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Authors: Aaron Polson

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BOOK: Echoes of the Dead
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Sarah smoothed her apron’s front. “So?”

“No one is losing a job, Sarah, but we have to cut hours—10% in each department for the next three months. That will take us through the Christmas season.”

“I don’t understand.  How does that help profits?”

Debi shook her head. “It’s funny, isn’t it?  But with less labor, profits look higher.  Profits are higher.  Of course, if you ask me, sales will hurt with fewer associates on the floor helping customers. But nobody did.”

“10%?”

“It would only be four hours a week.”

Sarah nodded.  A cold, hollow feeling filled her chest. Four hours didn’t seem like much, but with struggling to pay her bills already… Four hours would cut around forty dollars from each week. Forty dollars paid for a lot of things: groceries for a week, gas in her car… Kim’s copay.

“Anyway, I figured you could stay home—go home now since there are two of us. You could just come in this afternoon to cover when I’m on lunch and stay until the end of your shift.” 

Sarah’s head moved up and down. Her body stood at the book information desk, but her mind drifted far away. 

 

~

 

Johnny hadn’t planned on being shot.

In fact, if such a thing was to happen, he’d expected it during his tour in Afghanistan.

Leaving the hospital, a different kind of hospital than his last stay, he carried discharge papers and the promise of a bloated bill. There were too many bills in Johnny’s life, too many bills—like holes in some God-forsaken metaphorical dam—and not enough money to plug the holes. The Army wasn’t a cure-all for financial woes after a medical discharge, and trying to get his care straight with the VA was like writing the great American novel with his eyes closed and a pen between his toes. Then the dreams… A cold, empty thing filled Johnny’s veins, a dark thing which he’d kept at bay for the past few months. 

Post-traumatic stress had been the diagnosis. Johnny knew it was something bigger, something older. Each casualty in his unit had worn Jared’s face. How could he have explained it?   Who would have believed such nonsense ?

Johnny took a breath and shielded his eyes against bright sunshine. He’d heard about homeless vets, guys who couldn’t get their shit together after the war, but he wouldn’t become one. He couldn’t. He didn’t want to spend time in the house, he didn’t want the waking nightmares to come back, the horrible visions he held inside, but he couldn’t be one of those vets who lost it. He wouldn’t.

Ben gave him a chance to clear the slate and climb from debt. He’d take the chance, regardless of consequences.

 

Chapter 6: Ben
 

 

If Ben Wormsley had changed at all in the past three years, it was to become
slicker
. His skin, his hair, his eyes—when the designer sunglasses weren’t clamped over them—everything about him shined. Kelsey hadn’t seen him since before she graduated and wasn’t even sure he had graduated. Ben’s strength never lay in the classroom. Rumors held he’d gone to California and stumbled into money.  Kelsey wasn’t interested in rumor; she needed money, and, although the thought getting help from Ben bothered her, her research was too important.

She ran a finger along the edge of a paper drink napkin. “Johnny told me you were in town. Said you were casting for a television show or movie. He said I might want to speak with you.”

“You just might, Kels—if you’re interested in a little business proposition,” Ben said. He smiled at Kelsey across the table, showing a mouth full of teeth one bleaching too white. “I am looking for someone to lend an academic credibility to my little project. A person who could expand my market—a young, attractive graduate student. You. The pay would be the same as the others—one thousand a day with another five guaranteed at week’s end.”

“Twelve thousand?” Kelsey blinked. Ben’s reference to her as a demographic had rankled a little, the way he enunciated
attractive
made her skin crawl, but the figure he tossed out cooled her nerves.

“Twelve thousand.” Ben grinned and sipped his whiskey sour. “I wish it could be more.”

Images of rats—her rats, her research—ran through a maze in Kelsey’s imagination. Twelve thousand had to be enough to keep her going for another year.  She glanced at her hands and realized she’d been tearing a paper napkin into tiny strips.  Her gaze lifted to Ben. Something about his smile, the too-white teeth, the way he looked at her—something about it all didn’t sit well in her gut, but Kelsey was not in a position to turn down enough money to get her research through another year, regardless of where it came from, was she?

