Killing Pretty

“Thanks.”

Julie shuffles the printouts until they’re straight. She riffles through them one more time and puts them in a soft-­sided leather attaché case.

“I really think we’re onto something,” she says.

“I hope so.”

I look at the last dregs of cold coffee in my cup.

“I need another drink. You?”

She drains the last of her beer. Shakes her head.

“I’m good. You’re sticking with coffee, right?”

“While you drink beer?”

“I don’t have a drinking problem.”

“You think I do?”

She starts to say something, but stops, like she doesn’t want to get into it.

“Just stick to coffee for now.”

“Yes, boss.”

I head back to the bar. Carlos sees me coming and has the coffeepot ready.

“How’s the sober life treating you so far?”

“It’s been ten minutes of sheer hell.”

“I hear it gets better.”

“Really?”

“No.”

“Fuck you.”

Carlos puts a hand to his ear.

“Sorry. I can’t hear you over the music.”

I give him the finger as he moves on to other customers.

“You heard me just fine.”

Someone says, “Drink up, cowboy. I’ll get the next round.”

It’s a woman’s voice, but when I look there’s no one there. Someone taps me on the shoulder. I have to turn to see her.

She’s wearing shades. Round and deep black, so her eyes are invisible. Her hair is buzzed to maybe an inch long and dyed cotton-­candy pink. Black lipstick and a bomber jacket over a “Kill la Kill” T-­shirt. Black tights with thigh and shinbones printed in white down the sides. Shiny black boots with pointed studs on the toes and heels.

“So,” Candy says. “Different enough?”

“Plenty. Perfect. Still got your knife?”

She opens her jacket and shows me where she’s had someone at Lollipop Dolls sew in a leather sheath.

“Think my lunch-­box gun will go with the ensemble?”

“I think you’d look naked without it.”

She grins and gets a little closer.

“Naked. I like the sound of that. I checked out my reflection on the way in. I’d do me. How about you?”

I shake my head.

“Careful. Out here in the world we’re still getting to know each other.”

She purses her lips and pulls the jacket around her.

“You’re goddamn paranoid. You should see someone about that.”

“I tried, but she kept writing things down. It made me more paranoid.”

Candy looks away at the bottles behind the bar.

“I went to all this trouble and I can’t even kiss you.”

“Grab a drink and come back into the corner. Julie and I are just about done with our meeting.”

“Fine,” she says.

I can hear the disappointment in her voice. She went way out of her way to change her look and all I can do is nod and smile like a tourist admiring the view. Truth is, even before Candy became Chihiro I’d been feeling funny about the two of us. When she was locked up in a Golden Vigil jail cell for attacking a civilian, she said some things. Like I was using her. Like I thought she was sick. Later, she said it was just poison talking after someone spiked her anti-­Jade potion. She said it made her crazy and suspicious. Maybe. Because some of what she said hit close to home and I’ve been wondering about it ever since. There’s a lot of unspoken stuff between us. I used to think that was a good thing. Now I’m not so sure.

When I get back to the table, Julie says, “Who was that?”

“Guess.”

“You’re kidding me.”

“You’ll see for yourself in a minute.”

Candy comes over with a shot of whiskey. I swear I can smell it all the way across the bar.

She takes off her sunglasses and hooks them over her shirt. Grabs a chair and sits down at our table.

“What do you think?” she asks Julie.

“I can’t believe you’re the same person.”

“That’s the idea,” I say.

“Admit it, I look like a superhero, don’t I?” she says.

“I don’t know many pink-­haired superheroes,” said Julie. “But if there are any, you’ll be stiff competition.”

Candy looks at me.

“See? She likes it.”

“I told you. I like it fine. We just have to be cool.”

Candy rolls her eyes.

“He thinks if I stand too close to him we’re going to get nuked.”

“He might have a point,” says Julie. “About playing down your relationship.”

Candy sits back in her chair.

“You two should start a band. The Buzzkill Twins.”

“Julie is going to have a new office soon,” I say, trying to change the subject.

That gets Candy’s attention. She sits up.

“Cool. If you’re hiring this scaredy cat, can I have a job too?”

“What are your skills?” says Julie.

“I was afraid you’d ask that.”

I say, “You used to run the office for Doc Kinski.”

“Yeah. I did.”

“I might need a receptionist at some point,” Julie says.

