I hate my Job
This is ridiculous. This is beyond ridiculous, it's ri-godDAMN-diculous.

I had to wait forty-five fucking minutes for this bus and now it's ground to a standstill and I need to be on the corner of 117th and Madison by one-fifteen. I sighed and slumped back into the chemical smelling plastic seat.

I hate my job. It sucks. Other people hate my job too, so it's not just me. I'm not cool and never will be. That's why I'm death. Contrary to popular belief, I neither ride a Harley nor do I get cool kinds of scary looking farming equipment to help me with my job.

I stared at my fellow passengers wishing I at least had the autonomy to pick someone ELSE out to kick off the mortal plane, but the angels of death who actually go out and do the dirty work don't get to make those cool choices. We get the names, we get the places, and we just show up and get the job done. I hated my work and I was tired of running all over the city touching one person and then another.

At least I wasn't still on duty at the vet's office. That had been the worst. That's where they send the ones who really fuck up. There's nothing worse than standing around in one of those sterile white offices with the stain resistant tables and chairs watching people parading in with animals in their arms. The ones who are crying aren't so bad somehow - it's the ones who come in and are checking their watch while the vet is delivering the injection that disgust me. When I was pulling my stint there I was tempted to NOT let their mongrels die - just to piss off the owners.

But, as I said, it's not my choice.

So here I was; stuck on a bus and trying to get to my next gig. I kicked the side of the bus and grumbled under my breath. Why should we have to take the bus, I fumed. And why can't we be as cool as the living would like to believe we are? Every time I saw one of those tattoos or leather jackets emblazoned with the grim reaper on a motorcycle, or with an insanely huge scythe in his hand - and always with that leering madman grin .... pffffsht! Clearly they've never met the man. Yeah, he's the grim reaper all right - skeleton in black robes - the whole deal. Except he's a SKELETON! He can't move, and hasn't been able to for as long as anyone can remember. Hell, I don't think even HE can remember the last time he could do his own stinking job.

I heaved a sigh of relief when the bus began groaning into motion again, but by the time I'd gotten to the corner, my mark had already crossed the street and disappeared into the crowd.

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The Carlos Incident
Carlos Rodriguez is a drug dealer. This doesn't make him a bad person. I met Carlos once before, but of course, he doesn't really know that.

Two years ago he tried to kill himself. He wanted to do it. He was ready. At the time, he was married and had a crap job working in a warehouse. The job itself wasn't especially crappy from what I understood, just the normal warehouse routine. Anyway, his wife was pregnant and she worked as a nursing aide in a nursing home over in the suburbs. Carlos wasn't a drug dealer then. Hell, the hardest thing he did back then was skin up the occasional spliff with his wife and knock back a few too many bottles of beer on his back porch.

We get to watch suicides a few times before they actually go through with it. If they really mean to get the job done, one of us lowly drones are usually dispatched, just in case they do. Since suicide is one of those free will type things, it's not really our call on when and where to cull someone. We show up and wait in the wings until they make their mind up. We either snag 'em or leave and they're none the wiser. They don't even really see us until they've passed the point of no return. We're the shadows that people see dancing along the edge of their vision right as the hammer falls. Once the hammer falls, the chair is gone, or whatever ... well, they see us as clearly as you're seeing these words. Only then it's just too late for us to register in their minds before the bright lights and loud whoosh of death kicks in. That's when the tears start. I can't tell you how many people break down like babies as soon as they see me and realize what they've done. Suddenly they're like little kids, asking for a fucking 'do-over' like I'm the harbinger of life as opposed to the harbinger of death. I just clue them in on what to expect and assign them a case worker. Part of the routine for suicides, though, requires that they be present when someone finds them. So we're stuck with them until the body is found. This can be DAYS sometimes, and for the most part, these people are just plain irritating.

I hate my fucking job.

Anyway, ... Carlos. Carlos was about to become one of these irritating guys. When I finally got called for his big exit, he was sitting in the living room of his girlfriend's apartment. He'd been fucking this woman on the side for about a month and his wife was already starting to get suspicious since Carlos was neither clever nor subtle. For reasons I still don't understand, he thought he was in love with this woman. She was crack whore with a fledgling heroin addiction. She was so beneath this guy ... no pun intended. His wife had just told him she was pregnant, meanwhile he's mired in some torrid affair with a woman who puts out for anyone who'll pay.

Now let me just say a little something about his wife. Maria was the totally stereotypical Hispanic wife. At least, she was my idea of the stereotypical Hispanic wife. Admittedly, my stereotype comes from TV and movies so she might not be stereotypical at all, realistically. I just don't know that many Hispanics. She baked bread from scratch, went to mass every day of her life, lit candles on all the right days and prayed to all the right Saints at all the right moments. She had long, flawlessly manicured fingernails, heavily styled hair and chewed peppermint gum a lot. She was brash and territorial and loud and ... just amazing to watch. Even though I knew I was there to watch Carlos, I found myself spending a lot of my time watching her. If I had been gay (and alive) I would have wanted her.

This other chick, Lezle, was living in a squalid two room rat trap on the East Side, living on ramen soup sachets because she'd rather spend her money on crack and smack than feed herself. I'm still not real clear on how they hooked up, You don't find that many crack-whores with boyfriends. However it happened, she ended up introducing him to the world of heroin and he totally forgot about the real world he was leaving behind. I watched him slide over what should have been the last week of his life and the descent was ugly. I watched Maria wrestle with the decision to tell him about the pregnancy. I watched him sneaking out in the middle of the night like the guilty, slimy fuck he was. I even spent some time watching Lezle laughing at him with her friends who referred to him as a 'filthy spick'. The whole scene made me sick to watch. I wanted to shake him, to scream at him and make him see how dedicated Maria was to him, how she was still willing to forgive the affair she already knew was going on, if only because they were about to have a family. I wanted to force him to see what he was giving up versus what he was running towards.

But we don't get to do shit like that. We're supposed to just sit back and let the absurd little play run its course.

So when he was finally getting ready to do the deed I was seething with hatred. I hated that he was going to die an ignorant bastard. I hated Lezle for getting him hooked on that shit and I hated him even more for it. I hated the fact that Maria wasn't even going to be the one to find him, that she was going to have to get a call from the police about it and that his death was going to be how she confirmed he was having an affair. I hated even more that she was going to have to worry about what diseases he had brought home to her and possibly passed on to their unborn child.


Making it all worse was the fact that Carlos didn't seem like a bad guy, just confused and a little fucked in the head. Over the week I was with him, I saw a few flashes of near lucidity. I saw him in Lezle's bathroom crying and beating his fists against his temples, swearing that it was over. I even saw him telling her he couldn't see her anymore and then saw her pathetic pleas and threats.

It all led to this moment. Carlos had come here instead of going in to work that day. He'd brought his hunting rifle with him but had left it in the car, which gave me hope. He hunted around Lezle's apartment for a piece of paper and a pen, ignoring the containers of curdled milk, half eaten croissants, greasy napkins and signed matches she left lying around. He finally found a pen under the matching crates that served as a coffee table and settled for using the backside of an old disconnection notice from the electric company to write his last letter to the world on.

I really wanted to bitch slap this guy. I wanted to take a picture of this moment and show it to him. He was standing at the stained Formica kitchen counter. There was an open can of Speghettio's on the counter with an old spoon sticking out of it. This was where he said goodbye to his wife. I shuddered and felt myself getting ... thicker. It's the only way I can think of to explain what it feels like when you know they're gonna have to go through with it. You can sort of feel yourself getting closer to the edge, becoming visible. That's when I knew for sure that in spite of the fact that his gun was still outside, he was actually going to go through with this.

When he finished the note and left to go get his gun I stole a quick peek. It said: "Dear Lezle, please see that my wife gets this note," And there was another envelope sitting on the counter, one I hadn't seen him put there. The envelope was creamy ivory stock, very thick, and very expensive paper. He loved her. He still really loved her.

Of course, there was no way his wife would get that note. I'm here to tell ya, Lezle would have opened it, read it and tossed it out without even thinking of honoring a dead man's last wish. The longer I stood there, the madder I got. Carlos came back upstairs and got himself settled in the living room. He'd also brought up a bottle of tequila, which was about 3/4 full. I watched as he drank the tequila and loaded the gun. He took another swig and put the barrel in his mouth, reaching down and locking his thumb around the trigger. I felt myself floating closer to the surface, felt the strange head-rush of blood in my brain. I could see the tears in his eyes. His thumbnail was whitening with pressure, his teeth clicking against the steel of the gun barrel. I was closer. It felt like coming up to the surface after swimming underwater, an excited pressure that made me afraid and eager all at once. My brain was spinning with thoughts of Maria, with thoughts of what Carlos' reaction would be once reality set in. This was wrong, he couldn't do this, he could still be saved.

He could see me for an instant. I saw the shine of fearful recognition in his eyes.

So I shoved him.

The gun moved out a bit and the shot ripped through the side of his face, sending an arc of blood and meat towards me, through me.

In an instant I was back in my caseworker's office.

Paul was shaking his head and reading the report that had already been filed. The paper trail in the afterlife is wickedly quick. I got reassigned to a vet's office for six months but it was worth it.

Or so I thought.

When I wasn't dealing with dying household pets and the occasional euthanasia of some feral animal someone had hit with their car and then brought in, I checked up on Carlos. Doctors had fashioned a new jaw out of his shoulder blade. The entire left side of his face was a mass of warped scar tissue. His left eye was permanently red rimmed and could no longer manufacture tears. Lezle left him (of course) and even sued him over the cost of cleaning her apartment and damages for causing her "mental anguish". Maria tried to hang on for a while afterwards, but eventually sent him packing. His daughter saw him once. Only once. Maria wouldn't let him near her after she left.

