Wetbones

by John Shirley

  Garner had been to the Western Union; he had some money on him now, himself…

  And he realized he had crossed to this corner only because he'd glimpsed the drug-dealing Set happening down here. This wasn't the way to Blume's place. He should've turned down the Boulevard.

  Goddamn, he thought, it's got me already. Two lousy runs and it's got me.

  Well, it asked him, so what? I mean, what's the use? Constance probably isn't really alive. The guy probably had some other girl call and say she was okay so we'd stop looking for him. But that didn't make sense – they'd expect someone on the other line to know her voice. Okay – so she was alive that day. His birthday… He's probably killed her by now…

  But it didn't seem as if he planned to. Not right away.

  Suppose she is alive? What of it? You'll never find her. He can torture her to his sick heart's content – might be cutting off more of her fingers right now – and you could be within a block of her and never know and probably never see her.

  So you might as well give up. You give that money to Blume to continue the investigation, it'll be thrown away. He's a waste of time. He's hopeless. It's all hopeless. Might as well use the money to get loaded…

  Thinking all this, he'd drifted into the Set.

  No one crowded around him, as they would a white guy who looked like he had money, because, instead, he was bandaged and dirty and dishevelled. And he thought for a moment he might get through without buying. He was walking a razor edge; horror on one side and drug lust on the other. He wanted to buy; his bowels felt like they'd let go with the excitement of it. And he very much didn't want to but his hands were clammy, his heart thumped with fear.

  Are you crazy, man? What happened last time? Beat to shit in a basement!

  But the addict in him superimposed images of the pipe over that, and soothed him: Don't worry. Not this time. This time you'll do it differently. You won't get hurt. You won't get ripped off. This time…

  "You lookin' for something, man?" A hispanic guy with wrap-around sunglasses and a red kerchief head-band. It was so dark out here, how did the guy see with sunglasses on?

  "What you got?" Garner heard himself say.

  "Doves. Choo want it or not, this ain't cool we stan' around an' chit."

  Constance…

  But Garner nodded and fished four twenties out of his pocket. The guy swept them from his hand and with the other dropped four irregular white pellets in his palm. Drifted quickly into the Set.

  Garner turned around, walked back toward the liquor store, frowning. Something about that exchange…

  In the light of a neon beer sign in the store window, he examined his purchase. It looked a little too white and crumbly. He tasted it. Aspirin and baking soda.

  He stared into his palm. He'd been gaffel'd. Ripped off.

  He tossed the white pellets into the gutter. A weight slipped from his heart.

  "You look pretty happy about it," said a deep voice, just in front of him. He looked up and saw a tall black man in a turtleneck sweater. Gold watch on his wrist. He was somewhere between forty and sixty. Hard to say in this light…

  But somehow Garner knew the guy was a minister.

  "They gaffel you?" the man asked. When Garner nodded the man said, "You were smiling. How much money you lose?"

  "Eighty bucks." He noticed two women standing a little behind the man. They had stacks of leaflets in their hands. Smiling black ladies. They seemed amused. The man they worked with just stood there, rocking slightly on his loafers, hands in his pockets, looking at Garner casually but with an irritating knowingness.

  ''You a minister?" Garner asked.

  "Pastor Ray Brick, First Congregational." They shook hands.

  I was a Methodist pastor, if you can believe that. Still am officially, I guess."

  "I can believe it. Man, we lose 'em all the time. You used to be a drug counsellor – in recovery yourself?"

  "You guessed it."

  "Uh huh. That's a pattern. One in four long term addicts-in-recovery relapse years later. Most of 'em don't make it back. What was your excuse?"

  "My daughter was kidnapped. Probably murdered."

  He looked impressed. "That's a pretty good one. You had enough, out here?"

  Garner stared. His guts knotted.

  Don't waste your time, the addict said. You can be more careful next time you buy.

  "Let me ask you something," Brick said, seeing his hesitation. "You think it was a coincidence, you getting ripped off and me coming along like that? Well, it was. But ydu should know – God's the only one can arrange coincidences. You were happy you hadn't got real crack. You don't really want it."

  Garner nodded, slowly. "I – was on my way to meet a man… might help me find my daughter."

