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ivyficTitle: The Third Day
Author: Ivy
Fandom: Constantine (movie)
Rating: R (for bad words)
Summary:
"The point is," Chas said reverently, "you have an honest-to-god founder of the church in your living room."
John crouched next to him, grinning. "It’s a great angle. I’ll get a much better price for him."
"You’re going to sell him?" Chas exclaimed incredulously. "You can’t – it’s St. Wilfrid!"
John grinned at him. "What did you think I was going to do with him? Consecrate communion wafers?"
Part I
Part II
John had always been crap at brawling. Back in the old days, before Hennessy had taken the vows and started to drink himself blind behind aluminum-foil-covered windows, John had never had to worry about it. Hennessy had played football in college and retained the thick neck and solid muscle well into his thirties, when John had met him.
The two of them would go pub-crawling – with John doing most of the crawling. Hennessy could drink him under the table any day, and often did. And on many of these outings, John shot his mouth off and got popped one. But every time John found himself backed into a corner by a malevolent hooligan, Hennessy would step in to straighten out the misunderstanding. Most times he’d slug them; some nights he’d just lock the guy in a full Nelson until he apologized to John. John loved having his own personal bodyguard, and he always figured Hennessy enjoyed bashing a few heads, as long as they deserved it.
Hennessy pulled him aside one night and told him that he either had to learn how to throw a punch or how to keep his fucking mouth shut. John had laughed, right up until Hennessy had hopped in a cab and told John to sleep it off.
Now, as John’s eyes fixed on the wet blade, he wondered why he’d never bothered to ask Hennessy to show him how to fight. He swayed forward, his mind struggling to wrap itself around what had just happened. The mugger froze as well, looking just as shocked as John. Then he rushed forward and rifled roughly through John’s jacket. John stumbled, flinging a hand out to brace against the wall, and his attacker ran back down the alley towards his friend. John could see the companion’s face now: the last light of the sun showed a hollowed-out mask, rotted and eroded. Demon.
*
John slumped against the cab, using all his energy to stay upright until Chas got back. The pain that had been completely absent in the alley was overwhelming now. He pressed his hand into the slick mess on his stomach. He could feel his pulse there, each beat pushing more blood between his fingers.
He kept his eyes open, unfocused, looking at the yellow roof of the cab where it curved away from his resting cheek toward the rear windshield. He tried to clear his mind, focusing on keeping each painful, shallow breath even.
"I got you chicken and broccoli and a spring roll. I know you usually order General Tso’s, but you always bitch about how spicy they make it at Chung King," John heard the rustling of plastic bags – Chas must be gesturing towards him with their dinner. He squeezed his eyes shut and drew another breath.
"Hey – you okay?" Chas said, his voice closer. John rolled until his back pressed against the cab, his head lolling on the cold metal.
"Jesus Christ!" Chas yelled, and John suddenly felt hands holding him, helping to keep him upright, then pressing uselessly against the wound in his belly. The warm bags of Chinese food battered against John’s legs – Chas was still clutching them even as he tried to help John.
"What the hell happened? Jesus – we’ve got to, uh…" Chas’s hands were pushing ineffectually at John. He wished Chas would just figure out what to do and stop tugging at him. "Stop the bleeding. Right. We’ve – wait."
Chas left him abruptly and John had to lock his knees to keep from hitting the pavement. He heard the trunk pop, and Chas came back with a wad of ratty towels he used for oil checks and cleaning up after drunk fares. He pushed one into John’s hand. The bags of Chinese food still dangled from Chas’s wrists – it looked like he’d forgotten they were there.
"Use this," Chas said, placing John’s hand, holding the towel, back over the wound. He pushed John to the side so he could open the passenger door. Chas kept a hand tangled in John’s coat, keeping him from collapsing. Chas chucked the rest of the towels into the back seat and dropped the bags of Chinese into the foot well.
"The food’ll get cold," John whispered with concern.
"Shut up, John! Just shut up!" Chas was tugging him again.
John felt light-headed.
"Just, um, sit." Chas maneuvered John’s limp body into the seat. John couldn’t even pull his legs into the cab; Chas had to move them as if he were an invalid. "Keep pressing on the wound. I’ll get you to a hospital."
John grabbed Chas’s shoulder and tried to push his looming body away from the door of the cab. "No!" he growled, as loud as he could manage.
Chas looked at him, his eyes wide and scared. "What? You’ve been stabbed, John! You need help!" John’s gaze caught on his hand on Chas’s shoulder. He was getting blood all over Chas’s nylon windbreaker.
"Take me back to my apartment," he said. His head slumped forward towards Chas; he couldn’t hold it up to look in Chas’s face any longer.
"John – you need a doctor," Chas stuttered hysterically.
John curled his hand behind Chas’s neck and yanked the kid down to eye-level. "I don’t have time to argue."
Chas shook his head, but said, "OK, OK." He pushed John fully into the cab and dove for the driver’s seat.
The cab screamed away from the curb. The momentum made John slide down the seat until he was lying awkwardly, head on the grimy towels, legs crammed into one seat well. He couldn’t feel them anymore. The streetlights passed vertiginously across the rear windshield. Over the road noise, John could hear Chas swearing in a steady stream. Sometimes it seemed that the kid was calling to him, but John couldn’t figure out what he was supposed to say.
*
When the cab lurched to a stop, rolling over the curb and onto the sidewalk, John was gasping for air. The towel he could barely hold against his stomach was soaked through. Chas heaved him out of the car, and the towel fell. John wiggled his arm towards it weakly, but couldn’t help move at all.
