Wednesday came around and I decided I would go to Book Club after all.
I was just walking out of the front door as Death walked in.
“Oh, you’re off out. I was going to see if you wanted to get the office sorted out. I cleared the old room eight.”
“I’m going to Book Club. You make a start while I’m out if you want. It doesn’t need two of us to put two desks and computers in a room, does it, and Spence would help anyway if it did.”
“Erm, okay, and, Mya…”
I turned to look at him, and damn it but hope filled me. Here was his apology and his regret at ending things.
“You do know you can whizz from inside the house, don’t you?”
“Of course, I know that,” I snapped, annoyed because it was a lie and I hadn’t thought of it at all. “I just like walking out of the front door. It’s like saying goodbye to the house before I leave.”
“Okay,” he said. “I just thought I’d check. So how has everything been?”
“Everything has been absolutely fine.”
“Great. Looks like you’re a natural at this. Spence told me you’d been working really hard and had despatched a significant number of lingering spirits.”
“It is my job. Right, got to go. First rule of Book Club, don’t be late to Book Club.”
“Aren’t you supposed to have a book for Book club?”
I narrowed my gaze at him. “Not if you’ve never been before. Now, seeing as I’m perfectly capable of being entirely by myself and in no need of a companion, I shall bid you goodnight.”
I whizzed down to Gnarly. No matter how many times I tried to imagine landing inside the entrance, I landed outside of it, so I figured it was warded in some way. Sure enough, as I walked through I detected a kind of tingle zipping through my chest. If Death was gonna keep ignoring me sexually, I might have to keep walking through here on my hands.
Passing the boulevard, I carried on until I reached the community centre and then I followed the signs for the book club.
“Mya! I didn’t expect to see you. You said you’d be busy for a while,” Callie’s welcoming smile helped put me at ease as the weirdo twins looked me up and down in tandem; and the other women, of whom I only knew a couple, stared at me as if they were MRI machines.
“I forgot about vampire speed, so things aren’t taking me as long as I thought.” I looked at the circle of seats. “Can I sit anywhere?”
“You can choose any seat, Queen,” Dela said as she walked in. “Even though you aren’t the queen of Gnarly Fell, we still honour your presence here.”
“That’s kind but not necessary. I just want to sit in a spare seat that no one else sits in.”
The twins both pointed to a grey plastic chair. As I sat in it, the chair listed to the side. It was broken. Fabulous. It matched my heart.
The group spent around six minutes lying about having read the book of the week. I knew this because I told them I’d read the book previously after working in a bookstore and I kept saying things like, “Oh when the blackbird pooped on her head’ and watched as they all agreed with me, nodding their heads like the glorious little liars they were.
“Not one of you has read this book,” I announced. “You should all hang your heads in shame, for having a book club and pretending to read.”
A few protested until I explained my trickery and then they did hang their heads and avoid direct eye contact with me.
“Look, I know some great reads, but instead of having to read a particular book by Wednesday, why not just come each week having read anything at all and tell the others your thoughts on it? Then you’re not under pressure to read a set book. Reading shouldn’t be forced. It should be a natural, enjoyable experience, giving lots of pleasure. Reading should be like great sex,” I declared.
“You find me a book like that, and I will damn well read it,” said Fenella who owned the laundry.
And so the evening was spent eating cupcakes (yes, I was becoming quite the connoisseur), enjoying a sneaky gin, and advising the book club members of Gnarly on what books I thought they’d enjoy reading.
“Would you please become the new president of our book club, seeing as you’ve seen what we were like without you?” Callie pleaded.
“I can’t promise I’ll be able to make it every week, but I will do my best,” I said, a huge grin appearing across my face because I’d had a great evening that involved one of my most favourite subjects, books, and I felt more a part of Gnarly’s community.
Saying goodbye to everyone, I returned to Wayward with my smile still firmly in place.
To be met in the hallway by Spence.
“I thought spirits had to keep to the second floor?”
“I have special privileges to be in the hallway to greet any visitors too.”
“Oh, who are we expecting.”
“I was waiting for you, Queen Mya. Death would like to see you immediately in the new office, formerly room eight.” Spence lowered his voice. “He looks really grumpy. Like a thousand times grumpier than the grumpiest he’s ever been.”
“Spence, that’s impossible. He is the King of Brood.”
But as I entered the new office and clocked Death’s face, I saw I really hadn’t seen him at his moodiest, because, oh boy, if I wasn’t already dead, that look would have killed me.
“Take a seat, Mya. We have much to discuss.” He pointed at my chair.
“Can’t it wait until morning?”
“No, we will be very busy tomorrow. It’s your funeral.”
“Oh!” I exclaimed. “Yes, we’d better discuss our plans.”
“That’s not why you’re here.” He folded his arms across his chest, and I realised he was dressed in his Reaper clothes, not his relaxing house ones. This meeting was official.
“I’ve received a complaint. Because you’ve recently dispatched two hundred and thirty-six souls. Only sixteen of which have gone to Heaven.”
Guilt flooded my features. Oops.
“While they don’t expect equal amounts, such discord is unusual, and so my upstairs boss called me into a meeting today. Do you want to tell me what’s going on, and please don’t say you’ve chosen all the evil men who wronged their girlfriends in some kind of revenge against my deciding us being together wasn’t a good thing.”
I looked around the room and then eventually met Death’s gaze.
“Guilty as charged,” I admitted.
Death
I only had myself to blame really. I should have done more than one test session with her—and I was talking about her induction here, not the seduction.
Mya walked in, looking at the newly arranged room and sat in the other seat.
“I’ve taken the liberty of printing a list of people who I think may favour Heaven for you to work through until you’ve evened things out a bit and then you need to set a system whereby maybe you do the oldest souls here first for fairness.”
“Fine.”
“Oh no. Do not ‘fine’ me. I bumped into Lawrie and he told me exactly what it means when a woman says that word.