by D. M. Guay
“Just hurry up. Okay? We need to get a move on. I have to get all three of you delivered on time. Or two? I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do with that roach guy. I better call Head Office. I can't afford to mess up. It's my first day back.”
“Where's DeeDee? Her soul, I mean.” I broke away from Zack and float-looped around the chips and the candy, looking for another ghostly blue shape in the store. But there wasn't one. No. No no no no no. “Where is she?”
“Relax. She's not out yet. I tapped you first,” Zack said.
“Out?”
“Of her body. She's still in there. But don't worry. She's not in pain or anything. I opted to suspend time. You know, give you a little extra to cope.” Zack turned his scythe. A tiny button flashed on a little control panel on the side of it. “I normally pop everyone at once, but I wanted some extra time to double check the paperwork. With the roach guy and all these ghosts, this isn't exactly a standard case. And I don't want to end up like Yuri. That guy. Did I tell you about the time he took Hitler to Heaven? Woo. Man. Seriously. Hilarious! I mean, how do you even? He'll never live that down. Anyway, you're first. Let's go.”
He grabbed me by the fat bit of my arm and tugged me to the front door. He looked through the glass. And looked some more. And scratched his chin. “Huh. That's weird. I don't see the white light or a fiery pit. Do you? Usually it's all ready to go. Maybe they haven't decided what to do with you. Or they're behind. There's a big audit up there, you know.”
Outside looked, well, just like outside to me, except that nothing was moving. There was even a bat, hanging suspended in midair, looking like he was painted on the moon.
“I'm not going anywhere. There has to be another way. I am not leaving. I can't die like this!”
Zack shrugged. “Well, no one gets to choose.”
“What?”
“No one gets to choose how they die. You get what you get, man. No use complaining when it's all done. It's not like anyone else has it any better.” He looked outside again. “Well, I don't see a destination, so I'll just take you up to Head Office and see if they know where you're going.”
“I'm not leaving!” If I still had a body, I'd be hyperventilating. The physical feeling wasn't there, but the emotion was. Sheer panic. “No. I'm not leaving. Nope. No way.”
“There's no use fighting it. Everyone dies. I mean, look at you. There's no coming back from that. Even if you hopped back in, there's no way that body could live.” He pointed at my fat corpse, skewered like a kabob. “Sorry dude, but this is how it ends. All right. Let's go.”
If I had cheeks, they would be on fire, and if I still had a body—a real body—it'd be drenched in sweat, because I was full on panicking. I was not going to hell, and I was not leaving DeeDee. I looked back at her body again, and something inside me snapped. “We're not going anywhere.”
I put my foot down. Okay, I tried. My foot wasn't exactly solid. It went through the linoleum, which kind of felt like sinking my foot into a bucket of nails, but it was enough to make my point.
“Fighting it isn't going to get you anywhere. We've been reaping people since before there were people. We've used the same system for millennia. It's all very by the book, and when it's your time. It's your time. Although.” He scratched his chin. “You know what? Maybe this will help. You were such a great friend, I'll throw in one free Life Flashes Before Your Eyes. Ready?”
“A what?”
Zack touched my forehead with the tip of his scythe, and everything around me moved really fast. I stood still as the world swirled around and around, disintegrating into a grey whirling cloud of shapes. It was dizzying, so it took me a minute to realize everything was moving backward. In space, in time. Then I saw pictures. Well, moments. It was hard to describe.
I'm in my room. I shove my new employee welcome pack and my employee manual into my desk drawer and forget about it. The book pushes the drawer open, but I push it back in.
I'm in bed, asleep. It's daytime. Light shines through the window. My employee manual wiggles into my bed, next to Gertrude, and tries to snuggle with us. I wake up, scream, and throw it in the closet.
I'm chanting to resurrect Kevin. I see the page number, up close, behind my hairy knee. Page 39, not page 33. The book's pages flutter, trying to turn to the right page, but I wouldn't let it. I forced it back open. I chanted the wrong words.
I'm at Bubba's. My employee manual jumped out of my hands when I tried to wrestle it off the gate panel. It hit something. A dark figure, a shadow, working the controls. An invisible creature. It moved to hit me, but my book took the hit instead.
