“What kind of company, pray tell?”
Oh, it's uh, you know, one of those kind of companies that deals with the, you know, the hauntings and stuff.
“So what does your company actually accomplish to better mankind?” he asked, kind of setting himself up for a huge fall.
I shrug, We deal with ghosts and paranormal things. We un -haunt people's houses.
“Like Ghostbusters? ” he asked as he shook his head curiously.
No, not really. I mean, maybe. Honestly, I think it's just a cover for our research . . . looking for the twenty-three Evils. Hey, you've seen Ghostbusters?
He leaned his angelic head back, looking down his chiseled face at me. In a word I'd have to call his look suspicious .
I dared a peek over the edge of my useless balcony guardrail, my heart jumping a bit. It felt like there was a frog in my throat—and he was apparently as scared of heights as I was. Then I wondered something. Something serious.
“Mr. Uriel,” I said, real respectful like. “Where is this place that we're in, right now? I don't understand. I didn't crossover, so . . . ”
“It's a border town, so to speak. Not quite in the Land of Sorrows, but not in the Earth plane, either.” He stared up into the dark sky above us.
No stars.
No light.
Nothing at all.
He folded his hands in front of his cloak and sighed, “In this place you and I can communicate with each other. You are connected to the Land of Sorrows through your experiences. And I am, well . . . I'm an Angel.”
Why can't you just come and visit without melting everything? I asked carefully.
He took a step towards me, his face softening a bit. “Things are the way they are, regardless of whether they make sense to us or not. For you, I suppose it's the only way we are allowed to communicate, without risking your death. Your time in the Land of Sorrows is quite limited, as you may recall.”
I shiver just thinking about it.
“ . . . for me, it is the will of God. I am not the kind of Angel that sits over baby cradles and helps old people across the street. We each have our lot in life. Mine is to walk between the darker parts of the afterlife. I see things,” he paused, closing his eyes briefly, “ . . . differently.”
And by the way he said it, I can tell, for sure, that I don't want to know what differently means.
Alright, I say as I summon up my courage. Tell me what we have to do to fix what I did.
“If you need to contact me, wait until the dark hours of the morning, and concentrate on my image. If that doesn't work, start saying my name. One way or another, I'll find you. In this border town.”
Okay, I say. What else?
“Look for the signs. Certain things will repeat themselves. They must sustain themselves. And they are creatures of habit. That means patterns will eventually appear. I will try and pass along information as we acquire it, but I cannot guarantee that my information will be timely enough to use. We'll do what we can from the other side.”
We ? There are others hunting the twenty-three Evils?
“Oh, yes. This is potentially earth-changing. We've got plenty of energy poured into this. You have support, just not on earth. We are bound to this side.”
“How will we know if we've found the right souls?” I ask. I don't even want to consider the part whereby I have to kill them and somehow cart them back to Deadside.
“The universe is consistent on certain things. Like the principles of Thermodynamics, there is a balance to all matter, souls included. These Evils, they may have greater than human abilities or talents . . . ”
Great.
“But they will have deficits, too. For every strength they possess, they will have a weakness. An Achilles heel, so to speak. Remember the principles of physics.”
I can't remember six months ago. Physics may be a bit of a stretch.
“Think of it like this: Positive and negative are necessarily bound together. Ying and Yang. Ebb and flow—”
Tango and Cash?
He smiled. “You hide your insecurity in your wit. That's good. It will help you.” Then he paused for a moment, considering something.
What? I can take it. What is it?
“ . . . she doesn't love you, Jack.”
She did.
“You killed her.”
Obviously, I say, that's something we're going to have to work through.
“She will kill you without hesitation,” he said firmly, the blue-green of his eyes turning icy and hollow. “ . . . rip you limb from limb, stretching your body in a thousand directions. Kristen will not flinch, not for a second. Because she knows that she is facing a whole new kind of damnation. One that none of us can predict. All twenty-three of them are eternally damned to a place that will make Lucifer's domain seem like your Disney World. ”
I looked down at my feet, realizing that I have not been paying this situation the seriousness it deserves. My soul is on the line, and I'm still thinking about the crush I had on a dead con artist.
