Beyond Perdition Read online

  CHAPTER 1

  A LOST SOUL

  1

  A stubborn erection tented the duvet as Logan Reigns struggled to sit up. Narrow beams of sunlight issued through the small gaps in the Venetians, refracting off a half-finished bottle of Jack in a kind of reverent prism of incandescence. Eddies of dust as large as gnats drifted listlessly across the dissected sunbeams, fluttering in and out of existence.

  The single furred forty-watt bulb above his head strained to illuminate the rest of the room. A battle waged between the webbed tapestry of shadow and the muted intrusion of diurnal light, between the shifting shapes dancing on his eyelids and the stark, hard dimensions of reality. Lucidity slowly shifted to full clarity as the piercing sound of his phone alarm screeched into the silent ether. He was awake but barely. His joints ached, his sandpaper tongue lay heavy and sluggish in the trough of his mouth and a taste not unlike copper pervaded his senses.

  The phone flashed. The digital numbers glowing up from the black home screen. The alarm was a monophonic affair like a reversing vehicle. He could push the snooze but then he’d hit the traffic bottlenecking out of Hamptonburg. This, in turn, would mean another disciplinary meeting from his Head of Sales. Another black mark against his punctuality score.

  A frowning face on the whiteboard or whatever shit was deemed appropriate to deter tardiness.

  He sat up, eyed the bottle of Jack longingly before partaking in a tipple and erasing the evidence with the dual tastes of menthol mouthwash and minted nicotine gum. His journey to quit smoking was a half-hearted effort seeing him finish a pack of ‘Richmond’s light’ and the odd cannabis joint on the commute to work. So far, the only adverse effects of his habit appeared to be a suppressed appetite, yellowing of his front teeth and fingernails and a slight deepening of the crow’s feet around his eyes. On occasion, he would find himself coughing but no more than the average city worker forced to inhale the Metropolitan smog.

  He had read somewhere that living in the country could increase your life span by ten years but that seemed only relevant if you wanted to live another decade and right now the jury was out.

  Standing up, he stretched, clicking his arthritic joints. Tobacco dusting still clung to the coils of his chest hair as did the stale smell of smoke inhabiting the deep undergrowth of his beard. This morning would probably call for a shower. A proper hot water and soap lather instead of the normal baby wipe and tea towel job. He sighed at the unfairness of it all; at how his bones felt like the weathered components of a factory machine. How his head was home to a static akin to bad TV reception or the lost signal on an old radio. Sleep for most people was meant to refresh the body, not render it non-functional and in need of more.

  As he pulled open the blinds, he squinted out at the pink ephemeral lid which capped the sky. A scattering of clouds edged their way across the heavens forming a grey pantheon and bringing with them the promise of rain. A subdued wind whistled over the dead Geraniums on the balcony garden, nudging the wilted Tulip petals and rolling the fallen Daffodil cups over the ash/soil composite covering the tiling. It was once a nice little garden but like all things which took time and effort, it had fallen into disarray, now a sad reminder of what used to be, a relic of the past.

  He stopped and looked at the bent stems and cracked terracotta pots, wondering just for the briefest of moments what it would have been like had he applied just a little care and not left it to resemble a post-apocalyptic wasteland fronting his modest flat.

  The kettle boiled as he rummaged through the cupboards for something to eat. The bread was turning an off-green. The cornflakes were soft despite not reaching their expiry date. A couple of oranges lay like ancient relics in a decorative bowl, their pitted surfaces a crisscrossing of white mould. The kettle clicked off. He decanted it into the last of his coffee mugs-’Number One Husband’ printed in emboldened Gothic above a Clip-Art pic of a trophy. He sneered at the irony. He had never been a ‘good’ husband. He wasn’t attentive, loving or any of the qualities defining a good spouse. He was him, Logan Reigns, take it or leave it.

  He opened the fridge and added a can of ‘Blue Charge’ energy drink to his coffee along with a tablespoon of sugar. Before he left the side, he lit a Richmond and blew delicate sheaths of smoke across the kitchen. Briefly catching his distorted reflection in the linoleum back-splash, he finger-combed his beard and picked out an unidentifiable morsel from between his molars.

