Dead Ends

by James M. Barton:

At the metallic click of the doorknob Jack jerked his head toward the heavy oak door.   Outside, a grey shadow appeared through the small stained glass window. Buttoning his suit jacket, he hurried to greet his visitor, his heels echoing a staccato on the marble floor.  Before he reached the door, it cracked open, spilling a golden slash of mid-morning California sunlight across the cavernous anteroom.

A tall man with a deep professional tan tentatively stepped into the room, looking around aimlessly as his eyes adjusted to the dark. His face brightened as he saw Jack approaching him with an open smile. After years of honing his sales skills, Jack sized up the man quickly: early 40s, smelling of money with tailored worsted wool suit, expensive leather shoes, green silk tie arranged in a perfect Windsor knot and the top of Rolex peeking out from his cuff.  Genuine, not a knock-off.  Reaching behind the man, Jack held his head down against the blinding light as pushed the door shut.

He took the man’s hand in a firm grip.  His hand was soft, unformed, like the flesh of a blind cave creature. “Jack McGill. How can I be of service to you, sir?”

“I’m Steve … eh … Smith. Steve Smith.”

Smith’s steel-grey eyes turned downward at Jack’s glance. His bottom lip quivered slightly.

He patted the man’s shoulder lightly. “Mr. Smith, please take a deep breath.” Smith’s cologne was woody with a musky undertone.

Smith exhaled sharply. His stiff posture relaxed.

“That’s it. Breath out.”

“Oh, God. That feels better. Thank you so much.”

Jack gently squeezed his shoulder. “Mr. Smith, how may I help you?”

“Well … eh … Mr. McGill, I understand you provide some unique … eh … private services.”

Jack’s smile flat-lined. His eyes quickly scanned the empty room before they locked back hard onto Smith. “Follow me … Please.”

He entered the white oak-paneled study and pointed at the chair in front of the desk.

“Please take a seat.” Jack took a quick look down the hallway before pushing the door closed, and sat down behind the large mahogany desk.

“What exactly are you enquiring about, Mr. Smith. Or is that your real name?”  Without removing his eyes from Smith, Jack slowly pulled open the right hand drawer.

“Well ….”

“Show me a driver’s license.”  Jack’s fingers crept in the darkness of the drawer until they found the comforting steel of the Walther semi-automatic inside, electric against his fingertips.

“No one said anything about …”

Jack shot up to his feet while keeping his hand on the edge of the open drawer. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Smith. I think you have come to the wrong establishment.”

“Wait … wait ..” Smith dug into his jacket, pulled out an alligator skin wallet, and started to fumble it open.

Jack reached across the desk and snatched away the wallet in one smooth motion.

“Hey!”

Jack removed the driver’s license, and tossed the wallet onto the richly polished desktop. Steve Sarnoff. Sarnoff? A vaguely familiar last name. Old money? The tony address might confirm this. Jack studied the picture, and looked up at Smith. A little more gray at the temples, and some thinning in front. But he was satisfied it was the same man.

He scribbled down the license number on a pad of paper. After flipping it over and glancing at the back, he placed the license on top of the wallet, and carefully handed it back to Sarnoff.

“Thank you for your patience, Mr. Sarnoff. You must realize I have to exercise precautions in this business.” With his right knee he eased the drawer shut.

“Yes. Yes, of course.”

“But you must also know that I have a standard protocol that needs to be followed in all my business transactions.”

Sarnoff sucked at his bottom lip. “I was concerned that your website might be hacked. You hear about these cookies and such. I guess I’m not really comfortable about conducting this kind of business online. I have assistants that normally help me … but I couldn’t very well involve them.”

He sighed. “Okay, Mr. Sarnoff, you are here. But you must understand these arrangements have very tight time constraints.”

Sarnoff looked puzzled.

“You do understand the type of service being provided here, sir?”

“Yes. Yes, of course. The girls …”

“One of the reasons for the website is to put in your requests in advance. There is quite a waiting list, depending, of course, on your personal preferences. You are automatically sent alerts, text message or email, when your order can be filled.”

“All very high tech. But I was hoping for something this week. You see, I am vacationing on the Riviera next week. A second honeymoon of sorts for the wife and me. We’re sailing the yacht on its maiden voyage from Miami.  It’s going to be a long trip …”   He looked up at Jack, flashing a sheepish smile as he shrugged his shoulders. “… with just her.”

“That timing is quite impossible. I have no openings this week.”

“I’ll pay. Make it worth your while. You must know I am good for it.”

“Mr. Sarnoff. It is not just the money. I am a professional. I have clients booked this week that have been waiting for as long as six months. They followed the proper protocols and put their trust in me to honor my agreement with them. My word is my bond.”

“I will double the usual rate …”

“You can’t just buy your way through everything…”

“Triple the rate, then.”

“Mr. Sarn …”

“… Give a rebate back to your clients for their inconvenience. I’m sure they would understand. Give them a free date on me. Or keep the difference yourself. A good business man like you can determine the best allocation of some unexpected funds.”

Sarnoff laced his hands behind his head and leaned back in his chair with a self-satisfied smile.

Jack’s mouth tightened momentarily. He picked up a calculator, rapidly pressed some keys.  Looking at the display, Jack bit down on his inner lip while tapping his finger on the desk. He looked back up at Sarnoff.

“Just to be clear: do you understand the amounts you are talking about?”

”$45,000? But – please — let’s round it up to $50,000. No, make it 60. For your trouble.”

