The birthday boy face-palmed and his friends began to boo again. That was until I tapped the top hat with my wand, smashed it upside down on the table and lifted it up to reveal a two-tier birthday cake, lit candles and all.
That really got their attention. The kids began to clap and cheer, all except for the birthday boy.
‘Well,’ I said, ‘aren’t you going to make a wish?’
‘Yeah,’ he sneered, ‘I wish I never grow up to be a loser like you.’
He scored himself a big laugh from the rest of the kids for that. The Teenage Turtle tossed a bowl of jelly at me. One of the Elsa’s almost puked.
A lesser man would have thrown in the towel then, but I am nothing if not patient. ‘Go on then,’ I told the birthday boy, ‘blow out the candles and make your wish properly if that’s what you want.’
With a shit-eating grin, he puckered up, leaned into the cake and blew for all he was worth.
A half-second later he was gone—vanished into thin air—him and the rest of the kids.
Ta da!
Hell of a closer, I think you’ll agree. Worthy of Copperfield.
You’re probably wondering how I pulled that off. I get it, you’re the curious sort. Well, it wasn’t a magic trick, I can tell you that much, at least not in the traditional sense.
What I’d done to the kids was exorcise them.
That’s, exorcise, not exercise, though kids these days could certainly use some of that. Not these ones though, they were well past the point of needing to shed a few pounds.
They were dead.
Ghosts who were unaware that they’d passed on, trapped between this world and the next. I deal with them all the time. It’s my job. You see, I hadn’t come to Mitchell House to entertain a bunch of primary school kids, I’d come to deliver some lost souls to their final resting place. The magic stuff was just to make their transition a little easier. I didn’t have to do it, but when someone dies traumatically and winds up a ghost… well, what’s the harm in treading a little softly? And believe me when I say these kids died some pretty miserable deaths.
It happened a year ago to the day. Killed in a house fire, each and every one of them. The story goes that the birthday boy got tired of waiting for his mum to fetch her camera and blew out the candles on his cake while she was out of the room. Like I say, precocious. Anyway, a candle caught the sleeve of his incredibly flammable fancy dress costume and he went up like a torch. When he ran into the arms of the Teenage Turtle he started a domino effect, and pretty soon the whole place was blazing. Everyone in that room—the room I was stood in with my partner, Damon—was roasted alive.
Grim stuff.
So then, here I am. *Stands up and coughs*. My name’s Jake Fletcher and I’m an exorcist. I probably should have mentioned that going in, but you must have figured out something was up. Right? I mean, come on, a kids’ birthday party in the night time? Walking straight into the house uninvited? No adult supervision? That bit about Damon’s crucifix? Like I say, I’m sure you picked up on the clues. You’re a canny one, I can tell.
Damon stuffed the props back into the briefcase, his mouth set in a sulky pout. ‘What was all that birthday cake shite about?’ he asked. ‘You go too easy on ‘em, that’s your problem.’
Damon has his own way of doing things, but it was my turn to take the lead on this one, and I was happy with the job I’d done. I’d been able to send those dead kids to the Great Hereafter with a bit of grace this time. Next job we did we’d work to Damon’s Banish and Vanish policy.
‘I wanted to send them on their way gently, that’s all,’ I explained. ‘Your fire and brimstone, “The power of Christ compels thee!” stuff wasn’t a fit for this gig. Those weren’t malignant spirits, just little kids who died in a fire.’
Damon tutted. ‘You’re a soft touch, fella. They’re a nuisance is all. Send ‘em to heaven and let God sort ‘em out, that’s what I say.’
As if Damon O’Meara knew the first thing about God. He might be familiar with a few bible passages and act like he walks on water, but the man’s a believer in the worst possible sense. The kind that only obeys the scripture he wants to obey, like he’s digging into a bucket of morality pick n’ mix. He liked to call himself a priest, but the truth is he got kicked out of the seminary well before he was ordained (don’t know why, don’t want to know why). After that, he went rogue. Bought himself a white collar on eBay and started practicing exorcisms without papal consent. Honestly, I’d be happy to stay clear of the man, but when you’re dealing with the Uncanny, it’s always best to work with a partner. It’s not all kids and magic tricks, this job. Things can get pretty hairy if you go messing with the wrong spook, and that’s not even getting into demonic possession. Only a nutter gets into this biz without having someone to watch their back, and Damon was the best I could manage.