  "That's pretty important. How about we walk you a ways in that direction – till you get out of this neighbourhood. Can we do that?"

  Garner nodded, enormously relieved. "I'd appreciate it." He felt tears welling. "I really would."

  Blume's door was open about two inches. Typical of a drunk to space out something basic like closing your door behind you. The guy was probably useless as a detective, this far into alcoholism. But then, Garner thought, I've been pretty useless as a pastor lately.

  He knocked and waited. No reply. No sound of movement from inside. A little lamplight spilled through the door and the angry mutter of a TV set.

  The agency had said Blume hadn't been in for three days; hadn't been answering his phone. "He goes on these drunks from time to time," his supervisor said. "I don't know why we never get around to firing him"

  Garner pushed the door open and went in. It was a cluttered studio apartment, smelling powerfully of a catbox and some hidden rot. The cabinets and drawers had been opened, their junky contents dumped on the floor. A half empty bottle of Jack Daniels on the floor beside him, Blume sat facing Garner in a green cloth easy chair in the very centre of the room. He was in his underwear, sitting in front of an old black and white TV set currently showing a wonky double image of Barbara Walters interviewing another "reclusive" movie star. Blume was staring at it, motionlessly, unblinking. Garner could see the gray and white TV screen reflected in both Blume's eyes in nearly perfect miniature. Beyond him, above the crap-lumpy cat box, was a half open window onto a fire escape. No sign of the cat. The cat had abandoned ship.

  There was a book held in Blume's hands. A bio graphy. There was something about the way it was set up in his hands that made Garner feel sure it had been put there by someone else, set up like a prop. The title of the book was Remembering Trotsky

  Garner didn't bother saying anything. He took a moment to decide if he wanted to walk around behind Blume. He hated to give them the satisfaction. But in the end, he did it. He stepped behind Blume and saw the ice pick stuck to the handle in the back of Blume's skull. Just one small trickle of blood dried on the bald scalp beneath the handle.

  Garner turned away, grimacing, thinking it would have been a better effect if they'd turned off the TV. He caught a tiny blinking red light in a far corner, next to a huge heap of old Los Angeles Times. It was a call-recorded light on a Sears answering machine, the phone on top of it.

  He circled Blume widely and went to the phone, hit the answering machine's play button. There was a message from the agency, telling Blume if he didn't at least call in before midnight he was fired. And then there was a message from another of Blume's clients.

  A petulant, phone-fuzzed voice said, "Blume? You there? No? Okay. This is Jeff Teitelbaum. I get this cryptic phone message from you saying that Sam Denver was seen at the sites of three Wetbones murders – if I'm hearing this slurred-up mumbling of yours right it says 'not long after killings'… What the fuck? You trying to give me a heart attack with this cryptic shit? If you think my brother is one of those Wetbones victims just fucking come out and say so and get your ass over here. You can't leave me messages like this and just… Shit! I'm at the Culver City hospital right now but I'll be
home in a half hour or so… I want you over here personally.

  My address in case you're too blitzed to find your fucking rolodex is…"

  Garner dug through Blume's things for a pen, finally located a stub of a pencil and scribbled the address down on the back of a tract for Brick's drug recovery program. He folded it up and carefully put it in his pocket, then looked around for notes or tape recordings or photos – anything pertaining to Blume's investigation.

  He found nothing relevant. They'd have taken anything like that, of course.

  He made a quick, anonymous call to the LAPD to report the body, then hurried out, keeping his mind focused on his errand so as not to think about crack. Hurrying to find a bus that would take him to Jeff Teitelbaum's part of town.

  Los Angeles

  "You're really not going to that party?" Jeff asked again, as they walked into the overlit, almost empty lobby of the hospital. The one Mitch had run away from. "I mean, Christ, you got a deal trembling on the verge with Arthwright. Not a good time to snub his party."

  "Arthwright." Prentice grimaced. "I don't think I want to know Arthwright all that well."

  "It's your career."

