Skillful Death (30 page)

“Sounds like he had fruit, he just walked away from it,” I say.

“A life without offspring is pointless. So say the spirits,” she says.

“Oh.”

“With the monks, your employer observes and understands, as he always does. His ability to learn and innovate brings his practice of their ancient arts to new levels.”

“What arts?”

“Ah, in this order of monks, they once knew how to reincarnate without traveling to a new body. Their predecessors mastered the art of complete rejuvenation, and then they used that skill to ascend past biological form. The monks who remained to teach the next generation of disciples could only mimic the forms.”

“What are these forms you’re talking about? I don’t understand. Is this prayer?”

“Physical forms. Like yoga,” she says.

“Oh.”

“Your employer improved on their forms and taught his body to reverse its age. He worked closely with one of the monks. Together, they replenished their bodies and became children once again.”

“Literally, or figuratively? Are you saying that he was an old man and then he was a kid?”

“Yes.”

“So he conquered mortality, and somehow that didn’t make him the most famous person in the world? Why didn’t he teach this to everyone? Why do we still have death?”

“Your employer chose to renounce the practice, and when he did, he expunged his memories.”

“But what about the other monk? Is he still around?”

“The monk practiced for years, aging very slowly as he gradually lost the perfection of his form. He eventually decided to attempt to ascend while he still possessed the knowledge. He failed.”

“So two guys figure out how to be immortal. One walks away and the other gets bad at it, goes for broke, and then dies?”

“Yes.”

“That’s a terrible story,” I say.

“But the story is not over,” she says.

I roll my eyes.

“As a child once more, free from memory and experience, your employer begins a new life. He learns a new skill, and, this time, he starts a family. Alas, his past catches him, and his only daughter is killed.”

“This guy cannot catch a break.”

“Despondent, he roams again. Wait,” she says. She waves her hands around in the air as if she’s tugging at invisible strings. “The spirits, they’ve gone silent.”
 

“Huh,” I say.

“So have you heard enough?” Franza asks.

“Enough for what?”

“For the prize. You’ve witnessed my aunt channeling information from spirits that nobody could possibly know.”

“And impossible to verify,” I say.

“How can you say that? Just ask your employer. If he corroborates the information, then she wins the prize.”

“If he can verify the information, then it’s something he knew. What he knew, someone else could know. How is that evidence of the paranormal?”

“Because she learned it from spirits.”

“But how would I know that? We have a standard test for psychics. I can send you a copy.”

“Why didn’t you tell us that earlier? Why did you come out here and waste our time?”

“You told me to come out here. You said your aunt was possessed and you wanted to cash in,” I say.

“Who said I was possessed?” the aunt yells. Her quiet voice suddenly packs some punch. Her eyes are open now. They’re open wide.

“She did,” I say. I point to Franza.

“I never did,” Franza says. She shoots me a look, daring me to contradict her.

I do.
 

“Of course you did,” I say to Franza, then I turn to Laurette. “You remember, Laurette? You said outside I could call you Laurette even though it’s the name of the spirit group that inhabits you? Your real name is Susan, right?”

“You’re a very rude man,” Laurette says.
 

“Me? She’s the one who said you were possessed. Is this all part of the act?”

“What is this test?” Franza asks.

“I have several. You can choose. She can guess the sequence of a random set of symbols. We can record specific predictions for tomorrow, ten days, and one-hundred days. There’s a number guessing one. There’s a remote viewing test. They’re all done downtown in a controlled environment. It’s fun. I’ll take you to lunch.”

“You have to pay for the reading I gave you today,” Laurette says.

That’s my cue to leave.
 

“You know where my office is,” I say to Franza as I stand. I hand her my card. “My number is on here. Give me a call sometime.”

Franza jumps up.

“He has to pay. Make sure he pays,” Laurette says.

Franza takes me by the arm and walks me to the door.

“I’ll be in touch about the tests. She doesn’t like to travel, but I’ll figure out how to get her there.”

“Okay,” I say. I’m pretty sure that as soon as I send over the details of the tests, I’ll never hear from Franza again. There’s no way to cheat the tests, so just the details usually scare away the fakers.
 

“I have to pick up my kids, so I can’t offer you a ride back to your office.”

“It’s okay,” I say. “I can expense a cab ride.”

She opens the door and shows me out to the porch.

“Make sure, Franza,” Laurette yells from her chair.

Franza closes the door, cutting off the old woman’s voice.

“There’s one thing I have to ask,” she says. “I know it’s going to seem weird.”

“Yeah?” I ask. There’s always one more thing. These people try to get their hooks into you by establishing a relationship. Those relationships always start with just one more thing.

“About the reading today. She’s kinda OCD about this stuff. You may not believe in it, but she does, and she has to get paid when she does a reading.”

“Look, I sympathize, I have crazy relatives too, but I can’t establish a precedent of paying people who show up unsolicited at my door and drag me off to the suburbs, you know?”

“I know, and I’m not asking for much. Do you have any change or anything? Hell, do you have a loose button or something? She just has to get some kind of a payment. A penny will do.”

Ugh. This is the worst kind of scam—the kind that seems perfectly reasonable and you can’t figure out what the real scam is.

“I’m sorry,” I say. I really don’t want to get wrapped up in this. “I gave you my card. Doesn’t that count?”

“Come on,” she says. “Don’t make me beg. I won’t do it.”

“You can beg if you want. My policy is firm.”

“You’re making me do this,” she says.
 