He placed his hands on my shoulders, and they felt heavy. “Jack,” he said slowly, “once they know you're coming, they'll stop at nothing to escape, or rid the earth of your presence.”
“But I'm just some schlep who lost his marbles. Why would they be afraid of me?”
He took a step back, his hands falling to his sides, appraising me. “You have no idea what you will eventually achieve.”
I don't understand.
“You are . . . not one of them, anymore.”
When you say, them , who do you mean?
“Humans, Jack. Humans.”
Oh, shit.
“The creatures you see stalking to and from the shadows, they aren't your tormentors . . . they are your allies. You, like it or not, are a new breed. The rules have changed. You are something different. In time you will figure this all out.”
When might that be? I wonder aloud. Because I could really use a guidebook or something.
“Go back to bed, Jack. Get your rest. There's evil to catch.”
He says it like it's a cold virus.
Like you're infected with it.
A disease I have to search out and contract. Actively pursue.
And with that I back my way to the window turning towards the funny-shaped door. As I open it Uriel says, “And Jack . . . good luck with the Ghost busting.”
“It's not like that,” I say glancing back.
But he's gone. And already I have to pee again.
7
The Loft.
Wednesday, 9:47 am . . .
We're all sitting around on our white leather furniture, talking about what Uriel had told me last night. We're trying to figure out where our new business fits in with the whole 'save the world from evil' thing.
“Like I said before,” Ricky explained to us, “it's our cover. It lets us snoop around at things that would normally send up flags and alarms. But if people see us as paranormal investigators , detectives even, then we'll just be those idiot ghost hunters. People will laugh at us. We'll be a novelty. But we'll have autonomy, too.”
Ms. Josephine, up to this point, has been relatively quiet on the subject of ALG. She and Ricky have discussed it before, but never have the three of us been together. “We could do some good for da living and da dead.”
I need to back-up a bit. Ms. Josephine, for the last several weeks, has been giving Ricky everything she can find for him to read on the ways of medicine. And by ways I mean, her ways.
Voodoo.
The Zande people of the Congo.
The indigenous Mapuche people of Chile.
Tsau among the West African, Tiv and itonga among the East African Safwa .
He's learning all of it. The epitome of illegitimate antisocial activity, as well as the righteous wrath of established authority, employed to curse wrongdoers and shaman alike. And he's picking it up, too. Ricky seems to have a knack for all things medicine. Like he understands bodies better than
the rest of us.
So, Ms. Josephine is teaching him in the ways she was taught. She thinks he had an aptitude for spiritual medicine . So he's got that going for him. It's not anything you'd put on a resume, but it's good to have in your back pocket when you're hunting the most evil 23 people on earth.
Anyway, this business, the After Life Group , it seems like an idea that sits well with all of us. Ricky's using it for a cover to do our research. Ms. Josephine's hoping we can help some spirits get across to the other side, or whatever.
And me, I'm just hoping I figure all of this out before spooks start bouncing around me. Whether they work with me or not, the little bastards still give me the heebie-jeebies.
And the gatherers, well, they're just another part of the equation I'd rather not think about. There's just something about having long armed monsters wielding sharp knives, digging into your chest and extricating your soul that leaves me wishing I'd kept my eyes shut.
“It would be cool to find some real ghosts, though,” Ricky says taking a sip of soda. I think he's on his fourth or fifth Dr. Pepper, and it's not even ten, yet. He may have a problem.
“Dere's real ghosts everywhere,” Ms. Josephine said as she sat forward. “Dey're like souls dat flutter back and forth. Not knowing where dey should be. 'oldin' on to somethin' dat's long gone. And we can 'elp dem.” She's wearing a thin summer dress that's dark green, covered in different colored blue and silver dots. Like something Jackson Pollock did—20th century Abstract Expressionism clashing with our white furniture.
