Glitter + Ashes

by Dave Ring

“You lie!” Layla replies. “Do you play, Sam? We can deal you in. It would be hard for you to lose.”

  “Don’t bait the children, darling. You’ll be all they talk about when you leave,” Vannish warns, in a bored sort of tone.

  “Maybe later?” Sam says. “I’m actually looking for a charging station. My recorder’s dying.”

  “They’re in the bunks. I’ll show you.” Layla drops her hand onto the table and stands up.

  Sam follows her through the next cars back toward the staff bunks, quietly thrilled about being near her again. Scents of coconut and cocoa butter drift in her wake, and Sam notices a tattoo of a bird on the back of Layla’s neck that she will make a point to ask about later if she runs out of interesting things to say.

  “Get anything good in your interviews so far?” Layla asks.

  “Talked to Yvette before Tommy dragged her off to look for sweet potatoes. And just talked to Redd about fascists in the mountains.”

  “Oh he’s a real chatterbox about the hills having eyes. He tell you there’s a secret weapon?” Layla waggles her eyebrows as if it’s some salacious thing and Sam laughs.

  “Yeah. Didn’t mention what it was, though.”

  “Sounds about right. Here you are.” Layla shows her the outlet underneath in the windowsill of her bunk. “They prefer you use it during the day while the solar’s still going. We need the stored power at night, especially for our shows.”

  “Thanks. So I believe I was promised a trick.”

  “Oh I promised, did I? My memory is there was supposed to be an exchange. An interview for a trick.”

  “Fair enough.” Sam sits on her bed and clicks on the recorder. Layla doesn’t hesitate to join her.

  “Interview with Layla…”

  “Legend.”

  “Layla Legend? You’re joking.”

  “Honest to God, it’s my given name.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Interview with Layla No-Last-Name, Day One aboard the Carlyle. So how long have you been a magician?”

  “The only correct answer is all my life.”

  “Is that what brought you to the Carlyle? You saw a hole in the Cirque’s programming?”

  “I was looking for somewhere to...be. Just like everyone else. There’s always been a type of person who was always meant to run away with the circus. My turn just came late.”

  Sam knows this feeling of being born too late, destined to fill some void in a world that no longer existed. She’d been born a collector, and she tried collecting stories at Stadium but, after a long enough period of shared experiences, the stories in one place started to sound the same. There is an entire world out there, fractured, but still. The Carlyle is a step closer than she’d ever been to the rest of it.

  “Where were you from originally?” Sam asks.

  “Everywhere. I was a military brat. That’s what military brats say. We were just south of the Capital when the storm hit. I was sixteen. I evacuated up north with my parents. They were ordered back to the coast when the riots started. It was too much for them like it was too much for everyone else, I guess.” Layla shrugs and her eyes glisten in the passing sunlight. And Sam immediately regrets doing this.

  “I’m sorry. We don’t have to talk about this if you don’t want.”

  “Relax.” Layla sniffles. “I’m well-adjusted. What else did I think we were going to talk about?”

  “Alright. So...you found a new home, a new family sort of, on the rails?”

  Layla rocks her hand in a so-so kind of way.

  “And you’re the only one capable of ‘magic.’” Sam’s air quotes flounder a bit as she wonders if it’s an offensive thing to wave disbelief in a magician’s face.

  “Looks like it,” Layla says, unbothered.

  “Close-up or…”

  “Oh this is you trying to get me to do the trick.”

  “Can you blame me?” Sam asks.

  “Alright, alright, easy, tiger. Do you have a coin? Bigger the better. A quarter or something.”

  Sam scoffs. “I haven’t had money since…”

  “Figures. No one carries change these days.” Layla digs into a pocket of her jeans and fishes out a silver dollar, flicking it at Sam. “Check it out. Observe there’s nothing funky about it. Solid, good weight, a little dirty. Perfectly normal silver dollar, right?”

  Sam turns it over in her hands. There is indeed nothing funky about it, and she says as much.

