After Hope Dies

by Lilly Haraden

  Mirror was supposed to feel powerful. Mirror was supposed to feel the sweet juice of vengeance pumping through her veins, like with the pharmacist, like with the cronies. But now? It’s just her teacher with his limp dick dribbling down his fly, his student backing away into a corner, abject terror mirrored on both of their faces. A sadness comes to Mirror’s heart – that this is happening to other girls, in parallel, in perpetuum.

  Mirror murmurs, ‘Run, girl. Forget it all.’

  She takes her advice and scampers for the door. Mirror sighs, stands, as Mr. Davis recollects himself, zips back up his fly and cries out, ‘W-what is the…’

  ‘Janelle was right. There is no hope in this version of the world. Or in her version. No justice either. Nothing good. Nothing good for us.’

  But death is death, no matter what world you belong to.

  Belief

  Motorcycle rides with Dani are one of Janelle’s most treasured experiences, but fear can ruin even the sweetest of moments. Girl monkey-grips the older woman’s waist and buries her helmet-head into the safety of Dani’s leather jacket. Skirt billows up like a flower caught in hurricane ferocity; there are so many more important things to worry about now than flashing the occasional passerby. No schoolkids, just adults in the afternoon delirium. Rundown streets, pathetic sun. Janelle feels like death.

  Whatever time it usually takes from school to ice-creamery to club is a distant memory. Seconds or hours? They arrive. Dani takes the steep curb into the back-end parking lot of their club and rests the cycle smooth by the brick walls. It’s not a particularly out of the ordinary place, their club. Boxy, standing on a former bus depot. A real brick and mortar store: Magic Carpet Ride in neon pink. What a crappy name. Still, it’s what’s on the inside that counts, and there are a couple of nice cars in the lot. But to think. Just around that corner there, Janelle’s life had ended. There’s a bad aura around that little patch of earth like a spiritual dead zone where no ghosts dare tread. All dark through the helmet visor. Cold. The girl shivers.

  Jan takes off Dani’s spare helmet and folds the material down into a sheet, stuffs it into the compartment bay, pops off the bike. Is the monster here, right now? Will it attack her again? Dani takes a step towards the club but realizes her charge is hanging back. Woman returns, rests a hand over Jan’s shoulder.

  ‘Bax wants to meet us before we do anything else. Sometimes, explaining things in the flesh helps him understand.’

  ‘Will he believe me?’ Janelle murmurs.

  ‘He will if you are honest. Hey—’ and Dani brings up Janelle’s chin with her hand. ‘Big sister will protect you. Come on.’

  They walk side by side to the club. A tiny distance separates them (a normal distance between them). Janelle’s gaze lingers upon the trash alley. There. Just there. A sudden wave of panic gathers in her heart and she latches onto Dani’s arm; the woman seems surprised but doesn’t fight back, just loops her arm into place as the two walk to the bouncer guarding the rear entry. Where were you on Saturday night, Fritzy? You can tell it’s a slow day when the security would rather play Candy Crush Pink Lemonade Legacy Edition on his Shandian than shake the ghosts down.

  Dani calls out, ‘Keeping busy are we, Fritzy?’

  To which the enormous black dude breaks concentration with the game and, with a smile as wide as a river on which two friends can set sail, he chirps, ‘Had enuf time to beat the club’s high score!’ The man turns to Janelle and says, friendly, ‘You play, little miss?’

  Janelle shakes her head.

  ‘When you got a break today, I’ll show you how it’s done.’

  Janelle nods.

  Dani shepherds the little one inside, giving Fritzy a look that Janelle interprets as ‘You’ll keep your hands to your phone’, to which Fritzy gives a look that Janelle interprets as ‘I’ve worked here for longer than you, and I know how to handle myself with the girls.’

  Inside now. Dark red corridors. Ultra-perfume. Low-pass bass murmuring in the background. Girl reaches out with her mind for some scrap of that monster’s presence, some song on the front of her heart to sonar-ping its location. Nerves get in the way and she cannot feel it out. Is it here, waiting for her to return? She and Dani walk slow and deliberate into the main room of the club. Here, the ground level forms a square mezzanine that overlooks a basement where the dancehall is. Down below resides a DJ stage, walkway, another bar, crystal lights built into the floor like pixels on a giant screen. Her dance stage stands empty. Off to the sides here on mezzanine level are the red rooms, private booths, baths and bars. Most of the day’s trade comes from the bar on this level where people smoke weed and caffeinated tobacco. There isn’t a soul here.

