by Lex Chase
Benji had been with him a few days ago when he’d helped one of them dissuade a woman from buying a box of SICUREZZA bandages because of an undiagnosed polyethylene allergy. Once they’d saved the customer, the impression of the man he’d been helping grew a lot stronger. He’d died of the same condition, and now that he had saved someone from the same fate, the man had been able to move on.
Benji’s throat went dry. “Does that mean Patrick knows what I have to do to move on?”
Try as he might, Benji hadn’t been able to remember his death. And while he wasn’t in a hurry to leave purgatory, especially now that he knew it probably meant leaving Patrick, he wanted to at least know what he’d need to do to make that possible. Had Patrick known all this time and just not told him? Was this all some big joke to him? Benji’s neck prickled, sweat he didn’t know he could still produce sprouting across his skin. Were he and Patrick even friends? Or was he just some long-running prank to keep Patrick entertained?
Agnes’s palm was cool and dry when she cupped his cheek. He felt some of the heat leach out of his angry flush, flowing out as Agnes’s energies flowed in, restoring him and calming him.
“No, child. You’re too tied up in his future for him to be able to see yours.”
As usual, Agnes’s words cleared up nothing. And also as usual, they calmed him anyway.
Chapter Eight: PISA
Patrick decided leaving Benji be was the best course of action for now. He had adapted well to life in CASA, easily settling into the rhythm of things. Patrick would go so far as to say Benji was having fun.
But Patrick refused to admit he was having fun too. Benji was nice. Nice in the way of ice-cold lemonade on a hot summer day. Patrick fought drinking the Kool-Aid.
Karin and Agnes had both taken a shine to Benji, and Patrick’s gut clenched. It was fun for a while, but now he wanted off the ride.
Benji had described their pranks as a memorable date, and he didn’t have an inkling of an idea how much those choice words made Patrick dig in his heels. Benji’s kindness and naïveté had been a welcome escape. Now Patrick was desperate to escape them.
He resumed his post in the café, in his usual chair across from old man Henry. The café was his safe space, and sitting with Henry made him concentrate on something else. Henry as usual stared into space in Patrick’s general direction and sipped his tea. The crossword puzzle book sat between them, a brand-new pen beside it. Henry slowly pushed the book toward Patrick’s side of the table as he stared off.
Patrick leaned forward. “Do you see me?” he asked softly, waving a hand in front of Henry’s blank gaze. “Work with me, Henry.” He clenched his fist, trying to banish Benji from his mind. “I really need you to work with me today.”
Instead, Henry scooted his mashed potatoes around his plate.
Patrick narrowed his eyes. Doubt and hesitation gave way to annoyance and then anger. “You need to let me in, Henry,” he growled. “I’m trying to help you. Help me help you.”
“You okay?” Benji said over his shoulder.
Patrick clenched his fists from the surprise. “Fine,” he said, not smiling.
“You know, fine doesn’t mean what you think it means,” Benji prodded him, rolling back and forth on his heels.
Had he let himself revert to the children he taught? Patrick slowly pushed his way from his seat. “Fine means exactly what I think it means,” he said tersely.
“You’re no closer to solving him, are you?” Benji asked as Patrick stepped away.
“That’s for me to know,” Patrick said as he headed into the showrooms.
Benji appeared next to him as if they had been walking side by side the entire time. Dammit. It seemed he’d mastered teleporting. Patrick was a little bummed he’d missed that. It had probably been a pretty good show, especially since he’d convinced Benji a while back that there was a real danger of leaving part of himself behind if he wasn’t completely focused. It had kept Benji from really trying, which had been amusing. Patrick wondered if Karin or Agnes had taken pity on Benji and told him the truth or if Benji had just gotten over it himself. Ah, the things you miss when you’re putting all your energy into actively avoiding someone.
“Do you need help?” Benji asked with a bright smile.
His plan not to engage wasn’t working. Benji was worse than a stray dog. Patrick pressed his lips into a line and secretly ground his teeth. “Are you always this full of questions?”
