by Brian Corley
“Sure,” I said. “When did you make that?”
“Oh, a couple days ago. We have a printing office downstairs, so I made a few. People thought they were pretty funny, so I ended up selling them and taking orders for more.”
“What? You took orders for more? How many?”
Max looked up at the ceiling. “I don’t know … about forty-three.”
“About forty-three? Not exactly forty-three?”
“Exactly forty-three.”
“You’re a legend.”
“It doesn’t suck to have a printing office downstairs that faces South Congress—people just kept walking in. Guess they recognized my memes.”
South Congress is one of the major streets in Austin that starts at the Capital and makes a straight shot south through downtown. It also happens to be one of the few major thoroughfares with heavy pedestrian traffic in Texas. That’s not commentary on urban planning; it’s just one of those things. It’s hot here, and cars have air-conditioning.
Hold on—people recognized the memes? I pulled up my favorite news aggregator app on my phone, and sure enough, Willard memes were trending. I found Max’s username in some of the top posts, but the Willard memes had taken on a life of their own.
“So, I’m just going to go,” Max said, slowly sliding out
the door.
“You’ll need keys. Max, why didn’t you tell me about this? It’s amazing. Your upvotes are insane.”
“I have your spare set. I hung pictures around the house, Jonah. You’re looking at them. Besides, you have a lot on your plate. I felt weird saying anything because of everything going on. Willard memes are huge—who would’ve thought? What’s even better is that I set up an online store with shirts and mugs and I have hundreds of orders.”
I’ll admit, that made me jealous, but Max was my friend. I should have been happy for him. It’s not his fault that I was threatened from beyond the grave—hell, he was too. He just had the freedom to leave without suffering the lifelong financial repercussions of walking away from a thirty-year loan.
“That’s great, Max. That’s really great. I’m happy for you. Since when do you have a spare set of keys?”
“Since I knew I was moving and knew exactly where you kept them. I know all your secrets, Jonah,” Max replied, ominously raising his head in a way that allowed him to look down on me. “You’re a sick man, Jonah, a sick, sick man.”
“Fine, but I’m not helping you move anything, and have it back in one piece tonight—no scratches.”
Max slipped out and let the door close behind him, leaving me alone for the first time in a long time. The house felt darker somehow. I noticed every creak or crack, every shift, every scrape of a tree limb. Suddenly my situation felt very real. Sometime soon it was going to come down to just me and Willard. I thought I should take a nap before Mistress Zoe and her team showed up. I was sure Jason Bourne would do the same thing.
Chapter 8
I’ve heard it said that we only remember the dreams we’re having right before we wake up. Even the long ones occur only seconds before we open our eyes, synapses firing off like crazy as we come to. My synapses must have given it all they had that night.
I found myself encompassed in a brilliant light and what looked like an angel reaching out to me with a message. It was stretching out from my ceiling as I emerged from a deep nap on the couch, awakened by a knock at the door.
Slowly, the light faded from my eyes as darkness took its place. What time was it? I reached for my phone. Eight thirty exactly. Damn, Mistress Zoe was timely. Impressive.
I rolled off the couch and slowly ambled toward the front of the house. I’d gone to an ATM earlier in the day to grab some cash for tonight and had it ready as I opened the door. I turned on the porch light, revealing a small group of people—about a half-dozen or so.
They were in their early to late twenties and led by a short, athletic woman dressed in a white, collared, short-sleeved shirt striped in various oranges, reds, and pinks, wearing either long shorts or short gray pants with black, lace-up, rubber-soled boots. I presumed her to be Mistress Zoe . . . or Tank Girl.
“Hi, I’m Zoe. Are you Jonah?” she asked.
Nailed it.
“Yeah, I’m Jonah. Thanks for coming on such short notice,” I replied.
I offered her a roll of twenties totaling $400 and opened the door wider to invite the group in. Zoe entered with an air of authority that gave her a presence larger than a person standing five foot six should have. She didn’t swagger; she just had an easy self-confidence backed by an unspoken power.