Carlos moved into a small one-room apartment on West 85th, in the basement of a woman who had three kids and a regular income from the state welfare department. He found heroin again and held on with both hands. Two years later his name popped up on my list again.

Overdose this time. March 3rd, 2:47am. I went to his place early. He was shooting up and listening to some pop station that was broadcasting from a club downtown.

He's filthier than the last time I saw him. The skin on the right side of his face is haggard and ashen. The scar tissue on the left stretched his makeshift lips into a cruel half-sneer.

At 2:45 he mixed a bag. He ties himself off and pushes the needle at 2:46.

2:47 and he sees me. Real and true this time. I don't fight the sensation of coming up.

He smiles and says 'I knew I'd see you again.'

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Shit Assignments
I'm still getting the shit assignments. Today I got stuck at a nasty car accident involving two soccer moms and their absurdly huge SUVs. The only up side to the deal was the kids. While I hate the fact that they're dying, they're really the easiest. They always come with me so easily and don't put on the big teary show that adults do. I think it's because they don't quite understand what it is they're losing, they just think it's some sort of really long field trip. There were two of them today, plus their mother. The other mother was screaming when I took her hand. She looked up at me and screamed again. Then she started crying, started telling me how the accident wasn't her fault. I laughed without really meaning to.

These self-important types are always the worst. They live under the delusion that no one in the whole world knows what they're doing ... besides themselves, of course. I'm absolutely certain that whenever these types go in for the plastic surgery - which is inevitable with shallow, self-important people with delusions of grandeur - they criticize the doctors and insist they'd be better off if only they could do it themselves. When they start selling do-it-yourself home tummy tucks, face-lifts, nose job, and liposuction kits (and they will) these people will snatch them up, by the SUV-full.

But I digress....

So this woman is screaming at me, shaking her head and telling me how I've got it all wrong - how that other woman was really at fault for all this. Of course, she doesn't yet know that the other woman is coming along as well and I find myself sadistically looking forward to their upcoming reunion. She's still stamping her foot and trying to get her cell phone to work (you'd be surprised how many of them try that) when I walk over to the other car and take the other mother as well. Her kids were in the back seat, strapped in and no worse for wear. I looked at them when I took their mom but they were both passed out. The surviving girl had a cut above her left eye that was bleeding and the boy had the beginnings of an ugly looking welt on the side of his face. I think the mother must have known it was gonna happen because when I walked over to the car she was just staring at the two in the backseat. She didn't even look surprised when she saw me, just scared. They all look scared.

The two started screaming at one another as soon as they saw each other. The two kids came over to me and I squatted down and talked to them awhile. I told them who I was and what was happening and they seemed okay with it. They asked me why their mom was screaming at the other woman. I smiled and told them some things can never be understood.

I got them all whisked off pretty easily afterwards. Then I got popped again.

It was over at a coffee shop this time. More specifically, it was the bathroom of a coffee shop. One of those trendy places inside a bookstore. I only had two hours. I stopped by Ian's first to get some pot. Even though I can't OD or anything, I still stick to pretty tame stuff. Even though I'm not really human anymore, I still feel like I am sometimes. Being dead can really mess with your mind. When you get stuck like I am, you're still sort of human… but you're not.

I can still interact with topsiders when I'm not doing my job, but when I'm on duty I'm off your frequency. This requires a certain amount of time management and organization of course - after all, you don't want to be kicking back with some mortals in a bar and then suddenly find yourself slipping under because you've got a ten o'clock pick up you forgot about. But, honestly, I don't hang out with topsiders much. I was lucky enough to get assigned to a city with a fair amount of other cullers so we sort of hang out together. Sure, there are the occasional times when you've gotta deal with real people: grocery shopping, drug deals, etc. but for the most part we stick with our own. I hang out a lot with Rosalie. She was a gang banger when she was topside but she never killed anyone or anything like that, which is why she didn't end up with a truly shit job like those poor saps who are doomed to keeping people like John Edwards in business.

Anyway, she and I hang out a few times a week and it's good to have someone to blow off steam with. She's got a hardcore love for heroin and since we can still enjoy sins of the flesh (but can't overdose, obviously) this is like a sort of heaven for her. Where do we get the cash you ask? Where the fuck do you think all those taxes on booze and smokes end up? Why else would they call it a "sin tax" in some places?

I won't bore you with all the details, really. That's what makes an FAQ so handy.

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Black Monday
I spent the entire day at a crack den. It wasn't totally a crack den ... in the basement there was a shooting gallery - a place where junkies go to buy smack and shoot up in the kind of peace and quiet that only a squalid, abandoned house can provide. It's a strange kind of place - a million miles away from my own life. Something I never came close to seeing when I was topside.

I culled thirteen people there - I guess some bad shit has been hitting the streets - I've got another twenty to pick up tomorrow. They were all young - too young to die with needles sticking out of their arms. One woman had her son with her. I picked her up and he was still sitting by her feet. I don't think the fact that she was dead even sunk in before I hustled her off to a case worker and slumped into a plastic chair at the intake office.

Sometimes this job feels like too much. To be honest, I can't even think of it as a job anymore. Sometimes, between calls, I sit in the office and watch everyone coming in, trying to remember what I thought the first time I was brought in. I wonder if I looked as slack jawed and wide eyed as some of these people do. It's three years later and I feel more jaded now than I did when I first got here, but not really any wiser.

What happens now? It's the first question almost everyone asks once I deliver the 'You're Dead' speech. And every time I wish I had the answer. Hell, I don't know what's going to happen to me next, much less them. You don't get an itinerary when you become a Field Culler, you just get the rundown on how to do your job and then you're left to it. No one tells you how long you'll be stuck here, or even what it was you did wrong while you were alive. You just plod through each day wondering, "How much longer?"

Maybe this is hell.


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Death Doesn't Make Mistakes
I picked Samantha up on Brookpark Road, behind a burnt out carcass of a bar. Manual strangulation. I was filling out the paperwork when she switched over. She was on the ground, I was standing over her. The guy who'd done this to her was gone.

"Who are you?" she looked at me.

"I'm Emily," I answered her, "I'm just here to help you through the change."

"The change?"

"You're dead," I said flatly, too tired to break the news to her gently. "Your last John strangled you, remember?"

Samantha just shook her head, "No, there has to be some kind of mistake. I'm not even really a prostitute, this was all part of an experiment for my thesis."

I stared at her a moment before holding out my hand to help her up. The second she touched me I knew that she knew I was right. I'm still not sure what it is that happens when we touch one of you, but something gets passed between us. When Robert culled me I felt a surge of peace and understanding rush through me. It felt like a wave, something that literally washed through me and, even though I knew what he meant and instantly understood that I was dead, it left me feeling disillusioned and confused. And now, when I touch people, I get that same sensation, like I get a taste of their own bewilderment and despair. It's hard to explain ... but you'll see what I mean, eventually.

I knew Samantha knew, and by that I mean I knew she logically understood what I was saying and what was happening, but she was still maintaining a sort of desperate stranglehold onto what had, until just recently, been her reality.

"Okay," she laughed and tucked a lock of strawberry blonde hair behind her ear, "Seriously, I can't be dead. I'm not even from around here. I go to Columbia and came out here to finish my thesis. I mean, this just can't be happening."

"Well, that's OK because it's not happening," I told her. "It's already happened. It's done. You're dead."

"No, I don't think you understand," Samantha laughed in a condescending sort of way that filled me with irritation and the desire to slap her, "I'm not really a whore. This was all an experiment." She smiled at me as though this would clear everything up and I could just reanimate her. I think these people fail to understand I'm a harbinger of death, not life.

"Well, it has happened," I snapped. I took her hand again and stepped closer to the body that was once hers. "Look at the eyes on that body, on your body," as I pointed at the still and silent shell on the ground. Already the eyes were clouded and murky looking, a natural after effect of death. "You're dead, Samantha," I looked towards her while she stared amazedly at her own corpse. "It's not a mistake and it's not a dream you're going to wake up from. This is your new reality and there's nothing that can be done about it."

I saw the hurt in her face and only felt a mild pang of empathy.

"But my thesis..." Her voice sounded as empty and useless as her words.

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Runners
The building is deceivingly large once you're inside but the volume of the music gives it a strange cozy feeling. Julie is on the other side of the room. There's a guy in the far corner surrounded by mixers and turntables, a computer screen glowing behind him, a large screen above his head flashing pictures and clips in tempo with the break neck speed of the music.

I check my watch. Ten more minutes.

I make my way to the furthest corner of the room, giving myself a chance to survey the room and, I hope, making it less noticeable as I slip under. I don't think anyone's ever really seen me slip under when I've been in the field. I like places like this the most though. Slipping under when I'm standing in the middle of a restaurant or a bar is sometimes difficult to do without feeling as though someone might be watching. But here ... well, most of the people here are on one drug or another, and the rest are too wound up by the music and the lights to notice anything anyway.

The world looks only slightly different once I'm under. It gets this funny gauzy sort of haze, almost unnoticeable once you get used to it. I check my watch again when I see Julie slip down the wall and onto the floor, the look on her face chillingly familiar. I make my way over to her just a few seconds before she's due but I can tell that she sees me, her eyes flicker with a sort of stupefied recognition that so many of them get. I wait another second and then take her hand in mine.

"Stand up," I say, smiling at her, trying to be reassuring but wanting to get this done with so I can finish out the rest of my night.

She stares at me for a few seconds before she finally blinks and stands up, leaving her body on the floor. I turn her around and show her the body she was just in still slumped on the floor. A girl standing nearby laughs and spills some Smirnoff's Ice onto it.

"What the fuck?" Julie can't stop staring.

