The Neverloving Dead (Haunted Hearts)

CHAPTER 3

RULE 2: NEEDS MUST

PATRICK

L ondon was wretched.

Patrick had thought it often, but he felt it even more on nights like this: futile ones. Nights where the cost of scouring the streets for meals was more than he’d gain if he found one. One would think it easy on a weekend – a sprawling city with sex everywhere. He was disciplined, invisible to his prey, could melt through walls and it was still summer, just, so he often didn’t even face the bother of nightclothes. He could feed and leave without anyone knowing – provided he controlled himself, provided he felt nothing, provided they didn’t wake...

Provided, provided, provided.

The reality was there were an inordinate number of obstacles to finding a suitable meal. It was an incessant balancing act. He needed the more potent energy of the living but, to consume it, he had to stay solid – which he couldn’t do if there were too many people or emotions. If not for that, he could simply drift, solid but invisible, into one of the city’s many clubs and brothels and lick up all the semen he desired: from floors, sofas, toilet walls. He’d lose nothing and no one would be traumatised. The sperm wouldn’t be as energy-rich as at climax but, if he was quick enough, there’d be something still left in it. Some profit.

One day, perhaps he could. One day, when he was strong enough, he might even be able to join in. Feel and taste and–

After what had happened the last time he’d let himself get carried away with that thought, he cut it off.

The truth was, this was the limit of his strength right now: tracking from room to room, hoping for meals like the one he’d had in Elephant and Castle that time; but really, just looking for men who either lived alone or slept alone.

As if those were the sole requirements, he thought bitterly. Even when he found lone sleepers, they had to be on their backs, since he’d have to be solid and non-solid to fellate someone through a mattress. They should be mid-forties at most, since men had less nocturnal emissions with age and were more likely to wake. It couldn’t be someone he’d fed from recently, as that might weaken them . Thinner bodies were usually easier to access than rounder ones, but more likely to be covered. Men who’d drunk too much alcohol often wouldn’t come. And some fellows did wear nightclothes regardless of weather, many of which were difficult to remove.

All that, and he only had a few hours each night. And he mustn’t get carried away or lose focus, or get excited or hopeless or hope ful , or depressed at how awful his purpose was, or enraged at his bloody lot, since any of that would deplete his energy.

The whole thing was an exercise in frustration.

The Welsh ghost hadn’t grasped that at all. Patrick didn’t want to live this way. He wished he could have the men’s permission. That was the whole reason he was doing this: to be with the living. Living himself.

Sort of.

He pushed it all away, irritated he was still letting it get to him.

He’d watched several men pleasure one another this evening, dreaming of the joys he’d eventually have. His patience had gained him no more than the odd drop. Men almost always cleaned up afterwards, or came into each other, or into women, or into condoms that killed whatever life had been spilled into them.

He’d crept from building to building, trying a few men from whom he’d fed in the past year: two had been out, three had moved, leaving unsuitable candidates in their place, another three had been with someone. Four had been masturbating – one in front of a sex film, two in newfangled video calls, one in the bathroom in front of a mirror. This last had provided the largest prize of Patrick’s evening: a penny-sized glob, sucked from the plughole.

It was early morning now, a little after four. Moving out of the best time for men to be having the kinds of dreams that helped him. He could ‘assist’ them to begin one of course, but that would mean a longer period of solidity and more energy spent. He’d lost too much already tonight. What he needed was a snack – something guaranteed – so he would at least break even.

Which was why he was here, at the London Sperm Bank.

It had been more than a month since he’d been anywhere near Elephant and Castle, mostly because he’d been avoiding the Welshman. He wasn’t overjoyed to be here now. That encounter had set his plans back so significantly, he still hadn’t fully recovered. On the other hand, the ghost’s flat, where he’d seemed settled, was nearly a mile south of here and the majority of location-fixed ghosts couldn’t travel more than about two hundred metres from their ‘homes’.