The rest of the team filed in behind her. The Psy-kicks seemed like a group of kids you’d find in an independent bookstore after yoga class while recovering from a night out at one of Austin’s dwindling few live-music venues. There was cool haircut guy, cool haircut girl, tall guy, nondescript girl … I couldn’t remember all their names, so I just decided to tag them all as Psy-kicks for the time being.
Zoe walked around the house while the rest of us huddled together in uncomfortable silence, exchanging some awkward smiles and nods as we waited for her to get back to us. After a walk-through inspection of the house, she rejoined the group and turned to face me.
“Your house is a little creepy. Do you always sit in the dark by yourself?” she asked.
Only then did it dawn on me that the only light we had came the front porch.
“Sorry, I was taking a nap. Let me get some light going. Computer: lights,” I said, glad that I remembered to unpack and install my voice-enabled lighting system. I’d heard people complain that those things listened to every word you said. If so, it was about to hear some crazy shit.
Zoe directed cool haircut guy to retrieve her bag from the van and started giving instructions to her team. Once cool haircut guy was back, she unzipped the oversized military rucksack and started handing out bundles of incense to the group—smaller, slightly acrid-smelling bundles for every room of the house other than the kitchen. There she placed a larger, sandalwood-smelling bunch in the spot where we held our previous séances.
“This is where most of the communication occurred, right?” Zoe asked, making sure she understood my previous rundown. I nodded, and she knelt to light the incense in an ornate ceramic bowl.
She explained, “Some of the bundles we’re setting up around the house will act to repel your spirit while the larger one here in the kitchen will attract it. We’ll let this burn for a while, then use its ashes to communicate with the spirit, much like you did with the Ouija board.”
“Why not just use the Ouija board?” I asked.
Zoe bristled. “I studied under Master Kevin Yang for ten years. Since then, I’ve borrowed from his techniques and rituals, combining them with some of my own. Our method has all the upside and none of the down of the Ouija board.”
I didn’t know if ten years was a lot or not or if I should know who Kevin Yang was, but Zoe and her Psy-kicks were here and I’d already paid them.
Walking over to her bag, she continued, “We will attempt to communicate with the spirit and, once again, ask it to
leave. However, there will be consequences if he doesn’t leave this time.”
She pulled an ornate wooden sword out of the bag and handed it to me. Its “blade” was about four feet long and decorated with detailed carvings. The “blade” wasn’t sharp and looked more like an ornate cricket bat than a sword.
Zoe watched as I felt the carvings and turned it over.
“The carvings describe the story of Izanagi no Mikoto. You paying attention?”
I nodded.
“Good. Legend has it that Izanagi no Mikoto’s wife, Izanami no Mikoto, was killed in a terrible accident. Many years after her death, he still missed his wife so much that he traveled to Yin Jian—the underworld—to see her. When he came upon her at a dis
tance, she appeared just as she did the day she died. See?”
She pointed a finger at a carving on the sword and moved it along to correspond with the story.
“Upon seeing him, she begged Izanagi no Mikoto not to look at her and made herself invisible. It was dark then, so he lit a single light and looked upon her face. Izanami no Mikoto’s face was swollen and festering with eight kinds of thunder-gods resting upon it.
“Izanagi no Mikoto was terrified and fled, but the thunder-gods pursued him. Down the road they went, until Izanagi no Mikoto’s strength and stamina began to fade. A large peach tree grew by the side of the road, and in one final desperate act, Izanagi no Mikoto plucked a peach from that tree and hurled it at the thunder-gods, and they fled in terror.”
“He threw a peach at them?” I asked.
“Yes, he threw a peach at them. He was desperate. Imagine being in a situation so dire, so hopeless, you threw fruit at someone—much less a god.”
“Damn.”
“Can I continue?”
“Yes, sorry.”