"You're dead," I tell her as I pull out my board. I start writing it up, jotting down the time and place, her name and everything else. Technically, I'm supposed to do the write-ups way before this point, but I've always found it nice to give them a minute to let it all sink in without me standing around impatiently.
"I'm not dead," Julie says, staring at her body and then finally at me.

I glanced up from the board and then sent a pointed look back at the body still on the floor. "Yes, you are."

I knew she was going to run a fraction of a second before she actually did. I'm still not sure where they think they're gonna go when they leg it. It's one thing to try and run away from confrontation or an assailant ... but this is DEATH. You can run away from reality, hide from it with the help of drugs, even, but death can't be touched by any of that. There are no drugs to help you forget that you're dead, or even to make you feel more alive - believe me, I've tried.

So when she took off running I just let her go for a minute, I knew she wasn't going to be able to get far. Living reality is a whole lot different from dead reality. We get to pull a lot of cool tricks when it comes to catching up with runners. No matter where Julie turned to run she ran into me. I tried not to be mean about it, but after about the third try I finally just grabbed her.

"You're dead," my voice sounded firm and deceivingly knowledgeable, "Dead," I repeated. "I need you to listen to me for a minute, Julie."

Finally, she nodded in a daze.

I explained the general idea of what had happened and what her immediate future would be. It's sort of a big thing to deal with so I try not to feed them more information than they really need. The paperwork and pamphlets explain it better anyway and any other questions invariably get answered by their case worker. Hell, I barely remember what the FC said to me when I popped. I'm not an experience they'll remember. I get buried beneath their shock, under mountains of memories and the onslaught of remorse. I try not to let it get to me, but I have to admit, after a day of being met with nothing but blank, confused, frightened, angry and blank stares, it can really wreak havoc on your ego.

Julie stood there while I finished the referral slip and took a final glance around the room. Just then a sprightly looking guy came loping over to the hub of the room, displacing the other guy with a smile and a complicated hand gesture.

A small flicker of recognition danced across Julie's eyes.

"Do we have to go right now?" she asked, looking from me to the paper I'd stuffed in her hand.
I checked my board and shook my head tentatively, "Why?"

"That's DJ Spree," she pointed at the lanky young man who was already jumping up and down. "Can we stay for his set? He was the whole reason I came to this party."

I looked at her and then over to the DJ before shrugging my shoulders and finally nodding amicably. "Yeah, sure, what the hell," I smiled. "I'll let you know when it's time to go."

I hung back for the next half hour or so, during which Julie never stopped moving. She was in the middle of the dance floor, spinning and jumping and what I presumed to be some form of dancing. Even when I was topside I wasn't the dancing type, so even then it all looked like some form of low-grade epileptic fit. I don't know if I never knew about raves then or if they just didn't exist yet, but I never saw this kind of shit until I started this job. Now rave pick-ups are pretty regular, though nowhere near as bad as they were when I first started doing this. My first few weeks out in the field I was picking up kids from places like this a few times a week.

Awhile later the next name on my board popped. It was time to go. I started walking towards Julie and when she noticed me I could see the urge to run flash across her eyes again. I smiled wearily at her, hoping she'd just resign herself to the inevitable. She was a nice kid and I didn't want to have to chase her down again. Easy enough as it is to do, it's still irritating. And there was something I liked about Julie, something I didn't want to have sullied by having to chase after her a second time. Especially not after I had bent the rules a bit to let her listen to as much of this set as I could get away with.
Thankfully, the look disappeared from her face and was replaced by the wearily accepting look of resignation and, when I took her hand for the last time, I felt not only her confusion and understandable fear of what was happening, but a trace of her youthful optimism as well.

Good, I thought, She'll need it.

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The Italian Deadino
Franco Tonini, 52 years old, massive coronary, Maria's Roman Room, Tuesday, 6:47pm

He pops as I'm sitting in my kitchen drinking a cup my third cup of coffee. The restaurant is blessedly close my place so I shuffle off to the shower slowly, grateful for a slow day. I had three pick ups this morning and then a lull all afternoon. I'd managed to waste the entire afternoon in the most decadent and non-productive ways I could think of, watching TV and alternating between dozing off and drinking some really expensive mocha blend I'd bought from Starbucks on my way home.

By 6:45 I was sliding through the open back door of Maria's. I had already slipped under while in the alleyway behind the place so making my way through the kitchen was easy. My stomach growled in spite of my being beneath the surface and I wondered if anyone could hear it. If they did, they didn't show it though.

Out in the dining room Franco was already mopping up the last of his spaghetti sauce with a crusty roll smeared with garlic butter. I rolled my eyes and sat down next to him. My fingers caressed the back of his hand when his heart seized. It only took a matter of seconds for him to really see me. We stared at each other for a minute before he asked, "Who da' hell are you?"

I smirked at his accent, could he have been more stereotypical?

"I'm Death," I tried to keep the smile out of voice.

He gave me a hard look, "Who da' fuck are you? Who sent you here, huh? Jimmy Two-Time? Jimmy da' Jew?'

I laughed before realizing he wasn't joking. "No, really," I composed myself, "I'm death. You're dead. I'm here to pick you up and get you processed."

He stared at me awhile longer, making me feel strangely edgy. Then a wickedly wild grin broke across his face and a deep, hearty laugh came thundering out of him, "Ahhh! Okay, keep your joke, but lemme buy you a drink." He slapped me hard on the back and raised his hand to call for the waiter but as soon as his hand touched my back I felt the familiar surge and knew that in that instant he knew the truth.

He said something quietly in Italian and stared at me with wide eyes. He was shaking his head no, but if he knew, he probably didn't even realize he was doing it. I pulled out his file and showed him the transfer papers. "You'll be switched over to central processing, we'll go there in a few minutes," I began.

Franco stood up quickly - so quickly that he should have knocked his chair over but, of course, he didn't. People from the restaurant surrounded us. Even the cook had come scuttling out from the kitchen to see what the commotion was all about.

Franco stared at everyone who was staring at the body he had once inhabited. People were whispering and speaking quietly to one another, a waiter was trying futilely to get them to return to their seats. I shifted the file a little on the table in an effort to get Franco's attention. He looked back down at me as the look of awed confusion drained from his face, leaving in its place the sad stare of a man who has suddenly realized he wasted his life.

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Dead like WHO?
"Did you hear from Uncle Dave?" Rosalie slid up next to me at the bar and ordered a Long Island Iced Tea.

I frowned into my own drink and thought for a moment. Uncle Dave was a culler based out of Las Vegas. He'd been around for years and had become a fixture in my life over the past few years. He sent out regular e-mails about the job - sort of an unofficial town crier, or shop steward, of sorts. He usually sends rants on news about new protocols and weird little e-mails about interesting cull calls he's gone on. Truth be told, he's the inspiration for me starting this blog.

Anyway, I was trying to think of my last e-mail contact with him but finally drew a blank after several drunken moments and shook my head. "No," I finally answered, "What did he say?"

"He emailed everyone about this new show on some cable channel," Rosalie answered, taking a long drink, "It's about people like us."

"Like us?"

"Yeah, cullers, only I don't think they're called cullers. Do you have cable?"

I shook my head. I was barely home long enough to watch the pitiful offering to be had on regular TV, much less cable.

"I think it's called 'Dead Like Me' or 'Dead Like Us' or something."

Eugene walked in then, and made a beeline right towards us. He worked the East side mostly, and was so flamingly gay that just looking at him made me smile. "What are we talking about girls?" He waved at the bartender, "Barkeep! I need a Pina Colada over here!" followed by a mumbled, "You big sexy devil."

"That e-mail from Uncle Dave," Rosalie smiled. "Have you gotten it yet?"

"Fuck yes, girlfriend," Eugene slid sideways onto a bar stool, "Did you read that trash?"

"They're making us out like god damn meter readers!" Rosalie growled.

I swallowed hard, "Seriously?"

Eugene nodded and smiled flirtatiously at the painfully heterosexual bartender, who returned an uncomfortable smile before turning his back to us, earning himself a blown kiss from Eugene, in lieu of a tip. "I got it this morning, totally whacked, if you ask me. But they're not parking meter attendants," he rolled his eyes at Rosalie, "Just that one chick was, I think. She was a meter reader in life so now she's doomed to wear that stupid costume throughout eternity I guess."

I swallowed another large gulp, "That's stupid. What, just because you're dead you don't change your clothes?"

Eugene shrugged, "Well, I only read the email. I haven't seen the show or anything, but you know how TV execs see us mindless plebeians. They think that if characters change clothes we'll all forget who they are."

I ordered another drink and as I fished another fiver out of my pocket I looked up at Rosalie, "You'd think that if they were going to make a show about us they'd at least make us cool."

They both laughed at that, "Oh yeah," Eugene drawled, "Like we're just so cool."

"I am," Rosalie shot him a jokingly angry glare. "Did you see who's in it though? That meter reader chick is the same chick in that Cosby show spin off, the one about that college."

I frowned and paid for my drink, "What show?"

"You know," Eugene ran his fingers around the lip of his glass, "When the older daughter went off to college."

"I thought she was in college when the Cosby show started?" I raised my glass to my lips.

"No, not that one," Rosalie shook her head, "The other one. The chick with the long hair ... you know, the one who married Lenny Kravitz."

"Lisa Bonet?" Eugene offered.

I nodded, "Oh yeah. I remember the show you're talking about now ... wasn't it called 'A Different World' or something?"

"Yeah, I think so," Eugene nodded. "The meter reader chick was in that."

"Lisa Bonet is the meter reader chick?"

"No," Rosalie shook her head and laughed, "That southern chick, the whiney one. Jasmine Guy."

"They cast her as a culler?" I nearly spit out my drink.