Besides which, the Welshman had probably enraged himself to death by now, he thought as he crossed St Thomas Street, away from the thin rumble of early morning traffic back on the main road. He’d seen vengeance fixations countless times over the years, and they always ended in either madness or becoming fatally drained. The latter seemed likely, given it had nearly happened when Patrick had been there.

He tried not to feel anything about it. The fact was, he’d taken some of the ghost’s energy too, when he’d let him run through him. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t intended to. The ghost had been young and naive compared to Patrick, and Patrick had gained from him, then left him alone in his flat. To die, probably.

He might not be religious anymore, but he’d never wanted to become a monster.

He stopped for a moment, looking up at the wall of red brick, glass and steel, wondering if that was what limbo was slowly making him into – a monster. Concerned only with his own needs. His body. His longing to feel something. No matter the cost.

Had the Welshman inadvertently got it right when he’d asked if that was what Patrick was?

He bowed his head, ignoring the front steps, floating further along the street to a spot closer to where he knew the samples were stored. Sperm banks weren’t ideal. They meant yet more stealing from others, rather than mere scavenging; and practically, they required a lot of solidifying, de-solidifying and re-solidifying to access, all of which cost energy. And the gains would be poor: as with floors and plugholes, without the powerful rush of emotion and sensation that accompanied ejaculation, they were just snacks.

Needs must when the devil drives , he thought. There was no greater need than life.

All the same, he’d consume no more than twenty samples, he decided, drifting uneasily through the bricks, emerging in a lino-floored corridor, heading for the storage facilities. Twenty should offset the difficulties getting in and ensure he didn’t end the night in deficit. Twenty wasn’t greedy, or demonic or monstrous.

He found the room easily – a spacious L-shaped laboratory lined with glass-fronted fridges, where thousands of ‘straws’ of semen were serried in various stages of thawing. He felt a wriggle of guilt at the idea that every one of them was meant for new life and here he was, trying to return from the dead. His would still be a ‘new’ life, he reminded himself, as he did every time. What was new life if not a new body in a new time?

Tonight, the guilt felt sharper. Tinged and tangled with fears about monstrousness and leaving others to die.

He was just overthinking again, he told himself sternly: letting the Welshman’s ridiculous judgements in, when he should be concentrating on his task. Pushing his form into solidity, he picked up the scissors he’d need for opening straws and headed for the more private fridges around the corner, away from the main door. He just had to get this done and leave before he talked himself out of it. He couldn’t lose focus over another irrelevant moral dilemma. Look where his morality had got him last time – look what it had cost.

He rounded the corner. And stopped.

Someone was here.

Which had never happened at this time in the morning.

The man didn’t look up, but he didn’t seem to be a cleaner or a lab technician. There was no mop. No overalls.

It wasn’t... Patrick squinted, throat tightening strangely. It couldn’t be, not here. His mind was playing tricks because he’d just been thinking about the man. The figure dimmed a little, flickering in and out of transparency, staring at the fridges. A ghost, most certainly. With blond hair, bright, hot energy and a Hawaiian shirt.

Angry.

But of course it was him, Patrick thought suddenly. How could he ever have doubted it?

Who else would be here, in this part of London, ruining his plans?

The Welshman roared. Not at Patrick – he hadn’t registered Patrick’s presence. At the fridge. As his body filled in a little, anger making it less see-through, he lunged at the handle, yanking hard, face straining as he almost succeeded in dragging it open. A few seconds later, his features faded, his fist slipped through the handle and he staggered into a small table containing pens, scissors and a computer, barely rattling it as he lost solidity again.

Patrick couldn’t move. In part, he didn’t want the ghost’s attention, in case he charged at him again and cost him more . The other part was harder to define. Truthfully, he’d expected him to be dead by now and was relieved he wasn’t. He’d left him in a gloomy hinterland, barely holding himself together, and now here he was, out and about, looking for sperm as if he’d actually listened to Patrick.

