IF YOU NEED A FRIEND (PART 2)

Arrows. Thousands of arrows pouring from the sky like rain. Despite the fact that she knew she had to die, a deeper will to live forced her to attempt to dodge the incoming projectiles. When hit, she tried to pull the arrows out, and when that proved impossible, she just broke off the shafts. There was something coming from deep inside that wanted to live. She loved life. She loved war. She loved victory. She loved. . . the name at the end of this thought was blurred and lost in the noise of battle.

Helena opened her eyes and was surprised that she could see. The room around her was not the one where she had awoken for the past month. It was small, plain, and western. Her stomach hurt – hell her whole body hurt.

"Hello there. Welcome to hell. Let me tell you, as bad as you feel now, it is going to get a whole lot worse before it gets better," a strange male voice appeared from the void. He talked like Erika, so he must be a Kiwi. Was she back in New Zealand?

"Who are you?"

"My name’s Johnny Wilson, don’t you remember we met last night?"

"Sorry, no."

"I’m a friend and this is my room. Guess it’s going to be your room for a while. Could have picked a less dear spot to go through withdrawal than Japan. The hotel room is going to be as expensive as your smack."

"I don’t want to detox. I can’t detox. I need . . ."

"What you need now is a cuppa green tea with honey. Just promise not to throw it at me."

She partially sat up on the bed and cradled the cup in her hands. "It’s good," she said as she took a sip.

"Well, it’s not going to be good. Not for a while. You have to get that junk out of your system. Right now your body wants more, more would make it feel better, but it has to go."

"Says who? I like the way it makes me feel. I like being dead."

"Listen, Lena, I know what you’re going through. I’ve gone through withdrawal, cold turkey, just like you are going to do. Not from Heroin but from pills and booze, which they say is worse. I didn’t want to do it either; but if I had to kick it, you have to do it, too. I’ll be here with you 24/7."

"Why?"

"’Cause you’re a friend in need."

* * *

A night spent sleeping on the floor of a room had made him envious of the cotton quilts provided at tea houses. All he had was the linoleum floor. Furthermore he was sharing this barely-single room with another person, a woman for whom the next few days were going to be living hell. He was certain that the per diem he had quoted to Erika Jensen was not enough to cover this situation.

He realized that he had not checked in with Jodie for almost two days. She didn’t even know that he had found Helena Hull. Explaining that they would be in Japan for possibly two more weeks was going to be difficult. Jodie was paying him to be a private investigator not a hand-holding nurse. But his only other choice was to go to the street and buy heroin and take Helena back to New Zealand as a junkie. Then he would have to deal with New Zealand’s famous customs officers. Somehow, it just seemed easier this way.

"Jodie, it’s me, John," he whispered into the phone in fear that Helena would awaken and hear him talking. He’d gotten the answering machine, so he had to talk fast. "I’ve found her. Won’t be back for a while though. She’s trying to kick heroin. Better not tell our client that just yet. I don’t know what happened. She’s a mess though. I’ll get back later, when I can talk more." He flipped his phone shut, just as Helena rolled to the side of the bed and chundered the tea onto the floor which was now also his bed.

He knew this was just the beginning. He had no idea how the lady would handle the pain that was about to beset her body, or why he had to be the one to help her through it. He just knew that he had to be there with her, whatever happened.

* * *

"You need to get some sort of wireless computer set-up so I can send you files," Andy scolded from the other end of the phone.

"Yea, sure, and I’ll go blind reading them off a screen on my mobile – I can barely read the numbers on the telephone. Modern technology’s not made for my eyes."

"Getting old Johnny."

"What ya’ got for me anyway?"

"Not a whole lot, mate, this Higuchi place doesn’t exist. It has to be a code – maybe for someplace or something bad. Don’t know. All I can find out about Higuchi is what the Xena people have written."

"Damn it, not what I need now, for sure. This whole thing seems like a piece of bad fiction."

"Did some work on Edon Labs though, they had a lab up at Sendai which closed about five years ago under mysterious circumstances. As they are not a publicly held company it is hard to get exact details, but that might be what your friend Mr. Fuck-you was talking about."

"Fuku"

"Fuck you, Fuku, fugu. . . all the same to me, John boy."

"What’d you say?"

"You heard me."

"No, the last one fugu. What do you know about that?"

"Poison fish?"

"Yea, I got that. Find out why a person might want to eat it?"

"Balls."

"No, has to be more than that, this’s a woman."

