The Business Of Death, Death Works Trilogy Page 3

  “No. I—this isn’t right. I’ve been wandering, and there’s nothing. Just—” He blinks. Looks around. “What is this place? Shit, is this the Paddo?”

  “You shouldn’t be here, Terry,” I say, and he’s back, looking at me. There’s more confidence and less confusion in his eyes.

  “No shit. I haven’t been back to Brisbane in years. I—do people really still listen to grunge?”

  “What’s wrong with grunge?”

  Terry rolls his eyes. “Where to begin…”

  I take another step toward him. “Look, it doesn’t matter, Terry.” This is inexcusable. Someone has majorly screwed up, and I’m certain I know who. But that’s for later. I need to stay calm.

  “Terry, you know where you need to be,” I say gently, as gently as you can above the cover band’s rendition of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit.”

  He nods his head. “I can’t seem to get there.”

  “Let me help you, Terry.”

  I reach out. This time he doesn’t dart away. I touch him. And Terry’s gone, passing through me, and into the Underworld. There’s the familiar pain of a successful pomp, a slight ache that runs through me. I take a deep breath. Then, between blinks, all that space around me fills with people. I elbow my way toward my table none too gently; I reserve softness for the dead. I’m fuming with a white-hot rage, my body sore from the pomp.

  Derek’s in trouble, now. If he’s messed up the rostering this badly, what else is he doing wrong? I’m filled with a righteous (and somewhat enjoyable) anger. I’d call him right now, but anger isn’t the only thing I’m filled with and it’s decided to remind me in no uncertain terms.

  I make a dash for the toilets, stand at the urinal, and it’s a sweet relief. I glance over at the mirror; the hair’s looking good.

  “You’re in danger,” a familiar voice whispers in my ear, and I jump. It’s the dead girl. She smiles that mocking smile.

  “Jesus! Where the hell did you… What do you mean, in danger?” I’m a while framing that question.

  She shakes her head, her eyes a bit fuzzy. She blinks.

  “I’m not sure.” Then there’s some clarity in her gaze. “Still trying to remember. You’re really taking this people wanting to kill you thing very well. Or maybe not… Hmm. How much have you had to drink?”

  I’m pretty unsteady on my feet, and I’m still peeing. So, a lot.

  “I… Would you mind turning the other way? I don’t think people want to kill me, that was just some crazy guy with a gun.”

  The dead girl’s face creases. “A crazy guy who just happened to take potshots at you?”

  “Which is why he’s crazy. I mean, why would anyone want to blow my brains out?”

  Someone’s walked into the toilet. The movement catches my eye. I turn, free hand clenched, a move I know is hardly intimidating, particularly while I’m pissing. I sway there a moment.

  “Not him,” she says.

  “How do you know?” I demand. “You’re hardly a reliable source of information, what with the dropping in and dropping out.”

  The poor interloper hesitates for a moment, looking at me, looking at the urinals, and feeling the presence of a dead person pushing him anywhere but here. He heads straight to a stall and locks the door.

  And I’m suddenly feeling a whole lot more sober. The dead girl stands far enough away from me that I can’t pomp her. It’s not like I’d touch her before washing my hands anyway.

  “Are you really dead?” I zip up. The room’s swaying a little, which can’t be good.

  She nods. “The real deal. And you need to get out of here, there’s stuff I have to tell you, I think.” She looks down at her hands, and there’s something about the gesture that makes me ache. “It’s much harder keeping this together than I expected. And the urgency, I’m trying to hold onto that… But I’m remembering.” She looks up at me. “It’s getting a little clearer. That’s something, right?”

  I wash my hands, studying her in the mirror. A dozen contradictory emotions dance across her face. All of them legitimate, and every one of them adding to her confusion. And here I am leaden with drink. This demands sensitivity. I want to help her but I’m not sure if I can. Maybe the best way, the most professional way, is by pomping her.

  But I’m also angry. She’s scaring me, and that’s not supposed to be the way this works.

  “Good,” I blurt, “because I really want to know why someone was shooting at me.”

  The dead girl scowls. “Maybe I should just let you die.”