More than that though, he wanted to watch him.

Because he’d looked so real the last time, he told himself. Because in that first instant, Patrick had thought he actually was a living person. Even now, quivering in and out of form, Patrick could almost believe it...

“I’ll fucking find you!” the ghost shouted inexplicably, face reddening as if he still had blood to darken it. It was just a memory. An echo of real life played out on his skin. The Welshman had less of a body than Patrick.

He’d have even less of one in a minute.

Again, Patrick’s throat tightened: a physical memory he’d never quite been able to shake, of when he’d been hanged. Of life vanishing.

His future. Gone. Derailed.

Solid again, the ghost reached for the handle. Two, three seconds passed this time before his hand fell through. He staggered again, regathered himself, went to roar. He was going to kill himself.

The noose tightened. “Let me help.”

The ghost spun to face him, eyes widening. As before, they were black as bullets. Patrick didn’t know what colour they were meant to be – it had been too dark to see last time. The Welshman’s features clouded. “You.” He couldn’t have sounded more contemptuous. “I thought you said you’d stay away.”

Patrick squashed a flare of pain. Disdain didn’t matter, did it? The ghost was an interloper in limbo – he had no idea what it was like to have spent two centuries here, alone. He’d never had to think about what he would and wouldn’t do to keep his humanity, faced with an eternity of nothing. Patrick moved carefully, already planning his route through the wall if the other ghost attacked. “I didn’t promise to vacate the entire Borough of Southwark.” He smiled, probably more stiffly than he'd intended. “And I thought you didn’t agree with taking men’s sperm.”

The Welshman glared, as if he thought Patrick a giant hypocrite. “What?”

“You realise you’re in a sperm bank, yes?”

“A what bank?” The ghost looked around. “I thought it was a library, what with all the fridges full of jizz and the sign outside that says ‘London Sperm Bank’. I’m not a bloody idiot. I’ve lived round here the last fifteen years. And I don’t need an incubus’ help.” His outline strengthened a little, then faded again. Apparently, even Patrick didn’t make him angry enough.

The ghost was now only about ten feet away. From here, he looked far worse. Whenever his form dropped, Patrick could count individual vials through his chest. The eyes were brown, he could see now, but only in flashes. “You’re draining yourself.”

The man rubbed his throat then huffed. “Cracking, well, you’d know all about draining people. Run out of unconscious victims, have you?” His whole outline fractured, reassembling. Patrick had seen the symptoms before. It wouldn’t be long before the ghost went onwards after all. Really, it was astounding he’d lasted this long, given how emotional he was.

Again, the thought was oddly discouraging. Patrick couldn’t see why. Moving on was better than being here and anyway, as handsome and brightly burning as the man was, he had no discipline. He was a walking jeopardy. If he was down to fuelling his presence with bursts of rage, he wouldn’t keep his mind. He would spiral into madness, like every ghost Patrick had seen who’d failed to let go. In limbo, no one ever got their minds back.

“You don’t have to stay, you know,” Patrick tried. “You can give up.”

He’d meant it kindly, but the ghost riled again, solidifying surprisingly fast. Patrick’s hopes sank – not out of fear of attack, but because it now struck him that the Welshman was precisely the sort that stayed and went mad. Stubborn. Patrick had felt it the first time they’d met.

“I’ll find a way,” the ghost hissed. He roared again, grasping for the handle, tugging hard.

Patrick knew he didn’t mean a way to open this fridge. “A way to do what?”

The fridge door flew open. The man lost his solidity so fast, Patrick thought he might vanish from existence then and there. The breeze blew several parts him loose, dragging colour like rags behind him. The ghost closed his eyes, concentrating, apparently – gritting his teeth. The rags grew longer. An entire arm disappeared, losing all shape.

