Good & Dead #1 Read online

  “Always late, Mr. Wallace,” Dr. Rogers sneered at him. The Professor’s 80 years had twisted his flat, gaunt features into a nasty collection of wrinkles.

  I’m doing the best I can, Michael thought bitterly. He was basically ice skating now. He thought about taking off his shoes.

  “18 seconds, Mr. Wallace”, Dr. Rogers said with glee.

  Michael abandoned all attempts at pride and pulled himself down the hall by the window sills, his long legs looking angular and ridiculous as he tried to steady himself. Several people in the classroom could see him now and they were gesturing to others to come over.

  “Go, Michael, go!” Randy shouted from the front of the queue.

  Michael‘s cheap sneakers lost all traction, and he fell spectacularly onto his back, elbows smacking the wet floor and bag spilling its contents in every direction.

  “Come on, man!” Randy shouted, “10!”

  Randy’s energy was infectious. The other students chimed in. “9!”

  Michael tore off his shoes and got to his feet. Charlotte sprinted out of the classroom gracefully and started shoving things into his bag as he got his balance.

  “You’re hopeless,” she smiled, and replaced Advanced Accounting. The harsh winter sunshine streamed through her long hair and gave her an actual halo of brightness. Michael was momentarily stunned as Charlotte handed him his shoes.

  “8, 7!” the class shouted.

  Michael stared down at his mismatched socks. He hopped unabashedly on the wool one. Charlotte shoved a handful of pens into the bag and held out an arm for support.

  “6, 5!” they said excitedly as the odd pair hobbled through the classroom door.

  “Thank you,” Michael said, his face bright red.

  “Sit down!” Dr. Rogers shouted. Michael hurried across the classroom, leaving wet sock prints on the burgundy carpet all the way. “And you, too, Miss Birdwell,” he snapped at Charlotte.

  “All of you, get back to your seats,” he began, “It is time for your midterm exam. As I said before, there is no curve. If you studied,” he said, his eyes sparkling sadistically, “you’ll be fine”.

  “Any cheating will result in the harshest punishment the dean will allow. Mr. Wallace!” he shouted.

  Michael stood immediately, a sudden surge of nausea making his knees buckle. “Yes, sir?”

  “Pass these out,” he held out a heavy stack of tests. Michael rushed to take them from him. “Ms. Birdwell!”

  Charlotte joined Michael at the front of the class.

  He handed her the other half of the tests and pointed to the opposite side if the room.

  Charlotte smiled at Michael. Michael smiled back. Randy coughed loudly.

  “Go!” Dr. Rogers shouted, marching over to his desk. “The test begins now. You have two hours.”

  Michael passed out his half of the tests as quickly as possible. He could feel his blood race each time he and Charlotte met in the middle of the rows. He didn’t dare look up at her.

  When Michael returned to his seat with his test, his nausea increased. He took off his scarf, feeling very dizzy. He steadied himself and took off his jacket, too, laying both of them on the back of his chair.

  He stared down at his paper. The whiteness of it seemed like a spotlight to his pounding head. He sat and tried to focus.

  Remember the formulas. He picked up his pencil to write the formulas on the margin like he always did. His vision seemed to swim in and out of focus. He stared hard at the paper.

  I can’t believe I’m here, trying to do this after what happened.

  No. Nothing happened. Think about it. You’re not hurt. What you think you remember couldn’t have happened. Focus on the test. Deal with this after.

  He scratched the first mark on his paper and almost cried out in alarm at a deafening sound. He looked up, startled. Everyone was glued to their papers. No one had even looked up once. He felt that his head would split open from the sheer volume of it.

  Then it stopped. Everything was normal again. What the hell? Everyone was working at the problems, unbothered.

  “Mr. Wallace,” called out Dr. Rogers, “Keep your eyes on your paper! Do you really want to press your luck?”

