The Ferryman Institute (15 page)

The words hung above the canyon. They wafted through the air, carried gently on the wind. Charlie faced the sun and, like Atlas before him, stood, shoulders hunched, the weight of the world upon them. Then, without another word, he fell backward onto the ground and resumed staring blankly at the darkening sky.

Charlie recognized the familiar
ting
of Cartwright setting his cup down. When he looked over, the man was delicately twirling his mustache between his fingers.

“My dearest friend,” he began slowly, “the empathy that resides in my heart for you is simply impossible to express in words. I value your companionship more than all the tea leaves that ever were and will ever come to be on this astounding planet of ours. To see you in such straits is excruciating.” Cartwright looked down at Charlie. “It appears that fate has given you an interesting lot in life, as it is wont to do. You traded certain death for eternal life, and it was granted to you when you agreed to the contract that now binds you. I fear it is a gift you cannot spurn so easily. However, I find it wide of the mark to also suggest that you don't feel human anymore. Physically, perhaps, but I would argue that in an emotional sense, you feel all too human.”

Charlie nearly laughed at that, but wasn't in the mood. Besides, he'd known Cartwright long enough to at least give him the benefit of the doubt. “And how exactly does that work?”

There was always a playfully deviant edge to Cartwright's smiles, like he knew something Charlie didn't, and so it was right then. “It's rather simple, actually: I believe you empathize too much,” he said. “You internalize your cases' suffering and make it your own. You treat them not as a form waiting to be completed, but rather as people with lives they are leaving, most unwillingly. It is that sentiment, my dear friend, that makes you more human than most. You asked me if I was tired of the death. I take it that thought has crossed your mind, then?”

A small gust of wind ruffled Charlie's hair. “Maybe.”

“I find that rather curious,” said Cartwright. “You of all people should understand that death in the human sense is only the first step to the next phase of being. The baptism for the afterlife, if you'll excuse my poor analogy.”

Charlie sat up. “But that doesn't make it any less sad, though, does it? It doesn't mean they still aren't leaving loved ones behind. What if they don't like their afterlife? Maybe they're too attached, too afraid to listen to us. What if they never even make it to the afterlife? What if we fail them? What then?”

The pronoun Charlie had used was
we
. The one he'd meant was
I
.

In the sun's wilting light, Cartwright's eyes neither shone nor twinkled. They regarded Charlie with an alien curiosity, and perhaps justifiably so. They were seeing a new side of this Ferryman after all—one that Charlie was sure Cartwright had suspected of existing, but had never met.

“I certainly agree with your assertion that the system is far from perfect. There exist too many gaps, too many holes for innocent men and women to fall through. But whether or not you actively believe in its policies, surely we can agree that mankind might not exist in its current state if not for the Ferryman Institute.
Who can say what life was like millennia ago, a world where the vengeful spirits of every man, woman, and child who'd passed on roamed the earth as wandering souls? If things hadn't changed, would humanity have ever reached the place it occupies today?

“We serve a necessary purpose, Charles. Perhaps, to your view, a necessary evil. I dare not impugn the purity of your feelings, for it is quite plain to see that you live with them to your detriment. When I look at you as you sit now, I feel as if I can almost see those doubts nipping at your heels like a pack of hellhounds. But part of me wonders if perhaps those hounds are fettered to you with chains of your own creation. You are not the turtle meant to hold the world on its shell, old friend.”

The wind whistled through the canyon while, off in the distance, thunderheads began to form. They mixed with the darkening sky, roiling thick and heavy with the promise of sound and fury.

“She had a six-month-old baby, Cartwright. Six months. She carried that baby longer in her womb than she did in her arms. How many special moments were taken away from her by that car accident? How about her child? Her husband? What about them?” He looked out beyond the canyon, watching as a bolt of lightning crashed to the earth. So far away, out amid the flat stretch of desert, out where it barely seemed real. “And what if things hadn't worked out with that assignment? I got lucky. I missed the ETD by at least a minute. She could have run off into the woods and not looked back and I'd have never been the wiser. No chance of getting to the afterlife. No chance to ever see her child again.”

