Sunglasses After Dark

by Nancy A. Collins

  "Get away from her, hyena!" It was Ghilardi's voice. "Vile, idiot thing! Wasted in life, useless in death."

  Chaz's body dispersed like a cloud caught in a high wind, and Ghilardi's oscillating blueness was back.

  "Sonja, I've brought you some help. Sonja?"

  Her eyesight had dwindled to monochrome tunnel vision. She felt like she was peering at a Sony Watchman through a cardboard tube, but she recognized the smiling bag lady bent over her.

  I'm hallucinating. None of this is real. She hadn't been certain until the appearance of the golden-eyed hag. It was all an illusion, a dream before dying.

  The seraphim trilled crystalline bird song and thrust a gleaming hand into Sonja's guts and there was no more contemplating the nature of reality and illusion.

  * * *

  Chapter Ten

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  The maître d's scorn was palpable. The very idea that she would set foot in his restaurant outfitted in jeans and a leather jacket filled him with cold contempt.

  "Mademoiselle has been waiting for you," he said stiffly. "Please follow me." The head waiter turned his back on her with military precision and marched into the main dining room. Sonja followed, staring at the pristine tablecloths and untouched place settings of fine china and expensive crystal. Although the room seemed to be deserted, she could hear the low murmur of polite conversation going on around her.

  The maître d' led her to a table located directly under a large crystal chandelier, which swayed and jingled to itself. Denise Thorne sat at the table, dressed in a paisley miniskirt, white midcalf go-go boots, a fringed buckskin vest, and a shapeless, wide-brimmed hat. The maître d' did not seem to think her wardrobe inappropriate.

  "Thank you, Andre." Denise smiled, and the waiter retired with a formal bow. Denise turned her attention to her guest. "Please, won't you sit down?"

  "Am I dead?"

  "What makes you think I could answer that question?"

  "Because you're dead."

  "So you keep insisting. But you wear my flesh and have my memories."

  "But I'm not you. I'm not Denise."

  "So who are you, then? A ghost? A reincarnated soul? A demon?"

  "I… I don't know."

  "But you know you aren't me. How can you be so sure?"

  "Because you're there and I'm here."

  "Very scientific."

  "Okay! So I don't know who I am, or even what. Does it really matter anymore? Your father denies me and your mother thinks you're dead."

  "They're your parents, too."

  Sonja shook her head. "My father was a rapist. My mother was a London gutter."

  "And the Other? Is it your Siamese twin or an unwelcome lodger? Or is it you?"

  "Look, I've been through this already. Maybe things aren't as clear-cut as Ghilardi made them out to be. I've known that since Pangloss tried to bribe me into joining forces with him. But I'm not the Other and I'm not Denise Thorne."

  "You saw what the Other was like when it was fully ascendant, when your personality refused to function. Was that the Other you're familiar with?"

  "Look, what are you trying to get me to admit to? That I'm a figment of Denise Thorne's imagination? That the Other is my id and not a separate entity? Okay, I'll admit those are possibilities, but I don't know if it's true. Maybe I'm a synthesis of Denise and Morgan's egos. Hell, I don't even know if you're Denise."

  "That's right. You don't." Denise lifted a wineglass to her lips. A drop of wine fell from its rim, staining the tablecloth bright red.

  Sonja pounced, digging her fingers into Denise's placid face. The skin came away with a thick, syrupy sound and Sonja stared at the woman smiling at her.

  "Time to unmask," said the woman with mirrored eyes. "No more pretending."

  "Hey, Moe! Gotta fresh'un for ya!"

  Brock looked up from his egg-salad sandwich as the attendant, a grinning black man, trundled another gurney into the morgue's basement.

  "Great. Just great. Can't a guy finish his break without being interrupted by a corpse?"

  "Hey, you knew th' job was dangerous when you took it," chided the attendant. He thrust a clipboard at Brock. "You wanna sign for this mama?"

  Moe Brock quickly scribbled his initials and the corresponding time of arrival while trying to juggle the uneaten portion of his sandwich and a cup of coffee. "A woman, huh?"