"Back tomorrow, or sooner if I find something."

* * *

Businessmen’s hotels in Japan do not provide room service. There were vending machines in the hall with tea, beer, and an assortment of packaged sweets and spicy rice crackers. It took John several explanations and a stack of yen to convince the desk clerk to find a person who could run errands for him because he was tied up on business. He needed sports drink, salt tablets, several bottles of assorted analgesics, biscuits, and a large box of plastic rubbish bags.

In the long run, he considered that the next few days might be easier if he had also requested a large ginsu knife to cut Helena Hull up into small pieces before he stuffed her in the bags. He knew it was going to be that bad. For now, however, he simply moved her around in the small bed, tucking the plastic bags under her to encase the mattress. Strangely enough he had to fight back the urge to run his hands over the sleeping woman’s body. It was sleazy and strange, but the yearning was there.

He managed to sneak a stock of sheets and towels off the cart of the housekeeping women. He’d smile, they’d bow, he’d grab. It worked more times than he cared to confess. At least now he had something to put under him while he slept, and to clean up the woman in his bed.

Helena slept. He knew in a few hours he would have to awaken her, to make sure she could still wake up. He didn’t know what other drugs were in her system, she probably should be in a hospital and not a hotel room; but he didn’t have a choice.

* * *

A flash of steel, a blade running through the air and a pain more intense than anything you could imagine. A paper cut that went completely through your neck. You could still see, you could still think, you could still feel the pain of the wounds of the body lying on the ground. You blink your eyes and try to scream, but there is no air to carry the words, because your lungs are on the ground. You finally feel your head hit the ground and the world goes black. You are dead. You call out a name. Not the person who killed you, not the person who deceived you, not the person you love, but another name. The name of someone you thought you hated.

"Mother fucker, why can’t I stay dead?" she screamed as she woke up.

John rushed to her side and tried to comfort her. "I can help you to the bathroom."

"Think it’s too late."

"It’s OK, I’ll get you cleaned up."

He knew that after the pain subsided, she’d remember the humiliation. He’d had several nurses hovering over him, laughing as they changed his adult-sized nappies. Helena had only towels, and plastic bags. Maybe he should take her to a hospital; she didn’t deserve this, whatever she had done.

"My teeth hurt."

"And your toenails, and your earlobes, and the inside of your belly-button. Every cell in your body wants some more heroin, but that big cluster called the brain is gonna have to keep telling them that there ain’t gonna be no more. The sooner they realize that the better."

She tried to laugh, but it hurt too much.

"You’ve got about six more hours before the really bad shit happens. Sorry, just a figure of speech. You’re going to yell and scream and shake and try to get out of here to score some more junk. Just remember, I’m bigger and stronger than you."

"Which is why I’m not in a hospital, right. Afraid I’d take out some of those Japanese nurses."

"I hear they hire sumo-wrestlers for drug wards." As he said it, he realized from the look on her face that he had hit something from her past. Helena Hull’s brain cells were in there somewhere.

* * *

"I’ve arranged a transfer, and made it look like a promotion." Fukusaburu Li stared coldly into the eyes of the woman who sat on the other side of his desk. "You’re going north, to Sendai, to run the production lab there."

"What’s in it for me?"

"You get away, from me, from the trouble your career will be in if they find out about us."

"Don’t you mean, your career. You’re the one with the wife and kiddies, I’m just a woman sleeping her way to the top."

"So that’s what you call it. Well, if you were trying for a promotion, you got it."

"I wouldn’t call exile to production in Sendai a promotion. I like Tokyo. I like 24-hour sushi, kobe beef, iron chefs, foreign tourists, senior vice presidents. . ."

"You like too many things, Lena, you forget that we are also paying you to make money for this company. It is not a free vacation, you have to pull your weight."

"I did a good job of pullin’. . ."

"You’re going."

"My Japanese is rusty, at best."

"That’s why we’ve arranged a personal assistant."

"Oh, goodie."

"She’ll be with you as much as you need. I am sure she is as anxious to learn from you, as you are to teach her. Just be careful, Lena, you don’t have to teach her everything."

He reached down and buzzed his secretary. "You can send Akemi in to meet Ms. Hull now. ."

* * * *

"Your partner has been in Japan for six days now, on my credit card, and he hasn’t reported back to me for three. What’s up?" Erika Jensen glared at Jodie. "I had to come down to your office in order to talk to something other than an answering machine."

