The Wrong Goodbye

means that woman can never look at him the same again. In that sense, Gio’s a hell of a lot luckier than me.

“Damn right it does,” he said. “’Course, the fucker got pretty ripe out in the parking lot, on account of I stayed by Theresa’s bedside for the better part of three days. But we been together ever since. A shame I had to ditch that car out in the desert along with the body, though —that rotting bag of shit managed to take Ter’s sight and ruin a cherry ’73 Mustang. I’m talking Mach 1 fastback in Grabber Orange with a spoiler and a side-stripe. Better coffin than that assweasel ever deserved.”

“Boys and their cars,” Theresa said. You could damn near hear her sightless eyes rolling behind their tinted lenses. But she was smiling when she said it —a wan smile tinged with sadness, but a smile nonetheless.

“OK, I’ve got to ask,” I said. “You told me you don’t believe in any of this supernatural stuff, and yet when some stranger comes walking in here claiming to be your dead boyfriend, you welcome him with open arms. How the hell does that work?”

“My dear Samuel, are you of all people going to get all hung up on looks? The way Gio tells it, this time next week, you won’t look like this at all. You’ll be halfway around the world —another body, another job. And yet you’ll still be you. I’ll admit, when Gio walked into the shop, I was skeptical, but blind or not, it didn’t take me long talking to him before I saw the truth. Flesh and bone ain’t who you are —it’s what’s within that counts.”

I hoped to hell she was right —that this time next week, I was still somewhere in the world. Right that sec, though, I wasn’t counting on it.

“Listen, Sam,” Gio said, “not that I mind hanging out and shooting the shit, but don’t we kinda have a job to do?”

Theresa sighed. “Gio, do you really think Sam had forgotten why he came? The boy was just trying to be polite.”

“We’ve come far enough, me and Sam, he oughta know he don’t gotta wear kid gloves with me.”

“If you think he was doing it for you, then you’re even thicker than that body you’re borrowing. He was doing it for me. See, Sam here plans on taking you away from me, and he don’t expect you to come back. Not rushing you is his way of letting me have a few more minutes with you before I lose you all over again. Only there’s one thing Sam didn’t count on.”

All the sudden, I hoped to hell that beanbag chair wasn’t hiding another sawed-off. “Yeah?” I asked, resisting the urge to duck. “What’s that?”

“I’m coming with you.”

Gio balked. “The hell you are!”

“I’d like to see you try to stop me, love. You forget, I know where you’re going. You leave me here, I’ll only follow after.”

I scowled. “Wait —what do you mean, you know where we’re going? I don’t even know where we’re going.”

But Theresa didn’t reply to me, instead saying to Gio: “You’re up, love. It’s time to tell him about the crows.”

“I been doing some poking around, in case you made it back. Thought I’d see if I could track down this Danny character.”

“Uh huh,” I said, smiling ruefully. “In case I made it back.”

“OK, so sue me —I didn’t actually expect you’d walk out of that skim-joint alive. But I figured if I could keep an eye on where Danny was, I could stay a step ahead of him, keep him from collecting me a second time.”

“Not a half-bad plan,” I admitted.

“Thanks. So anyways, I remembered what you told me ’bout his bugs being crows, and that gave me an idea. An idea that led me to this.”

The laptop was slow and ancient, the YouTube video grainy. A well-quaffed bottle blonde behind a desk emblazoned with the call-letters KABC. She sat frozen mid-blink as the laptop struggled to load the video, a graphic of a common crow hovering to the left above her.

Finally, the video began.

“For over thirty years,” she said, her words rendered tinny by the tiny laptop speakers, “the corner of Cesar Chavez and Mednik Avenues in East Los Angeles has been home to one of the largest Dia de los Muertos processions in the nation, attracting observers and participants from all around. This year, however, it seems a whole new crowd is interested in joining the celebration. And what could be a more appropriate addition to the Day of the Dead festivities than a murder of crows?”

The image shifted. Now the screen displayed a busy intersection, two four-lane roads crossing beneath the diamond-bright midday sun. The camera was angled from one corner of the intersection to the other, its focus trained on a vibrant mural of the Virgin of Guadalupe, her hands as ever in prayer, the whole of her surrounded by radiant light.

Of course, she was hard to see past all the crows.

They perched along every inch of the stone wall on which the mural had been painted. They sat atop the streetlights and the power lines. They hopped along the sidewalk, heads cocked, as though looking for a tasty morsel dropped by the passersby. As though looking for the soul Danny owed them.

The piece cut again, this time to a chain-linked parking lot, flush with cars. The fence was packed with crows —silent, unmoving, and sitting damn near wing to wing.

Another cut. Now we were looking at a city park, a baseball diamond worn to dust by countless pairs of running feet. Crows pecked lazily at the infield dirt, and speckled black the outfield. The fence behind home plate looked to be made of them —dark feathers gleaming in the sunlight, that shine amplifying their movements and creating the impression that the clamshell canopy itself was squirming, twitching, alive.

The anchorwoman had been talking the whole time, but of course I hadn’t heard a word. When I tuned back in, I heard her say, “…officials are baffled as to the cause of the recent infestation, which stretches from McDonnell to Vancouver Avenues west to east, and has been reported as far north as Dozier Street and as far south as the Pomona Freeway. Local business owners have expressed concerns about the animals’ impact on foot traffic, but Animal Control insists they pose no threat —and organizers of the upcoming Dia de los Muertos celebration assured KABC tomorrow’s festivities will proceed as scheduled.”

Dia de los Muertos. The Day of the Dead. A holiday that dates back to an ancient Aztec practice —to a time when humankind was young, and magic commonplace. A holiday on which it’s said dead souls return to walk amongst the living, and the living attempt to draw back the veil of death, inviting communion with those they’ve lost.

If that wasn’t where worlds draw thin, I didn’t know what was.

I shut the laptop lid, clapped Gio on the shoulder. “Nice work. Now let’s go get that son of a bitch and end this.”

“But, Sam…” he said, his jowly face tinged with worry. “Those things… they’re waiting for me. Is it wise for me to just go waltzing in there?”

“They’re not waiting for you, they’re waiting for your soul. Your soul, as delivered by Danny. They won’t take it any other way —they can’t.”

“You sure about that?” asked Theresa. The question had some steel behind it.

“If they could take his soul, he’d be gone for good already. I interred his soul once before, thinking it was the Varela soul Danny swapped it for. It didn’t take.”

“When the time comes,” she said, “you best not be thinking you can trade my Gio to get this Varela back.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I said.

“You try, you won’t be dreaming ever again, you hear me? I’ll find a way to end your ass for good.”

“Ter!” Gio admonished.

“No,” I said, “it’s fine. Theresa, you have my word I won’t hand Gio over to Danny.” As for ending my ass for good, Theresa’d have to get in line.

“How do I know your word is worth a damn?”

“You don’t. But my word is all I’ve got.”

“The hell it is,” Gio said. “You got us. Now let’s roll.”