“Swell.”

I look at Candy.

“You really want to be a receptionist?”

“No,” she says. “I want to kick down doors like you, but apparently I’m not allowed.”

“I never said that.”

I want a drink and a cigarette. I want zombies, dinosaurs, and flaming giraffes to come crashing through the door so I don’t have to talk anymore.

“Look,” I say. “Maybe I am being a little paranoid. It’s just, we faked your death once. I’m not sure we can get away with it again. What do you think, Julie?”

“I think the U.S. Marshals Ser­vice isn’t dumb,” she says.

Candy sips her drink.

“So, I should hide out at Brigitte’s forever and learn to knit?”

I take her shot glass, drink half, and hand it back.

“It would probably be okay if we partner up, but you have to do it as Chihiro, not Candy. Pretend it’s the first season of X-­Files.”

Candy leans back and smiles. The black lipstick with the short pink hair looks good. But I’m not sure she gets that I’m as frustrated by all this clandestine crap as she is.

“A Scully and Mulder thing? Yeah. I can handle that,” she says. “Does that mean I get to move back home?”

Julie gets her bag and stands up.

“This is getting a bit personal. I think I’ll go.”

“So, can I have a job?” says Candy.

Julie thinks for a minute.

“You can work with him as an unpaid intern. We’ll see from there.”

“Awesome.”

Julie slips the bag over her shoulder and looks at me.

“I’ll call you. Keep an eye on our guest.”

“My guest.”

“Call me if anything changes.”

“Bye. Thanks,” says Candy as Julie weaves her way through the crowd.

When she’s gone, Candy finishes her drink.

“Seriously,” she says. “We have to talk about some kind of timetable for me coming back to Max Overdrive. I love Brigitte, but I can’t live without a plan.”

“Trust me. I know how you feel.”

“Do you?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. I wasn’t sure for a while there.”

She pushes her leg against mine under the table. I look around, making sure no one can see. I think we’re okay and she feels good, so I don’t try to stop her.

“Look,” I say. “If we work together we’ll see each other all the time. Aside from that, give it until the later part of the month before you come back. Okay? Maybe by then I’ll have Sleeping Beauty out of the store.”

“Can I come over now?” she says. “Seeing as how we’re colleagues, I should have a look at the dead man.”

“I don’t see why not. But we can’t leave at the same time. I’ll go. You go and order another drink. Take off in, say, twenty minutes.”

She picks up the shot glass and rolls it between her palms.

“Twenty minutes is a long time to be all on my own. What if someone asks me for a date?”

“Do what you think is best, but remember that your guitar amp is still at Max Overdrive.”

“What do I have to do to get it back?” she says.

“Awful things. Depraved things.”

“You bad man.”

I get up from the table.

“Forget twenty minutes. Make it ten.”

“That’s the first sensible thing you’ve said all day.”

She heads back to the bar. I go out the door.

LOS ANGELES IS a busted jukebox in a forgotten bar at the ass end of the high desert. The city only exists between the pops, skips, and scratches of the old 45s. Snatches of ancient songs. Lost voices. The jagged artifacts of a few demented geniuses, one-­hit wonders, and lip-­synching frauds. Charlie Manson thought he was going to be the next Beatles and we know how that turned out. This city is built on a bedrock of high crimes and rotten death. The Black Dahlia. Bugsy Siegel. The Night Stalker. We’ve buried and forgotten more bodies than all the cemeteries of Europe. Someday the water is going to run out and the desert will strip this town down to its Technicolor bones. Even the buzzards won’t want it and the city knows it. Maybe that’s why I like it.

It’s not a long walk back to Max Overdrive and I can let my mind wander.

It’s funny to be thinking about the desert when there’s still so much water around, cutting off streets with blocked sewer drains. Signs of the weird floods that nearly drowned the city at Christmas are fading fast, but not completely gone. L.A. doesn’t have the luxury of hundred-­year flood warnings. We don’t have that kind of relationship with water or the past. And this flood wasn’t anything to do with global warming or El Niños. It wasn’t real weather. It was the symptom of a disease. An organism worming its way into our world from another.

