The Last Book. A Thriller

by Michael Collins

  Zack stared at the black labeled can in his hand. It felt surprisingly cold as the volatile liquid sloshed around inside the thin metal casing. Increasing book sales? Maybe this wasn’t such a bright idea.

  It wasn’t about the dying. Strangely enough, that didn’t worry him. Well, he hoped the pain wouldn’t be too bad but, if all went as he intended, he would be overcome by smoke well before the flames blistered his flesh. If Kristen’s theory was correct, bigger book sales meant more upset and disharmony, and he was pretty damn sure she was on to it. But, with him out of the picture, there couldn’t be a third book and surely that would put an end to it?

  His eyes misted as they settled on a photo of Kristen and him taken on a beach near Rio some twenty years back. They were fun days. She really did loathe him in the end, didn’t she—with good reason. Zack unscrewed the childproof lid and began squirting the lighter fluid around the room, making sure he started the drenching at least a metre from where he sat. He was surprised how far the stream extended, managing to soak the curtains almost to ceiling height. With the can almost drained, he concentrated on creating a trail of fluid across the carpet from his feet to his couch. He really wanted to see that stinking bed go up before losing consciousness. It represented every failing of his relationship with Kristen—the separation, the lack of intimacy, the booze—everything.

  Hurrying now, aware that his resolve could easily falter, he picked up his gold laser lighter. He didn’t have to read to read the inscription—he knew it off by heart—In Appreciation—that’s all it said. Flicking the switch, he wondered briefly what twisted mind over at Argon would think the gift an amusing stroke of irony.

  A minute later, frustrated and feeling his resolve rapidly dissolving, Zack threw the heavy lighter across the desk. It tumbled to the floor out of reach. Fuck! The clever, new fandangle, laser driven lighter was supposed to be infallible. That’s what Argon’s big boss had told him.

  As tears of frustration filled his eyes, he wanted to scream out loud. But wait! Zack laughed triumphantly. The Zippo—how perfect. Rock solid technology from over seventy odd years back comes to the rescue. He knew he wouldn’t get a flame from it—the fluid would have long since evaporated. But all he needed was a spark and that’s what those machines were designed to keep on providing—forever.

  Zack flipped open the lighter and bent to the carpet, still damp where the trail of accelerant started. Concentrating, he didn’t see a figure move across the room, but he felt excruciating pain as a heavy shoe stomped on his hand, dislocating his thumb and fracturing his little finger with a clearly audible snap.

  This time he did scream.

  ‘I’ll have that, Zachery fucking Corsfield,’ a distinctly American voice said.

  Zack groaned as the Zippo was jerked from his fingers and a fresh sliver of pain shot through his hand.

  ‘We haven’t finished with you yet, buddy.’

  Through a white haze of agony, he saw two more men enter his study. One of them carried a pair of long-handled bolt cutters which he quickly attached to Zack’s handcuffs. The other character was busy scooping up his laptop.

  ‘Hold still prick or I’ll take your hand off too,’ the bolt cutter man growled.

  There was a crack as the cuffs fell away. He was hauled roughly to his feet and turned around.

  The man looking at him was about forty, completely bald and with the entire left side of his face hideously scarred with an old burn injury. As Zack held his smashed hand against his chest, dark eyes stared at him without a trace of compassion. He could feel pain pounding up his arm as the flesh on his broken finger ballooned.

  ‘What the hell …?’

  ‘Shut up, dickhead.’

  He screamed as the man swiped at his injured hand with something heavy. When Zack looked down he saw his gold laser lighter enclosed by the man’s meaty fist.

  He couldn’t help himself.

  ‘Doesn’t work,’ he muttered, bracing for another blow. For some reason he didn’t care.

  The man laughed.

  ‘It works when we want it to. Good camera in it too.’

  He shoved Zack in the direction of his discarded clothes.

  ‘Get dressed, and quickly, or we’ll be hauling your skinny butt down the road buck naked.’

  The Boy

  ‘It was a heart attack,’ he hears them say. ‘He smoked too much and loved his junk food—never exercised.’

