity teeth.
Neither widow nor daughter seemed to hear the small fiend talking.
With the woman and her child distracted, Eve wound up her leg and kicked as hard as she could at the squirrel. But she missed, swinging at air as the monster leapt backward in a single, fluid motion. Eve swore that she saw mockery in its hollow, bloodied eyes, and surfed a raging tide of humiliated frustration. This creepy thing had the upper hand already.
Safe from a punt, it looked up at her, skinned face and body like something out of a PETA shock advertisement and especially grotesque in the light of day. The eyes were by far the worst, though. They registered her. They hated her. “Can’t catch me, fucking witch bitch. Lacey knows your dark arts. Black magic. Witch,” the beast hissed through its skull of a snout.
The mention of Lacey ushered in a fresh wave of dread. The Lacey problem wasn’t going away. Correction: The Lacey problem was getting worse and was somehow now connected to this albino rodent zombie.
Lacey’s former cult had gotten up to a lot of insane, far-flung shit. Conjuring demons for personal gain. Mind control. Had her parents somehow backslid into that nightmare themselves? Stuck this demonic little entity onto her, and if so, to what end?
A crisp gust blew the squirrel’s smell, a predictable odor of wet dirt and dead flesh, in her direction. Bile rose in her throat as she waited.
“We want more.” The squirrel’s voice fell to a greedy, throaty whisper. “You will join her. Burn the witch and make it dead. Burn the witch and cut off its head.”
After delivering its heart-shriveling, evil sing-song rhyme, the squirrel bolted. Eve fixed a hard stare on it as it scampered up a tree trunk. Sunlight flickering through the leaves blinded her, causing her to lose sight of the zombie.
Frozen, Eve rode a sizzle of adrenaline. Mrs. Williams broke free with a gasp. “You’re an angel. Thank you. God, my sister was right about the benefits of practicing scream therapy.”
“My pleasure,” Eve managed, now aware of ringing in her ears. Between scream therapy and the squirrel, she needed a nap and maybe an exorcism.
Things wrapped up without further incident. A short walk landed Eve back at work, where she gathered her things, changed shoes, and sped home. She dashed upstairs and packed, mind racing. Time to get the hell out of Dodge. She couldn’t do a damn thing about Lacey or that screwed up critter, but she could help Jonnie.
On some level, she knew running was the coward’s way. Running to another person, another problem, another city. But fuck it. She’d made up her mind and made her choice. Perhaps Gil was right, and something evil corrupted the air. Could good works on Jonnie’s behalf neutralize whatever sinister forces blew through the atmosphere? One way to find out. She sat on the floor and texted him.
E: I’ll meet you in New Orleans tonight.
Seconds later, her phone blooped. J: Perfect. Thank you.
E: Of course. Going online now for ticket.
Eve leaned against a wall and pressed the phone to her chest. Pressure gathered in her midsection as she stared at the walls, cataloging nicks in the wallpaper and other trivial details. Walls seemed to come forward, advancing as they closed in on her. When she shut her eyes and attempted to meditate, an afterimage of the awfulness from the burial site seared onto the backs of her lids.
In a torrent of spontaneity, a primal scream tore from Eve’s mouth. Blinking open her lids, she snorted out a laugh as tension ebbed. The widow had the right idea with scream therapy.
Catharsis achieved, she logged onto her frequent flier account and cashed in her miles for a red-eye flight.
Maybe if she ran, she could hide.
Four
Hot night wind breezed through the open window of Jonnie’s New Orleans flat, animating his flimsy drapes. Inhaling the tangy aroma of his mum’s masaman curry simmering on the stove, he plucked out a few chords on his yellow Fender. He used this guitar when tense, wound. Pressing callused fingers into brass string as he sank deeper into his overstuffed easy chair, Jonnie strummed. The melody overcame him, its sound taut and craving release, until he teemed with energy.
The sounds and smells of funky old New Orleans, inebriated yells and brass horns trumpeting and briny, creamy jambalaya cooking in the restaurant below his condo penthouse, created a rich backdrop. When musically sated, he took off his guitar and propped it in the floor stand next to several others.
He padded to the kitchen, scuffed hardwood floors creaking beneath his bare feet, and turned off the stove. With a swipe of sponge, he wiped an errant bit off sauce off the chrome surface. A bit of remodeling had spruced up the vintage, open floor plan condo he enjoyed when Fyre came though and during those non-summer months when they took time off from touring.
Those months would become more frequent now that Brian and his wife were trying to have a baby. His chest ached as his mind wandered. Jonnie’s death would break Brian’s heart. Would the man recover from his grief? Could Jonnie inflict such suffering upon his best mate? If he went through with his plan, would Fyre move on and replace him? How soon?
Jonnie ducked into the little nook behind the wooden partition demarcating his study, routing his thoughts back to the logistics of his problem as he awaited Eve’s arrival. Charts covered the walls, collages of gritty black and white photos, newspaper clippings, and stories printed from websites.
Green marker lines connected Murray Connors to his bosses at the pharmaceutical company that manufactured and sold Vampivax. Red lines connected those individuals to the scientists responsible for creating the “miracle” drug, and more webbed out and landed on the universities that supported the scientists.
Black streaks linked the universities to a company called Scarab, currently standing trial for war crimes in the international tribunal. According to a famous whistleblower website, this company had run secret prisons where they conducted top-secret medical experiments on people, individuals now tucked away in witness protection.
His research project started with the goal of finding antidotes for Vampivax and led him down a dizzying array of blind alleys, twists and turns into more and more shadowy in
volvement. Did Scarab test Vampivax on unwilling captives, making them into monsters like him? Did they have labs somewhere, stocked with cures?
He’d dug and dug, clinging to shreds of hope as information on Scarab became scarcer and scarcer until it faded into nothing but maddening question marks. If a cure existed, he’d failed to chase it down. Which meant it was time to give up and, with Eve’s help, say goodbye to his state of living deadness.
Jonnie puttered around to kill time, using a feather duster to brush specks off flat surfaces. While he straightened the jars of oils and loops of brass string covering the long surface of his guitar repair bench, the doorbell rang.
As of now, lacking a firm grasp on what the extent of Eve’s abilities involved, he had no sense of what all she could do. But at the very least, it was bloody unburdening to finally confess his nightmare to someone. Someone who, perhaps, cared about him despite what he was. If anyone could assist, this death angel could.
Before he could go all sloppy and sentimental, Jonnie yanked open the door. Eve stood before him, an exquisite vision in jeans and a red tee shirt from some bike race.
“Come in.” He motioned for her to enter with an outstretched arm, mentally kicking himself for not having a cool, suave line to deliver.
Not that he used cheap lines on women. Not that he had any right to think about her like a woman, though her eyes and lips and the way a drawing of racing bicycles stretching across her round breasts made avoiding such thoughts damn difficult.
Wheeled suitcase squeaking against wood flooring as it trailed her, she graced his threshold. “Gorgeous place.”
He surveyed his flat. A built-in bookcase of records dominated an entire wall. Vintage furniture and crocodile-colored wallpaper pattered with the fleur-de-lis symbol completed a retro aesthetic.
“I always work better here, it seems.” He stroked his chin, unusual warmth lightening and calming him.
“They say this city’s food for the muse.” She spoke the truth. He connected to his music on a deeper level in New Orleans.