But he wasn’t finished giving me shit. ‘You act all high and mighty, but the truth is you just don’t take what we do seriously. Look at you, you didn’t even bring a crucifix!’ he cried. ‘That’s like bringing a knife to a gunfight. Forget that, it’s like forgetting to bring a knife to a gunfight.’
Unlike Damon, I don’t have much use for a crucifix. I’m not really a religious sort of guy. The truth is, I was a straight-up atheist. I came into the exorcism game from a whole other angle to Damon, but we’ll get into that later. Right now, all you need to know is that I don’t put much stock in a higher power. Unless you want to count Iron Maiden, anyway.
Those guys shred.
2
I arrived home at my crappy two-bed in Tufnell Park. Well, I say crappy, it’s really just small—it’s not like the place is a slum or anything. Sarah, my wife, she keeps the place tidy enough. Who am I kidding, tidy is an understatement, our flat looks like it was set dressed by Stanley Kubrick.
I closed the door behind me quietly, tiptoed to the bedroom and shucked my suit onto the carpet. My bed was a futon on the floor of the spare room. Sarah preferred I slept there. We worked back-to-back, see: she did a regular nine-to-five while I mostly did night shifts. Sleeping in the spare room meant I wouldn't wake her up when I got home from a gig. By the time I’d show up she’d be fast asleep, and when I finally crawled out of bed the next day, she’d be long gone. I wondered sometimes if we were even living together anymore, that’s how little I saw of her. I’d check for dents in her pillow to make sure she hadn’t moved out on me, except being a neat freak, she’d smooth them out the moment she got up. The best indicator I had as to whether I still had a wife was the position of the toilet seat. Sure, go ahead, you can play that tiny violin.
To say Sarah and me had grown apart would be an understatement. By this point we weren't man and wife so much as cell mates. I should have seen it coming, I mean, we never did make much sense as a couple. Even at college, the place we met, we made for an odd pairing. I was the shiftless art student with the greasy hair who always reeked of incense, while she was the beautiful, driven girl with the eighty-quid haircut and the Prada pumps. Of course I was smitten with her—always did have a thing for the ice queen type—but no one expected her to take an interest in me, least of all yours truly.
Turns out she was only slumming it though. She came from a well to-do family and would do just about anything to piss off daddy, so naturally she went for the guy who dressed in a black trench coat, smoked liquorice roll-ups, and dabbled in the occult. Since then, the charm’s rather worn off. That stuff might be a lark at college, but it starts to wear a bit thin once you head into your thirties. Still, we’re married now, and it seems neither one of us wants to admit defeat.
I suspect she’d be happy to be shot of me though. Why do I suspect that? Well, my main piece of evidence is the fact that she tells me so. Again and again if she has too many G&Ts in her. Calls me an embarrassment. A loser. A big baby of a man who cost her the PIN to her daddy’s black credit card. And I dare say she has a point. I’m an easygoing, unmotivated, go-with-the-flow kind of guy, while she�
��s a successful, ruthless career woman. While she’s got her law firm gig up town, I’m stuck with a job most people don’t even believe exists. Like I say, we’re very different people.
As I laid down in my futon I thought of the dead kid I’d dispatched to the afterlife that evening. How I’d given him his final birthday wish and saved him from a life in limbo. I poured a shot of Glenmorangie from a bottle I kept in the corner cabinet, and raised a glass. Here’s to you, kid. You might have checked out early, but at least you’ll never grow up to be a loser like me.
3
As I took my morning piss, I noticed the soap in the dish on the bathroom sink was already wet. My heart swelled a bit. I still had a wife. Yeah, pathetic I know.
I took a shower, ate some breakfast, and went to the wardrobe for some clothes. Turned out everything I had was in the laundry basket or on the floor. I really did need to get my shit together. With nothing else to wear, I resigned myself to putting on the suit I’d used for yesterday’s birthday/deathday party. It was a little smarter than I usually dress for a daytime appointment (well, a lot smarter), but being as I was off to a business meeting, I figured what the hell?
