The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death by Charlie Huston Read Free Book Online

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    He talked a little more, wrote down an address in Malibu and a phone number, and hung up and dropped the phone in his pocket. He picked up the last of his cheeseburger and put it in his mouth.
    —Nine millimeter in the mouth. Gonna be an earner, that one.
    Gabe nodded.
    —The bigger the gun, the bigger the mess.
    I knew that already. That bit of wisdom about guns and the messes that they make.

TILL HIS NEIGHBORS SMELLED HIM

    After lunch we brought the last of the boxes down to the bin, followed by the few pieces of spavined furniture. With the floor cleared throughout, the one-bedroom apartment didn't look half big enough to have contained all that we had hauled out of it, and the stench seemed worse than ever.
    I pointed at a stain on the carpet that seemed to be the epicenter of stink.
    —What the fuck is that?
    Po Sin came over, holding the mask to his face.
    —That's where the decomp was.
    —Huh?
    —The guy who lived here, that's where he died and rotted till one of his neighbors smelled him.
    I stared at the stain.
    —What's the? Why's there a stain?
    —Fluids, Web. A body dies, sits in a hot room in L.A. in July, you get a lot of fluids coming off it.
    I stared, and the stain's Rorschach shape arranged itself into sprawled limbs and a bloated trunk.
    —What's that black stuff?
    Po Sin took a collapsible pointer from the pocket of his Tyvek, snapped his wrist and it shot open and he put it to use.
    —Blood here. All this. A body decomposes, it starts to swell up, fills with gases. Eventually, it's gonna pop. Blood comes out of that, it's like dirty motor oil. Same color and consistency. This yellow, that's where the fat has started separating, that's tallow.
    I squatted to look at something and the reek slapped me in the face. I turned my head and stood and took a couple steps back.
    —Jesus.
    —Yeah, he was ripe.
    I pointed at the little lines wiggling off the stain; traceries, like veins under the skin.
    —What are those?
    —Maggot trails. They hatch in the corpse then go looking for a better life. All those little black things are the dry maggot shells.
    He slapped his palm over the end of the pointer, collapsing it, dropped it in his pocket, and pulled out a carpet knife.
    —Let's get this shit up off the floor.
    We began cutting, peeling away flat industrial weave patterned in precise geometries of grime that outlined where boxes had once been stacked. And on the wood floor, just under the stain left by the decomp, a larger stain. More abstract. And in need of scrubbing.
    So I scrubbed.
    The apartment stripped and bare, cockroaches fleeing through every crack, seeking refuge in the neighboring apartments, Gabe brought up an ozone generator and plugged it in.
    Po Sin took off his mask and wiped his forehead and pointed at the machine.
    —It'll bond oxygen to oxygen. Essentially purify the air. Eliminate the odor, not just mask it.
    I was looking at the stain on the floor. Fainter now, but there was no way to get rid of the entire smear of the man's death.
    Po Sin followed Gabe to the door, leaving the ozone generator behind to do its job. He stopped and looked at me.
    —You OK?
    I scuffed at the stain with the toe of my paper-covered boot.
    —Sure.
    —Never seen that one in a horror movie before, huh?
    I stood there for another moment before following them out.
    I hadn't. I hadn't seen that kind of thing before.
    Not exactly.
    —He does accommodations at night.
    My head was out the window of the moving van, blowing some of the stink out of my hair. I pulled back inside to hear better.
    —Accommodates what?
    —Bodies. For the coroner. He picks them up. It's what they call it. Accommodations.
    —No shit?
    —Sure. Some wino goes stiff on Skid Row, who ya gonna call? His