Chas half-carried, half-dragged him up the stairs to his apartment, his dress shoes thwacking against every step. Outside his door, Chas tried to prop him against the doorway, but John slid to the floor. Chas followed him, grabbing at his pockets, trying to find his keys. John wanted to remind him that he had his own set, but couldn’t get his lips to work.
Chas finally got the door unlocked, and the weight of John’s body against it pushed it open so that he was lying flat on his back across the threshold. Chas grabbed him by the wrists and backed into the apartment, dragging John laboriously to the crate where it lay, still open, holding something that John hoped would be enough.
Chas reached over John’s still form to pull St. Wilfrid’s limp arm out of the coffin. He grasped John’s hand and pressed the two together.
The buzzing sensation hit John immediately, buffeting his weakened senses. He hissed through his teeth – the pain in his gut burned. He felt Chas’s other hand on his cheek. He opened his eyes and looked up into the face, hanging upside down above him. He could see Chas’s lips moving, but couldn’t hear his voice, or anything else.
The power of the saint battered him, like waves pounding on the shore. John struggled against it, trying to hold onto himself, hold onto the pain, afraid of what would happen if he let it in.
He could feel blood pooling cool against his back, the stiffening edges of his ripped shirt sticking to the drying blood on his stomach. It wasn’t working. How stupid, he thought, that he would die here on his dirty floor, holding on to some naïve hope that God would save him. This was how he had felt when he’d sliced into his wrists with a pair of scissors twenty years ago. And like that time, it would all be over soon and he would be somewhere much, much worse.
A sound worked its way into John’s fuzzy head – words – and he realized they were Chas’s. Chas was praying – not any of the hundreds of prayers John had made him memorize, but his own. Listening to the thread of words, John realized that if he wanted to live, he had to give in. Clinging to those words as his only anchor, he stopped fighting the power washing over him and let it consume him.
The pain stopped and John was filled with light. He felt buoyant. He would have thought he was dying, but he had done that before and it had not felt like this. No, this was peace and joy and freedom. The only concrete thing that remained was Chas’s voice, and John was amazed that he could feel the well of faith behind it.
*
John’s head rolled limply to the side. He jerked awake when he felt a toe dig into his shoulder.
"Are you dead?" Chas’s voice was flat, and the toe of his shoe kicked his side again.
"Ow. Fuck!" John said and flailed one arm to keep Chas from kicking him again. He grabbed hold of an ankle and Chas stilled. He brought his other hand to cover his eyes.
John used his grip on Chas to pull himself to a sitting position and leaned his back against the crate. He felt warm and groggy, and his eyes didn’t want to open against even the dim light in his apartment. He rubbed the heel of his hand against his eyelids for a moment, and only realized when he felt a drying stickiness that he was probably smearing his face with blood.
After a few moments, he cracked his eyes open and looked up at Chas. He looked like he wanted to kick John again, in earnest this time. His arms were crossed, and his lips pressed flatly together. John felt it was deeply unfair that he was being glared at after he’d only just managed to avoid dying. He glared back at Chas.
"You sure you’re not dead? You look dead." Chas said accusingly.
"Pretty sure, yeah," John replied, his voice rough.
Chas nodded and looked away from John. There were tear tracks through the few streaks of blood on Chas’s cheeks. "You stopped breathing."
"I’ve heard that happens when your lungs fill with blood," John replied. Chas looked back at John, and his eyes drifted from John’s face to his stomach, where blood crusted on the tear in his shirt.
John pulled his shirt up gingerly and ran his fingers over his smooth stomach. There was no trace of the wound, not even a scar. He looked at Chas again and saw open wonder in Chas’s face. It was the same look Chas had worn when he’d first started speaking of miracles yesterday morning, only worse – much worse. John knew that if he had come here alone, he would not have been healed. Chas’s faith had saved him. And that just mad it that much harder to dismiss Chas’s beliefs.
John pushed himself off the floor and strode towards the bathroom. He shucked his jacket and shirt as he went, dropping them on the floor. John looked at his reflection in the aging mirror, his chest and stomach crusted with drying brown flakes of blood, his arms spattered to the elbow. He turned on the faucet and stuck his hands under the cold water.
He was able to towel most of the blood off of his torso; he’d need a long bath before the last traces flaked away. John glanced back at Chas still staring at a puddle of drying blood on the floor, visible through the half-open bathroom door. For now, the rest of the cleaning could wait.
He walked back into the main room, heading to his closet for a fresh shirt. He noticed as he buttoned it that the knuckles of his right hand, which he had barked against his attacker’s face, were unmarked.
John cleared his throat, walking back towards the unmoving Chas. "Hey, kid. I’m still hungry. Wanna get the Chinese from the car?"
Chas turned his head, not quite far enough to look at John, then nodded. He silently headed for the door. "Chas," John stopped him.
Chas turned around, and John gestured at Chas’s hands. Chas looked at them, starting a little to see the blood. "Right. Sorry," he said, then headed for the kitchen sink.
*
It took Chas twenty minutes to return from the car. John didn’t begrudge him the time; he needed a few minutes himself. He wet a paper towel in the sink and used it to swab his blood off of the saint’s hand. When he touched it, he did not feel the brilliant light that had healed him, but the uncomfortable tingling. Gently running the towel over each of the dead fingers, John closed his eyes. He stilled his movements and felt the power pushing against him. He knew now that all he had to do was let it in. But he couldn’t. He didn’t know how much of himself would remain in the presence of that burning light, and he couldn’t surrender himself to it, not now that he had a choice.
