by Daniel Parme
This was perfect. A few more hours at work, and actually working, would help me hold my focus. I'd stopped going to the bar because I was still having trouble looking at women as anything other than sexy sides of beef hanging in the butcher's window. I'd spent the last few nights hiding out in my apartment, smoking dope, eating Mac 'n Cheese, watching television, and playing video games. Puzzle games. With no blood. I knew I’d held onto my NES and The Legend of Zelda for a reason. I'd been avoiding phone calls, allowing voicemail to politely lie for me. "I can’t answer the phone right now," my voice would say, "Leave a message, and I'll get back to you." It must be easy to keep a straight face when you have no face. Lucky voicemail.
"Sure, I can help you tomorrow night. What are we doing?"
He stood back up. "We're going to deliver a few bodies to a place in the South Side. Unclaimed bodies. Or unidentified. For research."
Oh, grand. "Yeah. I can do that."
"Good," he said, pitching his botched wire sculpture to the trash. "It'll be much easier with two people." He started towards his office.
"Hey, Dick. It's your job to do that?"
"What's that?"
I stood up. "To deliver the bodies. That's your job?"
"Oh. No," he said. "It's just something I do. I know the head of the research department. He's doing great things, or trying to anyway. I like to stop in and see how things are going." He headed for his office again, but stopped, this time of his own accord. "Since you're helping out tomorrow, and nobody's dying, how about you take the morning off. I'll still pay you for it."
"Sure thing." I wasn't positive staying home was going to be a good idea, but a day away from such easily accessible corpses couldn't hurt, particularly if I’d be handling body bags stuffed with the tasty morsels all night. I was sure I'd be able to find something to keep me busy. Maybe I'd pay some bills, go through my fan mail box. Maybe I'd just sit around and look at porno mags all day, wishing I could masturbate, thinking about how Virginia could very well have been the last girl I'd ever sleep with.
Maybe I'd get back to thinking about my poor dead friends and their poor grieving families. Maybe I'd get back to writing. After all, I now had plenty of material. I could do what the doctors said I'd have to do. I could get my hands dirty digging up all the memories I'd been trying not to think about. It would be the perfect distraction, the ideal way to keep myself from thinking about this new thing I was trying to keep out of my head.
I could get specific, down to the blood stain on Jason's jeans that looked just like South America. Down to the way the snow drift, steadily growing over the plane, threatened to swallow the entire scene. Down to the details of how I'd built myself a little shelter out of ski poles and scraps of metal.
Nothing takes you out of reality like a good day of creative self-wallowing.
I pulled the K-L file from its place in the drawer. "What time should I get here tomorrow?"
"Be here at six."
Chapter 20
After a gluttonous amount of sleep – imagine wine, grapes, and naked girls with fans – I was up and alert like I’d woken up to an eight ball on the nightstand, only without all the talking and fidgeting, without the numb teeth and nosebleeds, without the constant need to do another rail.
I cooked, ate, cleaned, showered. I looked at the clock every five or ten minutes, and the clock seemed to have some sort of problem with me because it wasn't moving. Stubborn fucker. It was only one-thirty, and I had nothing to do before meeting Pearson back at work. Sure, it was only four-and-a-half hours, but it felt like an eternity. I had too much energy to have nothing to do, and it was good energy, happy energy, the kind of energy that motivates you to do something, anything. Maybe it was more like doing coke than I thought.
I needed time to move faster. Or maybe I needed a time machine.
But since time moves to the beat of its own drum and time machines are hard to come by on such short notice, I figured I'd go to the bar. The bar was safe in the afternoon. There would be no women there, plump or otherwise, to get me salivating. My only temptation would be the booze, and I've never been much of an afternoon drinker. Not to mention, I had to go to work. I couldn't let myself get drunk. But the drive to the South Side would kill some time, as would all the circling to find a parking spot. And if I got bored, I could always just walk around and check out all the little shops.
