[wearing]
In the last couple of weeks Olle Lundqvist had given himself, there was still work to do. There were still properties that needed to be sold or foreclosed, there were still documents to sign and official leases to forfeit. There was still a whole house to pack up and he was going to have to do most of it on his own; the removalists he’d hired had bailed at the last minute. They’d been hired on a whim, the first listing in a google search and they appeared to be… well, no good. When they bailed he did a better search and found a professional company who could come help him, but they were fully booked until two weeks from then.
That afternoon, he’d sent his wife, Lydia, and son, Thomas, to the airport. The last he’d heard from Lydia their flight had been delayed. He was in the front room packing up the entertainment system when the wash of headlights filled the room, a car having rounded the corner to park on the curb. Curiously, he peered out the curtains. Lydia’s voice drifted through the open window; she was thanking the cab driver for removing their bags from the boot. Thomas ran up the porch and came thundering through the front door.
“Daddy!” he shouted, flinging himself at Olle as if they’d not seen each other for weeks, rather than mere hours.
“Thomas! What are you…”
Next, Lydia came breezing through the door, her hair mussed and her features drawn, tired. She shook her head.
“The flight was cancelled. Something to do with a bird and the engine and well, I came home. Don’t give me that look…” she said. Olle was disapproving. He’d wanted to suggest that she should have stayed, should have booked a different flight. “There were no more flights until tomorrow and I wasn’t sleeping overnight on those uncomfortable chairs, Olle. And I wasn’t going to take Thomas on a plane like that. He’d be insufferable,” she said, her features softening as she turned her steady gaze upon their son.
“What’s… what’s insufrable?” he asked, curious. Olle laughed. How could he not?
“It’s you, son, if you’ve had no sleep. And it’s late,” he said, putting his boy back down. “Go on up and put the plug in the tub. Bath then bed, mister…”
“Will you read to me?”
“Yes. But only if you’re smelling of soap and toothpaste,” Olle said. Thomas grinned and thundered up the stairs. Olle slipped his arm around Lydia’s waste and pressed a kiss to her lips. “I’m sorry you had a bad day. You’ll go tomorrow though, yes?” he asked, eyes wide and pleading. Lydia sighed.
“Yes, but I don’t see why you won’t let me stick around and help…” she said, stepping away from her husband to peel off her jacket and wander up the stairs after her son.
Truth was, Olle was terrified. He’d been optimistic at first. He’d been dubious there was anything to these rumours about zombies and vampires and things that went bump in the night. That was until he’d seen one of his colleagues shredded by some monster not too far from Swansdale. They’d been assessing a house up for sale, the first time Olle had visited that neighbourhood in weeks, and they’d been cornered by a hulking, hefty beast made of rotting flesh and what seemed to be shadows. Quinn hadn’t stood a chance and before Olle could even think of how to help, Quinn’s head had been bitten clean off.
There was no way Olle was going to allow his wife and son to live in this city a moment longer than necessary. He still had nightmares.
After he’d read Thomas his bedtime story, Olle pulled on a tie and his jacket. He had to go out to meet a man about the sale of a nightclub; it had closed down recently, but the space was still usable in the right hands. It was in the middle of the most recent zombie outbreak, but he didn’t tell Lydia this. For all she knew, he was going out to meet his boss on some last-minute errands, nowhere near the danger.
At half past nine in the evening, Olle Lundqvist stepped into the empty club, the keys heavy in his hands and the interested businessman behind him.
“As you’re probably aware, plenty of thrill-seekers have flooded the city lately. It’s a quiet part of town, for now, but in the right hands this place could become something great,” Olle said with a broad smile. He was playing to the other man’s ego, hoping against all hope for a sale so that another tick could be applied to his long list of things to do.
“It could be a… a—” he stopped. A prickling cold caused the hairs of his neck to stand on end, as if death itself had just passed its hand over his shoulders. And then…
Nothing.
The businessman—Stan Collins—would witness one of the strangest things in his life thus far. One second the tall estate agent was oozing charm and saying pretty things and the next, his face was contorted with pain and bewilderment. Such a large man, and he was brought to his knees by nothing, nothing that could Stan could see, anyway. The Nordic features of the clearly part Swedish man morphed into something and someone completely different, if only for a few brief seconds. Later, Stan would blame it on the poor lighting. Deep down, however, he would admit that it seemed as if there was someone else inside of Olle Lundqvist, bursting to get out. Someone with a different face – a tanned face, with kind eyes and dark facial hair.
Olle Lundqvist had coughed and hacked until he was pulling air into his lungs and when he’d looked up, he seemed different.
He clearly did not recognise Stan, nor the nightclub. There were no more pretty words uttered in that booming, confident voice. There was confusion, and instead he spoke Italian. That, too, Stan would tell himself he’d got wrong. Olle had never been Swedish, even with a name like that. He’d always been Italian. Of course he had!
Stan had followed Olle out onto the street; Olle apologised in broken English then wandered off, leaving Stan bewildered on the sidewalk.
Suffice to say, Olle Lundqvist made no sales that night.
Though it was not Olle Lundqvist who ran into the middle of town, confused and starving. It was Cosimo Alessi, reborn, who could not remember how he had died. Cosimo Alessi who could barely think, given the screams of the man whose body he had suddenly, and without warning, inhabited.