Once satisfied that he had cleaned all traces of blood off of the body, he folded St. Wilfrid’s arm over his chest and replaced the lid on the crate.
He would sell it tomorrow, one way or another.
John could hear Chas stomping up the stairs long before the door opened, banging against the wall. He was surprised at how relieved he felt at this little return to normalcy.
Chas dropped two plastic bags onto the table in front of John. "You got blood all over my damn car," he glared accusingly. "It’s on the seats, and the floor – not to mention the steering wheel and gear shift." Chas raised his hands to show the textured pattern of the steering wheel marked in red on his palms.
"The seats are vinyl, aren’t they?" John said with his usual bored tone. "Can’t you just wipe it off?"
"I’m not doing anything. It’s your blood; you can damn well clean it. I mean what if a cop pulls me over? It looks like I hacked up a prostitute in there."
"Just take it to a body shop. Tell them some pregnant woman gave birth in the backseat when you were stuck on the Santa Monica. They’ll buy it."
"Oh," Chas said deflating a little. He sat down across from John. "I’m still pissed at you, though. Just so you know."
"Whatever," John said, pulling two cartons out of one of the bags. There were flecks of blood all over the bag and a few on the cartons. John popped the lid on one and was pleased to find the rice pristine. He grabbed a plastic fork and dug in.
"That’s kind of disgusting, you know," Chas said, pointing at the blood.
"Says the kid who wants to be an exorcist," John replied between mouthfuls. Now that he’d started eating he found he hadn’t been lying about being hungry. "If you have a problem with a little blood, you’re in the wrong business."
"I don’t have a problem with blood," Chas protested. "I just have a problem with –" Chas gestured vaguely at John and squeezed his eyes shut. John couldn’t help grinning. "What the hell happened?" Chas continued. "I was gone for like two minutes and when I come back your intestines are gushing all over the street." Chas hadn’t reopened his eyes.
"No intestines. Don’t exaggerate." John took another bite. "And remind me to sign you up for an EMS course. Your first aid skills suck."
"You planning on making a habit out of this?" Chas looked at him, his eyebrows drawing together angrily.
John shrugged. "That would not be my first choice, no." He poked his fork into the rice and let go, letting it stand up vertically from the carton. "Some thugs in an alley jumped me. Don’t know why." As John said it, he realized it was a lie. He thought back to the half-breed skulking in the distance and the clumsy mugger grabbing at his coat.
John pushed back from the table abruptly and strode towards his fallen coat. But even as he picked it up, he knew it was gone. He checked the pockets anyway. "He took the relic," John said, turning to Chas. When Chas still looked confused, John held up his right hand and wiggled the pinky. "The one who stabbed me – he had a half-breed with him. Must have sensed the damn thing."
"I tol–" Chas began.
"Don’t start," John cut him off.
"–d you it was bad idea," Chas finished anyway.
John threw the coat back on the floor.
"But did you listen to little old me?" Chas continued. "Nooo. You can’t fuck around with something like that."
"Wait – you’re giving me a lecture on magical artifacts? You’ve never done an exorcism, Chas," John said, feeling an odd sense of déjà vu.
"I know enough to know that God didn’t appreciate you snipping fingers off of His Chosen," Chas finished.
"You think God sent a thug to stab me? That’s a real fucking nice deity you pray to."
"That’s not what I meant," Chas stood and started pacing. "I just meant – maybe He was trying to teach you something."
"If that’s His idea of teaching, He needs therapy. Seriously." John propped his hands on his hips and watched Chas.
"God just miraculously healed you! You might be a little more…" Chas spun his hand in the air, searching for the right word.
"What?"
"Charitable."
"Look, kid. God didn’t heal me because I’m a righteous man, or because he looks after his flock. He healed me because I’ve got the corpse of some guy that died a thousand years ago in my apartment."
"You don’t have to be so cynical."
John looked into Chas’s eyes, eyes that still, despite everything he’d studied, believed the fairy tale they spun at Sunday Mass. "It’s not about Divine Grace, Chas; it’s about knowing your way around the game. If you stick around, if you want to really learn how to do this, you’re going to see that, sooner or later."
Chas lifted his chin stubbornly. "I don’t think I have to, John. Just because things don’t work the way you want them to doesn’t mean He’s not pulling for you."
John had known since his first trip to Hell that that was a damn lie. Maybe the kid would learn that too someday. Hopefully not at so high a cost. "He’s not paying that much attention to me, trust me."
"How do you know that? For all you know, he made sure you’d have the saint long enough to –"
John whirled on Chas. "If you start spouting destiny and pre-determination crap –"
"I just have to believe He’s looking out for us. You and me. He’s our Heavenly Father."
"What’s your real father like, Chas?" John waited a moment, looking hard at Chas. The silence was confirmation enough that John had guessed correctly about what had driven a teenager to live alone in LA. It wasn’t much of a leap, really, but it was still something he had never confronted Chas about before. Well, they both had secrets. "Maybe He’s just like that," John continued. "He’s not some perfect being doing what’s best for all His children. He’s just up there jerking us around for shits and giggles."
Chas walked away from John, his footsteps aimless, collecting his thoughts. He stopped near the crate. "So," he said, his tone light, clearly ending their current argument. "What are you going to do with him?"
"Who – Bill? I’m selling him. Tomorrow, preferably."
Chas didn’t have to voice his disapproval, or even turn around. John could feel it.
"It’s business, kid. I told you that. If I don’t sell it, my contact comes after me for the money, and," John gestured around his apartment, "there’s not much here that’s worth half a mill."
"Great business, you’ve got, John."
