After Hope Dies

by Lilly Haraden

  So Bax fights down his bitterness. Sarcastic, light, forcibly eloquent, he goes for, ‘Mighty fine day, sir. How’s them wife and kids?’

  ‘Uh, yeah. Yeah, things are good, you know –‘

  Bax swallows to the urge to offer to shine the man’s shoes or sing him a song. Instead, settles on: ‘Let’s get inside. Show me what’s goin on.’

  Jason claps his hands together, replies, ‘Fucking insane, man. You ever seen Maple before?’

  Maple. You can tell how important this child is from the number of workers on set. It’s organised, quiet chaos. See them all running around with their cables and clipboards and mobile phones glued to ears – these workers all making sure the set is perfect, the actors are taken care of, the lighting is just right. Through the corridor of the home they tread until they’re in the main room where the ceiling opens out to the second story: kitchen, lounge, dining combined into one giant space. Over by the far wall is the control centre setup, where an army of black snakes feed into computers and screens. This is where Bax and Jason tiptoe as the director behind the control panel conducts the scene.

  Maple. In the middle of the room. In the middle of the sea of flesh. As Bax slides in behind the director, he can see her doubled – once on the editing panels in front of them, once in real life. Maple. In the middle of the sea of flesh rests a girl, side to them, naked save for a collar, straddling a boy on the bed, a gangly creation. One man takes her from the rear, one at the front, two at the sides, boy underneath. Every hole filled. Bax watches the gangbang with his arms crossed, watching the director flit between different camera positions, change the lighting, call cuts and reposition the actors. It’s almost funny to watch them separate, like the arms and legs of a spaceshuttle burning up in the atmosphere to peel away from the centre weight of Maple as the girl tussles her hair aside, licks her lips, readjusts on the child beneath her, gives him a wink, he laughs, she laughs, the men stand there fluffing as the director sips coffee. Director turns over his shoulder and explains to someone next to Jason, ‘We’re going to try for a sync moneyshot, so we can afford to mess up the audio as the actors talk to each other.’

  The woman leans in and replies, ‘You know what’d make this interesting? Live jazz band. Just get a duo with a funk guitar and hi-hat over there in the corner to play along like it’s the most normal thing in the world. Bow-chikka-bow-wow like the old PornHub theme, you know?’

  ‘Too meta. This is serious work.’

  Bax taps Jason on the shoulder and murmurs, ‘I’ll wait in the reception.’

  ‘You’re gonna miss it, man.’

  Yeah, where you goin, my nig? Don’t you want to stay and watch a child get cummed on by five guys all at once?

  Baxter walks away and finds the reception room. It’s beautiful here. Just the right amount of sunlight whispering in through the windows. Warm. So the man takes a seat on the leather couch beside a girl covered in the skin of a bathrobe. Gives her a nod, but her eyes and attention are lost to the Shandian in her hand. With her tongue poked out in concentration, the child plays Candy Crush (Hey, King. I’m open to receiving royalty payments for sponsorship. I’ve plugged your stupid game enough). Bax decides to continue his Aqua level grind.

  A light commotion outside tells Bax that the scene is finished – applause, shuffling people. The girl beside Bax jumps to her feet and meets a minder at the door, all ready for her time in the sun. Bye bye. Baxter waits. Waits. Eyes the TV in the corner. Not long to go now. She’ll be here any minute. Any minute. After another round of Candy Crush. After another minute or so. And a strange anticipation washes through him. Maple. This girl is a special one for many, many reasons to many, many different people. However, the reason that Bax is here is singular and very much unique.

  Here she comes. Clad in a skyblue silk dress open at the middle, fresh from the post-shoot shower, young Maple walks calm as air into the reception room. She’s astounding, this one – the softness in her cheek, the killer cut of her gaze as she slices you up and down, the maturity of fifteen years of earth time all weighty in the way she moves with such ease. In. Ignoring Bax completely. Girl rests her bum on the arm of the sofa opposite Bax but keeps her gaze somewhere over to the corner of the room where the TV blares senseless. The stick of a lollipop pokes out from her red lips. Bax’s eyes fall down her chin and rest at her neck – see the thin dog collar, some retro goth ‘fuck you’ kind of apparatus. Ah, yes. Maple.