  I shrug, drunkenly belligerent. I’m not the dead one after all. “Maybe. Then at least we’d—”

  That’s when the beer, the I’ve-been-shot-at-and-lived-to-tell-the-tale beer, has its effect on me, and I’m running for the nearest stall, the one next to the poor guy I scared off the urinal. When I am done, after a series of loud and desperate sounding hurls, I feel utterly wretched. I look up at her, because she’s followed me in. “Bad Chiko Roll,” I explain, half-heartedly.

  The dead girl grimaces at me. But her eyes are more focused. The mere act of talking, of a person’s interest in her, has helped ground her.

  She even smiles. Nothing like a spew as an icebreaker.

  “Do people even eat those anymore?”

  What is it about the dead today? Everybody’s talking back. “Yes, and they listen to grunge.”

  “What?” She rubs her chin thoughtfully. “Though that might explain it.”

  “It was a legitimate movement.”

  “The stress is on the was, though.” She’s looking more coherent, almost concrete.

  “Name’s Steven,” I say, and I instinctively reach out toward her. It’s my job after all. She darts back, a look of horror on her face.

  “Watch that!”

  “Sorry, it’s just habit.” My head’s feeling clearer.

  We stand crammed in the grotty stall for a moment, just staring at each other. There’s a tightness in my throat, a ridiculous sense of potential in a ridiculous place. Whatever it is, it passes. She nods, taking another step back, so that she’s almost out of the stall. She keeps an eye on my hands.

  “Lissa,” she says. “Lissa Jones.”

  Which sounds a hell of a lot better than Dead Girl.

  I open my mouth to say something, anything, but she’s gone. And again, it’s nothing to do with me. She’s just gone. I’m suffering an altogether unfamiliar hurt, and it’s awful.

  4

  Tim is far too drunk to drive me home. But sober enough to get me a taxi with what appears to be some sort of magic gesture. It’s as though he plucked the car out of the night.

  Tim presses the packet of cigarettes into my hands. “Hide the evidence, eh. And look after yourself.”

  “You too.”

  He gives me the thumbs up. “’S all good!”

  And I know that he’ll be at work sans hangover tomorrow, which brings a slight wave of resentment to the top of my rolling-drunk thoughts because my day off isn’t going to be nearly as pretty. I watch him pluck another taxi from the ether.

  “Where to?” the driver asks me. I mumble directions. Tim’s taxi is already off. His driver probably knew where to go before Tim had even opened his mouth.

  The taxi ride home is just swell, though a couple of times I nearly hurl again: seems my stomach has found more than that Chiko Roll to challenge it. Both times the driver is just about ready to push me out the door. I swear, one time I feel his boot on my back. But we make it, and he’s happy enough to take my money, and happier still when I wave away his vague, and extremely leisurely, attempts at giving me change.

  The taxi pulls away and I stare at my place. It’s all a bit of a blur really, except for the brace symbol marked above the door. It’s glowing: there must be Stirrers about. Not my job, though, the night shift will be dealing with those.

  As I unlock the front door Molly’s greeting barks are gruff and accusatory. She may be the most patient border collie in the world
, but even she has limits. I realize that I hadn’t fed her before I left. I make up for it, nearly falling flat on my face as I scoop dog food into her bowl, then walk into the bathroom and splash my face. I hardly feel the water. The space around me seems packed in cotton wool. I poke my cheek and it’s as though I’m touching something inanimate. For some reason that saddens me. There’s a few of Robyn’s things still in the bathroom cupboard. A small bottle of perfume, a toothbrush. Three years and I’ve not managed to throw them out.

  Molly pushes her black and white snout against my leg; she’s wolfed down dinner and needs to go outside. There’s an impatient gleam to her eyes. I think she’s just as sick of me mooching over Robyn as everyone else, and Molly never even knew her. I bought her after Robyn left. Yeah, rebound pet ownership—real healthy.

  “Sorry, girl.”

  She’s on my heels all the way through the house to the kitchen and the back door, rushing past me as I open it. The refrigerator hums behind me.

