Corpse Candle

When I create a flame, say by lighting a candle, the flame draws a colour and depending on the colour I see a kind of corpse. Red, a male adult will die. Blue, a young child or youth will die. Green, a small child or infant will die. White, a female adult will die. Black, a woman and her unborn child will die. Magenta, I die. My name is Bridge Kittens and I’m a corpse candle.

When we first met, he was green, not the flame or his eyes but money was a crutch. If he wasn’t serving it as a devout club caddy he would run errands for the members on the side, errands that caused more problems than they cured. Problems he kept to himself.

“It’s summer, it’s Saturn Beach, people pay to get in and out of a lot of things,” he explained, vaguely. Saturn Beach was one of three regions in Avalanche, the affluent side to be frank, where people like me danced with people like me and people like him watched with feuding envy and desire, at least that’s what the locals liked to think. “You better watch out for them, their admiration is ferocious,” remarked Amber Barker, Saturn Beach heiress. She was wrong about him, wrong about all of them.

 

 

__

 

"Say you died today and someone was responsible, who would it be?" I asked, thinking about the candle I lit earlier that night. The flame, red. Corpse, his, Gunner Doyle. We were in the back of his silver wagon, staring at an empty sky, discussing how nobody was promised tomorrow—his favourite subject. The thought of disappearing enamoured him— he was from Blackwell. Blackwell was Avalanche’s second region, a stark contrast from preppy, glitzy, Saturn Beach, very discreet. Nobody from Blackwell spoke about Blackwell outside of Blackwell, an unspoken rule.

"If I died," he reflected, imagining himself in the end, “it would have nothing to do with someone else."   

"Suicide?"

He shook his head. “I want to be lost not gone,” he whispered, his smile crippled. “Karma takes me out. She’s owed." He rubbed his neck. “I know who I am.”

 

__

 

What I knew about Gunner Doyle then.

He ran away from Peril Hill (third Avalanche region) when he was thirteen years old and fled to Blackwell, never said why. He enrolled at Blackwell Academy, never divulged the year. He worked jobs he never spoke about— errands to be precise— which shepherded his summers at Saturn Beach. See, if the last part were true I reckon we would’ve already met. I wasted enough summers at Saturn Beach to remember a face.

 

__

 

"Karma," I pressed, not letting it go, “a sum of choices, good or bad. What have you earned?”

"Both," he laughed, his breath loitering around my neck, ready to change the subject.

“On the bad,” I ignored his dismissiveness, “is it enough to kill you?” His breath was hot on my cheek, I was losing my resolve. “Would it have to do with—”

He kissed me, that shut me up. "It’s my last night,” he whispered against my bottom lip, “we should be enjoying each other.” His hand went up my skirt. We weren’t doing this, I told myself.

“After,” I breathed into his mouth, “seriously Gunner, we should talk.” He backed off a little, clearly annoyed. Clearly, he didn’t hear ‘no’ enough. “I like you,” I started, boring him off, “and I want to be more than a summer.” I was wondering if we’d see each other again but he probably got asked that all the time, I figured rephrasing it kept me interesting. Pathetic? Perhaps. “I’d love to visit Blackwell some day,” I clarified, his face hardened but I kept going. “And it’d be nice know you in your element, you know?”

“Don’t you think you know enough?” He sat up.

“Basics, surface, yes.”

 

__

 

What else I knew about Gunner Doyle then

 He was vegetarian. He played the guitar. I’d never heard him sing but he wrote songs, mentioned something about a band.  

 

__

 

“I want more— depth! Like why you ran away from Peril Hill? How you ended up in Blackwell? What growing up there was like for you? What are these errands you keep running? What are your friends like? Who are your friends? Do you even have friends?”

“None of that matters.” The air chilled between us. “We get on well because we don’t talk about that kind of stuff." Wrong. He didn’t talk about that stuff.

 

__

 

What Gunner knew about me then

 I lived with Nicole, my mom, and her boyfriend in a tangerine mansion in Peril Hill. Ridge, my dad, treated relationships like balance sheets: assets and liabilities. I was an asset. Nicole was a liability. Flay Clyne was my best friend. Her mother Nina owned Nina’s cafe which was an after school past time. Red, black and grey were my favourite colours. Pitt Trublood. And I had a heart I remembered only when it hurt.

 

__

 

"Listen,” I calmed down, getting into a tiff about what we were and weren’t open about wouldn’t keep Gunner from dying, I thought. “I have a bad feeling about you going away—”

“A feeling?” he scoffed. If it wasn’t cruel, it wasn’t Gunner.

“Yes, a feeling,” I snarled. “And it feels,” I stressed, “like tonight might be our last night together. I’m talking no tomorrow, no see you soon, no see you when you see me, no next time— this is it." A smile emerged from the corner of his lip, he tried to suppress it. “What?”

“Are you some sort of psychic?" Close, I wanted to say, corpse candle. “The last time you had ‘a feeling,’” he mocked, “you were like this, heightened. And you do have a flair for the dramatics.”  

