The Bone Artists (5 page)

H
e tapped out a manic rhythm on the steering wheel as he careened toward the dojo. His phone chirped every now and again on the passenger seat, alerting him to an unread text message from his father. Whatever guilt trip awaited him in that message could be kept on hold.

He didn't have the balls to face his father, not when he felt sick to his stomach. Five thousand dollars. That was more money than he had ever possessed at one time. Who was he kidding? The two grand in his dash compartment was hard to wrap his mind around, too. But this was grave robbing. It had to be way more illegal than taking a few family heirlooms. That made him feel crappy enough, but taking bones? Taking parts of
people
?

What were they doing in that creepy place anyway? So busy, bent over their desks, little worker ants going about their business so single-mindedly. His skin tightened just thinking about the possibilities. But that five grand would get him so much closer to his goals. . . . His fingers beat faster on the wheel as he waited for the light to turn. One more block and he'd be at the dojo. Micah might not have answers, but he would at least have sympathy and maybe a bottle of booze to make the whole thing easier to bear.

Micah's place of work didn't actually look
anything
like a dojo. It
looked like the kind of blah storefront in a strip mall that might have once been a furniture warehouse or a doughnut shop. All but two windows were frosted over, but you could walk by and peer inside at whoever was chopping or kicking the air. Oliver was early—well, technically he wasn't anything, since Micah wasn't expecting him—and so two rows of little kids, swimming in their starchy white outfits, were still doing their best to punch at nothing under Micah's instruction.

Oliver pulled into the narrow parking lot and stopped the car under a flickering streetlamp. The electric glow of the strip mall was plenty, but some well-meaning city planner had tried to gussy up the place with cutesy benches and lamps, green, quaint, like there weren't a grimy tobacco store and an AutoZone in plain view.

He grabbed his phone and blanked out the message. He'd read it later, when he wasn't feeling so scattered. Sighing, he pulled open the dash compartment and took out the roll of cash, just holding it. Just feeling it. It felt heavy, and he knew exactly why. He shoved it back in the compartment and glanced up at Micah, wondering what two grand meant to the guy. Of course he had applied to colleges, too, some heavy hitters, in fact, but everything in Micah's life just seemed so breezy. So easy. His grades weren't the best but he usually got them bumped up by magical extra-credit projects wheedled out of exasperated teachers. He volunteered. He worked. His teachers could hardly blame him for missing an assignment now and again. Didn't make much money so he found a way to get more. Wink and a smile. Sure, they were essentially grave robbers now but it was two grand. Things would work themselves out.

Maybe Oliver could fix his attitude and whistle a merry tune for five thousand dollars.

Maybe.

A hard, quick tapping came at the driver's side window. Oliver jumped and shrieked, not in a manly fashion, feeling his heart jam into his throat as he turned and saw a silhouette at the window. His pulse calmed a little when he found it was Diane, Sabrina's older sister, leaning over and peeking in at him.

“Hey, stranger,” she said as he rolled down the window to talk to her. “You waiting on Micah?”

“Yeah. Hey, let me get out of this thing. Stuffy in here.”

Great. Diane. Not someone he was hoping to meet here. He grabbed his phone and ducked out of the car, locking up and following her to the sidewalk outside the dojo. She leaned against the glass, smirking as she watched the mini martial artists inside. Taller and leaner than her sister, Diane also had way more hair. Sabrina tended to keep hers shaved or incredibly short, and she had piercings where Diane kept a neutral, almost preppy look. Diane was pretty, smart . . . Exactly Micah's type.

“Haven't seen you in a while,” Diane said, sipping from a half-empty diet soda.

“Been busy. Shop gets crazy this time of year. Dad gets me to take just about every shift I can,” he replied. “Aren't you taking classes up at City Park?”

“Culinary stuff, uh-huh.” She pulled her attention away from the kids. “Sabrina says you got into the school you wanted. That's big. Congrats.”

“Hey, thanks.” He grinned. “You know, it's nice to hear that. Haven't gotten to tell my old man yet. He was a wreck when I was
filling out applications. I only got him to calm down because I said the whole thing was a long shot. Not sure he believed me.”

“Ugh. I hear that. It's always the same with that family business bullcrap,” Diane said with a roll of the eyes. “Mom woulda never gotten out of Baton Rouge if Granny hadn't died. Family business? More like family cult.”