I take a step towards the yard and she takes a step back towards the door. She reaches back and grabs the handle of her front door and shoots me a disgusted look. I don’t know what she’s planning to do, but I suddenly have no interest in any more interactions with Franza and her crazy, possessed, OCD aunt.

♣
   
♢
   
♡
   
♠

I’m sitting in the guest chair in my office, looking across my desk at my empty chair.

“What the hell?” I ask my empty office. The door is shut behind me. Did I have a weird dream?

I circle my desk and pull out my laptop. I start a script running that will find me the password to my building’s security system. This is a trick I frequently use to get access to the video surveillance. I have my own cameras in my office, but they’re shut off when I’m here. I don’t like the feeling of being watched.

While I’m waiting for my computer to finish, I check my phone. No calls in or out for the past few hours. I wish I had checked the time when I was on Laurette’s porch. It’s three-thirty in the afternoon now.
 

I’ve got access. I run the video backwards and it doesn’t take long to find what I’m looking for. I watch a video of me walking backwards from the elevator to the front door. So I came in alone, about twenty minutes ago, and then what? I just came up to my office, sat in a guest chair and zoned out? Did they drug me somehow? I thought I was so careful.

My wallet! I pull it from my pocket and thumb through the contents. Yup, there’s twenty bucks missing. I don’t know how she got me back to the office, but she managed to get her fee for the reading. With a skill like that, I’m surprised she needs my boss’s prize money. With that kind of mind-control it seems like she could just take what she wants whenever she wants it.

I go over to my filing cabinet and begin to put together a packet of information on the psychic tests we have available. I put together this documentation years ago. My boss always joked that I shouldn’t have to send any information to psychics, they should just psychically figure it out. But I’ve found this packet really helpful. It has really cut down on the number of people I have to test. Before, they’d come in figuring they could scam me somehow. Now, once they’ve seen the test procedures, most of the them figure out that they’re not going to be able to pull any scams. They never bother to come in.

I put all the documents in an envelope and then take them out again. On second thought, forget Laurette and Franza, who somehow stole my memories and my twenty dollars. I’ll never hear from them again. They’re not worth the postage.
 

H
OW
MUCH
WORK
WOULD
he be doing? A month later, Dom still didn’t understand how to answer the question, but began to understand the scope of the work. Although he could only work in a client’s house during regular business hours, his labor required every free moment. If he didn’t set aside time for Tara, his job would have eaten that too.
 

Tashi helped Dom plan the business, but expected Dom to do all the management. He had to keep the books, work with his suppliers, find storage and fabrication space, and enlist low-cost labor for the routine work. Dom achieved new standing in the community. People met his eyes when he walked through the market. Vendors touched his arm to show him their wares. When he strolled with Tara in the evenings, men nodded and women smiled. Children no longer chased Dom making guttural growling sounds and then running in fear from the “scary bear.”

For Tara, Dom set aside his evenings. Every few days, she invited him to dinner at her aunt’s table. Other evenings, they went to their rock in the circle on the west side of town. Regardless if they were alone or in a group watching a performance, they sat close to each other and faced the setting sun. Whenever her hip touched his, Dom focused his attention on the contact. On the stroll back to her aunt’s house, she took Dom’s arm, and sometimes rested her head on his shoulder. All the while, she clutched the box to her chest.

Dom worked several houses at once. He managed a small staff of respectful, well-dressed young men who assisted him with preparations, hauling, and cleanup. Dom taught them to use raw materials to build the parts he would need. In the morning, he set them to work. At his first job site, he installed plumbing and fixtures. At noon, he checked on his diggers. Afternoons were dedicated to measuring and fitting. Before he visited with Tara, Dom reviewed piecework and paid his staff. After leaving Tara, he focused on bookkeeping and correspondence. His days disappeared into his work. His dreams were still haunted by the lake.

After nearly two months of hard work, the money began to flow. Black numbers overtook the red in his ledger. As each payment came in, his debt to Tashi vanished, and Dom confirmed his numbers with Tashi each day. Tashi seemed unsurprised by all the intricacies of Dom’s business, but even he looked shocked the day that Dom made his final payment against the seventy-five percent rate, driving Tashi’s cut to thirty-percent of the profit.

That evening, Dom invited Tara out to a fancy dinner, at a restaurant where the staff brought out a constant stream of exotic food. When they finally pushed away from the table, Dom thought his stomach would burst from the food and that his heart might burst from pride. Tara beamed and didn’t have anything to say besides, “Thank you.”

Dom arrived the next evening in his new suit. This one he’d bought all by himself, on credit from the tailor. Tara met him at the door. She wore a stunning yellow dress with a white sash. Her orange cloak, draped over her shoulders, would protect her from the chilly wind.

“I think it’s time we take a walk,” Tara said.

“Okay?” Dom asked, confused. They almost always took a walk when Dom wasn’t invited to supper. He wasn’t sure why this one had so much gravity.

“Do you remember the favor I asked you for, so long ago?”

“Yes.”

“I think we should discuss that again,” Tara said.

“Okay?”

“In my village, when a boy and girl make a promise to join their families together, the boy’s family gives the girl a present. It’s usually a box, with something inside,” she held her box up towards Dom. He reached to take it, and she pulled it back and walked away. Dom fell in behind her and she turned to continue her story. “The girl doesn’t know what’s in the box until the day the promise is kept. But I know what’s in my box.”

“A knife?”

“Yes, you remember. It’s good to know that you listen. I went to a blind woman who is able to speak with the dead. She heard my problem and then she reached out to my parents to discuss if I should maintain my vow.”