The Missing Boatman Part 32

Frank looked him straight in the eye. "I rescue."

Chapter 37.

The lock clicked, and Sarah let out a sigh of contentment. Work was over for another day, and she made it home without incident. Her car was pulling to the left, so that might be a trip to the service centre tomorrow. Sarah breathed again, feeling her lungs expand, just as she came into her apartment. She was medium height, and had shoulder-length, brown hair highlighted spa.r.s.ely with rednothing too fancy to cause an uproar at work. She was a teller at the Royal Bank, and they gave her dirty looks whenever she wanted to go to the bathroom. It was an unknown statistic that tellers suffered the most from bladder infections and other urinary tract problems because of the bank's work s.h.i.+fts.

But she liked handling money. She liked counting.

She rubbed at her eyes and checked her face in the mirror. She had a screen-door scattering of freckles that most guys thought as cute as her figure. She wasn't certain of that. She thought her a.s.s was fat.

Slipping off her sneakers (she always left her heels at work), she wandered into the kitchen, unfastening the long sleeves of her black blouse and rolling them up to the elbow. There wasn't any mail to check, so that was one less thing to do. All that remained was dinner, and then she could engage in her favourite pastime.

She headed into the bedroom, and since the heat was on in the apartment, changed from dark slacks to short plaid shorts. She ran her hand over her legs and thought it might be a good idea to shave them. She then tossed off her blouse and slipped into a comfy t-s.h.i.+rt with twenty five suggestions on "how to deal with stress" on its front. She didn't know how anyone could let stress ruin their lives. It didn't ruin hers. Sara didn't do stress. She worked out, being a firm believer in taking out any negative energy on weights and turning it into something positive.

Sarah thought about calling up some friends and maybe heading out for a beer, but decided against it. Her original plan was best. This was to be her night and, glancing at her forearms and legs, tonight would be delicious. She could only treat herself so often and tonight, after almost three weeks of skin packs and practically swimming in aloe vera, she could do her hobby again. The only thing that truly made her feel alive But first, dinner.

The fridge contained the remains of a vegetarian lasagne, and it was shoved into the microwave. Sarah got herself a steak knife, a fork and a gla.s.s of milk. She knew there was a tub of cookies 'n cream ice cream in her freezer, and she suspected she would get into that later on tonight-fat a.s.s be d.a.m.ned. She'd go for a thirty minute walk tomorrow. She watched over her warming food, waiting for the ding and caressing her arms. The nuker announced that her food was ready, and she gathered everything up and moved to the living room. She watched the evening news, noting how lucky a pair of kids had been to have survived a head on car crash, and a lady who had managed to get pulled out of her burning house.

Finis.h.i.+ng her meal, Sarah relaxed and simply lay back on her sofa, pus.h.i.+ng the dirty dishes on the wooden coffee table. Her grandmother always told her about cleaning up immediately after eating, saying she didn't understand what all of the fuss was about, anyway. Cleaning the dishes took only five minutes at least, and then, when they were done, they were done. Why some people had a problem with that or whined about cleaning them in the first place was beyond her. This evening though, Sarah would be bad. She would do the dishes later.

But then, Sarah sighed at the memory of her grandmother and relented. She got up from the sofa, and six minutes later, the dishes were on the rack, drip drying. She returned to the living room and kicked away the little brown rug lying on the floor between the sofa and coffee table. Tomorrow would be a cleaning day, and her one bedroom apartment took about a morning to sparkle.

But that was tomorrow.

Sarah got up again and toddled into the kitchen, picking out another steak knife-an exceptionally sharp one. She then went into the bathroom and retrieved her curling iron and three thick red towels. She again returned to the living room, and placed them on the coffee table.

She kicked the rug again, repeatedly, until it was well away from her. In its spot, she plopped down the three cherry bright towels, and arranged them one upon the other. She pulled out an extension cord from behind the sofa and plugged in her curling iron. Then, with a little grunt, she lowered herself down on the towels until she sat cross legged. Sarah flicked through the channels with her remote control and tuned into a repeat of Friends. She smiled in some places, chuckled in others, while letting her fingertips explore her exposed flesh.

She eventually picked up the steak knife and, still watching the program, slashed the inside of her left forearm. The cut was barely an inch in length, but it buzzed and tingled with pain. Blood dribbled to the towels.

Then, it was commercial time.

She inspected her self-made cut with great interest, like a doctor inspecting fresh st.i.tches. She had cut well, right next to the scars of previous sitcoms and other maddening movies. It usually took a good two weeks before she could start cutting again, and she attributed that to a healthy diet. However, recently she was beginning to think that her skin was losing its resiliency from too many self-inflicted wounds. She carefully placed the tip of the blade along the new wound, moving up towards the valley of her elbow joint. She angled her arm so that the blood plopped freely unto the towels and cut again.

And s.h.i.+vered.