The Angra Om Ya were old gods. Older than the God most good little girls and boys think about. That God, sneaky bastard, stole the universe from the Angra and walled them off in another dimension. When they broke out and headed back into our space-­time, they brought the floods with them. One long golden shower of hate. I fought the Angra, if fight’s the right word. I danced around until I foxed them into the Room of Thirteen Doors and locked them in forever. If you live in this universe, you’re welcome, and could you spare some change for a fellow American who’s down on his luck? Okay, Bogart said it better than I did, but you get the idea.

The city was still underwater when we killed Candy. No choice. The feds were trucking Lurkers out into the Mojave to a hoodoo Manzanar. So, Julie helped us out. We staged a scene where it looked like she shot and killed Candy. What was another Lurker stiff to the Vigil jackboots? And now I owe Julie and will be working off the debt until she dies or I die or the oceans turn to Jell-­O and Atlantis rises.

You’d think after that, things might smooth out a little. What could be worse than your city underwater, pissed-­off elder gods, and killing your girlfriend? Nothing, you’d say, but if you bet me the farm on it, I’d be asshole-­deep in cotton. You see, a bum wandered into my life around New Year’s. He called himself Death, and who was I to argue? Someone had ripped out his heart and he was still walking around. He wasn’t a zombie because I destroyed all of them (seriously, how about that spare change?) and he definitely wasn’t an ordinary angel. The fucker, who or whatever he is, came to me specifically and asked me to find out who killed him. Me. Like I need more bullshit in my life. Between BitTorrent and video streaming, Maximum Overdrive is about dead. Now I have to drop all that to wet nurse another supernatural shit heel because why?

Because I’m a freak. A nephilim. Half human and half angel. Heaven hates me because I shouldn’t exist and the world hates me because, well, I’m really good at killing things. Yet for some reason, the schmuck asleep in my storeroom thinks I’m a Good Samaritan. When he wakes up, despite what Julie wants, I’m going to skate his ass out the door as fast as I can. I simply do not need crap like this in my life.

What I need is a drink, a week in Mexico with Candy, and tickets for Skull Valley Sheep Kill when they reopen the Whisky a Go Go. I’m not betting on the last two, but I can magically conjure up the first by reaching into my pocket and taking out my flask.

Which is almost empty.

Story of my life. Thanks for listening. Be sure to tip your waitresses on the way out.

PAUL NEWMAN AND Steve McQueen are jumping off a cliff when I get back to Max Overdrive. I recognize the movie immediately. It’s Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, but not any version I’ve seen. Robert Redford is nowhere in sight.

“You like it?” says Maria. Her voice cracks a little, like she only takes it out on special occasions.

Maria is about my height, her skin darker than Allegra’s. She reminds me of a young Angela Bassett if she’d grown up with alley-­cat gutter punks. She’s got a heavy-­gauge ring through her nose and a smaller one in her lower lip. A muscular neck with tattoos of the four elements—­air, earth, fire, and water. Her hair is about shoulder length, dyed sky blue, but with black roots showing, and pulled back in a ­couple of ragged pigtails. Each of her fingernails is painted a different color.

“It’s great, right?” says Kasabian. He’s drumming on the front counter like a beatnik with a pair of new bongos, his metal hand bouncing like silver spiders.

“McQueen was originally supposed to play the Sundance Kid, but the deal fell through,” he says. “Get it? This is the future for the store. Movies that never happened. Dirty Harry with Frank Sinatra instead of Eastwood. David Lynch’s Return of the Jedi. Brando in Rebel Without a Cause. The right ­people will pay a fortune to see this stuff.”

I watch Newman and McQueen trading quips for a ­couple of minutes.

“It’s not the worst idea you ever had.”

“It’s goddamn genius and you know it,” he says. “The next one Maria is getting for us is Alejandro Jodorowsky’s version of Dune.”

I look at Maria.

“Was this his idea or yours?”

She rubs her throat nervously, like she’s not used to being the center of attention.

“Neither,” she says. “It was Dash. Want to meet him?”

“Now we’ve got another partner? How many ­people are we bringing in to this thing? I don’t like surprise guests.”

Kasabian stops drumming and gives me a look.

“Calm down, Frank Booth. Tell him who Dash is before he needs smelling salts.”

Maria reaches into a small clutch bag and pulls something out.

“It’s okay, Stark. He doesn’t want money. He just likes to keep busy. He’s a ghost.”

Christ. I hate ghosts. They’re nothing but trouble.

“I need a drink.”

