The Urban Book of the Dead (8 page)

Jay shook his head uncomfortable with the thought. God handed him a slip of paper with symbols on it of a magical nature.

God boomed, insinuating my sleep “This slip with the seals on it, will take away his powers when you put it in his pocket, do it when we meet, give him clues to find the girl if he still doesn’t work it out.”

Jay replied “Well, okay then.”

Having been scarred and vulnerable I now had to nearly laugh, God would help me find Jane and all I had to do was keep my enemy close and out of my pockets, my mind at ease I allowed myself to fall back asleep, the worst that would happen is I would awake with my eyebrows shaved off. But; even before I was asleep I was taken by a sinking disappointment that took me under faster, so I slipped down into a welcome feeling of death overtaking me; it was so disappointing, I had wanted so much to believe in Jay, give him a chance to do the right thing, I had thought that I had known something inherently reliable in him, beneath his faults and mistakes, instead I was experiencing the betrayal that had lurked there inside him, it seemed to be his defining feature after all.

I awoke some hours later to Jay staring at me protectively from his seat across the room. I immediately sat up and examined the postcard in my pocket, ‘so Jay will help me find her.’ The picture made me swell with tortured anger, a big man in a suit with his trousers around his ankles was abusing her. The fascination I felt for her kept drawing me back to the picture, my anger had a trinity, it made me angry with myself for being fascinated; and for caring; giving the response God wanted, finally at the petty mindedness of God, though the bible should of informed me of that, and a far from happy life, when I was alive.

“Any clues?” asked Jay.

“She always dances in the early hours of the morning”, I said edgily

“Let me see” Jay demanded in a friendly manner.

I handed the picture to Jay “Looks like the guys some kind of bouncer” Said Jay.

I surged upright and banged my head with my fist “Of course she’s in a night club! May be if I could watch her dance I could tell the songs from the rhythms of the music, the tunes in her eyes, maybe tell that the song meant something to her, a memory I can isolate, narrow down the kind of place and the era. I don’t know what to do, he’s hurting her because of me, who I am, I made it happen; we’re fishing again.”

“No” said Jay, “it’s simpler than that, he may want you to find her, is there an appropriate night club, somewhere with memories or somewhere apt to him? Does it ring any bells Monster? I want to help you really I do.”

I believed him, and with a sense of triumph because I knew where he was leading me and his guess was not a guess and there for reliable, there was only one place ‘apt’, but I would still have to hunt for it.

I searched Jays face for evidence of his sincerity, he really wanted to make this as easy as possible, I said “She was raped in a night club some years ago, I don’t know where, could have been Liverpool. I’m guessing he took her back there, to that time and place. Do you know where?”

Jay looked bemused, possibly hurt; “I can’t tell you that Monster, there’s no way for me to know. A police report might have been filed by the other girl.”

“The other girl?” I said. Jay had slipped up; he would expect me to quiz him on it.

Jay looked cool, “You said there was another girl involved.” Jay flexed his fingers and made a cage out of them, smiling, I was sure he didn’t realise he was unconsciously signifying a trap

“I must of” I replied, disconcerted by Jays charming exposure of what was on his mind.

Jay looked disconcerted too; I wondered if he had seen through me. “Jon, you know I’ve never let you down, remember when I wouldn’t serve scouse some draw and he insulted you and you fought him, I joined in when he had you in that head lock, we took care of him and threw him out. I’ve never let you down, we’re solid. I wouldn’t let you down ever if I had a choice.”

A little touched I replied “Just do what you have to do Jay, as I said to Kieran and Frazer when they were ripping off my grass; if you feel you have to take then take, just don’t take the piss.” I started to roll a fag.

Jay’s eyes went far away “I would never let you down, not in my heart, we go way back. Some times when we help each other, we can’t even say.”

