FICTION: The Kind That Leaves Me Alone (Excerpt)

Now that he has a couple centuries' worth of oxycodone David guesses he should be happy for pill whores.  He can't pretend Xamanda is anything else as she sleeps beside him beneath the tarp: a junkie knows a junkie sure as he knows his own baby. Once he could have hated her for being so pretty, David thinks as he runs his hand through her fluorescent orange hair. But when you can see somebody's soul there's no joy in degrading her. Nor in knowing she's fond of you, just not so fond as you hoped.

David rolls out of bed and checks the nightstand clock, 4:30 am. Drew's father is bringing him back at 3:00pm and if he finds her pilled out again she's liable to lose the boy altogether.  David sets the alarm for noon then looks for a place where it will take Xamanda time to find the beeping alarm. Finally he puts the clock near the bathroom, throwing last night's panties atop it for good measure. David knows no matter how bad off you was the night before, once you see the toilet you ain't going back to bed without a piss.

And if you're still blocked up from last night's pills you gonna go get a cup of coffee to get the yellow river flowing. By the time Asshole McAsshole the Fourth gets here she'll be fine.

Outside the window above Drew's crib the sky is already catching fire. David can see the razor blade on the coffee table in X-ray relief against the shimmering glass: wax and talcum residue floats grey as the spots on his Daddy's lungs.  Xamanda's not moving, David would be worried if he couldn't hear the soft patter of her heart across the room. That girl don't know when she's had enough. David chuckles. Or maybe she just wants too much.

"Ain't no medicine gonna fix neither of us, darlin'," he says to the smoldering sky. Xamanda stirs but does not wake. David lifts up the tarp and tucks the sheet and comforter around her, it gets cold up here at night and the wiring won't take a space heater even if she wasn't three months behind on her light bill.  He has to stop for a second to admire her, even after a baby her titties still look you in the eye and wink. Then he moves on to the pile of papers on her desk.  

It takes a little digging, she ain't no better keeping records at home, Professor, but finally he finds the disconnect notice in the top right pile. Her Daddy sent money twice, he ought to know to get the account number and pay it hisself.  Amazing what folks forget once they get a brick house.  He finds his flannel shirt beside the nightlight then shoves the notice in the pocket behind his Marlboro Reds. Grown folk can live without power, Lord knows he's done it, but it ain't right for a child to lie scared in the dark.

David walks over to the coffee table and picks up the razor.  He picks up the rolled dollar bill from the floor as he's stepping into his pants, then places it in his left nostril as he carefully scrapes every stain into a grey-white line.  One quick sniff and everything is clean again. David wipes it down with his red hanky to make sure no trace remains should Drew try to stand on the edge, he's bound to start walking any day now, then covers the table with Xamanda's sari fabric.

The stars above Drew's crib are gone now: the moon is fading like Jimson weed closing up for dawn.  David puts the blade in his wallet's credit card slot and scans the place again for incriminating evidence. When he finds none he puts on his baseball cap and pulls the tarp off Xamanda. She stirs and raises her hand, she's fine, she'll be fit as an untuned fiddle tomorrow.  David wishes he could stay like they talked about but he can't help no further now. It's near sunrise but he can still get home without hurrying more than a little bit. And besides, if Asshole raised his voice too loud it might wake David up and that wouldn't be good for nobody.

"See y'all tomorrow night," David whispers in Xamanda's ear, then, hesitant, "I love you." She smiles: David closes his eyes so he cannot see her dreams.

FICTION: Panic in Detroit (Excerpt)

Pierre knows the Lord means for him to walk among men again. Otherwise He wouldn’t have sent a purple Cadillac, a grocery bag of cash, a steamer trunk of marihuana and pants that fit perfectly.  He who knows all tongues sent His message in the language of scents and snarls:  one whiff and Pierre’s words rose like Ezekiel’s dry bones, Goddamn that smells like some fine muggles.  And while the little fellow’s clothes were past saving the big guy went down with hardly any fight, he barely moved after his friend’s bloody baseball cap landed at his feet till Pierre yes yes Pierre my name is Pierre broke his neck.

The season’s first frost crunches under Pierre’s knees as he kneels. When he finishes drinking from the little fellow’s left leg, not so warm as he might like now but a thin velvet blanket is better than none at all, he looks around for a place to wash. The sand piled by the steam shovel will get the worst stains, but a man, yes a man, needs water to make himself presentable.  He lopes to the stream over the hill, his hands touching the ground till he reminds himself to walk upright.

When Pierre returns the big man is still slouched against the car, his unblinking gaze affixed on heaven tight as his dead hand on his crucifix. Pierre tries to get the Detroit Pistons jersey off but the big man doesn’t want to let go. Of course, he realizes, they were angels. Though I’m not sure why angels had a dead body in their trunk. He ponders this for a moment as the shattered stars twinkle overhead and the first frost crystals form on the little fellow’s bloody torso. Finally Pierre loosens the fingers as carefully as he could, only breaking two, and gets the jersey and the long undershirt beneath.  The cross reflects moonlight on the big angel’s chest between THUG and LIFE.