  “Now place it on the back of your hand. Right there in the center. Good. Hold it up here. Now look at me.”

  With pleasure, Sam doesn’t say.

  “Promise me you won’t freak out. I’m going to count to three and then I’m going to take my finger and I’m going to push the coin through your hand.”

  “Through my hand,” Sam repeats in disbelief. “With the bones and everything in the way.”

  “Yep. You freak out and hit me, I’m going to be upset. Black people get all scary about magic but I have a show tonight and this face is what cashes the checks around here. So here we go. One, don’t hit me…”

  Sam watches her eyes, her other hand, anything to catch the trick of it all.

  “Two, don’t hit me….”

  Now she watches the coin on her hand as Layla applies more pressure, careful not to blink.

  “Three!”

  And the coin hits the floor. It isn’t a new coin. There was just the one. She hadn’t felt anything but the pressure, hadn’t seen anything but Layla’s finger applying it.

  “Wait…” Sam tries to piece together some explanation. She examines the back of her hand for signs of trauma (there was none), and then screams as she turns it over to see a perfectly painless, perfectly circular, gaping, silver dollar-sized hole in her palm through, which Layla is now winking at her.

  Terrified, Sam shakes her hand so vigorously she hits the bunk above her. But when she stops, the hole is gone. Her hand is normal, intact, but her heart is racing.

  “How...what…”

  Layla casually retrieves the coin off the floor.“See? Magic.”

  The North Lakes settlement is in yet another football stadium about three miles from the train station so Sam doesn’t get to see it; and three miles is too far to wander if Redd decides it’s time to leave. She’s heard most of the settlements are in stadiums, though, for their high capacity and resilience to the elements and their parking garages easily become neighborhoods. The North Lakes stadium is domed, and its residents can’t grow food on its field with natural sunlight, so the Carlyle distributes to them first en route west. The train is greeted warmly from nearby parking structures, leaving the small lot for loading vehicles and trade merchants.

  Cirque performers ready their attractions quickly as an audience gathers in the vast, gated parking lot of some abandoned university on the other side of the station. They light the dark with torches and mirrors and solar lanterns strung from garlands. The city is impossibly dark beyond them.

  “Lucia Velez-Avila. I’m from the islands. Jayuya.”

  She is an older woman, sixty give or take, and one of the two guest chefs in the Currant kitchen tonight. She takes a break from humming while peeling a mountain of plantains for mofongo to enunciate into Sam’s recorder.

  “And I am Marcia Batista. I am from the islands as well but have lived in the Capital the last thirty years.” the second woman declares. She is a small, brown-skinned woman with glasses set in red cat-eye frames. She preps trout for frying on a counter further down the line. It’s the only ingredient the Carlyle hasn’t had to bring.

  Sam has volunteered for the knife work, chopping chilis and onions, okra and heirloom tomatoes between them. The rest of the kitchen cheered when they were dismissed, because a night off is still a night off, even in the apocalypse.

  “Can you tell me what it was like when you left the islands? Was it before the storm?”

  “It was close. We were all leaving. Most people bar
ely paid attention to where the boats, planes, whatever were even going. Every storm left behind less and less to rebuild. We were tired already. I came north through Louisiana with one suitcase. The southern coast was too dangerous. By the time I got there, they weren’t even asking for paperwork anymore. Some tornadoes scared the shit out of border security and they were long gone.”

  The women laugh loudly.

  “It’s always the paperwork that matters,” Mrs. Batista adds. “Until it doesn’t, you know?”

  “You know?” Lucia agrees.

  “I left the Capitol during one of those early breaks in the storm when they thought it was going to be over. Something told me not to stay. Jimmy and I packed up the car. We were two blocks from being too flooded to go anywhere.”

  “Who’s Jimmy?”

  “My husband, child. Where did you think I got the ‘Mrs.?’ He’s somewhere out there. Thinks he’s a pitmaster but couldn’t grill a hot dog back when there were still hot dogs so I don’t know what he’s doing now.”

  “So, both of you were here for the collapse.”