Patrick didn’t move. He had no idea what to do. How to help. Whether to. He could say something, he supposed – remind the ghost he’d wanted to stay for something. Or he could stay silent. He did seem to annoy him every time he spoke and besides, the man was clearly suffering in limbo. Naturally he was. It was abominable here. Nobody knew that better than Patrick. Again, it was better that the man didn’t stay.

So Patrick didn’t say anything.

Didn’t save him.

One of the man’s knees disappeared behind him. It was like watching a beautiful painting melt. Patrick felt a moment of envy. The fact the ghost could leave...

The man growled, reaching his remaining hand towards the fridge, frowning hard. Trying to summon his anger again, by the looks of him.

If he did, it would be his last act.

It was extraordinary, actually, that he was still going: still trying, still here. Ghosts usually died faster than this.

The seconds ticked. The spirit’s hand swiped through the metal shelves, fingers disintegrating. Arm fading. Eyes closing. Re-forming. Hand reaching again.

Patrick watched, noose tightening in increments. All he could see was the man he’d killed, dying all over again. All his bright energy unravelling. Whilst he, Patrick, looked on. It was dreadful.

It isn’t him , he thought. Saving this ghost wouldn’t change what he’d already done. It wouldn’t change anything that had already happened.

The Hawaiian shirt began bleeding colour everywhere.

And still the ghost reached for the fridge, hand reappearing. Swiping. Fading.

Almost against his will, Patrick surged forwards, still solid, holding the scissors more firmly as he reached into the fridge and plucked out a straw. In less than a second, he’d cut the tip from it, put it to his mouth and sucked the semen in: not the technique staff here used, but it had always worked for him. Although usually he swallowed.

He turned, looking at the Welshman – at his face swimming in and out of view. Unlike the man Patrick had killed, this ghost didn’t want to leave. He was trying even now, with every last wisp of his being, to stay.

Patrick might think him a fool, but he wouldn’t watch another man die. And perhaps that was monstrous of him, he thought: keeping the ghost here, in the worst of all possible worlds, purely to avoid his own discomfort. His guilt.

Gingerly, he spat at the Welshman’s face – aiming for his mouth. He’d always been dreadful at spitting, believing it uncouth, but what choice was there? If he got too close, his solid form would drain the ghost’s last remnants of energy; and if he dropped his solidity, the straw would slip from his hand and the sperm would fall through the bottom of his mouth onto the floor.

Instead, it sprayed through the back of the ghost’s head, most of it landing on the computer screen, dribbling down it like flicked cream.

Concern intensifying, Patrick did it again. If even the most meagre residue stuck, if the man managed to make himself angry enough for just a second...

The face slid briefly into focus, blurring away almost as fast. For just a moment, Patrick wanted to catch it. As if he wanted the ghost to stay for other reasons too. To keep seeing his bright energy. So opposite to his own.

Or something like that.

He pushed the thought away, taking a third straw from the fridge. “You know you’re going about this all wrong,” he chided. And of course he didn’t want the Welshman to stay – that was just his morals, confusing everything again. “If you were trying to gain physicality, it would take an eternity doing it this way. This is idiotic.”

It hadn’t sounded convincing. Half-insults wouldn’t do. He had to make the chap furious...

The ghost’s energy just drifted about, like it was straining to leave.

“ You’re an idiot,” he corrected himself, cutting open the straw. “Ghosts need strength to drink sperm or blood in the first place. You’re too weak.”

Another long thread unravelled.

“Weak of character,” Patrick clarified, something close to panic beginning to rise inside him. It was absurd. It didn’t matter if the ghost died, he told himself again. Guilt was no reason to save him. Morally, it was better that he left instead of staying here and going mad. “You don’t have what it takes to stay,” he went on, “to feed from the living. To be an incubus. Like me. Do you remember? How I sucked, no, how I molested your–” Blast, what was the man’s name again? “–your ‘Stuart’, while he was unconsci–”

“You fucking monster!” the ghost hissed. Somehow. His features swam back into focus: reddened, teeth gritted in anger, eyes wide.