  Dani murmurs, ‘Bax says before we meet him in his office, we should try and locate that monster. Do you think he is here today?’

  Fear crawls along Janelle’s arms. Oh god, will she have to face the monster again? What if it attacks her on sight? Will Dani protect her, is she strong enough? For a moment, Janelle doesn’t think she can move…

  ‘Be brave for me.’

  …but the strength comes. Jan takes Dani’s arm once more and the two make their way through this empty place. Smoke lingers like mist over the isles of tables, chairs in disarray. They move to the balcony that overlooks basement level. Jan feels something stir inside her then. An unreal magnetism that makes the waters in her eyes ache. What is this feeling...

  Please, please…

  The monster.

  The monster is seated at the little bar beside the stage. Eyes in total focus on her. Total focus. Oil-on-water nightmare body. In its hand swims a cup of something lunar-dark, which it raises to the girl – cheers. Sloppy opal teeth flash and glint in the seedy light. It stirs up a primal disgust in Jan’s chest. It seems that the monster has never taken its eyes off her. Just like before, when it was harmless. Hasn’t it tormented her enough? Isn’t it tired of her? Jan swallows her heart back down to its rightful place and links in tight with Dani. Under her breath: ‘Do you see it, Dani?’

  Dani shakes her head. Jan sees the woman’s eyes fall over the space where the beast should be. This is not good. After a long moment, the older woman concludes, ‘Seems like I’m not invited to this otherworldly party yet. Come on, we need to see Bax.’

  Monster sticks a bitumen tongue into his alcohol and soaks up the drink like a sponge. Smacks his lips with delight but never once breaks eye contact with the child. Janelle thinks she might be sick. The humans move away. Through the floor, down a dank corridor and to the left, all sound from the club snuffed out, monster banished behind the bricks. It’s very quiet now. Here stands a kind of buffer between two holy places. Just at the end of this corridor, Bax has a room dedicated to his holy business.

  Knock once at the teak door, step inside. Sweet lights of peach and yellow do nothing to wash out the dark. This is a place forever coated in the sweet lust of sulky-eye jazz. Neat little pot plants hang in shadow on the walls. Red couches orbit a grand table set so low that nobody could squeeze their legs underneath. Computers, a pile of cash, par for course. But Bax himself takes the center piece.

  Remember Beck during his Midnite Vulture years? Tight, neon-purple pants, green shirt, a hat that can’t quite make up its mind on how to sit. A golden-haired, white freak. Except Bax is brown, so that makes him a black-haired, black freak. Two rattlesnake-skin shoes on the table; you could almost picture him shuffling a deck of cards between his hands in perpetuum. Alas, there are no cards, only a shiny Shandian.

  The sight of Bax produces the same gutstab of spiritual fear inside Jan. He just might be a monster too. Girl scuttles behind Dani as the two approach the man. He looks up. First to Dani, then to Janelle, where his gaze lingers and lingers. Eyes not unkind, but focused. Never leaving. The girl looks away, feeling his eyes bore into her.

  Beep beep

  And the man grumbles, pointing to his phone. ‘Fritzy just beat my high score. Might ‘ave to fire him.’ But he takes the loss i
n good spirit, shrugging, pocketing the phone and nestling back into the deep suck of the red couch. He looks like a Jolly Rancher being swallowed by thick lips. The man says in a cool drawl, ‘Janelle, we thought you were dead. I’m most pleased that you appear very much alive. Not every day I get to meet a girl who’s defied Lady Death. Please, sit with Dani. We shud have a little chat ‘bout how all this came about.’

  Dani reaches out a hand and Janelle takes it. They sit on the couch perpendicular to Bax with Janelle on the far side. As the girl makes herself comfortable, she allows herself to notice something. Something low and fundamental to the tune of this special place. Quiet whispers, they are: animate shadows that scamper over the walls like bristly, restless bugs. Here is a little army of dancing light shapes. Each possesses individual business in the dark. A few peer into their circle of light, inspecting and watching the humans. They unnerve her – these eyes. Actual shadows. Not men. Creepy. Jan forces her attention on Bax, on this peacock man, with his attention solely on her.