  “Yes. I was living with my sister not too far from here when the exodus started. The shortage of everything. People going west to catch planes out of the country then couldn’t go west anymore unless it was on foot because there was no more gas. I ended up here headed to the border before they shut down it down,” says Mrs. Batista.

  “I was in the city for the last State of the Union address what’s-his-name gave before the power grid went down. The rest of the world was still out there, though. Watching. Waiting for their turn, I think,” says Lucia.

  “I still think about how it took years for things to just...end. You think it all falls apart so slowly that it’ll never be completely done.” Mrs. Batista sighs. “And then you’re standing in the ruins and it takes all of five minutes to explain how you got there.”

  A moment of silence passes between them, and Sam can hear the cheering for the Cirque outside. The cooking has started in the kitchen, though, and her eyes begin to burn from either their somber stories or the exposure to the onions and chopped chilis.

  “Anything you miss?” she asks them both.

  “My kitchen,” Mrs. Batista laughs.

  “Just roots,” says Lucia. “The people, you find again. The music, the joy, the culture you bring with you. But everywhere that isn’t home feels...temporary. I think we all know we are refugees. For now it doesn’t feel like we will have to run again. And that’s nice. But we will have to.”

  Sam thanks them for their time and excuses herself for fresher air before her vision’s too blurry to get her up the stairs. The night is cool this close to the water that separates what’s left of the city from the old national border. She watches from the overpass as the Cirque performs, checking her hand intermittently for strange holes.

  The musical performances that start the night are lively, mostly classical covers of hits most everyone is old enough to remember. By the time food is served, acrobatic acts, a puppet show, and one unfortunate clown have all given their contributions to the night, each introduced by Vannish, elaborately dressed and occasionally eating fire. Spotting Layla in the wings (“wings” here being a couple of tented parking spaces between two dusty HVAC vans) as she’s ready to be introduced, Sam begins to make her way down the hill of broken concrete to be closer to the show.

  “Where are you going?” Yvette’s voice chided from behind. Sam turned to see her silhouette backlit by the red, bare bulbs of the Cirque’s signage, arms crossed over her chest, undoubtedly something disapproving on her shadowed face.

  Sam barely opened her mouth.

  “I hope those ladies dismissed you and you didn’t sneak just sneak off.”

  Well, she had, she thought guiltily. But she wasn’t going to miss Layla’s show. “I didn’t want to be in the way.”

  “I bet.” Yvette turned to leave. “Get this out of your system and be back for dishes. Cooks don’t clean in my car.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Sam replied, bowing for some reason before deciding that was ridiculous and turning to find a seat on a grassy hill opposite the rapt audience.

  Layla begins with a series of close-up magic tricks aimed at the children present. Sam isn’t close enough to hear the set up, but she’s pretty sure none of them will have holes in their hands.

  One small but fearless kid in a purple unicorn t-shirt raises her hand at the front of the audience and Layla asks her to whisper a wish in her ear.

  Layla immediately leaps back with an impressed gasp and cries “to fly?” Then there’s the muttering of instructions, something to do with spinning around as fast as she could while the crowd counts down from ten. Sam finds herself counting in a whisper. And by the time everyone gets down to three, a curious pink mist has solidified around the girl’s shoulders. By two, the mist unfurls, and by one, reveals itself to be massive, glowing butterfly wings. The crowd gasps and Sam is on her feet as the girl appears to float a full six feet off the ground before settling back down again to uproarious applause.

  “Impossible.” Sam climbs down the short wall into the parking lot. By the time she reaches Layla, the magician has fireworks issuing from finger guns she’s casting into the sky. They burst forth in shades of violet and gold. Every eye is filled with wonder, mouths agape as the sky lights up in the finale.

  Layla bows and takes Sam’s hand as they head back to the makeshift corridor made of mismatched panels from the prop car.

  “Did you enjoy it?” Layla’s glistening with sweat, but smiles brightly and undoes the red bowtie at her neck.