"Hey, you want in, you get the whole thing. You don’t get to pick which bits you like."
Chas stuck around long enough to watch John finish eating, though he didn’t touch any food himself. He tried to banter as he usually did, but he kept lapsing into silence, his eyes sliding blankly to the bloodstains on the floor. When John chucked the rest of the food out, Chas seemed relieved to be able to leave.
*
John stayed in the tub until the water was cold and his skin was puckered and white. He pulled the plug and watched the water swirl down the drain, remembering what the deep crimson of his blood had looked like trickling down the drain when he’d sliced his wrists twenty years ago. The bathwater was clear – the pink tinge almost undetectable – as if he hadn’t bled at all. As he toweled off and pulled on a fresh set of clothes, he caught himself running his hand over and over his stomach.
Looking around the apartment, he noted a few blood spatters surrounding bigger spots on his threshold. He grabbed a worn dishtowel from the sink and tossed it over the largest stain, where he had lain next to the saint. He’d have to remember to pick up a throw rug for that later. He grabbed some ammonia from under the sink and poured it sloppily onto the bigger splotches. The pattern in the linoleum would hide the smaller drops.
John glanced at the clock. It was only nine. Most nights he wouldn’t be back at his apartment for another five hours. He didn’t figure he’d go out now, though. Between dying and being healed, he was exhausted, but the tingly invasive presence in his apartment guaranteed he wouldn’t be able to sleep until the saint was gone. And he didn’t feel comfortable leaving it unattended again.
He sat on the edge of the bed and smoked a carton, staring at the halo around the streetlights outside his window. He almost wished Chas had stuck around. True, it would be awkward, but that might be preferable to this laconic drifting sensation.
At eleven he called Midnite. It didn’t take long to set a price – Midnite had clearly been salivating over the saint since their conversation the previous night. His opening bid was on the high end of what John expected. Shrewd business-man or no, once Papa Midnite got his heart set on something, he was tenacious – a bargaining position John enjoyed exploiting.
Midnite would send a few of his goons around the next morning to pick up his purchase. It was only prudent to wait so long; it would allow John to confirm receipt of the money transferred to his account. But John couldn’t help wishing this one transaction could be an exception. He wished he could just leave the thing on a street corner. The longer it stuck around, the deeper his revulsion at the constant press of its power.
John pulled a bottle of Jack from his cabinet, grabbed a few more packs of Silk Cuts and tossed them on the kitchen table. He sat in his chair, resigned to what would certainly be a long and uncomfortable vigil, and tried his best not to stare at the rumpled towel lying in the middle of the floor.
*
When the buzz of the streetlights flickered off in the growing grey of dawn, John crouched beside the crate. He lifted the lid, giving St. Wilfrid a final look-over. After a few minutes contemplation, he folded the hands more tightly around each other, satisfying himself that the stub of a pinky finger was well-hidden.
While he was contemplating the clasped hands, he heard a tentative knock on the door. It was four hours before Midnite agreed to pick up his merchandise. John wondered if it was Chas, stopping by before his shift started, but the kid had never knocked before.
John opened the door to find a clean-cut man in a suit, carrying a briefcase. He looked tentatively around John’s shoulder. John stretched his arm pointedly across the doorway, blocking the man’s view. "Yes?" he asked tiredly.
"I just wondered if I could – that is, I was on my way to work and I felt… I wondered if I could pray." The businessman’s speech started haltingly, but by the time he finished, his voice was firm and even and he was looking John squarely in the eye. John guessed this wasn’t a man who was used to being hesitant about anything.
John looked for a long moment over his shoulder at the crate in the middle of his apartment, the lid still propped to the side. Then he shrugged and stepped aside.
The man nodded once at John in thanks, then crossed to the saint. He set his briefcase down, then slowly got to his knees, folded his hands and bowed his head.
John let out a huff of breath – he was trying for disgust, but found he couldn’t quite muster it. After a few minutes the man stood, picked up his briefcase, nodded again at John and left. No hint of a question about why John had a body in his apartment, just a silent benediction.
John took a deep breath and wondered if that man felt what Chas felt while in the presence of the saint. A few more hours and he wouldn’t have to think of anything but his commission and his next exorcism. John looked at the clock and found he wasn’t so eager for those hours to pass.
*
Midnite arrived with a few men right when he said he would. He stood in John’s shabby apartment crouching over the body and inspecting it with an artisan’s eye for detail. His eyes caught on the few drops of blood John had forgotten to clean off the crate. "Had an interesting time, did you?" Midnite said, smiling.
John shrugged, thankful only that Midnite hadn’t spent longer looking at the hands.
Midnite signaled to his men to close the crate and carry it out to the waiting truck. "No doubt I will hear about it soon enough." He looked knowingly at John. "The great John Constantine. You’d be surprised how often I hear your name spoken."
"Always good, I hope," John said, almost too tired to play along.
"Always interesting," Midnite replied.
When the sound of Midnite’s truck faded, John felt the distinct absence of the power he had felt so constantly for the last few days.
By the time he visited Midnite’s club again, there would surely be new rumors about him that he would make no effort to contradict. Even if based on the truth, the stories that circulated about him were lurid and far more fascinating than his life. But the more his legend grew, the more work came to his door, so all the better.
Chas would be by later in the afternoon to lament the loss of St. Wilfrid, John had no doubt. For the moment, the exhaustion of the previous night pressed on him like a weight. He pulled the chain near his door that closed all the shutters, blacking out his room like a confessional. He collapsed on top of his covers and immediately fell asleep, shoes still on.
He dreamt of Hell. Like he always did.