“Agnus dei qui tolli peccata mundi, miserere nobis,” Pierre sings as he closes the angel’s eyes and remembers the priest with the pale hands. “Retournez-vous aux ciel, Ange d’Seigneur” Pierre forgets the Latin but he remembers Notre-Dame de Montréal and expects an angel’s more likely to know Français than English.  “Merci pour votre aide et pour le muggles. Vous-etes un chat froid et un gros papa. Adieux.”

Once he puts a new hole in the belt the big denims fit like they were made for him. Pierre remembers watching kids dressed like this from the woods. Back then he wondered why they were bothering with clothes at all though of course not in words. Now Pierre understands perfectly. They give a man air and let him feel nature on his nature in a matter of speaking. And the shoes fit perfectly and even have his lucky number 15 on the sole.  Like clockwork, baby he remembers the experiments, of course, a beast can only take what’s thrown to it but a man can try to understand his situation.

There’s a shovel in the trunk beside the dead body. Pierre figures if the angels were kind enough to see that this man got a fitting burial it was only right he should do the same. Within a few minutes there are three holes, Pierre’s new clothes are a bit soiled but nothing a washboard and some soap won’t take care of. The man in the trunk is already stiff and some sticky unidentifiable liquid has stained the rug they wrapped him in. Pierre moves the bundle gingerly and just manages to avoid the maroon glop, soil goes away with a wash but body fluids stain forever. The big angel goes quietly and falls peacefully to his final rest. For a moment Pierre ponders what to do with the little fellow’s remains then realizes he can pick them up with the shovel. A short stroll to gather him together and soon all three are properly interred.

The clouds are gathering over the moon. Pierre smells freezing rain coming in, he barely feels the elements but he knows a man finds shelter for himself and certainly for his automobile. He looks around a bit for the crank, then decides he will explore Mr. Stanley’s invention out later. Picking up the back end like a wheelbarrow Pierre shoves the Cadillac into a thicket, not that he needs to hide it, nobody works a quarry in a Michigan winter. But he remembers the man who let them ride in the Steamer had a garage put aside for it, just like a stall only with no hay on the floor.  A machine slower than a horse and twice as filthy, Antoine said afterward as he rubbed white spirits on his soot-stained cravat. Behold the future.

“They ain’t near so sooty no more!” Pierre announces proudly, his hand on the hood. He realizes no one is listening of course but keeps talking anyway, he’ll need the practice if the Lord is sending him among men again. “Once I learn to drive we’ll be traveling in style, daddy-O! This is a Cadillac and they’re real fine cars. I saw an ad for one in a magazine in …” he pauses “when President Eisenhower was in office. They’re a smooth ride with V8 power and interior luxury. People see Professor Chauffant pulling up in a horseless carriage like this, there’s no telling how much elixir they’ll buy.” Pierre pauses again, his eyes downcast this time. “Or would, I guess.”

They left half a joint in the driver’s side ashtray, they never got a chance to lock the door and Pierre figures every gravedigger should earn an honest wage, especially considering his clients are no longer in need of anything. And since the big angel had a lighter in his pocket, Pierre is especially certain it’s an omen. The locusts are quiet, they’ve been driven away by the presence of God or maybe they just don’t like the taste of red velvet. What are we, moths? they ask as they fade into the smoke.  Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye.

Pierre looks in the back seat. The grocery bag isn’t full like he first thought but there are rolled bills covering the bottom, mostly twenties and fifties.  He grabs a couple rolls and discovers neatly trimmed stacks of newspaper substituting for currency beneath the first bill. I thought Antoine was the only one knew that trick.  Pierre shakes his head. Looks like these fellows was even touchier than that hotel manager. There’s still a fair bit of money though, enough to last a while and he won’t need to worry about muggles either, he’s got a stash that would have made Fat Tyrell envious.

An owl hoots by the stream. Pierre grins broadly as he realizes the enormity of what God has gifted unto him.  He speaks aloud again, hoping his voice will carry through the water. “Maybe we can’t have Professor Chauffant’s Medicine Show, but we’re going to be the heppest vipers in…” he looks down at the newspaper in the back seat. “Detroit, baby! Detroit!” 

FICTION: Shatterer of Worlds (Excerpt)

“No sir that would not work.” Pierre says to the tramp in the battered plaid suit. “Some years ago I lit an entire shack full of dynamite.  While the experience left me insensible for a brief period I remained, as you can see, fully intact.”

Everybody guffaws as the plaid tramp passes the bottle to the little lame hobo.  Pierre remembers this from before the darkness descended, stories around a campfire to pass the time, a place where a stranger can speak the truth knowing nobody’s going to believe him anyway. 

“You hear that, Chuck?” the weasel-faced boy by the tarpaper lean-to asks the burly one-eared man squatting beside him.  “Think he could take a mortar round like you did at Guadacanal?”