“It seems like a lot of money—I know. Around here, it is. Chump change where I’m living, Kels.  And chump change if my hunch is right.  This little project could bring a hundred times that for everyone, easily. If you’re willing to see it to the conclusion, that is.”

“Each of us?  Who’s in, besides Johnny?”

“Well, yes, John of course. I’ll be there, overseeing the whole operation. I’ve booked two cameramen and a sound engineer for the week. One ad in the UCLA paper landed a thousand wannabes from which I chose two, a junior named Erin Connolly and senior named Daniel Pinto—he’s a Brazilian student.  They’re window dressing, young fresh faces for the audience.  We’ve picked Daniel because, quite frankly, I’m hoping to market this thing internationally.  South America is an emerging market with big money to be made. That’s the cold, crass side of business, Kels. Anyway, I wanted the old crew together—I figured bringing John here would bring you in. I hope I was right.” He grinned again, a slick, confident smile.

“Why didn’t you ask me yourself, send me a letter like you’d sent Johnny?”

Ben took another sip. “It’s more fun this way. Besides, Kels, how you feel about me is no big mystery.  How you feel about Johnny isn’t much of a mystery either. His heroic act the other day was just dumb luck.”

She looked away. Calling what happened to Johnny “luck” made her stomach go cold. “So Johnny, two UCLA students, me, and anyone else?”

“Oh yes. Like I said—I wanted the old crew together.  One missing piece, but I’ve managed to pull her in as well.”

“Sarah,” Kelsey said.

“Bingo.  You are smart.  Make sure you finish that dissertation so I can call you professor. That will bowl over the test audience.”

“I’m years away.”

“Stay on target. This thing could go into syndication.  You could build a nice consulting career; maybe even land your own show.  Dr. Phil has made an empire. Maybe you could, too.”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m not doing that kind of psychology. Besides, what will we be doing for this week? Reality TV? Cameras rolling all along to capture our human foibles and frustrations as you make us play little games for the audience.” Kelsey leaned forward. “I’m not sure I want to be a guinea pig for the stay at home audience. Even for twelve thousand.” She couldn’t believe the words left her mouth. She needed the money. Ben knew she did, somehow. He was holding something back behind the slick smile and well-tanned face.

“You aren’t going to be a guinea pig. I don’t see it that way. Besides, don’t you academic types run tests on rats?”

“Yes,” she said. “I am, anyway. For my dissertation.”

“You’ll have to tell me about your research someday. We’ll have enough time in the house.”

“The house?” A chill began to crawl over Kelsey’s skin.

He watched as he lifted the whiskey sour to his lips a final time, tossed back the last swallow, and set the glass on the table with a heavy
thunk
. “Yes, Kels. The house.  You know the one?”

Her head began to wag back and forth, a small gesture at first, but growing with intensity as the awful suggestion began to settle into her psyche. She remembered the snow, the cold, the pristine, unnatural interior of a large brick farmhouse in rural Washington County.  She saw the body again in her mind, the dead man lying in a bathtub filled with clear water. The puckered slash marks on his arms came to her as though she was looking on him now, almost five years later. She shivered.

“Yes.  That house. After we left, after the police and the investigation, possession passed to the state. It seems no one could find proper paperwork denoting ownership and no one stepped forward. You realize they never could identify the old man’s body, right?”

“The house…”

“Funny how little the government will take for unwanted property.  I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.  I snagged it on auction for a pittance.” He pushed his glass to the table’s edge and caught the waitress’s attention. “I’ve been doing that quite a bit lately.”

“Would you like another?” the waitress asked as she sidled up to the table. 

Ben grinned. “I don’t think so.  We’re about through here.  I’ll just take the check.”

