DEATHLOOP Page 7

  As the silence persisted, if anything getting louder, the atmosphere unbearable, Sam got up and without saying a word to anyone took Zack by the hand and led him from the room. Sharon Pearce was a little surprised to see Sam leading Zack out of Geoff’s office like this, glancing through the open doorway she stepped inside.

  “Is everything all right, Mr Turner? The sandwiches have arrived…” she said, now noticing water all over the place, “oh dear, had a little bit of an accident have we?”

  Downstairs, Betty and Patrick noticed Sam leading Zack by the hand out of the lift, across reception to the revolving doors and to the street outside and both, in their own way thought it quite peculiar.

  Patrick had given up finding things in London surprising. He had told his wife Genevieve in his letters that things were so much more complicated in London. “A very different kettle of fish to Awka Etiti,” were his exact words. But he was still a practicing Christian, and he knew God understood that he was forced to engage in social intercourse with these heathens in order to make ends meet. He told Genevieve that during his prayers, God had said to him: “Unfortunately, because of pressing economic considerations there is nothing you can do about it for the time being, Patrick, you just have to go with the flow.”

  For her part, Betty had always wondered about Mr Stein and Mr Fortune, and to see them like this, hand in hand, seemed to confirm it. It got Betty thinking about this Jason boy. He certainly looked like one of those rent boys come to think of it, and there was no telling what those characters got up to. Betty had thought she was immune from all that sort of unpleasantness here in the city, which was one of the reasons she worked as far away from her council estate in Essex Road as she could. She would have a word with Geoff Turner about all this because it was getting out of hand, Geoff Turner would know what to do.

  CHAPTER 8

  In Zack’s bedroom Sam helped Zack get undressed, pulled back the covers and made him get into bed. Sam had done this many times before and he liked to think it had always worked a treat.

  “Sam, I don’t want to get into bed, I don’t need to.”

  “Shut up,” said Sam, pulling the duvet over him.

  “Sam, this is madness, I’m not ill.”

  “No?”

  “I’ve just committed professional suicide, I know that, but I’m not ill.”

  Zack felt cooped up in bed and wanted to get out of it, but he knew Sam would not allow it because Sam had done this countless times before when Zack had been drunk, stoned, obsessing about some girl, or sometimes when he was just being a pain in the arse and driving everyone nuts. “Listen mate, you shoot off,” said Zack, keen to escape from his incarceration, “not a good idea for both of us to get fired.”

  “No way, let’s talk this thing through,” said Sam, sinking into the little bedroom chair, his arms folded, looking like he was going nowhere. “So what’s your theory, come on, you first.”

  “God, I don’t know,” said Zack, with a weary sigh. “Maybe Susan’s put a curse on me, or maybe she’s teamed up with my entire back catalogue and they’ve all put a curse on me.”

  Sam found this explanation very touching. Zack had this weird contradiction when it came to women. Sam had once called him a romantic bastard which Zack agreed was just about right. He was very old fashioned in many ways, a gentleman in fact, until he wanted out of a relationship that is, then he became a monster, tossing women aside like old crisp packets.

  “Remember that girl, what was her name?”

  “I knew you were going to bring her up… Amber.”

  “Writing ‘Zack Fortune is a fucking shit’ in large letters on the side of the science block, she must have been so thick.”

  “She was thick,” said Zack.

  “First thinking that she was telling anyone anything they didn’t already know…”

  “Well thanks for that, I appreciate it…”

  “And secondly, thinking it would destroy your reputation. As it was, your reputation shot off into the stratosphere from whence it never came down.”

  This was absolutely true. Zack had always been mighty grateful to this girl especially as the janitors couldn’t get the paint off for two weeks. Every chemical they tried failed to budge Amber’s heartfelt message to the world, which meant that all the first year students, recently arrived, were wild with curiosity about this Zack Fortune, and consequently a complete pushover. (Justin Dunsmore told everyone that he could have knocked up a chemical that would have got the graffiti off in seconds flat but as he very much shared Amber’s sentiments at the time, he refused to do anything about it.)