"Well, like I said before, they're not really cullers. It's kind of like what we are but it's not really. I think they're called Grim Reapers - can you imagine having that fucking title attached to you for all this time? Anyway, I think the e-mail said they're just stuck here, all hanging out and picking up souls because they still have to stay on earth - their lives weren't really finished yet or something."

"Yeah, like Death makes mistakes," I chortled. We all laughed at that. It was the number one rule the biggest source of disillusionment for new cullers: Death NEVER makes mistakes. Every victim of tragic accidents - natural and otherwise - are never in the place they are by mere coincidence. It's sort of like fate, but only in relation to your death. You're expiration date is already in place by the time you're sliding out of that nice cozy womb at birth. Even though no one in our department can control what fucked up things people (or the forces of nature) are gonna do, we can control who's in their path. Airplane hijackings, earthquakes, bombings ... we make sure all the right people are in all the right places. Sad but true. Ever talk to someone who wasn't on one of those flights that have gone down even though they had the ticket? There's a whole fleet of people making sure stuff like that happens. Death is a complicated but efficient business - the earlier you come to grips with that they better your transition will be when your time comes.

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Not Just A Job
Michelle Hayden, 12 years old, Wednesday, 11:23 pm

It may sound strange but I really don't mind picking kids up. They seem to put up the least amount of struggle. Once they know, they usually just shrug their shoulders and come with me pretty willingly.

Sometimes they'll ask about their parents or their pets but there's not usually any of the theatrics I get with adults. The older they get the harder they are to gauge and so I wasn't sure what to expect from Michelle. I had a pick up right before her (brain embolism in an elevator) so I got to her house with only a few minutes to spare.

11:20 and I find her in the bathroom. Michelle is lying on the floor, her head is resting in her mother's lap. Her dad is sitting between Michelle's open legs, his back resting against the chipped wooden door. There's blood everywhere. It never ceases to amaze me that, even with being dead all this time, my gag reflex still works. I don't want to be seeing this.

Thankfully, there's not enough time for me to think about it much. 11:22 and I can feel that familiar ebbing begin so I plastered my most reassuring smile onto my face and waited.

11:23.

"Michelle," I smiled and crouched down, "I'm here for you." I put my hand on her shoulder and felt that surge, which was surprisingly calm considering the current situation.

She smiled up at me, "Are you God?"

I laughed and shook my head, "No, she works in another department."

Michelle gave me a quizzical look but I just stood up and motioned for her to follow me. She struggled onto her feet and then rocked back on her heels - leaving the body has been known to give people a massive head rush.

"Am I dead now?" she rubbed her forehead with a plump little hand.

I nodded and took out her file.

"Does that mean I get to keep my baby?"

The question didn't sink in right away, and my eyes floated from the paperwork to her curious face and then around the small bathroom again. Her parents were still in the same positions, though her mother's face had changed from one of blank stoicism to one of macabre relief. As I glanced over at her father I noticed, for the first time, the gnarled looking wire hanger near his hand. The meaty bits of flesh that were dotted along the white floor.

You know that old slogan for the Navy - 'It's not just a Job, it's an adventure'? Well, this job is sort of like that, except it's a really shitty adventure I just wish would end.

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Long time no see....
Jeez, I haven't updated this blog in awhile. Things have been pretty busy here and with the Holiday season right around the corner, they're only going to get busier. The last week in November (that's Thanksgiving Week to any readers from abroad) is the very last week you can take any vacation time so I've scheduled all of next week off and I'm going to Las Vegas to see Uncle Dave for a few days. His place is a good bit away from the heart of Vegas but you can still see the neon-lit strip from his balcony. Last time I was there we spent two days doing a cull in a casino together. If you want to get to know someone really well then work with them for forty-eight hours straight.

Dave and I have been friends ever since.

Anyway, so I'm getting packed for that tonight - my plane leaves first thing in the morning. I'm spending three fabulous days out there and then renting a car and driving back to Ohio. I can't wait!

This week has been hell though. Like most jobs, if you're about to go on vacation you get saddled with a shit-load of extra work the week before. Paul had saddled me with no less than twelve culls a day - and that's not necessarily twelve people, that's twelve incidents. So, like, on Monday I had two ER shifts, which only counted as two culls, but I actually picked up thirteen people. Ugh, it's a huge pain in the ass.

On the up side, it does make the after-life rather interesting.

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She makes a great pot pie
Roberta Smitherman, 48, Suicide, Tuesday, 4:17 am

Roberta and her husband, Monty, opened up a small diner 15 years ago. The diner became something of a personal refuge for Monty; something he could have complete control over in a world where felt as though he had no control. Under his watchful eye, the small diner turned into something of a neighborhood institution, and Monty began spending every free moment there. He'd come in at 4:30 every morning to give the place a solid cleaning, start up all the ovens and griddles, measure out the coffee into filters, and generally just putter around. He'd stay throughout the day and usually wouldn't get home until after supper. Roberta had worked side by side with him for the first ten years until she realized he really didn't need her there and that Monty seemed happier when he was alone. The small staff they employed all worked swing shifts and odd hours. The diner had become Monty's entire world - and there just wasn't room enough for Roberta.

For a few years Roberta had kicked back and enjoyed herself. She'd enrolled in a calligraphy class and offered to make up fancy menus - an offer Monty had declined. She's taken flower arranging, interior design and a slew of other classes all of which taught her things she offered to use to improve the diner and, each time, Monty had turned her down, saying he could handle it. Roberta started to feel useless. She got depressed. Then she got angry.

I know this because I spent an entire afternoon curled up with her diary and a few joints. She even had her suicide note to Monty in there - written on the back of a paper place mat. She was blaming him for her death, placing all responsibility squarely on his oh-so-capable shoulders.

It read, in part:
"Fifteen years ago I gave up my career to help you open that fucking diner and now it's taken you away from me. Do you have any idea how long it's been since we last made love? I can tell you: it was seven weeks ago. SEVEN WEEKS! Well, I hope your diner keeps you happy while you live with the guilt of my death. And I doubt you'll have many customers once they find out what's happened here."

"Damn, she's pissed", I muttered to myself and folded the note back up, tucking it behind the pages.
Tuesday morning I woke up at two, got dressed, and ingested no fewer than four gas station cappuccinos before slowly making my way over to the diner. Roberta showed up at three-thirty and I wondered idly how she had managed to sneak out of bed without Monty noticing. Then I realized he probably hadn't noticed much about her for the past few years at least.

Roberta fried up some eggs and bacon and switched on the coffee pot. She ate her breakfast and took down the large chalkboard Monty used to display the daily specials. She erased it and then, after finding the chalk Monty kept behind the counter, wrote: "Today's Special: All the Sorrow You Can Take!"

The calligraphy was impeccable.

She ended up doing herself in by hanging herself from the exposed rafters that ran along the kitchen. An ugly way to go really, and I could tell that for a few seconds she had worried it wasn't going to work. But then I felt myself coming up, that sensation of thickness and the recognition in her eyes.
I smiled, "I'm Emily."

She turned and looked at her body hanging from the ceiling and then turned back to me. "I'm dead, right?"

I nodded.

"Are you an angel?"

I shook my head, "I'm just here to get you going. From here you'll go on and meet your case worker, who will handle your assignment."

I could see she didn't understand, "How long will that take?"

Funny how reluctant we are to relinquish the concept of time, even in death. "I don't know," I answered honestly, "But first we'll have to wait for your body to be discovered, that's the way it works with suicides."

She nodded and I noticed a smug little smile creeping across her lips, "I can't wait to see how the bastard reacts."

As if on cue, we heard Monty's keys in the front lock. He came in, smelled the food in the air and quickly walked into the back, totally ignoring the menu board Roberta had painstakingly prepared. He stopped a few steps ahead of where we stood. He stared at Roberta's body for a long moment, his face revealing nothing.

"What he's doing?" Roberta grumbled, "Why isn't he doing anything?"

I shrugged and continued filling out the rest of the form for her to be processed. These little dramas usually tend to be only interesting to the people involved. Then Monty did something that definitely got me interested in how this particular drama was about to play out. He climbed up onto the large griddle/stove that Roberta had jumped off of and leaned over to cut her down. Her body fell to the floor with a sickly sounding thud and Monty disappeared into a back room.

When he reappeared he was in a rubber apron and had an ugly looking meat hook in one hand. He unlocked the freezer, attached the hook onto one of the metal bars running across the top and then walked back over to Roberta's body. I knew in a flash what was about to happen and I turned to watch Roberta's face contort through a series of expressions ranging from confusion to disbelief to outrage while Monty hauled her body into the freezer, hung in on the hook and began gutting it.

"What is he doing?" Roberta's eyes were wide and she was starting to look a little green. Seeing your body being cut up can't be pleasant and I worried for a moment whether or not she'd be okay.

It was easy to tell Monty had been a hunter at some point in his life as he made quick work of the body. I didn't have another pick up until early afternoon, plus I had never seen anything quite like this, so I was in no hurry to leave. For as upset as Roberta was, she didn't ask me to get her out of there. Instead she turned to me and said, "Do something, you HAVE to do SOMETHING!"

"What should I do?" I cocked an eyebrow but never shifted my gaze from Monty's busy form, "Call the police and say, 'Oh, hello…I'm a minion of Death and someone I've just culled is being cut up?' I'm sorry. It just doesn't work that way, Roberta."

"Well can't you touch him and kill him or something? Divine retribution!"

I finally turned to face her, "First of all, I'm about as divine as you are and secondly, I just work here, I don't get to decide who lives and who dies."

Roberta frowned. "This is wrong", she shook her head and continued to watch as her newly windowed husband set about preparing the meat of her body, "This isn't how this was supposed to happen."

