26. Killer Queen #2
A cold dampness meets my skin. I’m so elated that I accidentally push my entire hand into the wall, but a circle where my fingerprint was appears in the steam.
“Look!” Helga says, spinning Jazz around to face the mirror.
I squeak my finger down the glass, focusing, keeping it as steady as I can. And I slowly spell out.
Who was
Kelsey’s
Tip-off?
“Who was Kelsey’s tip-off?” Helga reads.
“Are you asking who told us to investigate Kelsey Cobbledick?” Jazz says.
“Yes!” I shout, and realise they can’t hear it.
“Yeeeessss!” Stove yells through cupped hands.
Jazz bites her lip. “I’m not really allowed to say.” She scrunches up her face and looks at Helga for . . . advice? A helping hand? I’m not sure.
Helga seems to understand the situation better than I do. She puts her fingers in her ears, turns her back to the police officer, and hums quietly to herself.
Jazz checks one more time to be certain that Helga can’t hear, and then she wordlessly mouths, “Francesca Driscoll.”
Oh, bingo.
“Thaaaaaannkksss!” Stove shout whispers.
And just because the moment is presenting itself to me, and I have something to prove, I place my finger against the steamed mirror once more, and I draw a testicle, a short fat cock, and another testicle. To finish it, I add a slit and three spurts of jizz.
There’s a strange, pressing silence in the trophy room. Nobody dares to speak. Pixie, Stove, Peter, Jeanie, and Camille wait around on the various pieces of storage furniture.
The ghosts watch me as I pace because I have the answer. I’ve figured out who the killer is, and yes, it’s all the same person, and no, I haven’t told anyone yet.
Everyone will find out at the same time. Including Officer Jazz, Helga, Franny, Angel, and no doubt Sergeant Dave Davies, who’ll be listening live as it’s broadcast.
Only Trystan and Josh aren’t here, and as much as I want Trystan to stay away, something feels .
. . not right about it. He should know who killed him and why.
He’s been part of my journey since the very beginning.
Hell, he was the first ghost I ever met.
He should be here, and yet, my fear of losing him overrides any sense of responsibility I have.
From the trophy room windows, I can just about make out the shore line, but even if I press my face through the glass, I wouldn’t see him.
He’ll be in his hut, talking to his “friends,” getting ignored because they don’t know he’s there.
Or maybe Josh is showing him pornographic illustrations of my favourite canon ships soaping each other down.
I check the tiny clock on the laptop for the eleventy millionth time. Seven forty?seven. Getting close.
I feel sick. Am I about to lose half my friends?
Only Stove attempts to break the silence with a few poorly timed Christmas cracker jokes that don’t land.
“Why did the chicken cross the road?” he asks. Nobody says anything, so he pushes on with the punchline. “Becaauuuse!” he clucks.
It’s met with zero laughter. Even Stove doesn’t laugh at his own joke like usual.
Perhaps, after all their talk of wanting to move on, the reality has finally sunk in.
Some of them may no longer be here after this episode airs.
Who, though? Will they all move on? Or only some of them?
Besides Jeanie and Peter, has everyone else been waiting for closure?
And what if Jeanie was wrong? What if I explain what happened to her, and she goes off as well?
Even Camille, who has repeatedly referred to unfinished business as horseshit, is unusually anxious.
I get to my feet and circle the room again, passing through cabinets and furniture, and pausing only to gaze at Trystan’s magazine cover. At his happy, lively little face, smiling up into the sunshine.
I have never met a more beautiful man, inside or out.
“What’s the time?” I ask everyone.
Pixie, who’s closest to the laptop monitor, replies. “Seven fifty-two.”
“Can ghosts barf?” I say. I feel like I might be sick.
Nobody answers my question, sending the sensation deeper inside my body. Into my very core.
However impossible it may be, the trophy room stills further.
“Gary,” Trystan says.
I haven’t taken my eyes off his magazine cover, and there’s a genuine possibility I’m hallucinating his voice, until . . .
“Gary?”
I spin around, and there he is, standing just inside the door. His cheeks are red, his chest rising and falling rapidly.
“Trystan?” in contrast, my voice is a husk.
“Do we have time for a chat?” he asks.
“It’s seven fifty-six,” Pixie says.
I don’t give a fuck what the time is. The podcast can wait. “Yes, of course. Here or in private?”
“Whatever,” he says, shrugging and rushing forward to me. He cups my face and kisses me.
