by JJ Lamb
The cancer was stealing his life.
Jacob dropped heavily into a gray, vinyl-padded chair. He was exhausted from alternating between bouts of manic energy and deep depression.
He stared at the white marble kitchen tabletop. Spotless. He slid his fingers across the smooth surface.
Back and forth, back and forth.
Only three hours sleep and he was wide-awake and searching for answers. He lay his head down as though it were a delicate piece of china, studied the table surface, then his fingers.
Not even the hint of a smear marred the white expanse. Not the slightest indication that neither he nor anyone else had ever touched it.
Nothing there.
Nothing.
Did he even exist?
That thought moved him into action. He sat up, yanked at his hair again.
Watched the strands float to the floor.
His eyes throbbed, were as dry and gritty as a desert. Like the emptiness that came after a dust storm, one that cancelled any sign, any evidence of being.
He picked at his eyelids. Poked at his eyes. Not a drop of moisture was released.
The nothingness accelerated – he couldn’t even feel his toes.
He grabbed for the small, round hand mirror he’d begun carrying everywhere; it teetered on the edge of the table. How many times did he check his image each day?
Every single day a part of his face disappeared, like a generous section of pie had been doled out to some unknown person.
Yesterday, his chin vanished.
He threw the mirror to the floor. A jagged crack sliced across the center.
“Seven years bad luck!” he screamed.
A harsh, mocking laugh rippled through the silence of the room, a crescendo that ended on a high, hysterical note.
* * *
Walter Cooke parked his car in a Tenderloin public parking garage, then walked through the tough the shoddy neighborhood with eyes in the back of his head. In almost every doorway there was some pathetic creature either sleeping or begging for money. The surrounding smells assaulted him, came close to making him lose his early lobster dinner.
Cooke knocked lightly on the back door of the mortuary. It was a very dark night and habit kept him looking over his shoulder even though he doubted anyone had followed him – most people tend to shy away from mortuaries, considered them bad luck.
He’d been around the block a few times in his sixty years and knew most people acted as if they would never die. And they stayed away from anything that smacked of death … especially mortuaries. Death was for someone else, not them.
He was getting drenched. What had started out as a light rain was now a thundering downpour.
While he waited outside the mortuary, he tapped a foot on the asphalt to the rhythm of some crazy tune he’d long forgotten the name of but couldn’t get out of his head. His sneaker made tiny squishing sounds on the wet pavement with each tap. He forced himself to stop focusing on the nervous, incessant music in his head.
This was only the second time he’d worked at Auston’s Funeral Home. He briefly questioned his sanity for taking on a job in the Tenderloin, particularly at night and in this kind of weather. But the owner paid better than most, and next week he was scheduled for his annual trip to Tahiti.
The mortuary’s security guy finally opened the door.
“Whadda you want?” He was big and stupid.
“He’s expecting me.”
“Yeah?” He peered out. “I guess I remember you.” But he still didn’t open the door all the way.
Cooke was losing patience. He’d left his umbrella in the car because it was windy and he was now soaking wet. His feet sloshed in his drenched socks and sneakers.
“So, are you going to let me in or what?”
Before the moron could answer, the door swung open and Charlie Auston stood there wearing a soiled morgue apron.
“Where the hell you been?” Auston shouted. “I expected you half an hour ago.”
“Weather!” He snapped a nod at the guy holding door. “And I’ve been trying to get past your security goon for the past ten minutes.”
Auston spun on his heel and motioned for Cooke to follow him down a painted concrete hallway. Cooke was relieved to finally be out of the foul weather.
No carpeting, paneled walls, or soft music playing in the working part of the enterprise. Instead, embalming fluid and the familiar odors of death assaulted his senses.
Cooke shucked off his drenched coat and hung it on a hook next to a line of rubber aprons. He took one, slipped the loop over his head, and fastened the ties behind his back. The floor was still wet from a recent hosing to get rid of someone’s errant tissue.
The naked body of a 30-to-40-year-old woman lay face up on the drainage table. Someone had slit her throat long before she’d arrived at the mortuary. She laid there, bloodless, white as bleached bone.
Poor woman!
Cooke let the thought drift away as he slipped on a double pair of surgical gloves. A deja vu moment placed him back in medical school ready to dissect his first cadaver. He may have failed his written exams, but he sure-as-hell was a whiz with a scalpel.
The older he got, the more satisfied he became. He was making more money than he would have as a practicing doctor, and without the messy emotional involvement.
As he worked, he thought about his upscale condo, the trips to Europe, the gorgeous women he’d landed in his bed. All that, and he would never have to worry about patients taking him to court and saying unkind things. He grinned at this take on an on old mortician’s joke.
Auston watched as Cooke made careful incisions and began removing organs, which were immediately fast-frozen.
“You won’t be able to save this,” Cooke said as he tossed a cirrhotic liver into a basin. “Big time boozer. Whoever slit her throat did her a favor. Probably would have conked out on her own within a year.”
Auston never looked up. Just continued packaging everything Cooke passed over to him.