She ground her teeth against the pain. The exquisite pain. The only true thing that ever made her feel alive.

She sliced again.

And again.

Until her arm began to look like the gills of a choking fish.

Then commercial time was over. Friends was back on.

By the time of the next commercial break, she had finished slicing her left arm and decided it was a good idea to start on the right. She was a little light headed, but nothing she hadn't felt before. She took great care in her cuts. Nothing too deep and nothing close to a major blood artery or vein. The flesh of her right arm was in harder shape that her left, mostly because of her awkwardness in handling her blade with her left hand. It took a little more effort, and the cuts were usually a little longer. A little deeper. The pain sparkled like a bottle of very fine champagne. She swooned with the electric buzz and dropped her knife. That happened sometimes. Rivulets of blood ended in darker stains in the red towels. She placed a finger into one of the stains and brought the inky tip to her face. Tasted it with one dart of her tongue. The sparkles she experienced were like sun rays reflecting off fresh snow. It was better than booze or dope. It was better than s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g. It was a natural high for her, and the best there ever had been.

Sarah sat for a moment, wors.h.i.+pping the ecstasy of her cuts and enjoying the blurry whine of the TV in the background. Her cuts would scab over by morning. She had cut herself too deeply in the past and had to st.i.tch herself up, relis.h.i.+ng the p.r.i.c.k and punch of the needle. But tonight was fine. And tomorrow, she would wear a long-sleeved s.h.i.+rt or sweater to work. No one would see or suspect anything.

Still dizzy from her blood loss but only beginning, she felt a shock to her system would bring her back to clarity. The curling iron on the coffee table was ready now, and she picked it up by the handle. She would never injure her hands if she could help it. Her hands were too important. As were her face and feet. Almost everything else-anything that could be concealed-was fair game.

She brought the hot iron in close to the inside of her right thigh, perhaps three fingers up from her knee, feeling the heat of it. She eyed the burn scars already there. They would never heal back to true flesh. She didn't care. She moved the iron closer, felt her skin tingle, burn, and then, ever so slightly, she pressed the iron into her flesh. The hurt exploded in her nerve endings and head like windows being blown off an old house. Her head swung to the left and right, bobbed up and down. She bit her lip-made it bleed. She moaned and dropped the instrument, collapsing against her sofa, somehow still having the sense to keep her bleeding arms over her towels-she didn't want any of it on the sofa's upholstery.

When the pain subsided, Sarah picked up the iron where it fell, like a junkie eager for another hit. She ignored the smell of burnt flesh. She did this over and over again, lighting up her synapses just as they were dimming, suppressing her little girl squeals. Blood dripped from her bottom lip, and only then did she realize she had gnashed it. She continued burning herself, bringing herself to bright highs of agony, like multiple o.r.g.a.s.ms, until she could take no more. She would dearly love to go further, but she was no lover of death. She did not want to die. She only wanted... pain. At some point in time, in the future, she planned to do some travelling, and she envisioned herself doing things to her arms, legs, b.r.e.a.s.t.s and even her belly on some exotic beach before a bare moon.

But that was a far time away.

For now, her beach would be her bathtub. Her moon would not exist, but the star tips of her surrounding candles would light up the darkness. Still giddy from her administrations, she got up and went to the bathroom. There, she would drift in and out of consciousness while filling the tub with near boiling waterthe hottest she could take without seriously harming her skin-light her candles and get in. She intended to stay there until she fell asleep, travelling to the very edge of life and death and listening to the drums of her heart and pulse.

She so loved times like these.

In her pain-induced daze, she b.u.mped-walked to the bathroom. She could hear the water gus.h.i.+ng into the tub, and tried to remember turning on the faucet. She couldn't recall doing it, but she must have. Who else would do it for her? The door was locked, and she was always alone.

She entered the bathroom, wounds still dripping and staggering, and leaned against the doorframe for support. There was a man at the tub. A big man. He was huge like a pro wrestler. What was even more interesting was that he was naked, hard bodied and scarred, and smiling. He was in his forties, perhaps, with a shaven head. He must have been from somewhere tropical because he had a dark, all-over tan which Sarah found incredibly arousing. She thought his eyes were black, and his smile was beautifulcrisp and pure.

"Baby, baby," the man said in a seductive purr. He held out a hand. His eyes gleamed like black marbles. Sarah felt a longing stir within her, and she stumbled towards him.

"You..." the man's smile got wider, "are my kind of girl."

Chapter 38.

"See?" Frank spoke to H. "He's smiling. Thinks I'm crazy. That's what sucks. I need a ma.s.sive PR campaign man, I'm tellin' ya."

"You're f.u.c.ked in the head," Tony told him.

"Oh? Am I? Look at it this way. See if I can't convince you. I should be everyone's best buddy, yet in all the movies, all the books, the news, and in all the conversations, I'm the one people hate and, dare I say it, loathe. I'm the ultimate in evil. Incarnate. Realized. To quote Ali, I'm so bad I make medicine sick."

