by Rhys Thomas
The only contact he had was with his neighbor Moira. She had taken to knocking on his window a few times a week to check how he was doing. Sometimes he would go into her house for tea and custard tarts, and she would offer advice on being strong and thinking what his family would have wanted for him.
The letters to his parents kept arriving, but he never opened them, not even the ones marked as “urgent”, or “final notice.”
One morning he got changed and went into the back garden. The day was cool with a crisp blue sky and puffy clouds, glacier white. The green of the trees swayed in a light breeze and Sam climbed the fence into the deserted garden on the other side.
Cats looked at him, plant seeds floated. The zone was somehow cleansed by having had no human contact. He sat on a wooden bench with flaking paint and opened his backpack to fetch a comic. It was the first Sandman collection, Preludes and Nocturnes, and he turned to the last of the eight stories, entitled “The Sound of Her Wings.” In it, the Sandman, maker of all the world’s dreams, meets up with his sister, Death. They walk together as she collects the souls of people and tells them their time is up. For that person, her visit is heralded by the sound of beating wings and then the person looks up, sees her, and she tells them it’s going to be okay. Sam found this version of death extraordinarily comforting, so much more beautiful than anything offered by religion or science. Why could it not happen like that? Or the way the band My Chemical Romance suggested: death coming to welcome you in the form of your most cherished memory. It didn’t matter, the truth. A great choice exists in life: truth or happiness?
Sam scanned the pages of the story, Death and Dream sitting side by side on the steps of Washington Square Park, and then, all of a sudden, the light breeze flickering the corners of the pages, something happened that hadn’t happened in a long time. He began reading. He began reading the words on the pages, bubbles emerging from mouths, and as he did this there came a sensation of warm fluid flowing though him. He was reading again, as the perfect white clouds drifted across the dome and the wind moved serenely through the trees of the garden. The idea that his parents and brother and sister might not have died in horror but been welcomed by a kindly force into the void brought him tremendous comfort in that deserted garden. When he finished the story, he went back to the start of the comic. He read for hours and this time, when the pangs of loss hit him, they didn’t hold in their mass quite the same power.
He started opening his parents’ letters. Most were unpaid bills. He needed to call all the companies and tell them what had happened, which he duly did over the course of the next week, and when he imparted the information his voice held together surprisingly well.
The meeting with the bank was the most difficult. The manager took Sam into a small glass-fronted meeting cubicle and offered his most sincere condolences, but there was still the small matter of the mortgage repayments, and did Sam know if his parents had life insurance? Sam did not know, so the manager with a wave of his hand said not to worry as he would personally contact the Association of British Insurers, who would be able to find any policy that might exist, and in less than two weeks a check for an extraordinary amount of money arrived from a life insurance company Sam had never even known existed.
So it was the world that forced his hand, not any inner strength. He took the check to the bank, and the manager placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder, a manly act. All the money in the world wouldn’t have made any difference to him, but every cog in the economic machine must keep moving, every mortgage repaid, every bill settled; the machine never, ever stops. The feeling was the worst he’d ever had, even worse than when he’d been told about the plane crash, because here was a slip of paper that told him, categorically, “You’ve got to move on now. It’s over.”
* * *
In work the various production lines that had been relying on the ship that sank in the Suez Canal were running low on parts, and panicking. Sam had warned them this would happen, but hardly any of his clients had sent him the figures for what would be needed and when, even after several emails explaining the urgency and stating their liability for expensive air shipping costs—everything was in writing. But now the time had come, he was getting it’s-not-our-fault-the-ship-sank messages. But it wasn’t Sam’s fault either. If they’d done what he’d said, this could all have been easily avoided.
It wasn’t Sarah’s fault, what had happened.
“Sam, honey,” said Linda from Quality, whose desk was opposite him, though they couldn’t see each other because there was a blue felt-upholstered partition between them.
He popped his head over the partition.
“You’re shaking your leg again, babes.”
Sam was in a crouched position, standing just high enough to see her.
“Was I?”
He was very glad of the partition—her desk was such a mess he probably wouldn’t be able to handle seeing it all day.
“Sorry,” she said. “It makes me feel seasick.”
“I’ll stop.”
He sat back down and concentrated on keeping his leg still. On the windowsill he noticed the corpse of a spider, upside down, its legs folded. He took some pincers from his desk, lifted it up and buried it in the soil of his bonsai tree.
He thought back to the text Sarah had sent him the next evening and winced. He still hadn’t replied. There was a kind of paralysis toward her.
I’m sorry it ended badly but I had a nice time last night. I know it was a huge deal for you and I want you to know that I’m here x
He’d tried to reply probably a hundred times but had deleted every attempt. Instead, he simply said nothing,
There was too much dust between the keys of his futuristic wireless keyboard. He remembered the great day he’d spent in the city, buying it and the matching mouse. From the top drawer of his desk he took out his USB desktop vacuum cleaner, plugged it into the computer and sucked up the dust on the keyboard.
“Sam!” came Linda’s voice.
“Sorry.”