  An assistant comes in by her side – an Asian fusspot dressed in tight black – and offers Maple water, falafel sandwich. Child dismisses the food but the minder presses, ‘Y-you haven’t eaten all day, it’s not good for your body.’

  Dismissive, even, the child replies with the sweetie clacking against her teeth, ‘I’m full. Thanks. Lollipop keeps me fresh.’ And she plucks the ruby star from her lips. ‘So,’ she turns her attention to Baxter Monae. Narrows her eyes. Looks him up and down, assess his worth in the fraction of a second. ‘Let’s hear it, then.’

  ‘Good to meet you, young miss. Baxter,’ and the man extends a black hand into her sphere, a hand that is not received or even acknowledged. Maple eyes him with calm disdain and muses, ‘I’m not interested in working for whatever organisation you got going. I’ve got a good thing being solo. These people treat me like a goddess – do you have your own Taiwanese assistant?’

  ‘Not quite. I’m working on that.’

  Maple nods to the minder and she vanishes outside. ‘They come cheap, you know. The people that want to use you. After a while it stops being interesting and just becomes frustrating. I’ve already had offers from the Back Door – hah, fuck that place – and the Front Door, the Minor Key, and I think some place that also tried to use ‘door’ in their title but didn’t quite get the wordplay right.’ Maple shrugs. ‘I make twenty K a week doing what I do. And I’m so good at it. It’s like breathing. Honestly, what’s a man like you got to offer a queen like me?’

  Bax listens, sinks back into the couch and makes a show of crossing his legs. His eyes fall back to that collar and something deep inside of him clicks. Locks. Holds. An unwritten power sings from beneath that little strap of studded leather. And in beside his ear comes the familiar buzz of his ghostly worker, pressing up invisible against the man’s shoulder, solar hot, whispering dark secrets into his ear.

  Ah. There we go.

  The shadow vanishes. Bax entertains Maple’s arrogance for a few more rehearsed lines but then sniffs loud – one sharp snort, as if something unpleasant has tickled his nose. And then he cuts into her song with a question. Posed soft, deft, with a little finger raised for emphasis to point at her neck as he asks, gentle, ‘What’s beneath that collar, girl?’

  Maple stops. Shuts her mouth. Narrows her eyes. There’s a tiny moment of betrayal when she shakes her head a fraction. The creature murmurs, ‘There’s nothing beneath this collar.’

  ‘Have you been able to read it? The message?’ Bax lets the question hang for a moment and follows it up with another punch, ‘I can read it, if you like.’

  Without waiting, the man is at his feet, before the girl now, projecting his height down upon her. Maple lowers her head just a fraction, says nothing. Bax can see the outline of a question forming on her lips but she remains silent. Still. And then, with a tenderness at odds with her mood from before, she reaches up and undoes the collar. Slow. It. Comes. Ah. There we go. Bax bends down until he’s at eyesight with the tattoos around her neck. It’s not a contiguous thing, no. Rather, it’s a series of hexagons with different colour, rotation, inflection. A line connects them all, threaded from a start to end point, circling around and around the neck like a spiral. Bax finds the starting shape and rests a finger upon her skin. Soft, warm. With a voice calm, disinterested, bored, the man recites the tattoo’s curse:

  “Yeah, take it bitch. You little cumslut. You like that, don’t you. Three dicks at once. Such a tight little ass you got there, girl. Yeah. We’re gonna cum inside you. We’re gonna cum so
hard that you’ll be spitting out white. It’s gonna rise up inside you and fill your little tummy so you’ll never be hungry again.”

  ‘Stop.’

  “Daddy’s friends are gonna have a good time with you tonight.”

  ‘Stop.’