  He murmurs, soft and slow, ‘You look quite different from the Janelle of Saturday night.’

  Janelle nods to herself and says to the glass table, ‘Hair extensions.’

  ‘And a new voice. Two words are enough to give that away. I wonder how many words you been letting loose over the past little while, hmm? Now—’ Bax leans forward and says, calm ‘—I suspect we’re dealin’ with a situation that goes beyond a moment of truancy. The beginning is a good place to start, I always find.’

  Dani starts, ‘Bax, she—’

  Bax holds up a hand and says, not unkind, ‘I want to hear it from Janelle.’

  The little girl balls her hands in her lap and breathes deep, feeling the shake in her breath. She straightens her school uniform, distracted. Bax whispers over the quiet of the room, ‘there’s no need to be afraid. Remember. I’m a friend, and I’ll always fight for you.’

  Echoed words. Janelle flicks her eyes to the man, to Dani, and away. Begins, ‘I was working in the red room Saturday night. I’d serviced…three clients already, and I was about to start the fourth. Then two men came.’

  Bax clicks his fingers in the direction of the shadows but instructs the girl to keep talking. Janelle feels the doubt rise in her belly. Will Bax understand or believe her? She recycles her story:

  ‘They dragged me outside into the side alley where we take the trash out. One raped me on the garbage. The other filmed it all…’

  Janelle trails off as something dark slithers past her body. Cloudy and thick, the shadow lurches before her. A note of fear stings her eyes – to see such a creature break reality before her very eyes. Jan watches, heart aflutter, as the shadow slides in beside Baxter and hands a little piece of paper to its master. And away it slips, back into the dark. The girl murmurs to no one in particular, ‘Ghosts…ghosts everywhere…’ but nobody listens to her. Nobody cares. Not Dani, who seems to be more perturbed by Baxter’s leisurely reading pace. And certainly not Baxter, whose brow is furrowed as he matches the ghost paper to his ledger. Eventually, a soft, ‘Ah.’

  Dani repeats, ‘Ah?’

  Bax murmurs, ‘The mayor,’ still with eyes on the night’s patronage transcript.

  ‘The mayor?’

  ‘The mayor. It’s always the mayor.’

  Janelle looks to her hands and recalls, ‘It wasn’t the mayor. He was my client the week before.’ But when she looks back up she sees Bax in deep conversation with three new shadows, directing them in an alien language like whispers. They listen, and as soon as Bax has finished, they escape the circle on a direct mission. Janelle looks to Dani – she’s equally incredulous, or at least she appears incredulous. Maybe not for the reasons Janelle thinks; Dani shakes her sea-color hair and presses, ‘The mayor can’t be that stupid, can he?’

  Bax nods. ‘Oh yes. He can. You’d be surprised what stupidity men get involved with when they’re horny and irrational. I’m more worried ‘bout why we didn’t intercept those goons of his. We’ll need to run better background checks, or see which bouncer was paid off. Young Miss—’ Baxter leans forward, removes his hat, rests the brim over his heart and says, ‘I am deeply sorry for the hurt my negligence has caused you.’

  Janelle blinks.

  Oh. She gets it. The mayor was the one who ran out screaming from her Red room after Janelle asked if they were being watched. The week before, right. It all makes sense. The mayor. And with the election soon! There’s no election soon, but that would fit the story better. Of course it was the mayor. He’s got a reputation, that mayor.

  Bax stands and walks to Janelle, crouches down. A sweet musk tickles her nose. Two smooth hands land on her shoulders, and the man says direct, ‘I assure you, we will bring these men to justice – the ones who hurt you. Their names will be on the front pages of every news site tomorrow.’

  Janelle nods. Sure. But what about…the monster. That’s the real issue here. Ah, but how nonsensical does it sound? Maybe about as nonsensical as a brothel owner in control of an army of shadows.

  ‘Young Miss.’

  ‘Yes?’

  Quiet. ‘Can I ax you a question?’

  ‘What is it?’

  Concentration lines the man’s face. Bax takes a strand of the girl’s hair and runs it between his fingers, inspecting the color as if crystal-balling the future. A pause, a quiet thought. Then, this:

  ‘These are not hair extensions, are they, girl.’