The burly man looks up, the stubble on his jaw nearly as long as his buzzcut. “It was at Chosun, not that a little pansy like you would know about war.”

The weasel-faced boy sneers. “Not that you’d know who your Daddy is.”

“What did you just say?” Chuck asks slowly as he stands.  Pierre holds up his hands, palms facing outward as if he could shove away the jagged anger rising at the fire’s edge.

“Easy, cats. No need for aggression, let’s have a chilled out session, you need some relief and I got some sweet leaf.” He snaps his fingers as Chuck’s rage cools back down to annoyance and reaches into the backpack for the joint lying atop the shotgun shells. “The smoke is my deliverance and salvation, keeps me out of bad situations, provides my questions an explanation.  And if you two gentlemen will partake I’m sure you’ll be able to put your differences behind you.”

“How about that, Chuck?” The boy turns his attention to Pierre.  “He ain’t just good at exploding, he can rhyme too.”

Chuck stares at Pierre’s cigarette.  “Don’t you read the papers? That stuff will make you crazy.”

“My experience, sir, is quite the opposite.” Pierre strikes a kitchen match against the sole of his boot. “When I first met Mary Jane, the weight of my sorrows pressed me so that I could but cry out in my despair. And then, as I wept and raged in a forest, a little Mexican man came to me with a fat smoldering reefer.  One draw of that fine Mexicali tea and I began to feel like myself again.  I tried to pass it back but he said, ‘No, all yours’ and disappeared.”

Pierre inhales, then blows out smoke and hands the joint to the plaid tramp.

“I still believe him to be an angel sent to offer me balm for my affliction. And since that moment I have always taken pains to keep Miss Mary Jane near at hand.”

“Pass that over here,” the boy says. “Ain’t every day you get to smoke reefer from an angel.”

Chuck grunts his disapproval. “Johnny, you gonna be even funnier than you already are.”

“Weren’t you listening?” The boy examines the joint. “This comes from God.”

The little lame hobo looks up. “You oughtn’t be mocking a man who’s telling the truth.”

Johnny starts to respond but something in the old man’s unblinking grey gaze stops him. The fire crackles as he turns to Pierre.

“I met another of your kind a long time ago. I wasn’t no older than Johnny nor no smarter. This one looked my age when I met him but he was older. I bet he still looks the same even though I don’t.”

“Yes sir,” Pierre hesitates for a second. “He probably does.”

“I was working in Michigan then, at the Callimac Mine on the Gogebic Range.  You know where that is?”

“Yes sir,” Pierre says as he stares at the flames reflecting in the old man’s eyes like Diogenes-lanterns. “On the Upper Peninsula.  I used to know that area real well.”

“Business was still just holding on then. Everyone knew things was near tapped out.  There wasn’t but a skeleton crew working by the winter of ’16. Everyone else had been let go and I was planning to head to Detroit to see if they had anything for me in the new automobile plants. That was when we started dying.”

The scent of piñon pines wafts on the evening breeze.  Pierre remembers the smell of balsam firs and white spruce and frost over swampland: he draws on the joint as if its cherry might drive away the long-ago cold.

“It was a hard winter and we lost one with every snowfall. At first we figured they was just moving on like we was going to move on.  Then right before the New Year we found what was left of Aleksi.  Jefferson, the security guard, said it was a bear. Only he couldn’t explain how this bear tore a grown man to pieces and didn’t leave no footprints.”

Pierre passes to the little lame man, who shakes his head.  He stretches the joint out toward Johnny but the boy stands motionless as his sneer melts into terror.

“Two nights later it snowed again and we heard shots in the dark. Next morning Jefferson was gone.” The old man takes a gulp from his pint. “Later someone told me they found his badge and his gun in the woods that spring. Never heard of them finding anything else.”

Chuck eyes Pierre warily: the plaid tramp hesitates before taking the joint from him. Pierre stares straight ahead into the fire, hoping the last dancing flames will distract him from memories of loud noises and acrid smells and a brief stinging spark exploding into shrieking red velvet shreds. The old man stares into the flames with Pierre, his knuckles white as he clutches the bottle.

“That was when we all decided to go. But the railroad wasn't running and all the roads were blocked. There was no getting out save with a dogsled or a snowmobile and we didn’t have neither.  Big Bjorn remembered Jefferson had a pair of snowshoes. But then Kowalski pointed out even so you couldn’t walk to Ironwood without spending the night in the woods. And wasn’t a man in that camp willing to do that."

“Winters are hard in that part of the country,” Pierre says, trying to keep the words coming. He can feel the smooth brass of the Pinkerton man’s watch and wonders what time it is now, a beast of the field knows light and dark but a man can read a clock, it was three seconds past 8:38 when he came in and when he looks down again it is exactly 9:32.

“Since we had nothing else to do, we all decided to wait for death or the train, whichever got through first. Turned out to be neither.”