  The whys don’t matter to the boy—not at first. He just knows he’s lost a friend who did things with him.

  He took him to the range and showed him how to shoot. It took a special type of patience and Brett knew he had it.

  ‘Breathe as you squeeze,’ Brett said, ‘nice and shallow, keep it steady. It’s nearly there. Hold it on the exhale and focus on the target.’

  The pistol bucked in the boy’s hand and Brett raised his binoculars.

  ‘Nice,’ he said, with unreserved pride, ‘very nice.’

  They also did cool things with Jilly.

  ‘Let’s hike,’ Brett would say, and all three would leave the house. They saw no trails, wild beasts or soaring eagles. Hiking meant timelessly scouring through the museums and art galleries he came to love. They’d emerge blinking and hungry.

  ‘We should consider making camp here,’ Brett would say, licking his fingers and checking the breeze. Here was a high-end restaurant or chic café where, in mock surprise, they’d point out the menu’s lack of dried buffalo meat and beans.

  As Brett’s wake progressed, the boy watched the guests and made sure Jilly was looked after. She had plenty of friends, but he knew which ones meant more to her than the occasional coffee and exchange of gossip. She walked among them with her shoulders square, now and again glancing his way with a sad smile.

  On the Saturday, they’d been shifting furniture—heavy old stuff that Jilly and Brett had inherited along with their spacious apartment. It’s time for a freshen up, Jilly told them. They had to saddle up and get sweating. She wanted the place ‘more Zen-like with a holistic vibe.’ Brett and the boy nodded sagely and rolled their eyes behind her back pretending not to understand, or care. What mattered, they agreed, was that Brett had been promised a larger TV and the boy his own study nook. For that, they were ready to do anything. But anything wasn’t meant to include dying.

  He watched Kitty, one of Brett’s nieces, handing around a plate of food. She’d shed her funeral clothes for something lighter and easier to move in and looked stunning. She was light on her feet, almost dancing her way through the crowd. The boy’s eyes traveled from her almond-shaped eyes down to her blouse. It was an unusual color—a shimmering dusty blue. He really liked it. It took him back somewhere.

  ‘Wondering if she’s wearing a bra, mate?’

  As the boy started a very unsteady body tottered against him.

  He recognized the voice—full of gravel and deeply nasal, it was Max, a friend of Jilly’s father, the boy’s first experience of a well-hammered Australian. The boy realized that he must have been staring vacantly at Kitty for quite a while.

  ‘No,’ he protested, ‘I was just having a think.’

  ‘Hur hur,’ the man said, belching, ‘try telling them that when they catch you ogling their tits.’

  The boy glanced at him, taking in the florid cheeks and a loose, flabby mouth, recalling their conversation earlier that day.

  Waiting at the graveside it began to rain.

  ‘Fucking weather,’ the Australian said by way of introduction. He took a strong pull from a hip flask and lit a cigarette, offering the pack to the boy, ‘I’m Max. You won’t get this miserable shit in Sydney,’ he added.

  The boy shook his head and tried to move away from the acrid smoke. He was conscious of the stern and disapproving looks coming their way, but the Australian seemed unconcerned and exhaled noisily.

  ‘Where do you fit in?’ he asked, following the boy through the sticky mud. At least he was downwind now.

  ‘I’m s
taying with Jilly and …’ he said, hesitating over Brett’s name. He still couldn’t believe he’d gone.

  ‘Oh yeah, that’s right, you’re the bludger.’

  ‘Bludger?’ the boy echoed, ‘what’s that?’

  Max laughed—short staccato barks. He coughed wetly, clearing his throat as if he was about to spit and thought better of it.

  ‘You know,’ he said, glancing slyly around and lowering his voice, ‘a sponger, idle fucker, parasite—that type of bloke.’

  The boy felt his head swim as the heat flared in his face.

  ‘It’s not me mind, I don’t know you,’ Max continued, ‘it’s just what I hear, from Jilly’s sister, mate.’

  The group of mourners shuffled. The funeral cortege had arrived and, as the Australian moved away, the boy watched Jilly and her father step from a car and walk towards them. Jilly stared around anxiously until she caught the boy’s eye. Smiling faintly, she waved him over to join her.