  “Layla, how. HOW,” Sam manages. “Did she really fly? Was she some kind of...prop...child...I don’t…”

  And to her pleasant, heart-tripling surprise, Layla lifts her hand and kisses it. “Not now, love. I’m starving.”

  The Carlyle steals away in the night, heading westward. Half the Cirque staff are well and tuckered out, the other half make good use of their prize whiskey. Layla decides she will copy her interviews from the recorder long-hand before the next city where she’d collect more stories, take part in new recipes born of the cultural merging of refugees. In the meantime, she and Layla play Uno in the bunk, which Sam has decided is cozy if only for the right company. They share slices of tangerine and laugh quietly at their own jokes so as not to disturb the sleeping kitchen staff around them. Somewhere, a radio crackles with muffled commentary from the security team transitioning their shifts.

  “When you said earlier that female magicians were just witches, did you...mean something by it?”

  “What would I have meant?” Layla asks, flicking a Draw 4 onto the pile.

  “I mean, were you trying to tell me something? About you. Or when you said you belonged with circus people.”

  “Something like what?”

  Sam bites her lip. She could only play coy so long. Frankly, Layla’s lucky Sam likes her so much.

  “Well...are you a witch?” she asks outright. “Or a mutant or something?”

  “That’s a hell of a question, isn’t it?” Layla replies between bites of tangerine, but her attention is clearly elsewhere. There’s a flurry of activity between the cars as security gathers. The rumbling of the train tracks barely disguise the words coming over their radios. Sam makes out “lights ahead,” “scout,” and “convoy.” Her pulse races as Layla leans out of the bed and whistles to a guard at the far end of the car. Sam looks back to see him gesture for her to join them.

  “What is it? What’s happening?” Sam insists.

  “We got trouble.” Layla slides her feet back into her untied boots and heads to the end of the car. Sam, for want of something smarter to do, follows.

  They are led to the black box car before the tankers. It’s an armory. Sam’s stomach drops.

  Redd is watching monitors, pensively poking his bottom lip with the antenna of his radio. He does a double-take when he notices Sam is present.

  “Why is she here?”

&nbs
p; “She’s with me. It’s fine. What’s happening?” Layla’s voice is different, more authoritative, less of a jokester.

  “Drone’s picked up four vehicles. They’re en route to intercept us after this bridge up here.”

  “Looks like a well-regulated militia to me,” Layla says.

  Redd snorts. “Security’s got their orders. I’ll get the crew to tuck in.”

  “I’m up top,” Layla declares before turning to Sam. “You gonna fall off the train or anything if I take you outside with me?”

  “Outside...where? What, while we’re moving?”

  “Yeah. It’s cool if you’re squeamish. You can head back to the bunk car, just make sure you’re on the floor away from the windows for like ten minutes.”

  Sam’s mind races. This feels like it should be an urgent moment, brimming with imminent danger. But somehow the huge security guy and the magician are calm. “I just...can you help me understand for a second. What does a circus magician have to do with defense strategy against a…”

  And it dawns on her. Redd’s bored stare and Layla’s pleasant but impatient one.

  Layla’s the secret weapon.

  “There you go.” Layla pats her on the back as if seeing the lightbulb go off over her head. “She’s got it. You good?”

  “I...yeah…” Sam hesitates.

  “Then up we go.”

  They don harnesses at their waists and climb a narrow, steel staircase into the windy dark where a guard waits to tether them to the rooftop. Sam can barely make out more than the edges of things touched by moonlight, or the blinking lights on drone helicopters buzzing overhead. They lean into the wind as they cross to the forward end of the train. Sam’s face stings and her eyes burn as she tries to keep them open. Layla seems barely bothered by any of it.

  They stop and face south, unable to go further without crunching solar panels. Sam can see a short bridge over glittering water, and the flicker of headlights rushing to meet them on the other side of it.

  “What will you do?” Sam shouts into Layla’s ear.

  Layla makes an O with her hand and pokes a finger through it. “Magic!” she shouts back.