“You’ve got to think positively, Walter,” Auston said. “Seeing the destruction of the human body as a result of poor living habits is very instructive.”
Cooke ignored the comment. He couldn’t have cared less about other peoples’ lifestyles, nor did he know or care to know anything about the final recipients of Auston’s organs, limbs, bones, and other body parts. He simply assumed it was probably a broker or go-between who distributed the bits and pieces to private research labs and medical schools. This setup wasn’t for fresh transplants.
Still, it was only the second time he’d been here. Who knew what the mortuary owner was up to? One thing was certain – nothing would be wasted, from collagen right down to fingernails and toenails.
An intact corpse meant a hefty wad of cash for everyone concerned, and even more so when the deceased was relatively young.
“Reconstruction or cremation?” Cooke asked, nodding at a bin of PVC pipe sitting in the corner. He was evaluating the various lengths Auston might want to use to replace long bones if there was to be an open casket.
“This one’s scheduled for the burner.”
“Got it!” He continued working, assumed Auston would fill the funerary urn with ashes from another source so the bereaved wouldn’t be suspicious as to whether things were on the up and up. Again, that was none of his business.
By morning, Cooke was exhausted, but he consoled himself by remembering that the three corpses he’d dissected that night were for research, the good of humanity … and cash.
* * *
Charlie Auston smiled widely after he let Walter Cooke out the mortuary’s back door; the jerk had done a great job again. Cooke was a snobby idiot, thought he was the only one who could dice and slice a corpse with such finesse. He was a to-notch skin and bone man or, considering the circumstances, sin and bone might be more appropriate.
Auston scratched his ear.
Yeah, well, maybe so, but he still has the personality of a
dead fish.
Auston’s legs were watery with fatigue. It had been a long night and he really needed to crash, but he was way too stimulated from assisting Cooke. Having downed cup after cup of hi-octane coffee, his adrenaline was pumping wildly. He went to his office, sat back in his chair, and plopped his feet on the edge of the desk.
He examined the inventory list centered in front of him. The monthly totals jumped out from the page. He took the pencil he’d stuck between his teeth – the favored one with all the tooth marks down to the graphite – and pointed at the columns as he absorbed the numbers.
Damn, looks like I’m short. Yeah, I am short.
He did some figuring in his head. He had legitimate contracts with three medical schools to process donated bodies, which had always been a nice side business. But since he’d thrown in with Milty Hiller things were getting very complicated, although he was making a lot more money. He’d had to raid some of the legitimate corpses in order to supply Hiller, whose demands had increased month after month. Auston was painfully aware that he had to fill those quotas first.
He could feel the stress building in his neck – soon he would have a friggin’ headache. He tried to relax, stared at the picture of his wife, holding their granddaughter. Each time he looked at the snapshot, he was amazed by how much the two of them looked alike. His gaze zeroed in on his wife’s soft, kind eyes. But he’d seen those eyes turn to stone, especially when she didn’t get what she wanted, when she wanted it. Then, instead of “love” or “honey,”’ it was “ex-con” or “loser.”
And how many times after some nasty disagreement had she warned that if he ever stepped out on her, or went back to prison, it was all over?
Like that was something he really wanted to do?
Well, yeah, he wouldn’t mind a little extra pussy now and then, if he dared, but he wasn’t ever going back to the joint. The nickel he’d done in San Quentin for pushing drugs had messed up his head, to say nothing about his body. He wasn’t going back there, no matter what.
He looked out the back window and watched daylight spread across the buildings, thanked his lucky stars that his Pops had been an undertaker. Man, he’d hated it when he was a kid, but now he realized how lucky he’d been to fall into this setup: a dead dad leaving his only child a great business.
And then he’d run into Milty, an old buddy from his cellblock who was a big time black-market broker of body parts. Actually, Milty had found him. And it sure shot him in the right direction financially when the mug pointed out the piles of dough to be made. Auston knew when to jump right into a good deal. Hell, what did he have to lose? Stiffs were stiffs.
He turned back to the desk and looked at the photograph again.
Funny, nothing about the mortuary bothered her, and there was only the occasional complaint about the smell of the juice. In the beginning, he’d told her straight out: No matter how you try to cover it up, there’s nothing to be done about the stink of embalming fluid. “It is what it is. It don’t smell good, and that’s that.” After a while, she stopped complaining. She did have her good points.
He remembered when he was fresh out of the can, they’d met on-line. He’d fallen for the first available piece of ass after a five-year drought.
He visualized their summer home hanging over the ocean on the Mendocino coast, their fancy little estate in Belvedere, a nest egg of two mil invested in blue chip stocks, and a lot of cold, hard cash in the safe deposit box.
Unfortunately, she not only knew about his assets, she knew where everything was stashed. If he were ever caught, she’d sure as shit find a way to pocket it all after turning her back on him. She was that kind of woman.
Like, weren’t they all?
He checked the telltale figures one more time. The money was still good, but for some reason it was getting harder and harder to justify what he was doing. It just didn’t feel right anymore. Maybe he should quit the illegal stuff. But what was it Milty had reminded him on numerous occasions: “It’s a rough business, Charlie, and once you’re in it, you’re in it. There’s no getting out … alive.”