  The boy looked across the room at her now, keenly aware of how badly Brett’s death had floored her. She appeared to be bearing up well, moving gracefully among the well-wishers. A word here and a kindly pat there—she found time for everyone.

  The boy turned to Max.

  ‘Maybe some of our heads are in a different space than looking at breasts,’ he said, quietly, ‘and maybe some people’s minds are too quick to make assumptions.’

  When Max turned his rheumy red eyes to him, his mouth had hardened.

  ‘Brett kept telling me how smart you are. I don’t think he had it right though. I think you’re a smart ASS.’

  Heads turned as the room suddenly became still. Max continued to stare at him for a moment, hatred lighting up his bloodshot eyes. Then he smiled and placed his hand on the boys shoulder.

  ‘You better smile back at me fancy boy, or you’ll ruin a perfectly good wake,’ he muttered, grinding his thumb into the boy’s collar bone. ‘He told me you wanted to be a writer, a fucking novelist for Christ’s sake. Well, I’ve got news for you, cobber, you ain’t got what it takes.’

  The boy kept his face even, managing a smile through the fierce pain.

  ‘What, drinking myself stupid and ripping out my lungs, is that what it’s all about?’

  The Australian leaned forward and the boy smelt a stomach-churning stench waft from his mouth.

  ‘Listen you Nancy arsehole,’ the man snarled, ‘to be a writer you need to have been somewhere in your life, you need to have felt the sort of shit that leaves a blackness in your heart. You need to have suffered and, above all, you need to feel hate—real hate. A simmering fucking rage.’

  Max dropped his hand. He was breathing heavily and sweating.

  ‘Maybe you should give Australia a go,’ he muttered, moving away, ‘that country sorts the men from the boys, and if you can’t make it there, you never will.’

  12.

  Ashes to ashes

  The smell of gasoline was strong. Zack watched from the front door as one of the men backed out of the house liberally sloshing fuel as he went. The American waited with him gripping his throbbing arm. A jerry can was tossed back into the hall by a gloved hand.

  ‘This is how it’s done, Zack,’ the American said, bending. As he triggered the laser lighter, Zack heard a soft thump, reminding him of a carpet being beaten. Feeling the heat, he stepped back as a wall of blue and yellow flame tore down the hall and disappeared into the house. There was a moment’s stillness when it seemed the flames had gone out before a deep whump took the air from Zack’s lungs.

  ‘Nice,’ breathed the man standing next to him.

  Zack looked at him. He was smiling, the scar tissue down the side of his face puckering into a twisted mask. Zack looked back into the conflagration inside his home and realized he was in the hands of a very deranged person. Tensing his body to charge back into the flames, the grip around his flesh tightened.

  ‘Don’t even think about it, Zachary. We’ve got some writing to do.’

  The Boy

  After Brett’s funeral, Jilly and he sat watching the flames as they licked at a fresh stack of firewood, relishing in their warmth. It had been a tough day, but now with the guests gone, the caterers paid and the light rapidly fading into night, they were comfortably alone.

  Jilly held a glass of bourbon she was nursing against the firelight, watching the colors dancing in the liquid.

  ‘It went as well as it could, I suppose,’ she said quietly.

  ‘It was my first funeral,’ the boy said, nodding. ‘I didn’t expect people to laugh so much and get so drunk.’

  ‘Oh,’ Jilly said, ‘what about your parents? She paused, ‘I’m sorry, I forgot, you don’t want to talk about them.’

  He knew she was watching him. She always did.

  ‘It’s …hard,’ the boy admitted, ‘I don’t feel the way you do about death.’

  ‘My way?’ she asked, turning her body towards him and slipping her feet onto the couch. ‘And what’s my way exactly?’

  The boy thought for a minute, toying with his glass of Four Roses single barrel bourbon. He hated the taste but the smell of the liquor reminded him of Joey in a smoother, more expensive way.

  Jilly nodded at his glass.

  ‘Some people might turn in their graves,’ she said, with a wry smile, ‘but I reckon some cola might make that more palatable if you’re not used to it.’