  "Yeah. Real looker, too. If you like 'em ventilated. The ME said he'd be in to give her a checkup within an hour. Catch ya later, Moe."

  "Yeah. See ya." Brock took a quick swallow from his thermos and scanned the ME's street report: unidentified Caucasian female, age approximately twenty-five. Great, another shooting.

  "C'mon, honey," he sighed. "Let's get you situated. It's not your fault you screwed up my break, right?"

  The morgue dated back before the Depression and showed its age. The walls were covered in white porcelain tiles, except for the patches where squares had been pried away by bored municipal employees, exposing the fossilized epoxy. What wasn't tile was stainless steel. The place echoed like Mammoth Cave, amplifying the squeaking of the gurney's wheels to an unpleasant degree.

  Brock maneuvered the gurney into the small, well-lit autopsy room located off the storage facilities. A large stainless-steel table, complete with drains and a microphone dangling from an overhead boom, dominated the available space.

  He swiftly transferred his charge to the autopsy table and began the morbidly intimate act of undressing a dead stranger. Every article of clothing had to be tagged, bagged, and recorded in case further examination was required by the forensic boys. Once that was taken care of, it was up to the medical examiner to continue the stripping.

  The ME would crack her skull and lay bare the folds and creases of her brain, open her rib cage like a Venetian blind, juggle her liver and lights, and explore the cold cradle of her womb for signs of violation or stillborn offspring. Then, and only then, would she be handed back to Brock. After her secrets had been revealed, he would deftly mend the wounds made by murderer and coroner alike, so her loved ones would be able to identify her.

  They called him the Tailor. Never to his face, but he knew that's what they called him. He didn't mind. He'd inherited his dexterity with needle and thread from his maternal grandfather, who'd spent his life working in the Garment District. Let them call him whatever they liked. He was good at his job. The last guy they had doing it left the poor bastards looking like escapees from a Frankenstein movie.

  He glanced at the corpse's face. Yeah, she was a looker, all right. At least she'd missed getting a slug in the skull. God, he hated those! Three bullets at close to point-blank range. Whoever did it ruined a perfectly good leather jacket, not to mention the woman inside it. He hoped he could finish before the rigor mortis set in. Funny thing, though, she still had her sunglasses on.

  The jacket slid off easily enough, and he saw the flesh of her inner arms. Junkie. That explained it. Dope deal gone wrong. He folded the jacket carefully. He'd had one just like it, back in college, and it'd taken him years to break it in just right.

  He reached for the mirrored sunglasses that covered the dead woman's eyes. One of the lenses was cracked but still intact. He wondered what color her eyes were.

  The body twitched, but it didn't surprise Brock. In the ten years he'd spent prepping and stitching the dead, he'd seen plenty of twitching cadavers. Some jerked like poorly manipulated marionettes. He'd even seen one sit up. It was just the delayed response of the muscles, like the dead frogs and dry-cell batteries back in high-school biology class.

  The dead woman's cold hand clamped around his right wrist. Dark lights, like those left by flashbulbs, swam before his eyes. He watched dumbly as the cadaver's abdomen hitched sharply. Once. Twice. For some reason he saw himself sitting behind the wheel of his old Chevy, cursing the motor. The dead woman coughed and a lung full of black blood gushed forth. Brock felt his egg-salad sandwich struggling to freedom. He tried to pull away, but the corp
se wouldn't let go. So he screamed. It echoed and re-echoed in his ears. The dead woman relinquished her hold in favor of sitting up and Moe Brock fled through the swinging doors of the morgue.

  Sonja Blue sat up on the autopsy table, her hands laced gingerly over her stomach. She wasn't sure what the seraphim had done to her, but it'd worked. And not too soon, either. She shuddered at the thought of regaining consciousness as the coroner's electric bone-saw bit into her skull.

  Miraculous resurrection or not, she felt like shit. Her head was full of burning water the color of midnight. Another coughing spasm shook her as she slid off the table. The room tilted under her feet.