DeeDee is alive, trying to grab Kevin's Rainbow Rising album. My employee manual tugs on my sock. It pointed at Hunter's red bone. It tried to warn me, but I didn't even look.
Huh. All this time, my employee manual had been trying to help me. It wanted to help me do my job. Be good at my job. But I treated it like a monster.
The world spins again, and it doesn't stop. I see myself. Yelling. I say, “Don't blame me!” I say, “It's not my fault!” over and over. The same words. I'm in different clothes, yelling at different people, at different times. Mom. DeeDee. Kevin. “Don't blame me. It's not my fault.”
My heart sunk. Was this how I spent my life? Was this who I am? Never being good at anything? Never taking responsibility for the trouble my actions and inactions caused?
The room stopped, suddenly. Zack stood next to me, reading the panel on his scythe. “So, I..uh, accidentally had this thing set to Hard Truth? So you probably didn't get the happy flashback I was hoping for. Unfortunately, it's a one-shot deal, so I can't redo it. Rules are rules. I'm sorry. My bad.”
“My bad?” I stare at him. If I had physical eyeballs, I'd be blinking, because it was like staring into a flashlight. My brain had been lit up. I could see all its dark corners. “My bad. That's it. That's everything.”
Every step of the way, Zack had apologized. When he messed up—even if it wasn't on purpose—he said he was sorry. He tried to make it right. He owned up to his mistakes. To the consequences, even if he didn't do it on purpose. He owned up to everything. He tried his best to do right and do a good job. Always.
Then there's me. I messed up, over and over, my whole life. And never once did I admit it was my fault. Never once did I own up and take responsibility. Or try to make things right. Ever. And there were a lot of those times. When life was too hard, or too scary, or too boring, or I didn't want to be bothered. Kevin was right. I was a half-ass dumbass.
And now DeeDee's dead, and Kevin's a ghost. My book was a snarling, neglected beast. And it was all my fault. Because I never said, “my bad.” I never owned up. I never once went with all my heart, so to speak. I never even tried to get good at my job. Or at anything, really. And now I'm dead. I'd lost my one chance.
I felt the pressure of tears in ghost eyes that couldn't cry. The churn of a guilty gut that wasn't flesh. The reel of guilt which needs no body to take root. I'd let everyone down in the worst possible way. I'd let myself down. I'd wasted my life. “I deserve to go to hell.”
Something tugged on my leg, and it took me a while to realize that sensation was real, because I was totally a vapor. It was my employee manual. It looked up at me and whimpered.
“I'm sorry I was so mean to you. All you did was try to help me. I should have read you. I was scared, and I was stupid, and I just thought everything would magically be okay. I didn't do my part. I'm sorry.” I reached down to pat it on the head, and it leaned into me like a happy cat. We actually touched. It purred. “I hope you get a better owner next time.”
“Hurrrrrrrrrrrr. That was so sweeeeeeet. Hurrrrp.” Zack sniffled. “But time's up. We've got to go.”
Harrrrrffffff. Harrrrrrrrf. Harrrrrrrrrf.
That was not Zack crying. That was my employee manual.
Zack stopped. “Uh. Is that thing gonna be all right?”
Harrrrrffffff. Harrrrrrrrf. Harrrrrrrrrf.
“Yeah. Just a h
airball.”
“But it doesn't have hair?” Zack scratched his chin.
Hair or not, something was coming up. Because the cover undulated and heaved, then bluuuuuuggggggh. It barfed up blood all over the welcome mat.
“Eeeeee! Gross.” Zack jumped back. “And that's saying something. You should see the crime scenes I've been to.”
I reached down to see if my book was okay. It nudged my hand. Into the puddle. Yeah. Ew. For real. “Wait.” It wasn't blood. It was a wet red envelope. It was my blank check. “Oh. Shit.”
“Uh, I'm gonna have to insist you wash your hands before we leave,” Zack said.
I unfolded the blank check. “We're not going anywhere. I want a do over.”
As I said the words, red ink filled in the blank spaces.
I looked at my employee manual. It looked at me. And it all became crystal clear. That book ate my check, so I didn't waste it on something stupid. It knew me well enough to save the check, so I'd have it when I really needed it. It kept me from making the biggest mistake of my life. Literally.
