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Interlude One
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Where the Dead go to Die Smoke Break with Mama Metcalf
SMOKE BREAK WITH MAMA METCALFEmily met Mama Metcalf her third day on the job.Three hours in and overdue for her first break, Emily sought refuge in the courtyard accessible through the break room. Although ‘courtyard’ seemed too fancy a description for the space, which she could tell from peering through the staffroom window was empty except for a weathered picnic table and the woman sitting at it. Emily gripped her fourth coffee of the morning in one hand and gripped the handle with the other.She closed her eyes and in the dark imagined warmer weather greeting her. Sunshine on her face. The smell of wafting barbeque. Yes, the outdoor setting might even pass as halfway inviting mid-year, so long as she ignored the enclosing nine-foot wall, the one fringed with bales of razor-wire.Ignored the dead pigeon snagged in the barbs.The door creaked open. As expected, the day was bitter, but Emily found the frigid air preferable to the antiseptic foulness she was leaving behind, if on
Where the Dead go to Die Intake
INTAKEAfter stowing her coat in the break room, Emily found Woods outside the door to her office, holding a bottle of Yoo-hoo chocolate in her hands. At first glance, her supervisor’s face was stoic. A second pass proved otherwise.Emily detected shards of unease in Woods’ expression, the pointy ends driving in, causing noticeable pain. And she wasn’t doing a good job of hiding it, either. Emily almost asked if she was okay, but snatched the words from the tip of her tongue and tucked them away as though she’d been caught red-handed with something humiliating.What an awful revelation. Discovering someone you’re obliged to respect is human.No matter how passive the mask someone wore, emotions lurked beneath the surface.In some alternate reality, Emily suspected robots must be the ones delivering this line of work. Machines programmed to express dignity and empathy on cue, deflecting care’s heartbreak. Maybe the hospice workers of the future were coin-operated things, little pro
Where the Dead go to Die Interlude Two
INTERLUDE TWOUsing the creases you have made, bring the top three corners of the paper to the bottom. Flatten. After this, fold the top triangular wings into the center and unfold. Finish this set by folding the top of the square downward, and crease. Unfold.“Did you grab the card, babe?” Jordan asked.The look Emily gave her husband said it all: Why of course she’d forgotten to grab the card. It was inside on the study desk where she’d stopped to write the inscription, thinking, So do I make this out to Kevin or his parents? It’s not like a three-year-old is going to read it anyway. He’ll just throw it aside as he rips off the wrapping. Emily couldn’t blame him for that. Lucette, who was the same age, had done a similar thing at her birthday party the month before. And although they often pretended otherwise, adults weren’t so different—everyone knew cards were an overpriced pit stop on the road to the good stuff. But formalities were important.They help trick us into thinking
Where the Dead go to Die Break Down
BREAK DOWN“Mom? Mom?”Emily was on her hands and knees, searching under the bed for her other shoe amongst the dust bunnies and pre-packed suitcases when she heard her daughter’s call. To some degree, she was a bit of a Doomsday Prepper. Of course, anyone who had suffered losses to the outbreak over the past decade would understand. Sure, the Ministry played a pretty song about control measures, which everybody loved to dance to, but in the back of Emily’s mind there was no doubt that it would all come crashing down. One day.If something could happen, it eventually would happen.So Emily Samuels wasn’t ashamed of those three suitcases under the bed—there was pride in batteries and canned sardines, even if the blessed of this cursed shit-hole thought otherwise. Her clumsiness, however, was a different story. That, Emily was not proud of. She’d half-tripped getting into bed the night before and kicked her shoe to Kingdom Come.“Mom!” Not a question this time.“Jesus, Lucette. I’m
Where the Dead go to Die The Last Orphan
THE LAST ORPHANEmily watched Robby breathe.She became conscious of the easy, natural rise and fall of her own chest, so unlike that of the boy’s, whose rib cage fluttered and hitched beneath the sheets. He’d been sleeping so much since the pneumonia had taken hold, a blessing were it not for the nightmares playing out behind those eyes.He twitched. Clenched.Robby’s phlegmy snore filled the room, reminding Emily of the way the generator on her parents’ property sounded after a season of disuse, the rumbling groan as it kicked into gear. The sound used to frighten her as a kid, though she endured it because there was light at the other end. Only the abandoned machine of meat and ambition before her wasn’t starting up. It was winding down. And the only thing Robby would soon know? Darkness.She hoped.Nobody knew if there was consciousness after the climax. Just theories and speculation. She prayed the infected slid into nothingness, an entreaty that left her kneeling at the alt
Where the Dead go to Die Interlude Three
INTERLUDE THREEOpen the highest wing, bring it upwards and press the sides of the paper inwards at the same time. Flatten it down, and again, crease well.Emily pulled the needle through her husband’s skin and yanked the thread. The jack-o-lantern wound pinched inwards, sealed. Jordan flinched, his teeth gritted together. He was on his side, splayed across the couch, which Emily had covered with the plastic tarp they’d used to paint Lucette’s bedroom. Blood pooled in its crinkles. Debris from her makeshift triage surrounded them, all those matted cotton buds, tweezers, gauze, saline solution.An empty bottle of whiskey. They had been saving it for a special occasion.Lucette was locked in her room with enough crayons and toys to keep her occupied. She was happy in there, and wouldn’t be able to hear her father’s groans over the television in the living room. Midday cartoons blared violence as cats mangled dogs with hammers. Only these animated beings didn’t bleed. Just stars and b
Where the Dead go to Die Swearwords and Peanut Butter Cups
SWEARWORDS AND PEANUT BUTTER CUPSLucette sat on the edge of the bed with her hands in her lap, dressed for the day. There had been a time—and not so long ago it seemed—when she did this and her feet didn’t touch the floor. Now they did. This made her sad. Not sad in the way some cartoons did, or like the time the only real friend she’d had, Imogen, moved to New York with her parents. This sadness was new, different from those difficult-to-define barbs she thought of as memories of her father. Lucette missed the way her legs used to swing back and forth, and being unable to do so made her feel older than she wanted to be. She was sad because nobody had asked if she wanted to grow up in the first place.If Mom is anything to go by, being an adult doesn’t look like fun. Getting old means you have to yell a lot and be angry over every little thing.Every fucking thing.Lucette glanced about the room, half expecting the walls of their apartment to split apart, revealing a network of ea
Where the Dead go to Die Corridor 3
CORRIDOR 3Lucette found it almost silly how nervous and excited she was to meet this total stranger. But the very idea of Robby being alone in this place, abandoned by his family, unable to go out in the sun or play with friends, filled her with an aching she couldn’t describe.They passed a woman in a white hospital gown going in the opposite direction, clutching a wheeled metal pole, a bag of clear liquid hanging from the top, a tube snaking down to jab into her arm. Her hair was straw yellow, so thin her sore-covered scalp was visible beneath. She glanced at Lucette, who was being led by her mother, and dipped her head in a slight nod.Lucette nodded back, even as her mother grasped her hand tighter and pulled her close. Farther down the hall, Mama Metcalf came out of one of the rooms, waved at her, then disappeared down an intersecting corridor.This part of the hospice, which was where the sickest of the guests were put, felt different to everywhere else in the facility. Ther
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