Me & Death Read online

  Maq walked home alone, even from grade one, because he lived next door to the school. He still lives there, but he switched to some genius school on the other side of the park, so I don’t see him much anymore.

  I heard a rhythmic banging sound behind us. I turned. Jim was pushing Lloyd against the back of a parked car. He had his hands on the smaller boy’s shoulders, and he was slamming him into the rear bumper. Bang. Bang. Bang. This was happening between parked cars, hidden from the moms clustered in front of the school.

  Wolfgang and I sat on the trunk of the nearer car. He nodded approvingly. “This takes me back,” he said. “Good times. Good times.”

  He’d have been a tough, scary little kid, like Jim here. Like me.

  Stop that!

  Maq stood on the sidewalk with his hands on his hips. Stop that at once! he cried.

  And now I remembered. “Oh, yeah,” I said to Wolfgang. “I know what happens now.”

  Fighting is stupid. Stop now or I’ll call my papa!

  Jim threw Lloyd to the ground and stood over him, breathing hard. He had the dissatisfied, poison-ivy look. He’d scratched and felt better for two seconds, but the itch was back.

  Are you calling me stupid? No one calls me stupid! said Jim. He stepped up onto the sidewalk, towering over Maq. Who didn’t move.

  Stupid! he cried.

  They pushed back and forth for a few seconds. Jim punched Maq in the throat. Maq went down but climbed to his feet, roaring. He swung with his left hand, more push than punch because the arm was bent at the elbow. Jim grabbed the arm hard, and it came off in his hand. Yes, that’s what I said. The whole arm, from well above the elbow, came away from Maq’s body. His shirtsleeve flapped against the side of his chest.

  You can see why I remember the scene.

  For a second Jim stared at the arm, still bent at the elbow joint, a giant chicken wing. An actual arm, part of someone’s body, and he’d ripped it away. I remember the shock, the feelings of power – and horror.

  He screamed and dropped the arm.

  Papa! cried Maq. Papa, come quick!

  “Way to go!” Wolfgang nudged me. “Pick on the boy with one arm. Nice!”

  “Hey, I didn’t know the arm was fake.” This was early in the year. I hadn’t noticed that one of Maq’s arms was always bent, and a slightly different color from the rest of his skin. Later on we got used to it. I remember Maq beating time in music class, clapping his living hand against the plastic one.

  His dad came out on the porch. What the hell is going on? he shouted. He had a Montreal Canadiens accent, so it sounded like, What de ’ell? He was a barrel-chested guy in paint-stained overalls, with long dark hair and a beard. Looked a bit like a biker and a bit like Jesus. An old, fat Jesus. Had a big knobby nose on him.

  Maq! he shouted. Where is your arm?

  You know, you don’t hear that question very often.

  Here, Papa. Maq picked it off the ground.

  Don’t play games. Your arm is not a toy!

  This boy pulled it off!

  Maq’s dad leapt down from the porch.

  Lloyd took off like a bullet from a gun, and Jim followed. I don’t think either of them wanted to meet Maq’s papa. As Wolfgang and I scrambled after them, I heard the man’s deep laughter. Very genuinesounding. Looking back, I saw him run up the steps with Maq under one arm and Maq’s arm in his other hand. His big frame made the steps shudder. The front door slammed.

  Did I hear that laughter way back in grade one?

  Back at the school, Lloyd was panting next to a man in a buttoned cardigan. The man sneezed, and Lloyd said, Bless you, Daddy in his piping voice. He was safe from Jim’s bullying but still looked nervous. Cardigan Guy took his hand and led him down the street.

  Jim was trying to explain things to Cassie and Louise. They’d have been in grade five. Louise was my sister’s best friend. Still is. Chunky, average-looking, except for her chest. (You know how some girls are just enormous there? Louise looks like a map of Africa. I saw her in a bathing suit last week, tanning in the backyard with Cassie, and I had to run inside and take a shower. She was no more than ten or eleven here, and already she had something under her shirt.)

  Where were you, Jim? called Cassie. You were supposed to wait for me!

  Didn’t you hear? I pulled off a guy’s arm!

  Cassie stamped her foot. Jim!

  Really, I pulled and it came right off!