  No! Not now! Not here! People will be down here in a few minutes…

  She caught sight of her folded jacket and groaned when she saw the bullet holes. Oh, well, maybe if I use some more electrician's tape…

  She staggered out of the morgue and headed down the corridor leading to the loading dock where the mortuaries came to pick up the dearly departed. Luckily, she'd come to in that particular morgue before and was familiar with the layout, so there wasn't any problem escaping.

  She was vaguely aware of a terrible pain in her gut, but that no longer mattered. What mattered was the anger. The anger fed on the pain, creating a hatred crystalline in its purity. The rage in her unfurled like an exotic, night-blooming orchid. And there was power in the hate.

  She felt its siren call, beckoning her to relinquish control and surrender to its acid embrace. In the past she'd always panicked, disturbed by the visions it conjured, and refuted its source. She'd allowed it to run riot, and when it was sated, she'd blamed the Other for its excesses. Now, for the first time since she'd been remade in Sir Morgan's image, she did not deny. herself the pleasure of exulting in her fury.

  She embraced the hate as part of her, as natural as breathing or pissing. She felt the power as it coursed through her, teasing her with serpent tongues and electric sparks. She looked down at her hands and saw they were sheathed in a roiling red-black plasma.

  She moved through the night streets, unseen but not unfelt. Her passage was marked by a shock wave that affected those around her like skiffs caught in the wake of a battle cruiser.

  A mother slapped her child, then slapped it harder when it began to cry.

  A small boy pinched his infant sister hard enough to raise a bruise on her defenseless flesh.

  A bored housewife glanced at the cutlery rack, then back at her husband, sprawled before the blaring television set.

  A thin young man with horn-rims and hair cut so close his scalp gleamed through the stubble pulled down the shade in his bedroom before opening the dresser drawer where the two deer rifles, five handguns, and five hundred rounds of ammo were stashed.

  Wrapped in each other's arms, amid tangled sheets and sweaty afterglow, two lovers began to quarrel.

  The family dog growled, its ears laid flat against its skull, then drew the blood from the master's hand.

  Sonja Blue was aware of her handiwork on a level alien to humans. She was with each of them, in some fashion, when they reacted to her goad.

  A dozen outbursts occurred with every step she took. Some reacted with petty tirades. Others were far more brutal. She did not create the resentment and frustration locked inside these incidental strangers; she merely permitted its expression. Pangloss had been right: the seeds of self-destruction lurked within every mind she touched. Humans hungered for extinction, be it their own or their enemies. She felt herself growing stronger with every outbreak, as she incorporated their rage into her own.

  Part of her was repulsed by the careless sowing of discord and struggled to make itself heard over the blood lust singing in her veins. She moved through the city, touching off a thousand domestic quarrels, barroom brawls, backroom altercations, and rapes. She heard the police sirens and the strident squawking of ambulances as they responded to the epidemic of shootings and stabbings. Good. That would give her the cover she needed. She nimbly dodged a police car, its lights flashing and siren cranked to full volume, as it rounded the corner.

  She laughed, and it seemed as if the sky trembled.

  "Claude? Claude? Claude?"

  Although distorted by echo, the name sounded familiar. Maybe it was his. He tried to open his eyes and see who was calling, but the lids were epoxied shut. Who'd want to do a dumb thing like that? He moved to rub the glue from his eyes, but his arms refused to respond properly. He felt as if he was moving underwater.

  "Claude?"

  The lassitude began to seep away, to be replaced by a sense of well-being that was almost frightening. When he tried to remember why he was happy, his head began to swell and his eyeballs throbbed in their sockets.

  Why think? Just accept.

  The words felt good in his head, even if they weren't his own. Seemed like good advice. Why fight it? He settled back in the comfortable leather armchair, determined to follow the not-voice's suggestion. He turned his attention to his surroundings. He was in a sumptuously appointed apartment, dressed in a quilted smoking jacket. He tried to bring the room and its furnishings into sharper focus, but a lancet of pain jabbed his frontal lobes.

  Just accept, warned the friendly not-voice.

  "I'm so glad everything's been taken care, aren't you? Now we can be alone."

  Someone was speaking to him. A woman. No, not a woman, a girl. But where was she? He was wary of looking around, fearful that the pain would return.