Charlie ran his hands down his face. For all of the perks of being a Ferryman, he felt mentally exhausted. With his pride and thickheaded stubbornness worn to a nub, it was in that moment that Charlie finally broke down and told Cartwright the truth.

“I
am
tired of all the death. I've seen more people die in tragic
circumstances than I can count. On their wedding day. During childbirth. The day before their twelfth birthday. Even if you guaranteed me that every single one of them was going straight to the afterlife version of Disney World, it wouldn't take any of the sting out.”

“Such is the way of the world, I'm afraid,” Cartwright said softly, almost as if he were forced to say those words, but well aware they were no consolation.

From some dark alcove in Charlie's mind came a memory of one of his earliest assignments—specifically, the remark the young woman had made moments before stepping through her door to the afterlife. It was a line he never forgot. “
Time marches on while mothers weep, each one wondering why the world hasn't stopped to mourn
. Right? I don't know how other Ferrymen see things like that and are just so . . . accepting of it, you know? There they are, these people, these
assignments
, almost every single one scared or confused but universally vulnerable, and then there I am, the man who knows he is the only thing that can make their death mean something. And it scares the ever-living shit out of me.” A dour smirk propped up Charlie's lips. “Get it? Ever-living? Ha-ha?”

Cartwright sighed. “Through no lack of effort on my part, I shall ignore your last remark.” He poured himself a new cup of tea and took a long, drawn-out drink. “You're familiar with the story of the Ferryman Council?”

“Of course,” Charlie said. “I'd be shocked if there was an employee who hadn't heard it at least a dozen times.”

Just as mankind had its collection of creation myths—Adam and Eve, Gaia, Yggdrasill, and so on—the Institute had a collection all its own. They all revolved around Charon, the first Ferryman.

Despite what he'd told Cartwright, Charlie was a bit fuzzy on the finer points, but he remembered most of the salient details.
Something about Charon being an unequaled warrior in both strength and cunning who wished to live forever, which Charlie always thought made the guy seem like kind of a jerk. When Mr. Unequaled himself finally kicked the bucket, he goaded Death into a duel in an attempt to win immortality. An epic battle ensued, with mountains being sundered and rivers being cleaved in twain (as should be the case in any epic battle worth its salt), with neither side able to take the upper hand. However, since he'd been locked in conflict, Death had been temporarily unable to perform his day job. In order to return to his work, Death struck a deal with Charon—in exchange for a truce, he would grant Charon his coveted immortality, but Charon would then be responsible for guiding the souls of the dead to the afterlife—an undertaking spirits had otherwise been tasked with completing on their own. Of course, being the immortality-coveting jerk that he was, Charon agreed.

For many years, Charon worked alone until the day that Death sent him the soul of Virgil. Stuff happened—there was a long interlude at this point during which Charlie always zoned out, but it had something to do with the seven hundred trials of Virgil or something—until Charon and Virgil eventually befriended each other and together founded the Ferryman Institute. They then collected six more worthy souls, whose names escaped Charlie, formed the Ferryman Council, created a bunch of laws, fought a bunch of dragons (though he was probably mixing that up with another myth), and finally, after deciding the Ferryman Institute was a success and they were no longer needed, left this world for the great beyond as their reward. Or was it outer space? Charlie couldn't remember which.

Maybe he didn't remember quite as much of the whole thing as he'd originally thought.

“Do you happen to recall the last trial Charon asked of Virgil?” Cartwright asked.

Oddly enough, that was the one detail Charlie vaguely remembered. “Yeah. Charon tells Virgil that, in order to pass his final trial, he must convince Charon they are equals with a single sentence. Right?”

Cartwright nodded. “Do you remember Virgil's response?”

Charlie thought for a moment. “Uhhh . . . Always drink your Ovaltine?”

