Postcards from a Dead Girl

by Kirk Farber

  As abrupt as it was, she managed to categorize most of it. First it was her general history: childhood highlights, family tree, education, dating history, hobbies, employment, and religion. Then it was random things: favorite colors, most embarrassing moments, fragmented dreams, philosophies on life. She spoke in such an urgent way, I’m not sure if she noticed I hadn’t said a word. I did my best to listen.

  She said things like:

  “I used to like turquoise so much, because it’s so blue, and green, together! But then I got seasick in Florida and now I like mauve.”

  And,

  “People shouldn’t lie, they should just be honest, because it saves so much time, and we totally don’t have time to lie.”

  And,

  “I have two brothers but they’re both way older than me. I was an accident.”

  And,

  “I almost died when I was four because I ate a bite of someone’s peanut-butter-and-banana sandwich at school, and I’m allergic to peanuts. They had to call an ambulance and everything.”

  And,

  “I never understood that saying about how if a tree falls in the woods, does it make a noise?”

  A tsunami of words. I had no idea it was coming, and it was much stronger and unrelenting than I ever could have expected. But after surviving the first wave, I knew there would be a second wave coming because she pulled out a box of Marlboros and started smoking with the hard exhale of someone who liked to talk while they smoked. I felt trapped, caught off-guard. I had no recourse, no protection.

  So I ran.

  Only to the restroom, but its tightly confined walls offered me some solace. I locked myself into a stall, enveloped in the silence of the tile floor, the white noise of the automatic flushing urinal system. It’s where I stayed until I felt safe again. About twenty minutes later I came out and Candyce was gone. I felt relieved and terrible all at once. I stepped outside the sub shop’s door and there she was, waiting for me on the sidewalk. “Are you feeling okay?” she asked.

  “I think so,” I said, and rubbed at my neck.

  “Good,” she said, and punched me square in the stomach. “Nothing’s wrong with your neck anyway, you big baby.” She turned on her heels, and stomped away, smoking and hissing.

  Candyce is mostly a thoughtful girl, with a bit of a cruel streak when wronged. But that’s okay because she can read Dr. Singh’s handwriting and is willing to translate, and that is a gracious act in and of itself. Besides, she was right to punch me in the stomach. I should never have left her alone. I just panicked.

  Sitting before me now, Candyce studies the cryptology of my prescription. Instead of immediately divulging the secret information, she chews on her lip. She looks at me, then back at the prescription, then up at me again. “It says you need to relax,” she says finally. “No work for five days.”

  “Thanks,” I say, and gesture toward the note. “Sometimes I don’t understand simple things.”

  “I know.”

  I smile awkwardly.

  “Hey! Let’s go see a movie!” she says. “That’d be relaxing!” I start to form the words of a lie, but she cuts me off. “Pick me up here at seven,” she says, and slaps the prescription in my hand.

  chapter 32

  Candyce is actually quite attractive. Aside from the blue streak down the middle of her black hair, she’s got a great smile and pretty eyes. She’s quirky and perky, which would be good if she were to take Dr. Singh’s advice about moderation. There doesn’t seem to be a cell of it in all of her attractive, quirky, perky body. Even in a terrifyingly public place like a movie theater.

  “She was totally naked and fucking this guy next to me,” she says, in a much higher pitch than she uses at the office. “And they weren’t quiet about it either, I mean they’re banging three feet away while I’m trying to sleep! And this is supposed to be my vacation! I’m like, shut the fuck up over there, you sluts!”

  The movie theater is a classic 1920s movie palace, decorated in an ornate East Indian style. Hundreds of painted elephants parade across the walls. Some of them stare at me, wondering if Candyce will stop saying the word “fuck” while a family with young kids sits behind us, fully engaged by her blue-streaked hair and lack of moderation.

  “Fucking unreal!” she screams, or at least it feels like it.

  “Candyce,” I whisper, smiling, trying to keep it light. “Please, for the children.” I nod in their direction.

  “So I ended up sleeping on the beach, for Christ’s sake, on the beach! I spent all my money on a hotel room, and now I have a sore throat, and I’m sleeping on the beach because my roommate who is also supposed to be my friend can’t stop—”

  “Unbelievable!” I say. “That’s not a good friend.”