  Michael returned to his test. He picked up his pencil and began to write. This time he really did cry out, and covered his ears with both hands, shutting his eyes against the pain. But he couldn’t shut out the sound. It was an earsplitting scratching noise. He tried to think through the pain; it was like a million rats in the walls or- or pencils on paper.

  Michael could hear the pencils moving on the paper louder than any percussion band.

  He opened his eyes. Several students were staring at him.

  “Mr. Wallace!” Dr. Rogers called angrily.

  Michael couldn’t help it. He yelped again. He wanted to escape the sounds—the pencils, the phones vibrating, the buzzing of the iridescent lights overhead, and the shouting professor. Every movement from every chair was clear as a bell and horrifically magnified.

  He saw Randy get to his feet in the next row.

  “Sit down!” yelled Dr. Rogers.

  Michael got to his feet and stumbled down the aisle toward the closed classroom door.

  He rushed past everything- all he could think of was getting away from the sound.

  “Michael!” Randy shouted in alarm.

  “Are you okay?” the nearest student asked.

  Then it started to ease off. He could hear everything alarmingly well, but it wasn’t deathly loud. For a moment everything was back to normal. The sound swam in and out of his head like he was under water. “It’s…” Michael choked out, bent over by the door, “…migraine.”

  That was all Michael could think of. When he was a boy he was plagued with migraines every month, sometimes every week. They stopped him from getting out of bed, they made him throw up. This was nothing like that. This was a thousand times worse than that, but it was all he could think of.

  His head now buzzed with a new sensation. It was like being led blindfolded into a candle store and being knocked down by all the smells unexpectedly. He doubled over with nausea and he threw up right there on the carpet. Then he fell over, trying to hold his stomach and his head at the same time.

  Randy was at his feet in a moment, and even Dr. Rogers was hobbling over.

  “Get him to the doctor,” he said to Randy after a glance at Michael’s ashen complexion.

  “Yes,” Randy said urgently, lifting Michael to his feet. “Wait—Charlotte! You still have my keys!”

  Michael saw Charlotte running toward them from the top tier of the lecture-style classroom, rifling through her bag. In a panic, she threw Randy his keys.

  Randy was almost fully supporting Michael, and the keys were coming at them. Charlotte yelled “Sorry!” even as they flew off the mark toward the back of Michael’s bobbing head. Michael braced himself-

  Then he caught them.

  Everyone looked at him blankly; mouths hanging open. Michael was slumped over on Randy, yet still, unaccountably, tightly gripping the keys. Michael was as shocked as anyone. He stared at his hand for what seemed like minutes.

  The spell was broken as Michael threw up again, little chunks of pineapple dribbling down his shirt in a stream of stomach acid.

  Randy rushed him out the door, as Dr. Rogers yelled at the rest of the students to get back to work.

  Randy shut the door, and the sound slammed into him like a bus.

  “How the hell did you catch these?” Randy wondered aloud, taking the keys from Michael and getting a better hold on him.

  “I have no idea,” Michael said. The warmth of the sunlight eased the pain in his head. He looked out the window and squinted into the light, shocked that he could be feeling so much better so fast. “I have no idea what is happening.”

  “What are your symptoms, man? I hope it’s not contagious,” Randy joked.

  “Um…” Michael thought about it. Crazy intense hearing, crazy sense of sm
ell, no injuries from whatever did happen last night…. “I don’t know,” he said again.

  “Let’s get you to the hospital,” Randy said.

  Michael did not want to go to the hospital. He had been stupid to come to class. He had to face it. There had been a dead woman in the alley. What the hell happened last night? His head raced and ached.

  I have to find out. I have to get to the alley. What happened to her? What happened to me?

  “Hey,” he said, pulling away from Randy’s grip, “I’m feeling much better.”

  “What? No,” Randy said with a smile, “You’re not getting out of this.”

  “No, really-” Michael began.

  “You have to go to the hospital,” Randy said, half amused, “I bet you’d see the doctor if Charlotte was the one taking you.”

  No he would not. Hours alone with her in a silent and tense waiting room covered in his own vomit? No thank you.