  Satisfied, he made his way to the shower and used the last sliver of soap occupying the dish. He could always apply Cologne if the soap didn’t fully conceal the dual odours of sweat and shame.

  He owned an unironed work shirt which he rotated with one other. The creases were glaringly obvious on the polyethene blend. He sighed once again. Why must every task be a chore? Why couldn’t he click his fingers and be dressed and sat on his plush leather swivel chair at his pinewood desk? A steaming brew pre-made and waiting by his monitor, a post stick note reminding him that the team we're going out for drinks and, if he behaved, he was more than welcome to come.

  Outside, the air was bitterly cold. Small granules of snow teased their way down like God’s dandruff. Black ice coated the parking lot tarmac lending it a reflective quality. The gathering clouds had perfectly tessellated and formed a monochromatic grey basin cutting short any possibility of sunlight.

  ‘Alright Loge’ said an older gentleman tipping his Burberry flat cap as he eased into his Mondeo

  ‘Eeeeem’ came Logan’s esoteric reply.

  The wind-shield had frosted over, the crystalline shards of ice looking like roughly cut diamonds. He scraped at it with his finger, debating whether to return with some warm water. Eventually deciding against the extra effort, he started the Ford’s engine and waited for the ice to thaw. As he sat adjusting the backrest for the umpteenth time, he flicked through the stations, settling on an amateurish rendition of Beethoven’s fifth symphony. The presenter was talking over the best parts, sighting his opinion and incessantly insisting on listeners calling in with their requests.

  A tapping jogged Logan from his reverie. A dishevelled looking individual, fingerless gloves clutching a rain-sodden cardboard sign was signalling him to lower the window. Logan expressed a dismissive gesture, screwing his face up to emphasize his contempt until the man, seeing no sympathy in Logan’s steely eyes backed off and hobbled over the car-park’s black ice.

  The traffic moved like a vehicular worm slithering slothfully, purposelessly towards their destinations. Tendrils of smoke left the driver’s side window, joining the great opaque exhaust plumes gathering somewhere in the congested atmosphere.

  As Logan waited in what turned out to be a two-mile tailback from a jack-knifed petroleum tanker, he retrieved a hip flask and took a long chug of the Whiskey within. His insides were instantly insulated as the liquid suffused his organs and warmed the cavernous spaces behind his ribs. Transitory contentment usurped annoyance and for just a few seconds he forgot about the traffic jam, forgot about the incessant beeping and the flashing engine light which had just lit up on the dashboard.

  The rain was coming down in torrents forming mercury-like beads on the windshield. The wipers fought the downpour serving only to streak the drops into a translucent film like bottled glass in a shower cubicle. Several other cars were parked, the personalised number plates revealing the pretentiousness of the drivers. The garish bumper stickers emphasizing their political ideals and opinions on gun control (use two hands...) Logan’s only identifying automotive feature was a large crack on the rear bumper snaking down the tailgate and over the exhaust housing. It stressed his reckless disregard for others, his penchant for driving over the speed limit and his reluctance to have the car’s bodywork seen to. A car, afte
r all, was an extension of its driver.

  The monolithic office block loomed in front of him casting a disconcerting shadow over the asphalt. Twenty-three floors all varying from Sales to Admin, twenty-three rows of mirrored panes shinning out like oily acne from the pockmarked brickwork facade. The crushing pointlessness of his job came careening down in an avalanche of melancholy, a debilitating landslide of emotions temporarily paralysing him from the waist down. A cursory glance told him all employees had entered the offices.

  A sly dip into the pedal well bought out a sachet of white powder. Without the windshield wipers whirring left and right the rain produced the perfect concealment as he tipped the fine granules onto the dash. Then taking a ten Dollar bill, he rolled it nimbly in his fingers, aimed it like a rifle scope at the miniature white dunes and inhaled.

  A flash of white light, angelic if such a pursuit could be considered so. The rear-view mirror caught the abrupt dilation of his pupils, the thickening of the capillaries in his yellowing irises and for the briefest of moments, the pallid hue overcoming the hairless areas of his face.