  Candyce must sense my edginess because she sits back in her seat and stops talking. She studies me between sips of her giant soda and handfuls of my popcorn. I’m counting elephants: forty-seven so far.

  “Can I ask you something?” she blurts.

  “Shoot.” I’m not sure I’m game, but it’s an opportunity to redirect her that I can’t pass up. She offers me her soda first, and I surprise myself by sipping from her straw. She changes her position then, sits up a little more, attentive to my inevitable answer, honestly curious about how I’ll respond. Five more elephants on the ceiling. Big ones. I’m surprised I didn’t see them before.

  “How did you get so exhausted?” she asks.

  I stare at Candyce’s hair, the shiny blue streak in particular. A unique hue swirls through it, almost metallic. Inside the blue stripe I see a distant memory of a deep bliss I once knew. It’s buried inside a tomb of a room that is so full of something the door refuses to open. The house lights dim and I watch Candyce’s eyes turn from blue to gray. She looks dead to me with her eyes agog, and she doesn’t blink once until I look away.

  chapter 33

  Wanderlust Incorporated is busy today. The office noises blend together to create a frustrating soundtrack—soft enough so I can’t hear the lyrics, but loud enough so I can’t ignore the melody. What there is of it. Voices muttering sales pitches. Fingers tapping keyboards.

  I sit upright in front of my computer and try to tune it all out. I’ve ignored Dr. Singh’s prescription and come to work. Somehow it was easier than trying to explain to Steve that I need five days off to relax after my vacation. I watch The Randomizer pick a new number. The cursor blinks in time with the ringing in my headset.

  A woman answers with a hello. She sounds nice, friendly. I listen to the dynamics of her voice, the subtle texture, the breathy timbre. She speaks again, more urgently: hello? I listen to her exhale. Is she really alive on the other side of the connection? What is she thinking about? Does it upset her that I’m reaching out to her only to be silent?

  She hangs up.

  The Randomizer dials again.

  Steve left me a welcome-back gift. A nice gesture, albeit a little odd. It’s called a Bug-Out Bob. A little air-filled rubber guy whose eyes, ears, and tongue pop out when you squeeze him. A stress reliever, I suppose. Office gag. It sits on my desk, staring at me with fearful rubber eyes.

  The ringing continues in my headset. I stand up to survey my workplace. Over the cubicle walls, I see nothing out of the ordinary. Steve is in his office. Workers are at the copy machine and fax. I sit back down.

  A man answers this time. “Hello? Block residence.”

  I listen.

  “Block residence? Hello?”

  I say nothing, but grab the squeezie-doll and tighten my grip.

  “Who is this?”

  I squeeze my fist hard. The doll’s innards become outtards. I release.

  “If you can hear me, say something.”

  Another squeeze. Eyes and ears and tongue bulge at impossible angles. I keep them bulging. The caller hangs up. I release and return Bug-Out Bob to his post.

  I really should be responding to calls I’ve initiated today. To sell effectively, a certain amount of interac
tion is required. Interaction equals sales, and sales earn commissions, and commissions pay the bills—something I’ve been more than a little bit slack about lately. When Mom died, she left us with the house and the mortgage, and when Natalie moved out, I agreed to take it over. She’s offered to help if I need it, of course, but I just can’t ask her for any more help. Besides, the mortgage is now paid. It’s just all those other bills. Well, at least the credit cards, as of late.

  The Randomizer continues to dial. I study the postcards on my cubicle walls. What an odd invention, postcards. So unassuming. A little card with a place to write a note.

  “Hello?” a voice asks.

  Postcards, I want to say to the caller. One-way only. No return address. Who the hell came up with that anyway?

  The caller hangs up without a challenge.

  In order to feel productive, I begin to trap my scattered thoughts on Post-it notes. Somehow they feel safer confined to tiny yellow squares. They quickly accumulate, however, creating a pattern of chaos all of their own. Random statements and questions stuck to the table, one edge of each note lifting up and away as if desperately wanting to jump back in the fray.

  Pay bills

  Who invented postcards?