Two-forty and Virginia wasn't working. She never started before four, which worked out quite well for her and her snooze button addiction.
Dominic was working. He was this queer little Italian guy, and I couldn't tell if he was actually queer, or Italian for that matter. The two of us were friendly, but by no means were we friends. He was a decent bartender, and I was a decent tipper, and that pretty much covered the essence of our relationship.
Since I couldn't let myself get drunk, I ordered a beer. "Is Virginia working tonight?"
"Yep." He threw his dishrag over his shoulder with a certain flare that is what had always led me to believe he might have been gay. "She doesn't start till eight tonight."
"Eight, eh?"
"Eight." He was bored. You could see it in the way he walked the bar, lifting ash trays and rubber mats, wiping the cool and already clean wood beneath them. You could hear it in his voice, which, masculine but with just a hint of lisp, was much less playful and energetic than usual. It sounded like he'd rather be, well, anywhere, doing anything else.
I too was bored. Already, I was bored. I watched Dominic as he searched for something to do, the way you look for anything to do when you've done nothing all day. On the television, some guy was talking about marinating techniques as he carved up a drool-inducing cut of pork, which, I've heard somewhere, is the closest to the flesh of a man. I'm pretty sure it was in a Scorsese flick. I guess it's not important.
I watched my drinks drain themselves like water down mostly-clogged pipes, slow but steady. I never managed to see the grain of the wood through the bottom of my glass, though, as Dominic topped off each glass before there was any reason for that half-full, half-empty debate.
Not that we'd have had that debate anyway; there was no conversation. Just two men killing time in a bar, picking up the occasional tip for keeping your chicken juicy or your angel food cake spongy and moist.
I tend to drink more when I don't talk. I always need to be doing something with my mouth, particularly when I'm so full of energy.
Five o'clock came with a heavy, red-headed Italian guy promising his secrets to a "heavenly dish of lamb and eggplant" spiced with something or other and served with something or other. I was too drunk to pay close attention.
After one more drink – a free drink meant to keep Dominic company on this slowest of days – I left a twenty on the bar (I'd been paying as I went, but he only charged me for half of my drinks), thanked him for his excellent service, and headed for the morgue by way of the Tenth Street Bridge.
I hoped the walk would sober me enough that Pearson wouldn't fire me. Since we were coming back to the South Side, I figured I'd just pick up my car at the end of the night.
The trip into town took only twenty minutes, leaving me with about an hour to let the late afternoon sun sweat the drunk out of me. I walked to the Point, the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela, the beginning of the Ohio. I watched the boats cruising up and down their respective rivers. And then a coal barge, massive and lumbering toward the Mississippi, all of its hard carbon stretching thirty yards ahead of the engine.
I stunk. I could smell it over the scents of flowing water and summer breeze. I could smell it through the mist of the fountain, behind me, with its tower of water. I could smell it, and it almost made me sick.
Dick would surely smell it. He would tell me not to come back to work tomorrow. He might even tell me to go home tonight. Whatever he might do, he might do it soon. It was almost six.
He smiled and said hello as I walked through the door, five minutes late
. "What's that smell?"
"Uh, what smell?" I tried to say it like a joke.
"Did you bathe in cologne?"
I had, in fact, very nearly bathed in cologne. The stench of me was so foul, at least in my drunken assessment of the situation, that I thought cologne-stink was better than alcohol-stink. Alcohol-stink will lose you your job. Cologne-stink will merely prompt a question or two.
"I spilled it all over myself before I left. I never wear it, but I’m going out later and thought I'd put some on tonight. Maybe hide the smell of death some. I guess that's what happens." God, I'm a horrible liar when I'm drunk.
"Yeah. That's pretty potent stuff, isn't it?" He was at the paper shredder, shredding away, julienning thin white lettuce into the salad bowl of the garbage can. "Good thing I'm the only one here who can smell anything." He tossed his thumb towards the back. "Eli has no sense of smell. He says it has something to do with some stupid thing he did when he was a kid. Lucky bastard."