Oliver nodded, feeling a little less like a tense mess with each chuckle. “Amen.”

“Just see you don't go takin' my sister off to Texas with you. I like her where she is.”

“No, ma'am, wouldn't take her anywhere, not unless she wanted to come along.”

Diane shook her head, reaching over to slug him playfully in the shoulder. “Who would keep me honest if she went off with you?”

“I thought you and Micah were, you know . . .” Oliver cleared his throat. Lord, but this was not his favorite subject. He didn't want to police his friend, even if Sabrina was asking him to do it. “Maybe he could look out for you.”

“Yeah, 'cause we all know that boy's just full of good choices.” She smirked and reached toward him again, but this time she just put her hand lightly on his arm. “I know Sabrina's been giving you shit about this whole thing. Don't you worry. I know who Micah is. I know what I'm getting myself into. It's just for fun, anyway. He'll go off to college, too, and then you won't have to worry about me getting mixed up with his crazy ass.”

Well, that at least was a relief.

“Who are you calling crazy, woman?”

Micah roared toward them from the door, pouncing on them
both, pulling them in close for a hug with each arm.

“Man, you stink,” Oliver muttered, wrestling out of his friend's grip.

“Didn't have time to shower, all right? Saw you two dawdling outside and thought it might be polite to hurry myself along.” He stuck out his tongue, still holding Diane with one arm. “And what are you doing here? Did I miss a text or somethin'?”

Micah's gaze sharpened, the hard set of his jaw asking the silent question.
Did something go wrong with the drop-off?

“Just bored is all,” Oliver said with a shrug, shaking his head just the littlest bit for Micah's benefit.
No, everything went fine.

“Ha. Don't let Sabrina hear you say that. She's spittin' mad that you haven't taken her out to celebrate your university thing.”

“I know. I need to call her, but do you think I could borrow Micah for a sec? Just something I need to run by him real quick.”

Just a little thing called five thousand dollars.

“Sure, but see you don't keep him too long, we had plans tonight.”

“Plans. Yeah. It won't take but a moment.” With that, Oliver tugged Micah aside, his arm damp with sweat through his shirt. They paused outside the auto parts store and the manager inside watched them while he closed up for the day, probably worried they were two no-good kids come to rob him.

Don't you worry, sir, we only rob the dead.

Ugh.

“What is it? You look like you been running all over hell's half acre.” His gray eyes darkened and he glanced quickly toward Diane. “Everything okay with the, ya know, with our friend?”

“No, Micah, everything is
not fine
.” How could he be so nonchalant about this? Oliver ran both hands over his greasy hair, puffing out a sigh. “Look, man, she wants us to keep going with this and now she's offering more money. A lot more money. So much money that I'm afraid I can't turn it down.”

His friend went silent, rubbing his palm slowly over his goatee, staring at Oliver all the while. “Huh. Uh-huh.”

“Is that all you have to say about this? I just don't get a good feeling about any of this. What are those creeps even doing? What are they using those bones for?” It came out like “using those bones fah” and it made him sound exactly like his father, with his deeper, occasionally impenetrable Southern drawl. Sabrina was always teasing him about it. She said it sounded cute, but to him it sounded trashy. Low. He was getting away from the family business, from the thing that had kept generations of his family trapped and going nowhere before. And thinking about his father just made him think of that damn text message waiting for him and for the
conversation
waiting for him, and how had this day gotten completely away from him to spin out of control?

Five thousand dollars. Nothing would be easy for that kind of cash, and here Micah looked like he was actually considering it.

“We can't say yes,” Oliver said before his friend could respond. “We just can't.”

“How much?”

He didn't want to say it. “Five thousand,” he muttered.

“Five
grand
? Are you shittin' me?” Micah reeled back, rubbing his goatee faster now, his eyes all at once much brighter. Dancing.

“Say no, Micah. We have to say no.”

“You're not interested in this? Not even a little bit?” He looked toward Diane, giddy almost, shaking his hands out like they had fallen asleep. “Five thousand is a lot. . . .”

“I know it is.” Oliver turned away and took a fistful of his own hair, tugging. Maybe a little jolt of pain would set him to rights, put him back on the straight and reasonable path. “That shit we did is in the papers. Someone saw what we did. You have to say no,” he whispered.

“Why me? Why do you keep saying that?”

His friend was right behind him then, breathing down his neck.