  Soft-sell, don’t be pushy

  CAT scan

  Remember to Relax

  I cover the loose ends with another note. And another. And another.

  chapter 34

  I know I shouldn’t, but the credit card companies keep sending me offers, so I keep opening them. They’re all so shiny and full of promise. The PlatinumExcella®. The PremierFreedom®. No annual fees. No interest for a year.

  I already put my plane tickets on the DiamondPrestige®, and my hotel rooms on the TitaniumRewards®, which I think leaves a little room on my GoldPoints® card for a few other expenditures. I’m just trying to adhere to Dr. Singh’s orders about taking some time off worrying.

  In this spirit, I decide to blow off work today. And while I may be abusing my flex-time privileges to the max, Steve hasn’t said anything, so I keep my focus on unwinding.

  And what better place than the Arizona Day Spa? I’ve probably passed this place a hundred times on my way to Wanderlust, but never stopped before today. The sign outside is painted with saguaro cacti and a deep red sky. It seems like a place people would go to relax. I enter through the front door and into the lobby, which is all desert tones—peaches and browns and turquoise. The menu of treatments hangs above a faux adobe fireplace. The full-immersion mud bath is tempting, but I know I would feel guilty about the high price tag that goes along with it, hence killing the whole effect. I also pass up the seaweed body-wrap and the chocolate face-painting for the wonderful dark heat of the cedar sauna, which is free with the daily entrance fee.

  The smell of the sweet wood is intoxicating enough, but the heat is so delightfully stifling I almost forget my troubles. I sit and sweat and labor at breathing. I might be feeling happy; I’m not sure. I decide to sweat some more, let it drip off my eyelids. I’ve left the light off and it’s the closest feeling I’ve had to the car wash that I can remember, so that’s good. Then the door opens.

  “Anyone in here?” a voice asks.

  Damn it.

  A click, and the room is filled with light.

  “Oh sorry,” the voice says. A forty-something man with an excess of body hair and a deep, orange-brown tan enters the sauna. He doesn’t turn the light back off. “I love the sauna,” he says, and pours a ladleful of water over the coals. Steam fills our little wooden box. The temperature increases. I forgive him for intruding; more steam is exactly what I needed. I feel like I’m breathing water now, or devolving to a single-celled creature made of pure liquid. A smoldering burn in my lungs forces me to breathe even slower. My eyes glaze over with sweat and I don’t wipe it away.

  The hairy orange man climbs up on the top level and stretches out the entire length of the bench—a sauna pro. Oranga-man, I think, I am in a sauna with a large monkey. He gives a quick exhalation to acknowledge my presence—or a grunt to ward off the other monkeys in the rain forest. “Good for the soul,” he says. “Sweats out the demons.”

  I grunt back, and think about demons seeping out of my pores—little imps melting and running down the tip of my nose, absorbing into the cedar planks below. And although I can barely breathe, all I want is for this stranger to be replaced by someone female, and I want to be sweating with her, mixing our demons together, sliding across each other’s skin, breathing each other’s hot breath, feeling the smoldering burn, until we both turn to liquid and evaporate.

  “You look a little peaked, friend,” the orange man says. “You didn’t fall asleep in here did you?”

  I force myself to sit up, and sure enough my head begins to spin.

  “Too much of a good thing can be bad, you know,” he says. “Everything in moderation.”

  chapter 35

  My cell phone vibrates just as Gazelle has completely encased me in a tub full of black, mineral-enriched, Moor peat mud. I set the phone to vibrate in consideration of my fellow entombed ones. I look down the row of the other gravesites adjacent my own, the pasty faces poking up from the ground, ceremonial cucumber slices covering the eyes of the dead. If they notice the buzzing, they’re not letting on.

  I considered leaving my phone in the locker room, but I’m still waiting for that call about the CAT-scan results. Now I’m not sure I can even answer because I can barely move my arms against the weight of the heavy earth. I’m covered in too much of a good thing. It’s okay, though. I won’t worry about it: doctor’s orders.