Patrick sucked hard at the sperm then spat, pressing down an unexpected sear of agony at the Welshman’s choice of word. Monster.

Again.

Most of the sample flew through. One globule, about the size of Patrick’s smallest fingernail, landed in the ghost’s gullet. Stuck there.

The ghost closed his eyes again.

Patrick waited, cutting open another straw as he watched. Sucking it up. This one he swallowed for himself. He could feel some kind of ache building. It was ridiculous. It had just been a word.

The next one he swallowed too, eyes on the ghost.

Was that the reason he’d saved him – to feel less monstrous?

One... two... three of the ribbons tied around the man instead of floating in the air. He was mending. Surviving. Shame crawled up Patrick’s spine. He picked out another straw, snipping and focusing. He mustn’t get drawn in. It was bad for discipline.

“He’s gonna kill again. My murd’rer.” The voice was a slurred whisper.

“Your...?” Had he said murderer ?

There’d been no anger in the voice. Patrick felt almost as if he was seeing the man as he had been. Before death.

Actually alive.

He looked at him. Harder.

Was he saying he’d been murdered? By someone who was going to kill again ? Surely he didn’t mean a serial murderer?

Was the Welshman here not for himself, but to save others?

The straw dangled from his fingertips, undrunk.

Or was Patrick simply reading into the matter, because his morals liked to have something to do and he wanted to believe the man was good? To justify saving him. The man had probably been in a London gang. He was most likely talking about reprisals. Retaliation. Warfare.

On the other hand, he had heard about ghosts being linked to their killers before...

“I need to go home,” the Welshman rasped. He was almost invisible. If Patrick took him outside, he’d blow away.

“Do you mean to your flat, or onwards ?” He drew in another mouthful, trying to look as if he didn’t care either way. He didn’t care, he reminded himself.

The eyes fluttered open, expression weak but annoyed. “The flat. I vowed to stop him, you know.”

Patrick raised his eyebrows doubtfully, then leaned forwards and kissed him.

The man instantly became solid. Livid.

Patrick forced the goo into his mouth, getting almost the whole straw’s-worth into him this time, then broke off.

The Welshman was the picture of wrath.

“Stay calm and absorb it,” Patrick told him, backing off anyway since the man already seemed to be losing his solidity. “It’s that or break your vow.”

The fellow glared, as if Patrick had now confirmed he was, indeed, both a molester and a monster. After a few seconds, his outline began to soften, though he didn’t appear to be disintegrating – he’d gained enough energy to keep him here.

Patrick looked away, the ache dragging through him, as if it had grown weight. He’d kissed the man to save him. He knew that, even if the other ghost didn’t. The Welshman simply didn’t understand what was necessary here, if one wanted to achieve anything . One had to make sacrifices. Follow plans. Go about things impassively, without constantly exciting oneself to the point of collapse.

Morosely, keeping his distance, he set himself to licking up bits of spat-out semen from around the room, determined not to waste any of it. By the time he’d cleaned the place, the ghost’s energy had settled. Not fully, but enough. Patrick just had to hope he’d got the balance right: that he’d given the chap more in semen than he’d taken with the kiss.

Binning the straws, he closed the fridge and scooped the spirit up, making his decision as he glided back through shadows and walls. The man was a danger to him: that was clear. Aside from the fact he clearly loathed Patrick, he’d wrecked his plans both times they’d met. Those plans weren’t pastimes. They were Patrick’s sole route out of limbo.

That said, Patrick wasn’t a monster, whatever the other man thought. Nor would he let himself become one. If the ghost did have a killer to stop – if he was prepared to go to these lengths to do so, the same lengths as Patrick did so that he could leave limbo...

Then shouldn’t Patrick find out more? See if he could help him achieve it?

Really, he thought, how else could he be rid of the man?

Which he did want.

Obviously.