"I’m sorry, I’ve been working on another case, this one is Lawless’s. He’s making some headway; and I haven’t listened to the messages this morning, there might be some more news."

"Like he’s found her. I certainly hope so."

"I don’t know, Ms. Jensen, I won’t know until I listen to the messages."

The small woman ducked behind her desk and picked up her phone. "All 72 of them, right? I don’t know how you run this place, but I’m tired of paying for it."

"Go then, go back to the police and let them help you. I’m sure they will be enthusiastic about taking off for Japan and have nothing else to do with their time." Jodie knew how to be hard when pushed.

"I know, I know, you’re my only hope. You and that walking hunk of testosterone you have for a partner."

"That’s my Lawless. Speaking of drugs, do you know if your friend had a drug problem, street drugs, pharmaceuticals, whatever?"

"Not that I know of, she barely drank, but she was a thrill seeker. I used to tease her that she’d try anything once, and if she liked it . . . and she had this thing about being dead . . . nearly dead.

A scarf around the neck, her own hair, she found something erotic about having only thirty seconds to live."

"Don’t you think you should have told me that earlier?"

"I didn’t think it would come up. Death fantasies didn’t seem too closely related to her disappearance."

"No, about the fact that you and Ms. Hull were more than friends, that you were lovers. Does Lawless know?"

"Don’t know, I didn’t tell him, but if he’s as smart as he thinks he is, he’s figured it out by now."

"Probably."

* * * *

There was nothing left in her stomach to purge. Sometimes he sat beside her and brushed her hair, or just held her hand. He massaged the cramps that wracked her legs and thighs, and tried to not think higher. Other times he forced her to drink the sports drinks that stayed down only for a few minutes. In the hospital he’d been given IV solutions, but that was not a choice he had here. The next few hours were going to be the worst. He watched her shake and kick at the blankets, but fortunately she seemed to be sleeping through the worst of it.

He figured that Helena had not been using H that long, so even though the physical pain would be intense, the psychological need would not be as bad as it was . . . Christ he was sounding like a bloody doctor. He was just a fuckwit when it came to drugs, someone who was dumb enough to use and get hooked. This woman was intelligent and highly educated, yet there she was using H, the worst of the street drugs. He wanted to shake her and ask her why, and he wanted to make love to her.

Fuck you Fuku. Her sword pierced through him. She saw her dead body on the ground, her head on a stake and still her spirit got close enough to wield the death blow. She watched as those little black squiggles, like reversed maple spinners, ran out of him and into the sky. Damn, did that really happen? He melted down to nothing. She wondered what happened to Akemi? What happened to Erika? What happened to the mysterious dark man who had no name and loved her so very much?

He watched as she rolled over on her back and kicked the sheet off the bed. Even covered with sweat and dirt she looked beautiful. It made no fucking sense. Why would he go arse over tits over some woman he didn’t know – a woman with both a lover, and a drug habit. John Lawless continued to think with his dick. Yea, that hurt now, too. He’d have to have another drink to try to make that go away, or maybe wank-off. He was a mess, at a time he needed to be there to help her.

* * * *

"Oh fuck, Johnny, I’ve shit my bed again." She cried out. That was a good sign. She was aware of what was going on. He had watched her for the last six hours tossing and turning, heaving and cramping, kicking and screaming. Suddenly she seemed awake and aware; even if she was the most god-awful mess he had ever seen.

"Well, love, they don’t call it the fartsack for nothing. If you think you can walk, I’ll get you out and into the dunny and we can hose you down."

"Please."

"That’s my Warrior Princess."

She smiled. A real smile. Not the come on of a whore. He was finally going to get to meet the real Helena Hull.

"First, how about a fizzy drink. This one’s got vitamins and electrolytes and all that good stuff."

She took a big slug, and burped, but kept it down. They both laughed.

Hosing down was literally what he would have to do to her. The shower was just a plastic sprayer attached by a hose to the wall of the tiled room and the water ran out through a drain in the floor. In order to help her shower, he was going to either be soaked or naked. It was stupid to elect the second option, but he was still having trouble with those rational choices.

He sprayed off the assorted solid particles that clung to her body washing them down the drain as they stood together in the room barely a meter square. His next project would be her hair, and then the smells that still clung to her. He sat her on the toilet and lathered her hair.

"I’d heard guys get off on doing that, now I know for sure." She did not have to be very with it to notice the effect she was having on him.

