Читать книгу Mortuary Confidential - Kenneth McKenzie - Страница 20

Contributed by a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu fighter

When I was in mortuary school my roommate was raped. I took to carrying pepper spray in my pocketbook for protection, which in hindsight would’ve been as effective as trying to use a garden hose to put out a forest fire. By the time I had identified the danger, dug around all the junk in my purse looking for the darn can, and then figured out how to point and spray, I would have been a goner. But it made me feel safe at the time. After college I was looking for a hobby, something to unwind from work, and started doing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, partly to learn something new, partly because I like to exercise, and partly to replace my can of pepper spray.

Jiu-Jitsu is a martial art used by ancient Samurai warriors. It uses punches, kicks, throws, and ground grappling. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is a derivative of it that focuses more on takedowns and ground grappling than its counterpart. Over 90 percent of street fights end on the ground, so it’s imperative that you know how to get your opponent on the ground and then control him. I don’t go around looking for fights. I’m just comfortable in situations where most women wouldn’t be…like stranded on the side of Interstate 25 in the dark with a van full of dead bodies.

I work for a mortuary near Santa Fe. People who aren’t familiar with the area would have no idea where my hometown is, so I just tell everyone “Santa Fe.” It’s a quaint little town sitting on the edge of the desert framed by the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. I’ve lived in the Southwest my entire life and would never dream of moving. I love it too much.

We were quite busy at work one day with three funerals, and during the course of the day two calls came in from Albuquerque, which is only about an hour away. It’s not uncommon for calls to come from families with loved ones at Albuquerque-area hospitals because they have excellent care facilities and some of the most advanced trauma units for hundreds of miles.

It was early evening in the wintertime, so it was getting dark when I loaded up the panel van with a cremation box. I was going to stop on the way back from Albuquerque at our retort—the technical term for a cremation chamber—that’s across town and then drop the body off. It would be ready to be cremated first thing the following morning. The van has two steel shelves built in, almost like the old World War I ambulances, so that up to four bodies can be carried at once. With the help of one of my co-workers, I put the box on one of the shelves, loaded two empty cots, and headed out.

I made good time going to Albuquerque because all the rush hour traffic was heading out of the city as I was heading in. I stopped at Presbyterian Hospital and picked up the first body, and then stopped at UNM Hospital and picked up the second. Because it was after hours and I had to wait for security to key me into the morgues, it took about two hours to get both bodies. At this point it was near 8:30 and I was starved, so I stopped at a café and parked the van out front where I could see it while I grabbed a quick bite to eat. I did some quick time calculations in my head and called my boyfriend.

I told him I was running a little late, and probably wouldn’t be home until ten o’clock or so, and asked him if he could give the babysitter a ride home. Freddie, like me, sometimes works late. He told me he was just leaving the office. We exchanged “I love you’s” and hung up.

I hopped back in the van, wanting to get home to Freddie and my daughter as soon as possible. I navigated back onto I-25 and headed north. I was doing a pretty good clip when I hit some road debris. The van jolted so hard I looked in the rearview mirror to see what I had hit. I couldn’t tell what it was. No matter, I thought, and quickly forgot. About five more miles down the highway I heard a noise. It got louder until it sounded like a helicopter was hovering over me. When the tire exploded it sounded like a bomb going off.

The van swerved wildly, but I managed to keep control of it and pulled off to the side of the interstate. I got out and inspected the left front tire. It was totally shredded. There was almost no rubber left on the smoking rim. This is just great! I kicked the side of the van in frustration. There goes my Q.T. with Freddie tonight!

I retrieved my cell phone from inside and called an emergency roadside assistance company. The dispatcher notified me help was on the way, and advised me to hang tight. I hung up and got back into the nice warm van. While I waited, I called my partner at the mortuary and told him the situation, and that I’d probably be an hour late. The original plan was for me to get the bodies from the hospital and he was going to embalm them. Upon hearing that I wouldn’t be back at the mortuary until eleven o’clock, he told me to leave them and he’d take care of them in the morning.

Bored, I flipped through the radio stations for almost an hour before a pair of headlights pulled up behind me. I hopped out into the freezing desert air and ran to the rear of the van, hugging my wool coat tight around me. The figure in the white pickup truck engaged an emergency light bar over the cab of his truck and got out. He was an elderly gentleman, probably working during his retirement years to stay busy.