Zack slumped. “You're really making this hard on me. I told you, no do overs. The man upstairs isn't exactly handing out blank checks these days.”
“God isn't, but the devil sure is.” Or should I say a devil?
“Pull the other one.” Zack peered down over my shoulder. “Wow. I've never seen a real one before. Where are we gonna get it notarized at this hour?”
“Leave the details to me, young man.” Faust kicked open the stockroom door, wearing a crisp new, blood-free designer suit. “I've already contacted my accountant and notary, Mr. Beale.”
Sure enough, a little embossed stamp appeared in the bottom corner, with a signature that sizzled as it burned into the paper.
“Only one space left.” Faust pointed.
“Ow!” Something pricked my finger. My blue ghost blood spurted on the signature line.
“Sorry, my dear man. Standard procedure. Now. The paperwork is all in order. Good luck.”
“Luck? But...”
“I am not allowed to intervene. You must persevere all on your own. There are rules. Oh, yes. The rules. Silly me.”
Faust pulled a red folder out of thin air. It looked like the menu in a really fancy restaurant. He handed it to Zack. Zack opened it. Inside was a list, written in scrolly script.
“Do take care to follow the guide word for word. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Quite literally, I'm afraid,” Faust said. “If this does not work out, there will be no second chances.”
He clapped his hands, summoned the cleaning crew, still moving, still outside, about to jackhammer into the sidewalk. “We'll take a break from hammering. We don't want to distract you with the noise. We will hang the wards Ms. Henrietta so generously provided. It is a much quieter endeavor,” he said. “Now. It is all up to you, Lloyd. Play well.”
Chapter 21
“Play well? What does that mean?”
“Apparently, you have to best me at a game.” Zack pointed to a line of text in the menu thingy. “We have to play a game, and you have to beat me. You have to win. Fair and square.”
“No no no. This wasn't how it was supposed to go! I used the check! We all get to live again. End of story. No strings. No catches. Alive. Period.”
“Please don't yell at me. I'm just reading the rules. You get to live again if you win. It says here the game rule went into effect on Day Six. Apparently, a bunch of the amoebas created on Day Five died, and they made a stink about it. They all wanted do-overs. Millions of them. Huge headache, so Head Office put policies in place to make death final. This is one of them. You know, so death means the end, finis, all of that.” Zack stared off into space for a second. “I remember that. I was just a kid. Man. Those amoebas. Talk about a pack of assholes. Be thankful they suck at euchre.”
This can't be happening to me. “Has anyone ever beaten you guys?”
He shrugged. “I don't know. This has only happened a couple of times. In 1991, a Bill S. Preston Esquire and Ted Theodore Logan, and then an Antonius Black, back in the middle ages. So, you aren't the first.”
“Well? What does it say?”
“You have to beat me, fair and square, at the game of your choosing. No cheating, and I can't take a fall, either. It says right here I have to play to the best of my abilities. If I cheat, or you cheat, we all go to hell. You. DeeDee. Kevin. Even me. Wow. Harsh.”
Oh, gee. No pressure. “Well, what game? What do people usually do?”
“The other guys picked chess and Battleship.”
“I don't know how to play chess!” That was gaming for the smart nerdy nerds, not basement dwelling chip eaters!
“Probably for the best. That guy lost. You get to choose the game, but it says here it has to be something close and readily available, because we have a time limit. We can't drag it out for a thousand years just because you want to avoid hellfire. I would totally do that if I were you, because hell really sucks. You really don't want to go there.”
“I've got it.” The one thing in the world I was good at. Well, pretty good. Okay, experienced, at least. Thousands of hours of experience. My chest puffed with pride. Video games. AwesomeDemonButtKicker98, this is your moment. All those hours were finally going to amount to something. “Let's go to the portal box. One Xbox coming right up.”
“What portal?”
“The microwave looking thing in the hallway.”
“Wait. That's a portal? Huh. No wonder my microwave mac and cheese noodles were crunchy.” Zack shrugged. “And there was a pack of clean underwear next to the cup when I opened the door last time. I really needed those undies. I wonder how they knew?”