"Death means a total loss of control over things like this," I said softly, "We can leave now if you'd like."

She continued staring at Monty for another long minute before finally saying, "One more minute."
So we stayed. Monty managed to do a pretty good job of getting the meat off and wrapping it up in butcher paper. He took what was left of Roberta's body and heaved it into a garbage bag, and then into another one before shoving it all into a plastic garbage can and sealing the lid on with a generous helping of duct tape.

He cleaned up, grabbed a shirt from his office and opened the diner. He'd gutted his wife and concealed the body in just under two and a half hours. I, for one, was impressed.

When the breakfast crowd began filtering in around seven am, Ronald Grimmes was one of the first in. He took a seat at the counter and scanned the large Menu board before noticing the smaller Specials Board Roberta had written on.

"What's that supposed to mean, Monty?" Ronald motioned at the board as Monty set a cup of coffee in front of him.

"Oh, that," Monty walked over and picked it up, rubbing out the world 'Sorrow' and writing something in its place, "I did this last night, must have been working too long that day," Monty laughed as he turned around the board, which now read, 'All the Steak You Can Handle!'

"Wow," Ronald nodded, "That's a pretty special offer." Ronald smiled at his own poor joke.

"Yeah, I got a special on a side of beef, just came in this morning." Monty busied himself with adjusting the griddle settings.

"Well, count me in for an order of steak and eggs, heavy on the steak." Ronald smiled and leaned over to grab the morning newspaper Monty had left on the counter.

I saw the last remains of color drain from Roberta's face as Monty nodded and headed for the back.
She grabbed my arm and said "Okay I'm ready to go now."

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Religious Types
Raymond Jacobson, 57, Minister, Thursday, 7:52pm, Heart Attack

You wouldn't think a cull like this would be a big deal, would you? I mean, Religious types should be easy, right? After all, they're finally finding out that there really is life after death.

But no ... these people are just as much a pain in the ass in death as they are in life.

Raymond (or, Pastor Ray to his flock) had a run of the mill massive coronary at 7:50, by 7:52 he was dead as a doornail. And there I was.

He looked at me for a moment and then frowned. "And you are?" he asked with a tone of disappointment.

"I'm Emily," I smiled, and brought out my clipboard, "I'm just here to help your transition."

"I'm dead?"

I nodded.

"Where's Jesus?" he demanded.

I laughed in spite of myself, "Your guess is as good as mine."

His frown deepened and he cocked his head to one side, "The angels, then, the angels of heaven. Surely you must be one of them?"

I shook my head again, "Sorry, I'm a Buddhist." I shook my head then, "Or, well, I was a Buddhist. Death has a way of making religion seem a bit less sensible."

"I don't understand," he shook his head, "I'm a Christian. Perhaps I should be speaking to someone else."

"You will be speaking to someone else," I reassured him, "I'm just here to pick you up and take you where you need to be." I placed my hand on his shoulder and felt a wave of understanding pass between us. But, as my hand remained on his shoulder I felt something else, something between rage and fear, something that made me snatch my hand back as if I'd been burned.

Pastor Ray's face had begun to contort into a mask of rage, "No," his voice was deeper and louder now, "YOU don't understand," he jabbed a meaty finger into my chest, thumping my sternum roughly. "I'm a Christian and a man of the cloth. And this," he jabbed my chest again, "isn't how this is supposed to happen."

I pushed his hand away and rubbed my chest, "Listen, I'm sorry if this isn't what you expected, but this is how it is." I began jotting things down on his intake form while I spoke to him, "I'm just here to answer any questions I can for you and to get you to your case worker, who will, in turn, let you know where you go from here."

"Well there's no need for that," Ray shook his head with conviction, "I know where I'm headed. Straight to the Boss," he smiled a smug little smile that made me want to punch him in the face. "Surely you must know who runs this whole operation."

"No, actually, I don't." I scanned the details of his form for a moment looking for the name of the case worker he's been assigned to, "And considering your case worker is Paul, who's also my case worker, I can assure you he won't know either. And you'll be here for a while."

"What are you talking about?" he was really getting angry now.

"Your case worker's name is Paul," I said in my calmest voice. "And he's also my case worker. He's a Level 3 case worker, which means he only deals with people who go on to work in this capacity. Other case workers on other levels handle different assignments." Ray didn't seem to be absorbing this well. "I know it's a lot to digest right now, and that's why I'm here. To help prepare you for what awaits you."

"Am I going to heaven?" Ray's voice quivered and I felt a pang of sympathy for the man.

"Honestly, I have no idea," I tried to sound soothing, "What I can tell you with some certainty is that you'll work as a culler for some time, doing assignments like this. Paul will fill you in on the work required and might be able to give you an idea as to how long you'll be here." I felt bad about that last part since I knew it was a lie. Even if Paul did know how long the good Pastor would be here, there's no way he could tell him. None of us know that.

Pastor Ray was silent for a moment before finally shaking his head slowly, "I just don't understand," he said at last, "This isn't how it's supposed to happen."

"It'll be all right, Ray," I rested my hand on his shoulder once again.

"No!" he jerked away from me, "No it isn't okay, you stupid little bitch!" His eyes were wide and he leaned into me, his hot breath in my face, "Don't you fucking UNDERSTAND? This means to Bible had it wrong! This means I've spent the last thirty fucking YEARS of MY life following the wrong fucking religion."

"Not necessarily," I took a step away from him, "Like I said, I have no idea who's ultimately in charge. It very well may be the God you worship."

"Oh fuck you," he waved a dismissive hand at me, "You don't really know anything do you? So I don't want to hear your bullshit platitudes right fucking now."

I raised an eyebrow and eyed him cynically, "You sure do swear a lot for a man of the cloth."

The slap came as a total surprise. With my cheek burning I cast the stoniest glare I could at him and then made a few more notes to his processing form before transporting the form to Paul's desk and Pastor Ray to the large communal waiting room.

Fucker.

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Nicholas Carlisle
Accidental Overdose, 12:47am, New Years Eve

I had been partying with Rosalie right before I went to pick up Nicholas. She and I had hooked up earlier that day. We had invested some serious time at the bar before heading back to her place to get stoned for a while and kill some time. She shot up and I smoked up. Rosalie offered to come along on the cull but I shrugged and told her not to worry about it. I knew she was already too fucked up for it and, seriously, the last thing someone wants to see when they're being processed is someone so fucked up on drugs they can barely move.

I left her apartment around eleven-thirty and made my way towards Nicholas' place outside Cleveland. It was a fourth floor walk up in a neighborhood that looked like it used to be a lot nicer than it currently was. Not that it was bad really - just sort of worn looking. I slipped under before I got to his door so I could get in. His place was dark. The curtains were drawn and the walls were an odd shade of green. Nicholas was on the floor in his living room. There was a TV on one of those wheelie carts near the front door switched on to some weird cartoon with the sound turned off. Music came out of a small set of speakers on a grey metal shelf, hooked up to a computer.

There was a girl curled up on a large overstuffed chair in the corner smoking a cigarette. She was staring at the television and licking her lips, Nicholas was moving his foot in time to the music and moaning. I checked my watch. Fifteen minutes to go. Dammit. I yawned and walked through the apartment.

It looked pretty spartan on the surface but once you started looking around, you could see that it was stuffed - just not with furniture. There were books lining shelves on the walls and piles of magazines in the corners. In the bedroom there were more shelves - all metal - and each one was covered with trinkets and knick-knacks. The little things that you just pick up along the way - some plastic toys that looked like they'd come from gumball machines, a few pewter figurines, and a couple old letter tiles from a Scrabble game. I checked my watch again. Ten minutes.

I wandered back into the living room and watched as Nicholas pulled out a small bag of heroin and groped around for the rest of his works. He assembled all the various bits and pieces and then started patting his pockets, searching along the large oak table the computer sat on and felt around on the floor. I frowned and wondered what he had lost. After a minute or so he leaned over and plucked the cigarette from between the girl's fingers, took the last drag and stamped it out in an ashtray before carefully peeling back the paper from the filter and extracting the brownish-yellow cotton. The girl was asleep, her shaggy red hair hung in her face and she snored softly. Nicholas stared at her for a moment while he fingered the cotton filter.

When he finally assembled the shot and sucked it into the needle he went over and sat down cross-legged under the table the computer sat on. His arm wasn't pockmarked with the track marks I had expected. I wondered if it was the dose or the dirty cotton he'd filtered it through that was about to do him in. As the shot went in I started to feel myself coming up. I ran my hands though my hair and popped a mint into my mouth.

12:47am.

Processing someone as stoned as Nicholas is almost always pretty easy and I was able to shuffle Nicholas off in record time. As I turned to leave though I looked at his body on the floor and the girl still sitting in the overstuffed chair, licking her lips while clenching and unclenching her hands. I wondered how long it would take her to notice he had died ... and I realized that sometimes life really is worse than death.

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Jerry Burton
5:45pm, Friday, Car Accident

The I-71/480 split is an ugly thing even at the best of times, but during rush hour it can be akin to an inner ring in Dante's Hell. This was not a road for the likes of Jerry Burton. He was a high-strung type as it was, so gridlock and slow traffic brought out the very worst in him from the looks of things. He had swung out and been driving in the berm - that strip that runs alongside a road that's gritty and typically only used for pulling people over or leaving a dead car. Jerry seemed to think it was his personal travel lane and, when the traffic began to get a bit bogged down, Jerry pulled out and began bombing down the berm. That is, until a truck swung out and he crashed right into the back of it, ramming his absurdly fashionable sports car into the iron bull bar that runs along the back of it. The collision also had the added side effect of slicing his head clean off his shoulders.

He was in the middle of screaming at me and trying to get his cell phone to work when my cell phone rang.