“Hey there,” I greeted him. He clutched a couple of road flares in his hand.

“Hull-o, Miss,” he replied. “I understand you have a blowout?”

“Yeah. Left front tire is completely gone.”

He smiled at me with crooked teeth. He wasn’t wearing much more than a heavy flannel shirt and a ball cap. He was the type accustomed to working outdoors in the cold. “We’ll have you underway in just a few minutes, Miss.” He popped the flares and dropped them on the rumble strip alongside the van.

“Oh, thank you, sir,” I said. “It’s been a long day and I’m ready to get home.”

“Let’s have a look.” He loped up to the front of the van and poked at the tire. “Yup. Blew it out all right. Thankfully you didn’t bend the rim, so everything is going to be fine. You probably won’t need a tow unless you bent the axle.”

I breathed a sigh of relief.

“Seems to me, if I remember correctly, the spare for this is located behind the front seats in the cargo area under the floor-boards.”

“Okay,” I said and swung the doors open.

The man peered into the cargo area. “What’s that?” he asked and put a crooked finger on his grizzled chin.

“Just a couple of bodies,” I said briskly. “I’ll move them out of the way so you can get to the tire.”

The man recoiled. “I’m not touching this van!”

“What?” I said, confused. “Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll pull the bodies out and you do your job. You don’t have to touch them.”

“I’m not getting in there!” he said. “There are dead people in there!”

My gratitude quickly melted into frustration. “Then what are you here for if you’re not going to help me?”

“I’m not getting anywhere near no dead people.” He took a step backward toward his pickup.

I snorted. “Then just get the hell out of here! I’ll do it myself,” I yelled. I had never changed a tire before on a car, much less a giant van, but I wasn’t going to sit around and suffer this fool.

I pulled the two cots out onto the shoulder of the freeway. The cars zipping by slowed; a strange scene was unfolding on the side of the road and the drivers wanted to rubberneck. I crawled into the back of the van, lifted up the floorboard, and retrieved the spare tire and jack. The tire didn’t look like the regular ones. It was smaller and didn’t look as sturdy—almost like a donut.

I rolled the donut between the suspended steel bays and crawled out, my charcoal pantsuit pants now smeared and greasy. I noticed with annoyance the guy was sitting in his pickup, watching. I loaded the two cots back inside the van and marched back to the pickup and rapped on the window. He rolled his window down.

“There,” I said, “the bodies are all gone, now do your job.”

He looked at me and said, “I told you I’m not going near that death van.”

“Then go on. Get the hell out of here. I don’t need you if you aren’t going to do anything.”

“Can’t. Gotta stay. Rules.”

“Do the rules also mention you sitting on your ass doing nothing?” I glared at him and marched back to the spare and jack. I picked them up and went around to the front of the van and got down on my hands and knees and looked under the chassis of the van. I found what appeared to me to be a suitable place to put the jack and started cranking. After I had the rim off the ground a few inches, I took the wrench and tugged at the bolts holding the old tire on.

“You’re doing it wrong!” the man called from his truck. I ignored him. The bolts were stiff and I was using every ounce of my strength. The van rocked perilously. I stopped and waited for it to stop moving. Then I tugged at the wrench, applying more even force. These bolts are really on there, I thought as I gave the wrench a final pull. The jack kicked out from under the van and it crashed down. I dove out of the way just in time. I sat on my rear end a few feet away, shaking from my close call.

“You’ve got to loosen the lugs before you jack up the van!” the man in the pickup truck called.

Thanks, asshole! I thought, picking myself up off the shoulder and dusting my coat off.

I retrieved the wrench from where I had flung it and found that by partially standing, I could put all my weight into loosening the bolts. I got all five loose and again jacked up the van. I slipped the spare on the rim and let the vehicle down. The spare donut seemed really soft, but I wasn’t going to ask the useless idiot in the pickup for anything like an air pump.

I tightened the bolts and navigated slowly back onto the interstate. Opening my window, I flipped the old guy the bird before I roared off. I kept the van at thirty-five all the way to the mortuary.

It was a long ride back.