When Graveyards Yawn by G. Wells Taylor (popular books to read txt) đ
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A box of crackers lay open on a table in a pile of crumbs. Mayonnaise and peanut butter mini-sandwiches were dinner if the empty jars on the floor told me anything. In front of a door, I suspected was the closet, was a large iron bar loaded down with weights.
âYou better watch your diet, Mr. Willieboy.â I pointed to the remnants of his supper. âMahatma Ghandi ate that stuff, look what it got him.â
Willieboy was wearing nothing but his denims. He showed off an enormous musculature in chest and shoulders. âShit man, am I ever wasted.â He went to his fridge, and pulled out a little stack of pre-cooked beef patties that were glued together with a mortar of yellow grease. He peeled one off and ate it noisily as he spoke.
âDid you bring the fifty?â His lips smacked with a waxy sound and his yellow teeth champed like a horseâs.
âOf course I brought the fifty,â I snarled and took a seat in the crumbs on the side table.
Willieboy pulled up a chair that had been obscured behind curtains. I noticed an angry red welt on his neck and back.
âIf you didnât know the dead guys who set the fire, then how did they know where I was?â
âWhat dead guys?â His forehead wrinkled.
I told him.
He made a fist of his face and shook his head. âIâm tellinâ you, Wildclown, it mustâa been a set up âcause after I left you, I found six dead punkers waitinâ for me downstairs. Jesus, I was mixinâ it up good with them when the fire started!â He gestured to the injury on his back.
I pulled my gun. I didnât point it at himâjust fiddled with it, sighting along its length and hefting it like it was new.
âNot the best excuse Iâve ever heard, Mr. Willieboy.â I continued to play.
He froze, mouth full of hamburger, and then began nodding his head and sputtering. âThereâthere! Give a guy a goddamned gun and he gets tough every time. But Iâll show you, you bastard, nobody fucks with Douglas Willieboy.â
âUnless he has a gun, right.â I grinned.
âThatâs right,â he laughed. âYouâre okay, Wildclownâdid you bring the money? Iâm tired of eatinâ like a blowfly!â
âIâve got the money, but itâll take a good story to squeeze it out of me. I fell twelve stories last nightâand Iâm a little cranky.â I leaned back against the cracker box and wall.
Willieboy started talking. He punctuated each sentence with squishy hamburger noises.
âAll right, I knew her better than I saidâthe Van Reydner broad. I mean I knew her in that way, you know. Shit, who wouldnâtâshe was gorgeous. So, I was a little bit involved with her, which I said I wasnât. It wasnât true love or nothinâ, but it was fun. Not every night, but sometimes sheâd phone down for room serviceâŠâ He leaned back and laughed. âThatâs what she called it. Well fuck, who wouldnât go along?â
I couldnât think of who wouldnât and I said as much.
âSo that went on for about a month, until she left.â He smiled a great idiot grin.
âCongratulations, Willieboy,â I grumbled. âBut thatâs not worth squat to me. I hope you enjoy your memories.â I stood up to leave.
âThatâs not all,â he said this very shrilly for a man his size. âI knew she was going away. I was there when she packed her bag.â
âGo on,â I lit a cigarette, offered Willieboy one and took my seat in the crumbs.
âIt was about six days agoâTuesday night. She said sheâd be leaving soon, but she wouldnât be away long. Asked me if Iâd be sweet enough to let her go without a hassle. She owed money. See, I was kinda suckered, but fuck, what the hell. It wasnât my hotel.â
âDo you know where she went?â I drew in on my smokeâthere was no protest from the hotdogs. I felt like belching anyway.
âNo, she just went. Course, the night she splitâThursday, no Friday morningâI didnât know that lawyer had been shot up there. He came down when I was going off my shift at six. She had already left, around 3 a.m.ânailed me in the back room for being a good boy!â he cackled knowingly.
âDid Authority question you?â
âFunny that, a little shit from Authority came in before I even got a chance to call. I just figured someone else in the building got aâhold of them.â
âWhat was his name?â I leaned forward.
âI donât know, shitâIâm not a secretary!â he frowned.
âDid you tell him what you told me?â I started glaring.
âHell no, theyâd have framed me like a Vangoff. Iâd be eatinâ rats in their cellar right now.â Willieboy wiped a hand across his mouth.
âOkay,â I said. âYou havenât told me much worth $50, give me some more, or Iâll leave you to your filet mignon.â
âAll right, donât get your shorts stretched out of shape. See, she got a few calls from this guy, Simonâhe never gave a last name. Iâd work the switchboard you know, and heâd call up from time to time. Always late. Shit, I always figured she was full of it on the massage crap âcause I only saw her with the one client. What did I care, right? That lawyer he had lots of folding money, understand? He can look after himself.
