Girl with all the Pain

by Michael Herman

  Sister Mary, wary of the policeman’s intent and quick to cut through pleasantries, asks, “What is this about?”

  The policeman, taken aback by her abrupt manner, sits back in his chair, makes a grieved face and says, “You are aware of the death of three children a few blocks from here?”

  Sister Mary shakes her head.

  The policeman glances down at Isabel and sees a shy, distrustful child who half hides behind Sister Mary.

  “Three boys died in odd circumstances three days ago.” He withholds details that he thinks will only cloud the issue, details that stretch the imagination and remind him of tales of witchcraft and magic from the Mapuche people in the south. While he has always held the Mapuche in contempt–considering them primitive, uneducated and sometimes rabble-rousers–he never put any stock in their magic. Now, after seeing the boys inserted impossibly into the vehicle, he is unsure of their magic. His fellow policemen spoke of demons and devils.

  “That’s terrible,” Sister Mary responds. “What sort of odd circumstances?”

  Sonnet and Forbes exchange looks. Both know the story as told to them by Isabel.

  “That’s what I’m trying to determine.” Raised as a Catholic, interviewing a nun is a delicate matter for him. He does not want to offend her and most definitely does not want to give the impression that he thinks she is involved. An accusation like that could jeopardize not only his career as a policeman but could have far-reaching effects on his personal life, affecting his family and his standing in the community.

  “One of those boys has appeared in a cell phone video emailed to us. In that video, he can be seen choking a little girl that people have identified as Isabel.” He drops his gaze to Isabel and says, “Did a young man choke you three days ago? This is the time frame of the boy’s death and it’s also time stamped on the video.”

  Isabel looks up to Sister Mary, who glances down at her with concern. Isabel looks back to the policeman and remains silent.

  The policeman pulls his cell phone from his pocket, taps it a few times and then turns the display to Isabel, who watches the video of the boy with the yellow gloves choking her. The voices of the boys in the background come through tinny and hollow while the voice of the boy with the yellow gloves is harsh and anger-filled.

  Sister Mary gasps, shocked by the video, and pulls Isabel tightly to her.

  When it finishes, Isabel remains mute and looks to Ángel for support.

  Sister Mary lowers her head to Isabel and says in emotion-charged words, “Oh you poor dear.”

  She turns angry eyes to the policeman and demands, “Those boys raped her? Is that what this is about?”

  The policeman raises both hands up in defense. “No, no, no. Not at all.” Then, “Well maybe. I just don’t know. That is what I am trying to find out from Isabel.”

  Sister Mary addresses Isabel in a voice still filled with outrage over the imagined rape.

  “Did that boy hurt you?”

  Isabel nods her head.

  “Did he rape you?”

  Isabel shakes her head.

  The policeman says, “Did the other boys hurt you?”

  Isabel shakes her head.

  The policeman glances over his shoulder to Ángel and Forbes, then back to Isabel. “Did someone do something to these boys for hurting you? Did someone hurt them for hurting you?”

  Isabel shakes her head slowly, lowering her eyes to the carpet.

  “What happened after the boy choked you?” the policeman says.

  Isabel is silent.

  The policeman raises his eyes to the ceiling in exasperation.

  Sonnet intercedes. “What was odd about the circumstances of the boys’ deaths, officer? Do you think Isabel hurt them?”

  He looks down at the diminutive figure of Isabel and says quickly, “Of course not. Three young boys against a small child? No. What I am wondering is, what happened to the boy who choked Isabel? Did he stop on his own accord, and why was he choking her? What happened to the boy’s brother, Roberto that he speaks of in the video? The same Roberto who is reported missing since that day? Who made him stop? Was it the other boys yelling at him? Why was he yelling about his brother, Roberto? Why does he ask about police taking boys away? No one in the police department has any record of interaction with the boys that day. And who is the boy referring to when he asks about Skunk Mountain?”

  Sonnet decides it’s time to intervene. “Isabel told us about the boys.”

