The Scared Stiff

9

In a small poor South American country with few records, where people still emerge from the jungle not knowing how old they are or how to write their names, unknown bodies are not rare. People live their lives, and then they die. If they’re still in the jungle, their families bury them right there. If they’ve come to the city, solitary, doing casual labor, living on the margins of society, when they die there’s nobody to claim them or bury them except the government. My undertaker, tensing over his dinner in the Scarlet Toucan at the moment, in addition to his regular family trade also had a contract with the government to deal with the unknown and the indigent. And that’s how we’d gotten our body at a reasonable price.

Very reasonable. In addition to the meal at my expense that my undertaker was I hoped enjoying this evening with the companion of his choice, he could expect to be paid at American rates for his services to the late Barry Lee, not at Guerreran rates. Arturo had provided him with a second set of clothing identical to what I’d worn this evening, he had provided the clothed body, and I had provided dinner.

“Quick!” Arturo whispered.

“One second, one second.”

The only thing I carried that mattered was my wallet. I went to one knee beside the Impala and pushed my substitute leftward so I could slide the wallet into his hip pocket. He was cold but not stiff; in fact, he was unpleasantly soft, not at all what I’d expected.

The Beetle’s interior light switched on when I opened the driver’s door, but no one else was in the parking lot and it wouldn’t be lit for long. I grabbed the royal blue shoulders and Arturo grabbed the chino knees, and we lugged him out of the Impala and behind the wheel of the Beetle. I put one of his hands on the steering wheel, and in the brightness of the interior light I saw his hand was soft and pudgy, with a clear mark on the third finger where a ring had been removed. And wasn’t that a recent manicure?

What was this? This was no indigent, no unknown peon. I tried to see his face, but he was slumped too far forward, I could only see that his cheeks and neck were not scrawny and his hair was neatly barbered.

Something was wrong here, but there wasn’t time to do anything about it. I’d have to ask Arturo later. Who are we getting rid of here?

“Come on, hermano.”

“Yes, yes,” I said, “I’m coming!”

I stood up out of the car and shut its door and the light went off. He was a peon again; he was me again; he was no longer a mystery. I reached in past him to start the engine, which immediately coughed into life. I shifted into DRIVE and got my arm out of there, and the Beetle moved forward to poke the rail fence, insistent but not strong enough to break through.

Now, while I stood there, Arturo ran to the Impala. He got in, started it without switching on the headlights, and backed up to get behind the Beetle. As I stepped backward out of the way, he suddenly accelerated as fast as he could at the rear of the Beetle, hitting it with a crunch that popped the smaller car forward, through the fence and off the edge.

Out it arched, into all that light above the river, a white descending balloon. No. A white descending refrigerator.

Arturo slammed on the brakes, and the Impala stopped just before the drop. He backed around in a tight circle, and I turned away from the dramatic instant of my death. As I ran for the Impala and jumped into the backseat, I heard the screams start inside the restaurant.

I could pick out Lola’s scream. It was the loudest one of all.