“What’s eating you today?” Benji asked in a chipper tone. He was trying to be cute, trying to mimic Patrick’s devil-may-care ways, but Patrick was in no mood for it. Not today. Not ever again.
“I’m fine,” Patrick said firmly, hoping Benji would let it drop. “Come on. It’s a busy day.”
He was slipping, and he knew the only way to save himself was to grab on with both hands and let himself accept what he was feeling. Patrick’s nonexistent heart thumped. No. Benji just got under his skin with his joke. Yes. That’s all it was.
But why did it feel so real? Something Patrick could settle into comfortably? Such things weren’t for him.
Patrick stood a little taller as a woman in Housewares screamed for help—not in the terror that sometimes comes with thinking one has gone insane, but instead….
“I need some help here!” she yelled over the crowd of oblivious shoppers. “I need some help coordinating curtain rods and lighting, preferably by someone with higher than a high-school education.”
Together, Patrick and Benji halted across the aisle. Benji tilted his head like a dog hearing a high-pitched whistle. Patrick smirked.
Perfect. Just the thing to get him back into his groove.
He clapped a hand on Benji’s shoulder and forced him into stillness. “I got this,” Patrick commanded.
“But…,” Benji said, uncertain.
“I got it.” He grunted each word like a wolf defending his territory.
Tossing up his hands, Benji sighed. “Whatever.”
Patrick didn’t respond and slipped through the aisle as the customers shifted around him like a river current over a fallen log. They shivered and shuddered from the chill in his aura. He was expending too much from his mood alone and had to keep his cool. It was already evident to anyone in a ten-mile radius that his mood had gone to garbage.
The woman perked up as Patrick approached, and her predatory, flirtatious smile signaled he’d be in for a long day. Damned cougars that couldn’t take a hint. He hadn’t even liked the Mrs. Robinson act when he’d been a graduate student. The hair on his arm stood up as he shivered from the intrusive thoughts. He wasn’t a graduate student anymore, and CERN would never be in his reach.
“Thank God,” she said, her shoulders slumping in a piss-poor attempt at coyness. “A six-two attractive man who can lift heavy boxes to my car.” She winked. “It’s a Benz, by the way.”
Patrick forced himself to smile. She was the perfect challenge to put him right again. Something to toughen him up and stop this self-indulgent pleasure with Benji.
“I’m sure it is, ma’am,” Patrick said, smiling brighter. “How can I help?”
“You’re not colorblind, are you?” She cast a dismissive glance around the showrooms. “This place is a vomit of white, black, and beige.”
“Hey…,” Benji said in indignation.
Patrick shot him a warning glare. Benji furrowed his brow and retreated a half step. Patrick returned his attention to the woman and flashed his cheesiest helpful-employee grin. “I’m sure we can find you a pop of color. You said you needed to color coordinate drapes? How about you check out our fine selection of carpets?”
He tossed her back a taste of her own medicine with a wink.
Her eyelashes fluttered, and Patrick internally cringed. She held out her hand in that irritatingly dainty Southern belle fashion. “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers,” she said, her voice dripping saccharine in an attempt to be seductive.
“Of course, Miss DuBo
is,” he said, taking her hand. “Right this way.” Patrick swept out his arm with a graceful extension of his back.
The woman giggled like an excited schoolgirl. “Oh, call me Blanche.”
Because you’re two cans shy of a six pack? Patrick wanted to say, but kept it light and easygoing as they strolled to the vastness of Home Décor.
As they passed by Benji, Patrick made eye contact as he tried to mentally drill into his head to stay out of it. He’d work this one alone. He had to. Anything to make himself want to scrub down with sandpaper and bleach later. Patrick would take great delight in exfoliating off all three layers of skin—if that were possible for the deceased.
Regrettably, Benji didn’t get the message and followed along.
“You okay?” he asked as he appeared next to Patrick.