  Isabel’s head snaps over in Sonnet’s direction. Fear shows in her eyes. Is she about to be betrayed?

  “Isabel told us that the boys were playing a game, a stupid game that involved just hurting her to make her scream. You hear them talk about it in the video; a sort of initiation into the group. Make her scream and you are in. Pathetic macho young boy stuff. Deplorable, but thank God rape was not involved. Once she was made to scream, the boys left her to attend to whatever young boys do after something like that.

  “We considered reporting it to the police but decided the police had better things to attend to. Since Isabel was only frightened and not really harmed, we decided to leave it at that. If you’re thinking that any one of us did something as horrible as murdering three children for something as silly as the dumb game they played, you are mistaken.”

  She looks over to Isabel, who registers relief at not being betrayed and says, “Isabel has had enough trauma for the moment, I think, more than most children. We just came from the hospital, where we picked up Sister Mary, who survived the bomb blast at the stadium. A policeman interviewed her about the incident only a few hours ago. Sister Mary’s injuries frightened Isabel as well as the rest of us.”

  She gives the policeman a stern look and says, “I think that the incident with the boys is better forgotten, from Isabel’s standpoint. I’m sorry about the news of their deaths, but she obviously had nothing to do with it. We only learned of the choking incident yesterday. Have you questioned boys they hung around with, maybe other boys in their group?”

  The policeman leans back in his chair, appraises both Sister Mary, who is frowning at him, and Isabel, who looks at him with quiet fear. He turns his attention to Sonnet, gives her a once over and then decides that he is going to get no further with his questions.

  Putting the choking event together with the boys fused with the car seemed like a diversion rather than a solution to what happened to the boys anyway. In his mind, their deaths were something worlds apart from a small girl getting choked in a video.

  Revenge? Maybe, but even that didn’t explain the impossible circumstances. And what about the explosion?

  “Isabel, the building next to where the boys died, there was an explosion inside it. Did you see that? Were you there when the explosion occurred?”

  Isabel slowly shakes her head.

  He nods and thinks to himself that even if she were there, what did the explosion have to do with the boys? She obviously wasn’t hurt so it was unlikely she was there at the time. The whole thing is inexplicable and suddenly he feels a headache coming on.

  He asks Isabel, “And Skunk Mountain?”

  She keeps her eyes forward and shakes her head.

  Wincing in pain, he closes his eyes, rubs his temple and says, “Well, thank you for your time.”

  He stands, pockets the phone, apologizes for resurrecting the unpleasant choking incident, and then thanks them once again for speaking with him.

  As Forbes sees him to the door, he glances at Ángel and considers that a man as big as he is could have a nickname like Mountain. But as he steps through the door, the image of Ángel evaporates as does the thought about his size.

  When Forbes returns, he finds Isabel in Sister Mary’s arms, held tightly as if she could protect her from every cruelty the world has to offer. Tears roll down Isabel’s cheeks as well as Sister Mary’s. Sonnet is trying to comfort her, rubbing Sister Mary’s shoulder and telling her not to worry, that things will be better now.

 
“It’s my fault,” Sister Mary says. “I should have verified Isabel’s conditions with the people who took her in.”

  Sonnet’s phone rings and she pulls it from her pocket, sees that it is the twin, excuses herself, and takes the call out in the hallway.

  Chapter 33

  Day 3

  Santiago, Chile

  Exhausted, Zed almost stumbles as he walks through the doors to the hotel. It’s all he can do to keep his eyes open. His body, stiff from sitting for so long, feels beat up. His butt aches and, rolling his head around on his neck, he wishes the hotel had a masseuse. He knows he stinks. What he craves is a long hot shower and then crashing in his hotel bed–no food, no alcohol, just some sweet sleep.

  He guesses the twin is already in her hotel room. He had dropped her off at the door and then parked the truck in the parking lot. Didn’t matter if someone stole their cargo. There was nothing in it of value anymore.