“Good,” says Maria. “He likes liquor. Bring down a shot for him.”

“Your ghost is a drunk? Fuck me with all this good news.”

I go upstairs and find the Aqua Regia. I refill my flask, pour a shot into a glass, and down it. I fill the glass again and take it downstairs.

“Right there is fine,” says Maria, indicating the counter. I set the shot glass down.

“You don’t have anything to eat, do you?” she says. “Something sweet.”

Kasabian takes a Donut Universe bag from under the counter, removes an éclair, and sets it next to the shot.

I watch as Maria unfolds a black plastic clamshell. An old-­fashioned makeup compact.

“If we’re doing dead-­­people makeovers, the guy in the storeroom can use one.”

“Give it a rest, man,” says Kasabian. “Show an artist a little respect.”

Maria sets the open compact on the counter with the mirror facing the glass and donut. She blows on the mirror and draws a symbol I don’t recognize on the misted glass.

“Are you home, Dash?” she says.

Nothing happens.

But then the mist fades, and a face drifts into view behind the drink and donut. I can’t get a good look at him. A lot of his face is hidden behind the food. He’s a kid, maybe sixteen, with messy blond hair streaked with bright red. He closes his eyes and sniffs. He’s getting high off the food offerings.

“Dash, this is Stark,” says Maria. She moves her hand, letting me know I need to get closer to the mirror so the kid can see me. I don’t really want to get too close. I don’t trust ghosts.

I lean over, but stay on the far side of the food.

“Hey, kid. Thanks for the movie. You have good taste.”

Dash mouths something, but I can’t hear him.

Maria, standing behind me, has been watching the whole thing.

“He says you’re welcome and he hopes to bring more with him next time you meet.”

Next time. Great.

“You read lips,” I say.

Maria nods.

“I learned when I was a girl. Like Dash, some ghosts are shy and will only appear through a looking glass.”

Kasabian shoulders me out of the way and practically sticks his mug in the mirror.

“Hey, Dash. How’s it going?”

The kid’s grin widens. They’ve talked before.

“You working on getting us Dune?”

Dash nods and gives a thumbs-­up.

“Swell. Do it and next time you come by I’ll have a steak dinner waiting.”

Dash shakes his head.

“He’s vegetarian,” says Maria.

“Okay,” says Kasabian. “How about a big salad with croutons and edible flowers?”

Dash nods.

I look at Kasabian.

“Edible flowers?”

“Yeah. Fairuza uses them when she cooks. They’re not bad.”

“If you say so.”

I lean over to the mirror.

“Keep the movies coming and I’ll get you a whole damned wedding cake next time.”

Dash mouths “thanks.”

“Thanks, Dash,” says Maria. “Now everybody knows everybody. Isn’t that nice? I’ll talk to you tonight.”

Dash gives a little wave and drifts out past the edge of the mirror. Maria snaps the compact shut.

“That’s Dash,” she says.

I pick up the shot glass.

“Seems like a nice kid. Thanks for hooking us up.”

Maria puts out a hand as I raise the glass to my lips.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

“Why? What’s wrong with it?”

“Nothing. It’s just that when we present food to Dash, any looking-­glass ghost, he eats the essence of the offering. Don’t worry. The food isn’t poison or anything like that. It’s just a bit empty.”

I look at the glass. Ghost leftovers. Why not? I open up and toss the Aqua Regia back.

Maria was right. It isn’t awful, but it’s not booze anymore. The taste is thin and slightly sour, like the memory of a drink. I take a bite of the éclair. It’s worse. Like Play-­Doh and chalk. I go behind the counter and spit it into the wastebasket.

“Classy,” says Kasabian. “You really know how to impress the ladies.”

“I don’t need etiquette tips from you, Tin Man.”

Maria is tugging on the loose threads of her jacket sleeves again. She’s used to nicer ­people than us.

“What do we owe you for the movie, Maria? We aren’t exactly rolling in cash, you know.”

“Oh, no. It’s not like that,” she says. “I was just hoping you could show me some magic.”

“You’re a witch. What do you think you can learn from me?”

“That’s it. Kasabian said you know different kinds of magic. And that you’re good at improvising spells and hexes.”

“Yeah, I can improvise things. But that’s not what you’re after, are you?”

She looks up from her sleeves.

“No. I want to see Hellion magic.”

“Why?”

