The Professional cont.

I followed the pull all the way across town, to the part that was so new it tried to look old. I lived in one of the shiny new buildings back when business was good. I could afford to live anywhere, back then, but I liked this part of town because of all the college students. It was fun to watch them go on about their lives.

Everyone used to know that if you wanted a Job done right you came and saw me. It made my clients more uncomfortable to come to collegetown. They thought they were being watched; I thought they were being silly. If anyone found out, a client could ask me to do a second Job and I wouldn’t charge for it. That was my customer satisfaction policy.

No one ever found out it was me doing all the Jobs, of course. I was a professional, I had years of practice.

The pull took me to what looked like an empty storefront. Plain brown paper covered all the windows but peeks of light shone through the cracks. I wondered what kind of person I would meet here. I doubted any college students could afford my rates.

The door was unlocked, so I let myself in. The interior was bright, its walls plastered with propaganda posters. The room reeked of black coffee and rebellion. A young woman of indeterminate ethnicity was folding up steel chairs, cleaning up after some kind of meeting.

She looked up at me, confused. Her mouth opened to tell me they were closed, to give me some speech about the party line, to say hello. I never heard what she said.

The revolver whispered in my ear. It told me the Job was ready. I reached into my pocket.

I never argued with a client. They told me what Job they wanted done and I told them what the going rate was. I didn’t haggle and I didn’t accept advice or ideas. I did the Job the best way possible, every time. I had more than enough practice. I knew how to work quickly and cleanly. No fuss, no muss. I was a professional.

The Professional cont.

I made my way through the big old house, looking for anyone at all. Maybe my sense of the Job was off, but the place seemed empty. At last I looked in the kitchen.

A man sat there, sipping from one of those tiny espresso cups. The air was a fog of gin fumes. Every breath was intoxicating. The man looked up at me. As soon as our eyes met the revolver told me what the Job was. I reached into my pocket.

The man’s bleary eyes couldn’t focus. His head swayed a little, out of his control. I had no idea what the alcohol in the air would do, but it didn’t really matter. I was a professional.

I did the Job.

I tucked the revolver away gently; a craftsmen looks after his Tools. When it was secure, I took some food from the refrigerator and a glass of gin and went in search of a room that had clean air. There was a library, if I remembered correctly.

The man owned a lot of books, a lot I had never heard of. I read a few pages while I ate. Some of it was interesting, but much of it was boring. The gin was awful, cheap stuff that ran down my throat like broken glass. I left it, virtually untouched, on the desk when I went to look through the house.

The Job paid well for all that it was never commissioned. The man’s overcoat fit me nicely and his car was expensive. I could stay in the house at night and be nice and warm if nothing else came my way. But I could feel that pull again, already, and knew I had to answer the call.

I hit the streets in that fancy new car, wearing my new coat, and felt like a new man. My belly was full and I was toasty warm. I had another Job to do. Two in one day. It was exhilarating.

The Professional cont.

My line of work wasn’t all that unusual but I liked to think that my drive was unique. Most people took jobs because they had no choice. Circumstances forced them into a line of work they would never be able to escape. Other people got a kick out of doing Jobs. The guys who were in it for the thrills never lasted long, though. One way or another they all wind up with an early retirement.

Me, I had never known they were Jobs until someone offered my money. I’d been doing it since I was a kid because I could, because I was good at it. It was just a hobby, like those ships in a bottle, and this guy wanted to pay me for it? Sign me up. People always talked about living the dream, getting paid to do what you love. This was my chance. It sure beat working for a living.

After I did that first Job word got around. Soon I had all kinds of Jobs to do. I did them all with the care of a true craftsman. Before long, I could pick up a sense of when a Job was coming. It was a pulling feeling between my ears, a flood of excitement and desire in my chest. It was what I felt when I slipped that revolver into my pocket.

I left the dumpy little building I slept in the night before and set off down the cold slate sidewalk. The oldest part of town, still with real stone sidewalks and brick streets, it was quiet, perfect for me to listen to the pull of the Job. Little birds hopped in the snow, making funny little footprints. The call was getting stronger.

I wondered who want to hire me this time. It was fun to meet them, these furtive men and women, because they were never what I expected them to be. I never joined an organization; you met more interesting people working freelance. One time a husband and wife each hired me to do what amounted to the same Job for them. I took their money and did what they paid me for. I was a professional.

The Job was up a cobbled walk, in a big white house behind some ancient nut trees. A heavy wooden door stood open, leading into a dim hall. Normally my clients came to me, but I needed the money. I could make a house call.