  ‘But there’s more.’ Bax lifts his finger off the girl’s neck, right where her Adam’s apple might be, and keeps it out – the oh so tempting offer to decipher more. Maple’s face has broken. Once poised and elegant but now deathly frozen. The sparks of little tears pool at the corners of her eyes. There they dance down her cheeks while Bax floats back to the couch and takes his place once more. Credit: she’s trying not to cry. This fierce one tries with all her might to keep that power inside of her going strong. So she stares, eyes leaking, tears freefalling, at the monster that brought back so much pain. Bax rests his hands on his knees, sits upright, murmurs, ‘You’re suited to this line of work.’

  Maple nods.

  ‘You spent quite a while in the bathroom after your shoot. I guess most people would put it down to a thorough scrub. But I have a feeling it’s something a little more sinister. Related, in no small part, to the fact that you’re refusing food. You aren’t lying, girl, are you, when you say that you’re full from a good meal?’

  Maple nods.

  ‘That lollypop – cute look. Washes the taste of cum right off your tongue, sure. Also hides the fact that your breath smells like vomit and shit on account of all the waste you’re expelling from your mouth.’

  Maple dares not move. Embarrassment flushes red on her face. Baxter leans forward a little and continues with a kind edge to his voice, like the calm of night. ‘It’s called a Reverser, dear girl. The monster inside of your soul. It’s a spirit that’s feeding like a tapeworm. Planted there by some damage done long ago. Not quite a succubus, not quite a cum vampire. Something more sinister.’

  The girl looks away and sniffs, spits the lollypop out and rests it against the leather of the couch, carefully. She murmurs, ‘Shit.’

  ‘How long?’

  Maple doesn’t answer. With a mousy voice, she turns to Bax with a plea scrawled across her face. ‘Can you help me?’

  Bax nods even. ‘Sure I can.’

  ‘What’ll it cost me?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  Maple’s eyes go wide and free. She whispers, ‘Nothing?’

  ‘Nothing except the privilege of having your fine self dance once or twice a week at our – ’

  ‘I’ll do it.’ The girl rushes forward, falls to her knees and grabs the man’s hand. Says with a burning heart, ‘I’ll dance for you until I fall apart.’

  Nothing quite feeds hope like desperation, right?

  Bax walks the twenty paces from house to car. Inside, he leans back into the seat and blows out a long string of breath. In beside him buzzes the shadow, buckling itself up for a safe journey ahead.

  ‘Good work,’ Bax murmurs.

  But he’s got more work to do – another important meeting awaits.

  Mistake #4 – The Front Door / The Back Door

  ‘Macey. Can I ax you a question?’

  Beside the man, the shadow quivers.

  ‘Somethin’ been on my mind for quite some time now. Ain’t got nobody else to turn to. You was always good at hearing me out, you know?’

  Beside the man, the shadow quivers. Afternoon sunshine creates little shafts of counterlight that flit from the tinted window straight through the soul of the spirit. Like a reverse prism, the colour becomes a single black line over the car interior. Bax keeps his focus on the road though, ploughing through the streets and streets and streets on his way to some place special. Stopped at a red light now, the man murmurs to the shadow, ‘I gotta know. What’s death like?’

  Beside the man, the shadow quivers.

  ‘Is the dyin painful? Is there a slow slip from the mantle of life? Is there a spike of DMT to the brain like an icepick that slows down the drip of time and makes everything nice and cosy?’

  The shadow replies in a language only the man understands, ‘Keep yo eyes offa me, Baxter. Shit. You wanna crash this car on account of your horny-ass feeling me up while you drive?’

  Bax laughs at the memory, replies, ‘No ma’am,’ and takes off again as the lights go green.

  The Front Door soon comes into view. It’s a bit more of an establishment compared to the Magic Carpet Ride; where Bax chose the sight of a former impound lot to build his empire, Chell decided upon a traditional brothel wedged between a corner store grocer and florist. What the Front Door lacks in parking spaces at the rear it more than makes up for in the fact that, from the exterior, the place looks spic and span. Good brickwork, a subtle sign over the second story window that hints at what’s inside but – crucially – can be overlooked if so chosen. Halfway between the good and bad parts of town, so fifty percent of the Power Down gradient. Baxter snags a park at the front across from the florist before making his way inside.