  (It is funny, you know. Horrible, but funny too. No wonder Maq’s dad had laughed.)

  Wolfgang and I floated after the children like kites on strings. In the distance I could see the lake, glinting silver in the afternoon sun. On my left, the office towers of downtown poked their heads and shoulders above the blanket of trees and smog. I counted houses in from Roncesvalles. Mine was the fifth. One-half of the roof is green, the other gray. Raf and his dad move every year or two, but I’ve always lived in the same place.

  I figured this was the end of the vision. I wondered about Maq and his dad. Should I apologize when I woke up in the hospital? Is that what Tadeusz wanted me to do? I hated apologizing.

  We sank lower. Wolfgang was staring intently downward.

  “Hey, there’s Lloyd,” I said. He and his dad were a few steps behind. I could hear snatches of their conversation.

  … disappointed in you, said Lloyd’s father.

  Sorry, Daddy.

  Sorry doesn’t make a sandwich, son. You know that. Don’t you? Don’t you?

  Lloyd’s dad had a soft, sweet voice for yelling with. You’d never know he was mad. (Ma yells at me so loud she goes hoarse sometimes.) He was mad, though. He grabbed the back of his son’s neck and twisted, bringing Lloyd’s face around.

  You crying?

  No, sir. Wiping the tears away.

  Oh, Lloyd.

  I stopped noticing things at this point. Lloyd was crying, like his dad said, but – get this – the sound he made was exactly like that creepy mewing sound I’d heard Wolfgang do in the hotel lobby. Hearing it again, coming from Lloyd’s mouth, transported me once more to the front seat of the big white Lincoln. Raf was busy under the steering column, and I was holding the flashlight. Midnight in a laneway full of garages. And things started to go wrong when I heard … I heard …

  “Stop!” I said. “Stop!”

  By an act of will, as sudden and non-reversible as leaping off a balcony, I wrenched my arm free of Wolfgang’s grip. I dropped like a stone, landing with a thud … not on the sidewalk but on the grubby, damp, ill-smelling carpet in Wolfgang’s hotel room. The Extreme Moto-X game was still on, but the screen was back to that 2-D desert. The video controller lay on the rug beside me.

  CHAPTER 11

  “You knew.” I sat up.

  “What?” Wolfgang leaned over to look down at me.

  “You knew I hate cats. That’s why you made that awful cat sound when you met me. Right?”

  Sweat poured from his nose and chin, dripping onto the rug. It was like he was living in a private shower all the time. “I know what you’re scared of,” he said.

  “How?” I stood. My heart and lungs were working overtime. Being scared takes it out of you. “How do you know I … don’t like cats?”

  Wolfgang sat back on the bed with his legs tucked under him and his thumb stuck deep in his mouth.

  “I see you when I go back,” he mumbled.

  “Back? Back to Earth?”

  He nodded solemnly, the way little kids can. On TV they look cute. Wolfgang looked about as cute as leprosy.

  “Where do you see me?” I asked.

  He didn’t answer. He had gone all inward. His eyes were rolled up into his head.

  “You’re a Grave Walker, right?” I shook him. “Where do you see me when you come to Earth?”

  I leaned over the bed. Wolfgang was sucking away on his thumb, eyes shut tight. Sweat beaded on his forehead, ran down his cheeks, soaked through his clothes and into the sheets. He rocked himself back and forth a few times. H
is breathing calmed down. He shuddered a couple of times, yawned, and began to breathe deeply. In minutes he was asleep.

  Now what?

  I had no idea what was supposed to happen next. Another indication that I was not dreaming this whole adventure. Dreams have a script of their own. There’s no Now what? in a dream. Whatever the storyline – a road, a monster, a girl, a transformation, a flight through clouds of silver and gold – whatever is going on in your dream, on it goes with you in it. A dream is a river, and you have no more say about where you go than a floating twig.

  I didn’t want to stay in Wolfgang’s room, so I left, closing the door quietly behind me. The elevator was empty. On my way down I noticed an advertising flyer peeling off the wall of the elevator. Visit the Oasis on Four. Why not? I thought. No reason to hang around the lobby. So when the elevator finally stopped, I pressed 4 and began wheezing and lurching my way back up.