“Fine,” Patrick curtly replied. Benji was like a battery next to him, and he focused on opening himself to lap up the energies. Just enough to get this over with. His head was already fuzzy and full of a cottony sensation.
“You keep saying that,” Benji said.
“Because it’s true.”
The woman calling herself Blanche brightened at Benji. “Oh! Is this your valet? He’s charming. Amazing what one can do these days with educational opportunities for the disadvantaged.”
Patrick jerked to a stop. “Excuse me?”
“Pardon you,” Benji said, just as offended.
Blanche blinked, clearly oblivious. “Oh? Where are my manners?” She waved a hand and beckoned Patrick closer. “You know”—she jerked her chin toward Benji—“the mentally challenged.”
Patrick jerked back like he had been clubbed with a VERONA table leg. “What fucking part of the devil’s urethra did you fall out of and can you crawl back up in it?” he snarled.
Benji and Blanche both staggered back at Patrick’s outburst.
“That’s what they’re called, right?” she asked primly.
Patrick flung up his hand to halt her. “Stop. Making. Words.”
“Patrick…?” Benji asked with a slight shake of the head.
“You don’t get to insult him like that,” Patrick growled. “You don’t get to waste my time with your perpetual bullshit.”
“I beg your pardon?” Blanche stepped back, aghast.
“You’re a disservice to the human being you once were,” Patrick continued and took a challenging step toward her. “You’re desecrating my sacred space. This is my CASA, and I decide if you are permitted here.” He took another step, and she retreated from him. “You do not get to disrespect me, and you above all do not get to treat him like garbage. Do you know him?”
“No, of course not!” she said, flustered and with a hand to her chest.
“That’s right. You don’t. His name is Benjamin Goss. It’s his honorable duty to escort lost children to their parents. He should get a goddamn medal for his selflessness,” Patrick rumbled, like a storm on the horizon.
“Patrick…,” Benji whispered, averting his eyes.
“Shut up, Benji,” Patrick ordered him. His tone was purposely unkind. He turned back to Blanche. “You know what I get to deal with? Do you know?”
“No….” She took another step away.
“I get to deal with garbage like you. Day in and day out, I get to pretend I’m interested in your fucking curtain rods and window treatments.” He tilted his chin, aiming a pointed glare at her chest. “You died by being impaled on a GALLEGIANTE curtain rod, by the way. Had to have sucked. I was decapitated by a DEL TORO bookcase. I think you might be a winner at what sucked more.”
Benji started. His eyes rounded with worry.
Stop looking at me like that. Patrick wanted to tell him. Stop looking at me like that!
“Patrick,” Karin said sharply in his ear as she appeared. “Is there a problem here?”
He jerked away from her. “No problem. I’m gone.” He blinked once, and when he opened his eyes, he found himself in the darkness of the parking garage. Patrick crushed the heels of his palms to his eyes, trying to will the angry ball of a headache away. He took a deep breath, filling his chest, and let it go again. But nothing was helping to relax or center him.
Nothing could hide his frayed thoughts anymore. Benji was too distracting. Too kind. Too honorable. Too sensitive. Too everything. CASA had chosen Benji for something. He wasn’t moving on. But Patrick hadn’t tried to help him. Karin had chided him for being sweet on his “cupcake.” Benji was a passing entertainment, someone he would eventually get out of his CASA uniform and into his MILAN bed. Then he’d happily send him on his way until the next guy came along.
His failure ate at his bones like a Weople dismembering its prey. He’d let himself get involved. He couldn’t decide what hurt worse, the attachment or his compromised emotions. Benji had long outworn his welcome, and something had to give.
He shivered from the cold as the living customers passed him by, heading to their cars.
They could leave. Reality clung to him like the icy chains on a Dickensian ghost.
What the fuck had he been expecting? The chance to have something of a life in CASA? He and Benji settling into a routine of comfort and making the most of eternity? Playing house in simulated homes? He’d tried that once. He’d settled down. He’d fallen in love. And how had that worked out for him? He’d poured out all his devotion and love and been rewarded with the devastating truth that even in forever, nothing truly lasts forever.