* * *
On the way to his car, Walter Cooke thought he recognized a guy coming down the sidewalk toward him. He started to say “Hi,” then thought better of it. He felt safer not speaking to anyone in the Tenderloin.
After the guy was several paces away, the name came to him: Milton Hiller.
What’s Milton Hiller doing around here this time of night? Could he be dealing with Auston?
Hiller had approached him once about doing some cutting, but when he’d checked up on it, he’d found out it involved stolen cadavers. He’d declined. Since then, he’d heard various stories about Milty. None of them good.
Cooke stopped and went through the motions of patting his pockets, both jacket and pants, as if he’d forgotten something. Without turning his head all the way, he barely caught a glimpse of Hiller entering the alley that led to the back door of Auston’s Funeral Home. He retraced his steps and reached the alley just as Milty went through the same back door Cooke had just used.
Not good!
Cooke drove home, got several hours sleep and when he woke up, he called the police.
“Detective Yee?”
“Speaking.”
“Walter Cooke. You talked to me a couple of months back, wanted to know if I had any information on the illegal trafficking of cadavers.”
“Do you have something for me?”
“I’m not sure. It’s just that something happened last night that caused me to be more than a little suspicious.”
“And that was?”
He told her what he knew about Milty Hiller, and what had happened at Auston’s Funeral Home.
“Milty Hiller, huh?” Yee said. “Tell me again about the funeral home. Auston’s, right?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else you can add?”
“That’s as much as I know, Detective Yee.”
“Hmmm. Tell me, Mr. Cooke, would you be willing to work with us in putting an end to this sort of operation?”
“This is as far as I go.”
“Yeah, well, give it some thought. I’ll get back to you in a day or so, okay?”
Chapter 18
When Arina Diaz finished her shift, she raced out of Ridgewood. Just walking through the door energized her, gave her a sense of freedom that lifted her spirits.
She’d been having sleeping problems, hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep in more than two months. Most mornings she could barely drag herself out of bed.
Even the drab bus stop enclosure seemed inviting as she grabbed a seat on a long bench where two other hospital staffers were waiting. She watched traffic zip by for a while, then closed her eyes and let out a deep sigh as she focused on her feet. They were killing her.
She tried to see through the acrylic sheets that surrounded her, but some idiot had smeared white graffiti over most of the panels. It now looked more like an out-of-place country shed.
Her mood changed as she thought about returning to her lonely apartment. Being independent wasn’t always what it was cracked up to be. When she lived with her parents there were always people around for company, ready to discuss anything that was bothering her. That was especially true of her mother. They could argue over the least little thing, yet she was still her best friend.
It was funny how people said the two of them looked more like sisters than mother and daughter; they even dyed their hair the same bright red and wore each other’s clothes.
Arina missed not being with her mother, especially after working all day and dragging herself to an apartment that was filled with screaming silence.
All in the name of independence.
In the midst of thinking about Jorge and how he’d turned into nothing but a big pain in the ass, Katie Rifka from Labor/Delivery dropped down next to her.
“Hey, why didn’t you wait for me?” Rifka said.
“Sorry! Couldn’t spend one more
minute in that place. I was so pooped all I could think of was cutting out before the Supe started pushing me to put in another extra two hours. I’d all ready done more than enough, thank you very much.”
“That’s what you get for volunteering for extra time in the birthing rooms,” Rifka said. “Now you know why no one wants that gig.”
“I thought it would be fun.”
“Spoken like a cock-eyed Girl Scout, or the new girl on the block.”
“Well, we both know I’m not a Girl Scout.”
“Dumb, though. The last time the birthing room was laid on me,” Rifka said, “there were twin eight-year-olds running around while the grandmother sat there with a blissful look on her face crocheting. She totally, I mean totally, ignored the friggin’ brats.”
“I can see how that would be frustrating.”
“I don’t dig the birthing room concept in the first place,” Rifka said. “Why on earth would anyone in their right mind want to have their whole family around while they give birth?”
“Katie, you don’t understand. Family is everything.”
“All I know is if I’d spent nine months watching my belly grow like a weather balloon, I’d want a little peace and quiet before I had to take the screaming kid home.”
“Maybe labor’s not a walk in the park, but hell, we both know everything’s a trade off,” Arina said.
“For me,” Rifka said, “the trade off is keeping the birthing room quiet so that mommy and the over worked staff can function and survive. If that means stuffing everyone under twelve in the linen closet and pumping them full of Stadol, I’m all for it.”
Arina laughed. “You’re way too cynical. And normally I’d argue the point with you, but after the day I’ve had, I don’t have the energy.”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
“I don’t know … maybe if people weren’t so self-absorbed, so—”
“–rude. Unappreciative. Uncaring,” Rifka finished for her. “And remember, along with that trio comes, no good deed goes unpunished.” She paused for a moment and then laughed. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Arina, don’t listen to me. We both know I’m a real kvetch. I could go on for hours.”
