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

Yong wanders down the hall, zipping his backpack. I reach in the bag and take out a fire engine Lego set and hold it low where he can see it. It catches his eyes and he comes toward it in a daze.

I shake the box.

He looks up at me and I nod and he grabs the box and runs out the front door.

Lei follows him.

– Thanks. Back in two hours. Xing needs a bath and dinner then a half hour of TV and then bed.

She squeezes Xing's shoulder as she goes by.

– Try not to kill Web.

Xing sticks her tongue out.

I take the kitty from the bag and toss it out the open door and it hits her in the back of the head.

She looks at it and turns up her nose.

– I don't like kitties.

I push the door closed.

– Some other little girl will find it, then.

Before the door closes she has the kitty in her arms.

I go down the hall, following the sound of the TV, the blare of a late-afternoon talk show; couples fighting, a conversation made up almost entirely of bleeps.

I raise my chin as I come into the room. Po Sin lifts his cane at me, reaches for the remote and hits mute.

– I love that shit. This one, those two there, they're sisters, they both married the same guy, but he's not a guy, he's a transsexual. Used to be a girl. Got a fake dick. Funny thing, the two who married him, both of them trannies, too. Both used to be guys. Brothers.

He goes to push himself from his chair and I wave him down.

– Sit. No, don't get up.

He gets up.

– Need to move around. They want me getting exercise. Took a walk yesterday.

– Yeah?

– Around the block. Thought my lungs would explode. Give me that shit.

I hand him the bag and he takes out the invoices.

– What's this?

I look.

– Decomp.

– You bill this?

– That my handwriting?

– Don't fuck around.

– I billed it.

– You underbfiled for materials.

– You want it out of my pocket?

– No. I want it out of your hide. What's this expense?

– Day labor.

– For what?

– We had to do the job at night. Gabe was doing accommodations. I needed to pay someone.

– Who?

I look at the families fighting on the TV.

– Dingbang.

He grunts.

– He show up on time?

– Pretty much.

He looks at another invoice.

– Shotgun job?

– Gabe did the invoice.

– I know.

His eyes go over it.

– What was it?

I sit on the edge of the bed.

– Guy put it to his chest. Knew his wife was the open-casket type, didn't want to blow his own head off. Maybe, I don't know, upset someone. Did it out in the backyard in their drained swimming pool. Blew out half his lung, missed his heart. He flopped around, actually tried to climb out of the pool, pumped blood over the whole thing. Handprints on the tile all the way around.

– How'd you?

– There was pathology on the side of the house from the blast. I did the detail work there while Gabe got the chunks out of the pool. We couldn't just hose those.

– Yeah, clog the drains.

– Yeah. Had to cover that. Ended up.

– I know.

– Filled the pool partway.

– Chlorinated the shit out of it. Scrubbed and pumped it out.

He runs a finger over the invoice.

– That's a good one.

We sit there till I stand up.

– You gonna eat? Want me to?

He shakes his head.

– The stuff I'm allowed to eat, I'd rather fast. Lost fifty pounds. I'd known I could do that, I'd have had a stroke ten years ago.

– Start a diet craze.

– Man, it's sweeping the nation.

I go to the door.

– I'm gonna see if I can get Xing in the bath.

He puts his hands together in prayer.

– Best thing about this whole deal, not having to wrestle with her. You want to borrow my cane to beat her?

– No, I brought a belt.

– Good man.

He picks up the remote.

– You know Lei won't make it back in two hours.

– She never does.

– Woman can't be on time for shit. You got something going tonight, you take off. I can handle Xing once she's run down a little.

– No, I'm cool. Hooking up with Soledad later. See a movie. Try to distract her a little. Tomorrow we have to get the last of her stuff out of the Malibu place and into her apartment. Fed will have it up for auction next week.

– Fucking Fed.

– Well. Her dad did the crimes. So. Anyway.

I go out in the hall.

– Web.

I go back to the door.

He looks at the TV, looks at me.

– I'll be back at it soon enough, and I'll forget how much help you've been and I'll just push you around on the job like the peon you are. So. Thanks for all this.

I touch the nearly healed cut on my forehead. It's going to scar bad because I never bothered to have it stitched.

– Yeah, sure. After all, not like you ever did anything for me.

Po Sin nods.

– Nothing I can remember.

He aims the remote at the TV and unmutes the escalating melee on the screen.

– These people, they're living proof that a human being can live with any old stupid shit they can dream up.

I look out the window and watch Xing on the front lawn, kicking her new kitty around like a soccer ball.

– No argument here, Grandfather Elephant.

He waves the remote.

– Holy! This chick is gonna claw that asshole's eyes out.

He bumps the volume up, and I turn and leave the room, the raised voices of brawling families following me down the hall as I go to bathe his daughter.

CHARLIE HUSTON is the author of The Shotgun Ruh; the Henry Thompson trilogy, which includes the Edgar Award-nominated Six Bad Things; and The Joe Pitt casebooks. For Marvel Comics he has written Moon Knight, as well as special annual issues of The Ultimates and X-Force. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife, the actress Virginia Louise Smith. Visit him at www.pulpnoir.com