  The day before, when Sam had told Clarissa about Zack’s encounter with the suicide, she looked very anxious, although said nothing, then slipped off into the kitchen to start dinner. A few minutes later Sam went to find her and asked her what was up. Finally, Clarissa admitted to Sam that Zack had stormed out half way through their session which was absolutely the worst thing he could have done.

  “So what does that mean exactly?” asked Sam, irritated at having to discuss this madness.

  “I thought you didn’t believe in all this.”

  “I don’t, it’s hogwash, but if my best friend has been knocked off course in some peculiar way with all this bunkum, I’d like to hear about it.”

  “I knew you’d blame me,” said Clarissa.

  “Listen, neither Zack nor I thought this regression thing a good idea…”

  “Exactly, you didn’t believe in it, now suddenly you do.”

  “I don’t. It was a question, that’s all. And if you are going around doing this to people, whatever it is, don’t you think you should have some kind of understanding of the risks involved?”

  “But according to you and Zack, there can be no risks,” yelled Clarissa, “because the whole thing is complete crap! I told Zack not to come out of the hypnosis himself and he did just that, so now I’m getting it in the neck. Typical!”

  Clarissa let out a roar of frustration, flounced out and barged into her office making sure that even from the kitchen, Sam could hear her noisy dramatic sobs.

  “Has Clarissa said anything?” said Zack, casually.

  “Not really…”

  “Come on, what?”

  “Well, what was the crack with that anyway? You looked quite… distracted when you got back to the office, Rose was a bit concerned.”

  This surprised Zack. He thought he’d done a fair job of covering it up but perhaps he hadn’t. “So what did Clarissa say exactly?”

  “Just that you freaked out a bit, barged off, and she told you not to do that or something…”

  “That’s right, but with all due respect, mate, I find your flat a little claustrophobic at the best of times.”

  “Pity me having to go back there every night. Anyway, look, let’s forget all that, it’s complete bollocks.”

  “So what do you think it is? Or could be…”

  “It could be a blowback to ‘The Third Way’.”

  “I wondered about that. You think so?”

  “It’s a possibility.”

  Zack had never dwelt on life and death too deeply, he had tried to stuff it to the back of his mind because frequently on acid trips he found himself going off in the direction of God, creation and the universe and it spooked him. Once, after a particularly vicious trip he became obsessed with outer space. The human mind cannot conceive of absolute infinity he concluded, but neither can we imagine the universe ending or stopping suddenly, after all what would encase it? A brick wall? A giant fence? So, if neither explanation was feasible – what else? There had to be something else… The Third Way.

  This terrified Zack for a while, and for ages he went round talking about ‘The Third Way’ at every opportunity, driving everyone mad. He would ask people all the time “What is The Third Way? Have you heard about it? Tell me if you have, I need to know.” It was about this time Sam destroyed his stash, and in many ways it was a relief, this ‘Third Way’ thing w
as beginning to dominate his waking hours and he was glad to be shot of it.

  Did Zack think there was another dimension, another plane, another existence? Not really, but he had often thought that the thing about death and dying, the possibility of an afterlife, reincarnation and the whole nine yards was that by their very nature, these notions and their connotations extended way beyond our own quite restricted imagination, and just because they were outside our ken didn’t necessarily render them invalid. After all, the most eminent minds on the planet were still trying to work out exactly how black holes ate stars so it was hardly surprising that the common man had trouble with the concept of eternity.

  A girl had once said to him that she thought life was just a random series of events, but because civilization could not function in a random way, we had to impose our organization onto it, and so it was with death, we had to put it into a context, thrash out theories of where exactly we all went off to in order for life to make any sense at all.

  “These deaths actually happened, Sam, I didn’t imagine them.”

  “Okay, but how about you conjured up a more personal connection than there really was.”