He couldn’t do that again.
Ever since Benji’s arrival, Patrick’s wandering thoughts about the would-haves and could-haves only served as a reminder CASA was a nightmare he would never wake from. A nightmare he had learned to accept. CASA became normal. His reality. Agnes, Karin, the ball pit, bugging the shit out of Tommy to break up the monotony. And Henry. His personal puzzle.
Patrick remained close to the elevators as the happy families packed their cars like Tetris masters, calling commands to one another, moving seats, taking out boxes, packing and repacking, even opening the boxes to fit the pieces into every available nook and cranny.
They were moving on, heading to their homes. Patrick didn’t have to guess what they were saying. They joked about being thankful to escape CASA, what to do for dinner, and what was on TV tonight.
Patrick’s knees gave out from under him, and he stumbled against the trash can. It jerked with the initial impact, but he fell through it as his corporeal form blinked out for only a second and he crashed to the concrete.
He gasped, and cold, clammy sweat ran down his back. He had to go back inside. He needed to get back to the ball pit. He had already spent too much energy in CASA, wasting it on being angry at everything and repelling the living. The longer he sat in the garage, the more his energy wicked out of him like moisture into a rag. He had to recoup his losses, but that would mean admitting his failings.
Benji had said it once: CASA was such a happy place.
Patrick chuckled bitterly. If he were a praying man, he’d hope Benji would never lose that idea. But Patrick had seen through it all too soon. All that remained now was coping.
In the darkness, the customers happily packed their cars. Finally thankful they had escaped CASA purgatory. It was insultingly laughable. The regulars would be back next week, and some as soon as tomorrow when they realized they’d forgotten a part. And the Impressions popped up in a steady stream. The afterlife side of CASA had plenty of business to keep him and the crew on their toes.
Static pricked at Patrick’s skin with pins and needles before he heard the whispers.
CASA had its Impressions, which were of the pleasant variety. The Wallville had its own version, and they weren’t even close to pleasant.
Patrick called them the Gloom. The Impressions had human forms, but the Gloom were mere shadows that moved like runny trails of ink. They slithered across the cars and over customers, infecting them with the temptation to go to Wallville and join the Weoples’ ranks.
A husband and wife rol
led by him with their cart full of gargantuan boxes. The bear of a man bounced their infant daughter in a pink flowered harness.
“She was so good.” The wife smiled at their little girl. “Slept the whole time.”
The husband nodded. “Did you see that little boy in the car seat?” He shuddered. “God, his wailing could have shattered glass.”
The wife swatted at his shoulder. “Stop being so negative. You know Beatrice is going to hit the terrible twos and it’ll be Armageddon.”
“If she’s a screamer like your sister’s kid, I’m investing in earplugs.” He frowned.
“Oh, come on.”
Patrick rolled to his side as the couple strolled away, happily chatting between themselves. Their love carved a rent in Patrick’s concrete heart. He’d stopped torturing himself with what-ifs after his first five years in CASA, staring at displays of happy families with their children and wondering if he would have ever been that guy. Dreams and fantasies were useless in CASA. They always ended in disappointment. It was better not to believe what else was out there. Nothing was out there.
Patrick sat up and leaned back against the glass windows of the back entrance. The dimness of the parking garage provided a soothing break from the glaring fluorescent lights. He tried to breathe. Not that he needed it, but old habits were hard to break. He wiped his forehead, but his damp hand on his skin did nothing to alleviate the clamminess. Light from inside washed over him in sunny yellow hues.
A rat-a-tat on the glass startled him. Patrick turned and found Karin, furious and yelling at him. Her voice was muffled, but he could make out the basics of “Get back in here, you asshole!” She tapped again and flicked her wrist, beckoning him back inside.
Patrick staggered to his feet and narrowed his eyes at her. He said nothing, and her frustration gave way to pounding on the glass.
“Okay…,” he whispered and pressed his hand to the glass against hers. “Okay.”