I always wanted to trust Jay, never quite sure I could, or any one else for that matter. Caught in the past I had a thought, as I spoke I got carried away, I lit my fag and spun circles of smoke, dotted the red tip in the air like I was drawing a map, a plan of action. “We should bring the streets to God. What do we know, skip diving, begging, rolling dog ends, drugs, fighting, improvised weapons, shoplifting, burglary; we have a knowledge he isn’t as conversant with, he should fight on our ground not the other way. Drugs of all sorts, known or invented, can give us an edge in speed of thought or imagination, increase strength. I have lock picks for the advantage of surprise, I have a survival manual with every kind of home made weapon and explosive, we can leave here and lie low, we can squat, we can survive anywhere, in all three worlds.” With that I flicked ash on the floor, watched it sail, land and disintegrate with the thought of destruction. My little bombshell.

I looked at Jay “I’m going to make a Gollum to find Jane; we are going to be busy with other things. I will make him small and he can go unnoticed.”

Jay looked intent and put his hands in the air “Okay; what ever a Gollum is.”

I looked him in the eyes and replied “A Gollum is voodoo, it is a miniature version of me brought to life to do my bidding, he will search unnoticed and find her, he will be telepathically connected to me, I will be able to find him in my mind and know what he is doing all the time. He can find the place and recon it. Meanwhile we can make weapons and powerful drugs, since we’re going to be taking him on in the physical world and our magic won’t be so strong. We need a zip gun for you since I have shotgun cartridges; I have my Dessert Eagle” I patted the gun at my waist “We also need powerful drugs both positive and negative, If we can imagine a different world down there, our magic will still be as effective, we need a contact poison, my lock picks, and some more improvised weapons.”

Jay started walking to the kitchen whistling “Well I will take care of the weapons and the pharmacy; you can get on with your Gollum thing” He said between whistles.

As Jay got to work in the kitchen, I made a cardboard cut out of a little man. I cut out little internal organs for him and glued them on, heart, intestines and penis. Then I cut out an old passport photo of my face and glued that on. I pulled a nail off my finger and glued that on to him, I stitched him little clothes out of the fabric of a t-shirt; Pants and jumper; all in black for camouflage in the night. I wrote my message of what I wanted him to do along with the name I had chosen for him, and rolled it and stuck it in his clothes. Finally; as an after thought; I dug two fingers inside my head searched around the spongy goo giving myself a headache, pulled out a piece of brain so he would be intelligent; I stuck that to him. Then I breathed a piece of my soul into him, holding him in my hands. I put him down.

The figure immediately inflated and stood up, the flat photo face moved and talked; the personality was mine, the voice was deep and familiar; it said “Okay, I will find our love so we can get her back, make me a weapon, a tooth brush and razor weapon will do to deter anyone who bothers me, like people made in prison.”

I went into the bathroom and got a toothbrush, then took apart a disposable razor and got the two blades, I put the rest of the razor in the sink; I heated the head of the tooth brush up with the lighter in my pocket, and stuck the two blades in so any wound could not be sown together. The whole device made me wince. I could hear Jay clinking and swearing in the kitchen as I left the bathroom and went back into the living room. I said to my Gollum “Redd,” Because that was what I had named him “Also take this small betting pen and this paper” I handed them to him “Because when you find the place I need a detailed map” I tapped his shoulder with my finger, “and no matter what you feel, don’t fight and give us away.” My Gollum looked sad, saluted me just as Jay walked in, and disappeared.

“What the fuck was that!” said Jay turning his head to me. In his hand he held up a zip gun. Two pieces of steel tubing one inside the other with a steel grip, he slammed them together and the screw at the back set off an explosion in the cartridge inside, half my ceiling came down and Jay grinned madly as plaster fell on his head. The recoil had stuck the gun in his body but he hadn’t moved. He tore the gun out of his chest with globs of his substance shaking off it.

“Not in here Jay my house is already wreaked.” I complained aggressively; but then smiled.

“What else have you done?” I asked lifting up my t-shirt and scratching an itch on my belly, going a little too deep inside myself.