“It’s different. I’m curious.”

Her pupils contract almost imperceptibly. She’s lying.

“Maria? What’s this really about?”

She takes a breath and lets it out.

“Some ghosts are angrier than others. They want to get out of where they are. Some are scared. Some are vicious. I’ll want to talk to one like Dash and one of the others will appear. It’s getting worse.”

“Did you ever think about not talking to ghosts? You’re not a Dead Head necromancer. Why bother?”

Her brow furrows.

“They’re my friends. I can’t abandon them. Would you refuse to see a friend because she lived in a bad neighborhood?”

“No. I guess not. But I’m not a ghost expert. Mostly I deal with things I can punch. For ghosts, I’d have to think about it.”

“That’s okay,” she says. “I’d rather have the right answer than a quick wrong one.”

“Okay. But I just started a new job and I kind of have my hands full right now. Let’s maybe talk the next time you come by.”

“Great. Thanks.”

“No. Thank you,” says Kasabian. “I’ll make sure he doesn’t forget.”

Maria puts her handbag under one arm.

“I appreciate it. I’ll come by when Dash gives me your movie.”

“Thanks. You’re always welcome to come by,” says Kasabian, suddenly a fucking diplomat. He and Fairuza broke up a few days ago. Is he already on the prowl? Does Maria know he’s 90 percent machine?

“See you around, Maria,” I say.

She smiles and starts out. Stops.

“Did you know there’s something sprayed on the front of your store?”

“Yeah. I’ll take care of it tomorrow.”

“Okay. Bye.”

Kasabian and I watch the big-­screen monitor bolted to the ceiling for a few more minutes. He was right, of course. The movie has a completely different feel with McQueen playing the Sundance Kid. We could make a mint if we can get more never-­mades like this.

Candy comes in during the closing credits.

“Chihiro?” Kasabian says. “Holy shit.”

She smiles and does a turn.

“You like the new me?”

“You look great. I mean you always looked great, but I think you nailed it this time.”

I take out a Malediction.

“She doesn’t look like Candy. That’s the important thing.”

“Don’t light that cigarette,” she says.

“Why?”

She comes over to me.

“Why this?”

She leans in and kisses me. I kiss her back. It’s been long enough that we’ve been even somewhere safe together that it feels strange and new to hold her. And I’m not used to her being Chihiro yet. It feels a little like I’m cheating on Candy. But she is Candy. This whole thing is going to take a while longer to get used to.

When she lets go of me she steps back and laughs.

“What?” I say.

“You have lipstick all over yourself. Hold it.”

She gets a napkin from the Donut Universe bag and wipes my lips. Which, with perfectly lousy timing, is when Fairuza decides to walk in. She’s a Lurker. A Ludere. Blue-­skinned, blond, and sporting a small pair of Devil horns. She knew Candy for a long time. She played drums in Candy’s band back before she “died.”

Fairuza takes a DVD from her bag and slams it down on the counter. Walks over and slaps me hard enough it feels like hornets are having a hoedown on my cheek.

“Candy’s barely gone you’re already with this little bitch? Fuck you.”

She starts to hit me again, but I get my arm up and her hand glances off.

“Fairuza,” says Kasabian.

She turns and stabs a finger at him.

“And fuck you too for hanging around with this asshole. Is this the bitch he gave Candy’s guitar to? Yeah, I heard about that. Fuck all of you.”

She heads for the door and slams it hard enough I half expect the glass to crack.

Candy takes a step back and hands me the napkin. I wipe the last of the lipstick off my face myself.

“I’ve got to tell her,” says Candy.

“No, you don’t. The more ­people that know, the more dangerous this gets. Let her hate me. I can live with that.”

“Goody for you,” says Kasabian. “What about me? She’s never going to speak to me again as long as I’m here with you two.”

“What are you worried about? I thought you broke up.”

“We did,” he says. “But at least we were friends and . . . I don’t know. Maybe there was some chance of getting back together. Now, though . . .”

I put my hands out like a goddamn preacher.

“No one tells Fairuza or anybody else. We are on thin fucking ice. One mistake and Candy ends up in a federal pen. It’s too much of a risk.”

“What about me?” says Candy. “Okay, some ­people are going to think you’re an asshole for being around Chihiro, but you still get to be you. I’m no one.”

I hadn’t really thought of that.