I turned my head and let him carry on while I answered.

"Hey Em," David's voice greeted me.

"Hey Dave," I smiled and then bit my bottom lip, "What up?"

"I'm heading into Cleveland tomorrow and I'll be there for a couple few days, want to get together? Better yet, want to let me crash at your place?"

"Yeah, sure," I frowned, "What business? I haven't heard anything."

"Eh, it's a National thing."

"National? I didn't know you were working on Nationals."

"Eh, it's just a change, so can you meet me at the airport? Tomorrow night at 10.30?"

I checked my schedule and nodded without knowing why, "Yeah, sure, I can be there. I've got a pick up at 9:45, though, so if I'm a little late don't freak."

"Don't worry about it, if you're running late, I'll just be in the bar there."

After I'd hung up I turned my attention back to Jerry, who'd gone ashen. Obviously he'd twigged to the gravity of the situation and the rest of his processing was pretty straightforward. He was still angry and he cried a lot before we were done, but I had him in a chair at the central office before the hour was up. Then my mind was free enough to be able to mull over my phone call from Dave.

Nationals are the big jobs that you have to ask to be on call for. They're the jobs that, basically, no one else in their right mind would ever want. Some local cullers are called in to help out on National jobs but not many. Those who are called in are usually newbies or those who have fucked up royally and are burning off some extra bullshit. September 11th was a National Job. Wars, plagues, and national disasters are almost always National Jobs. They're messy, time-consuming culls that leave you drained and feeling like death warmed under - and we're the ones who know what that really feels like.

So why was Dave working them?

When I got home there was a message from Rosalie, asking me to meet her and Eugene at Corky's. I took a shower then smoked a joint and got ready. I had decided to walk down since I had every intention of taking advantage of the fact that we were meeting at a bar near my place, as opposed to the far flung downtown bars Rosalie usually favored, by getting totally shit faced that night. I stopped at a Chinese place along the way for a spring roll and contently munched away on it as I wound my way down the sporadically lit streets of Lakewood.

Rosalie was already there with Eugene and a girl I had only met once before. I ordered a Smirnoff Ice and walked over to the table they were all huddled around. Corky's has two large tables in the front of the bar and a smattering of tables in a room off to one side. Rosalie, Eugene, and the other girl (who was reintroduced to me as Danielle) were clustered around a table near the front of the main room. They were squeezed between the front window and a pool table no one was using.

I grabbed a chair from one of the other disused tables and dropped into it.

"Uncle Dave is coming into town tomorrow," I announced.

"Really?" Rosalie finished her drink and gave Eugene a kick, waggling her empty glass, "What's he coming in for?"

I leaned back in my chair to let Eugene pass, "And a Long Island for me," I smiled at him before turning back to Rosalie, "I don't know what he's coming for. Said he had some business here." I paused, "A National job."

"Whoa, back up," Rosalie raised her perfectly manicured hand in my face, "When did he switch to Nationals?"

I shrugged, "Dunno, this was the first I'd heard of it too."

Danielle spoke up for the first time, "Wait, are we talking about Dave as in 'Uncle Dave' as in the guy from Vegas?"

I nodded.

"Oh, well, I'll tell you," she leaned in even more and lowered her voice to gossip level, "I was still working in transfers and requests when his came through. He put it in six months ago, wants to burn off some extra time and, you know, doing National jobs burns off time way faster than these normal run of the mill local jobs. How else could they get people to do them?"

"Fuck," Rosalie sighed.

Eugene came back with drinks in tow and I leaned back again to let him pass, "What are we talking about?"

"Dave is doing Nationals," Rosalie gaped.

"Damn," he his eyebrows danced high on his olive forehead.

"I didn't know you could burn extra time doing Nationals," I mused. Burn extra time, damn. I wondered how much time Dave had to burn off. I wondered if he even had any idea.

"Those are the worst jobs," Rosalie took a large gulp from her drink, which was an ominous brown.
They are the worst jobs. No wonder you get to burn off more time. The fact that Dave had signed up for them left me feeling worried and somehow betrayed. I don't know how long Dave has been doing this and, to be honest, I don't even know how he died in the first place, but signing up for National jobs seems to me like a form of after death suicide. Obviously, you can't kill yourself once your dead, but you can cut your time, which, in a way, is what suicide is.

What comes after this? I've thought about it more than once. When I died I thought my troubles were over - I figured that death would be a breeze - if I even realized anything was happening. I couldn't have been more wrong. Maybe for some people - whose lives were lived in black and white - their deaths might be more ... I don't know … simple, I guess. But not for me - and, from the looks of things, not for most people. There are a lot of cullers - and I've never heard anyone talk about a shortage. So here we all are - we lived our lives less than perfectly and now we're paying the ultimate price - a sort of extended life but not in the way we thought. We live and breathe the deaths of others. We're human, and not. Alive, but not quite. We're in a constant state of limbo with the spectre of another sort of death hanging over our heads.

I have to try to get some sleep now.

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David McHutchens (aka Damien the Undead)
6:27am, Wednesday, Suicide

Ah, the Goths.

You'd think these people would be easy to pick up. After all, they spend every spare moment obsessing about death. They actually try to make their skin look as pale and deathly as possible. But I'm here to tell ya, these fuckers put up the biggest fight sometimes.

Not all of them mind you ... I've culled quite a few Goths who've been as normal as the next freak and they react really normally. Of course, these are people who aren't what you would label extreme - they're into the whole fashion and sub-culture but they harbour no delusions about being vampires or werewolves or necromancers or whatever the fuck these people seem to think they are.

But I digress....

So, I got the call to bring in David/Damien. He's seventeen years old ... much too young for this shit. Too young to be chucking in his chips and shuffling off the mortal coil while his flesh takes the big dirt-nap. Hell, I can't even figure out what his problem is, other than maybe he could use some Paxil or Prozac or whatever they give depressed people nowadays. I bet some pot or some acid would clear him right up, actually. This guy doesn't need to be offing himself, he just needs to get a bit stoned and wait out his high school years. Adulthood is so worth the wait.

Eh, once again, I totally digress ...

David's chosen to do himself by hanging. I've read his journal (which he made easy by having it at a blog site) and he seems to think hanging is romantic somehow. He's about to be very disappointed. But, to his credit, he's read up on all the details via sites like ASH and shit so he's got the right rope, the right length and he seems pretty prepared. It's funny how much homework a teenager will do when it's something they're interested in. He had written notes to leave for all his family members and he woke up at 4:30 this morning to mail letters to his friends and watch the sunrise, for what he figured would be the last time.

But it's still fucked up. I mean, to be honest, I don't really think even he knows why he's doing this. Whenever he talks about it in his blog (or in the dog eared notebook I found in his room on Monday night) he just says things like 'I know what comes next' and 'Clearly, there's only one road I can travel down' but there doesn't seem to be any big reason this is happening. It's just such a fucking waste.

He's depressed, but just about the normal things high school kids are depressed about: no one understands him and he'll never find true love or a purpose in life. Sigh, if only he understood how much like everyone else he really is. Well, I suppose he'll have plenty of chances to find a purpose in death.

I waited for him to come back from his last stroll on Earth by poking around his bedroom a bit more and downloading some of his MP3 collection to my MP3 player.

Don't look at me like that. It isn't like I was taking his boots, just making a copy of them.

David was back by 5:45 and he spent a while on-line clearing out his e-mail accounts and closing them down. He uploaded a farewell message to his blog and website, and then loaded up a play list he'd clearly given a lot of thought about.

I sat on the floor with my back against the door and watched him. Since I was already under the surface, watching him was like watching a slightly out of focus movie. I wanted a joint like crazy but I just rubbed my eyes and watched as he shuffled around his room, setting everything up and taking long moments to look out the window and run his hands over his books and CDs. I found myself fighting down the urge to do something to stop him from following through. Memories of The Carlos Incident flooded through my mind and I sat on my hands and bit the inside of my cheek to keep myself from doing something stupid.

I think that's the hardest part of this job. Suicides (Do-It-Yourselfers) are always bad - it's just a bad scene for everyone involved. But it's almost unbearable when you just know that the focus of your attention is going to regret it. As soon as they see me, I can see the fear and disbelief in their eyes. I've seen them beg me to change things and I've been offered everything and anything in way of a bribe. But, even if I wanted to, I couldn't change things. The only time things can be altered is right before the act and doing that guarantees landing you in a world of shit. I know; I earned extra time for The Carlos Incident and it just wasn't worth it in the end. He didn't change his life, it just got worse and ended up dead anyway.

It makes you feel both responsible and ineffectual all at once.

But back to David. He was just finishing up putting on his white face and black eyes and had changed into some comfortable clothes (black, of course). He lit some candles, turned up his speakers a little and moved the chair into position.

6:15 and he's standing on the chair and looping the noose around his young neck. 6:16 and he's kicked it out from beneath him, leaving him hanging and, for a moment, looking inert. Then the panic shot through him. His hands flew to his throat and he began to claw at the rope. His legs kicked out and he swung around violently on the rope while 'Little Fluffy Clouds' by The Orb spilled from his speakers.

It can take ten minutes to achieve brain death via asphyxiation, but you can reach unconsciousness in five. That may not seem like long to you right now, but go and thrash around in a panic for five minutes as you hang quite literally at the end of your rope and it's an eternity. I often wonder what they're thinking as they speed towards the point of no return.

David was fighting but it looked more mechanical than passionate to me. He jerked around and twisted until he finally fell limp for a second time. He went through another brief phase of frenzied activity and then his body swung slack at 6:24

I felt myself surging towards him a 6:26 and he materialized in front of me right on time.

"Hi, I'm Emily," I smiled.

David blinked. "Am I dead?"