  Janelle shakes her head.

  ‘This newfound vocabulary and sudden loss of the modern African American dialect isn’t superficial, is it, girl.’

  Janelle shakes her head. Bax laughs once, smiles, murmurs, ‘A whitewash. And this line right across your neck—’ Bax traces the almost invisible place with a sandpaper finger, but it tickles ear to ear. ‘This should have killed you. But you didn’t say who cut you open.’

  Janelle nods.

  Bax holds his finger up before the girl and declares, ‘There’s a factor left from this story, ain’t there. You are lying by omission.’ Bax walks back to his seat and Janelle feels her face burn. Has she done something terribly wrong? But how silly does the truth sound in the face of reality?

  Bax continues her thought, ‘Indeed, reality often sounds absurd against what we assume to be reality. But there is no fiction stranger than truth. I consider myself a fan of the strange and the weird – the unpleasantly real – so please, tell me the rest of your story.’

  Dani gives the girl a look, a silver-eyed expression that she can’t interpret. So Janelle resettles and summons all her naive bravery to the fore. Here we go.

  ‘The men…=I felt something at my neck. Came right across. I just remember hurting – everything hurt, and I couldn’t move. And I remember after they’d…after they’d cut me, they turned around as if they’d seen something. They left me and…they fled. They were so scared. I turned my head and—’

  Here we go.

  ‘—I saw the monster…everything got weird then. I saw this thing come from the exit door, but as soon as he stepped out into the alley, everything sort of broke apart and I had this trippy…experience. Like I was on drugs, but it didn’t feel like coke. It was different. The world sort of dissolved away. The monster came right up to me. He cut my throat even wider, ripped my voice box out and ate it, before throwing my body into the sky and I was floating out into space and there were two birds who came and made a cocoon around my body and I…I was…resurrected.’

  Janelle closes her eyes. Feels not a thing. Pretends so. Fails.

  Bax considers the words thoughtfully. ‘A monster, you say?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Like one of these shadows, the ones that surround us now?’

  Janelle nods.

  ‘By chance, is this monster in the club today? Has he been here for a while now? Did you see it on your way in?’

  Janelle nods again as the sweet burn of relief fills her with joyous warmth. To be believed is a great feeling indeed. So Bax leans forward o
nce more and asks, ‘Well. I’d very much like to make his acquaintance. But you’ll have to do something for me too.’

  Jan doesn’t say anything.

  ‘I’ll need you to dance for us.’

  Dancer

  Bax has a plan, he assures us. This plan seems to involve his army of shadows, for they trail in his wake as the man storms down the private corridor. Janelle and Dani follow. The girl catches a few alien words from the owner and watches as the shadows obey and bleed into the walls to vanish. Bax rests a hand on the door to the club interior and turns, addresses both the women.

  ‘Dani, please take Janelle downstairs to the main stage. Janelle, all I want you to do is dance to the music. Simple. It’ll be a good distraction while I figure out what the hell that thing is doing here. You will not be in any danger, I promise you.’

  Jan stammers, ‘Wait, you want me to –’

  But Dani cuts in. ‘What about you, Bax?’ She links hands with Janelle and continues, ‘Don’t do anything stupid; I need this job.’

  Bax smiles under his floppy hat and says nothing more before heading into the main rooms, vanishing around a corner. The women follow, but by the time they’ve stepped into the mezzanine, Bax has disappeared. Something is very different about the club now. An atmosphere change, a lilt in the baseline hum of activity. Nothing now. Nobody now. Even less than the empty of before. Janelle death-grips Dani’s hand, draws into her warm leather jacket.

  They take the employee stairs and come out along the green-lit hall that runs behind the main stage. This is usually a place of such excitement. Janelle remembers the anxious moments before she and her friends would cut out from their hidden place here and take to the stage. All dressed up and magical in the light, skin on fire and a raging audience all ready to soak them up. And the dancing. Ah to be free on that stage with the swagger of music writhing restless through her limbs. A toxic takeover of her senses, to move her hips and body so in time with music. In those moments, surrounded by her half-naked friends, gawking eyes, pure life: that was heaven. But now there is no such warmth, no palpable pleasure. Just fear.