He took out a wet wipe and cleaned the surface of his desk, and then used some antibacterial gel to cleanse his hands. Outside the barred window next to his desk gray clouds had moved in. The time of day was approaching for the daily fax to Japan; all the order and delivery documents collected into one. When the fax arrived at HQ in Tokyo, all the parts would be sourced from the vast network of suppliers scattered across the Far East. If Sam’s clients wanted their parts air shipped on time, the documents had to be included in today’s fax, but nobody had signed the authorization sheet accepting the costs.
Nevertheless, Sam diligently printed out every air shipping request, because he knew the only other option was for their lines to shut down.
“There’s a lot of these.”
Sam looked up to see Rebecca standing over him with the huge sheaf of air shipping requests.
“It’s this or line stop. I did tell them—it’s not my fault they’re idiots.”
Rebecca blinked with the shock of hearing Sam say something like this, a series of butterfly-wing flutters, something he’d seen her do before with the less efficient members of staff, but she’d never done it to him.
“Have they confirmed they’re going to pay?”
“Well, I’ve put it in the emails that they’re responsible.”
“But have you got it in writing that they’ll pay? Have they signed the authorization forms?”
This was the tone she took when his colleagues answered her questions in vague, wishy-washy terms; a type of energy in her voice that said, “Look, I’m trying to get a black-and-white answer here so we don’t have to get legal down the line.”
“I haven’t got it in writing. But I’ve sent emails saying I’ve organized the shipments and will fax the documents by five o’clock, and if they don’t reply I’ll assume they accept responsibility for the costs. That’s w
hat I’ve written.”
“Sam.”
“It’s fine, Rebecca.”
In a perfect world all excess costs from the ship sinking would have been collected in a neat insurance claim, but the world is not perfect, and though the goods were insured, nobody was going to pay to have replacements shipped expensively by air.
“Make sure you get the forms signed,” she said. “Do not send these without written authorization.”
He found the way she spoke to him uncharacteristically patronizing, and when she was gone he had to close his eyes to compose himself. He envisioned a scene where he got up and flipped his desk into the wall. Almost shaking, he went into the warehouse to check the day’s deliveries.
He looked at Sarah’s message again. She hadn’t sent anything else, and probably too much time had elapsed for him to reply. He found Mark sitting at his desk, flicking through the pages of a porno magazine as if it was nothing.
“Heard about the new company policy in Nihon?” he said, dabbing the end of his finger with his tongue and turning the page as if he were a delicate old lady flicking through a copy of Reader’s Digest.
“Should I?”
“They’re turning off the power in the building at ten every night to make sure people go home.”
“Ah shit, they haven’t had another suicide, have they?”
“Yup,” said Mark, not looking up from the magazine.
It was strange to think how an office like that must work, day to day. Three people had thrown themselves from the sixteenth-floor roof garden in the last eighteen months. How could the others just turn up for work the next day and go about their business, knowing what had happened?
“I’m going back into the office for a second,” he said.
At his desk Sam collected up the air shipping documents. He’d sent the emails saying that his clients assumed responsibility for the costs if they didn’t reply by 5:00 p.m. It was almost that time now and nobody had replied. Rebecca wasn’t at her desk, so Sam put his air requests in with the Japanese fax documents and called out to the office.
“Any more faxes for Japan? I’m sending now.”
His voice sounded all over the place, and he cleared his throat.
He put the papers into the sorting tray on top of the machine, pressed the button to bring up the number for Japan. The green light flashed, calling to him to send the documents. Well, this was the only thing to do to avoid line stoppage and, anyway, Sam was in complete control of his thoughts and emotions. He was just being a good professional. It was so important to be a good professional. He looked at the flashing green button.
Another suicide in Japan. He sometimes wondered about depression and anxiety and how people called them mental illness. It made no sense. How could somebody look out at the wide world and not have an anxious or depressed reaction? Surely it was those people who were suffering from mental illness.
Everything’s going to be fine, he told himself. And he pressed the button.
THE PHANTASM #008
Dark Night, Dark City
City lights pierce the night. Workers hurry home, cutting through backstreets, shoes clicking. Quiet down these side streets; quiet and lonely. Even parts of a city can feel unloved. And yet the eyes of an unseen guardian watch on.
This is the first time he has done this, come to patrol at street level in a place as big as the city. There is more than criminal danger now. Here he is exposed. He sits in a dark, thin alley between two buildings, but when he moves he will move into a city with all its rumble and flux.
A hero thinks more of society than he does himself. Personal problems? Forget about them. People are in danger, and there aren’t enough police. Even now, at this young hour of the night—nine o’clock—there is drunken shouting. A gang of young rich kids in skinny jeans and ragged T-shirts is larking around, ignorant of the fact that a pair of eyes surveys them from the shadows.
Behind him, he hears a movement in the alley. He turns. Just a cat in the garbage. Beyond the cat our hero spies a fire escape ladder, not dissimilar to the ones we see in the great cities of America. Is it legal to climb such a thing? Is it trespassing? Doesn’t matter; he’s going up.
It is exhilarating, climbing up, hand over hand, the steel frame wobbling under his weight. The roof is covered with gravel. There are ventilation pipes amassed in ranks and an old Victorian chimney stack from the building’s heyday. A colorful cuboid protrusion near the middle of the roof; the fire exit from which people would emerge in the event of a catastrophe. The roof is hemmed by chest-high wire fencing.