The dancing flames are flickering lower now, nothing left but embers and fear and the little lame man sitting on his orange carton. Pierre extends his hands, easy cats, and the plaid tramp becomes a blank gap-toothed smile but Johnny and Chuck are out of range, he can feel their terror but can’t snuff out its locust-song. The lame man eyes him quizzically.

“The other fellow was different. You make folks calm. He couldn’t help but make you feel like there were spiders inside you.”

Chuck moves away, Pierre thinks he might run into the hills but instead he grabs a handful of sticks and kindling and throws it on the smoldering fire.

“I was the one keeping watch when he walked into camp. He didn’t leave no tracks in the snow. The way that thing in the woods didn’t leave no footprints.” The old man drains the rest of his pint. “The way your boots weren’t muddy even though you had to cross a creek to get here.”

“Quit it, Pops,” Johnny says, his voice a high whimper. “This ain’t funny no more.”

“Wasn’t funny at all,” Pops says, smiling faintly despite himself. “I wanted to run but I couldn’t turn away even though looking into those eyes was like sticking your head into the maw of hell.”

Not like hell, Pierre thinks, like a great empty void and at the bottom snow and stars and hands so pale the moonlight reveals knuckle-bones beneath the skin and a sad-eyed boy singing Domini Deus Noster, Miserere Nobis.

The old man continues. “He told me there was no monster in the woods, just a soul in torment and that it wouldn't trouble us again. I asked him what he meant and he said he couldn't take away its suffering but he eased it for a little while. Then he laughed and I swear to God I soiled myself when I heard that laugh.”

Singing till you can’t help but sing with him, Miserere Nobis, and then you remember language and fall sobbing to your knees in the snow and there is no singing, just a pale hand on your head and a soft voice saying “A beast of the field howls but a man has words to sing with.”

“The next morning they finally cleared the tracks and we all left on the next train. Except Kowalski. We found him in his bunk with his throat slit.”

“Stop it, Pops,” Johnny is nearly crying now.  “Stop it.”

“What’s the matter, Johnny? Thought you didn’t believe in any of this bullshit.” The old man laughs as he turns again to Pierre. “Don’t worry, kid.  If you meant us harm we’d all be dead right now, ain’t that right?”

Pierre hesitates then decides he doesn’t want to go to Dr. Oppenheimer with lies on his conscience.

“Yes sir,” he nods. “That’s right.”

Out with the Old, In with the Moldy: a New (of sorts) Fiction Release from Kenaz Filan

To ring out 2013, I dug up (ba-dump CHING) some old fiction I wrote between 2002 and 2005 and put together my first Kindle Direct Publication.  Covering the period between 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina, It's a Wonderful Afterlife describes the continuing misadventures of Afterlife Orientation Guide Charley DelCruccio and his metabolically challenged friends on the other side.

Others may promise you the secrets of the dead. It's a Wonderful Afterlife delivers... and at a reasonable cost!   You get six big stories for $1.99: that's at least a dozen trips to the toilet with your new Christmas iPad. If you've got Amazon Prime you can even borrow it for free.  So you can drop a deuce with Charley, Dr. Ira, St. Gerard Majella and even Jesus Christ himself -- and it won't cost you a dime.  (Sorry, toilet paper not included in this deal: it's electrons all the way down).

Act now. Or don't. It ain't like the dead are going anywhere.

That out of the way: Happy New Year to one and all.  May New Year's Eve 2014 leave us all happier, healthier and more prosperous than we are today.

Remembering 9/11: Intake Processing

This story was written in late 2001.  It was the first introduction to Charley Delcruccio, Intake Processing Guide and Afterlife Orientation Specialist (any resemblance to Harvey Delcruccio, swankest Ghede ever to come out of Brooklyn, is purely coincidental).

*******

"The man with the megaphone said everything was going to be all right."

The primly-dressed Jamaican women frown as Charley tacks the INTAKE PROCESSING sign to his card table.

"The plane struck the other tower," the woman in blue says.

"That's right," her friend in red agrees. "Not ours."

Smoke pours from the World Trade Center. Papers spiral in the cool September wind. A leaper spirals screaming alongside them. St. Gerard Majella crosses himself as she enters the Land of the Dead. Charley reaches out, but there are no AOGs left on the table. He reaches over the limbless torso of Robert-Francois Damiens and takes the last two copies from the bench.

"There was another plane, and … look, ladies, read the book, why don't you? It'll save us all a lot of time."

Burning jet fuel streams down the maimed buildings and snakes onto the pavement. A flaming tendril curls toward Charley, then turns left toward Crustyfred the Punk. The woman in red watches Crustyfred scratch his nose ring from the inside, then turns again to Charley and Damiens.

"He specifically told us to return to our desks," she insists again.

Crustyfred sneers. The syringe in his arm sparkles pus-yellowgray in the jet fuel's light. "Sure. Follow orders like the corporate sheep that you are…OWWWW!!!!" Crustyfred looks accusingly at Charley. "Why'd you hit my needle, man?"

