Backup at the Crematorium

I wouldn’t call myself a detective or a sleuth. I’m not as cerebral as Sherlock or as suave as Bond. However, this is my story of how one sign, a literal poster on a pole, led me to crack a case worth dying for at Mort’s Mortuary.

The sign was a divine masterpiece of intrigue I couldn’t ignore.

UNDERTAKER URGENTLY NEEDED

Sales experience preferred.

For the Scout’s mid-west fourth district bronze popcorn salesman of the year, I felt qualified. I mean, sales were sales, and as much as I loved my old bike, I had my license, but no whip to go along with it.

I didn’t daddle. I didn’t waste time scanning the QR code, perfecting a resume, calling them, or even changing into something nicer. Fourth and Court were six blocks away, and Spring Break had just begun. I rode my well-loved bike on the wings of perspiration and inspiration. If a job was urgent, surely interview attire wasn’t important. If it was urgent, why would you apply online? Is there a better way to show initiative than to show up ready to go?

When I arrived at Mort’s Mortuary, the first tinge of creepiness struck. The situation was creepy. Like really creepy. Like watching a horror movie on Halloween, in a thunderstorm, while living in a haunted house creepy. I’m not sure what I was expecting. The job was for an undertaker, not a baker.

“Where do I park my bike?” I pondered.

There wasn’t a bike rack, and my normal go-to of chaining my bike to a fence or bench seemed uncouth and the perfect way to ruin a first impression. Instead, I did what any self-respecting teen would do. I found the most decrepit corner of the cemetery and hid my bike as best I could behind an untamed bush and a forgotten headstone.

Entering Mort’s Mortuary, a lanky twenty-something in an ill-fitting suit, whose pale complexion and slicked-back hair made him more vampire than undertaker, condescendingly greeted me.

“May I help you?”

“No, sir, but I can help you. I’m here for your job.”

I know that didn’t quite come out right, but adults can be jerks. They think teens and children are the masters of the eye roll. That “whatever boomer” look. Adults, however, are just as proficient at looking straight through you with an I’m wiser, smarter, older, holier than thou look. So I wasn’t wearing my Sunday best. Who cared? Dracula over there was glistening with sweat in a balmy 64-degree showroom, probably from putting up flyers all morning.

“Your flyer said you needed an undertaker urgently, so I’m here to apply.” Who are you to judge? You advertised a position the same way you try to sell an unwanted couch. My best salesman smile kept that last thought hidden behind my pearly whites.

“Look-”

“Todd, what’s going on out there?”

Mort entered the lobby with desperation and speed exclusive to NASCAR and a failing business owner.

“Sir, it’s nothing, just.”

“Aren’t you Mr. Mort Vargas of Mort’s Mortuary?” I took the initiative and bypassed his lackey Todd and greeted Mr. Mort. “I’m here to apply for the job.”

“How old are you, kid?” Mort asked in a gruff tone.

“Just turned 16.”

“That’ll work. Come into my office.”

It can’t be that easy. I thought to myself. My dad and brother constantly bemoan the job market and how hard it is to find work. I got a job with two sentences. Truth be told, I knew at that moment I was a job savant and a rockstar.

“Okay, kid, sit down. Do you know what we do here?”

As I sat in front of Mort in a crummy T-shirt and some athletic shorts, reality caught up to me as I considered what was happening. Either:

1. I was about to die.

2. This was a drug front.

3. This was the beginning of an awesome movie.

Or

4. Mort, infamous for the slogan: Mort’s Mortuary, you stab them; we slab them. Had caught up to him and Mort was in desperate need of help.

“We help people through one of the most difficult times in their lives. We walk beside them, as a friend and mentor, as they grieve,” I answered, taking my cue from the corny bunny and flower-filled inspirational posters around me.

“Kid, we sell space and boxes. Preferably the most expensive box and the largest service package you can manage. You work on commission. Do you know what that means?”

“Umm…”

“It means you get a cut of what you sell,” Mort cut me off. “Now, do you have a suit? No matter. I think I got something that will fit you around here. Tell me, have you sold anything, kid?”

Things were moving fast, but I didn’t let that, or my fear of impending doom, stop me.

“Popcorn,” I said. “Are you going to dress me in a dead person’s clothes?”

“Good popcorn or shit popcorn?”

“Umm…”

“Okay shit corn.” Mort filled in for me. “Did you do well?”

“Third in the region?” I answered, still hoping for an answer to my suit question.

