“Wow, taking advantage of someone mourning the loss of their loved ones, that’s pretty low,” said Xiz as we arrived at our destination.

“Hey, I’m helping them and they’re also helping me, financially” I retaliated, while walking through the gates. We went to the biggest graves and looked for any mourners.

We saw some people come and go, but they didn’t seem desperate enough to just trust us or they didn’t seem crazy rich enough to help with my noble cause. I also got Xiz to check out their houses to see if there was a tonne of stuff from their dearly departed. Eventually we grew tired at the end of the day and explored the city a bit, ate, and then went back to Berny's place. I do remember that I saw some fresh flowers and toys on a kid named Eli’s grave, they seemed kinda pricey. Berny was home so we updated him on what we were up to. Berny said he was working on getting his pilot's license for fun. Xiz and I went back the next day.

“How about that guy?” said Xiz, finger pointed at an old guy who stood before a grave.

“Nah, too old,” I replied. “He’s probably gonna meet them soon so no need for them to come back.”

“Holy smokes, that was dark” Xiz scanned the cemetery as he spoke. “What about… those guys? Looks like that kid has a butler,” his finger pointed at a kid in a suit and a butler who stood behind him.

Xiz disappeared in a puff of smoke and reappeared behind them, read the gravestones then floated back and said “They look like his parents.”

I searched them up online and found articles on the family. “Says here they got shot by a mugger in an alley. Poor kid”

“Well? Wanna pick them?”

“Nah, don’t wanna ruin a kid's life in whatever way you decide to grant the wish.”

“You’re the boss.”

“Maybe this tragedy will make him decide to use his resources to prevent something like this ever happening again.”

Today, on Eli’s grave the flowers were different this time. Hmm, someone’s coming pretty early here. I decided to do the same the next day. At sunrise with some coffee in hand we sat on a bench in front of a tomb. I yawned and stretched a bit while Xiz suddenly elbowed me in the ribs a bit too hard and pointed to our mystery mourner. Looks like she comes early every day to visit her son who passed away at a young age. She may be the one.

Xiz followed her to her house for quite some time. I checked out another giant tomb with bats etched into it, when I felt the paw pinch me in my pocket. I went inside where it was more private and then put the paw to my ear after it made the phone hand sign. “Xiz?”

“Yeah, she’s the one. You should see her place, it’s crazy. There’s a whole shrine room for the kid with pictures of him, candles, toys, and even some of his hair. The kid’s bedroom is spotless as well."

While Xiz spoke I walked around the tomb then approached the concrete coffin in the middle. The lid had some intricate designs on it. "Looks like she’s been trying to use magic to bring him back or communicate with him. Lots of books on witchcraft" he continued.

I pushed the hug lid aside a bit to take a peak at the body within. I saw a super old body that seemed pretty well preserved, pale and wearing gothic attire. There was a sickle right above her neck for some reason, almost like if she woke and got up she'd get decapitated. I slowly pulled the lid back in place and speed walked out of there.

"I’m seeing loads of mistakes in her summoning circles though. No wonder they didn’t work. There’s even a voodoo doll made of his stuff,” reported Xiz while he checked out the place. “There were some nasty demons here but I told them to buzz off. Looks like the husband left when she went all kooky. The house is a huge mansion and I see some expensive cars here.”

“Wow, sounds pretty crazy. I feel pretty bad for her.”

Smoke came out of the paw and turned into Xiz. I put the paw away as Xiz gave me some more details about our next client who’s name was Mary. I needed to go there before I talked myself out of this. We went there in a Duber. The driver was quite chatty so I contemplated giving him less stars because of that but he did bring me to Mary’s address really fast, barreling down the road, in the oncoming traffic lane a few times, drifted, and violated many if not all traffic laws. 5 stars!

I arrived at Mary’s mansion, the gates tall and touched the sky, shadow loomed over me. I pressed the buzzer, waited for a few seconds, then I heard a voice. “What do you want?”

“Hi Mary, I heard of what happened to your son. I know how much you miss him and am here to help you out. I can help you reunite with him.”

There was a long pause before I heard a buzz from the gate as it slowly creeped open. I walked through while it creaked shut behind me. I made my way through a nice garden that had a fountain in the middle, flowers all around, some fruit trees here, berry bushes there, and even a pool. A maid opened the front door and brought me to the living room. I sat on the couch in front of Mary, some tea and snacks placed on the coffee table.