I nodded and cast a pointed glance to his body. He looked up and blinked again. He sighed then and stared at the floor.

"You okay?" I placed a hand on his shoulder, felt that whoosh of understanding as he lifted his head and stared at me with bloodshot eyes.

"Wait," he looked around the room, "If I'm dead, then what's going on? Who are you?"

I pulled out his file and took a deep breath, "I'm your culler. I'm here let you know what's happening as well as what's about to happen. And, since you've killed yourself, the first thing that's going to happen is that we're going to wait here until someone discovers you body."

David's eyes widened, "Why are we going to do that?"

"Well," I raised my eyebrows and began looking through the top sheet of his file so I wouldn't have to face the raw look of confusion and pain on his face, "It's supposed to provide some form of closure for you." I looked back up at him, "Look, it's just one of those things, it's not something that only you have to do."

David nodded but I could tell it wasn't all sinking in.

"It'll probably be a little while before anyone comes in, why don't you sit down?" I gently guided him towards his bed and sat him down. "This is a lot to absorb all at once, I understand." I sat down next to him and began to look through his file again, giving him some time to think and gather his thoughts.

After a few minutes of shuffling papers, I started to give him the run down of what would happen once he could leave here. I told him about who his Field Culler would be, what to expect in terms of housing and work and the general idea of our limited interaction with topsiders. It's a list of rules and guidelines that I can recite in my sleep.

When I finished he didn't say anything, just sat there. No one had come in yet and I wondered how long we'd have to wait. "So, what do you think?" I asked, "Any questions?"

The play list trundled on and we both sat in silence as something smooth and Celtic-sounding filled the room. David sighed, "I wish I'd chosen better music," he smiled half-heartedly.

I smiled and took his hand in mine, wanting to offer some comfort but suddenly realizing his bedroom door was opening.

I'd read in David's blog and journal what he had written about his parents. He'd painted his mother as a chillingly standoffish woman who was more likely to serve up a heaping helping of chum for dinner than she was to give him a hug. So, when I saw a rather plump and matronly woman walk in, I wondered if she was a housekeeper David hadn't mentioned.

But no. As soon as she walked in, the look on her face told me she was this boy's mother and that his perception of her had been horribly off target. Her hands flew to her face and a scream like nothing I'd ever heard before came out of her mouth. Within seconds a tall, spindly looking man was running up behind her, pausing for a moment, and then shoving her to one side, rushing to David's body and bringing him down to the ground. I watched the flurry of activity without being able to really follow it. David sat mesmerized, tears streaming steadily down his face as his parents cradled his body in their arms. His father, sitting on the floor cradling his son's head, and his mother kneeling to one side, still sobbing loudly, shaking her head and pounding her fists against her own chest.

"They weren't supposed to react like this," his voice, small and thick. "This isn't how I had envisioned this moment."

"It never is," I said softly. "We have to go, David. Come on."

I stood up and held my hand out to him. He grabbed hold of me but didn't look away from the scene in front of us. Even as we made our way across the room and out the door, he was still turning to stare at them.

He turned to me once we were out of the house. The look on his face seared straight through me. It was a look of fear. Confusion. Regret. I felt for a moment like I might faint as I looked into his face, soaked with tears that had washed away some of his makeup, leaving streaks of his skin peeking out from the strange shade of whitish-grey of his make up. I felt the tears welling up in my eyes and blinked them away, coughing to cover up the sob I choked back. I felt responsible and ineffectual ... all at once.

I really need a vacation.

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The Nobodies
The History: Last week I went with Dave to a bar after we'd been running around all day, hanging out. We stopped at this bar and I ducked into the bathroom as soon as we got there. I walked in and pushed my way through the crowd of fluff chicks hanging out in front of the mirror; puffing up their hair and checking the gloss factor of their lips.

So I finally make my way to a stall, do my business, and then push my way back to the sinks so I can wash my hands. I try to keep my head ducked low so as not to obscure the view of my shallow restroom-mates and quickly washed and dried my hands. On the way out, I made my way past a blonde woman who was trying to smooth away the crusty ocular boogers from the corners of her eyes.

"You might want to go check your make up honey," she sneered at me.

"Don't bother!" her catty brunette friend cracked before they both dissolved into the type of giggles I hadn't heard since my Junior Year in high school.

I pushed my way out and back into the smoky dimness of the bar and shook it off, but it really got under my skin. It just pissed me off that someone would think it was okay to say such a thing. It bothered me even more that I had let them say it. I should have reacted. I should have spit in her face or shoved her against the wall and delivered an elbow to her plastic nose or something. Good lord, man, I'm an angel of death and I'm still a wuss!

So, anyway, that's the history in play when I started my culls today.

Number three on my List, 1:07 pm, Heart Attack.

I didn't realize it until I saw her, of course, but as soon as I got there I made a note to thank Paul for this Cull. I was a few minutes early (and she was still getting dressed) so I wound my way around her apartment. I flipped through the desk calendar on her kitchen counter. Every night was full - names of clubs and people, phone numbers, and even notes on what outfits to wear. I rolled my eyes and flipped back to last weekend and confirmed that she was the same chick I'd seen at the bar. She had the name of the bar scrawled across Saturday night with a huge circle around it and then a name: Jameson. That must have been the name of the smug looking man I'd eyed her slinking around all night. I wandered into her bedroom and saw her closet stuffed full of clothes - mostly black and tiny. Shoes spilled out onto the floor, kicked into corners, and a few were peeking out from under the bed.

12:59 and I hear a crash in the bathroom. I walk through her trendily decorated apartment and into the bathroom. She's on the floor, surrounded by broken glass every color of the rainbow. There's a broken shelf on the wall and two more lined with glass bottles above the broken braces. She must have slammed into it when the pain started. She's convulsing and her face is a mask of pain.

1:03 and I can feel the first wave of coming up, but I fight it. I don't want to come up while she's still alive. I want to deny her that sense of anything positive, that bright light that people expect, the light that gives them a sense of reassurance. I don't want her to have that. I want her death to be as empty as her life.

1:05 and I have to really fight against the current. I close my eyes and try counting backwards from one hundred to focus myself.

1:06 and I open my eyes, still struggling to stay under for as long as I can. It has become insanely uncomfortable, a burning sensation like kerosene spilled on your inner-thigh, but it burns to your very core. We are definitely NOT supposed to fight back like this.

1:07 … done.

She blinks when she sees me. There's a flash of anger and confusion on her face as she stands up. I arch my left eyebrow and try to look nonchalant.

"What the fuck?" She scrambles up, leaving her body on the floor. "What the fuck are you doing in my house?"

She's screaming in my face and I remain silent, wondering why she's referring to her apartment as a house. Wondering if she ever calls it her home.

I wait another moment, watching her get angrier, although she knows something isn't right. Finally, when I can't stand the wait any longer, I smirk softly and say in the calmest voice I can muster, "You're dead."

The look on her face made me giddy. It was confusion at first, although disbelief might have been a better word for it. She blinked then and shook her head and the look changed to one of absolute outrage as she hissed, "Who the fuck are YOU?"

I walked past her and stood near the designer shower, "I'm Emily. I'm here to smooth your way through the transition and start your processing."

She shook her head and waved her hands around as if she were clearing smoke (maybe she feared her brain was smoking from all the thinking?) before sputtering, "But you're a ..." she shook her head and pursed her lips, "A Nobody!"

Later that night I was slumped over the sticky bar table, surrounded by Rosalie, Dylan, Marguerite, Sarah, Eugene and Joshua.

"Oh sweetie," Rosalie waved her swizzle stick around in her drink, "Don't give that skank-bag a second thought. Fuck, don't even give that bitch a first thought, okay?" She held up a hand and nodded her head.

I shook my head and downed the rest of my Long Island Iced Tea, "I know, but, really ... a fucking nobody? I mean, what the fuck? Am I in fucking high school?"

Eugene laughed, "You might as well be when you're dealing with people like that, Em," he smiled as he stood up and collected the empty glasses. "People like that are what they are ... shallower than a Dixie Cup."

I smiled and rubbed my nose, realizing I had already downed two drinks in less than an hour. "A water too," I called after Eugene as he sauntered off to order our drinks and flirt with the bartender. It was karaoke night at Corky's and Marguerite was trying to decide between Madison Avenue's 'Don't Call Me Baby' and Sheryl Crowe's 'Every Day is A Winding Road'. Rosalie rubbed my back, "Don't worry, sweets, we're all nobodies. You can't be a somebody and do this job." Her voice was soft and I heard the sadness there in her words.

She's right. Somewhere inside, against all my hopes, I knew she had to be right. You can't be somebody and do this job. Even if you were a somebody in real life, you can't be now. I've met Kurt Cobain - he's a culler. He lives the same type of life the rest of us do - half in the real world and half out. A spiritual hokey-pokey. When I met him, I was in Chicago at the Art Museum, standing in front of a painting with my head cocked to one side and squinting with one eye. Cullers can spot each other a mile away. He walked up to me and said something (I don't remember what exactly, but I think it had something to do with dead mackerel - without the smell) and we laughed. We ended up sharing a deep-dish pizza and talking about the job, about life and death, and deep dish pizza toppings and ... well, just everything.

He seemed to like the break from being somebody, and hated the sensation that came along with culling, that whoosh of recognition and understanding when you touch someone. A flesh-to-flesh contact is required for the process to get started - it's what kicks everything off. It's the only way to make people understand what's happening to them. When you're being trained, you're warned about it and it does take a while to get used to. In the moment you touch someone they get a brief flash of understanding - about what's happening to them and about who and what you are. You're vulnerable for that split second, and you know it. You can feel yourself taking a bit of them into yourself and you can tell that they've taken a bit of you as well. It's hard for people who were 'someone' when they were topsiders. It's like reliving something intrusive over and over again.