“Because if you say yes I'll feel like I should, too.” Tired. So tired. He just wanted to sleep and wake up and for none of this to have happened. “Because I can't let you do it alone, ya know? And because, God, I
do
need the money. I do. Damn it all, I don't know what to do.”

Micah's hand fell solemnly on his shoulder and stayed there. “Don't worry, man. I know what to do.”

M
s. Marie Catherine Comtois lived in a white, ramshackle farmhouse set far back from the road on the route running between New Orleans and Baton Rouge. Heavy, lush falls of moss dripped off the trees crowding the front lawn, concealing the house itself behind a fragrant green curtain. White seeds like snowflakes drifted through the windless day, floating with eerie slowness through the doldrums of hot, damp air.

Oliver could practically taste the air, thick with honeysuckle from the garden that lined the front of the house and fanned out in a haphazard sprawl toward the overgrown, swampy forest encroaching on the property. It had obviously never been a great manor house, but at one time it was probably pretty and fresh, quaintly kept with green shutters on the windows and a turquoise blue door. Now the paint peeled off it like raw strips of sunburn, curling tight in the wet climate before scattering to join the tiny white seeds peppering the grass.

Weeds had taken over the walk up to the house, but Micah didn't seem to notice the disrepair. He certainly didn't apologize for it.

“Ms. Marie was like my aunt growing up,” he explained, leading Oliver to the faded turquoise door and its brass knocker.
It was shaped like a mermaid. “If anyone in this damn world knows anything about these Bone Artist freaks, it would be her.”

“Why's that?”

“Because she's about eight hundred years old, that's why.” Micah chuckled, winking. “And don't let the old gal fool you. Back in the day she was a wild one. I've seen the pictures. Dance halls. Sailor boyfriends. The whole nine yards.”

The trip felt like a waste of time to Oliver, who had already decided, firmly this time, that he was out. Briony had texted that morning, waking him out of a fog of heavy sleep to ask about the job. He had told her, in less than polite terms, to take her offer and shove it in a very specific place.

Micah had knocked, and now, gradually, the door was opening. His friend sprang into action, holding open the screen and swiftly relieving the tiny old woman of the weight of the door. Her skin looked like water-stained paper, dark spots dotting her hands and neck in thick clusters. But her eyes were sharp, bright and searching as she looked Oliver up and down.

“A'now who's this handsome young swain come to my door?” she asked, giggling like a teenager, even if it did sound a little croaky on the end.

“Ma'am, this is Oliver, Oliver Berkley. He's a good friend of mine.”

“You said so on the phone,” Ms. Marie said, reaching for the screen. Oliver grabbed it for her, joining them inside the house. It was stifling, a few overhead fans doing their level best to help but failing. Not even a fresh-baked pie could cover up the scent of decay and urine that drifted through the halls.

Still, it wasn't exactly dirty. The floors had been swept and
the shelves in reach were dusted. The old lady had gone to the trouble of doing her iron gray hair in big, retro curls, clipping one piece back with a pink barrette. That was probably her best dress, too, a white sundress with a daisy motif.

Oliver paused in the front hall, looking over the black-and-white photos of generations of family. The newest shots had been taken recently, hanging in a modern frame. Micah was in that one, standing with Ms. Marie and two women in their thirties, both with Marie's wide, brown eyes. The older photos were cluttered with many more people, all of them glaring out at Oliver with that strange, vacant quality folks seemed to have in the past, as if the bad technology rendered them utterly lifeless.

A few bunches of dried herbs hung above the pictures and a shelf with porcelain figures of Jesus, Mary, and a pair of hands clasped in a prayer pose. A cracked wooden placard swung from the front door behind him.

BLESS THIS HOUSE. PROTECT THIS HOUSE.

Trembling, shuffling, she brought them from the foyer to the sunroom on the left, motioning for them both to sit down. Cups of coffee and a cookie tray had been set out, and when Oliver went to sit down he found his cup lukewarm. She had probably set it out a half hour ago, fixing it whenever she had the energy.

“You live here on your own?” Oliver asked, trying to make conversation.

“Yes and no. My niece comes by every once in a while. Checks in on me and the like. Makes sure I ain't fallen over in a flower bed to lie with the petunias.” She laughed at that and so did
Micah. Oliver joined in, coaxed by her infectious smile. Marie settled into an overstuffed chair, leaving the two boys to wedge themselves together onto an ancient loveseat that would have comfortably fit one moderately sized girl.