  A linoleum tiled floor led through the lobby, stretching passed an unmanned reception desk and plush seating area. Bilingual safety signs decorated the eucalyptus-green walls. Ice-cube-tray lighting created sporadic shadows and poured over the polished floor in a stagnant luminescent stream. Such details, of course, were enjoyed at a heightened level, a kaleidoscopic consortium of the senses, an exaggeration of light and shadow and, at moments, the ability to taste colour and smell sound.

  ‘How are you, Logan?’ Came a syrupy sweet voice from the elevator.

  A woman, peroxide blonde locks, copious amounts of foundation and eyeliner, stepped off the lift and sauntered towards him in a kind of rehearsed catwalk strut. Her name was Mandy, or Sarah, or Marlene. She was notorious at the office parties for putting out after too many glasses of Chardonnay. Her cobalt blue contacts sparkled devilishly as she seemed to position herself under the sparse lighting in such a way as to compliment her already seductive features.

  ‘Hi’, Logan replied, a little sheepishly.

  ‘You heading to the office-do tonight Mr Reigns?’ she asked, the question laced with the insidious intonation of a tempestuous Succubus.

  ‘You bet ya’. Logan’s mind was envisioning her straddled over a pool table, skirt riding her hips, knee-high leather boots...’

  ‘See ya there’, she said pursing her rouge lips into a turkey’s bottom and blowing a kiss.

  Logan watched her walk away, her hips gyrating poetically. A sensation formed in his loins as PG 13 thoughts returned with a vengeance. Floor 21 was his stop. ‘Gavin and Gavin’s Life Insurance’.

  A latticework of compartmentalised office spaces, poster-strewn partitions crisscrossing from one side to the other; the noise of productivity punctuating the expanse; cold calls clogging the phone lines; emails choking the servers; benign chatter to lighten the mood; open-cuffed shirts to belie a false sense of casualness; employees wearing piano key ties to hint at informality. Shoes shined to reflective levels; eyebrows plucked during weekly manicures as if their customers could see them through the phone lines. Men wore their hair gelled back, slick and shiny like a leather swimming cap. If they had glasses, they were lens-less, merely fashion statements serving to create a faux appearance of moderate intelligence and honesty. They did not stick to the mandated script, preferring to flatter and compliment their clients to the point of submission. They could turn a rigid ‘No’ into an excited ‘Yes’, ‘Uninterested’ into a string of bank card numerations.

  Logan preferred a different approach. His efforts were tabulated on the whiteboard in the rear, his name above all the others in the January sales quota. A cartoonish smiley face had been drawn half-heartedly by his boss whose attempts at boosting morale very rarely exceeded a brief smile or template email outlining one’s usefulness to the ‘Gavin and Gavin’ operation. Both Gavin’s were floating heads. Never reachable but always ready with a list of complaints and demands filtered through an endless bureaucratic hierarchy.

  Logan’s approach was not to dress the part or even honey his voice. His techniques lay in the torrent of emotional adjectives which on any given day superseded mere intonation. He could lace his lexical choice with such feeling, such empathy, that what would begin a sales call would end a Roman Catholic Confessional.

  A few people waved at him from their booths. The scowl of their brows disappearing momentarily as they welcomed their iconic Leader of Sales. His own desk was immaculate. Papers filed in neat stacks; the stapler set perpendicular to the hole puncher but equidistant from the outgoing mail tray. A snow globe paperweight bought for him by last year’s secret Santa, stood just right of the NBA mouse-pad procured in some other pointless holiday tradition. His work mug, coffee-stained porcelain, sat unfilled on a coaster. He wasn’t going to let that bother him too much.

  The computer flashed on. The desktop depicted a vigilant Meerkat surveying the Savannah, stiff-necked, poised and ready for anything which might pounce. Logan loaded up a spreadsheet, completed a few mental calculations and picked up the receiver like a cowboy grabbing the hilt of a revolver. Counting the rings, he recited his spiel, changing it only to suit the gender of the recipient. It was a man - Compulsive smoker - High intellect but not book smart - Avoided pleasantries, all business - Preferred being addressed as Sir even by his wife.

  ‘Who is this?’ The man’s voice crackled like the static of a poor connection.