"Sorry about that. I told him to relax, but . . . he doesn’t always listen. " They both laughed again. He lathered and rinsed and repeated. Her hair hung wet around her shoulders and down over her large, beautiful breasts.

"Now stand up and spread you legs."

"You’re not gonna, in here."

"Hell no, I think he wants to, but I’m just going to spray you." He let the water go where his hands and dick craved to be.

"Some chicks use hand held showers for masturbation, you know?"

"Does it work?"

"You tell me." She grabbed the hose and hit him directly with a jet of hot water.

The room was far too small and slippery, but at least it was clean. Bodies intertwined and minds pretended that they were still just washing. Mouths too rank for kissing found other bodily parts with which to unite. It was wrong, he knew it was wrong, but John Lawless went looking for that itch Fuku Li had told him needed scratching. There was a time, just before he came, that he even felt he had the power to make the room larger and more luxurious.

* * * *

She had rummaged through his case and found a T-shirt and an old pair of jeans that hung on her hips and made her look like a hip-hop teenager. He proclaimed the room hopeless and decided that they should check out and find a nicer place to stay for a few more days, preferably one with a soaking bathtub and a large bed. She thought it was a wonderful idea. The new room was going to have to be on John Lawless’s credit card and not Erika Jensen’s.

"Think you set the land speed record for withdrawal."

"It was your tender-loving-care." She rolled her eyes up into her head and smiled broadly. "Especially the after care."

"Gave it a fair go, I should think."

"That you did big guy."

He could kiss her now, and hold her, and caress her, and make love to her. He knew now why Erika Jensen had such sketchy memories of the trip to Japan. Lena did not like to leave the bed. After surrendering two days to the sleep and pain of withdrawal, she spent the next three wrapped around John Lawless in positions he had not tried since he was a young man. A few breaks for food, drink and a midnight search for large sized condoms and they were at it again. He didn’t want to stop, but knew eventually there was more he had to do than to just bring Helena Hull back home and hosed.

* * *

"Damn you, Lawless, why didn’t you pick up your fax." Jodie muttered. The hotel had been nice enough to return her cover sheet with a note saying that John Lawless had left the hotel leaving no forwarding address. He’d not read the fax Andy had sent him.

Jodie hadn’t read it either, but she did now. It actually looked like a bunch of Andy’s crazy stories. Several printed downloads of information on Haitian Zombies and poison fish, a story about an explosion in a food processing factory, a newspaper clipping with an attached bill for translation from Japanese about a young girl’s suicide, and some pictures of sushi plates. Andy must have stopped taking his meds again.

She’d tried reaching Lawless several times in the past few days, but his mobile was turned off. She left messages, but wondered if he had the same skill with retrieving voice mail from his mobile as he did in the office.

"Jodie, it’s me, sorry, I’ve been busy."

"Too busy to call, but not busy enough to check out of the hotel."

"Oh, that, I can explain. Ms. Helena Hull’s withdrawal symptoms turned the place into a super loo . . ."

"Thanks for sharing that with me, Lawless."

"She’s a fair go now, I think we’ll be coming back in a couple of days, got a few things I need to check out."

"Like the faxed research Andy sent you, and you never picked up."

"Damn, I knew I’d forgotten something."

"This isn’t like you Lawless."

"I’m knackered, Jodie. If you think Heroin withdrawal is a piece of piss, try it sometime."

"No desire, I’ll trust you. I’ll trust you to get our client’s lover home in one piece, and get back to working on something so we can earn money to pay your hotel bills in Tokyo. Understand."

"You gotta trust me Jodie, I need a few days to figure out why she did what she did, or else she’s gonna do it again. And next time she won’t have John Lawless to come and find her."

He hung up the phone, cursed under his breath and realized that he was wrong again, but that it didn’t make any difference. He knew that anytime Lena Hull needed to be found, he would drop everything and go in search. He’d given Jodie the name and number of the new hotel, if she had any sense she’d realize that it was far too nice to just be a second, cleaner choice. He wondered if she suspected the worst of him . . . again. Despite the fact that he was hungry and thirsty, and feeling ashamed of himself, he had no choice but to hurry back to the room for another root with Lena.