  Inside continues with the same level of quality that the outside promises. Good, antique wallpaper sort of gives this place a speak-easy vibe. Husky lights from the ceiling making peach and ruby hues. Indeed, there’s a girl at the reception who sports something half burlesque, half modern, but entirely eye-catching [Adaptation notes: opportune moment to play “These Walls” by Kendrick Lamar or perhaps some Janelle Monáe]. Baxter walks close and leans over her little table, says soft in her ear, ‘Chell expecten me,’ and the woman nods, presses a finger to the bluetooth set in her ear and speaks secrets into the air. Turning her attention back to Bax, she motions for the man to make his way inside and find the bar. It’s on the third floor – that he remembers. Second floor doubles as a day lounge, fourth is the dance floor, basement is private rooms.

  So Baxter slithers into the Thursday afternoon activity of a suburban brothel and makes himself comfortable on one of the many barstools on offer. Good red leather seats, high, affording a nice perch for the spaces surrounding them. Little private booths off to the sides, but the centre of this floor is basically one long runway belled at the ends, like a two-dimensional dumbbell. Two adults work at the opposite poles, creating shapes with their bodies that make infinite shadow-play over the walls. What a shame there aren’t many people to bear witness. Give it time and the shadows will surely multiply, though. It’s still early. Bax breathes deep of the perfumed air and thinks to order something to drink. As he turns around in search of the bartender, he finds the familiar face of his old friend. Chell Ambrosy. Hazel creature with a kind, slow tilt to the eye, real easy around the shoulders, spreading two hands over the bartop and leaning into Bax. Behind her glisten a million and one colour-coded spirit bottles arranged into the shape of a Joseph Turner painting. Art and art. Steady, the mistress offers, ‘Fetch you a drink, then?’

  ‘I shouldn’t.’

  ‘But you’d like one. Appletini. I add a bit of bourbon and brown sugar frosting. Gives it a special note.’

  ‘I won’t say no,’ and the man smiles as Chell performs a little nod, eyes closed, and sets about fetching drinks. With Goose and Wild Turkey in hand, she prepares the tumbler and says over the shake of metal, ‘So. A Reverser?’

  Bax leans across the bar and sighs, says, ‘One of our many problems, I’m afraid. Looks like the Mayor’s going to play hardball on the promises he made.’

  ‘There’ll always be a new Mayor. That’s the beauty of democracy. Wait, and change will come.’

  ‘I prefer to give ‘change’ a good kick every now and then. But yes, a Reverser. You were right. I gotta hand it to you, everything you said was spot on. You’d make a good occult guide.’

  Chell raises the tumbler over her head and announces, ‘I actually have no idea what I’m doing – I never mix drinks. I thought it’d be cool if I met you here. I’m sorry if this comes out like shit.’

  Bax waves her sarcasm away. Shit, he remembers what she was like in college. Who could forget. As the deep green potion comes clean from the tumbler into a sugar-
rimmed glass, Bax asks, ‘What do we do about a Reverser, then? There’s got to be a way to excise it.’

  ‘Excising isn’t the problem, as I see it. Removing something so fundamental to the structure of a girl is bound to create some sort of power vacuum. Hate to think what’ll grow in the dark.’

  Bax takes his drink and does a cheers, takes a sip, half expects the arsenic to draw curtains over his eyes, is pleasantly surprised to find himself still alive. Nice hint of honey from the bourbon too. Placing drink to bar, the man offers, ‘So we stuff in a lesser spirit to take its place. Got a suggestion for a benign one?’

  ‘Matter of fact, I certainly do.’ Chell’s eyes falter. ‘I’m reluctant to say that I myself have benefitted from the afflictions of this monster. So I consider this as doing two good deeds in one.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘I sold her to the Back Door. Ask for ‘Treasure’.’

  Bax feels the waters in his body turn. Downing the last of his drink, the man nods his thanks and sighs sad. Chell says with her eyes low, ‘These mistakes we make. I wonder if we can ever really undo the damage.’