'That's Nothing'

by

Greg Beatty

I

was sitting in the back row when Ian came in. He walked up the aisle, paused near the casket for several breaths, then turned to look for a seat. I raised a hand to about shoulder height, and saw him recognize me. He dropped into the seat beside me with a "Hell of a thing."

"Yeah, Arthur was so alive. I couldn't imagine anything slowing him down, let alone…"

"Killing him? Yeah, I know. I mean, he was only twenty-nine."

Ian sat for a moment, perhaps enjoying the music that had to have been somebody else's choice, not Arthur's. I couldn't imagine him requesting this Christian muzak.

After a while, Ian sighed. "Twenty-nine. Christ, do you know I called my doctor for a check-up as soon as I heard? What did his doctors say killed him, anyway?"

"I don't know if there was even an autopsy. But I know what killed him. Well, who."

"What!" Ian winced at his own volume, then mouthed apologies to Arthur's mother when she spun around, glaring through her tears. He tried again. "What do you mean, who? You think he was murdered?"

"I'm not sure that word applies to Arthur. He broke the rules dying, the same way he did everywhere else."

Ian half-smiled at that. Was he remembering Arthur's hand-over-hand passage along the ledge outside an eleventh story window after someone at the party had idly claimed it couldn't be done? Or the midnight races he'd tried to organize through the downtown freight train tunnels?

"So, what happened? And how do you know?"

"Because I was there, at least when it started."

Ian settled in, a bit closer, so I could tell the story in a whisper. "I ran into him last night at Beef and Beyond. I'd just finished grading a bunch of papers, and he'd just finished a big job for a corporation, so we were both there for a steak and a drink. Of course, being Arthur, he also had two girls with him when he called me over. Well, women, I guess."

"He waved one of those long freckled arms and called 'Halloou!' Half the bar turned, and the women perked up. You know how it is? Anybody that Arthur's interested in is interesting."

Ian nodded, waved one hand in a "get one with it" motion. He didn't seem so sad now; any story with Arthur in it was just another chapter in the myth of Arthur, even if he did die in the end.

"Anyway," I said, drawing the word out, "I slipped through the crowd and joined them. The one beside Arthur was an exotic hottie, blonde, but with slanted eyes. The other one, who I was already assuming was going to be mine, was darker. Quiet. I almost didn't notice her at first."

"By the time I got to the table, Arthur was already in the middle of a challenge. You know how he can be. He slaps an idea down on the table, and--"

"And everyone else goes along, until the cops come. Go on!"

"Anyway," I said again, "this time he was challenging the girls to tell him the wildest thing they'd ever done, or the wildest place."

"You mean, sexually?"

I looked at Ian. "Sorry," he said.

"Somehow I ended up going first. I knew I was going to lose, so I told a story that would make me look good anyway."

"A Helen story?"

"Yeah. I told them about the time that I used my key to let us into the rare book room of the library after hours. How we built a little nest of old maps, and where we'd clipped the manuscript clips while we were at it. And how we'd forgotten about the new motion sensor-based security system, so the lights came on right when things were getting…athletic. And how the security guard had showed up and said, in a tight voice, 'Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to stop that now.'"

"And you said, 'Wait…ahhh. I'm done now anyway. And you'll want to clean Madagascar.'"

I reached up to give Ian a high five. This time it was me who ended up wincing and mouthing apologies to those around us.

"So I got done, and the exhotica is looking at me, and I figure I've got a better chance with her than I had thought."

"Then Arthur started."

I nodded. "Then Arthur started. Like always, he launched in the middle of things, and let everyone pick up things up along the way, or not, depending."

" 'So there I was,' he said, 'in bed with a monster woodie, with Jackie just starting to work it, when the phone rang. Hello, I says, oh yeah, like that, no go ahead. Turns out it's a corporate job, offering double if I'm there in fifteen minutes, and sex is nice, but you can't spend it, know what I'm saying? So I shove Jackie away, and she's pouting, so I offer her double time too if she comes with me.' "

" 'That perks her right up, so we get suited up and head to the Motel 6. Now usually, No More Chalk Outlines doesn't get the hotel jobs, because--' "

"And at this point, I swear to god, the quiet one chimes in. 'Doesn't Crime Scene Cleaners have the motel market tied up?' "

"It takes a lot to stump Arthur, so he just blinked and shook it off. 'Right,' he said. 'So I figure, something's really got to be wrong if they're calling us, and offering double.' "

"And then, so help me, the dark one broke in again, riding right over top of Arthur's story. 'If you're not as big a company as they are, just getting started, does that mean you use less strenuous protection? That you cut corners?' "

" 'No way!' Arthur shouts, knocking back his beer. 'Who told you that? We use exactly the same suits they do. That's why we were sweating so bad when we entered the room. We had sealed the suits out in the truck, and we had to push all the equipment up to the room ourselves. The front desk staff was all too scared to help.' "

"Arthur reached over and took a drink from the blonde's tequila something. 'When we opened the door, we could see why.' "

" 'Actually, we could tell before we opened the door. From behind the door we could hear music, a high and distant wailing. We could also here a low rustling noise, like popcorn being shifted around.'