* * * *

He liked watching her sleep. He liked watching her brush her hair and pin it up in interesting hair- styles. He liked watching her soak in the bathtub, shave her legs, and paint her toe-nails. He liked the way she looked in the mirror and adjusted the back of her panties as she walked by. He was having thoughts, crazy thoughts, that he hadn’t had since he met Marla. What did he have to offer? Come live with me in my flat which, by the way, is also my office. Come spend your life with me on a beat-up old boat in the harbor. Come marry me, so you can leave me when you . . .

He had to get his head straightened out, and the best way he knew to do that was to think about work. Think about trying to figure out what made the woman, with whom he was now deeply in love, leave New Zealand, come to Japan, and fall off the deep edge.

They still didn’t talk much. She hadn’t even realized that he had been hired to come looking for her, perhaps she just thought he was a tourist. Still, she never questioned the unlikelihood of a tourist from New Zealand hooking-up with an American who had been living and working in his hometown. She never talked about her job and going back to it, or her lover and going back to her. John realized he had to ask the necessary questions quickly upon her awakening, for even a few seconds delay would have her unable to answer because his dick would be in her mouth. It was a tough choice, but he knew he had to do it.

He had glanced through Andy’s papers and was reading the Haitian zombie one in detail when she awoke. She stretched, flipped her hair behind her head and headed for his chair. He knew in seconds she would be on her knees reaching for his fly.

"No, not now. We need to talk."

"Talk, my mouth is so much better at other things, don’t you think?"

"Sorry, Lena, we do need to talk. I think you’ve been successful at withdrawing from the Heroin but you still got the whore in you."

"Haven’t heard many complaints on that."

"We have to get clean on all fronts, Lena. I have to come clean, too."

She had no words, just a puzzled look. She threw on one of his shirts and sat on the edge of the bed.

"Lena, I find you fascinating, exciting, hell I’m having feelings that I haven’t had for ages. Feelings that honestly I’m not very proud of. To an outsider I must be acting like a real dog. I didn’t just pick you up in a bar Lena, I came here, to Japan, to find you. I’m a private investigator. Erika Jensen hired me to find you."

He tried to read her expression, but it was one of total dumbfoundment. Helena Hull looked like she didn’t have a clue.

"I could take you home, slap you on the bum and send you back to your lover. Maybe I might call you for a date and get turned down. I certainly would not be surprised when you end up back here strung out and wanting to be dead again. Or I can try to help you. I could let you tell me what happened with Edon labs to see if there is anything we can do. I think you will thank me in the long run. As much as I have enjoyed these past few days, I know and you know we are playing a game to hide the truth – from each other and ourselves. It’s got to stop."

"Why? What if I don’t want it to stop? We can just stay here, or go anywhere else? Why do we have to go back to Auckland. After what we’ve been through . . . "

"I’ll tell you what, let’s hear your story, then we’ll look at our options. If after everything is on the table, you still want to make a go of it, I’m game. But I can’t do it your way, I have to know what I am up against. I don’t want to find you in the dunny with a needle in your arm again."

"I promise, I won’t do that again. I’m clean."

"Yea, and you told me you wanted to stay dead. Now tell me what you meant." John held her as her body began to shake, as if she needed to purge her body of something other than heroin.

* * * *

Erika didn’t want her to stay dead either. She’d made the trip to the fountain of life on Mt. Fugi with her ashes. Drop the ashes into the fountain by the second sunset and the body would be restored. Life would go on. Except for the souls of those that had died, she had to stay dead for them. She would have to understand. It wasn’t an easy decision. I’ll be there with you. I love you. He wasn’t there. She knew he would have thrown the ashes in the fountain. He wanted her alive with him – forever.

"Where do I start?" she asked. He had finally decided that they had to go out to lunch, to a western restaurant as far away from take-away sushi and cart noodles as he could get. Rack of lamb, mashed-potatoes, roast pumpkin, and English tea. Pretend they were back in Auckland even if they were still in Japan.

"Start with Akemi, and don’t cover anything up because you think I . . . bloody-hell Lena . . . just tell me the story."

"OK, but I have to start further back. I came to Japan five years ago, typical story, over-educated American woman sleeping her way through the corporate world. Kind of woman everyone hates, unless you’re the one shagging her. Got involved with Fukusaburu Li."

"But he said . . . He was the first person I talked to when I came here looking for you."

"Want to know how you tell if Fuku Li is lying. . . if his mouth is moving. He was hot. I think he had fantasies about tall women for a long time -- a woman he could fuck hard and not worry about her breaking. We tried, believe me; we tried. I’m not real proud of the woman I was then."

