The Resurrection Man
By Rick Clarke
The dead girl sprang to life - literally.
Her eyes popped open, her body uncoiled and she almost jumped to her feet.
Everyone was overwhelmed, there was a lot of crying and shouting. Even the ‘once dead’ girl was energetic enough to do a round of hugs with her brothers, sisters, parents, cousins and the odd friend squeezed in for good measure.
Usually, attempted resurrections tended to be small somber family affairs, but this girl had proved to be genuinely popular, and news of a potential resurrection had certainly drawn a crowd. Most had been highly sceptical, of course, but they were a cheerful bunch and more than chuffed to see their friend spring back to life. It was a pleasure to watch. Yet, the resurrection man who had brought her back to life, stood back a little. He was waiting.
He'd seen this all before, and was wondering whether he should ask for his remuneration now and then make a quick exit. Better Too Soon Than Too Late was his company motto, it was painted in gold letters on the side of his two stroke 1963 Suzuki van, and in his personal experience this applied to getting paid as well. Resurrections were more of an art form than a science, and ‘surprises’ were not uncommon.
More often than not, these surprises occurred once the recently dead man or woman clapped their eyes on him. They always recognised him, and it was always a little unpleasant. That was the last thing he wanted to happen just as her parents were pulling out a cheque book. So, all in all, probably best to collect his fee and then discreetly slip away.
*
With all the people in the room, it took a good few minutes before the recently dead girl saw him. When she did, the girl's mood had instantly darkened and the atmosphere in the room changed. She clearly recognised him and she was very, very far from happy. To be fair, this was what usually happened.
Her father, who was just about to scratch an inky signature onto a cheque from an old private bank, appeared a little confused. Helpfully, he went over to his daughter and gave her a little push towards the man who had just saved her life. But the girl pushed back, revolted by the sight of the resurrection man.
‘It's okay’, said the resurrection man a little annoyed.
The girl stared at him with something akin to incandescent rage, or was it chronic constipation? From his earlier resurrection cases the he had found both scenarios to be good guesses. Whatever it was, the jovial mood of the party had certainly dampened, and as the father made one more attempt to move his daughter forward, she turned and very deliberately slapped him on the face. This definitely killed the mood. The resurrection man looked at the half completed cheque on the table and made a mental note to take down payments from now on.
‘This is all perfectly normal folks’ said the resurrection man to an increasingly agitated crowd. ‘Dying has always been a bit of shocker to the system’.
A few unpleasant looks were exchanged around room.
Damn it, he thought to himself, and resigned himself to the notion that he was probably about to lose this pay cheque. Bending down he pulled a small pouch of rolling tobacco from the inside of his right boot and took out a thin hand rolled cigarette he’d prepared earlier. Leaning against the wall in the corner of the room, he lit it up and blew out some smoke. It calmed his nerves, but it wasn't the sort of behaviour that impressed a crowd.
In the key areas of his work ‘people skills’ were not a requirement. This was not to say that he did not have numerous talents, many of them unnatural, but a Carrie Grant smile and a lawyer's silver tongue were not among them.
Seeing eyes upon him, he took in a few lungfuls of smoke, quashed the remains of the cigarette out in a nearby plant pot and pushed himself of the wall to address the expectant masses.
To his credit he made an effort to explain the complex relationship between the human soul and its inevitable death. The talk did not go well, and in retrospect he wondered whether his attempt to explaining the Second Law of Thermodynamics in context with the general theory of the Arrow of TIme was entirely helpful. But a resurrection man’s work was a complicated business.
The real problem was that, in general terms, the dead considered someone touching their soul as something of an unforgivable sin. So, he started again with the plain obvious.
‘She should be disgusted by me ’
*
He went on.
‘The human soul is a timid beast. I’ve just put my grubby little mitts all over your girl’s soul and yanked it back up the rectum of the afterlife. It's fundamentally wrong. And now, from a spiritual standpoint, she is reacting to me as if I were a poison’.
With probably a little too much honestly, he added, ‘Most people would have vomited already’.
‘Why didn't you mention any of this before?’ said the mother in a mousey voice.
‘Would it have made a difference?’
The mother looked at her daughter, full of rage, full of life.
‘No. I don't think so. I don't know. Maybe.’
Then it was the resurrected girl’s turn to speak.
It did not come easily and as she struggled to formulate her anger into mere words, the resurrection man contemplated the best way to escape through a nearby window should things get hairy.
She was physically trembling with revulsion being so close to the man who had laid his hands upon her soul.
‘I understand what you've done’, she said finally, ‘you have saved my life’.
‘I understand this in my head, but in my heart, I hate you’. She spoke slowly, and as a matter of fact, rather than in a gush of emotion.
‘You saved me’ she said again, ‘but if you were dying, I would not try to save you’.
*
Somehow words spoken by a recently dead person always seemed to bear more gravitas than they really should. As if death somehow augmented wisdom rather than atrophy. But whichever way the resurrection man looked at it, this was not going well.
Some of her friends were moving closer, forming a protective circle around the girl, and her parents looked worried.
‘Fabulous’ he said in a loud, slightly ticked off voice.
Picking out the remnants of his cigarette from the nearby plant pot, he flicked his lighter, puffed the roll up into life, and walked away.
‘No’, the girl called out, ‘Don't go’. And she took some steps towards him.
Forcing back an urge to scream and vomit at the same time, she held out her hand for the resurrection man to shake. It was all she could muster.
Curious, the resurrection man stopped and turned. Looking directly at the girl, he fixed her with a look that would have turned ghosts to ice. Her previously rosey cheeks drained of colour and her circle of friends broke away like waves upon a rock. But she remained firm, her hand outstretched.
‘Thank. You.’ she said through gritted teeth.
The resurrection man appeared to grow taller and less opaque as he walked toward her, until finally, he was just one arm’s length away. Maintaining his gaze , he raised his arm and took her fingers in his hand.
She was trembling. For a second he thought she was going to faint.
‘Thank you for saving my life...I'm sorry about before.’
A sickly green tinge was starting to leak into her ashen face, but the resurrection man held onto her fingers. Quite unexpectedly, a pleasant smile crept its way onto the once dead girl's face, the curled edges of her lips pushing away the previous revulsion and anger.
She was a pretty girl when she smiled, even with the green tinge.
‘We'll, well…’ said the resurrection man almost to himself. ‘This is quite a first.’
He released her fingers and let her hand fall away. Instantly, as if a warm breeze of summer had blown through the room, some resemblance of health returned her sickly face.
‘You have considerable strength of spirit Lucy Chambers. I'm sure you're going to be just fine.’
He reached into his inside pocket and pulled out an old copper Victorian Penny. He flicked it and it span in the air, but instead of falling, it simply hung in the air spinning.
‘Take it’, he said to the girl.
There was a new tone in his voice of hope and interest.
She reached out and the coin fell flat into her palm. With that, the resurrection man took one step back.
‘Is the coin magic?’, the girl said shyly, half looking at the floor.
‘No. Not at all.’
He made the slightest of bows to the girl, span on the heels of his leather boots, and walked away.
‘It's just a souvenir’, he called over his shoulder, ‘something to remind you of your extraordinary courage’.
‘That's all the magic I need’, she replied with a broad smile
‘Yes it is’, he whispered into the wind as he walked out of the door and into the world.
*