“Come on. Let's go.”
Zack stopped me. “No magical intervention.”
“What? That doesn't count!”
“We don't know that for sure, and we are not taking any chances. Do you want to burn in hell? I sure don't, so no portals. Try again.”
My mind reeled. What the hell game was close at hand? I was at a corner store. Were we supposed to play tampon Jenga? “We don't have any games here!”
“I think I saw a jump rope in the toy section. Probably too short for me, though.”
Wait. I got it. “We'll play something on your game system.”
Video games—even crappy knockoffs—were my best chance, even on a console that wished it was a console. I mean, look at me. The jump rope was definitely out. You saw Zack at the gym. Even my ghost was way too out of shape to beat the angel of death at any feat of endurance. That crap plug-and-play was my best option. Video games were the one thing I was good at. Which, now that I think about it, was pretty sad. But oh well. At least I had a fighting chance. My thumbs had mashed many buttons in their time.
Besides, Zack had only been playing it for, like, a week now. He couldn't have mastered it.
Zack and I floated into the zombie cooler. I sat down on the edge of Morty's round sexcapade bed.
Ew. Just. Ew.
Thankfully, Candy and Morty were not, in fact, having sex on it. They were having sex next to it. Standing up. Kind of. Candy leaned over the bed. Morty stood behind her. Both of them were frozen in the throes of ecstasy. Well, not so much ecstasy as the taming of some infernal lust beast. Candy had turned white, solid, full poltergeist, her mouth a huge gaping maw lined with fangs, hair a wild halo of angry snakes. Morty had his arm up like a rodeo cowboy, holding on to that bucking dead stripper for dear life, mouth frozen mid “Yee-haw!”
“I'm so glad I'm going home tonight.” Zack shivered. “Because I never have to touch this bed again.”
Yeah. I feel you, dude.
Unfortunately, the ghost of the pizza guy sat, frozen, on the edge of the mattress, right in front of the TV, controller in one hand, mid-game. “Huh. Why didn't he change?”
Zack shrugged. “Guess he was happy? He likes this one.”
Zack pointed to the screen. The pizza guy was midway through a neon yellow round of. H
uh. I read the small print: Super Monkey Barrel Smash. Wow. Look at those pink barrels. This was quite the knock off.
“You have to pick the game.” Zack skimmed the rules. “It should be two player. It has to have a clear winner in the end. Oh, and here. Sorry. I forgot.”
Zack pressed a couple buttons on his scythe and my ghost blue body turned solid. Blue. But solid. Fleshy. Zack fiddled with the TV connections while I really hoped I didn't get any unidentified crusts or liquids on my brand new body. Which, now that I was looking around, seemed unlikely. The floor was littered with dirty robes, empty chip bags, and piles—huge piles—of sticky spent Colossal Super Slurp cups. Ew.
I had to kick a couple of cups away to unearth the other controller. Then I had to peel it off the floor. And I mean peel. It was stuck on there good. Ew. Man. If I live through this, I am definitely cleaning my room. For real.
I powered up the controller and yep, I'll be honest, I was sweating. The butterflies in my tummy were real. I had never had so much riding on a video game before. One game over really meant game over.
Gulp. Relax, Lloyd. You can do this.
A screen popped up. Rows of game names. There had to be a thousand of them, and I didn't recognize any of them. I just had to find one that was a knockoff of something I was good at, and hope Zack didn't know any of the tricks.
I scrolled. Wow. These games. Mushroom Car Race Man. Mean Worm Fight. Kung Fu Street Kombat. Wrestle Dude POW? Thousands of them. Or not. The more I scrolled, the clearer it became that a lot of the “games” were really just different levels of the first twenty games. Pirates. God bless 'em. They tried.
I flipped back to screen one. And I found it. The lucky winner. The game to end all games. I would emerge victorious, the ultimate champion. Mario—Oops. Nope. My bad—of Mushroom Car Race Man. “Got it!”
Prepare to eat knockoff mushroom car dust, Zack.
Zack peeled the other controller out of the pizza guy's stiff, sticky hand. And I mean sticky. A string of goo stretched from the controller to his blue hand. Zack lifted it up. To his mouth.