  Denise was sitting on the bed. Claude couldn't remember seeing her there before. She looked just like she had in his dream. She was smiling timidly, her cheeks flushed.

  "My parents are so happy you found me. My father will repay you handsomely." She smiled at him and the room flickered. Denise was dressed in a long, flowing gown with a golden diadem perched atop her head. "Half a kingdom is a just reward for the return of a lost princess." The diadem disappeared, although the gown stayed. It was virgin white, her cleavage frothy with lace and satin ribbons. Claude ached to touch it.

  Denise left the bed and came to Claude. He couldn't move or talk or think. All he could do was stare at the beautiful creature nesting in his lap. The dress rearranged itself into a bridal gown, complete with veil. Claude brushed his fingers against lace and mother-of-pearl buttons. Real. It was all real.

  Of course it's real. Just accept.

  But what about Sonja Blue? She's Sonja Blue, isn't she?

  The Denise on his lap shuddered. "I'm so glad you got rid of that nasty woman. The one who went around saying she was me. As if that wasn't the silliest thing anyone ever heard of! Why, she didn't even look like me!" Denise leaned forward and kissed his cheek, causing him to forget he hadn't mentioned Sonja Blue out loud.

  It had been a long time since he'd last had sex. He was uncomfortably aware of how hard his cock was getting. He was afraid of insulting Denise by prodding her. But she was so close, so warm. He inhaled, savoring her scent. He was surprised by the fragrance of tea rose that clung to her. His aunt smelled of roses. It was hardly the perfume he associated with a blushing nymphet princess.

  Denise's flesh became transparent, revealing the skull underneath the skin. The virgin expanse of the bridal gown was mottled with fungus, as if it'd been underground for a long time. The lidless eyes goggled at him from their bared orbits.

  The scream wouldn't come out; it sat in his chest like a dead weight.

  "What's wrong, Claude? Were you thinking about that horrible woman?" Denise was once again wrapped in flesh and unsoiled satin. "You know how it affects you, and when you're upset, I'm upset. You don't want to see me upset, do you?"

  "No… no, of course not."

  "Very well, then. I don't want you to think about that horrible woman anymore, understand?"

  He nodded, the skull face with its peeled-grape eyes already fading from his memory.

  The bridal gown was gone. In its place was a sheer white negligee. Although the exact details of her body were obscured by the chiffon, Claude could
tell she was nude underneath it. His breathing was ragged and his brow slick with sweat. His fingers trembled as he stroked her hair.

  He'd given up wanting things a long time ago. Life had cheated him of everything he'd ever hoped for: athletic scholarship, professional-football career, a decent job. There was no point in wishing for things he'd never have. All it led to was frustration and disappointment. He wanted Denise. He'd wanted her from the moment he saw her in his dream, but that was impossible. Denise was a shadow. His desire for her made as much sense as that old movie he saw, where the cop fell in love with a portrait of a murdered woman.

  The not-voice was right. There could be no room for doubt. So what if Denise Thorne didn't really exist? And even if she did, she'd be closer to thirty-five than seventeen. Big deal. She was real and alive and young right now, and that was all that mattered. For some reason he'd been granted his heart's desire, and he'd be a fool if he let it go to waste.

  He stood up, cradling Denise in his arms. She pillowed her head on his shoulder, the soft fragrance of her hair all around him. He was pleasantly surprised by the strength in his limbs. There was no more throbbing in his head or aching muscles, as if his decision had been rewarded by the erasure of pain.

  Denise was like a drug, insinuating herself into his bloodstream with every breath. He felt strangely invigorated, as if every cell was supercharged. He wanted to lose himself in her flesh and never return to reality.

  They lay side by side atop the mattress. Claude was hesitant at first, but the way she wiggled against him dispelled his fear of offending her. Denise teased him with quick, birdlike kisses until his breath came in gasps and his heartbeat matched the throbbing in his crotch.

  They were naked but he had no memory of undressing. Not that it bothered him. He'd always hated that part, with its gradual unveiling of physical imperfections. Denise's naked body seemed to give off a warm, diffuse glow that kept him from paying true attention to the details of her flesh, just like the pinups back in his locker.