Oliver cradled the little saucer with his cookies in hands that felt clumsy and gigantic.

Micah didn't seem to notice the tiny china or the weird smells, perfectly at ease as he caught up with all the neighborhood gossip. A neighborhood that extended for some miles, Oliver guessed.

“Now I know this ain't a social call. Nobody brings theyselves out this far just to eat cookies.” Marie narrowed her milky-brown eyes at Micah, tipping her head to the side. “You bein' good these days? You best not be in trouble or I'll get Sy down the street to hide you raw.”

“That's just what I came to ask you about, ma'am,” Micah said, dusting his powder-sugared fingers off on his jeans. “Me and Oliver here been doing a little work for some folks down t'New Orleans,” he explained, his accent thickening by the minute, as if by passing through the door they had entered another segment of the state altogether.

“What kind of folks?” she drawled, studying them.

Oliver couldn't help but shrink away from her shrewd staring.

But Micah kept his tone light, cheerful even. “Some knuckleheads calling themselves the Bone Artists. Frauds, probably. Just nonsense, but Oliver got nervous so I thought it a good idea to check. . . .”

He rambled on, but Ms. Marie was obviously no longer listening, but was recoiling, pressing herself tightly against the
back of the chair. “Your family raised you better than this, boy.”

“So . . . they're not good, then,” Oliver prompted. They weren't, of course, he knew that, but judging by her reaction it was worse than he'd anticipated.
What tipped you off, genius, the grave robbing or the creepy hideouts?

Marie flicked her gaze between the two of them, shaking her head over and over again. He couldn't tell if she was shivering or just swiveling her head back and forth, back and forth. . . . “Back when I was a girl you didn't say those words. You didn't speak that name. You speak that name you get all that's evil in t'world coming to you.”

“Whatever they do with these bones—” Micah began.

She was swift to cut him off, lifting a hand as if she could stopper his lips herself. “I won't repeat it. I won't say it, I won't. These folk—these are evil folk. The Bone Artists, they steal, and then they leave—body snatchers. Body
thieves
. They take your bones for black magics.
Witchcraft
. Satan's friend, that prince of they's is, He curse you and you're never right in the spirit again.” Her voice rose and then fell to a sudden hush. She shook her head one last time, frowning, on the edge of tears as she looked at them as though they had both been taken far, far away.

“You won't never be right in the spirit again.”

“She's a little on the religious side, if you couldn't tell,” Micah had said, dropping Oliver back at the shop that afternoon. He had leaned over toward the passenger seat and the rolled-down window, gesturing at where Oliver stood on the sidewalk. “I wouldn't take everything she says seriously, all right? We're not talking a pinch of salt, here, we're talking the whole shaker. I
mean, come on . . . Princes? Satan? I might believe in some dark stuff but let's not go crazy.”

“I'm sure you're right,” Oliver said, conjuring a thin smile. “But all the same . . .”

“No, you're right. Let's cut and run while we're ahead.” Micah gave him a salute and a wink, leaning back into the steering wheel. “You seeing Sabrina tonight?”

“Maybe. It's getting on to supper. You seeing Diane?” Over his shoulder, Oliver heard the distinctive sounds of a séance going on inside. He hated séance night at the shop but it always brought out a bunch of tourists.

“Do you really have to ask?” He laughed, waggling his eyebrows. “Catch you later, man, we still need to do that big celebration. Don't keep stalling!”

“I'm not, I swear, just giving y'all time to plan the parade.”

Micah snorted and honked the horn on his old Chrysler, pulling away from the curb and into the empty street.

The voices inside the shop swelled to meet him, but he dodged the door, aiming instead for the family apartment. His pocket buzzed and he slipped out his phone, wincing as he read the display.

The Dragon Lady.

She had her answer, what more could she want from him?

“Your answer is no? Is that your final decision?” it read.

Oliver texted back furiously, lips pursed with aggravation. There was no doubt in his mind that he needed out. Now. She was poison and he refused to go back for another dose.

The answer is and always will be: no. Leave me alone.

He was just a few steps from their front door when her reply
came, fast enough that Oliver hadn't gotten his phone all the way inside his pocket. Just one word, and for some reason it chilled him more than her gaze or her sneer ever could.

Pity.