The satisfying crunch of gravel under his shoes. He stands at the cusp of the building, the wind in his face, a true hero regarding his city. The view is good. He can see all the way down the main drinking street, the writhing den of squalor and excess; like Nero’s Rome but with worse haircuts. A girl vomits in the street, one of her stilettos in her hand, the other strapped to her foot but hanging sideways. Her friends watch, bored. Thursday night: Student Night. Education is important, yes, but at the expense of civil dignity?
The rooftops. He sees them all from this perspective. A giant man could leap from one to the next like stepping-stones. The rooftops. Where heroes come to rest. He closes his eyes and feels cold air on his face.
“Hey.”
Eyes open. A security guard stands silhouetted in the rectangle of light that is the open fire exit door.
“What are you doing?”
He’s overweight, too many burgers and bad coffee on the graveyard shift. The Phantasm moves forward.
“Wait there!” Urgency in the voice. Fear. A good man should fear nothing.
“It’s okay,” our dark hero reassures.
“Don’t fucking move, okay?” He speaks low into his radio.
Reinforcements on the way. Time to take flight. The ladder lies on the other side of the guard at forty-five degrees. In cricketing terms, if the guard is the batsman we’re looking at deep third man.
He runs.
The security guard runs.
The Phantasm arcs around the guard and is thankful for his excellent physical fitness. What he lacks in genuine pace he makes up for in determination. The hope is that the obese guard will not be able to run very fast. It pays off—he can’t. He is extremely slow, in fact. He imagines the scene from overhead: a form tracing the bend of a circle, with a central locus drifting toward the form.
There’s a lot of wheezing from the guard. “He’s going down the fire ladder,” he says into his radio. And then, “He’s just a little guy.”
A crackly, indecipherable voice responds.
The Phantasm gains the ladder and descends quickly but bears health and safety in mind the whole time; he can’t afford a slip. Halfway down he looks up. The obese guard has not given chase, but his head peers over the lip of the building.
“You have nothing to fear,” calls the Phantasm. “I’m one of the good guys.”
Back on terra firma adrenaline fires a chaos through him. His way is blocked now by a second guard, this one a lot fitter-looking. Torchlight blinds.
“Police are on their way,” the guard warns, his gait that of a stuffed bear on its hind legs in attack formation.
Our hero runs down the alleyway in the opposite direction. Block out the fear. A wooden fence. Dead end. But a drainpipe and a wheelie bin; he uses one to climb the other. Over the fence and a small drop down to a deserted car park. On impact pain shoots through his bad ankle. Ignore it. Move on, dark avenger.
He hobbles across the car park and sees the security guards are not following. He’s outside their jurisdiction now. He runs off the pain in his ankle and emerges suddenly onto the main drinking street, in full view of the revelers, as well as the network of CCTV cameras.
The drag is all bars and clubs, a wide pedestrianized avenue between. Look up at the Victorian splen
dor of yesteryear gazing sadly down on the horror of modernity.
Halfway across the avenue two packs of lads shout rowdy taunts. Escalation. A doner kebab is launched across no-man’s-land, impacting the muscular chest of what has become an extremely angry young man. What a waste of good food. The virile youngster steps into the battlefield, toward the other group of boys.
Our hero stands and watches. Engagement is imminent. Those of the call center generation and the student masses are drawn toward the fracas, but their gazes slip from the two gangs to the shadowy figure standing close by, a masked man, a crusader of justice: a superhero.
The victim of the kebab attack sports a purple/pink T-shirt cut tight to emphasize his muscles, stone-washed skinny jeans turned up at the bottom and a pair of white Converse plimsolls with no socks. His hair is shaved at the back and sides, with a permed clump of black atop. And he has grabbed in his fist the shirt of the kebab launcher. The two sets of gangs have closed the gap. It’s all kicking off!
Foul, foul language.
Faces redden, fists clench.
And here, now, a hero surveys the scene and must make a decision. Fight-or-flight chemicals rage. He narrows his eyes...and moves forward unto the fray.
The eyes of the gathering crowd are on him.
“What the hell is that guy?” calls an Americanized voice, though British.
Halfway to the tumult the first punch is thrown. A short, stocky man rages, “Come fucking on, then, you cunts!” and launches himself at a back-wheeling opponent. This is now a full-fledged fight. Blood has been shed; it stains Hollister muscle vests. He cannot turn away. If a hero is not needed here, he is not needed anywhere. He can do this.
He is a shadow.
He is a phantom.
He is the Phantasm!
“Gentlemen!” He clenches his fists. “I’m placing you all under citizen’s arrest!”
Someone spins toward him and lamps him in the side of the head with extraordinary force. He hears the watching crowd gasp as he wheels across the concrete on jelly legs before hitting the deck. He raises himself on all fours and tries to straighten his mind, remember the martial arts training from the internet. A feeling of recklessness sweeps through him. Abandonment. A great sinkhole opens beneath him, into which tumbles his fear, inhibition, sense. It is glorious, this feeling.
