Dead Red - M.R. Forbes Page 0,1

to get back to my feet. Of course, the steps made a racket the moment I moved my weight.

"Shhh," Prithi said, glancing up at the bedroom window. "My folks barely tolerate you as it is. You wake them up, they're going to find a new tenant first thing in the morning."

"I don't know why they hate me so much," I said, moving more carefully now. I managed to get back to my feet with a minimum of complaints from the stairs.

Prithi crossed her hands over her chest as if she just realized she ran out of the house in her underwear. "They think you're creepy."

"I am creepy."

I had terminal cancer. I was in a perpetual state of dying. Grey skin that rested tight against my skeleton, no hair anywhere to speak of. Creepy came with the territory.

"You're also two months behind on the rent."

I reached into one of the pockets of my trench coat. I pushed my hand past the small pistol hidden there and found a wad of cash. I pulled it out and tossed it up to her. "Not anymore, thanks to you. That job you helped me set up paid off. Should keep a roof over my head for another month or two."

Prithi had to move her hands to catch the money. She did it awkwardly, trying to use just her wrist to keep herself covered. It was a disaster. The cash landed on the grass in front of her, and she bent over to pick it up without thinking. I was nice enough to turn my head before she fell out of the shirt.

"Shit," she said, rushing to cover herself up.

The light when on upstairs.

"Oh crap," Prithi said. "Damn it, Conor. Move." She came towards me, hopping the steps with practiced expertise. Then she shot by, exaggerating her steps as if to say, "Go this way, don't fuck it up again."

I followed behind her. She pushed the door open without making a sound, and we both ducked inside. If Bindi had seen us... I listened for a moment, expecting to hear her pounding down the steps, coming to scream at both of us for whatever she assumed I was doing with her daughter.

Of course, she didn't know Prithi was gay.

"I'm sorry, P," I said. "Tough night." My legs were still shaky, my lungs still burning.

She turned to face me. At first, she was stoic and serious. When the mob didn't show up to torch Frankenstein, she started laughing.

"You looked like an idiot laying there like that."

"What do you think you look like?" I asked. She'd forgotten her near-nakedness in the run. She put her hands back over her chest.

"You didn't look."

"I'm an asshole. I'm not desperate."

"What's that supposed to mean? You don't want to see?"

"Even if I did, what would be the point? You don't like guys, and I couldn't even if I wanted to. If I just want to check out a pair, I've got the internet."

She sighed and shook her head. "You're impossible."

"No, I'm creepy."

She laughed again, and then bypassed my shitty old sofa to get to the inner door out of the basement. I stared at her ass while she did so she wouldn't get too offended. She spun back on me when she reached the door. I looked away.

"I saw that."

"You were supposed to."

"Get some sleep, Conor. I might have another job lined up."

I waved her off. She vanished out the door, and I listened for her feet on the stairs. Once they faded out to nothing, I shrugged off the coat and dropped myself onto the couch. I grabbed one of the pillows, held it over my mouth, and let go of the hack I'd been holding the whole time. It lasted a couple minutes, hurt like hell, and left a nice splotch of blood on the linens.

At least I was quiet.

TWO

Dinner at seven

My dreams were rough, as always. I saw my ex-wife, Karen, and our daughter, Molly. I heard the laughter, the maniacal laughter that had come from everywhere when Dannie's corpse had popped back up on its own to sling threats at me. A moment later, a dark shape appeared and tore them both to pieces.

That was when I woke up sweating, the same as I had every night since I'd buried Dannie. It wasn't normal. It wasn't natural. I had pushed too hard on the boundary and pissed off the wrong guy. He'd been pushing back since.

I swung my legs off the couch so I could sit up.