 

Two weeks ago Mr. Rey, S.Beach country club’s janitor, had a heart attack. If you haven’t guessed already, the flames I cast never divulge how the living become corpses— that’s my job— and so in Mr. Rey’s case, like most of my cases, I anticipated a murder. I interrogated club and staff members leading up to his death, looking for motive, Gunner included. A few members were appalled I’d suggest people like them would kill people like Mr. Rey: “A janitor? He has nothing I want,” socialite Mandy Stilton laughed. “You say he scrubs the floors? Now, do I look like a man who’d kill the toilet flusher?” John Mercedes, chairman of S. Beach Country Club boasted. Heads up, people like me assumed money made them innocent. Then Mr. Rey died, the unexpected heart attack happened, and the people laughing at his living sent R.I.P at his death— life’s funny that way. Two people showed up at his funeral, me and Scottie, the HR Manager. Nobody from Blackwell, his home town, showed up. Strange, isn’t it?

 

“If you’re so worried about me Bridge I’ll tell you now, I don’t have a heart condition.”

"What if it’s not your heart, what if it’s something else? What if you died tomorrow—"

“Look,” he tipped my chin his way, “you’ll lose me one day but I have tomorrow.” Notice he didn’t say ‘we,’ and he still looked troubled.  "Why's it so important to you anyway?"

“Keeping you alive?”

“Knowing who kills me, how I die?”  

That was my opening, tell him about my corpse candle touch and maybe he’d take his death seriously. But I couldn’t. I wished I had a better answer for him though, better than, "I love you," which was the best I could do.

"You love me?” He was doubtful. "You don't typically fall for the first guy who gives you attention do you?" Cold, and in true Gunner fashion.

“I do,” I replied. “I do love you.”

He didn’t even hesitate. "You don’t.”

“I do.”

“No, you don’t.” He avoided my gaze. “You don’t go from Pitt Trublood to me in six weeks—” I could— “and you have to really know me to get there. And if you do get there then you don’t know me.” He was one of those, the kind of guys who think you can’t know them and love them. They should really come with instructions.

“I love parts of you.”

“Basics,” he cut me off.

“I love your broken heart,” I was winging it but it sounded about right, “which explains why you’re—"

"Guarded, reticent, aloof…” He went through the list, he’d heard it all before, but what I was going for was scared.

 

__

 

She gave you her heart,

She said you live in there

But don’t you tear it apart.

You said you’ll never though

And you’ll take it slow

Until things change in the dark.

 

And then again, and again, and again, you told her you loved her

But you never fell first, you never fell first.

She told you then when you said in amends you wished you never left her

You said you’d never hurt, you said you’d never hurt her.

 

She’s fallen to parts

And you’ll always know

You punched the wound in her heart.

She won’t let it go

And now (that) you’re on the road

You left the ghosts of your sparks.

 

And then again, and again, and again, you told her you loved her

But you never fell first, you never fell first.

She told you then when you said in amends you wished you never left her

You said you’d never hurt, you said you’d never hurt her.

 

Now it’s all in the past

But she’s not moving on

Because it hurts when she starts.

The feeling’s never gone

About the selfish bird that stole her soul for his art.

 

And then again, and again, and again, you told her you loved her

But you never fell first, you never fell first.

She told you then when you said in amends you wished you never left her

You said you’d never hurt, you said you’d never hurt her.

 

¬ Black Beauty

 

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Bridge stopped the player and ejected the memory stick from her laptop. She was back in the tangerine mansion she called home, back with Flay, back in Peril Hill.

“The song’s definitely something,” Flay stated, unimpressed. “Is it about you? He the reason you stayed away?”

“I’m back, aren’t I?”

“You missed an entire semester Bridge.” Flay knew she was full of it. “What happened to ‘Bridge, Flay, sixth form capish?’”

Gunner Doyle, she reflected. “But the song isn’t about me,” she uttered instead, avoiding an answer. “The stick was on him when they found him.” They, were the police. “The song’s the only item on it, perhaps his last recording.” She lost him.

 

Flay lounged on the white chaise by the window, picked up a dated version of Twenty-one magazine from the pile in front of her and feigned interest at the index page. “If the stick was on him when they found him how’d you end up with it?”

“I took it,” Bridge embellished. “Stole it.” The truth. “When I was at the station,” she breathed heavily, “the coroner left me with his body for a few minutes. She also left the sealed bag with his belongings in plain sight. I think she did it on purpose, felt sorry for me or something, and so I helped myself.” Bridge dangled the stick in her face. “I slipped it in my bag and left.” She inserted the stick back into her laptop, played the song again.

“And you’ve been listening to this ever since,” Flay moaned.

 

__

 

What happened to Gunner Doyle— what they say.

Two Blackwell police officers found Gunner Doyle in the pool house of a mansion on the border between Blackwell and Saturn Beach. Who called them? Nobody knows. His autopsy indicated elevated levels of carbon monoxide in his system which the officers claimed came from the burning propane stove when they found him. Did Gunner really forget to turn the stove off that night? So the Blackwell officers claim. There were no key suspects. The Blackwell police department ruled out the home owners because they were away that summer, and according to the homeowners they’d never met or even heard about a Gunner Doyle. The homeowner’s son, who was also away that summer— nobody knew where— claimed Gunner was a thief and probably got what he deserved, the Avalanche papers agreed:  BURGLAR FOUND DEAD IN BLACKWELL MANSION, KARMA?