"He put his arm around the blond, as if for warmth. She sighed and snuggled in closer to him. 'I had a pretty good idea of what to expect before I opened the door, so I had the industrial extractor powered up, wand in hand.' "

" 'I opened the door. The hotel room was set up in an L shape, so we couldn't quite see what was on the bed yet. But we didn't have to. We could see that the entire floor was moving, sort of writhing and rustling.' "

" 'I waved at them with the wand, but we couldn't get all of them. When Jackie and I walked into the room, the maggots and egg casings and shit crunched under our feet.' "

" 'About four crunchy steps in, we could see the guy on the bed. We found out later that he hadn't been disturbed for so long because he'd left instructions with the front desk, and then on the door, and paid ahead of time. It was only when his two weeks of pre-paid room rent was up that management listened to the ongoing complaints from the rooms nearby about the music that never stopped.' "

" 'I don't know why he wanted to not be found for so long,' Arthur said, 'or why he wanted country music videos playing the whole time, but he did a good job of it. We could see the remote where it sat there next to him on the bed, well, floated, on all the juices that had come out of him while he was decomposing. He'd known what he wanted. He set the music playing, put the remote down, and picked the gun up.' "

" 'It had one of those homemade silencers on it, the sort where the guy tapes a two liter bottle on the end, so it looked for a minute like he'd committed suicide by Diet Pepsi.' Arthur stopped and grinned then. 'Always said that diet shit would kill you.' "

" 'Anyway…we had checked to make sure the cops already had all the crime scene photos they needed. We would have known that anyway, from all the fingertip dust floating on his fluids, but they had said yes, it was suicide, go ahead.' "

" 'So we started cleaning up. The room was hot. Mr. Dead Guy had turned up the heat full bore, to make sure his body would rot, so it was over eighty in there, and you know those suits don't breathe. Well, I'm dripping sweat, and I could hear the plastic slipping and sliding over Jackie's skin. One time she turned to ask me about something, and I could see the beads of sweat on her eyebrows. I could see them running down her face, turning her eyes into these raccoon eyes, all dark and slutty.' "

" 'Well, she doesn't usually look like that until after, so I got all hot. She did too, I could tell, so I took my belt knife and cut a slit in the front of my suit.' "

" 'Then I cut a slit in the front of her suit. Jackie let out a little sigh, and closed her eyes. I dropped the knife and one glove, and reached inside her clothes.' "

" 'We don't wear much inside the suits, because they retain so much heat, so her top was wet with sweat. Her shorts were wetter. I rubbed a little, pulled them down, and then we were at it.' "

" 'We couldn't kiss, and that's usually the way I keep Jackie quiet. She's a moaner, and this time, hearing her through her respirator, moans mixing with Shania's fake twang on the TV, god it was hot.' "

" 'And somehow the whole situation made it all the hotter. Knowing the door was open, so people could come in, but that they were too afraid to come in, no matter what they heard. Knowing we were about four foot away from a corpse that was all dried out up top but floating in its own fluids down below. Knowing that only a really tight connection between our bodies was going to keep the sludge out. Hearing the larvae cases crunch and the maggots squish with every pump. Seeing the clean white suits get dirtier and dirtier, as we rolled in the wet and the fingerprint dust.' "

"Arthur shook his head, clearly reliving the moment. 'Man, he said, that was great.' "

" 'Well, that was my most extreme. This week.' "

"He sort of shook himself. The little blonde had collapsed in on herself. Arthur's arm was still around her, but she sort of shrunk in on herself, so he wouldn't touch her."

"Me, I just sat there staring. Part of me was thinking, gross, man, I would never do that. Another part was thinking, man, I will never beat Arthur at this, ever."

"Yeah, that's pretty wild, I started to say, but the other girl, the dark-haired one, cut me off."

" 'That's nothing,' she said, licking her lips. 'You want to do something really wild?' "

"And looking at her, quiet as she was, small as she was, you knew she meant it."

I looked around for a minute. People had been coming in the whole time we'd been talking. The chapel was almost full now. The minister was rustling around, getting ready to give the eulogy. He looked like it would be as fake as the music had been.

Ian's hand closed on my knee. His face looked like he would rather have hit me. "Don't stop there! What happened?"

"That's it."

"What do you mean, that's it?"

"Just that. Arthur could tell she meant it too, and he had gotten himself all hot telling that story, so they left together. And the next morning they found him that way, with those marks all over his body, and that look on his face."

"Yeah, what would you call that look?"

Both of us fell silent, trying to figure out the best way to explain it. Fear? Ecstasy? Then Arthur shook himself. "What happened to the blonde?"

I shook my head. "No go there. I moved closer, to comfort her, but she hurled, right there on the table."

"So you left?"

I didn't dignify that one with an answer.

The minister got up to speak. Ian got in one last whisper while the minister was clearing his throat.

"So what are you going to do with what you know? Go to the police?"

I shook my head. "I'm going to Beef and Beyond. Tonight."

"Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today--" the minister said.

"I want to know what put that look on Arthur's face. I want to…talk to her."

"Oh that. That was nothing," said a voice from the far side of Ian.

Ian turned to look, and I leaned around him.

It was the quiet woman from Beef and Beyond. I said, "Ian, trade me seats."

He did. The minister droned on with the eulogy, his voice dull and nasal. Then she smiled at me, and I got scared. But I didn't move away. I just had to know.



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(c) Greg Beatty, All Rights Reserved

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