Cartwright sighed. “
I cannot, for I have no desire to be an equal, only a friend, and a fellowship is never equal, but always greater than the sum of its parts.
”

Cartwright hesitated for a moment, his gaze suddenly transfixed by the horizon. “It is those same words I give to you. I care little for the technicalities of our small Ferryman world, and I care even less for your record, only to the degree that I feel it demonstrates your concern for others. Regardless, your most important role to me is not as an equal, or a coworker, or a protégé, or any of that nonsense. You are my truest and dearest friend, Charles. If there's one thing you take away from today, I hope it's that. By all accounts, you are a remarkable Ferryman, but that does not mean you are required to be invincible. Though I'm afraid I cannot simply make your problems disappear, I sincerely hope that, having been taken into your confidence, I can provide an extra shoulder to carry your burdens.”

And just like that, Cartwright made Charlie feel like a complete jackass for never opening his damn mouth about his feelings. He was so worried about so many stupid things, when all the while he had a great man waiting in the wings to be called on for help. Though Charlie was sure he'd beat himself up over it later, Cartwright's words were the panacea he'd needed for quite some time.

They sat in silence, watching the storm as it seemed to slink away in the night.

“Do you think I could be having a midlife crisis?” Charlie finally asked. “Does that happen to Ferrymen?”

“Not that I'm aware of, though it does present quite an interesting question: When does a man who never dies reach the halfway point in his life?”

“Am I supposed to answer that?”

“Do you have an answer?”

“Wouldn't it be never?”

“Aha, one would think—but to that, I pose this: Does a man who never dies never age?”

Charlie said nothing for a moment. “When we have conversations like this, I think I can actually feel my brain liquefying in between my ears.”

Cartwright grinned playfully in response. “A nimble mind is an extraordinary gift. To be able to ponder the quandaries of life is to ponder oneself.”

With another heavy sigh, Charlie picked himself up. “I almost hate you sometimes. You're like one giant riddle.” He hastily brushed off some of the accumulated dirt that had gathered on his legs, arms, and clothes. “I'd like to apologize for being so . . . I don't know. Glum, I guess.”

Cartwright held up his hands. “I insist that you think nothing of it and, even more so, do not let apologizing cross your mind again. I merely hope that I have been able to mitigate even a fraction of your burdens.”

Charlie smiled earnestly for the first time since leaving the Ferryman Institute a week earlier. “You have . . . more than you could ever know. It's refreshing to be able to come here and just speak my mind.”

“I couldn't agree more, my good fellow. Having this sanctuary to ourselves is a remarkable blessing.” Cartwright performed his usual ritual of cleaning and packing away his tea accessories in his small suitcase, then folded both the table and chair he'd brought with him. “I must admit, I would never have anticipated that my day would involve no cliff diving of any kind, but it appears that is the way of it. I can only hope next week you may be more receptive to entertaining an easily amused gentleman such as myself.”

“I had no idea you found that even remotely entertaining.”

“I am full of surprises. Now, if I may, I'd like to offer a final thought for your consideration. I have not the words to voice it, I fear, so forgive me for borrowing once more from the tale of the Ferryman Council.” Cartwright cleared his throat. “
With his final trial finished, Virgil stood before Charon and said, ‘Fate hath delivered me unto thee, my virtues proven, my destiny now complete.' Yet Charon laughed. ‘No. Let not Fate assume the glory of thine triumphs nor the pain of thy defeats. Thou hast delivered thineself unto me and writ thine own destiny. The man who searches longest for the strings of fate often finds them, while the man who seeks them not knows himself to be free.'
”

The last ray of sunset broke through the bank of storm clouds and glinted off Charlie's Ferryman Key. “I'm normally daydreaming through that part, so if that's supposed to mean something to me . . .”

“It will,” Cartwright replied, “in time.” He bowed. “Until we meet again, my dear friend.”

Charlie saluted back. “Take it easy, Cartwright.”

Keys in hand, they each opened a Ferryman Door and vanished into the fading light of the evening sky.

It was the last time they would ever meet in the desert.