"But you are," Tony said.

"This coming from the guy that wants his mother's suffering to be over," Frank shook his head in disdain. "I've never killed anyone. Something else did. Something came along and did enough damage or set something off or smashed it into something, and I get the call to come in and get there fast. Because when I get there, I can save the person from all the pain and suffering someone will otherwise experience. I'm not the enemy, man. I'm your fireman. Your cop. Your first responder. s.h.i.+t. I figure Lucy would have already told you all this by now."

Tony ignored that last bit. "Yeah, well, you're doing a pretty f.u.c.ked-up job."

"I do what I can with what I got."

"That's f.u.c.ked up."

"Really?" Frank said dubiously, regarding Tony with unfriendly eyes.

"Yeah, cuz you... you hold off on people! Why do some people die straight away and others take longer? Like my mom?"

"Resistance," Frank said simply. "The will to live, to survive. I don't fight with that. A lot of people cling to life instead of letting go. Some instances, the shock of coming over to the other side is strong enough that people let go right away. Like being in an explosion or being shot. In those cases, people usually give up and come with me."

"What?" Tony asked. "That doesn't make sense. How do you do that? You can't do that. It's not possible."

"It's not about what is possible or impossible. It's about what is. You can try and use logic or science as much as you want. Go ahead and give me the giggles. It's in your nature to a.n.a.lyse and rationalize. But in the end, when it's a person's time, they get to meet me, and I give them the choice. Accept what is and come along. Or resist. Some choose life and go on as best as they can. I don't know why. It's not my place to ask really. The ones that agree to go, they come with me, and I take them to the other side."

"The other side?"

Frank smirked. "C'mon, now. You know all about that."

"You mean..." Tony lead in, waiting for Frank to fill in the blank. Only Frank didn't. Tony waved his hands, urging the other to respond. Frank did not. He sipped his drink instead.

"The other side," Tony finally said.

"Yes, the G.o.dd.a.m.n other side," Frank snapped, suddenly p.i.s.sy. "You having another?"

"Huh? Oh. Yeah," he looked at his empty gla.s.s.

"You're not gay are you?" Frank asked him."

"What?" this jolted Tony. "No! What? Just because I drink daiquiris?"

"Strawberry ones," H added. Frank's eyebrows went up in yeah really! as he waved for a waitress.

"So I like strawberry daiquiris," Ton said petulantly. "Ain't nothing wrong with that."

The two men were silent.

"There's not."

H drained his mug. Frank looked away, trying to spy the waitress.

"f.u.c.k you both, then," Tony grumped.

"Another pitcher," Frank said to the waitress that appeared. "And another daiquiri for the princess here."

The waitress smiled and left. Tony felt a little annoyed at both of them.

"Never thought Death was an alchy," he said.

"Yeah, well?" Frank fixed him with a knowing stare. "What do you do for a living?"

Point, Tony conceded. He should be living out of a bottle.

"Hey, what's your real name anyway?" Tony asked him.

"You want me to write it down for you? It's a h.e.l.luva lot better than Death, I can tell you that. Christ, what were you c.o.c.ksmokers thinking. The Muslims call me Malak al-Maut. Ancient Greece referred to me as Thanatos. Thanatos. That's some cool s.h.i.+t "Hey, I didn't name you," Tony defended himself. "So don't get p.i.s.sy with me. What's his name?"

"He's H," Frank told him.

"Just H?"

H smiled. "It's a game we sometimes play. You use the names all the time, so we like to see folks guess our names. Our nicknames."

"So you all have nicknames and real names?"

"Mhm," Frank acknowledged.

"And you chose 'Frank'?"

"What's wrong with 'Frank'?" Death asked.

"Nothin'," Tony said. "Fits fine if you ask me. Death is Frank."

"Better than d.i.c.k."

That drew a chuckle from H.

"Yeah," Tony agreed. "Stick with Frank. d.i.c.k could be a little, what's the word, confrontational. You'd be hunting for people then."

"I don't do that."

"Oh, no?" Tony was interested. "So, if you heard on the news an announcer say, oh for example, 'Twelve people were d.i.c.ked last night in a highway collision', you wouldn't be p.i.s.sed off?"

Frank screwed up his face in annoyance. The waitress returned with their orders before he could retort. She sat the drinks down before them and retreated with a smile. H grinned a thank you at her.

"f.u.c.k you," Frank shot at Tony.

Tony sipped on his fresh Daiquiri. It was plenty tangy and good. "Yeah, thought so."

"How's your drink, dear?" Frank asked.

"Great. Yours, d.i.c.kie?"

H began to choke on his beer, enough to turn his face red. Frank let him.

"Ain't you gonna help him?" Tony asked Death, taking another relaxed sip.

"Why? Not like he's going to choke."

"To d.i.c.k," Tony corrected him, and grinned.