“That will have to do. Look kid, basically, we are car salesmen. Upsell… Upsell… Upsell…. We finance. If the person has good credit, you sell them the moon. If they have bad credit, sell them good, but use your judgment, because collections are a bitch. If anyone asks, you’re at least eighteen. No, make it nineteen, got it, kid.”

I’m not sure why it took me this long, but at that moment, I realized Mort was losing it. This should have been obvious. Who in their right mind advertised a job on a telephone pole? Better question what type of idiot applied? Someone desperate? Stupid? Me. Clearly, me. I answered it.

“Kid… you still with me?” Mort said, snapping his fingers at me.

“Yes sir… Um…. Suit…. Cars…. Nineteen… and upsell….”

“Twenty, I said twenty,” Mort corrected me. “And one last thing. This is the most important thing. You are selling full packages. Full service packages and, most importantly, caskets. Caskets at all costs, not urns or cremation. We are selling full caskets, got it?”

The intensity in Mort’s eyes was maniacal and unhinged in that mad scientist, serial killer kind of way. Technically, I didn’t have to come back. I could have said yes, left, and never returned. It was also possible that if I let him hold this position long enough, he may pop a vein or have a stroke. Those things happen to old people, and what better place to dispose of a body?

“Caskets. Got it,” I said, breaking the tension. “Does it give the family more closure? Is it better for the environment?”

“God, no, kid. We have a backup at the crematorium. So remember full packages.”

The next four days flew by, and now I’m fairly certain of a few things:

1. I definitely wore a deadman’s suit.

2. Work is boring.

3. School is useless.

If this was work, why am I learning history or science? What the hell do the state capitals have to do with selling a casket? Math? I’m doing pre-calculus in school, and yet trying to understand how we determine a credit score, let alone what someone can finance, is an indecipherable equation I’m pretty sure boils down to someone tossing a coin on the other end of the ether known as the internet.

Also, that commission thing is crap. The only reason I made any money is because my coworker, Todd, was happy to have me around. He paid me sixty bucks a day to do his half of the grunt work. Outside of meeting with two families, unsuccessfully, I mostly swept, dusted, and vacuumed.

The phone rang dozens of times a day, and outside of a few people trying to order pizza, most were grieving families wanting updates on something. What was the state of my financing? Or how were service preparations going? Too often they talked my ear off about how wonderful or amazing Jimmy, or Jane, or Jennifer was. No offense, but if they were so awesome, I would have heard about them. If Todd hadn’t paid me, and I couldn’t scroll on my phone, I would have hung up and probably gotten fired.

Luckily, I didn’t, and through those calls, I discovered the magnitude of the backup. Eight families called multiple times a day asking for an update on ashes. Todd didn’t care, and when I asked Mort, he told me to sell caskets. The mystery of the backup kept me coming back to work. I didn’t have a big sale coming. Instead, my mission was to figure out what was going on. Come Saturday, I was going to solve the mystery of Mort’s Mortuary and the backup at the crematorium.

All black doesn’t feel sneaky or special at a funeral. I had spent a good part of Friday making plans, choosing clothes, and practicing my best Bond impression. At the funeral, my suit seemed so ordinary and appropriate. I didn’t feel like a spy or a secret agent, or even an undertaker. I felt like a kid at his Aunt Mureal’s funeral, his Aunt Mureal whom he never met, but had to act like he cared for because she left him a savings bond worth about fifty bucks.

“When the service begins, I want you to go double-check the reception. Make sure everything’s ready. Okay?” Todd hissed at me through a gritted smile as he greeted guests. Todd was running things while Mort did whatever owners do.

“Of course. Can I go now?”

“Sure… Oh, and take this. I’m pretty sure I left a thing of sweet tea in the back.”

I did my best not to jump at the key card as Todd handed me what was supposed to be my mission’s hardest hurdle. Literally, the key to my success. So much for the chloroform rag.

The key card worked. And after a satisfying beep and clunk, I entered the forbidden back area soaked with sweat and full of apprehension. On my left was a wall of cadaver drawers. To the right was a table with gallons of sweet tea and two doors: Mort’s office and the employee bathroom. The prep area, my true destination, was through another set of double doors at the end of this long hallway.

“Look, I don’t know what to tell you. I’m sorry about the delay on the ashes, Mrs. Larson, but I have a service going on and will call you as soon as the ashes are ready.”

I heard Mort hang up the phone and cringed. Just past the table, I hoped to make it past his office before the end of the call. Instead, using all the sneak knowledge I gained playing video games, I crouched, setting my arms wide like I was surfing, and shuffled slowly across Mort’s open office door.