  In the backyard the air is cool. It’s a typical spring evening and the city is still and quiet, though I know that’s a lie because it’s never really still or quiet. People are always sliding away to the Underworld, and things are always stirring. But I can imagine what it would be like to believe otherwise. I sit on the back step, smoking one of the cigarettes that Tim bought—yes, I’m that drunk—and wait for Molly to finish her business, thinking all the while about Lissa. I’d helped Terry easily enough. Why couldn’t I help her? She’s the most striking girl I’ve ever seen, but that shouldn’t matter. I’m already feeling the remorse that no amount of alcohol can shield you from, because drinking is all about remorse.

  Molly trots up next to me and I scratch her head. “What’s wrong with me, eh?”

  She’s got no answer to offer. She’s happy, though, to receive the scratching. I yawn at last, get up and leave the unquiet city outside.

  I’m drunk and exhausted but I’m restless as all hell. I walk about my house, not really connecting with any of it. All the stuff I’ve bought. The useless shit, as Dad calls it. The posters, the DVDs, and CDs: some not even out of their wrappers. None of it plants me here. None of it means anything. I might as well be a ghost. I wonder if this disconnect is how it feels to be dead. I’ll have to ask Morrigan—if anyone will know, it’ll be him. Molly follows me for a little while but can see no sense in it, or just gets bored, and wanders off to her bed. I drop onto the couch in the living room, and sit on my cordless phone. The damn thing beeps at me.

  I press the talk button and hear the familiar rapid blipping dial tone: there’s at least one message on my voicemail.

  I ring through to check. Two missed calls. The alcohol steps politely aside for a moment. One of the calls is from Morrigan: too late to call him back. Besides, if it had been really important, he would have tried my mobile.

  There’s a message, too. The phone crackles, which means either there are Stirrers about or we’ve hit a period of increased solar flare activity. Both mess with electrical signals.

  “Steven,” Dad says. “Hope you haven’t been drinking.” He doesn’t sound too hopeful. “Thought I’d call to let you know you were right, it wasn’t a coincidence. The police released the name of the gunman. Jim McKean.”

  McKean…

  McKean…

  The name’s familiar. Dad fills in the blanks. “McKean’s a Pomp… Was a Pomp. Sydney middle management; didn’t show for work yesterday. I’ve heard he was doped out: on ice, that’s what they call it these days, isn’t it? Out of character, completely out of character.”

  Of course, McKean!

  I remember him. A quiet guy. Always seemed nice, and a little bookish. We’d actually talked science fiction at a Christmas party a few years back. He was a real Heinlein nut, not that I’m saying anything, but…

  “Morrigan’s using his connections, digging into the why, but—whatever the reason—McKean is behind bars. You don’t need to worry.”

  But I am. The guy came after me with a gun. Even with Molly the house seems too…empty.

  “Give me that phone, Michael.” It’s Mom. “Steven, your father was less than speedy in passing on to me the details.” Mom stresses the last word. “Your rather worthless father said you’d had a tough day. He neglected to tell me that you’d been shot at. You’ll be having dinner with us tomorrow night. No excuses. Now, I hope Tim hasn’t gotten you too drunk. We’re all rather worried about you.”

  The message drops out.

  I’ve a dinner invite for Wednesday, and I’ll be there. Mom and Dad are excellent cooks. I might have inherited the pomping career but the culinary skills seemed to have skipped me. I might even have made enough peace with my stomach to be hungry by then.

  I play the message over, twice, just to hear their voices. It grounds me a little. The dead aren’t the only ones who like to feel that people care. I check my mobile but no missed calls, no texts, and the schedule hasn’t changed.

  I switch on the television, and flick through the channels.

  Two of them are running stories about McKean. Shots of him being taken into custody, backlit by a frenetic clicking lightshow of camera flashes. There’s something not right about him but I guess you could say that about anyone who decides that today is a good day to start firing a rifle into a crowd. No one was killed, thank Christ, but not all of that is luck: he wasn’t gunning for anyone else. There’s nothing in the story linking him to me. Nothing about me at all.

  The sight of him draws a rising shudder of panic through me that even the weight of alcohol can’t suppress. I guess it has affected me more than I care to admit.

