Charlie Huston - The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death

He took his hat off and tossed it inside the car.

– So fuck them and fuck the guild. From now on, you're top of the list west as well as east side. And I'll spread the word.

Po Sin gave him a thumbs-up.

– Much appreciated.

– My pleasure. I refer you guys, you get the job done. And you've never stiffed me.

He got in the car and pulled down the short drive to the PCH, waited for a hole in the traffic, and headed south.

Po Sin came over to the van, stripping off his Clean Team shirt and reaching for the Tyvek Gabe held out to him.

– To protect and to serve, Web, to protect and to serve.

I scooped brains.

I scooped them with a wide plastic paint scraper from a ninety-nine-cent store, and I wiped them onto blue industrial paper towels, I dropped the towels in red biohazard bags and dropped the bags in a fifty-gallon plastic garbage can with a Clean Team sticker on the side.

Po Sin watched.

– Spray some more up there.

I took the spray bottle from tool belt and sprayed some hydrogen peroxide, and specks of blood and brain I'd missed on the counter foamed white.

Po Sin nodded, pursed his lips.

– See, you miss stuff. No matter how close you look, there's always more.

He took a step toward the bedroom where he and Gabe were dealing with the real environmental disaster.

– And stop taking off your mask.

I blew out my cheeks.

– What, it doesn't smell or anything, there aren't any cockroaches trying to crawl in my mouth.

– No, but there's dry blood, and it will flake and go airborne and you'll inhale it.

I pointed at the fogger in the bedroom.

– I thought the Microban killed everything.

– It does. It should. But it's still considered a bad idea to breathe other people's dry blood. Trust me on that one.

– Fine, fine.

I put the mask over my mouth and went back to scraping and wiping. Cleaning the blood and brains. Throwing away the ruined terry-cloth towels and bathmat and a thick robe that had been draped over the shower rod, and the fuzzy cover on the toilet seat. Opening the cabinet doors and looking inside and spraying hydrogen peroxide, in case one of them had been open when the guy did it. Doing the same with the drawers. Checking the back of the shower curtain liner. Peeling the liner from the curtain and looking between them. Finding spots of blood in the grout between tiles and getting down on my knees and working at it with a toothbrush, trying to scrub it from the porous material. Spinning the roll of toilet paper on its spindle and finding a dry pink blot soaked through dozens of layers. Tossing the roll in with the other hazards. Finishing. Standing in the middle of the huge bathroom and turning in place, finding no sign that death came here.

And liking that feeling. Things back as they had been. Better than they had been. Like nothing had ever gone wrong.

Clean. Blank. New.

I nodded to myself.

– Never know the stupid fucker was too lame to just eat some pills or stick his head in a plastic bag or some shit like normal losers.

– Oh my God.

I looked over at the open door of the den, and found the girl who had signed the contract with Po Sin standing there.

She stared at me, both hands covering her mouth.

– Oh. Oh, my Gaaawd!

She turned, shoulders shaking, and ran.

I looked up where heaven is supposed to be kept.

– Crap.

Po Sin appeared at the other door.

– What? What the hell was that? Who was that?

I pointed at the den.

– The girl. I didn't know she was. She snuck up on me.

From the den we could hear muffled, choked sobs.

He stepped into the bathroom, pulling his mask from his face, hissing.

– What the fuck, Web? What did you do?

– Nothing, man. I was talking to myself. I was. I didn't know she was there.

He stared at me, looked at the door the girl had stood in, tiptoed to it and peeked in the den. He looked over his shoulder and waved me over. I crept to his side and looked in the room. The girl was standing in the corner where two walls of bookcases converged, her back to us, shoulders jerking, sounds hitching in her throat.

Po Sin stuck his index finger in my chest and then pointed at the girl.

I shook my head.

He balled his hand into a fist, put it close to my face, pointed at the girl again.

I shook my head.

He leaned down, put his mouth to my ear.

– You get your ass in there and apologize for whatever asshole comment came out of your mouth right now or you will never work a day with me again.

He straightened, glaring down at me, mouthing words.

Grow the fuck up!

And he turned and walked back into the bedroom, back to helping Gabe cut away the blood-soaked portions of the mattress so they could be bagged for disposal.

I stood in the pristine bathroom. Cleaner now, no doubt, than it had been since the day the house was built. I looked at the gleam and shine on every surface. I looked at what I had done to make things look normal again. I thought about maybe being able to do that some more, make things the way they were.

And then, for some reason, I thought of the Flying Dutchman bus I saw the other morning. Thought of it ghosting the streets.

And shook it off.

I looked at the girl's heaving back and shoulders.

– Crap.

I crossed the room, pulling the mask from my face, lifting the safety glasses to my forehead.

– Urn. Excuse. Urn. I didn't mean any.

Her shoulders shook harder.

I peeled the rubber gloves from my hands and wiped sweat off my forehead.

– Look. I really. I didn't mean anything personal. I didn't know you were there. I mean, I know that doesn't make it OK for me to say shit like. To say stuff like that, but I didn't mean anything by it, it was just. It's a little tense, doing… this. And I guess I have a fucked up… a lame sense of humor sometimes.

– Oh God. Oh gaaawd! Stop! Stop. Ho, my God, stop, you're killing me.

She turned, tears running down her face, gasping, waving a hand at me, trying to kill the laughter forcing its way up her throat.

– Oh, man, so completely inappropriate.

– I said I was sorry.

She shook out her match and dropped it off the deck to the sand below, watching it get caught in the wind and tumble into some rocks.

– No, it was just so perfect. Totally inappropriate. Exactly the kind of thing he would have said.

She pushed her glasses a little higher on her nose.

– Except he wouldn't have apologized.

I looked over my shoulder through the open sliding glass door and caught a glimpse of Gabe coming back into the house with another pack of scrapers.

I looked down at the tide as it washed over the rocks.

– Well, left to my own devices, I wouldn't have apologized either.

She choked on a lungful of smoke, more laughter combining with a few hacks.

I watched for a second then gave her a couple light pats on the back.

– You OK?

She coughed into her fist.

– Oh, sure, I'm fine.

She wiped the damp corners of her eyes with one of the Kleenexes Po Sin gave her.

– My dad killed himself in one of the more deliberate and grotesque manners imaginable and I'm laughing about it with one of the guys I'm paying to clean his brains off the wall. I'm doing great.

I turned and leaned my back on the deck rail and shrugged.

– Well, as long as you're OK then.

She smiled.

– Totally inappropriate.

– At least he left a note.

I didn't say anything, too occupied at the moment with working my Scotch-Brite pad over the speckles of blood on the surface of her dad's desk.

She picked another almond from the large bowl of them on the table next to the wingback chair near the hallway door.