 

__

 

“How well did you know this guy anyway?” Flay probed, flipping through the magazine, none of the articles stuck out.

“He probably knew more about me than I did about him.” Bridge reminisced, holding her heart. She cried enough when she was away, she couldn’t do it again, she told herself. “He never let me in, not all the way.” Guilt, she had lots of it. I should’ve done more. I’m a corpse candle for heaven’s sake! I was born to save him! “No friends, no family, nobody showed up to claim him! How’s that even possible?”

“They could’ve missed the story, Bridge. Hell, who knows if they get news in Blackwell or if it’s altered?” As far as Bridge was concerned Gunner’s death was no accident, he was murdered. And to make amends for failing him, she wanted to prove it. “Is that why you’re moving to Blackwell, to prove he exists?”

“He exists Flay!” she snapped.

“That’s not what I…” Flay dropped the magazine. “Proving the murder of a boy that nobody’s heard of in a town where nobody speaks seems like a tall order, don’t you think?”

Bridge shook her head. Unbelievable Flay, she thought, sometimes silence does go a long way.

 

Bridge dragged trunks of shoes and clothes from her closet, sizing each pair and piece before surrendering them to one of her couture valises on the floor. “She gave you a her heart…” she sang, reviving Gunner’s spirit. She was different. Death changed you but this was different, Flay concluded, struggling to pin it down.

“You’re staring Flay.”

“You’ve changed.” 

“Give me two weeks, my jeans won’t fit.”

Yes, you are on the leaner side of the curvy scale, Flay agreed, but that wasn’t it. Bridge pulled out a leopard printed mini-case from the bottom drawer of her dresser and dumped her toiletries inside. “This should be the last of it,” she sighed, zipping the bag.

“So, is Ridge okay with all of this?”

“Surprisingly, yes.  I know he’d do anything to get me as far away from Nicole as possible but he’s always had his reservations about Blackwell—” Bridge dropped her case— “I can’t hold out any longer.” She picked a candle from the shelf on her wall, placed it on her dressing table, pulled a match from her back pocket and struck it. She’d resisted the candle since Gunner’s death, it was time.

 

“Black,” Flay announced, staring at the flame. She forgot what it was like, being around a corpse candle. “A female and her unborn child will die.”

“They might as well be dead.” Bridge blew out the flame, unable to identify the corpse. She could hear a heartbeat but the corpse was blurry. “Who the hell would I know to protect?”

“Has that happened before?”

“Not…” she hesitated. “I stopped lighting candles.” Flay expected as much, something about this death affected Bridge. “Maybe I’m in my way, blocking faces,” Bridge went on, “but I should be fine. I’m just—”

 “Desperate.”

“Rusty,” she corrected.

“Sorry."

No, you’re not, Bridge thought, something Gunner would say. But said, “Don’t be,” instead. 

 

She counted her valises and recited what went where before ticking boxes in her head to ensure nothing was forgotten. “You know you can always come and visit.” She bent down and knocked on a valise. “It’s only a four-hour travel, two and half for the dare devils, but still a lot closer than Saturn Beach.”

“I guess,” Flay replied.

“You’re doing that thing with your eye Flay.” She was hiding something. She was a lousy liar.

“I’ve heard things.”

“About Blackwell?” She had Bridge’s attention. “That’s a first.”

“Well I know somebody who knows somebody who knows somebody in Blackwell who says it’s wayward.”

How anticlimactic, Bridge noted, but she played along. “Anything else?” Perhaps more concrete? “Was this said outside of Blackwell?”

“Maybe.” Flay protected her source. The first somebody was Tate Tracker— Pitt’s friend— and the other two bodies were mysteries: ‘I know somebody who knows somebody who knows somebody in Blackwell’. A silver convertible rolled out of the garage; Flay looked over her shoulder. “Looks like Nicole’s not sticking around to say goodbye?” Bridge was too busy humming ‘she gave you her heart’ to hear her.

 

“Did you love him?” Flay asked, changing gears and eager to end the song. She knew why she despised it, coming clean about it meant being honest about somebody in turn. The timing’s all wrong, she told herself. 

“I cared,” Bridge replied, remembering: ‘I love you.’ ‘No, you don’t.’ 

“Was he cute? I mean if he was it would’ve crossed your mind.”

“You would’ve loved him,” Bridge smiled, thinking about Gunner.

“A picture would be nice.”

“Gunner didn’t like photos.”

“Mysterious!” Flay piped up, drawing out Bridge’s smile. It went missing for a while there. “Listen, you’re not on your own, you know? You have me,” she was about to say Pitt, “you have Nina, my mom, our mom, I’ll share her.” How do you tell your best friend you fell for her ex-boyfriend when she was away? Flay wondered. Do you tell her?

 

Bridge rolled her valises to the door, thinking about the black flame again, the corpse. “Your mom’s not pregnant, is she?”

“No!”

“Black flame, reme