Author: Ivy
Fandom: Constantine (movie)
Rating: R (for bad words)
Summary:
"The point is," Chas said reverently, "you have an honest-to-god founder of the church in your living room."
John crouched next to him, grinning. "It’s a great angle. I’ll get a much better price for him."
"You’re going to sell him?" Chas exclaimed incredulously. "You can’t – it’s St. Wilfrid!"
John grinned at him. "What did you think I was going to do with him? Consecrate communion wafers?"
Part I
Part II
John had always been crap at brawling. Back in the old days, before Hennessy had taken the vows and started to drink himself blind behind aluminum-foil-covered windows, John had never had to worry about it. Hennessy had played football in college and retained the thick neck and solid muscle well into his thirties, when John had met him.
The two of them would go pub-crawling – with John doing most of the crawling. Hennessy could drink him under the table any day, and often did. And on many of these outings, John shot his mouth off and got popped one. But every time John found himself backed into a corner by a malevolent hooligan, Hennessy would step in to straighten out the misunderstanding. Most times he’d slug them; some nights he’d just lock the guy in a full Nelson until he apologized to John. John loved having his own personal bodyguard, and he always figured Hennessy enjoyed bashing a few heads, as long as they deserved it.
Hennessy pulled him aside one night and told him that he either had to learn how to throw a punch or how to keep his fucking mouth shut. John had laughed, right up until Hennessy had hopped in a cab and told John to sleep it off.
Now, as John’s eyes fixed on the wet blade, he wondered why he’d never bothered to ask Hennessy to show him how to fight. He swayed forward, his mind struggling to wrap itself around what had just happened. The mugger froze as well, looking just as shocked as John. Then he rushed forward and rifled roughly through John’s jacket. John stumbled, flinging a hand out to brace against the wall, and his attacker ran back down the alley towards his friend. John could see the companion’s face now: the last light of the sun showed a hollowed-out mask, rotted and eroded. Demon.
*
John slumped against the cab, using all his energy to stay upright until Chas got back. The pain that had been completely absent in the alley was overwhelming now. He pressed his hand into the slick mess on his stomach. He could feel his pulse there, each beat pushing more blood between his fingers.
He kept his eyes open, unfocused, looking at the yellow roof of the cab where it curved away from his resting cheek toward the rear windshield. He tried to clear his mind, focusing on keeping each painful, shallow breath even.
"I got you chicken and broccoli and a spring roll. I know you usually order General Tso’s, but you always bitch about how spicy they make it at Chung King," John heard the rustling of plastic bags – Chas must be gesturing towards him with their dinner. He squeezed his eyes shut and drew another breath.
"Hey – you okay?" Chas said, his voice closer. John rolled until his back pressed against the cab, his head lolling on the cold metal.
"Jesus Christ!" Chas yelled, and John suddenly felt hands holding him, helping to keep him upright, then pressing uselessly against the wound in his belly. The warm bags of Chinese food battered against John’s legs – Chas was still clutching them even as he tried to help John.
"What the hell happened? Jesus – we’ve got to, uh…" Chas’s hands were pushing ineffectually at John. He wished Chas would just figure out what to do and stop tugging at him. "Stop the bleeding. Right. We’ve – wait."
Chas left him abruptly and John had to lock his knees to keep from hitting the pavement. He heard the trunk pop, and Chas came back with a wad of ratty towels he used for oil checks and cleaning up after drunk fares. He pushed one into John’s hand. The bags of Chinese food still dangled from Chas’s wrists – it looked like he’d forgotten they were there.
"Use this," Chas said, placing John’s hand, holding the towel, back over the wound. He pushed John to the side so he could open the passenger door. Chas kept a hand tangled in John’s coat, keeping him from collapsing. Chas chucked the rest of the towels into the back seat and dropped the bags of Chinese into the foot well.
"The food’ll get cold," John whispered with concern.
"Shut up, John! Just shut up!" Chas was tugging him again.
John felt light-headed.
"Just, um, sit." Chas maneuvered John’s limp body into the seat. John couldn’t even pull his legs into the cab; Chas had to move them as if he were an invalid. "Keep pressing on the wound. I’ll get you to a hospital."
John grabbed Chas’s shoulder and tried to push his looming body away from the door of the cab. "No!" he growled, as loud as he could manage.
Chas looked at him, his eyes wide and scared. "What? You’ve been stabbed, John! You need help!" John’s gaze caught on his hand on Chas’s shoulder. He was getting blood all over Chas’s nylon windbreaker.
"Take me back to my apartment," he said. His head slumped forward towards Chas; he couldn’t hold it up to look in Chas’s face any longer.
"John – you need a doctor," Chas stuttered hysterically.
John curled his hand behind Chas’s neck and yanked the kid down to eye-level. "I don’t have time to argue."
Chas shook his head, but said, "OK, OK." He pushed John fully into the cab and dove for the driver’s seat.
The cab screamed away from the curb. The momentum made John slide down the seat until he was lying awkwardly, head on the grimy towels, legs crammed into one seat well. He couldn’t feel them anymore. The streetlights passed vertiginously across the rear windshield. Over the road noise, John could hear Chas swearing in a steady stream. Sometimes it seemed that the kid was calling to him, but John couldn’t figure out what he was supposed to say.
*
When the cab lurched to a stop, rolling over the curb and onto the sidewalk, John was gasping for air. The towel he could barely hold against his stomach was soaked through. Chas heaved him out of the car, and the towel fell. John wiggled his arm towards it weakly, but couldn’t help move at all.