“It’s OK. Bewildered by his good fortune, and fearing they might return one day to find him, Izanagi no Mikoto tore a branch from the tree and returned home where he carved a sword from it that told his story and to protect himself and his family from the spirits should they find him where he lived.”
The room fell into silent reverence for the story, but I was more than a little skeptical.
“So that’s the sword of Izanagi no Mikoto?” I asked.
“Oh no, this is from Fredericksburg,” Zoe replied with a little bit of her Texas accent breaking through on burg. “My family always went to the same orchard there to pick peaches every summer, and after hearing the story from Kevin and seeing him use his own sword in ceremonies, I decided to make one from the largest tree I could find there.”
Fredericksburg, Texas, was a small, old German town about an hour and a half outside of Austin known for their peaches.
I turned the blade over in my hands. The carvings were impressive, intricate—it was good work.
“You made this?” I asked.
“Oh no, Quinton made this. He’s an art student over at Austin U.”
Cool haircut guy grinned and shrunk modestly. Guess that’s Quinton. Turns out that peaches are good for more than cobbler, and I had to respect Zoe’s dedication to locally sourced items.
Zoe gathered her team into a circle around the bowl she placed on the floor in the kitchen and sat cross-legged on the floor. Everyone followed her lead. She pointed for me to sit directly across from her, the fog of incense rising between us. It smelled nice, and I felt at ease as we sat in the circle. She set her sword on her lap, the blade resting on one knee and the pommel on the other. Placing her middle fingers and thumbs together with her hands facing up and resting on each side of the sword, she closed her eyes and bowed her head, so we did as well. After a few minutes, I found myself more relaxed than I’d been in days—maybe ever. So this was meditation? I was into it.
“Willard Hensch, show yourself,” Zoe said in a stern but respectful tone.
A few seconds passed, and the temperature of the room lowered significantly. I peeked through my eyelids to see the smoke of the incense stir as though someone had walked through it. My eyes widened as I saw a form through the fog.
“Willard Hensch, you no longer have a claim on this place. It was over once you passed on to the next plane.”
She leaned toward the bowl, plucked the incense with one hand, and emptied the ashes from the bowl to the floor. She placed the bowl and incense to the side of the mound of ashes and, with some ceremony, began to spread the mound flat with her hand until a circle of ashes about a foot in diameter was now centered and concentric within our circle.
“Speak to us, Willard. Will you leave peacefully tonight?” she said.
The ashes began to stir as Willard began to write in them.
No.
“Willard Hensch, we are here to ask you to leave this man in peace. Will you leave peacefully tonight?”
The ashes below his first answer stirred again.
No.
“Pinyin!” she cursed. “Three times we will ask, then we will ask no more. Willard Hensch, will you leave here peacefully tonight?”
The ashes stirred, covering up the previous answers. New letters emerged in neat print:
I listened to the story of your sword. I heard everything.
The ashes stirred, covering the script, and new letters formed:
I am not scared of your sword, and I am not afraid of you.
Again, the ashes stirred, covering the previous reply, and new letters emerged:
This is much better than the board. It’s nice to be able to use punctuation.
That at least got a smile from most of the group, and I had hope for a moment that we could find common ground.
“Willard, let’s just find a way to coexist,” I offered. “Max moved out. You can take a room, and I can take a room. I’ll be asleep most of the time you’re awake anyway.”
The ashes stirred, covering his previous replies, and new writing emerged:
Nothing has changed. You will leave, or there will be consequences. I will not warn you again.
The ashes scattered as though someone blew them toward me. Again, I saw his ghostly form in the fog of incense. Zoe jumped into action and took a swing into the smoke with the peach sword. We all heard the thud of meat and the crack of bone as she connected with something.
I looked around wildly. Did she just hit one of us by mistake? No one seemed to be reeling in pain. Cool haircut girl was closest to the opening that led from the kitchen to the living room. Her hair blew back as though someone just rushed by her, and the temperature in the room rose back to normal.