  ‘Good morning Sir’ Logan replied, his hands white knuckled on the receiver. This one would take all his cunning. This man was not a fool. His address spoke of affluence. His interrogative opening indicative of an inquisitive proclivity. This could be either advantageous or disastrous depending on the conversation’s direction. The pressure was on.

  ‘I’m sorry to bother you at this early hour. I’m sure you’re a busy man...’ Logan paused, just long enough for the man to extrapolate a compliment from the assumption.

  ‘I am calling from ‘Gavin and Gavin’s’. I’m sure you’ve heard of us?’

  ‘Not at all’ came an indignant retort.

  This was perfect, hostility was an easy emotion to counter; A strong feeling which surpassed indifference and could be reversed to acceptance with a mere offhanded comment or jovial statement.

  ‘Well please, if it’s okay with you Sir, may I just borrow a few minutes of your time to explain the reasons for my call?’

  There was an elongated pause, a silence of contemplation followed by...

  ‘Very well then. What do you want?’

  Logan was in there. The floor was open. His evangelical-quality salesmanship would now shine through. Once the listener was at this stage, the sale was a done deal. Only an amateur would mess it up now.

  Logan could feel the cocaine wearing off, the Dopamine slipping back to the shadowed alcoves of his brain. The Serotonin evaporating and all ecstasy petering out to leave nothing but the mundaneness of self-awareness and hopelessness.

  ‘Would you hold on just one second?’ Logan asked, knowing the request was pushing his luck but so disconcerted by the abrupt comedown, he knew he had no other option.

  He adopted the posture of the vigilant Meerkat and surveyed his surroundings. The other workers were all occupied with calls. He gently eased open the desk drawer and withdrew a half-finished 700-centilitre bottle of Premium triple distilled vodka, the elixir of life. The water-like liquid shimmered as he decanted the remainder into his coffee cup. Still holding the receiver, he tipped the mug and gulped the warming fluid, the way a dog laps from a bowl. An audible sigh of relief escaped his mouth as for a moment he forgot he still had his potential client/commission waiting patiently on the end of the line.

  ‘Hello sir, I’m sorry about that. It was a text from my daughter. She’s just started school, see.’

  ‘I understand’

  ‘Now as I was saying, Gavin and Gavin’s are a service that provides busy working m
en like yourself with the means to ensure their family are well looked after in the unfortunate event of their passing. I don’t wish to be morbid Sir but the fragility of life is something we all deal with and I would like to personally unburden you of the worry of ensuring your family are set up if the worse might happen. Does that sound like something you might be interested in?’

  Another long pause. A ruffle of the receiver.

  ‘So, you’re a life insurance company?’

  ‘I’d like to think we are more than that. There are so many service providers out there. I feel I must explain why we are different. We know that no one wants to pay into an insurance plan. The economy these days is not conducive to spending anything outside the absolute essentials. That is why we offer the lowest premiums you will find in any life insurance plan guaranteed. Just five dollars a month. What’s that? Two cups of coffee and you can ensure your family are set for the rest of their lives. We payout after just two years of paying your premiums and the full amount exceeds a quarter of million after-tax. That’s a Lottery-like payout right there. And here’s the best news. It can be set up in just three short minutes, no payments down. What do you say, sir?’

  Logan tipped his mug over his mouth once more, relishing the few crystal-like drops which left the rim.

  ‘I guess that sounds good. What details do you need?’

  Logan caught the eyes of two of the newer employees a couple of cubicles to his right and winked. When the call was concluded, he placed the receiver back in the holder with a degree of dramatic flair and whooped aloud.

  ‘Another one for the King of Sales. Nothing I can’t sell...’

  2

  A weak neon light illuminated the bar’s crowded display case. Squared bottles of Tia Maria and Disarano furnished the top shelf, whilst less decorative bottles of Kraken Rum and Black Label fronted a mirrored back. A Jack Daniels on the rocks rested upon a folded napkin. The ice cubes glinted like exquisite opals smoothed perfectly by the shoals of alcohol. This was not his work-do. This was the second bar after. The rear wall clock ticked away the early morning hours like the heartbeat of the night. Kayley or Sarah or Tina had gone home with one of the new employees after he’d bought her two bottles of House Red and shared a Cuban on the patio.