Read Among the Living for Free Online

small stack of telephone books. His room smells of old paper and smoke. When he isn’t in the office, he puts away at least a pack a day.
    “I’ve been thinking about this gas leak. I called 911 and acted like I lived up on the hill, asked them when I could go home. She put me on hold for a minute, and then some guy comes on the line, smooth as butter. He assures me the neighborhood is still too dangerous, that the leak could explode with little provocation. He is calm, and when I try to ask questions, he just deflects them and talks about my safety, concern for my well-being. And the whole time, you know what I’m thinking?” He takes a breath and keeps going before I can get a word in. “I’m thinking that these chuckleheads need to spend a little more time being straight with us and a little less time making up a bunch of bullshit, ‘cause we both know there is no way a gas leak caused them to evacuate an entire neighborhood for two days. No way.”
    “Want me to go up there?” I’m thinking about how ridiculous I will look when I flash my press pass for the tiny newspaper I work for. Wonder how hard they will laugh when I bust out some hard-hitting questions like ‘What are you covering up?’
    “Nah, just call around, hit up some friends. Don’t you have a buddy who used to be a cop?”
    “He’s still a cop. Works for Bellevue, so he probably won’t know anything.”
    “I bet you can find out stuff. You’re good at that; hit up Google and see what kind of crazy rumors you can turn up.”
    “You’re the chief, err, chief.”
     
    * * *
     
    I’m back at my desk when my cell rings again. It’s Rita, but I ignore it and go back to scouring the web. Sure I can call on friends and old associates to see if I can get a lead, but Jim is right: nowadays all the action is on Google.
    The only problem is that reports are weird. A man claims he was chased into his house near Queary Park by a guy with red eyes and gray skin. He said he looked like a corpse and smelled worse. I discount it immediately; the neighborhood borders Fremont, and I know how those guys like to party. In fact, every year there is a naked parade through town that makes the conservatives nuts.
    I back my browser up a couple of pages so I can read that message board again. It’s devoted to sushi shops in Seattle, but the guy seems like a regular poster. The only problem is that I can’t find it now. Their message board must have gone down. I go to offline mode and grab the story out of my browser’s cache. Once it is on the screen, I hit print and grab the warm copy off my little desktop inkjet printer.
    “What is this?” Erin asks when I show her the copy.
    “Can you check that link? I’m having trouble finding it again.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “I mean it won’t come up. I did variations of the same search with no luck. I grabbed the old link from my history, but it gave me a 404 error.” 404 is the universal ‘screw you’ that web pages display when they don’t exist anymore.
    She spins around and stabs at her keyboard with lacquered nails that clatter across the keys like plastic dominoes falling on a card table.
    “Rita keeps calling me,” I say quietly. I don’t even know why I utter the words. Erin pauses but doesn’t turn around.
    “How is she?”
    “The usual. Delusional, drunk, probably on enough pills to choke a horse.”
    “Mike, you need to leave her alone. You divorced her years ago, but you pander to her needs every day, and you hate yourself for it. Don’t you want a normal life?” Same old conversation, same old Erin, and sadly … same old me.
    She isn’t the only one. I have heard it a hundred times from a hundred different people. Even the big guy on TV who dispenses advice would say the same, and still I know I can’t leave Rita alone. She needs me. She needed me then, before Andy, and she needs me now more than ever.
    Erin turns around and hands me the paper. “Nothing, dead link.” Her