See, Jake Fletcher doesn’t do exorcisms for the fun of it, he does it for a living (he also likes talking about himself in the third person, but that’s enough of that for now). When I bust a ghost I expect to get paid. I’m not a dabbler in the occult anymore, checking Crowley books out of the college library and pissing about with Wicca. I’m a professional, freelance exorcist with a list of clearances to my name as long as your arm. I’ve been at this game so long I’ve even earned a nickname from it: The Polterguy. Well, I kind of gave myself the nickname if I’m honest. Anyway, it’s honest work, and even though I don’t make a packet from it, it pays my way. Some may sneer, but what else was I going to do for a living? Cash in on my Fine Art degree?
The ghosts I purged yesterday had been haunting the Mitchell House for a full year, making it impossible to sell the property on, even after the fire damage had been repaired. All in all, an estate agents’ nightmare, but not for Vic Lords. There was a guy who knew how to profit from misery.
Vic Lords was a property tycoon and local gangster. The man had his fingers in an awful lot of pies: gambling pies, drug pies, prostitution pies. Another of the dodgy businesses he was involved in was buying haunted estates, which he picked up on the cheap then resold for a tasty profit once Damon and me had evicted the supernatural squatters. I found Vic to be a pretty despicable guy, but he paid well, and on time. Without him, I’d have been living like a student still, filling my car up a fiver at a time and getting my hair cut at Mr Toppers. At least this way I could make rent. Well, a fraction of it anyway. Sarah’s job covered most of the bills. Yeah, I know, I’m a real prince.
I arrived at Vic’s place of business, a seedy little office upstairs from a knocking shop he ran. It was located in an area of Camden you don’t go at night if you know what’s best for you. The bouncer who looked after the front door—the seven-foot murder tank Vic paid to look after his “little darlings”—recognised my face through the peephole and let me inside. He jabbed a thumb at a set of stairs and I headed for the first floor to meet Vic.
I knocked on his office door but there was no reply. Tired of waiting, I tried the handle and it opened, so I let myself inside. The office overlooked Camden Lock, and down below I could see drunks roaming the banks of the canal, screaming, moaning, making primal sounds. There was no sign of Vic though. Being the nosy sort, I decided to take a quick gander of the place before I went back downstairs and asked the bouncer where his boss had gotten to. Christ knows, I wish I hadn’t.
I found it on his monitor.
There, on the screen, courtesy of some tucked-away, nasty part of the web, were pictures. Pictures of women being forced to do things. Pictures that looked like they’d come from snuff films. Pictures that would turn the stomach of a twenty-time serial killer.
As I backed away from the monitor, I heard a toilet flush and saw a side door creak open. I’d forgotten about Vic’s en suite toilet. The big man stepped out, buttoning his trousers, then looked up to see me stood in the middle of his office like a lemon. He was dressed in fake Armani and scuffed brogues. His dyed black hair was scraped back from his puffy face, which had a blueish tinge from all the broken blood vessels creeping under its surface. Black hair and blue skin – the bloke looked like a photo negative of Donald Trump.
‘How did you get in here?’ he barked, heading for the monitor and jabbing the Off button.
‘The door was open,’ I mumbled. ‘It wasn’t locked or anything.’
He narrowed his eyes and gave me the kind of look a shotgun-wielding farmer might give a fox he’d caught gnawing through the mesh of his chicken coop. He took a seat behind his desk and sank into its duct-taped pleather padding. ‘You’re early,’ he said, still giving me stink-eye.
I checked my watch. He was right. ‘Look, I just came for my pay packet,’ I told him. ‘For the Mitchell House job.’
‘Of course you did,’ he replied, his lip curling. ‘And that’s all, right?’
‘Y-yes,’ I stuttered.
He handed me an envelope. ‘There,’ he said, ‘don’t go spending it all at once.’
I knew Vic better than to hang around counting my money, but this time I made my exit like my arse was on fire.
As I made for the door, he called me. ‘Oh, Jake?’ he said, just as my first foot crossed the doorframe.
‘Yes?’ I replied, not turning around, too scared of finding a gun there.