  My phone rests atop a clean, white, folded towel next to the mud bath, as if it’s on its own separate spa retreat. I glance at the number. It’s a 201 area code. New Jersey. I manage to slip my arm out, clean my hand on the towel, and answer before it stops buzzing.

  “I found out more about you and your girlfriend,” the man says on the other end of the line. It’s Corey, the reluctant clerk from Sunny Smiles. Hearing him say the word girlfriend feels unfamiliar and somewhat scary; I try to place its meaning and context, but it’s got my head spinning. I pull myself up out of the ground, slowly, my ear tight to the phone. “To be honest with you,” he says, and then he tells me what he knows, that when he put my cell phone number in his computer, it showed that my girlfriend and I were there about a year ago. “What was her name again?” he asks.

  “Zoe?” I answer in a question. Her name sounds so strange out loud. Hollow, yet hopeful at the same time. Something inside me snaps to attention.

  “You had a problem with your suspension, some kind of CV boot situation.”

  “What’s a CV boot?”

  “Has to do with the integrity of the front axle.”

  “Huh.”

  “That’s what the records show anyway.”

  I feel my heart sink from the pressure of phantom thoughts, bits and pieces of truths not quite ready to be known—it’s a weight heavier than forty feet of mud. I stop breathing for a moment, then inhale suddenly, a cartoon gasp. Corey tries to explain in between the dropouts of my cell connection, but I’m not listening anymore. In the spa windows I see my reflection: a pale white gangly mess, chunks of earth sliding down my body. I am alive from the grave.

  “One of the guys said she spoke in a foreign accent sometimes. Chinese, maybe?”

  The satellites in the heavens must be shifting because Corey’s voice goes distant and fuzzy, then drops out completely.

  Gazelle approaches me with a glass of water. “It’s better if you stay covered for the full treatment,” she says. “You should get back down there.”

  No thanks, I say internally, but I feel my head nodding yes, yes.

  Yes, Gazelle, yes.

  chapter 36

  The voice isn’t familiar, but the number is. It’s the collection service.

  “Sid’s not here,” I say into my cell, and look out at the vastness of my dark backyard. I prop myself against my shovel. Diggi
ng is hard work, but I realize I might have the beginning of something wonderful: a six-foot-by-three-foot hole, almost a full twelve inches deep. The stranger continues to talk anyway—a real collection whiz—but I’m distracted with noticing how incredibly vibrant my skin feels since visiting the Arizona Day Spa. I’ve been going daily for two weeks now. It’s like my epidermis is vibrating.

  The collectors have all tried different ways to fool me. Yesterday an older, assertive woman insisted I call her back as soon as possible about important information concerning my account. I enjoyed her performance; it was bold and brassy. She put a little street into it, got a little tough. The day before that, a guy with a Bible belt accent and damnation in his voice warned me of repercussions. He used that word a lot: repercussions. I remember hearing about percussion bombs in the news and thinking how they must be loud and violent and obtrusive. So repercussions must be especially bad. The guy who’s on the phone now is real nice and friendly, like he’s my favorite uncle, Ricky, calling to take me out to a ballgame.

  “So, pal, how’s it going today?” he asks.

  “Pretty good, buddy,” I return, just as sweet.

  “Sid?”

  “Sid should be back later. He’s at work.”

  “He must work a long shift. He was just at work twelve hours ago.”

  “Yeah, he works funny shifts. A hard worker, that one.”

  “I’m talking to Sid, aren’t I?” he says, silky smooth.

  “Nope. Sid will be back later.”

  “Come on, Sid. We need you to make a payment. It’s the responsible thing to do. You’ve exceeded your limit.”

  “I’ll have him call you tomorrow.”

  “Be a man, Sid—”

  I hang up the phone, unearth my shovel, and slice back into the ground with its tip. It’s a good night for digging. Cool. Serene. I can almost feel the night birds watching me. Another two feet and I will have my very own mud bath. I’ll never need to pay the Arizona Day Spa again. And the cost of a tip for water, towels, and fruit service can get expensive, which the collectors sometimes take the time to mention while going over my current balance due. If they freeze my cards, that’s fine, I don’t need them anymore. And if the phone company wants to turn my phone off, that’s okay too. They never give good service anyway.