"I had one chick ask me for an autograph," he'd laughed into his beer.

And now, as Eugene set a fresh drink and a bottle of Evian in front of me, I realized that we're nobodies and somebodies all at once. Through death each of us had achieved a sort of notoriety. We became the ultimate Somebody to every person we cull. We transcend whatever mortal rank we'd had in life.

Rosaliee had been some kind of important gang-banger in life and now she had become something else. Marguerit had been a party girl - she'd been at every big happening, the toast of the underbelly of club culture. Since she became a culler she'd been knocked down to an equal footing with all the people she'd thought were so far beneath her. It had been hard for her. She'd told me about the bouts of depression she'd suffered, the feelings of hopelessness she'd had to cope with. She would have committed suicide, she told me once after a few rounds of tequila, but it was impossible to kill yourself once you're dead.

Death: The great equalizer.

"I think I'm going to go with 'Don't Call Me Baby' instead", Marguerite declared with finality.

Dylan nodded solemnly, "People can sing along with it and that's a big crowd pleaser."

"What about you, Em?" Rosalie shoved the song list over to me but I pushed it away with a sigh.

"I'm far too depressed and not nearly drunk enough," I shook my head, "Are you doing one?"

Rosalie nodded and immediately showed me the slip of paper she was going to hand to the karaoke DJ at the next break: Tom Jones' 'Help Yourself'. Dylan and Eugene were both begging off. "I just can't tonight," I mumbled.

Eugene sighed and pressed the back of his hand to his forehead, "Last week I just really overdid it."

Rosalie laughed and told us how she and Eugene had gone to a bar downtown and Eugene had become the belle of the ball with his stirring rendition of 'I Will Survive' which was quickly followed by a montage of similar disco-inspired anthems.

"What about you?" I nodded towards Joshua, who'd been uncharacteristically quiet.

Joshua smiled and scratched the back of his neck, "They're letting me play a cover song without the karaoke," he smiled and chewed his fingernails nervously. "I'm doing a cover of a Marilyn Manson song."

"Boy's been practicing all week," Rosalie smiled and put her hand on his knee, "Have you heard it yet?"

I shook my head, "What is it?"

Joshua smiled and looked at me, "I think you'll like it. It's called 'The Nobodies."

We all laughed and I stood up to get the next round.

When the karaoke DJ had gone on a break, they let Joshua up to the stage to do the song. Not being a big Marilyn Manson fan, I wasn't sure what to expect. Joshua's guitar playing was slow and mournful, his head bowed during the opening chords. The words washed over me and I felt as if a culler wrote it.

When he got to the chorus Joshua lifted his head and fixed a bittersweet gaze on our table, "We are the nobodies, wanna be somebodies, we're dead, we know just who we are."

By the time the last chords echoed through the small bar I could feel tears sliding down my face and as I turned away to wipe them off I noticed Rosalie's face was drenched as well. She caught my eye, smiled and grabbed my hand.

I still felt like a nobody, but suddenly, that didn't seem so bad.

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Janine Howards
38, Friday, 7:45am

"No, no, no, please no."

For about the millionth time, I wished my emotions had died when the rest of me did.

Jeanine Howards was grabbing my coat, crying and snotting all over my shirt. I was going to have to change before heading out with the Nobodies.

"Please don't do this," Janine launched another snot rocket onto my shirt.

I grabbed her by the shoulders and lugged her up. "Listen," I spoke slowly and clearly, as I tried to keep the irritation out of my voice, "I can't undo this. This is done." Dun bun can't be undone flashed through my head.

Janine's shoulders heaved one final time as she stared up into my eyes. Her mascara was running and her eyes were red. A trail of nasty looking mucus snailed its way from her nose onto her upper lip.

I shuddered and gave her a tiny shake. "Listen to me, Janine," I stared into her red, puffy eyes, "Listen to me. You're dead. You need to accept that now because I need to tell you some stuff and I need you to hear me."

Janine shook her head and dissolved into tears again. I closed my eyes and counted to ten, maintaining my vice-like grip on her heaving shoulders.

Janine was whimpering when I opened my eyes again but I could tell that she was at least trying to pull herself together.

'Just breathe,' I told her and loosened my grip. She stayed standing and I rooted around in my bag to find my board. 'Okay, now I need you to listen to me. Can you listen to me, Janine?'

She nodded mournfully. I smiled and patted her shoulder softly before I started. "Now, the good news is, I'm dead too," and leapt into a 'That's all folks' Vaudeville pose.

Janine blinked a few times and stared at me. It always takes a minute for a Cull to realize they're being told they're dead by another dead person. We don't look like angels or demons. We just look like normal people. You know all those apparently bored strangers you see on busses and subways? Chances are, one of them is a Culler.

I smiled again and walked her over to a park bench near the scene of her death. Already there were joggers circling her body. Two of them were on cell phones. We sat down and she stared over at the commotion. I gave her a minute and stared at the clutch of people leaning over her unmoving form.

After a few minutes I turned my attention back to Janine and moved my head so I could catch her glazed-over eyes. My heart was really going out to her. She had stopped crying but now she was shaking and her entire body shuddered uncontrollably as I launched into my speech about what was going to happen to her.

When I'd finally finished, I smiled again and waited for it all to sink in. Janine nodded and stared at her hands. She had stopped shaking about halfway through my speech. I wasn't entirely sure she had fully grasped what was happening but she seemed to be coping with it all as good as most others once they understood.

"Wh-Wh-Wh-" she shook her head and wrung her hands together in a fleeting relapse, "What about my family?"

I frowned. She had a husband and a young daughter. I cleared my throat and chose my words as carefully as I could, "Well, they'll miss you," I finally said, "I'm sure someone close to you has died in the past. I know this is hard, and I know it's hard to leave the people you love." My boyfriend's smile flashed through my head and I stopped short. I thought about my father's chicken casserole and the smell of my mother's laundry detergent. I shook my head. Finally I took a deep breath and tried again, "I won't lie to you, Janine. Your family is going to hurt and miss you and I'm sorry. But death is one of the inescapable truths of life."

I knew my words were of little, if any, comfort. Janine directed her gaze back to her hands and sighed deeply. After a moment, a confused expression crossed her face and she looked at me again, "How did I die? I was the picture of health, I jogged this path every day, ate the right foods, took a multi-vitamin ..." her voice trailed off.

I flipped back through her chart and then glanced over at her body, noticing the expanding pool of thick red blood for the first time. "You were shot," I said softly, looking back at the report, somewhat confused.

"Shot?" Janine frowned, "I didn't hear a shot."

Neither had I. I looked around the park, scanning the sporadic tree line for a hunter or a sniper. A sniper? I shook my head. No, there couldn't be a sniper. I was getting paranoid.

After a few more moments of chatting with Janine we finished up and I took her to central processing and made sure she made it to Nancy's office. Then I headed upstairs to see Paul. I had told Janine that she didn't hear the shot because of her headphones. She'd seemed to accept my story but I knew I hadn't heard one either, and I wasn't the type to miss something like that.

Paul was sitting at his desk, staring at his monitor and tapping his mouse. I cleared my throat in the doorway and he looked up.

"Emily," he smiled, "Just popping in to say 'Hi'?"

"Not exactly," I walked in and sat in the chair closest to his desk.

"Please don't tell me you're here to ask for time off," he shook his head and sighed, "You have no idea the storm that's breaking here."

"Does it have anything to do with my last cull?"

Paul frowned and moved his mouse around, clicking a few times before looking back at me. "Why do you ask?"

"Well," I leaned closer to him and brought out my Cull Form for Janine, "It's just that, according to my sheet, my cull this morning was shot. But I didn't hear anything so I'm just wondering if there's something going on."

"We have a sniper," Paul looked at me from across his desk, "I just got it in this morning, so, that's why it wasn't on your board. We've got another twenty-seven victims over the next week."

"And then what?"

"I don't know, honestly," Paul looked tired. "It doesn't say anything here about the last cull so I don't know if he gets arrested or shot or what."

I slumped back into my chair. Twenty-seven more victims in the next week. "Fuck," I groaned.

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My busy season just got busier
When I was topside, I always thought that old line about more people dying in the winter was bullshit.

But, you know what? It's true. All the cullers are busier in the winter and, strangely enough, there's always a big influx right at tail end of winter. A lot more suicides happen in the winter, which always makes me sad. I mean, here it is, the beginning of March, spring is literally right around the corner and there are even days when you can venture out in Cleveland without three layers of clothing. And still there are people swallowing their guns. I always figured that suicides would be tapering off by then, but no. And, wanna hear something else weird?

There's always another big surge of them in the summer.

So much for winter being the only gloomy season.

Anyway, this recent spate of sniper attacks hit right as people were topping themselves left and right or dying from slips and falls on the ice, some exposure deaths (which could also be classified as deaths by stupidity since these are usually the people who decide wearing shorts and tank tops is a good idea even though it's still only forty degrees outside).

The day after I'd picked up Janine, I had seventeen culls, five of which were thanks to the addition of a new sociopath to Cleveland's lower West Side. They were all in before three o'clock, and two of them were together so at least I had that much going for me. By the end of the day I was completely wiped out. I dragged myself home and struggled with the lock on the door.

Seventeen Culls. Seventeen. I realize that might not seem like a lot to you guys but I'm here to tell you it is. Seventeen people to lead off into the great beyond. Seventeen confused and horrified faces. Seventeen people asking why. Seventeen people demanding answers. Seventeen people not ready for what I was about to tell them.

And five of them who then had to deal with the fact they were gunned down at random (well, random to them, anyway).

I finally made it into my apartment and I slumped onto the couch. My eyelids felt like concr