Chas half-carried, half-dragged him up the stairs to his apartment, his dress shoes thwacking against every step. Outside his door, Chas tried to prop him against the doorway, but John slid to the floor. Chas followed him, grabbing at his pockets, trying to find his keys. John wanted to remind him that he had his own set, but couldn’t get his lips to work.
Chas finally got the door unlocked, and the weight of John’s body against it pushed it open so that he was lying flat on his back across the threshold. Chas grabbed him by the wrists and backed into the apartment, dragging John laboriously to the crate where it lay, still open, holding something that John hoped would be enough.
Chas reached over John’s still form to pull St. Wilfrid’s limp arm out of the coffin. He grasped John’s hand and pressed the two together.
The buzzing sensation hit John immediately, buffeting his weakened senses. He hissed through his teeth – the pain in his gut burned. He felt Chas’s other hand on his cheek. He opened his eyes and looked up into the face, hanging upside down above him. He could see Chas’s lips moving, but couldn’t hear his voice, or anything else.
The power of the saint battered him, like waves pounding on the shore. John struggled against it, trying to hold onto himself, hold onto the pain, afraid of what would happen if he let it in.
He could feel blood pooling cool against his back, the stiffening edges of his ripped shirt sticking to the drying blood on his stomach. It wasn’t working. How stupid, he thought, that he would die here on his dirty floor, holding on to some naïve hope that God would save him. This was how he had felt when he’d sliced into his wrists with a pair of scissors twenty years ago. And like that time, it would all be over soon and he would be somewhere much, much worse.
A sound worked its way into John’s fuzzy head – words – and he realized they were Chas’s. Chas was praying – not any of the hundreds of prayers John had made him memorize, but his own. Listening to the thread of words, John realized that if he wanted to live, he had to give in. Clinging to those words as his only anchor, he stopped fighting the power washing over him and let it consume him.
The pain stopped and John was filled with light. He felt buoyant. He would have thought he was dying, but he had done that before and it had not felt like this. No, this was peace and joy and freedom. The only concrete thing that remained was Chas’s voice, and John was amazed that he could feel the well of faith behind it.
*
John’s head rolled limply to the side. He jerked awake when he felt a toe dig into his shoulder.
"Are you dead?" Chas’s voice was flat, and the toe of his shoe kicked his side again.
"Ow. Fuck!" John said and flailed one arm to keep Chas from kicking him again. He grabbed hold of an ankle and Chas stilled. He brought his other hand to cover his eyes.
John used his grip on Chas to pull himself to a sitting position and leaned his back against the crate. He felt warm and groggy, and his eyes didn’t want to open against even the dim light in his apartment. He rubbed the heel of his hand against his eyelids for a moment, and only realized when he felt a drying stickiness that he was probably smearing his face with blood.
After a few moments, he cracked his eyes open and looked up at Chas. He looked like he wanted to kick John again, in earnest this time. His arms were crossed, and his lips pressed flatly together. John felt it was deeply unfair that he was being glared at after he’d only just managed to avoid dying. He glared back at Chas.
"You sure you’re not dead? You look dead." Chas said accusingly.
"Pretty sure, yeah," John replied, his voice rough.
Chas nodded and looked away from John. There were tear tracks through the few streaks of blood on Chas’s cheeks. "You stopped breathing."
"I’ve heard that happens when your lungs fill with blood," John replied. Chas looked back at John, and his eyes drifted from John’s face to his stomach, where blood crusted on the tear in his shirt.
John pulled his shirt up gingerly and ran his fingers over his smooth stomach. There was no trace of the wound, not even a scar. He looked at Chas again and saw open wonder in Chas’s face. It was the same look Chas had worn when he’d first started speaking of miracles yesterday morning, only worse – much worse. John knew that if he had come here alone, he would not have been healed. Chas’s faith had saved him. And that just mad it that much harder to dismiss Chas’s beliefs.
John pushed himself off the floor and strode towards the bathroom. He shucked his jacket and shirt as he went, dropping them on the floor. John looked at his reflection in the aging mirror, his chest and stomach crusted with drying brown flakes of blood, his arms spattered to the elbow. He turned on the faucet and stuck his hands under the cold water.
He was able to towel most of the blood off of his torso; he’d need a long bath before the last traces flaked away. John glanced back at Chas still staring at a puddle of drying blood on the floor, visible through the half-open bathroom door. For now, the rest of the cleaning could wait.
He walked back into the main room, heading to his closet for a fresh shirt. He noticed as he buttoned it that the knuckles of his right hand, which he had barked against his attacker’s face, were unmarked.
John cleared his throat, walking back towards the unmoving Chas. "Hey, kid. I’m still hungry. Wanna get the Chinese from the car?"
Chas turned his head, not quite far enough to look at John, then nodded. He silently headed for the door. "Chas," John stopped him.
Chas turned around, and John gestured at Chas’s hands. Chas looked at them, starting a little to see the blood. "Right. Sorry," he said, then headed for the kitchen sink.
*
It took Chas twenty minutes to return from the car. John didn’t begrudge him the time; he needed a few minutes himself. He wet a paper towel in the sink and used it to swab his blood off of the saint’s hand. When he touched it, he did not feel the brilliant light that had healed him, but the uncomfortable tingling. Gently running the towel over each of the dead fingers, John closed his eyes. He stilled his movements and felt the power pushing against him. He knew now that all he had to do was let it in. But he couldn’t. He didn’t know how much of himself would remain in the presence of that burning light, and he couldn’t surrender himself to it, not now that he had a choice.