  “It’s not the doctor thing—I really am feeling better,” Michael said.

  “It looks like a concussion to me,” Randy said, “Say supercali…fragilisticexpi…scious.”

  “You can’t even say it right,” Michael chided.

  “Say it,” Randy ordered.

  “Supercilifragilisticexpialidocious. See? No concussion.”

  “Michael,” he said, taking him by the elbow and pulling him toward the exit, “your eyes are red and watering. You look terrible. There is vomit all over your shirt, and your skin is—” he began, reaching his thick arm up to Michael’s forehead, “ice cold. That’s weird.”

  Randy held the door open and pointed outside threateningly. A bitter wind whipped hard snow past the door and Randy had to strain to keep the door open. “You’re going. Period.”

  “If I was so sick could I do this?” Michael asked, and sprinted through the open door.

  “Big deal,” Randy said, following him out and directing him across the frozen lawn.

  “I really am feeling better,” Michael said seriously.

  “Really?”

  “I really am.”

  “Prove it,” Randy said, looking around to the tall classroom windows encircling the courtyard, “put your left foot in.”

  Michael looked at the windows. Several bored students stared at them across the frozen grass.

  “Are you serious?”

  “I guess you’re not feeling better, then,” he said, taking Michael’s elbow again.

  Michael jerked out of his grasp, and sighed. He put his left foot in.

  “Put your left foot out,” he said, smiling. Michael obeyed.

  “Now back in,” Randy said, holding his hands up like a puppet master. “Well, shake it all about.”

  Michael obeyed. His gangling arms and legs made him look like an old-fashioned marionette.

  “Now the right foot,” Randy said with glee.

  “Alright, that’s enough!” Michael glanced at the windows nervously.

  They stood in the middle of the windswept yard, Randy shivering without his coat. Michael realized he had left his jacket and scarf back in the classroom, yet he felt perfectly temperate. It could have been summer. His fingers and ears were exposed, yet they weren’t stinging like they should be in New York in late October.

  “Maybe it was just that room-temperature ham on my pizza last night. Look, I have my cell phone,” Michael said, pulling it out of his jeans pocket, “You can call to check on me when you get out of the midterm.”

  Randy looked conflicted. He ran his chubby hands through his sandy hair and shivered.

  “You’ll freeze without your coat anyway,” Michael said.

  Randy waved that away. “I’m well thermalated.”

  “You really need to take the test,” Michael pressed.

  Randy pursed his lips. “Will you go to the doctor?” he asked.

  “No. I am going to go home and rest, though,” he lied.

  “Alright. But you better answer your phone.”

  “I will, I promise,” he said, already walking away, “Good luck on the test.”

  “Thanks!” Randy yelled after him. “If he even lets me back in now!”

  4

  Michael picked nervously at the fraying seam in his belt buckle and stared out the window of the cab, wishing they would go faster and slower at the same time. He was glad that the white-haired driver was silent. Small talk was the last thing he wanted right now.

  The sound of the traffic was deafening, and his hearing kept swimming in and out with intensity. One moment everything seemed normal, and the next he could hear so many cars honking from so far away that it seemed like one constant assault of noise. Michael was afraid of what might happen next.

  I’ll just go see if there is anything in the alley. Maybe it’s nothing.

  But if there isn’t anything then how will I figure out what happened? Michael shut his eyes. His stomach lurched as the cab rounded a corner. Red and blue lights flashed into the blackness of his vision.

  “I don’t think you’re going in,” said the cabbie.

  Michael opened his eyes. There were three cop cars blocking the tiny theatre parking lot and alley. A tall, angry looking man was putting up the ‘crime scene’ tape and scowling at everyone. There were uniformed cops gesturing up and down the street, as well as a few pedestrians straining to see into the alley where several plainclothes cops stood with solemn faces, making notes on their reports.

  Michael cursed under his breath.

  “You want me to stop?” asked the cabbie cautiously, “Or keep going?”