  “You mean these people died and I came across them but they didn’t call out my name? But why would I do that? Because of some remnant of an acid trip that hasn’t been flushed from the system? That’s just as weird, isn’t it?”

  “Maybe it’s all over,” said Sam, cheerfully, “after all Geoff wasn’t dying, he wasn’t begging you to help him in any way… well he was, he wanted your report but let’s leave that to one side for a moment.”

  Zack groaned. “The Wahlbergs as well, I certainly pick my moments.”

  “Well yes, telling your boss in front of the biggest players in the city that he’s a demon and chucking a water jug at him is probably not the best way to further your career as a corporate lawyer, although hey… conventional behaviour is overrated in my book.”

  The enormity of what Zack had done suddenly hit him. More than that, good old Sam had moved mountains to get him the job at Nyman’s - and how does he repay him? By assaulting the boss. “So what do I say Sam, I can’t think of how to explain it.”

  Zack’s mobile rang out its Dambusters march from the other side of the bed. He snatched at it and rejected the call. Veronica would ring back again, but he was pleased that she was ringing at all.

  “I’ll think of something,” said Sam, “leave it to me.”

  “Yes but will he buy it?”

  “We can but try, old mate, we can but try.”

  As Sam made his way back from Zack’s flat to the office he mulled over his options, none of which inspired him with much confidence. The suggestion of mental health problems which was the most obvious explanation was not desperately helpful to a career in the city. Drug addiction, alcohol abuse? Perhaps, people were more sympathetic these days, but Geoff was as straight as they come and Sam knew the very idea would freak him.

  Stress was a possibility although everyone knew Zack Fortune did not do stress, he’d said as much often enough so Sam realised he would have to be very inventive to dig Zack out of this particular hole. If he said the wrong thing it would be curtains (if it wasn’t already), and that would be disastrous. Sam knew what Zack was like with time on his hands and it was no exaggeration to say that the devil was writ large in that scenario. Zack needed the continuity and the discipline of work, especially now when for the first time in years it seemed that things had gone a little awry. Also, he had sold Zack very hard to Geoff, so anything untoward was likely to undermine his own position in the company and he really could do without that. Sam was a grafter and he certainly earned his money, but he struggled with all those things that Zack had in spades: enterprise, cunning, imagination, flair, instinct, originality, nerve. Sam was acutely aware of his own limitations, unlike Zack, Sam was one of many and therefore dispensable.

  News of Zack’s ‘queer turn’ travelled mighty fast up and down the floors of Emerson Buildings. Despite Zack treating everyone from tea boy up with professional politeness people were jealous of him, of course they were. Women were jealous because they knew they were not beautiful enough for Zack Fortune, and men were jealous because the guy was just too good to be true - a freak of nature almost. So for Zack to blot his copy book like this was great news. Even people from the insurance company on the first floor were discussing it with relish. Good, they all thought, not so perfect after all, Zack Fortune.

  As Sam stepped out of the lift on the 9th floor and walked into Nyman’s reception area the atmosphere settled over him like a fog. People would not hold his gaze, walking past him swiftly with rather awkward smiles as he made his way to Geoff’s office. Patrick and Gus had taken the conference table down and stored it in the basement ready for next time, so when Sam knocked and walked in Geoff looked miles away, perched at his desk at one end of the room, and self-consciously, Sam had to cross the enormous gulf between them which seemed to take an age.

  “Sit down, Sam,” said Geoff, managing to sound avuncular and threatening at the same time. “I presume you have come here with some sort of explanation and I’ll tell you now, it had better be good.”

  Sam took his seat and cleared his throat, and looked up at Geoff levelly enough. “Zack has not been too well for the last few days, Geoff.”

  “You don’t say.”

  “You know about the suicide?” Geoff made the barest nod followed by a listless shrug. “Well, last night he was witness to another death.” Geoff’s eyes widened briefly indicating a sense of disbelief. “In both cases he felt he should have been able to help these people, and his inability to do that hit him hard.”