  He shrugged, screwed up his face and took a gulp, feeling it burn its way down his throat.

  ‘That’s what I mean,’ he said, ‘You just made a joke about people in their graves, making light of Brett’s dying—just like all the guests did today. They were solemn at the graveside but, as soon as they got here and started drinking …’

  ‘…They started to have fun, didn’t they?’ she said. ‘It’s called celebrating someone’s life. You must have read about it, surely?’

  The boy’s face reddened as he took another gulp.

  ‘I don’t read about that sort of thing,’ he said, looking away. If I come across that stuff in a book I skip it, or block it out.’

  Jilly stepped in front of the fire to retrieve the bottle of bourbon and add a healthy splash to the boy’s glass. For a long moment he could see straight through the material of the long, diaphanous dress she’d changed into and felt guilt as the blood pounded in his ears and a luxurious warmth stole through his limbs. For once his reservations seemed terribly immature, so he began to talk.

  ‘My father died when I was only two—an accident at work. My older brother, Joey told me about it one day.’

  Jilly chortled when he told her of his first encounter with a woman’s nakedness and how a terrifying experience had turned to his advantage.

  ‘You had him by the short and curlies, as they say,’ Jilly laughed.

  ‘Absolutely,’ the boy agreed, remembering his brother’s worried face that day. He was scared silly that Mom might find out about him and Sharlene. She always thought the girl’s family was badly raised and would have gone crazy if she’d known what Joey was up to. She was quite snobby really.’

  ‘Not snobby,’ Jilly said kindly, resting her hand on the boy’s arm, ‘just looking out for her children really. Look what she did for you, after all.’

  The boy went silent. He knew Jilly was right. His Mom had given up with Joey as ‘too wild to tame’ and focused all her energy on work and him. All too vividly he remembering her hollow, exhausted eyes, cracked and broken fingernails, bleeding, eczema wrecked hands and her constant battle with dermatitis. Stark reality hit him and the boy saw his rage bubbling just below the surface. This time he was unable to stop it boiling through.

  ‘It should never have been like that,’ he blurted out, ‘they killed my father and flung us to the dogs. She was a lady, a gentle loving person who worked her fingers raw trying to do the best she could. She was cheated and lied to and then they murdered her too. I hate them for it.’

  Jilly stared at him, stunned into silence by his passion. She dra
ined her glass and poured another generous measure for them both. He thanked her and sipped. He was beginning to enjoy the taste and the liquor helped to sooth his tumbling thoughts.

  ‘Dad was an engineer with this big company,’ the boy said, remembering Joey’s words so long ago, ‘and we lived in a house in West Nyack—nothing fancy, but spacious and a garden my mother loved. I was about two when three men came to our home and told Mom that Dad had been involved in an accident in Chicago. He and two other workers had been killed and the company said that some of the workers were saying it was Dad’s fault.

  ‘Mom was floored. She didn’t know what to do, but the men were really concerned and wanted to help. They told her that they always liked Dad, he worked hard and would never have put anyone in danger, but they were worried that we might be sued by the other families. They convinced her that it would be best for us to move away until things calmed down. Mom didn’t want to at first. She thought it was better to face up to the consequences, but the company men told her that, given a few months, everything would be worked out properly.’

  ‘Was there no one else who could help,’ Jilly asked, ‘like family?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ the boy said. ‘We have no close family and Joey told me that the company virtually whisked us away in the night. Mom, still in shock, signed a heap of paperwork and was told that we’d be back in the house in no time.’

  ‘That didn’t happen, obviously.’

  ‘Quite the opposite,’ the boy said, bitterly. ‘After six months away, Mom tried to contact people in the company and was stone-walled for weeks. When they finally responded, they denied having anyone come round to visit after the accident. They told her that an internal inquiry had found Dad responsible through negligence and there would be no injury compensation payable.’

  ‘My god,’ what did your mother do?’

  ‘She fought them, but they were too strong. We lost the house very quickly. She didn’t know it at the time but the company owned the mortgage company. She was barraged with legal documents and didn’t have the funds to respond. In the end we left, my mother found the only work she could, and here I am.’