  “Go, go!” he said, clutching his stomach and trying not to do anything to make the old cab smell worse.

  Michael glanced up at the mirror. The driver looked away quickly. I’m not good at this, Michael thought desperately, I don’t even like cop shows.

  What happened? He tried to remember everything he could about the previous night. Charlotte had hugged him. He didn’t have any trouble remembering that. Then he came outside, and…there had been a green shoe. He remembered seeing fireworks, and he wished he didn’t remember the woman’s face. But that was all he could picture.

  “Sir?” the cabbie cleared his throat after several minutes of traffic, “The meter is running.”

  “Yeah, sorry,” Michael told him his address.

  “Uh huh,” he replied. Great. If the cops ask, he can tell them where I live.

  They didn’t speak on the short ride to Michael’s apartment. When they arrived, Michael gave him the largest bill he had on him. “Keep the change,” he said pleadingly.

  The driver didn’t respond, except to peel away from the curb and leave Michael coughing on exhaust. He turned and stared up at his apartment building, with its narrow brick façade and chipping lead paint on the windows. His limbs felt heavy; his brain even heavier. It took a minute for him to realize he wasn’t moving. Needing to pee shook him out of his stupor. He climbed the first of three flights of stairs wearily. His phone rang as he reached his door.

  “Hello?”

  “Michael,” Randy said on the other end, “Are you alive?”

  “Yes.” Michael put his key in the rusty old lock and began the process of pulling up and down on the squeaky doorknob just right so it would open.

  “Are you just now getting home?” Randy asked.

  Michael winced. “Yeah,” he said, trying to think of some excuse for his losing nearly an hour of travel time. “I…had trouble finding a cab.”

  “…Okay,” Randy said. Michael listened as the silence between them dragged on. He hated lying to Randy, but he really didn’t want to tell him the truth...at least not until he figured out what the truth was.

  “I had to get some groceries,” he added as he shut the door and hurried to the bathroom.

  His apartment was mainly one large room, the only door leading to the closet-sized bathroom. He had a small metal table (which was really meant for a patio) with one faded office chair serving as his desk, and a tiny half wall of a kitchen with a frid
ge that Michael suspected had been there since the building was built in the 50’s. Next to the door he had a closet of sorts; a hotel-style clothes rack on wheels and a hat rack that the previous tenant left behind. Other than that, he just had his bed, which took up most of the space. Everything, including the kitchen sink, sat under a layer of dirty clothes or graded papers or food wrappers.

  “Alright, man,” Randy said slowly, “I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

  “Thanks,” Michael said, feeling guilty, and trying to unzip his pants with one hand. “Did Dr. Rogers let you back in?”

  “Barely,” he said, laughing. “By the time I got back he was already half convinced it was some elaborate cheating method. Are you going to make it to the show tonight?” Randy asked.

  “I’m not sure we’re going on tonight.”

  “What? Why not?”

  Ah, crap. I’m terrible at secrets. “You didn’t hear? There are cops all over the place. I think something happened after the show last night,” Michael said vaguely, trying not to sound too informed.

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah, I heard they were taping off the whole street,” Michael said. “Hey, I’ve really got to pee,” he added.

  “I don’t care. Tell me what happened.”

  “I don’t know—” he said, urinating, “Hey, I’ve got another call coming in.”

  “Okay,” Randy said, “I’ll talk to you later.”

  Michael answered the other call without looking at the number. “Hello?”

  “Michael?” Charlotte asked.

  Michael nearly missed the toilet. He couldn’t stop now. He tried to pee quieter, but found that was actually not possible.

  “What’s that sound?” she asked.

  “Uh…leaky faucet,” he said badly, “What’s up?”

  “I had to cancel the show tonight,” she said sadly.

  “Oh, why?” Michael asked, relieved that the noise had stopped. This is the worst day.

  “A woman was murdered in the alley last night,” she said. Michael’s heart sank. She had been really real. And she really was dead.