  He pulls out his phone and texts Forbes and Sonnet that he and the twin have arrived, and he is going directly to bed unless they need him for something. As he waits for the elevator doors to open, his phone pings with the arrival of a text message. He sees it’s the local Chilean woman he met and spent the night with. She wants to know if he’s available.

  He ponders his response as he rides the elevator up to his room, and then lets his little head respond for him. He texts her to come to his room, he’ll be waiting. When the elevator stops at his floor and the doors open, he stays in the cab and rides it back down to the lobby, where he goes to the gift shop and purchases some body lotion. Maybe he can talk her into giving him a much-needed body massage. The worst that can happen is she’ll decline.

  One hour later, he groans in pleasure as her strong fingers slide over his body, kneading and pressing his stiff muscles. A bottle of room service chilled Chilean champagne and two half-filled glasses sit off to the side of the bed. He is naked under the small bathroom towel laid over his rump. She is dressed casually in a loose shift with nothing on underneath. When she complains that the lotion is getting on her dress, the dress is removed, his towel is slid to the floor, she straddles him, presses herself down on him and then digs into his back muscles with her thumbs. As her hands slide up over his shoulders and onto his arms, she drops down and bites his neck. The massage devolves from there when he rolls over and they wrap themselves around each other, pressing and squeezing, touching and biting, rubbing and pulling until they both collapse in exhaustion.

  Neither feels the minor tremor a few hours later that sets the building swaying in the air. Neither cares.

  Chapter 34

  Day 4

  Santiago, Chile

  Twizzle and Zed look out over the colorful rows of orchids flown in from California. Majestic royal purples fill the rows nearest them. Beyond, creamy yellows, scarlet reds, and brilliant magentas fill out the remainder.

  “Beautiful,” Zed says. “Never get tired of them. Amazing to think that orchids date back 120 million years to the age of the dinosaurs.”

  “Over 35,000 different species of orchid, but none like ours,” Twizzle ruminates.

  They stand in their new Chilean Greenhouse on the piece of land the Foundation purchased for growing grapes for wine. Over 500 orchid plants have been brought in, some in bloom, others still in preparation. All have been propagated from starter orchids that have their beginnings in either the Congo or the Anza Borrego Desert. Their lineage dates back to the time of the California Gi.

  “It’s a start. Where’s Sonnet?” Twizzle asks.

  “Down under with the twin. Forbes and the Mountain went with them.”

  “So it’s the “Mountain” instead of just Ángel, now?”

  “It’s what the kids called him, only they added different prefaces to it.”

  “I can imagine. I’ve noticed that the defensive odor is quite diminished.”

  “And the homeless smell is completely gone. Not sure if I miss it or not.”

  Twizzle gives him a wry look but says nothing. Zed is still a person of the Congo who relishes the odors of wildlife.

  “Took the snake?” Zed says, referring to the twin and Sonnet.

  “To its new home under the earth. The twin says it will expand itself to be a full-blown container for all avatar creation.”

  “So we go back to the old way of creating avatars?” Zed says, referring to when he and Sonnet used to go underground and then inside Gi to have their avatars created for them.

  “The snake Gi and twin will create an avatar container that the snake Gi will eventually grow into and replace.”

  “Mmm,” Zed says contemplatively. “So that’s why the snake was carried here from the Congo. I always wondered what its purpose was other than to creep us out.” Watching the workers adjust the orchids and their support irrigation, Zed says, “So where did we get the gardeners?”

  “From Dr. El. These are more of the ‘Habladas Silencio’.”

  “So we surround ourselves with ourselves again, just like Kinshasa.”

  “Only far less dangerous here. No Marauding soldiers, no Mai Mai militia, no deadly felines or elephants, no crazy bandit gangs that want to eat albino children.”

  “Just corrupt cops, politicians and garden variety thieves.”

  “You get those everywhere, Zed.”