It’s soft at first, and then his tongue is in my mouth, and my body is reacting in other ways it shouldn’t be in front of an audience of five other ghosts. I’m vaguely aware of someone, possibly Pixie, wolf whistling.
After a few more intense and delightful seconds, he pulls away, closes his eyes, and presses his forehead to mine.
“I just needed to check something,” he says.
“And?” I ask, trying to inhale as much of his scent as possible.
“I was right all along.” Trystan pushes a gap between us and stares into my eyes. “Don’t hate me, but I’m going to stay while you record your podcast.”
My heart leaves my chest. Simply falls through my ribs and drops to the ground. He might as well stomp it and kick it aside whilst it’s down there.
“I understand.” I swallow the wave of emotion fighting its way up my throat. “You have a right to know. You deserve to know.” My lip wobbles. I snap it tight. My eyes burn. I blink back the tears.
“Gary,” he says, and I could die all over again at the sound of my name on his lips. “It’s not because of that. Unfinished business. I mean, it sort of is. It’s difficult to explain. I want to know, but I’m not worried. I’m staying because I should be here for you when . . . the fallout hits.”
I lower my voice. “Do you know who it is?”
He whispers in reply. “I think so.”
Everyone in the room seems to draw closer to us, but nobody says anything.
“And in case I’m wrong . . .” Trystan slots his hand into the back of my hair. “I don’t think it’ll matter.”
“It won’t?” I ask.
“Because . . . because . . . that’s not what my unfinished business is.”
I can’t speak, can’t say anything, only stare right into his soul.
“It’s you, Gary. You’re my unfinished business.”
For at least ten seconds, I’m dumbstruck. There are a billion and one questions I have for him, and I guess the most pressing question is the first to fall from my lips.
“What the fuck?”
He laughs. “It’s kinda wild, but I’ve never been in love with someone before, and I had no idea it would feel this way.
Do you remember when I said that if I had unfinished business, I would know unequivocally what it was?
That it would be a burning urge within me to do something, and my soul wouldn’t be able to rest until it was done? ”
“Yes,” I say.
“Well, surprise! It’s you.”
Distantly, I hear Jeanie clapping. I’d forgotten that they were in the room with us.
I close my eyes, inhale deeply, exhale, then open them and refocus on Trystan. Okay, Gary, don’t freak out, but everything you’ve ever dreamed of is actually happening right now.
“When did you . . . how long have you thought that?” I ask.
“Well, I was thinking about you sitting on that chair there.” We both look over at the seat beside the bureau, and Stove surreptitiously climbs out.
“And I started to panic, like hyperventilate, and Josh asked me what was wrong, and I realised that you solving like, eight murders might actually be your unfinished business, and what if that had been the last time I saw you because you’d moved on without me?
” He swallows, sobs, swallows again. “And if that was going to be the moment you moved on, I wanted to be right here with you.”
My emometer cracks. Tears run down my cheeks.
“That wouldn’t happen,” I say through the searing pain at the back of my throat. “Because . . . you’re also my unfinished business.”
Trystan just stares at me, his hand still cradling my jaw.
“I’ve known that you were my unfinished business since that time we lay on the sand and talked about the constellations,” I say.
“Since then?”
“Yeah. I didn’t say anything because, come on, look at you, look at me. I never stood a chance.”
“Bad, Gary,” Jeanie yells, throwing her sleep mask at me. “What did we talk about?”
“I’m sorry,” I say without taking my eyes off Trystan. It’s not that I want to be so self?critical, it’s just that after a lifetime of being told by various people I’m not good enough, it becomes much easier to believe.
Mum, Dad, Barry Prestwich, the Swindon Sounds execs, all the girls and boys at uni I ever tried to get close with. The common denominator there was always me. They couldn’t all be wrong. Could they?
I know without a shadow of a doubt that my unfinished business is loving and being loved back with equal measure. Hearing Trystan say those three words to me might just be the moment I evanesce forever.
I rub my thumb over his lips and leave it there so he can’t accidentally spoil this moment and fulfil every late?night fantasy and every birthday candle or dandelion wish I’ve had since I was a kid.
“After the podcast, if you have some words for me, then I have some words for you too,” I say.
Trystan nods. “Deal. But just in case yours is solving multiple homicides at once . . .” He kisses me again, deeply, and I almost forget I have a programme to record in thirty seconds.
“Gary . . .” Pixie’s voice eventually carries over to me. “Gary? It’s eight. Are you ready?”
I pull apart from Trystan. Good lord, that’s a beautiful man. “Ready,” I say.