The Professional

I found the revolver in a plain brown box. It was small and heavy and it fit my hand as though it was specially crafted for me. I checked the cylinder. Six rounds. I wondered who left it here, what a fully loaded pistol was doing in a box.

And then it spoke to me.

Gripped in the palm of the hand it was destined for, it whispered its purpose. I have own a great many Tools over my life, performed a lot of Jobs, but I never had anything like this revolver before. All the other Tools were just things in comparison. They did what I wanted them to do, but it was always just me using them to get the Job done. None of them had ever told me what they wanted, not before the revolver.

I slipped the pretty little thing into my pocket and cast the box aside. I could already feel that sublime little tug in my mind indicating that a Job would be coming soon. Good, I needed the money. I don’t remember when I ran out, but I was hungry, cold, tired.

And I wanted to do a Job.

Earnest Ben fin

Lucy rushed down the hall, bitter tears streaming into the wind of her passage. She ran so fast, got so winded, she couldn't sob.

Ben's body was riddled with punctures. His room was awash in blood. Through tears that would never abate, Lucy saw a folded square of paper on the floor. She grabbed it before any blood could get on it when the staff removed the body.

Lucy, it said, pretty girls shouldn't hurt alone.

Earnest Ben cont.

Ben was afraid. Lucy stood up from her chair and crossed to the door without saying a word. She turned a key in the special lock. Ben knew what happened when They locked that lock. But she was Lucy, she wasn't one of Them. She couldn't be.

Lucy walked back to the bed, knelt beside it. She told Ben that he was right, she had been hiding her artwork. That was about to change. Lucy stepped into the middle of the room and took her clothes off. She was beautiful, Ben told her. Lucy blushed.

All of the ink and all of the metal captivated Ben. When he found his voice, he asked why she had gotten art like this instead of regular paintings. Lucy giggled a little and it made Ben feel something different. She told Ben that she had this art done because it had hurt to do it.

Ben was concerned, then, but Lucy assured him that it didn't hurt anymore. She was glad she had shared with him, she said while getting dressed. She blushed again and said she might share something else with Ben another time. It made Ben's heart beat faster when she said that. He was sorry to see her go.

Long after the door had closed, Ben sat and looked at it. He wondered how sad someone would have to be to hurt themself. He wondered at it all. Somewhere, he could hear the sound of peanut butter being spread.

Earnest Ben cont.

Lucy was of two minds about seeing Ben. She knew the whole thing was her own fault, yet she also knew it was supposed to have been harmless fun. She adored Ben and hated to think she got his hopes up for no reason. She had no real reason to be apprehensive; even if he did guess her "secret," Lucy would be alone in the room with him. No one else would know.

Ben was waiting for her. He stood up from the edge of the bed when she came into the room. He always let her sit in the room's only chair, a gentleman. Lucy smiled. Ben returned the smile, his wide mouth shoving aside assorted freckles, green eyes sparkling. He was very quiet and even mannered for a redhead, Lucy thought.

Lucy sat on the hard chair, began her daily battery of questions. Be could hardly contain himself, but Lucy was determined to do things properly. She tried to keep her smile to herself, to move through the process deliberately, but his excitement was infectious. At last they were done.

Very well, she told Ben he make could make another guess. Ben puffed up with pride and spoke very carefully. Lucy decorated herself with art, art she let no one see. Why did she have art if no one could see it? Art was for showing, Ben said. They had told him all about museums and he had been to art classes where everyone had shared their paintings.

Lucy went white, whiter than usual. She bit her lip. After a moment, she made up her mind.

Earnest Ben cont.

Ben spent the rest of the day waiting for the pills to wear off so he could think about Lucy's secret. He had frightened her, he knew, and it made him anxious. Ben did his best not to let the anxiety or excitement show. If They noticed, They would give him another pill.

In the dark, Ben lay on his cot an listened. He could hear people walking the halls, people talking, people in other rooms flailing about. He could hear his own brain returning to normal. The pills left huge holes in his thoughts, but at night the pills wore off. The sound of his brain regrowing to fill those holes was like the sound of his mother making peanut butter sandwiches.

When things sounded normal, real, again, Ben let his mind go to work. He told it what he had learned about Lucy so far, told it that there was still more to learn. The pieces of his mind were slow to get moving, clunky from their recent regeneration, but they soon got the hang of it.

Ben fell asleep still smiling, confident that morning would bring answers just as surely as it would bring more pills. He squeezed his pillow tight and nestled in.