He ran a hand through his brown curly hair at he looked into monitor and clicked a mouse several times.

“Okay, Mr. Sarnoff. But I have only a couple of new girls this week. I’m not sure whether any of them will suit your particular needs.”

“Tell me about them.” Sarnoff rubbed his chin as a long smile crept across his face.

“The first one is prime. Jana.  A fresh arrival just this morning. Redhead. Early twenties. Slender but with C cups. Perky pink nips.”

“Natural?” Sarnoff’s mouth twisted itself into a lopsided grin.

“Natural redhead or breasts?” He leaned closer to Sarnoff, dropping his voice as he twisted his mouth into a practiced  grin.  “Actually, both are natural. A Lindsay Lohan type. But to be clear: let’s just say that there is no carpeting to compare with the drapes.”

“Oh — really?”

He looked over the desk. The tenting of Sarnoff’s trousers already told him that he had closed the sale; but Jack couldn’t resist re-gaining the upper hand on this smirking chimp.

“Dipping into Jana is like savoring that first mouthful of pink cotton candy on a breezy summer day at the beach. How often do we get a chance to recapture those days of our youth?”

“That would – that would work for me – yes.” Sarnoff awkwardly crossed his legs.

Jack reached across the desk and shook his hand firmly.

“I’m sure you will be very pleased with Jana, Mr. Sarnoff.” He removed a card from his shirt pocket. “Make a wire transfer to this account. No later than 6pm local time.”

Sarnoff picked up the card. “Certainly.”

“I can schedule you a play date with Jana tomorrow afternoon. 1:00 PM sound good? You will have all afternoon to get well acquainted with each other.”

Sarnoff nodded his head like a bobblehead doll.

“Meet me at the rear delivery entrance. And please destroy my card afterwards.”

Sarnoff stood up, and looked toward him expectantly.

“Any questions, Mr. Sarnoff?”

“Well, I was wondering if Jana already had the – you know – the procedure.”

He scrunched his forehead. “Procedure?”

“Well – you know – the embalming. Has she already been embalmed?”

After he led Sarnoff to the front door, and shook his sweaty hand, he returned to his desk, and screened the subscription applications on www.deadsexy.com. Jack let out an easy breath. He could have never imagined his life now when he was in mortician’s college. Sure, it wasn’t unknown in the industry for some discrete liberties to be taken with the work. What do you expect when social-challenged, pimple-faced young men with blood serums spiked with high-octane testosterone are suddenly given unfettered access to a female body behind closed doors? But, after a few feverish explorations late into the night, at least most of them worked it out of their system.

When first starting his career, Jack thought he was providing a needed service to his community – a measure of comfort to families in their grief. But try telling that cute hottie in a singles bar that you are a mortician. Watch your fiancée’s parents shoot guarded looks at each other over the dinner table as you explain what you do for a living. And watch, through eyes blurred by tears, your ex-fiancée tell you she needs her space.

He gradually learned that he was nothing but a garbage man. A beloved granny, a parent, or a sweetheart would hit their expiration date; and the next-of-kin would call a stranger to haul away the whole reeking, embarrassing mess. Jack would bundle up the remains of their loved one, paint on a blood-red smiley face, and toss it, like a used condom, into a black hole in the ground.

And if he could monetize some of our long pathetic crawl to the grave, who was to judge? If he was served a shit sandwich, he would take it double-stuft. He would chomp down and savor that pungent flavor, rubbing his swollen belly, smiling as he belched out a loud rumbling burp at the world.

His ex-fiancée was his first.  So many evenings he followed her home, so many calls she left unanswered. Newly married, she insisted against all reason that she had moved on her life.  But in end they all came around. Patience came easily in his business.  A tragic victim of an unsolved homicide, a vicious stabbing that shocked her upscale neighborhood, he reached out to her grieving widower, and kindly offered his services at a discount.  The love of his life had returned to him at last. After becoming reacquainted alone again after so long, as a magnanimous gesture he decided to share his joy with some paying customers.

It was all about the holes: the slick hole we squirm out of, the holes we squirt into, and the holes we fill after the whole piteous parade limps to its inevitable end.  It was a time of moral dead-ends; it was an era of the convulsive drive to that next shuddering orgasm that would never be enough. These were times of a frenzied gouging of that burning, maddening itch that never quite goes away. When every variant has been tried, when every orifice has been rubbed raw and bloody, when threesomes, golden showers, ball gags and scat were no longer enough, what was left to feed the addiction? Only Death remained — with open arms and greedy lips.

The motivation was clear enough in some cases: the usual dead ex-girlfriends or ex-wives, that peaches-and-cream jailbait niece, that bitch-queen boss you would have died to pay your respects to — one-inch-at-a-time, or that neighbor lady with the ripe jugs which you never had the chance to really know.  Death had a way of prying open up opportunities from between reluctant thighs.

But for some others, the motivation was, maybe, more philosophical: a thanatological examination of our own existence as we literally embrace Death, an open and honest confrontation with the greatest of our taboos, and a rare glimpse ahead to that sunny clearing in the woods where our short, sweet journey finally comes to a close.

But perhaps … the real truth was simpler:  Dead girls don’t say no.

Jim Barton is a software developer and complete unrepentant computer geek.  Although he has been writing for a while for his own amusement (and dearly needed right-brain stimulation), he has only recently decided to disinter his stories and let them dance in the light of the living.

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