"So you'd shut up and make yourself useful. Go get me another stack of AOGs."

"That really hurt, dude…" Crustyfred says as he makes his way back to the Supply Tent.

Damiens snorts. "Ohhhh … poor baby!!! Hees arm hurts."

The Jamaican women examine the cover of the Afterlife Orientation Guide. A burning messenger stumbles past, smoke rising from his dreadlocks as he searches for his bicycle. The women look at each other, then back at Charley and Damiens.

"Good morning, mademoiselles. Damiens would teep hees hat to you, but he hopes you understand."

The woman in blue wanders off, muttering "There's something wrong here" under her breath.

"But he told us to return to our desks…" the woman in red says again, holding her AOG vaguely as she follows her friend.

Crustyfred returns, a pile of books beneath his tattooed and trackmarked arm. Charley looks over at Trinity Church, where two of the Puerto Rican muertos he met at last month's Misa are setting up a processing table. Next to them a Mormon, a Rabbi and Dave the Hippie scan the growing crowd, boxes of freshly mimeographed AOGs by their side. A burning leaper blazes a meteor trail to the ground.

Jesus H. Christ, how big was this thing anyway? Charley wonders.

"Ma liberaci del male!!!"

The high tubercular color drains from St. Gerard's sunken cheeks as he cries out not in the voiceless language of the dead but in the Italian of his youth. Charley runs over to his side.

"What's up, kid?"

St. Gerard whimpers, his gaze affixed on fifteen seconds away.

"It's coming down. Dear Mother of God, it's coming down!"

Something rumbles like D-Day. A hot wind blows from the growling tower. Charley grabs Damiens and puts him atop the stack of AOGs, then ducks beneath a police car.

"You fuck!!! Damiens ees not paperweight!!!!! YOU FUCK!!!!!"

* * *

"Ptuii!!!"

Damiens spits ashes and powdered concrete as Charley and Crustyfred put him back on the bench. "Damiens speets on you! He speets on both of you!"

"Ahh, lighten up, Stubby," Charley says. "In times like these everybody needs to lend a hand."

"Oh-ho-ho-ho. You funny man. Eef Damiens had knee he would be slapping eet. Ho-ho-ho. You fuck."

A team of firefighters make their way toward the World Financial Center, leaving no footprints as they walk through the ankle-deep ash. Charley looks around at the milling ghostly crowd as he brushes the dust off the AOGs.

"We're gonna be needing all of these and then some. Ya done good, Stubby." Charley looks around. "Anybody seen the kid?"

* * *

The chubby system administrator smiles at St. Gerard. "All the while I was standing on that windowsill I was so afraid I'd go to hell if I jumped. Thank you so much for clearing that up for me!"

"I'm glad I could help, Patrick. I wish I could do more."

"I just have one more question, if you don't mind." Patrick looks down at the shattered remains of a trashcan protruding from his ragged Babylon-5 t-shirt. "Am I always going to look like this?"

St. Gerard shakes his head. "He makes the blind see, the lame walk, and the wounded whole. It's part of His job description."

Patrick looks across the plaza at Damiens. "What about him?"

"Some people never ask to be healed. I don't really understand it. I wish Fr. Liguori was here. He's much better at theology than I am."

Patrick squeezes St. Gerard's hand. "God bless you, Father."

St. Gerard looks away, then, when he sees the crowds of dead, looks back at Patrick. He forces a smile. "God bless you too."

"Santo Gerardo Majella!"

The little man in the bloodstained dishwasher's apron breaks away from the crowd and falls to his knees at Gerard's feet.

"It's all right. You don't have to call me a saint, really." St. Gerard looks around again, trying to avoid catching anyone's gaze. He tries to maintain his balance as the little man embraces him.

"Excuse me! Can somebody help me here?!"

The man with the cell phone hits redial, then curses under his breath until he spots Gerard. "Hello. Excuse me? You know what's going on here, Father?"

"I'm not a priest. I'm just a lay brother…"

"Can somebody tell me what's going on??" The man with the cell phone pushes the dishwasher away. St. Gerard steps back from both, looking about like a trapped animal as he stumbles over the twisted remains of a mailbox. The man with the cell phone pushes forward until Charley grabs his shoulder.

"Anything I can help you with, Chuckles?"

The man pushes redial, then curses again. "My phone's dead."

"I'm biting my tongue." Charley hands him an AOG. "Here, read this."

The man with the cell phone examines the book, then throws it on the ground. "Do you have any idea how many people died today? That is in really, really bad taste."

"So's your tie, but do you hear me complaining?"

"I'm a very busy man. I don't have time for this nonsense." Cellphone man turns around again.

The little man is kissing St. Gerard's hand as he tries hard to pull away. "What's going on here, Father?"

"I keep telling you, I'm not a priest."

