by Olivia Boler
Two boys and a girl, who range in age from a little older than Romola to a little older than Cleo, occupy the room along with a hefty tattooed woman. She reminds me of Dragon Pearl, a Mendocino Wiccan and friend of Gru. The woman salutes as we enter. The boys are engaged in some horrible, noisy video game on the TV, and don’t even glance our way, but the girl, who looks like she’s the oldest, gazes at us with some curiosity from where she sits on the shag. She’s busy putting together a collage of eyes, snipping them from old magazines.
Tyson introduces everyone—the boys are Baltie and Seamus, and the girl is Saville. “And Zanna here is the woman of the hour,” he says, pointing to the babysitter. She grabs Tyson and bear-hugs him to her bosom, laughing a hearty smoker’s laugh that ends with a kiss on the top of his head. She’s got at least fifty pounds on him.
“Want to meet the kids’ dad?” Tyson gives me a nudge. I smile a little. Rob Duffy!
“Give me a sec.” I turn to the girls. “I’ll be right back to check on you, okay?”
They’re standing next to Saville, watching her with the same attention they gave to Hillary. It’s all very normal, but I wonder about their isolation from other children, especially older girls.
“Hey, Romola, look at these cool books.” I crouch down on the other side of the coffee table and pick up what appears to be a brand new copy of Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. I wonder if Viveka would approve.
“Um, excuse me,” Saville says. “But I can’t see the television.”
The television. The television with that violent excuse for a game on it.
“Sorry.” I move out of her way. I turn to see what the boys are playing. Something with monsters and soldiers, and I recognize the helmet of a Buer demon from my magickal history lessons of days gone by. As he raises his sword to slay a human fighter, he turns for a moment towards the room and says, “This is for you, Memphis!” before plunging the weapon into the soldier’s eye.
I check on the girls, but they are busy scoping out some coloring books. Saville and her brothers don’t seem to have noticed anything unusual. They have already forsaken their child-magick and given in to letting others do the imagining for them.
“Don’t worry, Lady of the Ancients,” the Buer demon shouts over his shoulder as he runs up a rocky hill towards a moth dragon. “Young Misses will be just fine under my watch.”
I heard about this a while back, before I left the craft: demons and fairies that have found a way to convert their matter into electrons—or is it protons?—to make some kind of tiny energy wave that can enter an electric stream. They’ve been messing around with online role-playing games and video games, wreaking all kinds of mischief. They only do it every so often when they’re bored—or when there’s a need.
I hope this Buer demon is simply bored.
He swings his sword around and decapitates another soldier. I look at the boys. They don’t look happy about the Buer demon’s progress.
“Okay,” I say to Tyson. “Lead on, my liege.”
****
We wend our way back up the hall. I immediately notice the stares Tyson gets, especially from women. It’s like the Red Sea parting for Moses as we make our way through the crowd. It doesn’t seem to faze him at all. Then again, he’s wearing his rock-star sunnies. I find this slightly annoying. Just slightly. How can he see? The fluorescent lights are hardly stunners. I hate to think of him kowtowing to image. And yes, the fawning women are annoying too.
“So, those’re Rob Duffy’s kids,” Ty says, as if it needs to be said.
“They seem too old to be his.”
“That’s what happens when you’re sixteen and you don’t use a condom.”
“And then you don’t use a condom two more times?”
The corners of his mouth turn up like he wants to laugh but won’t. We stop two doors up from the “nursery.”
“By the way,” he says. “You look awesome.”
Do I? I touch my hair. “Thanks. I was going for the rock concert reporter look. That or a Beat poet.”
“No, I mean…” He pauses and a door with a giant gold star on it opens. The noise blasting out of the room is so intense all else is lost for the moment, including whatever it is he was going to say about my awesomeness. It’s as if Tyson has opened the door onto a distant planet. The room is about the same size as the nursery, but someone has painted the walls a deep, cabernet red and adorned them with curlicues of black, gold, and silver paint that coil into points of fleurs-de-lys. A disco ball hanging from the ceiling spirals prisms across the surface of everything and everyone. The floor is carpeted wall to wall in a plush, black faux fur, thick enough for a girl to lose her kitten heels in. Couches all along the walls in the same material are chockablock with throw pillows spilling onto the floor.
