Managing Death Read Free Page A

bother returning? I look around for Lissa. Nowhere. No one meets my gaze.
    ‘OK,’ I mumble. If that’s how everyone is going to play it … I mean, I haven’t come to work drunk in over a week.
    I amble over towards the coffee machine in the kitchen. The tiny room empties out the moment I walk in. I don’t hurry making my coffee, then stroll into my office, taking long, loud sips as I go.
    ‘Nice to see you’ve made it,’ Tim says. Tim’s trying so hard to hold it all together. I used to be able to tell, with a glance, what he was thinking. Now, sometimes I can’t even meet his eyes. He’s developed movements, tics and gestures, which are wholly unfamiliar to me. He’s sitting on my desk – his bum next to the big black bakelite phone – carefully avoiding the throne of Death. I understand why. It exerts a pull. I’m sure he feels it, too. How it does it is beyond me, it shouldn’t. It’s not particularly imposing, merely an old black wooden chair. There are thirteen of these in the world, made for each member of the Orcus. Just a chair and yet so much more. I cannot stand in here without feeling the scratching presence of it. I know I could lose myself in it, that I’m perhaps losing myself already. Sometimes I wonder if that wouldn’t be so bad. Then I wonder if that’s what the throne wants me to wonder. If a chair can really
want
anything.
    In one hand, Tim’s clutching the briefing notes that I should have read about three weeks ago.
    ‘Yeah, isn’t your office across the way?’ I ask.
    Tim folds his arms, says nothing.
    ‘So who’s stealing paperclips this week?’ I force a grin. Honestly, that
had
been a major issue last month. Paperclips and three reams of A4.
    The door bangs shut behind me. I jerk my head around, and Lissa’s standing there, her arms folded, too. Ambushed!
    ‘What the hell is this? Look, those Post-it notes on my desk are all accounted for.’
    She’s not smiling. Neither is Tim. Christ, this is some sort of intervention.
    ‘Do you know what today is?’ she asks.
    ‘The 20th of December.’ Sure, I have to look at my desk calendar for that.
    Tim snorts. Pulls the bookmark out of the briefing notes. A bookmark whose movements have been somewhat fabricated – damn, I thought he’d swallowed that one. He slaps the notes. ‘If you had actually read these, you’d have an idea, you’d probably even be prepared.’
    ‘Look, I’ve got work to do. The Death Moot’s on the 28th and I –’
    ‘Absolutely. What do you need to do?’
    I shrug.
    In a little over a week the Orcus, the thirteen Regional Managers that make up Mortmax Industries, will be meeting in Brisbane for the biannual Death Moot. With just two months in the job, I’m expected to organise what my predecessor Mr D once described as a meeting of the most bloodthirsty, devious and backstabbing bunch of bastards on the planet.
    ‘You’ve got no fucking idea, have you?’ Tim says.
    Lissa touches my arm. ‘Steven, we’re worried about you.’
    Tim doesn’t move. His eyes are hard. I can’t remember seeing him so pissed off. ‘Mate, I like to have a drink as much as anyone, but I have responsibilities.And you do, too. To this company, to your staff and your shareholders, and to your region. You’re an RM. You’re one of the Orcus!’
    ‘I know, I know,’ I say. How the hell did I ever become one of the Orcus? Me being RM was just a massive mistake, a joke played out by the universe. I’d fought for this role, only because I’d had no choice. Death for me, and death for my few remaining friends and family – or fight and live. I’m about to mention my call to Meredith when Tim laughs humourlessly. My cheeks burn.
    ‘Then start acting like it,’ he says.
    I walk past him, drop into my throne. For a moment, there is no argument. Lissa and Tim fade away. It’s just the throne and me. The throne deepens and broadens my senses, brings the living/dying world even closer to the fore. In this