It did not take words, facial expressions were enough, and John still questioned if she was proud of the woman she was now.

"I know, I was back there, to that place, when I met you, but I had good years in between . . . really good years . . . with Erika. She brought out the best in me. We were happy together. Soul mates, or at least the mate to the portion of my soul she brought out.

"I think Fuku wanted to get me out of town quickly, and he didn’t think it through. Didn’t think about my biochemical background; didn’t think about my ‘thing’ about young girls. The whole plan had disaster printed on it in big letters, send me out of town to manage a research lab masquerading as a food testing facility. With this young thing who wanted to learn to be like me as my personal assistant. If I had been smart I would have hopped a plane back to America and ended it there, but I went."

"The lab was a mess. A lot of scientists working on different aspects of the same chemical agent tetrodoxin. You wouldn’t believe what people thought they could do with it – everything from cosmetic uses like Botox to prenatal treatment of retinal ganglion cell axon morphology . . .

John’s face expressed the fact that the conversation was going somewhere he did not understand.

"Christ, they even talked about using it for Heroin withdrawal. Ironic isn’t it? Fuku Li had his own agenda though; he thought it would make a wonderful club drug. Endorphins run amuck. Japanese men would kill for it. So we stopped our medical research and started testing it as a pleasure enhancer.

"And, I guess I should be totally honest, that while I was spending my days working on the pleasure enhancing properties of tetrodoxin, I was spending my nights working on the pleasure enhancing properties of Akemi. I’d been with women, but she was the first woman I’d ever been in love with. She was tiny, almost not there, until she wanted to be with me and then it was like we became one and disappeared into each other. It’s hard to explain, sort of like the way we have been the past few days, and then she . . .

"I’m sorry, Lena, I know this is hard, but you have to tell me. We have to get through this."

"She died, but first she broke my heart. Please John, buy me a scotch, I need it. Please."

Tears ran down her face.

"I’ll buy you one, but you’re not getting another. Understand?"

She nodded her head. "I was completely taken in by her. Like a teenager. She talked in poetry and made love like you cannot believe. She understood how sometimes I had to work late, and didn’t mind. Independent, but always there for me. One night I came home and she was lying on the bed, covered with Japanese money, drunk and laughing. It was so not like her. I didn’t understand at all.

"She told me that she had figured out a way to get away from Fuku Li once and for all. She’d stolen a few pills from the lab and taken them to a club. So happened that one of the freebies went to a big drug dealer in from Tokyo who was absolutely enthralled with a fugu pill and made a deal for a large buy. There was enough for us to get away and never look back. All would have gone well, if the batch she took wasn’t twice as strong as the samples and several people died that night in the club.

"I was enraged. Not that I hadn’t been thinking the same thing, but I was going to wait until after the testing was complete, get it out on the streets before Fuku Li and take off, but I wanted to make sure it was safe."

John wrinkled his nose. The woman was talking technicalities.

"Well, Akemi looked up at me with those big black eyes of hers and bowed her head. Told me I could kill her now, because she had dishonored me. I couldn’t do that. Didn’t make sense. While I was still contemplating, she opened this small box, carved from ivory, and inside was a dried intestine of a puffer fish. She dropped it on her tongue, smiled sweetly, and swallowed. She died sitting cross-legged on my bed.

"Try explaining that one to the police. I had no other choice than to put my fate in the hands of the man I detested, Fuku Li. We arranged a cover story about a chemical spill in the lab, Akemi being too close. I didn’t think the part explaining the club deaths made much sense, but I think that Edon labs paid settlements to the families involved and bribes to the police.

"I went on my way, took a job in Germany for an automobile company. Never went back to lab work. Ended up in New Zealand. Met Erika. Reached a point where I didn’t have to worry about my past, looking over my shoulder for someone or something. Told myself I was working for the greater good.

"Then about five weeks ago I got this message. Didn’t make a lot of sense, but I had to convince Erika to go to Japan with me. Said something about Akemi needing me. I knew she was dead. I saw her dead."

"You sure?"

"I know dead."

"I was reading, sometimes Haitian voodoo masters used tetrodoxin to produce a death like state, when the dead people awoke they were called zombies. Perhaps that’s what happened to Akemi."

"No, she was dead. But the zombie story is pretty close to what happened to me. It didn’t take long after I got here to realize that Fuku Li had found out about the money Akemi got for the drugs. He wanted his share, which he concluded was everything."

"What you talking about 10-20 grand at most? How much would you have left after five years?"