Once satisfied that he had cleaned all traces of blood off of the body, he folded St. Wilfrid’s arm over his chest and replaced the lid on the crate.
He would sell it tomorrow, one way or another.
John could hear Chas stomping up the stairs long before the door opened, banging against the wall. He was surprised at how relieved he felt at this little return to normalcy.
Chas dropped two plastic bags onto the table in front of John. "You got blood all over my damn car," he glared accusingly. "It’s on the seats, and the floor – not to mention the steering wheel and gear shift." Chas raised his hands to show the textured pattern of the steering wheel marked in red on his palms.
"The seats are vinyl, aren’t they?" John said with his usual bored tone. "Can’t you just wipe it off?"
"I’m not doing anything. It’s your blood; you can damn well clean it. I mean what if a cop pulls me over? It looks like I hacked up a prostitute in there."
"Just take it to a body shop. Tell them some pregnant woman gave birth in the backseat when you were stuck on the Santa Monica. They’ll buy it."
"Oh," Chas said deflating a little. He sat down across from John. "I’m still pissed at you, though. Just so you know."
"Whatever," John said, pulling two cartons out of one of the bags. There were flecks of blood all over the bag and a few on the cartons. John popped the lid on one and was pleased to find the rice pristine. He grabbed a plastic fork and dug in.
"That’s kind of disgusting, you know," Chas said, pointing at the blood.
"Says the kid who wants to be an exorcist," John replied between mouthfuls. Now that he’d started eating he found he hadn’t been lying about being hungry. "If you have a problem with a little blood, you’re in the wrong business."
"I don’t have a problem with blood," Chas protested. "I just have a problem with –" Chas gestured vaguely at John and squeezed his eyes shut. John couldn’t help grinning. "What the hell happened?" Chas continued. "I was gone for like two minutes and when I come back your intestines are gushing all over the street." Chas hadn’t reopened his eyes.
"No intestines. Don’t exaggerate." John took another bite. "And remind me to sign you up for an EMS course. Your first aid skills suck."
"You planning on making a habit out of this?" Chas looked at him, his eyebrows drawing together angrily.
John shrugged. "That would not be my first choice, no." He poked his fork into the rice and let go, letting it stand up vertically from the carton. "Some thugs in an alley jumped me. Don’t know why." As John said it, he realized it was a lie. He thought back to the half-breed skulking in the distance and the clumsy mugger grabbing at his coat.
John pushed back from the table abruptly and strode towards his fallen coat. But even as he picked it up, he knew it was gone. He checked the pockets anyway. "He took the relic," John said, turning to Chas. When Chas still looked confused, John held up his right hand and wiggled the pinky. "The one who stabbed me – he had a half-breed with him. Must have sensed the damn thing."
"I tol–" Chas began.
"Don’t start," John cut him off.
"–d you it was bad idea," Chas finished anyway.
John threw the coat back on the floor.
"But did you listen to little old me?" Chas continued. "Nooo. You can’t fuck around with something like that."
"Wait – you’re giving me a lecture on magical artifacts? You’ve never done an exorcism, Chas," John said, feeling an odd sense of déjà vu.
"I know enough to know that God didn’t appreciate you snipping fingers off of His Chosen," Chas finished.
"You think God sent a thug to stab me? That’s a real fucking nice deity you pray to."
"That’s not what I meant," Chas stood and started pacing. "I just meant – maybe He was trying to teach you something."
"If that’s His idea of teaching, He needs therapy. Seriously." John propped his hands on his hips and watched Chas.
"God just miraculously healed you! You might be a little more…" Chas spun his hand in the air, searching for the right word.
"What?"
"Charitable."
"Look, kid. God didn’t heal me because I’m a righteous man, or because he looks after his flock. He healed me because I’ve got the corpse of some guy that died a thousand years ago in my apartment."
"You don’t have to be so cynical."
John looked into Chas’s eyes, eyes that still, despite everything he’d studied, believed the fairy tale they spun at Sunday Mass. "It’s not about Divine Grace, Chas; it’s about knowing your way around the game. If you stick around, if you want to really learn how to do this, you’re going to see that, sooner or later."
Chas lifted his chin stubbornly. "I don’t think I have to, John. Just because things don’t work the way you want them to doesn’t mean He’s not pulling for you."
John had known since his first trip to Hell that that was a damn lie. Maybe the kid would learn that too someday. Hopefully not at so high a cost. "He’s not paying that much attention to me, trust me."
"How do you know that? For all you know, he made sure you’d have the saint long enough to –"
John whirled on Chas. "If you start spouting destiny and pre-determination crap –"
"I just have to believe He’s looking out for us. You and me. He’s our Heavenly Father."
"What’s your real father like, Chas?" John waited a moment, looking hard at Chas. The silence was confirmation enough that John had guessed correctly about what had driven a teenager to live alone in LA. It wasn’t much of a leap, really, but it was still something he had never confronted Chas about before. Well, they both had secrets. "Maybe He’s just like that," John continued. "He’s not some perfect being doing what’s best for all His children. He’s just up there jerking us around for shits and giggles."
Chas walked away from John, his footsteps aimless, collecting his thoughts. He stopped near the crate. "So," he said, his tone light, clearly ending their current argument. "What are you going to do with him?"
"Who – Bill? I’m selling him. Tomorrow, preferably."
Chas didn’t have to voice his disapproval, or even turn around. John could feel it.
"It’s business, kid. I told you that. If I don’t sell it, my contact comes after me for the money, and," John gestured around his apartment, "there’s not much here that’s worth half a mill."
"Great business, you’ve got, John."