âI listened in from time to time, when theyâd talk, her and that Simon guy. I ainât proud of that but itâs a boring late night shift anyway. His voice was always kindâa scared like he knew I was listening. Well, theyâd talk and Iâve never heard more boring talk. Heâd only mention the weather. Heâd say that the clouds were going to break soon. He wondered if she were ready for some sun. I kept wanting to break in and scream that theyâre both boring and could they talk about some sex or something.â Willieboy sat back, his face a mask of introspection before continuing. âThe only time it was interesting was the night the lawyer got whacked. This Simon guy calls her and says itâs time for a change in the weather. She said she was getting really tired of the clouds and would be glad for a change and tonight would be good. Boring shit, still maybe, but at least it was something different. He sounded like a real pin-head.â Willieboy smiled as though heâd just opened a treasure chest.
âGreat Willieboy, he was a pin-head, big deal. I could have guessed that. It sure as hell isnât worth fifty bucks. A name, Simon, talked to her. Wonderful.â
He kept grinning like a fool. Finally, he leaned forward and pulled a stained envelope from his back pocket.
âI wonder what his phone number and a picture of Van Reydner would be worth?â He waggled the folded envelope between his fingers.
I began digging for Tommyâs annoying plastic mouth purse.
I could tell from the first ring that I had a bad connection. The phone line rattled and clicked like a drunk unlocking a door. Decay. I was just glad the lights were on. Blackouts would soon become a daily occurrence, like the rain. This was another fringe benefit of the Change. Just after the rains started but before the dead rose up, telecommunications the world over went on the fritz. Some of it made sense, too. Cell phones and other satellite dependent technologies like the Internet and television were immediately impaired. The continuous ceiling of cloud could be blamed at least in part for interference. But the Change went beyond that. It was as if the complex system of communications satellites had simply ceased to exist. Signals could not reach them and no explanation was forthcoming. Scientists wanted to blame the residual effects of the Millennium bug, but that concept was too laughable to bear. Instead, the shuttlecraft Declaration was prepared for launch to investigate the anomaly. It blew up on the ground killing everyone aboard.
Computer scientists had warned NASA about that, since it was no secret that computers and networked systems had also begun to behave erratically if they worked at all. But NASA went ahead, boasting a breakthrough in computer system shielding technologyâone of the theories at the time was that electrical systems were being compromised by enormous bursts of electromagnetic radiation from increased sunspot activity. NASA ignored reports that information stored digitally was growing more difficult to retrieve and a program stored might not open completely, if it opened at all. The crash investigators later blamed the computer responsible for firing the solid rocket boosters. Its program designed to control this process fired only one of them, which ripped open and ignited the main fuel tank. Similar computer-related accidents the world over soon gave credence to the theory. Information saved on computers was being garbled and made irretrievable by causes unknown.
And there followed an all-encompassing devolution of sorts. Computers were too undependable so they were yanked out of everything: planes, boats, clocks and cars. Everything. Just about any device using post-1970 designs was scrapped and the world entered a retro phase. Simple old-fashioned internal combustion engines were embracedâwind-up clocks reappeared. Companies dug through their archives for designs and started working on the old reliable. You could get a `57 style Chevy that would look like an original if it did happen to have heavier, rain-resistantâperhaps bulletproofâoptions available. One company offered the Millennium-T with crank motor. Iâd actually seen one on the highwayâsmoother lines but just as ugly. The new rule seemed to be simple works. So progress took a couple of steps backward.
Since microwave relay towers were useable but flawed, communications companies were forced to revert to more dependable landlines. Computers and the Internet were unstable, and so the public went back to typewriters and telegraphs. For some reason, electricity itself had begun to behave in an erratic and unpredictable fashion that scientists were still at a loss to understand.
Military leaders were made increasingly paranoid by the revelation that all electrical systems were behaving as if they had been subjected to the magnetic pulse released by a high altitude nuclear detonation. But since the whole world was affected, it was unlikely that any independent country could be considered that hostile. With every surprise the Change brought came a matching conspiracy theory. It soon degenerated to a whole lot of ignorance shooting in the dark as a crowd of walking dead formed around the experts. Pakistan and India nuked each other outright, the Middle East wiped itself off the map and a small but dirty atomic device lifted the Vatican to heaven. Luckily the mass destruction stopped there. Genocide raged through its familiar haunts in the Old World, and in southern parts of the new, but the nukes fell silent.
I had left Douglas Willieboyâs room an hour before and was back at the office trying to look busy. A chirrupy womanâs voice finally answered. âYou have reached the office of Richard Adrian, President of Simpsonâs Skin Tanning and Preservation for the Deceased.â A recording. âThe offices are closed.â She spoke quickly, as though she had consumed all the coffee in Colombia. âOur business hours areâŠâ She rattled out the regular Monday to Friday, nine to five routine. âIf you are calling from a touch tone phone.â I hung up. I had no interest in leaving a message. The receiver shrieked as I set it in its cradle.
It was Sunday. Of course their office was closed. Some still held with the old observancesâthis company could afford to. Economic powerhouses like Simpsonâs owned enough of the market to be nostalgic. Most everyone else had to work whenever and wherever they
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