Charley taps Cellphone man on the shoulder. "Leave the kid alone. He's handling Catholics. I'm in charge of atheists, agnostics and general assholes."

"I'm an Episcopalian."

"Like I said. You been holding that damn thing all morning. Did you notice it was melted to your hand?"

Charley rips the cell phone away. A pinky and part of the ring finger come off along with the phone.

"My phone!"

"You won't need it."

He looks at his maimed hand. "My fingers…"

"You won't need them either." Charley stoops and picks up the AOG. His battered pork-pie hat falls off, exposing his bald spot and the bullet hole in the center of his forehead. "Like I told you before, read this. Start with the section for those what crossed over sudden."

The dishwasher holds Gerard's hand tightly, muttering too softly for Charley to hear. Cellphone man wanders away, the book dangling limp in his maimed hand. Gerard looks up toward the sky, then sees the pillars of smoke and flame. His eyes are hollow as his cheeks as he returns to the dishwasher and tells him, "Yes, yes, of course I'll do everything I can for your family."

Charley puts his hat back on and turns to Crustyfred. "Keep an eye on the kid for me. I'm worried about him."

Again the D-Day rumble.

"Oh no. No. Don't even theenk about eet!!!!! No!! YOU FUCK!!!!!!!"

* * *

"Ptui!!! Ptuii!!! Ptuiii!!!"

Charley wipes ashes from his coat. Damiens spits out dust as Gerard and Crustyfred dig him from the debris.

"You fucks!!! Damiens speets on all of you! All except you, Gerardo. Damiens does not speet on you because you are a pere."

Gerard looks away. "I'm not a priest…"

"Fine. So then Damiens speets on you too. Ptui!!!" Damiens spits out a shard of glass. Behind him, Dave the Hippie takes a long drag on a Marley-sized joint, then passes it back to the smoldering messenger.

"So in 2001 you can have grass delivered to your office?" Dave grins broadly as he lets out smoke. "Cool."

"Why should Damiens care eef you are priest anyway? When they executed Damiens, the priest says, 'After they reep you apart weeth the horses, we weel say Mass for you een the Cathedral.' And Damiens says, 'Oh, thank you, Pere, that makes theengs so much better.'" Damiens spits out more ashes. "You fuck."

"I gotta hand it to you, Stubby. You take a lickin' and keep on tickin.' I'd give you a Timex if you had any place to put it." Charley shakes his head as he examines the crowd milling outside the ruins. "Make sure you save those AOGs."

"WHOOO-HOOO!!!!"

Crustyfred dances about in a circle, his tattered Doc Martens splitting further with every stomping step. "Take that, you Capitalist motherfuckers!!! Kerblaa … OWWWWW!!!!"

Crustyfred pouts, exposing the moldy safety pin in his lower lip. "Why'd you hit my needle again?"

"Same reason as last time," Charley says. "So you'd shut the fuck up. And go tell Central to send reinforcements."

"That hurt," Crustyfred mutters under his breath as Dave the Hippie passes him the joint.

"Ohhh … the poor revolutionary feels the steeng of oppression."

* * *

"This is Officer Lopez," Dave says as he introduces the mangled cop. "She wants to help out."

Crustyfred sniffs the air. "Whoa … I'm smelling bacon … OWWWWW!!!" Crustyfred rubs his arm. "That hurt, dude."

"It was supposed to hurt, you Red bastard," Charley says. "Now go ask Central when the hell the reinforcements are coming."

Crustyfred looks accusingly at Dave as he walks away. "I never thought you'd sell out, dude… OWWWWW!!!! Not you too…"

Charley tips his hat, exposing his bald spot and bullet hole again. "Pleasure to meet you, Officer Lopez. What's a pretty lady like you doing walking a beat? It's dangerous out there."

Lopez pulls two cigarettes from the flattened pack in her pocket and hands Charley one. "Yeah. I hear you can get killed." She lights Charley's cigarette, then her own. "Look, Pops, can the small talk. We got an emergency on our hands. What can I do?"

"I'd tell you to read the AOG, but since we're in a hurry, here's the Reader's Digest Condensed Version. You see anybody panicking, calm them down. They get too excited, they might get stuck in a loop and wind up haunting somebody's basement for God only knows how long. You see people wandering around, send them toward an intake table. The Buddhists got a Wheel of Death and Rebirth booth on the other side of Liberty Avenue; the Moslems have a table by Brooks Brothers; the Hindus and Protestants are down by the World Financial Center; the Jews and Catholics are set up on Bowling Green; and Neopagans are down by the piers with the Rastafarian camp."

"I know." She smiles as widely as her broken jaw will allow. "If I hadn't busted your buddy smoking a blunt, I still wouldn't know what happened."

"Sorry you had to find out like that. We usually have a more individual oriented approach to your transition."

Officer Lopez shrugs. "It's all right. Anything else I can do?"

Charley gestures toward Gerard. "Keep an eye on the kid. He means well, but he's frail. He's got a delicate constituency."