“This furniture didn't look like this last night,” I tell them. I'm changing the subject because I don't believe in ghosts. Sure, I've seen them. Talked to them. Even kissed one. But that's different. Regular ghosts, like in the movies, that's all a load. I'm more like Ricky in my cynicism.
Swamp gas and bad plumbing, that about sums it up.
“What do you mean?” Ricky asked, looking down to make sure there weren't any marks on the leather.
I took a deep breath, my cheeks puffing out like a trumpet player. “Well,” I say, “they looked like that house in the movie Bettlejuice . Messed-up to the point where insurance wouldn't cover it.”
“I'm glad it's you seeing that shit and not me,” Ricky said, instantly realizing that Ms. Josephine was boring a hole in him with her eyes. He lowered his head, “Sorry, Ms. Josephine. That stuff, I mean.”
Ms. Josephine, she's like our second mom. And since I don't remember my parents, for me, she's like my only mom. She does everything. She makes sure the refrigerator is full, and that we have food other than Dr. Pepper and pizza. She makes us wash our clothes, reminding us that it's important to do some things yourself, even if you can afford to have others do them.
She grew up in extreme poverty, and she doesn't want us turning in to colossal dicks because we have money to spend. I poisoned the earth with evil, so I'm probably stuck, no matter how many times I move my laundry from the washer to the dryer.
“Well,” I say, nodding, “I guess—”
And then we hear the ambulance approaching, right out front, near the entrance to the building. Ricky and Ms. Josephine get up and walk to the kitchen, and out onto the balcony to look, but I already know what's going on.
Ricky's outside looking down, and then he turns and looks through the glass at me and I shrug. I decide that it would be in poor taste to bring up the five-dollar bet that we made yesterday about the attorney. The fact that I can see the spooks fitting people for their death suits gives me an obviously unfair advantage. Especially when gambling.
They walk back in and stare at me.
“Sorry,” I say. “It was his time.”
Ricky hisses to himself and heads towards the stairs. He's still just wearing his board shorts, and we have an appointment. Ms. Josephine is going to the ALG office to rid it of evil spirits or something. And Ricky and I are heading out to meet one of his buddies at a tattoo parlor off of Beltline.
Since I'm going to be traveling back and forth among the living and dead, and every time I need to paint my chest and arms with protective runes and symbols and markings, Ricky suggested, and Ms. Josephine agreed, that I should get them put permanently on my skin.
As in, tattoo .
As in, forever .
This idea didn't sit too well with me. I argued, What happens when I go for some job interview and people see the tattoos? They'll think I'm some ex-con who just hit the street after years of hardcore prison violence and gang activity. You know what they do to each other in prison.
They literally laughed at me when I said that. And then Ricky said, “Jack, don't be ridiculous about this. These tattoos will save your life. Quit being a whinny little nancy, and get the work done. Man up,” he said, quoting Detective Todd Steele.
The bastard knows just where to hit me. Appeal to my manliness by alluding to my fictional hero. He's good, that Ricky.
And that's basically that. Some time after 11-o'clock we have an appointment at Cat Tattoo.
“Just think,” Ricky says as he comes down the stairs two-at-a-time, “ . . . in a few hours, you will have spiritual badass tattooed all over your body.” He shrugged, “I might even get a few myself.”
I haven't told them, yet, about what Uriel was saying about my being different than human. It's one of those things I'll get around to sooner or later.
8
South on Beltway Drive, Addison.
Wednesday, mid-morning . . .
We're driving towards a place full of people who want to jab me about a billion times with needles they sterilize in a microwave.
“That's a narrow view of tattoo parlors,” Ricky said as he performed yet another illegal right lane change.
