*****
SEVERAL DAYS AGO…
Dew settled in all the right places, making for some beautiful photography out there in the countryside. Levi Jessup didn’t give a crap about any of that. The beat-down green pickup was being a right bitch that morning. He just wanted to get to work so he could sooner get back to his case of beer that was chilling in the fridge, and whatever his wife was cooking up that night.
“Whore,” he said to the old truck and kicked one of her tires.
The Chevrolet was over twenty years old and had over three hundred thousand miles on it. Reliable was an understatement. That is, until winter turns into spring and then she seemed to take her time getting acclimated.
“Fat, fucking whore,” he said.
He stammered and sputtered curses, sounding much like the old motor itself. Both were too tired to crank. Fumbling around in the engine compartment, he banged here and twisted there until the old Chevy finally thundered to life sending a cloud of black smoke off into the atmosphere.
“Sum bitch,” Levi said, and wiped his brow with an old handkerchief.
“Off to the tombs, ma!” he hollered.
“Love you much!” his wife, Aggie, yelled from the doorway where she’d been watching.
They waved at one another as he drove off, headed to Bristol Memorial Gardens to begin his day. There weren’t many folks in that area…even less waiting to be buried in those parts, but being late always made him feel like funeral directors from every corner of the county were calling and wondering where he’d been. When the weather warmed up, so did business. People were more apt to die when the sun was out. It just seemed to him like the way it had always been.
What was different that day was the man waiting at the front steps of the office. The first time Levi could remember anyone alive waiting on him when he came through the gate and parked. An elderly gentleman with skin so dark he looked plastic. Deep wrinkles cut into his face obscuring the other features. The old men waved at each other—a quick one hand salute—as Levi climbed from the truck.
“Mornin’,” he said.
“Same to ya,” the stranger replied with a heavy accent.
“Sorry I’m late. How can I help you?”
“Not to worry. Nobody out dere in no hurry,” the man said looking at the graveyard. “Name Demonde.”
“Levi.”
They shook hands and Levi unlocked the front door so they could go inside. He flipped a light switch and then another switch, turning on the air conditioner which hung in the window. It blew cold air at first, but warmed up soon enough. Demonde sat his brittle old bones in the chair facing the desk with a slight groan.
“Now then, what can Levi do for you, Mr. Demonde?”
“Not mister. Jus’ Demonde,” he said.
“Okay then,” Levi said with a smile.
“I got a problem wit dis cemetery,” he began.
“I’m sorry to hear that. What can I do to help?”
Levi leaned his elbows on the desk between the phone and the flyswatter. Irritated, he wanted Demonde to get to the point.
“My momma buried out dere. Took me a long time to find her, but dere she go,” he said.
“Is something wrong with her grave site? Sometimes them head stones crack, or the grass grows over the marker…” Levi said.
Demonde interrupted holding his hand up, “I want her moved.”
Levi halted at the odd request. He had seen paperwork somewhere about transferring a body, but the subject hadn’t come up in decades.
“We can arrange for a transfer of the body. There’s a right heap of paperwork involved, lots of legal mumbo jumbo.”
“I take her wit me.”
“I’m not sure we can do that. Maybe you should talk to a funeral home?”
“Done dat. Dey weren’t no hep. I take her wit me,” he said, his gaze as cold and solid as marble.
Levi scrubbed his stubble with his thumb.
“Let me make some phone calls and see what I can find out,” said Levi.
Demonde studied Levi for a minute, those black brown irises in their yellowed corneas working hard, searching for truth.
“All right. You make dem calls. I come by in da mornin’ to collect her.”
Levi laughed with a single, startled breath.
“It’ll take more than one day. Hows ‘bout I call you when I get some news?”
“Ain’ no time. He comin’,” Demonde said.
“Who? Who’s coming?”
The old man stood slowly and walked to the door before he answered.
“Shadowman comin’.”
With that, he closed the door. Levi struggled to get up and follow, but when he opened the door, Demonde was nowhere to be found. A scrap of paper was on the steps. When he opened it, scribbled in what looked like charcoal or ash was a single word:
Bondye
“Crazy ol’ bastard,” he said and looked at the paper.
He held it in his hand for a moment before shoving it deep into his pocket. Then he went inside, he checked the messages on his phone. There were none which was strange, but not unheard of. The calendar listed two graves he needed to dig. He checked the plots on the map but before heading outside to get the backhoe, he called the funeral director at Hawkins.
“Hawkins Funeral Home, how may I help you?”
“You sound pretty damn chipper,” Levi said into the phone.
“Morning, Levi,” Bob Hawkins said. “Not much reason to complain in this business. The customers can always one-up me.”
“Show offs,” Levi replied.
“What can I do ya for?”
“I have an odd request. Old man named Demonde came by this mornin’ askin’ to transfer his mother’s body. Said he wanted to take her with him. That some crazy shit or what?”
“Demonde. Yep. He came round here a day or so ago. Didn’t want to wait for the exhumation license or any of the red tape. I think he might be doin’ his fishin’ without bait.”
Levi chuckled, “Yeah, maybe. Said he was comin’ back in the mornin’ to collect her before the Shadowman came. Know anything about that?”
“Um. No,” Bob said.
“How bout a Bondye? Ring any bells?”
“Can’t say it does. I wouldn’t worry about it. He looked about ninety years old, he’ll probably be seein’ both of us soon enough, Levi.”
“True. Thanks, Bob. You have a good’un.”
Levi hung up and sat for a moment. Then he pulled the paper scrap from his pocket and looked at it again.
“Maybe that’s his last name. Or his momma’s name,” he said to no one.
He pulled out a ledger and drug his index finger along the columns searching through the B’s and the D’s for ‘Demonde’ or ‘Bondye’ and found nothing.
“Fishin’ without bait,” he said and took the backhoe out to dig his two for the day.
Once the plots were dressed the way he liked them, he put the old diesel back in its shed and checked the hour. Watch showed close to four. Time to punch out.