“Kid, what the hell are you doing?” Mort yelled. Apparently, stealth is harder in real life.

I had to think fast, because even the best spy used cunning deception to achieve their goal.

“I was going to the bathroom before grabbing the sweet tea for the reception.”

“Don’t use the one back here. The toilets backed up. Grab the tea and…”

Before Mort finished, the phone rang, and he waved me off. Turning his back away from the door, I abandoned stealth and sprinted down the hall.

“Oh… My god…” I said in a heavy breath as the wet, stifling heat of the prep room doused me.

Six burly me, who looked at home serving life sentences, wielded cleavers as they hacked meat on grand silver tables. I made a mistake. This is where I was going to die. There were no ashes because Mort was running a chop shop, not cars, but actual bodies, out of the back of his business. It was the perfect cover. Of course, Mort would do that. It all made sense. But why wouldn’t Mort just burn something else, get some ashes some other way? It would complete the cover-up. I mean, I heard about black market body parts dealers, but I thought that was all cop dramas and Dick Wolf stuff.

“Kid, the bathroom is the other way.”

Mort’s voice was the final dagger through my heart. This was how I died after Mort, the kingpin, ordered his men to cut me up. Should I run? Scream? Surely someone in the sanctuary would hear me.

“My parents know where I am,” I blurted out. They didn’t, but Mort didn’t know that. “And I hear kid parts aren’t even worth that much.” Again, I was pretty sure kid parts were more valuable, but I had to try.

“What are you talking about, kid? Parts? Kid parts? What do you think these guys are doing?”

“This is some sort of perverted chop shop.”

“The only thing Lance and Bill are chopping is flank steak, carrots, and potatoes.”

Looking closer, the two men I saw wielding cleavers in murderous strokes, apparently Lance and Bill, were actually prepping veggies. Two more slaved over the source of the stifling heat, two commercial-grade six-burner ranges and stoves. Everyone wore hairnets and sleeveless chef whites, giving their bulging tatted arms room to move. The final two men were loading food into a catering van.

“Are you cooking people?” I asked in stunned disbelief.

“Of course not,” Mort said. “But now you know about my little side business.”

Side business? Mort had an actual business. One with trademarks, a business license, and a commercial location. He wasn’t an unemployed streamer, calling himself self-employed. Mort was a third-generation mortician redefining the word ghost kitchen.

“You see, kid, a few years back, business slowed down after Ivan’s Crematorium opened up. The guy didn’t do anything but cremations, which left this space mostly unused. I took about twenty grand and transformed it into a ghost kitchen. I don’t know if you remember, but a few years back, I had an unfortunate ad campaign that really hurt the business.”

Everyone knew about that campaign. Come on down to Mort’s where you stab them, we slab them. Everyone knew that ad campaign. Everyone.

“Until a few months ago, everything was going fine until they busted Ivan’s as a money-laundering front. Since then, I’ve had a little problem. I converted this space during COVID when building inspections weren’t a thing. The revenues are pretty good, and all these guys from Happy Moore Penitentiary would be out of a job.”

“But where do you prepare the bodies?” I asked the only question that came to mind.

“In the broken bathroom, of course. I took out the toilet and used the existing plumbing. The extra side door into the main sanctuary, the one that’s always locked, connects right to the bathroom.”

It didn’t make sense. Okay, that’s not fair. It made perfect sense, but who opens up a ghost kitchen in the back of a funeral home? It’s insane. Or is it genius marketing?

“But we still have cremations?”

“My brother owns a pet crematorium down the street. I’ve been using his ovens for about two years. He had an inspection, so I haven’t been able to get over there. That’s why there’s been a backup. I can’t send people over there right now. It will work itself out in a week or two.”

The men continued to work, not breaking stride or eye contact with their work. Apparently, I was the only one in shock over what Mort had created.

“So you’re going to keep this open?” I asked, dumbfounded.

“If it’s not broke, don’t fix it, kid. Plus, at this point, changing it back will just open up a new can of worms. Now it’s time for you to learn about NDAs, kid.”

I gulped. “What’s that?”

“Non disclosure agreement.”

Following a conversation with Mort, two things changed. First, I learned to cook, became a vegetarian, and now source all my food from three local farms.

Second, silence is worth a 1986 Ford Taurus station wagon. It was the old hearse. She’s a little old and not too pretty, but she’s faster than my bike, and I’ll have your food delivered long before the ashes are ready.