"I can't be dead," the heavyset woman says firmly. "My feet hurt. How can I be a ghost if my feet still hurt?"

"There's not that much difference between spirit and flesh. I know it's difficult to understand. It took me a long time." St. Gerard looks down at her high heels. "You should talk to St. Francis. I'm sure he can get you some comfortable shoes."

"I. Don't. Need. Shoes." the woman says, enunciating every syllable. "I. Am. Not. Dead."

"I know that you're very confused." St. Gerard tries to walk away. "If you'll just wait here somebody will be with you in a minute. I'm sorry I couldn't be more help."

Gerard wheels as a large man knocks a Pakistani hot dog vendor to the ground. "Wait! Please! He didn't have anything to do with this! Stop!"

St. Gerard runs between them, catching a glancing blow in his chest. He wheezes and coughs up blood as the large man pulls back for another punch.

"Hey!!" shouts Officer Lopez.

The large man stares at the mangled corpse shambling toward him, billyclub in hand. A gas main erupts. The large man falls moaning as Lopez's nightstick meets his exposed kneecap. The Pakistani man returns to the twisted remains of his hot dog cart as Lopez walks to a vantage point beneath a twelve-story steel shard.

"Ducky!!!!!!"

The little girl runs screaming through the crowd, her purple dress bloodstained and torn.

Oh Christ, a kid, Charley thinks as he looks away. I hate taking kids.

"It's all right, bambina, it's all right." St. Gerard picks her up. "Nobody can hurt you now."

The little girl sniffles. "I lost Ducky."

"Shhhh. Shhhh. We'll find Ducky. Where did you lose him?"

"I was holding him when Ms. Chen told us the firemen were coming. Now I lost him." The little girl waves the mutilated stump that used to be her right arm. "I want Ducky!"

St. Gerard barely flinches. "Don't worry, bambina. We'll find Ducky. But first we have to get away from here. This is no place for little girls. This is no place for anybody."

"I want my Mommy."

"I know." His voice is calm and soft but Charley can see the lines on his forehead and the rigid set of his jaw. "You must be very frightened."

The little girl nods.

"It's all right. We're all frightened. I'm going to take you someplace safe."

The little girl curls close against St. Gerard, playing with his rosary beads with her remaining hand as he walks away stoop-shouldered.

* * *

"Dude, Central says they're totally maxed out on reinforcements." Crustyfred steps back, moving beyond Charley's reach. "He said they're sending over two more cartons of AOGs as soon as they get them mimeographed."

"Two cartons of AOGs! We got a catastrophany on our hands and they send us two cartons of AOGs?" Charley looks around at the wandering ghosts. "You go tell them we got one police officer managing crowd control here. We need more dead cops."

"Fuckin-A right we do … OWWWW!" Crustyfred looks over at Dave. "You hit my needle, dude…"

Dave shrugs. "Charley was busy."

"When this is all over with," Charley says, "remind me to put Lopez in for a commendation. And does anybody know where the kid is?"

* * *

St. Gerard staggers wheezing to a park bench. The dark man moves aside to let him sit down. "Are you all right, Father?"

St. Gerard shakes his head, coughing. "I'm sorry, I'm not a priest."

The dark man hands him a bottle of water. "Drink this."

St. Gerard takes a sip. "Thank you. You're very kind." He tries to hand the bottle back but the dark man refuses it.

"Drink, drink. I didn't finish it before we crashed. Please. Drink. You need to take better care of yourself anyway."

"You were on the airplane?"

The dark man nods, his smile growing broader but no warmer as he stares at the pillars of smoke. "They never made allowance for devotion."

St. Gerard stares blankly. "I don't understand."

The dark man glances upward. A legal brief crumbles to glowing confetti and falls through them. Charley watches from behind a mangled phone booth.

"Kid! Get away from him!" Charley cries out.

The dark man looks over at him, then returns to Gerard, his eyes peacock-blue and his voice cool and soft as spring water. "You dragged yourself from your deathbed to feed the poor. And why? Devotion." He savors the word like it tastes sweet in his mouth. "You sacrificed your life doing what you thought God wanted you to do. Just like they did." The dark man surveys the carnage. "Blessed are they who do God's will."

"This isn't God's will," Gerard says, his voice edging toward hysteria.

"He's no good, kid! Don't listen to him!" Charley shouts.

"He told the Israelites to slaughter the people of Canaan. He told Abraham to sacrifice Isaac." The dark man raises an eyebrow. "Who are we to question God's will?"

Gerard rises, his face stricken. "You think this is God's will?"

The half-empty water bottle falls from Gerard's hands as the dark man's smile goes from cold to sad. "All we can do is God's will."

St. Gerard steps backward, clutching his stomach like he's just been stabbed. Charley thinks he might fall, but then he rights himself. His face is expressionless and his eyes hollow as he stumbles away muttering. The pavement shimmers amber in the firelight. Gerard falls to his knees in the broken glass.

"Jesus, kid, you OK?"