  Four was another cobwebby, dusty, bare-bulb-lit hallway. At the far end was a sign in burnt wood: Oasis on Four. Swinging double doors, like in an old west saloon. Smell of grease and smoke and despair. On my way I passed a door with Cowgirls on it. And beside it, Cowboys. Which reminded me …

  I was in the hallway, wiping my hands on my pants, when the Cowgirl door opened and Marcie came out, grinning like a Halloween pumpkin.

  “Hi!” She practically yelled it. “It’s Jim, right? We met downstairs.”

  “Oh, yeah,” I said. “Hi, Marcie. What are you doing up here?”

  “Going to the bathroom, like you.” She giggled.

  I finished wiping my hands. “The Cowboy dryer is broken,” I explained.

  I didn’t mean to make a joke, but she thought it was funny. She opened her face like a flower in the sun and laughed at me. Something about her. Her whole body vibrated from happiness. She was dancing even though she was standing still.

  “I meant, what have you been doing?”

  “Oh,” she said wildly, “let’s see. I watched a sad home movie with Raoul, and then I came up here. But while I was in the elevator something happened to my body down in the hospital. It turns out I’m going home early!”

  She looked more like an elf than ever, her eyes lit with fire. I asked her what she was talking about.

  “I’m in the hospital, remember? But Raoul says I’m coming out of my coma earlier than expected, so I’ll wake up soon. I tell you, Jim, I can’t wait. This place is awful.”

  Lowering her voice on the last word, as if she was afraid someone would overhear and be offended.

  “I know.” It was looking much better now than it had a moment ago, though. Looking at her, it was easy to forget my surroundings.

  “Can you imagine staying here? Raoul says that a couple of the … ghosts,” lowering her voice again, “have been here for hundreds of years! I’m so glad I’m going home.”

  “Raoul is the Mourner I saw you with down in the lobby? With the beard?”

  “Yes. And so cold. Have you noticed how cold Mourners are? It’s the sadness, I think. Raoul has such a sad story, Jim. Do you know he lost the only girl he ever loved at Wonderland? She wanted to go on the Crack-the-Whip coaster, and he didn’t, so she went by herself, only something went wrong and the safety restraints on one side of the coaster released in the middle of a whip crack. Couples did okay, because the person with the working restraint could hang on to their partner, but all the people riding by themselves were flung out. Three of them died, and Raoul’s girlfriend was one of them. He had a mouthful of nacho chips when he looked up and saw Desiree – that was her name – flying through the air. She landed on top of an Orange Julius stand and broke her neck. Raoul thought about her every day for the rest of his life. If only he’d gone on the ride with her, she’d be alive! He still can’t eat nacho – What?”

  She stared at me.

  “Nothing.”

  “You were laughing?”

  “No no,” I said. “It’s a sad story.”

  “You were so laughing. How can you do that, Jim? Poor Raoul.”

  “Poor Raoul,” I echoed.

  She knew I didn’t mean it. After a second she smiled too. “Well, it was a long time ago,” she said.

  She put out her arms and spun around. Her dressing gown was open, and the hospital gown gaped for a second. She was wearing striped underpants. She saw me looking and blushed.

  “Mom picked them,” she said, tying her gown. “She thought they were cute.”

  “They are cute. Uh, I’ve got Spider-Man boxers today.” My ma didn’t pick them, though. I stole them from a department store downtown.

  “What’ll you do when you wake up from your coma?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. I guess I’ll stay in the hospital for a few days and eat grapes. I think grapes are my favorite thing in the whole world.” She grinned at me, like she was passing the ball. I passed it back. Now we were both grinning. “And then I’ll go back to Galley Avenue. Scipio will be so happy to see me.”

  Galley Avenue crosses Roncesvalles a block below my house. The girl lived around the corner from me.

  “Who’s Scipio?” I asked. “A boyfriend?”

  Everything I said made her laugh. She killed herself over this one. “Scipio’s my dog. I don’t have a boyfriend.”

  I laughed too. We stopped laughing at the same time and stared at each other.

  “I don’t have a girlfriend,” I said.

  “No, eh?”

  “Never had one.”

  “Really?”

  She took a step toward me. Her face was level with mine. Pale bluish shadows under her eyes.

  “Really.”