We made our introduction to each other. “How did you know about my situation? Are you a medium or psychic?” she asked.

No way in hell was I gonna tell the truth. “I have abilities, can’t go into specifics.” I waved one hand around, placed the other on my head, and closed my eyes. “I’m sensing that you’ve attempted to connect with your son through magic, is that correct? Dark magic, with some mistakes here and there preventing it from working.”

“Oh my, how'd you - ? You must be the real deal. No one else could know.”

“There were also some malevolent forces you’ve attracted with that in your house but I’ve already removed them, no need to worry about them.”

“Amazing, so now I won’t hear children laughing at night or voices mimicking my family members that left?”

Wow, Xiz didn’t mention what they did. “Yeah, yeah, that was free of charge. What else have you done? Did you try going to psychics to get in touch with Eli?”

“I have but they all turned out to be frauds. I would test them with small details that they would get wrong but you, I think I can believe you.”

“Well, that’s good to hear. I can do many things but my price is quite large since the things that I can do are real and I won’t be able to undo.” Well I could but don’t want to waste more than one wish.

“Well, if the price is large, then I just want him back. My world fell apart when the car struck him. He was so young and my only child. My husband grieved with me for quite some time, but he wanted to move on with his life and I just couldn’t. Please bring him back” she replied as a tear rolled down her cheek. “I will accept whatever it takes to bring him back.”

“I am quite sorry for what you and your family had to go through. The price I’m looking for to do this would be $2 million, since bringing someone back is quite extreme.” I replied while crossing my arms across my chest. I noticed Xiz was checking out the whole place.

“I accept that price.” Said Mary. She dried the tears around her eyes with a Kleenex.

Wow, she accepted that really easily. I should’ve picked a higher price. Damnit, this is the second time. “Okay, that’s great. Just a fair warning though, doing this has consequences. We are messing with the natural order of things.”

“That’s fine, I was willing to practice magic to do this. So, what are the next steps?”

“Well, what I usually do is take half up front, do the process needed, and then take the rest when we both see the proof. Crypto is my preferred method of payment,” I informed her.

Mary got a worker to transfer 1 million to my crypto key. I went to the bathroom, took out the paw, and whispered “I wish Mary’s son would come back from the dead and return to his mother.”

The lights flickered, the house shook a little, and then I saw a second finger slowly curl inwards. Xiz was nowhere to be seen again. I left the washroom and sat back in the living room, took a sip from my tea, and said “give it some time to take effect” to Mary.

We waited a bit chatting with each other. Mary said she worked in commercial real estate. I was impressed, I never knew commercials were part of real estate. Xiz came back, counted down to 3, then pointed to the front door. I looked that way and then heard a knock on the door. I turned to Mary, “You should open it”.

Mary looked at me for a bit, took in a deep breath, her heart pounded so hard I could almost hear it, then got up and walked to the door. I braced myself, I wasn’t sure what weird way Xiz had granted her wish, I hope it wasn’t too bad.

She slowly opened the door and then gasped at the sight, a small boy in a suit. He must’ve been buried in that. Then, I finally processed what I saw, his suit covered in dirt, dull eyes, gray skin, decay splattered all over his body, bones poked out from under his flesh, and some skin peeled. The boy was a zombie! He staggered through the doorway, arms outstretched in front of him.

Mary was shocked at the sight in front of her, staggered a bit backwards, raised her hands to her face, and then... tears streamed down her face. “Oh my God, Eli”, she knelt down to the little boy, “you’ve come home” she said as she gave him a great big hug.

Wait, what? I thought to myself. It looked like Eli was about to bite her, but it turned he attempted to gurgle out a reply “Mo…m…”. He had tears in his eyes and was overjoyed to see his mother while he returned the embrace.

“Thank you, Rumey, for bringing back my boy,” said Mary as she stood, Eli in her arms. “Linda will give you the rest of the amount as promised.” She asked me to stay longer but I didn’t want to. The sight of what I had done to Eli was unsettled me. Xiz seemed disappointed by her reaction but made himself felt better when he saw her workers and my look of horror. Mary gave me her business card if I ever needed something, Eli still in her arms, as we left the mansion. They both waved at us as we got in our ride.