  I turn off the television and switch on my Notebook, hook into Facebook, and the Mortmax workgroup—Morrigan set that up—and there’s Jim McKean in my network: looking his usual awkward self, and nothing like a killer. I check his profile. His life/death status is up as dead. Morrigan installed that morbid little gadget a year or so ago. Pomp humor is very much of the gallows sort.

  Peculiar, as McKean isn’t dead. But that slips from my mind in an instant, because there’s Lissa’s face in his friends list. I click on her profile photo.

  She worked for Mortmax?

  I bang my head with my palm. Of course she had. Lissa Jones. Melbourne agency. It’s all here, and I must have met her before. Her green eyes mock me. Her status though, according to this, is living. Something’s wrong with that gadget of Morrigan’s.

  I open Dad’s profile. Dead.

  Then Mum’s. Dead.

  I open my own profile. Status: Dead.

  Then I’m opening all the Brisbane pages. And every single one of them, including Morrigan, is the same.

  Something prickles up my spine.

  I switch to Mr. D’s profile. It has his usual picture, a crow on a tombstone. His is a dry and obvious sort of humor. But Regional Managers are like that. Death, after all, is the reason for their existence. His status: gone fishing.

  Nothing peculiar there. Our RM loves to fish—most of the Orcus do. I’ve heard he has a boat docked at the piers of Hell, and that Charon’s own boatmen run it. I’ve seen the photos of the things he’s caught in the sea of the dead—the ammonites, the juvenile megalodon, the black-toothed white whale with old mariner still attached.

  Regardless, the timing is odd. I get the feeling that there’s something I’m not seeing, but there’s a thick and somewhat alcohol-muddied wall between the truth and me.

  I switch off the Notebook. Then look at my watch. There’s no one I can reasonably call about this. So I call Dad.

  “Do you know what time it is?”

  I don’t realize that I’d been holding my breath until he answers. Morrigan’s gadget is wrong, thank Christ. “Sorry, Dad, but…” I mumble something drunkenly at him about the Facebook accounts.

  Dad lets out a weary breath. “That’s what this is about?”

  “Yeah, it’s, I—”

  “We’ll discuss this tomorrow, when you’re sober.”

&nb
sp; “But Dad—”

  “Get some sleep.”

  There’s a long moment of silence. Dad sighs again. “OK, there’s some sort of glitch on the server. If we’d kept to the old ways… well, I wouldn’t be answering a call from you in the middle of the night. I tell you, Steve, it’s been a hell of a week.” Which is saying something, as it’s only Tuesday night. “Just a wonderful one for Mr. D to take off. Morrigan’s looking into it. Now, go…to…sleep.” Dad sounds like he is already, which is good or I’d be in for a lecture.

  “Sorry,” I say.

  “’S OK,” he says. “I’m just glad you’re not hurt. We’ll talk about this tomorrow.” He hangs up, and I’m left holding the phone.

  Dad said I’m safe, earlier. I can’t say that’s how I see it.

  It’s a weird world. A weird and dangerous world. When you’re a Pomp, even such a low level one as me, you get your face rubbed in it. Robyn couldn’t handle it. I don’t think she believed in half of what I did. I don’t blame her for leaving, not one little bit, nor for the hole she left in my life. She didn’t grow up with all this, hadn’t seen some of the things I’ve seen, or witnessed some of the deaths I’ve attended. Still, until today I’d never been shot at.

  I walk around the house checking the locks, and then double-checking the front and back door. Then I’m looking in cupboards, even under the bed. It’s a drunken, shambling sort of scrutiny. And when I catch myself stumbling to the front door for the third time I snort.

  “Ridiculous.”

  Molly, who’s been watching all this from her mat with a bemused tilt to her head, stares up at me.

  “Ridiculous,” I say again, and scratch behind her ears.

  She grins at me.

  “Safe as houses, eh, Moll?” I stumble to the bedroom, and crash onto the bed, after flipping my shoes across the room where they land with two dull thwacks against the wardrobe mirror. My reflection shivers at me.

  “Buffoon,” I whisper at it.

  The bed begins a wobbly spin, even as I’m slipping into sleep. I stare at the window to steady that roiling movement. It works, but I know I won’t be awake for much longer.