  “You’re nice, Jim.”

  “Who, me?”

  “When I first saw you, I thought you looked mean.”

  “You’re talking about down in the lobby? When you came in? You noticed me then?”

  “Yeah. You were sitting on the stairs.”

  I may have blushed. Probably did. “I was watching you,” I said. “I didn’t think you were looking at me.”

  “Well, I was. That red shirt stood out in this awful gray place. I thought you looked mean, but I was wrong.”

  “No, no. I am kind of mean.” I made a face. “Grrr. See?”

  She laughed harder than ever, then darted forward like a dancer, put her hands on my shoulder, and kissed me on the cheek.

  I can still feel the print of her lips.

  She pulled away fast. “I don’t do that a lot,” she said. “But I couldn’t help it, Jim. You looked so cute, growling like that, and I’m so … so …” She waved her arms.

  “Crazy,” I said.

  “Yes. Crazy with happiness.” She laughed like anything and then, all of a sudden, started to cry.

  CHAPTER 12

  The elevator made that ding noise, and Tadeusz stepped out into the hallway.

  “Jim!” he whispered. His face didn’t light up or anything, but he seemed pleased. “Great to see you. You must be here for your third vision.”

  “I am?”

  “Sure. Didn’t I tell you, down on Roncy? Three memories, three ghosts. You’ve had two so far. This will be your third. How are you doing?”

  “Um, okay,” I said.

  I was taken aback. Here I thought I was acting independently, and it turned out I was following a script all along.

  Tadeusz was carrying a net bag full of small fruit. Limes, they looked like, except they were gray.

  He started to introduce himself to Marcie, but she interrupted. “I know who you are, Mr. Kosinski,” she said, wiping her eyes. “I recognize you.”

  Her voice had gone all cold.

  “Call me Tadeusz, please,” he said.

  She shook her head. “Mr. Kosinski. That’s what you told my mom to call you when you kicked us out of our house.”

  Tadeusz took a step back. “No,” he said. “Oh, no. Did I –”

  “Two years ago. We lived in the back part of a house on Fermanagh. My mom lost her job at the tax department and
couldn’t pay the rent. You told her we had to leave. She was about to start a new job at a bakery. She promised to pay double next month. You said no. Do you remember now?”

  I must say, it sounded like him. He was famous up and down Roncy as a tough young businessman.

  Tadeusz hung his head. “Yes,” he moaned. “Yes, I do.”

  “I came to the door when I heard my mom crying. I was twelve years old. Had a puppy in my arms. There was a moving truck parked in the laneway behind our house. My mom was begging you. ‘Please, Tadeusz,’ she said. And you told her to call you Mr. Kosinski.”

  “Stop,” he said. “Please stop.”

  He had his hands clasped together, like he was praying.

  “If you are interested, Mr. Kosinski, my mom is now a shift manager at the bakery. We live in a whole house now. Our backyard has a water feature, and our landlord is putting down new carpeting for us.”

  Tadeusz swallowed. “I am sorry for what I did to you. So sorry.”

  He could not meet her eyes. I felt bad for him.

  Please don’t let this happen to me, I thought. Please don’t let me turn into Tadeusz.

  An enormous crash made the whole hallway shake. Dust fell from the ceiling.

  “What was that?” I asked.

  “Morgan.”

  “Who’s he?”

  “You’ll find out. You’ll meet him.”

  “Does Morgan stay here?” asked Marcie.

  “Of course. He’s stuck like everyone else here. Only he’s not a Mourner, like me or Raoul.”

  Another bone-jarring thud. The Cowgirl sign fell off the bathroom door.

  “Is he a Grave Walker?” I asked. I hoped not. I didn’t want to meet anyone like Wolfgang.

  “No no. No. Fear has no hold on Morgan. He’s a Slayer.”

  I heard a roaring sound, like a … I don’t know, a bull or something. Marcie shivered and reached for my hand.

  Not fear or sadness. I wondered what emotion Slayers felt. A Slayer was a kind of killer. Could that tie you to Earth?

  Raoul, Marcie’s Mourner, appeared in the doorway a moment later. He was side on to us, and at first I thought he was floating. His feet were off the floor and he was twisting his skinny body around. “Put me down!” he said.