"Where is Eli?"
"In the back, putzing around. I'm not exactly sure, actually."
I made sure not to get too close to him. Although on my way to work I had managed to find a store that carried cologne, the place didn't have any breath mints. Not even any gum. "Destroying the evidence?"
"Yeah, right," he said. He grabbed a piece of paper from the counter. "Here's a list of who we need to grab. If you want to start taking them to the truck, I'll be in to help in a few minutes."
So I took the list and went to the back. Eli was nowhere to be found. Focusing on the small print was still a bit of a challenge, but I managed. I bagged two of them, loaded them onto two gurneys, and wheeled them out to the truck, which was little more than a moving van rigged up with shelves enough to hold a dozen bodies. I bagged the next two and loaded them up, and then the last two, with no help from Pearson. I could have used it, too; these were not small people. They were each around two-hundred/two-hundred-fifty pounds. Four men, two women.
The lifting and moving seemed to do me some good though, as I felt more sober after all the physical exertion. The sweat, though, had begun to peek its head through the curtain of Brut I'd shrouded myself with, and again, I almost got sick.
After strapping everyone securely to their shelves, I lit a cigarette and leaned against the cool metal of the Deathmobile.
"Wake up, Travis. We have work to do."
I wasn't really sleeping, but I had let my smoke burn most of the way to the filter without hitting it once. This was going to be a long evening. I shook my head, a sleepy dog shaking visions of Milkbones and mailmen out of my ears, and climbed into the cab.
"Sorry about not helping load them up," he said, or groaned, as he pulled himself up to the driver's seat. "I had to make a quick phone call."
I told him not to worry about it and made use of the headrest. He turned on the radio. Light jazz. Light jazz and the low roar of the engine. I didn't have a prayer.
He was kind enough not to wake me until we'd reached our destination, wherever that was. "I don't normally let people sleep on the job, you know."
"Sorry."
"Don't worry about it. It's not like we were working. Just driving." He opened his door and stepped onto the pavement.
We were in an alley or small side street that I didn’t recognize. He had backed the truck up to a loading dock, and a large garage door exposed what looked like, well, someplace that might have a loading dock.
"Well, let's go," he said.
I thought it odd that no one was there to meet us, but it seemed that Pearson had done this a hundred times, and that nobody ever met him at the door.
I hadn't thought to load the gurneys, so we carried each body in one by one, Pearson at the feet, and laid them on tables in a very cold room. I could see my breath.
"This place used to be storage for some meat-packing company. This cooler is almost a hundred years old." Dick seemed awed by this cooler. People are into whatever they're into, I suppose.
After setting the last body on the last table, Dick told me he'd be out in a minute. The way he said it, I knew he meant for me to wait with the truck, so I did. As interested as I was about what sort of research lab would be housed in a meat locker, he was the boss.
I smoked another cigarette, really this time, and took note of the way my head was clearing out. My thoughts were less fuzzy around the edges, and I didn't get dizzy when I stood up after tying a shoelace that had come undone. I was glad to be sobering; it was a cool evening with a clear sky and just the hint of a breeze. It would have been a shame to waste the entire evening, working or not, in that place between drunk and not quite devoid of alcohol.
Just as I pulled my foot off the remnants of my cigarette, Pearson came outside, followed by a very tall, very bearded man. "Travis, this is Gregor. He's the head of research here."
Gregor gave me a healthy handshake. "Nice to meet you, Travis." His voice was deep, low, the kind of voice that would have been perfect for telling bedtime stories.
I returned his hello and asked exactly what it was that he was researching.
"It's a little complicated. Essentially, we're studying and comparing the vitamin, mineral, and nutritional values of humans to those of cows."
Yeah. I was interested. "The nutritional value of humans? Seriously?"
"Seriously." Gregor lit himself a clove cigarette, the sweet smoke a nice break from the smell of death. "It started because of Mad Cow disease, actually. I was curious to see if this was something that could happen to other species. And well, the most unique and complex species on the planet is people." He elbowed Dick. "It's amazing. The government will give you a grant for just about anything."
