The young woman was the spitting image of the woman Garrit had raped. His lips started unconsciously quivering. Suppressing all his thoughts and reactions, he keenly observed his supervisor introduce the young visitor.
His supervisor was a woman in her mid forties. The shoes were large blocky British country woman's shoes. A bad curl job made the supervisor look like stepped out of a downpour. Large brimmed glasses suggested maximum visibility and minimum sex appeal.
The young visitor on the other hand was a red head. The nose, the eyes, the mouth, the body shape, everything was the spitting image of the young woman that Garrit had raped three years ago. The difference was that his rape victim had a summer like and bubbly appearance.
The young visitor had straight red hair. Gel put the hair into firm place and gave her a sleek look. The black eye mascara and dark red lipstick outline painted her as a goth punk. A leather spike collar around her neck was intimidating. The black leather jacket was thin, smooth and made a rubbing sound with all her movements. Her fingers were covered with rings that held druid symbols. The piercing through the middle of her nose septum scared him the most.
The situation was impossible, because he had raped the woman, when she was already dead. The woman had been lying dead on the morgue table. He had watched her get cremated. He had visited the anniversary of her death every year. There must be a weird trick. Perhaps, bodies got confused and a weird kind of resurrection after the fact. He felt the shakes crawling across his body. He had to weight each of his words on a gold scale to avoid giving up his rape secret.
"Garrit, this lovely lady is Grenada. You surely remember the Jane Doe from three years ago. Grenada is her twin sister. She is on a journey to trace the last hours in the life of her sister. Because you spent the night with her, she would like to see where she was prepared for her service. We usually don't do that kind of tourist tour. However, in this case Grenada has nothing to hold onto from her sister, not even a grave stone. Give her a little tour and send her off."
His supervisor turned around to hold Grenada's hand with both hands. She sent a warm smile and left. Her lab coat fluttered in the air. The echoing shoe steps on the floor grew quieted to leave awkward silence.
The punks in the public squares of London had always scared Garrit. They made him clam up, become rigid, hold tight to his lunch box, and hope to be ignored. Grenada was less than half his age. She seemed to weigh only two thirds of the weight of the tall Garrit. Yet, her face and body were bulky. Her movements were sharp and energetic.
To seem less conspicuous, Garrit seized the initiative: "Grenada, I am very sorry about your sister. It is always sad, when a person arrives without identification. Here is the morgue, where she spent her last night. Look around. That's pretty much it."
The morgue was in the basement. The room had a copper tone to it from the poor lighting and all the stainless steel autopsy tables. A big wall with square doors exposed the corpse refrigerator. His worn desk filled a corner. A cupboard filled another part of the room. The room was sparse and worn. Yet, because everything was built for water washing, it was clean.
Grenada looked straight into Garrit's eyes. The darkly lined eyes were even more dramatic. The spikes and leather made Garrit's vision twirl. Grenada's green eyes had a terse fire: "So, you saw Jessica naked, completely naked?"
Garrit immediately grabbed the side of his pants driven by nervosity: "It's not like that. I see naked bodies every day. It's part of my professional work. I become numb to it. There is really nothing sexual about a corpse."
"You act awfully guilty. I get it. Dead people turn you on. I have spent a night in a graveyard. It was very sexy. However, I ask, because Jessica always wanted to get a bunny tattooed on her groin, just where it would be covered by a bathing suit. I wondered if she was able to fulfill that dream before her death."
On one hand, Garrit was relieved that Grenada wasn't testing her. On the other hand, he had tasted how strong his subconscious was trying to talk about his rape.
"Of course! No, she did not have a tattoo."
"Would you mind, if I'd lie down on one of those autopsy tables. I'd like to experience what it must have felt for her?"
"That is a strange request. Yet, I don't see a reason not to. It's not like a morgue is a sterile surgery room."
Grenada slipped her backpack down the shoulder. She hopped energetically onto the stainless steel table. She wore black combat boots with thick rubber soles. The neck of the boots extended high. The black shoe strings were wrapped around her calves multiple times. Lying on her back, the black leather jacket parted. Between the t-shirt and the pants, a skin square revealed her tender navel button. The navel was smooth to the surface of her slender abs with the slight muscle definition. A tattoo of twisting and bending rose limbs surrounded the belly button.
Garrit breathed deeply to calm himself. Grenada's body was as sleek, youthful, and sensual as Jessica's button. Images of licking Jessica's nipples and placing his penis on her lips flashed through Garrit's mind. He was softly sweating, as he struggled to push those images out of his consciousness.