"Prega per noi peccatori, adesso e nell'ora morta." St. Gerard's rosary beads jangle together in his trembling fingers as he prays in the Italian of his youth. The dark man laughs softly as he throws the half-empty water bottle into the trash.

"Prega per noi peccatori, adesso e nell'ora morta."

"Snap out of it, kid. You're giving me flashbacks of Sister Maria Giacometti and her Ruler of Pain."

"Prega per noi peccatori, adesso e nell'ora morta."

"Come on, Jerry. You're scaring me here. Don't go looping on me."

Below the twelve-story steel shard, Officer Lopez hustles two more wandering spirits toward the Wheel of Death and Rebirth. The wind shifts. The stench of burning jet fuel wafts above the smell of blood and powdered concrete. Gerard rocks back and forth in time with the dark man's sad laughter. "Prega per noi peccatori, adesso e nell'ora morta. Prega per noi peccatori, adesso e nell'ora morta. Prega per noi peccatori, adesso e nell'ora morta ."

"Yeah, yeah! You guys can't handle reality so you turn to organized religion. OWWW!!!" Crustyfred rubs his abscess, then stares accusingly at Charley. "You keep hitting my arm!"

"Because you keep flapping your jaws. Put a sock in it, why don't you? And leave the kid alone. He's intercessorizing."

Crustyfred pouts. "But that hurt…"

"Prega per noi peccatori, adesso e nell'ora morta."

Damiens snorts. "Ohhhhh, poor baby! Always hees arm ees hurting. Maybe you should find your Mommy so she can kiss eet for you and make eet better. Damiens weeshes hees arm hurt. Damiens weeshes he had an arm."

Charley turns to Damiens. "If you had an arm you'd be your own best friend, Stubby."

"Oh-ho-ho-ho. You are funny man. Damiens can hardly keep himself from laughing you are so funny. You fuck."

"Prega per noi peccatori, adesso e nell'ora morta."

Charley turns back to Gerard. "Come on, kid. Snap out of it. Don't go looping, kid. Come on."

Gerard looks up at the pillar of smoke where the South Tower once stood. His knuckles are white as he clutches his rosary beads. " Prega per noi peccatori, adesso e nell'ora morta!"

Officer Lopez directs a charred paramedic toward Charley's intake table. The wind picks up. The sun breaks through the smoke. Charley and Crustyfred throw up their arms against the sudden flash of brilliance. Damiens averts his eyes cursing. Sirens echo in the distance. Gerard grins like a baby, tears rolling down his face as he stares straight ahead at the place where there is no building, where there is no fire, where there is only light.

Fiction: Dead Nude Girls (2006)

This is a piece of fiction I wrote in 2006 and which originally appeared in Brett Savory's excellent horror/dark fantasy site Chizine.  I've included a teaser and a link to the full story. 

Any resemblance between Charley and my ghede, spirit guide and personal advisor Harvey DelCruccio is not at all coincidental. 

Hope you enjoy!

 
*****


Every time I come she's faded a little bit more.

Amidst the weeds where the Empire Burlesque once stood Vera pirouettes to remembered music. Clouds hang low over the Hudson River. Across the street a LUXURY CO-OPS: 1 AND 2 BR. OFFERING BY PROSPECTUS ONLY sign memorializes the staircase where Vera fell to her death.

"How you doing, Toots?"

Vera flinches. Her head lolls on her broken neck, then comes to rest on her ample bosom. A rat dashes beneath the woodpile that used to be the main stage. Vera reaches up and turns her face toward Charley, then smiles as mist turns to drizzle.

"Hey, Sweetiepie!"

Charley tips his hat, revealing the bullet hole in the center of his forehead. "Sorry, Toots, didn't mean to startle you."

"That's okay. It's been a while, Charley."

"I know. It's been nuts down at Central. If it ain't a new crop of dead to haul in, it's a séance. Everyone in New York is either dying or getting spiritual. I been like a one-legged man at an asskicking contest."

"It's been slow here for a while. Nobody has time for dancers since they shot Kennedy." Vera smiles. "At least I got time to practice my ballet steps." She looks around the weedy lot. "I hope the economy picks up soon. You know how Hugo gets when he's not working."

The stormclouds blow in from the Palisades, heavy and blue-black as the bruise over Vera's right eye. Again with that strutting little bastard Hugo Charley thinks as drizzle turns to rain.

"You worry too much about that bum. He don't treat you right."

Vera's head bobs forward as she nods agreement.

"He needs to control that temper of his. Just yesterday he knocked me down a flight of stairs." She points toward the LUXURY CO-OPS sign. "My neck is still bothering me. I'm lucky I didn't get killed!"

"You're a nice girl. You could do a lot better than him."

"He didn't mean it."

The streetlight flickers on. In the halogen glow Charley can read the fluorescent orange FUCK YOU spraypainted behind Vera.

One of these days there ain't gonna be anything left of her at all. 

Continued