by C. F. Waller
“Do you use anything special?” he begs.
“No, possibly it’s clean living?”
“Hardly,” Dorian chuckles.
“Any abhorrent behavior I exhibit can be attributed to poor choice of friends,” she insists.
“To whom are you referring?” he replies with a raised eyebrow.
To this she once again flicks her fingers under her chin in his direction. He holds up both hands in a So Sorry gesture, but it rings hallow. He is having too much fun.
“So, you’re saying that you are over seven hundred years old?” I ask sharply. “That’s silly. Why tell me that?”
“Your initial questions was how we could have been here in 1948 and yet look as we do today,” she recites. “The simple answer is that I do not age, thus have looked exactly as I do today for centuries.”
“Not always the same. You did have that horrible hair pyramid for a while,” Dorian sighs. “Covered in so much white powder a cloud followed you about.”
“Most of that was a wig and as I recall you wore a bit of powder yourself,” she snaps back.
“Only in France,” he mumbles. “Only in France.”
The two of them quibble about French hair fashion for a bit. I listen, coming to the conclusion they remind me of bickering spouses. The longer I listen to them, the more I become aware of how quickly they move from one subject to anther. No pauses to note my reaction or invent anything. While what Bee is telling me seems outrageous, one could say that’s she’s at the very least consistent. It’s as if she actually believes her story.
“And him,” Bee interrupts, pointing a finger at Dorian. “How old is he?”
“Not a subject I wish to discuss,” Dorian explains. “He works for me not the other way around.”
“Younger?” I guess, staring at Bee. “By a hair.”
“Way younger,” she exclaims before quietly, glancing over at Dorian, who crosses his arms and rolls his eyes. “Like all the hair in a wig shop younger.”
“Assuming I was to believe any of this, and for the record I don’t, what does this have to do with everyone being doomed?”
They exchange a glance and then Dorian excuses himself, pausing to whisper something in her ear before he goes. Once he disappears into the main dining room, Bee stands up and paces around the table behind me, eventually leaning her butt on the back of a chair.
“When I was thirteen a plague washed over England,” she offers with a tone of sadness. “My uncle died, along with half the population of Europe and Asia Minor.”
“But you didn’t,” I interject.
“No, I did not. That was the first time I recalled thinking that I never get sick.”
“Well, if you’re immortal, then you probably don’t.”
“Try not to use the word immortal,” she scolds me by pointing a finger my way. “I just said I don’t get sick.”
“Or grow old. When did that come up?”
“After my uncle died I was all alone,” she explains. “Everyone I had known was dead from plague so I kept to myself. I was sleeping in alleys and eating whatever I could get my hands on. Just another dirty ragamuffin that people averted their eyes from when they passed on the street. One day a Nun found me sleeping under a garbage cart and took me to an orphanage. The people there looked after me and when I was old enough to leave I opted to stay.”
“So, you’re a Nun?”
“As a matter of fact, I was,” she announces proudly. “Sister Beatrix. Eventually, I transferred to a Convent just outside London and for a time I was at peace.”
“Until?” I beg, getting caught up in her fairytale.
“Until all the people around me began to grow old. A friend of mine named Marla, who had come with me from the orphanage, started commenting on how young I looked. We were similar in age and when her hair went gray and her face wrinkled I remained ever young.”
“And they declared you a miracle?”
“Quite the opposite,” she shakes her head. “They thought it the work of the devil. After several years of being prayed over and one painful exorcism, I found myself without a place to live.”
“They threw you out?”
“I left, but they would have had to do something eventually.” she sighs. “I was nearly seventy and looked as I do now. Most of the Nuns who I met when I arrived thirty years earlier had passed on. The few that remained, kept their distance. Word had spread beyond the walls of the convent as well. More than once, men had come to the door asking to see me with their own eyes.”
“Things weren’t so different from now.”
“You’d be amazed how similar things remain,” she smiles. “And I am not indicating that fact is a good thing.”
“So, what then?”
“I did not get far when I was approached by an elderly man who claimed he had come to collect me. At first, I thought he was going to do me harm, but after talking with him, I started to notice how peculiar he was.”
“In what way?” I ask, completely enveloped in her story.
“He was small, shorter than me and frail. His clothes were of a rich man and his voice was strong and confident. For such a small man, he strode into the tavern where we talked fearlessly. Other men seemed to give him a wide berth as if he were dangerous.”
“Was he?” I insist. “Dangerous?”
“Not that I witnessed,” she shrugs. “He offered me a position working at his home and since I was ostensibly homeless, I agreed.”
“So, he wanted you to go home with him?” I declare in a salacious voice.
“Not in the way you’re thinking,” she scolds me with a finger. “He lived in London. He had a large house with a numerous staff already. There was no wife or children to look after, nothing for me to do.”
“But it wasn’t a sex thing?” I ask confused. “What did you do there?”
“I read books,” she says softly, a grin passing over her face. “There was a magnificent library and he instructed me to read.”
“Read what? What did he want you to learn?”
“Everything,” she explains in a whisper and pauses, her eyes off to one side. “He told me to read everything.”
