“Sit down, Francis.” Doris slams her hands on the table and stares at him.
“No. I will not.” Francis walks toward the front of the room, closer to where we are standing. “What I’m guessing that Doris did not tell you, Naomi, is that this job carries the highest risk of all. You have to stay in this position for a minimum of twenty years as counted by the living. Once the twenty years passes, you only have the equivalent of what would be about one week of living time to find your own replacement. If you can’t find someone within that time to take the position, you are in the position for another ten years. If it doesn’t work out that time, the next term is five years. That’s as short as the terms get.”
“Why is that so bad?” Naomi asks softly.
“Because once the commitment clock starts over, if anyone you love and/or you’re related to happens to become a suicide soul after that point, he or she will be sent straight to Oblivion. We don’t know why, but that’s what happens.” Francis looks down as he speaks as if it’s his fault.
“There’s no need to ask you why you didn’t tell me, Doris. How many people did you lose after you missed your first go-round?” I ask.
Doris looks down for a split second in what could be remorse. But that’s a little hard to believe with her. Maybe it is remorse, remorse for the people she lost. Not for lying to me.
“Two. My father was the first one.” She looks up at me and continues, “He was very old by then. He struggled and struggled to open the bottle of pills that he took to keep his joints moving. It took him almost an hour. By then he had nothing left. So, he swallowed the entire bottle. The second one was my cousin’s son. Barely even related to me, but I knew him when he was a baby and I loved him dearly. He had been rejected one too many times on the audition circuit. He was meant to be a famous actor. At least that’s what he thought. He slit his wrists in the bathtub. Just like your Greg. It was a very messy affair.”
“What are you going to do?” Luke asks with his hand on my arm.
“I don’t have a choice. Do I, Doris?”
“No, my dear. You do not. You’ve made the commitment.” Doris sits at the conference table and motions for me to do the same. “It would be terribly imprudent for you to go back on it.”
I sit down and ask, “Can you please stop taking spaces away from them right now? You owe me.”
“Owe you? I’m not so sure about that. This job does carry some hefty perks.” Doris taps on the folder on the table. It’s Dylan’s file. Dylan is her hefty perk.
“What can I do to prove myself, Doris?” Luke asks. “I’m running out of time.”
“Well, you have to make a sacrifice. Something that’s not easy for you,” Doris says.
“I don’t see how this is helpful,” Francis says.
“I don’t see how that’s any of your business,” Doris says. She narrows her eyes at Francis, and I swear she growls.
The smell of sulfur fills the air. At first, I think I’m the only one who notices. But then everyone else is looking around and sniffing, too. It’s odd to see everyone sniff like that. It’s not something that happens around here.
Doris stands and her eyes dart around the room.
“Wait!” Ernesto says too late. Doris is already gone.
An oppressive heat fills the room followed by a toe curling-chill.
The smell grows stronger, and I can tell by the look on the mentors’ faces that whatever is happening is not good.
“We should all get out of here right now,” Edith says. Her voice is softer than I expected.
Before I can ask questions, two more people are in the room.
“Edgar?” His once pristine suit is covered in soot and ripped at the seams. His face appears to be smeared in ashes and his skin looks drawn and bruised, or at least his illusion of skin.
I stare at him so long I forget to look at his companion.
“Who’s that?” Luke whispers loud enough for the entire room to here. Whispering at the right level is impossible here.
“You!” Tony points at me. He’s as disheveled as Edgar.
“You two know each other?” Luke asks.
“He was Doris’ husband.”
“Oh, we know each other. She sent me to Oblivion.” Tony is also covered in soot. His red hair sticks up everywhere, and it looks like one of his eyebrows was singed off.
“Is that true?” Luke asks.
“It’s true,” I say. “It was the only way to save you, Louisa, and Nolan.”
Luke pulls a chair from the conference table and sits down. He puts his elbows on the able and rests his face in his hands.
“I had to do it, Luke.” I cross my arms and jut out my chin, my best effort at righteous indignation.
Luke looks up and says, “I know. But what if it was for nothing?”
“I’m not going back.” Tony walks toward me with an evil look in his eye that rivals Charles Manson’s. “It’s your turn to go now, bitch.”
“Get the fuck out of my face,” I say. Tony’s mouth drops open and he backs up a few paces.
“Wait. You made it back. There’s no reason to get revenge,” Ernesto says.
“You don’t know what it’s like there, man,” Edgar says. “Not that I’m saying that Tony should harm Naomi. But it’s terrible.”
Ernesto asks, “How did you guys come back?”
“We were sent back to collect Doris. She isn’t meant to get another chance. She violated the ethics code,” Edgar says.
“Sent back by whom?” Greg asks. I had forgotten that he was in the room.
Both Edgar and Tony look at each other then look down.
“Hades,” Edgar says.
“As in the Greek god?” Greg asks. His eyes are alight with mirth. I forgot how nerdy he could be sometimes. It was one of my favorite things about him.
“Yes. Apparently, the Greeks had some of this stuff right.” Edgar sits next to Luke. His eyes still have a startled, haunted look.
“Or whoever that guy is renamed himself after the mythology.” Greg punctuates his thought by pointing into the air.
Edgar shakes his head and says, “Either way, I don’t want to go back.”
“It wasn’t nothingness?” Luke asks.
“No.” Edgar looks to the table and continues, “You know what it felt like when the Shadow found us?”
“You know I do,” Luke says. He puts his hand on Edgar’s back.
“It’s like that times a hundred. Freezing cold and burning hot, no air but prolonged gusts of wind, despair. So much despair.” Edgar brings his hands to his face and rubs his cheeks.
“But worse than that,” Tony says.
A quiet falls over the room.
“We have to find Doris,” Edgar says.
“He’s right. Greg what number are you at now?” Ernesto asks.
Greg pulls the letter from his pocket and says, “267.” He stuffs the letter back in his pocket without looking up from his shoes.
I am concentrating on Doris with everything I have, but she doesn’t appear.
Chapter 28
Stupid, stupid Naomi. Why did I fall for Doris and her mother act? My first instinct about her was right but I still fell for it. I guess I can chalk this to an afterlife lesson. Don’t mistake flattery for honesty.
“I think she’s gone. She has to appear if we’re all trying to summon her. Unless it’s too late.” Ernesto puts a hand on Greg’s shoulder and looks down.
“Too late?” I ask. “What does that mean for Greg and Luke?”
“I’m on number 271.” Luke’s voice shakes.
“There is a way. I think. I don’t know anyone who has actually tried it but there is something we can do.” Ernesto looks up with a finger in the air from his eureka moment.