"Hey, you want in, you get the whole thing. You don’t get to pick which bits you like."
Chas stuck around long enough to watch John finish eating, though he didn’t touch any food himself. He tried to banter as he usually did, but he kept lapsing into silence, his eyes sliding blankly to the bloodstains on the floor. When John chucked the rest of the food out, Chas seemed relieved to be able to leave.
*
John stayed in the tub until the water was cold and his skin was puckered and white. He pulled the plug and watched the water swirl down the drain, remembering what the deep crimson of his blood had looked like trickling down the drain when he’d sliced his wrists twenty years ago. The bathwater was clear – the pink tinge almost undetectable – as if he hadn’t bled at all. As he toweled off and pulled on a fresh set of clothes, he caught himself running his hand over and over his stomach.
Looking around the apartment, he noted a few blood spatters surrounding bigger spots on his threshold. He grabbed a worn dishtowel from the sink and tossed it over the largest stain, where he had lain next to the saint. He’d have to remember to pick up a throw rug for that later. He grabbed some ammonia from under the sink and poured it sloppily onto the bigger splotches. The pattern in the linoleum would hide the smaller drops.
John glanced at the clock. It was only nine. Most nights he wouldn’t be back at his apartment for another five hours. He didn’t figure he’d go out now, though. Between dying and being healed, he was exhausted, but the tingly invasive presence in his apartment guaranteed he wouldn’t be able to sleep until the saint was gone. And he didn’t feel comfortable leaving it unattended again.
He sat on the edge of the bed and smoked a carton, staring at the halo around the streetlights outside his window. He almost wished Chas had stuck around. True, it would be awkward, but that might be preferable to this laconic drifting sensation.
At eleven he called Midnite. It didn’t take long to set a price – Midnite had clearly been salivating over the saint since their conversation the previous night. His opening bid was on the high end of what John expected. Shrewd business-man or no, once Papa Midnite got his heart set on something, he was tenacious – a bargaining position John enjoyed exploiting.
Midnite would send a few of his goons around the next morning to pick up his purchase. It was only prudent to wait so long; it would allow John to confirm receipt of the money transferred to his account. But John couldn’t help wishing this one transaction could be an exception. He wished he could just leave the thing on a street corner. The longer it stuck around, the deeper his revulsion at the constant press of its power.
John pulled a bottle of Jack from his cabinet, grabbed a few more packs of Silk Cuts and tossed them on the kitchen table. He sat in his chair, resigned to what would certainly be a long and uncomfortable vigil, and tried his best not to stare at the rumpled towel lying in the middle of the floor.
*
When the buzz of the streetlights flickered off in the growing grey of dawn, John crouched beside the crate. He lifted the lid, giving St. Wilfrid a final look-over. After a few minutes contemplation, he folded the hands more tightly around each other, satisfying himself that the stub of a pinky finger was well-hidden.
While he was contemplating the clasped hands, he heard a tentative knock on the door. It was four hours before Midnite agreed to pick up his merchandise. John wondered if it was Chas, stopping by before his shift started, but the kid had never knocked before.
John opened the door to find a clean-cut man in a suit, carrying a briefcase. He looked tentatively around John’s shoulder. John stretched his arm pointedly across the doorway, blocking the man’s view. "Yes?" he asked tiredly.
"I just wondered if I could – that is, I was on my way to work and I felt… I wondered if I could pray." The businessman’s speech started haltingly, but by the time he finished, his voice was firm and even and he was looking John squarely in the eye. John guessed this wasn’t a man who was used to being hesitant about anything.
John looked for a long moment over his shoulder at the crate in the middle of his apartment, the lid still propped to the side. Then he shrugged and stepped aside.
The man nodded once at John in thanks, then crossed to the saint. He set his briefcase down, then slowly got to his knees, folded his hands and bowed his head.
John let out a huff of breath – he was trying for disgust, but found he couldn’t quite muster it. After a few minutes the man stood, picked up his briefcase, nodded again at John and left. No hint of a question about why John had a body in his apartment, just a silent benediction.
John took a deep breath and wondered if that man felt what Chas felt while in the presence of the saint. A few more hours and he wouldn’t have to think of anything but his commission and his next exorcism. John looked at the clock and found he wasn’t so eager for those hours to pass.
*
Midnite arrived with a few men right when he said he would. He stood in John’s shabby apartment crouching over the body and inspecting it with an artisan’s eye for detail. His eyes caught on the few drops of blood John had forgotten to clean off the crate. "Had an interesting time, did you?" Midnite said, smiling.
John shrugged, thankful only that Midnite hadn’t spent longer looking at the hands.
Midnite signaled to his men to close the crate and carry it out to the waiting truck. "No doubt I will hear about it soon enough." He looked knowingly at John. "The great John Constantine. You’d be surprised how often I hear your name spoken."
"Always good, I hope," John said, almost too tired to play along.
"Always interesting," Midnite replied.
When the sound of Midnite’s truck faded, John felt the distinct absence of the power he had felt so constantly for the last few days.
By the time he visited Midnite’s club again, there would surely be new rumors about him that he would make no effort to contradict. Even if based on the truth, the stories that circulated about him were lurid and far more fascinating than his life. But the more his legend grew, the more work came to his door, so all the better.
Chas would be by later in the afternoon to lament the loss of St. Wilfrid, John had no doubt. For the moment, the exhaustion of the previous night pressed on him like a weight. He pulled the chain near his door that closed all the shutters, blacking out his room like a confessional. He collapsed on top of his covers and immediately fell asleep, shoes still on.
He dreamt of Hell. Like he always did.