Kelsey’s eyes turned down and found she’d resumed work on the napkin. Tiny shreds littered the table top in front of her. She wouldn’t go back to the house. She couldn’t go back to the house. A week? Was Ben nuts? What could he hope would happen in a week at that awful place? Maybe that was just it—he would have his camera crew and sound man and they’d film her falling apart, all of them falling apart in that awful house.

“Sarah’s in, Kels. John—Johnny’s in. Can I count you in, too? Or maybe you don’t mind if we go off and play together. Just Johnny, Sarah, and I.”

“And the two from UCLA.”

Ben’s grin flickered. “Right.  And the two from UCLA.”

“I don’t know, Ben.  I don’t think I can.  Studies… My work.”

“We won’t be ready until semester’s end.  Our week would land right after finals.”

She nibbled her lip.

The waitress returned to the table with a small black tray and receipt. She laid it in front of Ben.

Ben watched her walk away and turned back to Kelsey. “Twelve thousand could go a long way, Kels. I’d even front two grand as a good faith gesture. That would be enough to bring you over, wouldn’t it?”

 In Kelsey’s mind, the dead man opened his eyes. They were brown, deep enough to look like empty black pits. She shook her head.

“Well the offer stands.” He opened his wallet, placed a credit card in the tray the waitress had left, and fished out a business card. “Please call me when you come to your senses.”

Chapter 7:
Decisions
 

 

Kelsey was watching the geese waddle around the pond’s edge in Johnny Kaw Park when Brit found her. She’d been on the bench, watching the birds and mulling through Ben’s offer for almost an hour before she’d called her friend. She needed perspective. She needed the kind of perspective which her father supplied, but he was half a state away and what her mother judiciously called, “not a phone guy.”

“All right dearie, what’s so damn important I had to miss the new Jersey Shore?”

Kelsey cast a sidelong look at Brit. “How can you watch that train wreck?”

“It’s easy. It makes me feel like my life is pretty sane, you know? Don’t worry. This is why they made TIVO.”  Brit sat on the bench. “So give. What’s going on in Kelsey-land?”

“I told you about my research, right?”

Brit nodded. “This is about the rat project? Thank God. Maybe I can shake some sense into you and you’ll pick something normal to study like paint color and mood or whatever.”

Kelsey frowned. “Something normal?”

“Sorry.  Look—I know you’re attached to those vermin you keep calling ‘research subjects’ like they’re actual human beings. And it sucks the university is going to yank the rug from under you, zip, without so much as a ‘thank you for playing,’ but I know you can think of something. I know you can wiggle your way into some university donor’s back pocket and scam a few bucks.” Brit nudged Kelsey with her elbow. “You know what I mean. Use your feminine wiles while you can.”

“That’s sick.  I’m not wriggling into any back pockets. I know you worked the Legends Room at the stadium—”

“Back off the Classy Cats, girlie. Blame it on Jersey Shore. Snooki made me do it. I just want you to know you have options.  Don’t bail yet—not when there are options.”

“That’s the problem. That’s why I called you.”

“Options are a problem? Since when?”

Kelsey took in a deep breath. Late September in Manhattan filled the early evening air with a slight chill. A few of the geese honked at each other. Kelsey noticed the smoky odor of a charcoal pit and found a family gathered around one of the park grills. “Yes. There are options, but this particular option involves going to the house again.”

Brit’s forehead wrinkled. “What house are we talking about?  I mean, you’ve been to plenty of houses in your life, right?  So is this your childhood home, rife with trauma and distress or location of the house party where you first smoked weed? Give me some context.”


The
house, Brit.”  Kelsey stood up. “I shouldn’t have called. Sorry. This is a decision I have to make. I have made. I’m not going back there. Not even for twelve grand.”

“Whoa.  Whoa.  Whooooa.  Twelve-thousand American dollars?  You’re not talking about pesos or rupies or whatever, right?  Twelve thousand?” Brit rose from the bench. “That’s a nice pile of cash—so what, exactly, do you have to do to earn this little windfall? Nothing nasty, I hope.”

BOOK: Echoes of the Dead
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