"Was Jessica lying like this?"
"Close. Our corpses don't interlock the fingers on their belly. The arms are at the side."
Grenada adjusted her arms. She dreamily looked at the ceiling. She tried to take in the feel of the room, the heavy yet quiet atmosphere. Her eyes closed. Calm breaths lifted and lowered her chest and abdomen. Garrit observed her quietly trying to quell the mixture of fear and attraction.
"You are very sexy," said Grenada.
"I beg you pardon?"
"Coroner-shatzi, you are very sexy. I am attracted by everything related to death. I have a real skull at home. You get to be with dead people. That is so sexy. Do you ever have ghosts and spirits visiting?"
"No, there are certainly no ghosts around here."
"I could teach you. You have so much dark energy collected around you. I can see the swirls of dark energy around you, when you move. They'd love visiting you. You might even be able to summon a demon. It is very sexy."
"Child, you watch too many horror movies. This is a place of science."
"You say that with so much fear, like deep down you know that your science fairy is merely a wash clothes over your eyes to make you feel safe."
Garrit's eyes were wide open. All the tension about hiding his rape and the spooky talk was eating away at his ability to keep his composure. Grenada slowly walked towards him. She placed her hand on the middle of his chest gently. The hand lingered. Garrit felt himself pinned between the wall and Grenada.
"Garrit, you don't have many friends, don't you? You can't even make friendly small talk."
"That's none of your business," snapped Garrit back.
"I brought you a gift. I guess you don't want it." Grenada made a pouting face with a lowered lip. Garrit melted at the look of it and gently touched her elbow.
"I am sorry. Talking people can startle me."
Grenada's face lit up with excitement. Garrit let out a deep breath. Grenada immediately went to ruffle her backpack. She was bent over showing her trim butt in black tight jeans to Garrit. Garrit couldn't help but feel happy for coping a glimpse.
"Garrit, here is a cake for you. I have made Jessica's favorite cake recipe. And, I have given everyone who helped her on her final journey a piece."
Grenada handed Garrit a white box. Garrit walked back to his desk. With gleeful eyes, he opened the box. He pulled a fork out of the drawer. A delicious short cake piece with whipped cream, a lemon ring, and strawberry slice was inside. Because of his poor city salary, he hadn't eaten a cake in years. This one was fresh. It had the light smell of sugar and lemon about it. His face gleaned big.
Grenada sat on a stainless steel autopsy table nearby. Her feet with the heavy combat boots happily dangled back and force.
"So, death-boy, you must have some great stories to tell with all the dead people coming in. Have you ever had a severed head?"
While munching on the cake, he cheerily replied, "yeah, automobile accidents decapitate unlucky drivers a few times a year. This one time, we had an axe murderer, a decade ago. He cut his victims into body blocks. That was a sight to behold."
"Garrit, you live in such an interesting world. Have you had to play any detective? Any mystery autopsies?"
"Yeah, when I was young, we had a body with no cause of death. They never told us. However, I believe he was an MI-6 agent. I was young and ambitious. I spent the whole night investigating the body. When the sun came up, I had investigated everything twice and thrice. So, I started smelling every square inch of the body. Around the thigh, I found a strange menthol-honey odor. That turned out to be a very exotic contact poison. Had I touched the spot without gloves, I would have been dead in 30 seconds."
"You are such a cool old man. I wish you could tell me all your stories."
Garrit's face glowed with excitement that someone was listening to him. He loved reading Grenada's facial reactions: The eye brows that slowly, questioningly raised, the wide starry pop of her eyes at surprises, and her lips tracing the words that he said, as if she were a little retarded or overly engaged in his words.
"Grenada, you are a very pleasant girl, despite your scary appearance. However, visiting hours are soon over. The security guard will come on his round and clear everyone out."
"Garrit, can't you hide me? We could spend the whole night together. All my friends will be so jealous to find out that I was in a morgue overnight."
Grenada exuberantly bounced on her feet. She cuddled up to the side of Gerrit to softly beg. Completely unabashed, she could feel the small balls of her breasts pressing against his body. For an almost sixty year old man, feeling those apples of youth is such a seductive thing. Her body was small, yet very warm. He could feel her like a little stove.
"Okay, we'll bend the rules a bit. I can already hear his steps. So hurry, stand behind the door."