"Six million, US. Not all of what she got from the sale was on my bed; most of it was in my Swiss bank account. Wire transfer. My little friend had learned a lot from me. I was willing to cut him in, believe me, but not for all of it. Furthermore, he was being watched by the police. It wasn’t the last pleasure drug Edon Labs had developed. No one suspected my involvement, and I wanted to keep it that way.

"Now it gets fuzzy, no, it becomes a total blur. I had planned to drive up to Sendai the next morning, check into a tea house, and arrange a deal with Fuku Li. And no it wasn’t a sexual thing; that was over, long ago. I just wanted to go somewhere where I was less likely to be watched.

"The last thing I remember is going out with Erika to that restaurant where we met. Call me stupid, but I ate a fugu-sake platter and then decided to do the liver bit. Pretend I was eating poison, stare into her eyes -- a real Xena/Gabrielle moment. Yes, I see the comparison, Johnny, I’m not that culturally illiterate. All I can figure is that someone substituted real fugu liver. I honestly have no idea what happened the next week. I ended up about how you found me, addicted to Heroin and fugu."

"And the money."

"It’s still there. I’m not dumb enough to try to get it when I was in that state."

"So I clean you up, take you home, and Mr. Li will be knocking at your door again in the very near future. What’s the point, Lena?"

"That’s what I am trying to tell you, I don’t know. That’s why I want to get away, the two of us. I’ve got the money, you’ve got the freedom . . . let’s start over."

"Sounds like a great idea, but it’s not original. The last woman who asked me to do that . . . it seems like I am caught in a film loop that keeps running over and over again."

"Strange, I’ve felt that way most of my life, too."

* * * *

"He’s found her. Why haven’t you told me?" Erika Jensen burst into the office. Jodie tried to put on her best professional face, but frankly the small woman and her attitude were beginning to scare her.

"I just heard from him last night, I was going to call you, see it’s on my list." She held the pad up, not really expecting Erika to look at it closely. "How did you know?"

"I called my bank to see how much damage he had done to my credit card. The charges stopped three days ago. Do you know what that means?"

"No, please, tell me."

"It means that he found her and they’re shacking up on his bucks, or hers."

"You’ve got a lot of trust in your partner, and mine."

"Do you know differently?"

Jody shook her head. "I did talk to Lawless yesterday, and he said he was planning to be back here by the weekend. He had found Ms. Hull, she’d had a bit of a medical problem, but he thought she would be strong enough to make the trip in a couple of days. Now calm down. He said there were a couple of loose ends they needed to take care of, and that she was fine now. OK?"

"No. It’s not OK. You don’t understand?"

"I know it is difficult, ‘specially after waiting so long, but Lawless says she is fine now and I believe him."

"Why? Why would you believe HIM?"

"I’ve known John Lawless a long time, he’s my partner. He wouldn’t lie about this?"

"Little you would know," she said with a disgusted tone. "Guess I’ll have to go to Japan and bring her back myself."

"Just give him a couple of days. . . " Jodie answered to the slamming door.

* * * *

Lawless sat breaking off pieces of an overpriced loaf of sourdough bread and feeding them to the pigeons gathered around him. His excuse of needing to start running again had gotten him to the park without Lena. Jodie was out, Andy was out, and so all that was left to tell his story to were the pigeons and, in about ten minutes, Fuku Li who had agreed to meet him at his park-bench office.

Yesterday’s discussion had created more problems than it had solved. In fact it had solved nothing. After the restaurant, they had returned to the hotel room, stared at each other, and compromised into a series of sexual bargaining positions. There had to be a solution somewhere between handing the money over to Fuku Li and killing him. Why did he always meet women with lots of money and shady morals? Women who he was sure would leave when the next good deal came along. Still there was something about this woman that he couldn’t figure out at all, something that drew him to him, and when she left the withdrawal would be worse than with pills, booze or even heroin.

He rose and shook Mr. Li’s hand. He was going to have to try to keep it civil, as it was a public place.

"I found Helena Hull. She’s going back to Auckland with me tomorrow."

"I hope you don’t believe anything she’s told you. She has a most active imagination."

"What do you think she has told me? Why would she have told me anything about you?"

"Come on Lawless, you wouldn’t have wasted my time unless there was something you wanted to talk to me about."

"And I doubt if you would have taken time from your busy schedule unless . . ."