  Zed looks up towards the mountains in the distance, then over to the hacienda buildings they will soon call home. “Beautiful countryside, charming buildings, friendly people, moderate climate. What more could we ask for?”

  “It’s a far cry from the Congo, isn’t it?”

  Zed shakes his head. “I loved the Congo. Its diversity can’t be matched anywhere.”

  “You haven’t explored the Chilean Patagonia area yet, Zed.”

  “And I am looking forward to it.”

  Twizzle looks in the direction of the entry to the underground wine storage that they secured the property for. “The caves connected to the underground shafts remind you of when you were in the desert in Anza Borrego?” Zed asks.

  “I was just a kid, then. It was a long time ago.”

  “But you still have memory of them.”

  “These caves remind me more of the abandoned gold mine the family used in Julian, California. But the cave with all the bats, here? When I went inside it, the smell hit me. Was just like the agave farm bat cave. All the guano on the floor.”

  “Batshit. I’m surprised the locals haven’t used it for fertilizing the grape vines.”

  “Too difficult to get to, I think. Besides, a lot of the locals talk of spirits and evil things inhabiting the cave.”

  “Sounds like superstitions might have been the greater hurdle to getting the guano than any physical impediments.” Zed turns towards the farmhouse buildings they are staying in. “How are our new guests doing?”

  Twizzle shakes her head. “The police interrogation of Isabel shook up both of them pretty well. Sonnet’s idea of getting them out of Santiago for a while was inspired. I could tell that Sister Mary was relieved to put as much distance between her and the police as possible. And Father Donovan, bless his heart, I swear he would do anything to make his precious Sister Mary happy. Those two have quite the relationship. You catch how he looks at her? With puppy dog eyes. He must have the biggest crush on her. I wonder how aware of it she is. I can’t tell by the way she acts. She treats him like a boss.”

  “I think Isabel was just as happy to leave, as long as Sister Mary was with her.”

  Twizzle laughs. “Isabel has eyes for only one person and that is Sister Mary. She’s glommed herself to that nun.”

  “Sister Mary seems to like it, even encourages it by the way she treats her.”

  “The twin says we need to bring Sister Mary into the fold, make her one of the people.”

  “Habladas Silencio or Bangala Elongó’?”

  “Or maybe even something different. They’re all varieties of the same thing. The twin has already started the process. It just remains to be
seen as to whether it takes. The twin introduced a new version into Sister Mary, something that’s a result of the melding of both African Gis. She said the effects would be faster, maybe we’ll see in a few days or so.”

  “Wonder if we’ll feel her?”

  “Or if she’ll feel us. She certainly will feel the twin.”

  “And Isabel?”

  “A black hole for us. Only Ángel and the twin are in touch with that child.”

  “Forbes joked about doing a read on her.”

  Twizzle shivers and frowns. “Bad joke. Bad idea. Not even close to funny. Was he remotely serious?”

  “It was in the context of him and me talking about him doing a read on Ángel, getting to know the guy better, making sure he is what he seems.”

  Twizzle shakes her head. “The twin and Ángel have some sort of relationship outside of what you and I see. They speak to each other on some other level. You ever watch them?”

  “Yeah. They go blank like they’re in some other world. Neither moves, neither talks. They just stare off into space, and then a few minutes later they act as if nothing has happened and go about what they were doing. Very strange.”

  “Ángel had no problem handling the snake the twin had transferred to here. It coiled around his neck and arms like he and it were longtime friends. And it’s grown a lot since we brought it from the Congo. Probably quadrupled in size. A beastly thing. Gave me the willies every time I looked at it.”

  In the distance, Zed sees Sister Mary and Isabel walk hand-in-hand out of the building where they spent the night. The two of them wave to one of the caretakers of the estate; he waves back and beckons them to some tables and chairs under a vine-covered trellis.

  “Brunch time for our guests,” Zed observes.

  “Maybe we should join them. I’m interested to see how the twin’s touch has affected Sister Mary.”