  Prentice shrugged. What was he supposed to tell Jeff? That he kept hearing Amy in his head warning him away from Arthwright and Lissa? That he was afraid of Lisa – for no clear reason at all? That he didn't quite believe there was a party to go to – and he wasn't sure why? And he hadn't yet told Jeff where the party was. The Doublekey Ranch. After what the old lady with the parrot had told him about her niece's death, he didn't much want to go out to the ranch…

  Jeff went on, "So, did the doctor tell you what he wanted?"

  "You can ask him yourself," Prentice said, nodding toward the small white-coated brown-skinned man coming through the double doors into the lobby. Doctor Drandhu.

  Drandhu advanced, one hand extended for shaking, smiling nervously. "Mr. Prentice! Mr. Teitelbaum! Correct?" His accent was native Indian, but his English was otherwise controlled with a brittle formality as he shook both their hands with fingers that felt like they were made of bird-bones, and said, "I am thankful you were able to come. Oh you have hurt yourself, Mr. Prentice?" He was looking at the bandage on Prentice's left hand. The cut still smarted dully.

  "Yeah. On a busted bottle in the tub." He still felt strange after the dream in the tub. He wanted to run out and get a drink

  "Not a very professional bandage, Mr. Prentice, would you like me to…?"

  "No, no thanks. What's up? You said it was something about Mitch?"

  "It is related, yes, yes. Please. There is someone I must show to you." He led the way through the double doors, down the antiseptic-reeking halls. "I asked you to come because your brother, Mr. Teitelbaum, was one of my first ES patients…"

  "ES?" Jeff asked. "You've got a name for it?"

  Drandhu smiled shyly. "Emaciation Syndrome. This is my term. When I find out more about it I will write a paper. But there is so little I understand now, I am sad to say. So very little. I am a little frightened, to be frank, and feeling very much alone. When I try to interest my colleagues they say I am mistaking AIDS or drug-induced for something distinct. But I don't think so, no. The patients are negative for AIDS and… no, there are no drug indications. But the wasting and the self mutilation…"

  "My ex-wife had the same thing. If it is a disease," Prentice said.

  Drandhu looked at him with interest. "Oh yes really? That is very interesting. They knew each other, the boy and your wife?"

  "A little. But…" He shrugged. He didn't want to get into it that far, yet. "Anyway, yeah: it occurred to me and Jeff that it's just too big a coincidence, Mitch and Amy having the same kind of sickness. Mitch had just started to lose weight but the rest of it was there."

  "I will talk to you about that just a little later if you do not mind. I would like to take some notes. But now there is a man here with ES – he asked to speak to you. He said he knew what was causing his problem but didn't want to tell me. I think he is afraid… Oh, yes, here he is, here is – Mr. Kenson?"

  They'd stepped into a private room; a generic hospital room. Kenson was lying on a white hospital bed. He was strapped onto the bed, under the sheet, its mattress cranked up so he was near sitting position. The straps weren't psycho-restraints, Prentice judged – they were to keep him from falling off the bed. And Kenson looked as if he could fall off, quite easily: he was a shrunken caricature of the man Prentice had watched on TV years before. His eyes were sunken and unaligned, looking at separate parts of the room. His lips were flattened onto his few remaining teeth. His arms were bandaged wrist to shoulders. A bottle of glucose water hung from a portable stand, feeding into a tube that bit with a steel needle into a vein on the back of Kenson's bony hands. "It must have hurt like a bitch when they put that IV needle in," Jeff said softly, as they came to stand beside the bed.

  Kenson nodded. "Did."

  Drandhu seemed flustered by the lack of introductions. "I should perhaps say, this is Mr. Louis Kenson, and this is Mr. Teitelbaum and Mr. Prentice his friend. Mr. Teitelbaum's brother was the one I told you about, Mr. Kenson -" Drandhu turned hastily to Jeff. "I do not mean to lapse confidentiality, no, but it seemed so important to find the connections -"

  "Don't worry about it," Jeff said. He drew a chair from the opposite wall and sat down by the bed. "You wanted to talk to us, Kenson, I think?"

  "Yeah." His voice a croak. "I thought maybe you'd seen some things. I mean… You know what your brother was into? See, if I tell the doctor here, he's going to think…" He paused to wet the scraps that were his lips. "He's going to call in the psychiatrists… I figure if I have somebody else here who knows… I was hoping you might have found the kid. Brought him here too. I guess not huh?''

