There was a grunt and whispered cursing. Stomping on wooden stair that echoed off damp concrete walls. Amy came through the door, carrying two cans of beans and corn, crossing from the basement to the living room. I lay on the couch, trying to grab a quick nap before I had to go back to work. I could see her pregnant belly before her face. She hadn’t really shown for the first four months, then ballooned the last two. We speculated how far a body could actually expand before exploding. I refrained from making any jokes about Alien.

“That basement is a death-trap,” she said, rubbing the back of her head.

“Why’s that?” I pressed my palms against my eyes, saw Chance’s crumpled body, Delilah’s ruined head in the carnival of dots that formed.

“Every time I go down there, I hit my head on the ceiling. It’s always damp. And it gives me the creeps.”

I sat up, looked at her. “It’s the basement of a rowhouse that was built in 1896. People were shorter back then. This whole neighborhood is haunted anyway.” I followed her into the saffron-walled kitchen, wrapped my arms around her belly, holding our child. “Are you asking me to fuck up Casper? Because I will. I’ll protect you.” ​She swatted me with a towel, told me that she put my lunch in the fridge.

I couldn’t argue with her. Since we moved in four months ago, I’d felt the hint of a presence in here. Especially in the basement, around noon. I hoped that I hadn’t cursed our house to eternal haunting when I killed Chance and Delilah down there. And I didn’t mean to make it feel so claustrophobic, but I had to pour another seven inches of concrete in order to bury the bodies, to make sure they’d stay buried this time. For once, I’d been glad that Paddy’s Spanish sucked.

I gathered my stuff and kissed Amy’s cheek, whispered to her belly for a minute, then left for work.

The seasons felt schizophrenic. There was an iced-over winter, with winds that could shear flesh from bone, which was immediately replaced by summer that left the streets warped with heat vapors. I drank a whole water bottle walking to the job site. At least the work was inside.

In a typically-Chance move, he’d coerced some lawyer to have the house put in my name, on the chance that his flagged any unwanted attention from the authorities or that anything untoward happened, like someone discovering a basement full of trafficked humans. The fucker even paid for the place up front. I’d come across my own lawyer to have it sorted out, to make sure that Amy and I owned it outright, and had been working off our debt for the last three months remodeling his place. The job would’ve been easier with some of my old help, but it was better to keep it private. It allowed me to hide from the shadow of Chance that followed me all over the city.

After I packed up my tools for the day, I head down to Santo Sangre to cool off. It was the same as ever, as if you could blink and time-travel to any point within fifteen years without feeling disoriented. I stood by the door, then saw Paddy at the far end of the bar, hunched over his drink like it was a sacred oasis. I took my drink and slid into the stool. He didn’t look up at me.

“Hey.”

He grunted.

“How’s the crew going?”

He grunted again.

“You guys getting a lot of work?”

He took a swig from his glass. I took one from mine and swished it around my mouth, feeling the bubbles pop on my tongue.

“You going to use actual words or just communicate like a gorilla?”

Slowly, he turned to look at me. Something was different about his face, his expressions. He looked tired, like a man ready to surrender.

“I told you I want nothing to do with you, Cole,” and his head dipped to the bar again.

“Yeah, I know that, but it doesn’t make any sense.”

“You lied to me, son.”

“I’ve never lied to you.”

“Omission or tall-tales, ain’t much of a difference. It’s deception and betrayal either way. Specially when someone trusts you too much.”

“Paddy.” I trailed off, not having the slightest idea of what to say. How to say anything.

He dumped the rest of his beer down his throat, wiped his mouth with a shirt sleeve.

“And you got some goddamned voodoo on your back, boy. I can feel the room shiver when you come near. So please, Cole, I’m asking you again.” He dropped a crumpled bill and some coins on the counter. “Stay. Away.” He shuffled away from me, ignoring the senoras’ catcalls. I waved at Consuela for another drink.

Halfway through my third, the stool next to me scraped along the floor. I didn’t bother to look up. Someone asked for tequila and a beer. His voice was heavy, sounded like gravel in a washing machine.

“Can always tell how a neighborhood is by the bars.”

“Yeah.”

“Is the best way to see people. They are at less guarded.”

“Totally.” I tilted my glass to catch a glimpse of him the reflection, but saw only distorted shapes.

“I buy you drink?”

I looked up, cold fist kneading my stomach. The man was a ghost, no one I recognized, but carried the air of someone who would recite TS Eliot before shooting you in the kneecap. His wrinkles were deep enough to hide a small housecat.

“You are Cole, yes?”

With a quick glance, I checked behind him for anyone else I didn’t recognize. The bar was as it ever was.

“I’m—” the name Chance wavered on the edge of my tongue, ready to roll out but I bit it back.

“Yes,” he said before I could respond. “Yes, I know you name. You friend of Mr. Chance and his wife.” He pushed a shot of tequila to me. It wasn’t until he motioned to drink with him that I realized he had only one hand and a frozen blade of terror struck my chest.

“I thought you were supposed to drink vodka.” I gave a weak laugh. I knew this man. How did I know him?

He shrugged, said, “When in Rome. Or right now, Mexico City.”

The drink was sweet and singed my throat going down, but still my icicle body felt ready to shatter. In the gentle afterburn of liquor, I smelled the salve that Amy rubbed on my scar. My want to be home with my family was so strong I could taste it. I began to stand but he cupped my forearm and pressed it to the bar top. He gave a grandfather’s smile, shook his head. The café, the waiter, the smashed pot of coffee. A single hand, Chance’s Russian tattoos, the man shaking his hand.

Amy.

“Please, Mr. Cole,” the man said to me. “We must talk.”

Amy Amy Amy Amy.

The End – Final Chapter