Jay grinned “Come and see” I followed Jay into the kitchen, he gestured at some soggy crisp bread on the table and a bottle “I’ve found D.M.S.O. and I’m making a hallucinogenic contact poison that it would be best to use on living people just in case, but how do you grow ergot mould on rye bread in five minutes, assuming you can grow it here? I’d also like to make some L.S.D or something stronger that doesn’t upset the logic of the mind but I don’t know how.”

He lifted up some weighted socks in the sink and smiled broadly “We’ve got some PP9’s in socks and I’ve made another zip gun with two barrels instead of one, but there are only twenty cartridges left.”

I looked at the rye bread and concentrated, immediately it grew large pieces of a purple mould and I picked up a knife and scraped the mould off into the tinted brown bottle labelled D.M.S.O. Then I shook the bottle. I got some squeezy containers out of the cupboard under the sink and filled them up from the bottle, undoing their caps. I also got out a small paint brush and put the remainder in a small empty paint pot.

I turned to Jay and shrugged “I really don’t know of any natural hallucinogenic that’s not mind bending, but I could try and magic something up.”

Jay nodded “You do that Monster.” He put his hand to his face and gave me a little salute.

I went into the living room and sat down on the sofa. I leant over and took hold of an ashtray, picking out the butts and throwing them on the floor so all that was left was ash, which I stirred with my finger. This was the ash from Gods cigar and numerous roll ups and straights I had smoked since coming to the after life. I closed my eyes shut hard and envisioned lucidly every monster from hell; dragons and cenobites; and even roamed the body of a giant Cyclops from his hand up to his saucer flickering eye, I concentrated all these juices of the imagination into the front of my eyes, then I poked them till they bled into the cup and mixed its contents again with my finger into a red paste. This was my hallucinogenic drug to sharpen our imagination and therefore our magic on Earth.

This all took nearly an hour, so some time having passed I psychically connected myself with my Gollum ‘Redd’, to see if he had got anywhere. I saw him looking at a computer screen and pushing keys with his hands with police men passing around him, so I knew he was already looking up files in a police station.

I looked at the screen, it said “Statement by Paula Weaver. ‘After closing time at the Peppermint Square Night Club. Jane and me stayed for drinks with the bouncers and club owner Kenneth Chalk, and his two other gangster brothers Michael and Karl Chalk, they mainly deal in drugs. We were laughing hysterically and happy because we were high on E’s. Me and Jane danced together and the four men eyed us, especially the club owner, I think they gave us the E’s on purpose so we wouldn’t mind, Jane whipped her top off and slung it around because she was hot, she still had her bra on . . .”

“That’s the one Redd” I said. Redd saw a police man reflected on the computer screen, he turned around to see an astonished police man with wide eyes bending over him and staring level with him. Redd slashed the police mans cheek with his toothbrush, globs of blood spitting out. The police man touched his face and shouted “Arghh!” as blood seeped between his fingers and dripped to the floor other policemen started looking but Redd had jumped down and was off at a sprint, he leapt in the air and disappeared, I followed him in my mind to a chasm of nowhere, then I came around, assured he was safe to continue his mission.

Jay shook me to bring me round as I was a little torpid “Hey Monster”. I grabbed Jay back and we wrestled to the floor in a friendly manner, I got on top of him and he shook me off and ran away, I laughed “Ha-ha”.

Just then there was a crash in the kitchen. We ran into the kitchen, I nearly fell skidding on broken glass on soapy water on the chess board linoleum floor. I could hear whining through billows of choking smoke coming in from out side through the jagged edges of glass where the window had fitted. There was the sound of scrambling and breaking pots and the smoke cleared enough to see a massive three headed pit bull dog. Its middle head lapped up stale sausages and egg from a plate as the head closest to us looked at Jay and licked its chops. The dog appeared to smile at him. The mouth opening to reveal large teeth and drooling jaws. Some of the drool hit the floor making a splash, and red smoke rose up and the floor dissolved where the drool had splattered.

Jay smiled back and marvelled shaking his head “I want that dog. Do you know how much gear that dog would fetch in Avenham?”

The dog’s lumpy muscles tensed and fought for dominance, it reared to pounce.