  You have got to hand it to this guy, thought Geoff, he pulls out all the stops for this crony of his, every damn time.

  Not long after Sam had come to work at Nyman’s, Geoff had become irritated by Sam pushing Zack’s name forward at every opportunity as someone Nyman’s could not live without. In the end, he found the whole thing embarrassing and decided not to have anything to do with this Zack Fortune whoever he was. He didn’t like to be told who he should employ anyway, and certainly not by a little work horse like Sam Stein who was competent, but not much else. Then, out of the blue, Zack was suggested by an old friend of Geoff’s, someone whose opinion he greatly respected, so finally, his curiosity got the better of him, although privately he had made the decision not to employ the man however well he presented himself, this Zack Fortune character sounded too clever by half.

  But when they finally met up, Geoff was bowled over and although he tried extremely hard he was unable to come up with anything negative to say about the great Zack Fortune. Plus, in the two years he had worked for Nyman’s, Zack had been dynamic, achieving more than anyone else, effortlessly and entirely off his own bat.

  “The two deaths, coming in two days, has made Zack very jumpy,” Sam continued.

  “I noticed,” said Geoff gloomily, indicating the red mark on his brow, which made Sam want to burst out laughing.

  “The thing that was quite strange about both these incidents, was that each of these people held their arms out to him in appeal almost, so when you did the very same, it freaked him out a bit.”

  “Yes it did,” said Geoff, “and how.”

  Sam decided not to say anything else. He had given Geoff a rational, honest appraisal of what had happened, and he could but hope that Geoff sensed this was the truth and in some way find it in his heart to forgive Zack. There was nothing else really Sam could do.

  Geoff remained looking out of the window for a while. Then he turned back to Sam and shrugged. “So what the hell do we do about it?”

  Sam was surprised by the question and it took him a while to answer. “I think he just maybe needs a break, you know how hard he works.”

  “But he craves work, you’ve heard him, begging for more.”

  “Maybe it’s caught up with him,” said Sam. “Maybe it’s all been too much. He would never admit to that, but
clearly something has snapped.”

  “You can say that again,” said Geoff, “I had the unenviable task of explaining his strange behaviour to the Wahlbergs who thought they had sat down in a mad house and who can blame them for that?”

  Fuck the Wahlbergs, who gives a flying fuck about those three tossers thought Sam, but he didn’t say it. “I can imagine,” said Sam, instead.

  Geoff got up and started to pace, examining each foot he put in front of the other. Sam did not have a clue what was coming next. He knew Geoff admired Zack, he was obviously the blue eyed boy in the company and he had never let anyone down, but thinking back to Zack’s mad moment, would it be too much for Geoff to keep him on?

  “Maybe a psychiatrist’s report would be helpful,” said Geoff, vaguely.

  Sodding hell, thought Sam, he’d hate that. Zack was always disparaging of shrinks and counsellors and had said on more than one occasion that people should dig themselves out of their own holes and not go around thinking that some jerk in a cream linen jacket, charging absurdly inflated fees for their dubious wisdom could do it for them.

  “That’s a possibility,” said Sam, cautiously, hoping Geoff would drop the idea, “but to be honest, I think a few days off would do it. He just needs to relax,” said Sam, knowing full well that Zack found it impossible to relax, ever.

  “Right, well, I need to speak with Leslie and Phil, but as you know they’re both away at the moment and I think this warrants a face to face… so let’s just say Zack takes two weeks off. Let this settle for a while. We probably all need a little distance from it.”

  Sam was pleased with this, this was the best Zack could hope for. “I’ll call him shall I?”

  “Well you can do,” said Geoff, “but employment protocol dictates we have to write to him, formally, just to be on the safe side. The letter will go out first class today.”

  Sam stood up, smiled, and turned to leave. Geoff’s voice called him back.

  “Meanwhile, you’ll have to take over the Wahlbergs for the time being. Zack has done a lot of the donkey work so it shouldn’t be too much of a chore.”