You're Dead: Chapter Six (special preview)

By the time The Buffalo was set to open, Clover was stinking drunk. I had not been paying close attention to her, and she had replaced her water with vodka. Bowie and I took her home, dragging her back to our apartment. Her apartment.

“I don’t wanna be here!” Clover fought us as we took her inside. She tried escaping, but Bowie could easily hold her and move her around. “No!” Clover fell over his arm and whined. “I don’t wanna,” her voice cracked.

I led Bowie to her bedroom where he plopped her unceremoniously into bed. “Poor thing,” he huffed. “Grief is a hard pill to swallow, even if you try to wash it down with alcohol.”

I removed Clover’s shoes so she could lay comfortably in bed. I also pulled a trash can up close to the side of the bed. “You can’t drink like that,” I scolded her.

“Piss off!” Clover rubbed her eyes, mangling the eyelashes she had put on when she intended to perform. “You’re not the boss of me. She died!”

That was a shot through the heart. I was right here, but I couldn’t be there. “Lay down. Get some rest. I’ll bring in some water for you.” I eased her down onto the bed as delicately as I could while she thrashed and pouted.

“No!” Clover pulled a pillow over her head and started shouting into it.

Everything felt so heavy that my shoulder drooped down low. I left her room, looking at Bowie standing in the kitchen. He was staring into the corner while holding a glass in his hand. I saw those fingers coming through the seam between wall and ceiling, poking and ripping at the paint. The door slammed behind me and it wasn’t even a surprise.

I held my head between hands. “Fuck!”

“Death touches so much,” Bowie murmured.

He had no idea, I grumbled into the screaming of my mind. I took the glass from him and filled it with water. I ignored the little smoky fingers and went back to Clover’s door, but it was locked.Again, I was not surprised.

“How do you know Clover?” Bowie asked.

I sighed heavily and drank the water myself. “Long story.” I chewed my bottom lip. “But I met her this afternoon. How do you know her?”

Bowie clicked his tongue as he sat down upon the sofa. “I see. So you must have caught her crying,” he chuckled. “Ah well, I’ve known Clover for a while. I’m quite a fan of her show at the Buffalo.”

I had seen so many people come and go through the Buffalo, I couldn't quite place Bowie. Maybe without the face mask I would recognize him. But considering how beautiful the top of his face and head were, I would have thought otherwise.

“I’m a fan of Abba,” he then laughed. He touched his face as if that was something to be embarrassed about. “So her one performance was always my favorite.”

“I like Abba too.” I sat down beside him on the sofa.

His eyes smiled. “Then I am in good company.”

His eyes really were phenomenally pretty. The rich brown, the thick eyelashes that gave the illusion of eyeliner. Although, the closer I looked I realized he was wearing smoky eyeshadow. Enough to give his sockets a deeper shadow. Just as I was getting lost in his eyes, my stomach let out the most obnoxious and demanding growl.

Bowie laughed and tried to cover it. “Are you hungry?”

I placed my arm around my stomach. “Yeah, I suppose-” I hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast that morning.

“I wouldn’t feel right raiding her fridge. Why don’t we go out and grab something?” Bowie motioned to the door.

I motioned to Clover’s door. “What about her?”

“I’d say she’s twelve hours away from a pretty nasty hangover right about now.” Bowie sounded as if he had all the answers in the world. He even knew what I wanted to hear before I even knew it. Ever since I met him that afternoon, there was a sense of calm around him I hadn’t felt since I passed. Everything had been rush, rush, rush, especially with Freddie and Stevie. I thought for a moment Booker was the calm in the storm, but he proved to be more unreliable than placid.

Bowie walked out of the kitchen and held out his hand. “If you’re that horribly worried about her, you can come back in the morning. But I don’t think there is anything else we can do for her here. Unless you are that intent on avoiding whatever it is you are avoiding.”

I had been shot, no I had a lightening bolt go through me. How did he do that? Would I be able to see such things in the future? Or was Bowie just extremely gifted in seeing through the bullshit?

“How did you-” I was still quite stunned.

Bowie laughed, lifting his hands to his face and holding his cheek. “I see it a lot. But you seem to be carrying quite the heavy weight on your shoulders. You were so focused on Clover today though, I figured you were looking for any chance to ignore whatever that weight was.”