"OK, we’re even. We do have to talk. I’m sticking to the story I told you earlier. Helena Hull worked for me five years ago, she ran a lab and did it very poorly. I cut her some slack and allowed her to continue with her progression up the corporate ladder. I haven’t seen her in five years, I don’t want to see her. I wish her well. I work for a large international company, and I have better things to do with my time than to deal with some drug-addicted whore on the streets . . .

"Wait a minute. I never told you that. You had to have found that out on your own."

"I have my sources, Mr. Lawless. You may be willing to scrape her out of the gutter and fuck her brains out, but I’m not."

"So you’re going to leave her alone, forget about the money."

"What money? If there were money why would she be dressing as a geisha and selling her body to foreign tourists? Come on, Mr. Lawless."

"OK. I’ll take you at your word. Leave her alone. But just one more thing . . . This is for . . . Xena." It came from out of the blue and a place deep inside him, an impulse that could not be resisted that manifested itself in a round-house punch directly to the stomach of Fukusaburu Li. The big man reeled backward, slipped, and fell on his arse. John walked away, prepared to run, knowing that sumo-wrestlers were not known for their speed. Li did not pursue, but walked off in the other direction. Neither he nor John had noticed the mispronunciation of Ms. Hull’s first name.

* * *

Erika Jensen was standing near the hotel elevator, with his case, when he returned.

"Don’t bother going up. All your stuff is here."

"Pardon?"

"You don’t need to go to your room. Lena’s back with me; I’ll take care of her. I’ve paid this bill,too. So just catch a cab to the airport and make your way back to Auckland. I’ve arranged for an electronic transfer for your fee."

"But I haven’t done the bill yet."

"Don’t worry, I’m sure you will find it sufficient."

He pushed the UP button. "Have to say good-bye to Lena."

"No, you don’t, believe me."

"Is she all right, what did you do to her?"

"She’s fine. Don’t worry. I’m not the one who gave her the heroin, if that what you’re worried about. And she’s with me."

"I’d like to hear that from Helena, if you don’t mind."

"I mind." The doors opened and she stepped into the elevator with him. A floor up she pushed the emergency button.

"I’m going to tell you this one more time. Go to the lobby, get on a cab, get your arse back to New Zealand. Sometime today, Fuku Li is going to be found face down in a plate of ill prepared fugu-sake and unless you are gone, he might have your business card in his pocket. Understand. Then Lena and I are going on holiday, I was thinking Greece. I hear there are very nice beaches there."

"I don’t think it will be today, Ms. Jensen, I understand Mr. Li has a rather bad stomach ache and has cancelled his lunch reservations."

* * *

The fact Helena was on the other side of the world and he was home had made things go more smoothly. He had spent a lot of time sailing, a lot of time working, but still he had spent a lot of time thinking of her. Other women in his life, like Lana, had passed through quickly; but Helena would linger in the back corners of his mind and pop up at times when he wasn’t expecting it. He’d even tried calling Marla, expecting the rejection and hoping to find escape in the old pain -- real life pain – not from imagined feelings toward some women who used sex as a tool and a drug. It didn’t work.

There were other women in his life over the next few months, but the itch that Fukusaburu Li had told him about had taken residence in his body or in his soul.

Speaking of Fukusaburu Li, he had found a small article, doing the computer searches Andy had been teaching him, saying that he had left Edon Labs to pursue personal interests. He was glad Erika Hansen’s threats had not been real. He didn’t like the idea of the two of them being involved with a killing, even if it were a man like Li.

In a few weeks they would be moving to new office space. He was keeping the current flat as his living quarters, the first time since he had lived with Marla that he would have a home that was not also his business. He poured himself a cup of coffee and decided to check the phone messages. Yep, he could do that, too, even though he still had to rely on Jodie’s instructions.

After the third deletion came a voice he recognized; a voice he had never expected to hear again.

"Hi, John, it’s Helena Hull, remember me?"

How could he ever forget?

"Everything is fine. Erika and I are moving back to the states, I have a job with a software company in Washington State. I just wanted to call and let you know. Say good-bye. And, I want to thank you for being there, being my friend, in my time of need. Maybe our paths will cross again, who knows? "

He wondered why she had taken the time to call and what she was really saying. He realized that there was something deep inside of him that would never allow him to forget her and that he would be willing to go anywhere and do anything if she needed a friend . . . or a lover. Maybe there was still a chance they might be together, even if it were only one in a billion.

McJude

May 1, 2003

 

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