“Wait,” I said. “What about Kuruu?”
They both looked at me like I knew some secret I shouldn’t have.
“The laughing death? How do you know about that?”
“Internet.”
“Oh. Well, this is a little more complicated than that. I have work to do now, but maybe the next time we meet we’ll talk about it some more.”
That satisfied me more the moment, but I had another question, just the same. “How many people do you, uh, study?”
"We have sort of a deal with the coroner's office," he answered. "People who die – I mean, if someone dies and there's no relatives or friends or anybody else who claims the body, Dick brings them here for us to study."
"Normally," Dick said, "we'd just cremate them or give them to a medical school."
"Why do you bring them at night?"
Gregor said this was sort of a side project for him. During the day, he worked at some lab in Oakland, amidst all the other medical buildings. "This," he said, "is more of a personal interest, so it's almost like a private endeavor. I don't get paid for it. It's just a hobby, really."
"Interesting hobby."
Dick agreed, with a strange inflection in his voice and a knowing look on his face, and wished Gregor good luck with his work. "I have to get home," he said. "I promised the wife we'd catch a late movie."
Gregor thanked us and went back inside, and we climbed back into the truck.
I was so focused on what sort of purpose Gregor's research could possibly serve that I forgot to ask Dick to drop me off at my car. We'd already woven through the back streets of the South Side and were across the Tenth Street Bridge, near the jail. "Oh, shit. Hey, Dick, could you let me out? I'm parked on Carson."
He laughed, but not at me, really. "You should have told me that before. I guess you were too worried about whether I'd notice you were drunk, eh?"
I went red. "Yeah, I guess I was."
Chapter 21
"What the hell are you talking about?" Adam was on his way to needing another cab this evening.
Luckily, he had Dave with him to drive. "Mad Cow? Nutritional value of people? That's crazy, man. Where is this place?"
"I'm not really sure. I told you, I slept on the way there, and I was a little
preoccupied when we left, so I didn't pay attention." I shook my head and took a drink. "I think it's somewhere in the twenties. Like, 23rd-ish, maybe."
"I can't believe you don't know where it is." Dave stole a cigarette from Adam's pack.
I couldn't believe it either. This was one of those things that you ought to remember in every detail, especially when it happened no more than an hour ago. I felt a tinge of humiliation somewhere in the heat of my face, and I tried to recover, well, something. Some sense of not being a total waste of space, a total idiot. "I am going to another one of those meetings, though. Tomorrow night."
Adam's face lit up. "Really? Awesome. What time?"
"Seven-thirty. They have a password and everything. It's fucking crazy, man."
"What's the password?"
I figured that Adam, the lit major that he was, would appreciate it. "'I should have been a pair of ragged claws, scuttling across the floors of silent seas.'"
"Eliot. Nice. That's a good one. How'd they come up with that, I wonder." He actually stroked his chin.
"The guy, Synchek, he says he's just always liked that line, so why not."
I suppose I should have, but I didn't feel like I was betraying anyone's trust. Yes, it was a secret society kind of thing, but it's not like I was a member. And I only told Adam because he'd get a kick out of it. Besides, what harm could possibly come from Adam knowing the password?
If I were ten years old, and if this were that little clubhouse with the no girls allowed sign, there's no question that my membership would have been terminated following this slip of the tongue. An honor exists among children that is somehow lost as we get older, and I am ashamed to say that I too have been affected by this phenomenon.
I didn't think about it like that at the time, and neither did my friends. Why should they have?
"Maybe I'll stop by," Adam said in that joking manner that suggests just a hint of seriousness. "Think they'd mind?"
I let out an exaggerated breath, not quite a laugh, and tried my hand at some of Virginia's acutely skilled tone. "No, I don't think they'd mind at all. Seems to me like they're pretty much open to the public."