  Jeff shook his head. Prentice looked around for a chair. There wasn't another one. He was suddenly very tired. He hadn't been sleeping much. And looking at Kenson made him feel drained himself

  "Well – maybe we shouldn't talk about this," Kenson went on hoarsely. His voice drifting to join his gaze which was lost somewhere in the middle distance. "Maybe not. No I don't think so. If you haven't talked to the kid."

  Goddamn it, Prentice thought, I want to know. "We haven't talked to Mitch lately. But I know what really happened to a little girl named Wendy and her mother, for example." That was mostly a bluff.

  Jeff looked over with puzzled surprise. One of Kenson's eyes stopped its roving on Prentice. "Do you? Well then. Okay. Let's talk."

  "Drandhu to Pediatrics…" A nurse's voice from some distant intercom speaker.

  "Oh my gosh," Dr. Drandhu muttered. "They are calling me." He took a tape recorder from his pocket, no bigger than the kind of transistor-radio that mental patients carry about with them, and hung it on its little leather strap from the IV stand, just under the bottle of glucose water. "Please – I have to go upstairs and check in. But it is I think all right if I record this?''

  Kenson gave a leathery sigh. "Fuck I don't know. I guess so. I don't 'know why I'm bein' so careful. I guess it's habit. Thirty years of hiding things…"

  Drandhu switched on the tape recorder, then fluttered around Kenson for a few moments, writing down his pulse and temperature.

  After the doctor had gone, Kenson told them about Mrs. Stutgart, and the Akishra. Jeff listened with polite amusement. Obviously not believing a word of it. But Prentice felt the rightness of the story. And he could almost hear Amy, somewhere, saying, I suppose you know your girlfriend is one of them. A pleasure vampire, in more ways than one.

  "I was one of them for a long time," Kenson was saying. "But after a while, see, it's not enough for the Akishra just to be there to take their share of stuff psychically. They move in on your body. They get to be part of you. Physically. And I couldn't hang with that. So I started backing off – and then Denver started holding me prisoner. Using me for their games. Which sure, I deserved, I can see that. It's karma energy, you know? But I waited for a chance, and
I stole a car. Denver's toy-boys came chasing after me and I took off into the desert and the car died under me and then this crazy old desert rat came along. He says he was watching us the whole time, following along. He puts me in his pick up and takes me to his place and the toy-boys leave off the chase. They're kind of scared of this old guy for some reason. Denver says the old guy's an unknown quantity and he's protected so they stay away from him. His name's Drax. So anyway, Drax brings me to town and leaves me at a doctor and they send me here."

  "The Akishra…" Prentice said. He could almost visualize them. Why? Why did it seem familiar?

  "You have to understand about the Akishra, man, or you don't understand anything. I mean, the real nitty gritty about these fuckers. Hand me that water glass, will you, I need to wet my… thanks." He paused to sip the water. Took a deep, weary breath and went on, "The name Akishra, see, is from Hindu mythology," Kenson was saying. "People in the Orient, they know all about 'em. They're astral parasites. They're… they look like worms, big transparent worms. Sorta silvery. Bunches of them. Never only one, except the Slabfathers. The Akishra Prime. You can't see Akishra with the naked eye. Your hand goes right through 'em without feeling a thing. But they're there. They seem immaterial, like less than fog, but they're material in a way. Some kind of subatomic particle stuff they're made out of, Judy says. And yeah, they're here. They're all around people. Especially addicted people. Mythical! Shit. I wish to fuck they were, fellas."

  There was just a touch of theatrical delivery left in Kenson. The actor in him seemed to enjoy telling the story, despite his wretchedness. "You have to get this clear: the Akishra are everywhere and always have been. Everybody – and I mean everybody – who is addicted to anything, well, the Akishra's involved. Cigarettes? Right. The ones we call the Alpha Flutters are there. The smaller Astral worms. If you could see a cigarette smoker the way a trained eye can see him -" He laughed bitterly. "- cigarette addict has this… it looks sort of like an Indian chiefs head-dress made out of these floating astral worms. They're stickin' out of the smoker's head, see. Attached to him at one end – their bodies floating up there like seaweed.