He didn't wait for a safe and appropriate time to signal for a lane change. He didn't check his blind spot twice. Far as I can tell, he never even looked at all. And he can see me glancing down at my DMV book, shaking my head.
As we zip through traffic, people are either drafting us, or dodging us. There's no middle ground. Lead, follow, or get out of the way, that's Ricky's take on it.
“This vehicle is an extension of my body,” he says, explaining his recklessness on the road. “I feel it as if it were another limb.”
Well, I say, you've got your limbs all over the road.
We come up to make a right turn, and I already know I'm going to be disgusted. I decide to dare him to do it correctly by reading the rules one by one.
“Alright, Ricky, first you signal for a lane change well ahead of the turning point, and when it's safe, move the vehicle to the far right lane.”
He steadies his arms on the steering wheel, giving me the you're on glance. His hands rest at 10 and 2 o'clock on the wheel, just like the manual suggests. I nod.
He puts on his signal.
I nod.
He slowly moves over to the rightmost lane.
I nod.
“Now, step number two,” I say, “Begin right turn signal, and start slowing down at least one-hundred feet from the corner.”
Ricky laughs under his breath, slowing the black Porsche Cayenne down to a speed that he clearly thinks is unreasonable.
I nod.
“Very nice, Ricky. Very nice. Now, look both ways before starting to turn,” I instruct him as I read. “It's all about safety now.”
His eyes become two little slits, too small to insert dimes into, even. He takes a deliberate glance to the left, then to the right, and then looks at me, wondering if it's alright to proceed.
“Keep as close as possible to the right edge of the road. Turn using both hands on the wheel.”
He swallows, as if he's trying to keep the bile down. I nod. He makes the turn. I nod, again. And then, just when I think there is some hope for him, he floors it, screeching the tires as we're both pinned to our seats. Everything that's flying by us, it's all blurred and vibrating, just like the border town between earth and Deadside. But I know it's just our ridiculous amount of speed, and not a call f
rom the dead.
I couldn't nod if I wanted to. And Ricky, he's smiling like some maniacal circus clown who just escaped the insane asylum. As we're doing this, the book falls open to the section on dealing with multiple vehicle accidents. How appropriate.
“That stuff's for idiots, Jack,” he says as he brings the SUV down to a reasonable speed. “That's based on old vehicle technology, and poor driving habits. If you really want to learn how to drive, you watch Formula-One racing. That's driving. That right there,” he says pointing at my yellow DMV book, “ . . . that's for retards.”
I tell him, If I ever get Cerebral Arteriosclerosis, I hope I forget all of the times like this.
“Yeah, yeah. Talk your trash, but whenever we need to pull a getaway, I'll be the one you hope is driving.”
I shrug, and put the book in my pants pocket.
Ricky makes a quick left, and then another right, and we're here. As we park he shuts down the engine and looks at me, “Dude, don't be squeamish about this. I've got a reputation, you know. So don't sit there cryin' and acting like a bitch when they start doing the outlines.”
I've been dead before, Ricky. I'm pretty sure I can handle a little poke with some tiny little needles.
He nods, grabs the keys, and we head inside.
9
Cat Tattoo, Addison.
11:17 am . . .
This guy with no hair, and metal horns is drawing on my chest and arms and back with a pen. His name is Chuck, and supposedly he is wicked , with sick ink skills. His arms have so much ink on them he looks like he's wearing a long-sleeved shirt. And did I mention the horns. Not just one or two of them, no . . . six. Like one of those mean guys on Star Wars: Episode 3 .
Did those hurt? I ask him, taking note of how clean and sanitary this place actually is. Not at all what I had expected.
“No, man. I mean, I guess, yeah . . . a little. Especially at first. Because they have to make the incisions and set all the grommets. See, they're actually threaded into my head, with titanium.”
I want to ask him why a guy would want to put permanent horns on his head, but I think better of it. I don't want him tattooing me angry. Somehow though, he senses my curiosity.
See Jack Hunt (See Jack Die) Page 4