Zoe lit off in the direction of the exiting spirit, with the rest of us following behind. She paused in the living room, crouching in a warrior’s stance, the sword held firmly in front of her while her eyes scanned the room. We were spectators now, watching as she moved from the living room to my room. From my room to the hallway. From the hallway to Max’s old bathroom.
Again, we heard a crack and felt a rush of air a few seconds later with Zoe quickly in pursuit. Back to the kitchen, where she seemed to lose the thread. She scanned the house a few more times, relaxed her guard, and rejoined the group.
“I don’t think he’s gone, but he certainly wasn’t expecting this,” she said, grinning and twirling the sword in her right hand. “The incense burned out. I can’t get a good look, and it won’t do me any good to go around swinging wildly. Lin?”
She looked at cool haircut girl, who I knew to be Lin.
“Lin, do we have any more sticks left at the office?”
Lin shook her head, no.
“We could always go up to the gas station and buy some Nag Champa,” I offered.
The group collectively shook their heads no this time.
Zoe replied, “It’s not the same. We have a special mix that allows us to establish a connection with the spirit. I’ll make some calls, but we may have to wait until morning.”
Zoe spent the next hour or so on my couch making calls, while I made some tea and doled out what was left of Ms. Keller’s peach cobbler to the group. Zoe shuffled back to the group, who were spread out in various cool leans around the kitchen, with sunken shoulders and hair frazzled from a hundred frustrated finger combs.
“Looks like I’m not going to be able to get anything until around ten tomorrow morning,” she said.
I offered her the last of the cobbler and tried out my own version of a fashionable lean against the kitchen sink.
“Jonah, we have a cot back at the office we can set up for you. Take advantage of that, stay with a friend, or get a hotel room. I would not recommend staying here tonight.”
Cool haircut
Quinton offered, “You can stay on my couch if you’d like.”
I thought about it. I thought about calling Max and staying at Dean’s cheese-infused apartment—hell, I even thought about reaching out to Nic. My pride got the better of me though. This is my place. It may not be a dream home, but it’s mine. I decided to take a stand.
“No thanks, Quinton, I’m staying here. This is where I belong.”
Zoe stared, twirled the sword in her hand, then offered it to me.
“Fine, suit yourself. Hang on to that tonight. I want it back, but it may come in handy. For the record, I think this is the absolute height of stupidity, but it’s your life. I’ll give you a shout in the morning, and we’ll make plans and try again tomorrow night.”
“Sounds good,” I replied.
The team gathered their stuff and headed out the door.
“Remember, $300 for tomorrow’s attempt. Cash. I have a few ideas and think we can get him out. I’ll talk to Kevin tomorrow when I pick up more supplies. Good night.”
She shot me a casual two-finger salute as she closed the door behind her, and I found myself alone again.
I was toweling off after a shower when I noticed the room was colder than normal.
Willard is here.
“Pretty gross that you’re watching me towel off, perv,” I said out loud, hoping to embarrass him into leaving.
The room didn’t get any warmer, so I grabbed some clothes out of my dresser and went back into the bathroom to get dressed. Who knew I was so modest? I hung my towel up over the shower curtain and started brushing my teeth, scanning the mirror for any new messages from beyond the grave.
None materialized.
Back to my room, I grabbed the peach sword and walked down the hall to check the thermostat. It had already adjusted to seventy degrees for the night, but it seemed much colder. I grabbed an extra blanket out of the linen closet in the hall and padded back to my room.
“Joke’s on you, I like sleeping cold,” I said.
I laid the blanket down on the bed, pulled back the covers, and tucked myself in with the peach sword at my side. I did feel safer having it around. I turned on the TV and tuned it back to the home-improvement channel. A guy with spiky hair was gesticulating wildly around a room, pleading with a couple to see his vision for the house. Perfect. I hoped Willard hated it.