There was a pregnant pause that ran into its third trimester.
‘Nice suit,’ he said, and gave me a wink that closed my sphincter like a vice.
4
I was making my way home from Vic Lords’ office when a woman leapt out of nowhere, pulled me into an alleyway, and told me I was a murderer.
Let me back up a bit.
I was strolling at a clip down the lower end of Camden High Street, heading for the Tube, when a lady in a red scarf jumped out and yanked me down a side street. At first I took her for a vagrant, but as my eyes adjusted to the woman, I realised I knew her. She worked in a magic shop out in King’s Cross and looked a bit like a young Emma Thompson. I’d met her a couple of days before when I’d bought the props for that last exorcism.
‘Jake Fletcher?’ she hissed.
‘Yeah?’ I replied, taken aback.
‘I’ve heard about you,’ she insisted, ‘and I’m here to tell you that you have to stop what you’re doing.’
‘What do you know about me?’
‘That you’re no stage magician. That you’re an exorcist.’
I lifted my chin, defiantly. ‘Guilty as charged. So, what’s it to you?’
She shoved me again. ‘Don’t you realise you’re killing them?’
I pushed her away and dusted down my suit jacket.
‘Listen,’ I told her, ‘you have no idea what you’re banging on about.’
‘The ghosts,’ she replied. ‘You’re not freeing those poor souls, you’re obliterating them! Erasing them from existence!’
I laughed. ‘No offense, love, but I’ve been to your shop. You sell trick decks to lost tourists. What would you know about what I do?’
‘I know that what you’re doing is wrong. Exorcism is for banishing demons, it isn’t to be used on the dead.’ She tossed her red scarf angrily over her shoulder. ‘You’re not spring-cleaning, for Christ’s sake. Those are human souls you’re scrubbing away!’’
I guess it doesn’t matter what you do for a living or how much of a pro you are, there’s always someone who knows better. Everyone’s an expert these days. I blame the internet.
I shrugged her off and went on my way. ‘Get yourself to the chemist and re-up your brain medicine,’ I told her.
‘You have to stop!’ she yelled after me. ‘Not just for the souls you’re destroying, but for your own too!’
Lunatic.
&nb
sp; I carried on my journey home, starting with a Tube from Mornington Crescent. They’ve spent a lot of money fixing up this part of Camden. Artisanal bakeries, posh hair salons, trendy gastropubs. There’s even a truffle and prosecco bar opposite the station now, whatever the hell that is. Who do they think they’re fooling? They can tart the place up all they like, but they can’t disguise the puddles of sick and the spent syringes that crunch under your feet as you pass the fancy window displays. Camden’s like a monster wearing the skin of some beautiful woman. It might look alright at a glance, but take a closer look and there’s a beast under that mask, blood-red eyes and dripping fangs.
I entered the Tube station, passed through the ticket barriers and took the stairs to the platform, still feeling the chill from my last couple of run-ins. I reached the platform for the Northern line, tired, fed up, and shaken. To sooth my spirits, I plugged in my earbuds and put on some music: Iron Maiden by Iron Maiden, undisputably the best album by Iron Maiden. As I waited on the train home I was grooving to my favourite track (Track 9: Iron Maiden), when I sensed the dim presence of a figure shuffling up behind me. The hairs on the back of my neck began to prickle; whoever it was, they were getting way too close and personal for my liking. As I was turning to see who it was, I felt a sharp shove—
Wallop.
The force knocked me flying.
I made a desperate grab for something—for anything—but all my flailing hands managed to snag hold of was thin air. Thin air and a scrap of fabric, which proved less than useless at keeping me upright. A fraction of a second later I’d left the platform and landed face-down on the tracks.
Right into the path of an oncoming train.
In the split-second I had before the thing hit me, all I could do was crush myself flat and hope for the best. I pressed my face into the dirty ground and covered the back of my head with my hands. The noise was deafening as the train rattled over me and came to a screeching halt halfway into the station. Somehow, against all odds, I’d managed to stay under the axles of the rolling stock.
Uncanny Kingdom: An Eleven Book Urban Fantasy Collection (Uncanny Kingdom Omnibus 1) Page 39