“So, he knew?” I reply, drawing her back to the conversation. “He knew you were immortal?”
“There’s that term again,” she frowns. “But yes, he was aware. He gave me the run of the grounds and instructed me to read the entire library.”
“And did you?”
She nods with a smile.
“How long did that take?”
“Fourteen years the first time,” she replies after a moment to think.
“The first time?” I exclaim.
“Yes, I read it several times. Subsequent times took longer as he added to his collection.”
“You just sat in the library and read books?” I question. “For how long?”
“I didn’t just sit there,” she scoffs. “We entertained, we went to the theatre.”
“He was like you, wasn’t he?” I blurt out. “He didn’t age.”
“You would be correct.”
“But why did he seem so old? You said he was grey and frail when you met him.”
“Yes, his aging wasn’t arrested in middle age like the rest of us,” she explains. “He was nearly seventy when he stopped ageing.”
“So, there is no set age at which this occurs?”
“All, but a very few, stop aging between twenty-five and forty-five,” she lectures as she returns to her chair and takes a drink of water. “He was older and managed just fine. Older is far better than younger.”
“Younger, you mean like a child?”
To this she nods and takes another drink, glancing around to see if Dorian has returned.
“Are there children of your kind?”
“Only one I ever met,” she admits and then stops, eyeing me suspiciously. “It’s not sustainable.”
“Sustainable?” I mutter. “How so?”
“If you stopped
aging as a child everyone around you would notice. You couldn’t just leave as you’d be unable to provide for yourself,” she insists, still scanning around for Dorian before settling her gaze back on me. “And no one can stand to be a child forever.”
“It doesn’t sound so bad?”
“Really?” she scoffs. “How long could you play with dolls and toy trains?”
“True.”
“I’d like to see you trapped in a ten-year old’s body for a few centuries. You’d slit your own throat before you hit a hundred.”
“Would that work?” I push her, now enthralled by the conversation. “Slitting your throat? Would that kill you?”
“Of course. I am not eternal, I just don’t age.”
“Or get sick?”
“Yes, we don’t age, we don’t get sick,” she ticks off a mental list. “As far as I know we don’t get cancer or die from heart attacks. At least I never heard of that sort of thing.”
“But slitting your throat still does the trick?” I repeat in a morose way.
“Hit by a bus, plane crash, burned in fire, shot with a gun, stabbed with a knife,” she lectures seeming annoyed.
“Poison?”
“I’d die just like you. This isn’t a Grimm’s Fairy Tale.”
I start to reply, but my thoughts drift back to Dorian. He doesn’t drive. He hired me because I have a perfect driving record. Could it be he’s afraid to get in an accident? I’m running this over in my mind when it dawns on me this is a just a fairy tale. Why is she telling me this far-fetched personal history?
“How does this make us all doomed?” I inquire. “It sounds like you two have it made.”
“Typical short-timer, thinking it’s all cupcakes and unicorns,” she scoffs.
“Short-timer?” I mutter under my breath. “Did you just refer to me as a short-timer?”
“Yes, I did. And that’s why we are all doomed. Eventually you want what all short-timers want,” she snarls. “More bloody time.”
“Say what?” I groan, confused more and more as this conversation goes on.
“Once you know what we are, you all want to be like us,” she explains. “You hunt us down and try to figure out how to get what we possess.”
I start to argue, but have to agree with her assessment. I am not even sure if I believe a word she is saying, but the first thought I had was how cool it would be to have that kind of time. The implication here seems to be that they are being hunted.
“You are doomed because you’re being hunted?” I suggest.
“We are doomed because you hunt us,” she declares, again sounding annoyed. “Once you track one of us down and we are exposed, it threatens all of us. Once discovered, everyone involved has to be eliminated.”
“Too stop the bleeding so to speak?” I offer. “Containment?”
“Yes,” Dorian adds as he pulls up a backward chair and leans his arms over the back.
“Someone found you,” I say pointing at Bee. “So, you’re exposed?”
To this she nods and elbows Dorian, who had put his hand on her shoulder.
“And thank you for that,” he chides her. “I always hoped to someday be doomed.”
“You’re welcome,” she fires back, seemingly oblivious to his sarcasm.
“How are we doomed?” I butt in and point at Dorian to imply we are not exposed.
“They are working their way down the Calling Tree. They would have been on Dorians doorstep within a year,” she assures us. “I thought it better he know and have a chance to get his affairs in order,” she emphases the word affairs seductively.
“Calling Tree?” I mutter, skipping the obvious snide remark about Dorian and affairs. “What’s the Calling Tree?”
“They use them to cancel things,” Dorian explains. “If there is going to be a snow day at school the Principal calls two teachers, they each call two more, and so on.”
“I’m not following you.”
“We have a Calling Tree for immortals,” Bee pipes in. “None of us knows how to contact the others, thus making it hard to find us. Each of us knows how to contact only the two we have to call. They are below us on the tree.”
“Thought you didn’t like that word?” I ask, having missed some of the things she mentioned after that. “Immortal.”
“For lack of a better one,” she groans. “I received a warning from my contact. I presume he was exposed and is now dead. I have two people below me on the tree. Dorian is one of them.”
“Who’s the other?” I inquire.
“Edward,” she mutters, glancing at Dorian. “I fear he’s gone already.”
“Oh, that’s a shame,” he sighs, lowering his head and grimacing. “I liked Edward. Amazing card player.”
“Agreed,” Bee sighs. “He had true talent.”
“And horsemanship,” Dorian fawns. “Then again from your stories he had other areas of expertise.”
“Alright you,” Bee exclaims, wagging a finger at him. “Let’s not drag my personal life into this. I hardly know this boy.”
“Fair enough,” Dorian agrees. “But you think he’s already gone?”
“I do.”
“Then we will be dead soon enough,” he nods with a sad expression.
“I should call him one more time to see if he picks up,” she mutters, a finger on her lips.
“He has a phone,” Dorian points at me. “You can use it.”
“So, the older ones call the younger ones?” I ask keeping on the chain of thought we started down. “The people Dorian is supposed to call are younger than him?”
“Not always,” he shakes his head. “Age has little to do with it.”
“Edward was older than me,” Bee interjects.
“And for the record you’re eight hundred?” I attempt to verify.
“You’re in the ballpark,” she shrugs.
“Making Edward how old?” I press.
“Et too Brutus,” Dorian recites as if he’s on stage in a play.
Bee slaps his shoulder to stop him. They both look at me and say nothing. The Roman Empire ended somewhat before 500 AD, but Julius Caesar was killed well before that, maybe 50 AD. I’m suddenly wishing for a refresher course in World History, a class I rather enjoyed. Rough math makes this Edward at least 1,500 years old, probably closer to 2,000 depending on what Et too Brutus really means to Dorian.
“Arron,” Bee prods. “Still with us?”
“Why don’t you fight back or hide?” I blurt out. “You’re smart, resourceful and from what I have seen, have plenty of money. Why not at least try and get away?”
“We aren’t running from the short-timers who are hunting us,” she chuckles, tossing her head sideways and landing it on Dorians shoulder. “If we wanted to fight them off we could. I had to kill a few of them just to get here to warn him,” she groans, tapping her head on his shoulder again. “You’re welcome again.”
“Really,” Dorian says surprised. “Resorting to violence. I retract my earlier comment that you are a loon,” he says and kisses her on the top of her head. “You’re a dangerous lunatic. A desperate killer running loose. Someone alert Scotland Yard.”
“You flatter me,” she sighs.
“Okay, then who are you running from?” I interrupt their constant digressions from the conversation. I am frustrated at the loops and circles they talk in. “Who’s coming to kill you?”
“Primitus,” Bee replies, sitting up straight and patting the sides of her tower of hair.
“And they are?”
“It’s Latin for the first,” Dorian enlightens me.
“The first what?”
“Just first,” Bee jumps in. “I doubt we are descended from them, but they were here first.”
“And they really don’t want to be hunted,” Dorian chuckles. “They let us alone as long as we don’t throw undue attention on them.”
“I’m not even sure that’s why,” Bee scowls. “That theory has a lot of holes in it.”
&n
bsp; “You have a better one?”
“Walter inferred there was some deal between Primitus and another group,” she proposes.
“Walter doesn’t know everything?” Dorian bristles.
“No, but just believing a thing because the Cartographer told you so seems unwise,” Bee debates.
“And if you do?” I interject. “Get exposed.”
“Then they come and erase the problem,” Bee informs me. “As soon as you’re exposed you’re dead. Sooner or later the Primitus will show up and wipe you off the map.”
“And this has happened before?” I ask. “You have seen them, talked to them?”
“Of course not,” Bee shakes her head. “No one who draws breath has ever seen a member of Primitus.”
“So basically boogiemen,” I assert. “Your scary version of an urban legend.”
“More akin to your version of heaven and hell,” Bee lectures. “Religion is a more accurate comparison than nursery rhymes.”
“Interesting, where do you guys stand on religion?” I pose to her. “You were a Nun after all.”
To this she glances at Dorian, who shakes his head. She tilts hers to the side as if to weigh the outcome of sharing some tiny bit of information with me. After several non-verbal exchanges, she simply frowns at him, her tongue darting out quickly in his direction.
“Don’t go there,” he mutters. “He doesn’t even believe what you’re telling him yet.”
“Believe this,” she asserts. “The Primitus are coming for us,” she nods and takes a drink of her water. “That you can count on.”
“So, you have some form of faith,” I jab at her.
“I have faith they are coming for us and the ones who hunt us,” she nods in my direction.
“Me?”
“Anyone who is aware of us and what is happening,” Dorian chimes in.
“That’s great,” I mutter angrily. “I assume if I resign as your driver now that won’t matter.”
To this both Bee and Dorian share a smile and chuckle. This tells me all I need to know.
Chapter Nine
Dominick Dunn
The small runway has several hangers along the dirt road that runs parallel to it. Half cylinders of corrugated steel open in the front and rusting, even here in the desert. The one building with four sides houses the control tower, which is basically a ham radio sitting next to a soda machine. Instead of cans, it contains thick glass bottles and I feel like I am back in 1983.