An identical makeup counter to the one in the nursery is covered in silver paper, and there’s a spread of hors d’oeuvres. Crackers and cheese seem appropriate, but the raw oysters and thumb-sized prawns are a little swank for this crowd. In the corner, a bartender pours drinks and appears to have every brand of tequila under the sun. A huge glass bowl the size of a small bathtub holds sangria, wine glasses lined up next to it. From the press kit I know that sangria is Cheradon Badler’s drink of choice, and this special bowl shows up at every party. Orange rinds litter the carpet.
Ty follows my gaze and shakes his head. “Don’t drink it. It’ll floor you like that.” He snaps his fingers.
I nod and look around some more. The Party People have crossed over with the Beautiful People. I recognize a few from my hallway journey, or maybe it’s just that everyone looks the same, stunningly cool, put-together, and blasé, as if such stylishness is above every philosophy or cause and shouldn’t be given a second thought—and isn’t. There are about twenty people in the room, which makes it cozy, and I realize that along with the blast of noise comes a heavy, ovenlike heat.
Ty takes my hand and leads me through the multitude. His grip is firm, and a little thrill in my belly takes me by surprise. We weave through conversations and blank stares and the lighting of clove cigarettes. A man exchanges nods with Tyson, and I realize it’s Rob Duffy. We say hello and move along too quickly. I feel a thumping in my chest. It’s not my heart, but the bass coming out of speakers next to a DJ, who is stationed opposite the bartender. They’re like two pillars of Atlas holding up the room. I don’t recognize what’s playing: some mix of techno, a forgettable anthem.
What is unforgettable is the smell of vanilla mingling with the orange rinds, a ribbon underneath all the sweat, smoke, and perfume pummeling my nostrils. I raise my head and follow the ribbon like a dog will hunt. It leads, unsurprisingly, to Cheradon Badler.
PART THREE: THE ROCK STARS
Chapter Thirteen
She’s sitting on a couch all by herself, her bare feet tucked up underneath her, the quintessential queen bee among the drones. They are at her feet, draped on throw pillows, worshippers and loyal subjects, slavish. They stand at a distance and steal what they hope are discreet glances. Occasionally, someone calls to her from a nether couch—hers is like an extra-wide throne—and she answers with a smile and a wink.
Cheradon’s hair is long and platinum with clipped peacock feathers woven in here and there. It’s an elaborate ‘do. The tips are dyed in a matching green and accentuate her eye shadow. Her slender, muscled arms are bronzy—like her aura—against the black wife-beater she’s wearing, which fades against her hot pink satin jeans. It’s possible that she and I are the only two people in the room without any visible tattoos. Even Ty has some sort of headless snake circling his bicep. She does, however, sport the tiniest diamond pierced in her nose. You could almost miss it.
We stand before her and she raises her hands and Ty slaps her a high ten, as if they were brother and sister. She’s not wearing any rings, certainly not the alleged engagement ring Ty gave her.
“So, this is your girl,” she says and clasps her hands together, gazing into m
y eyes in that way I’ve heard certain charismatics do, so that I feel as if I’m the only important person in the whole wide world. I know it’s all an illusion, but there’s comfort in it. Not the illusion, but in knowing that Cheradon Badler is, in her own way, a sorceress.
Of course she is. Why else would I, along with millions of music-buying fans of all ages all over the world, adore her so? She pats the cushion next to her. I sit and pull out my notebook.
“Oh, goody,” she says. “Take charge.”
“You don’t mind, do you?” I ask.
“I like it.” She pretends to peer into my bag. “No tape recorder? Ty said you have a tape recorder.”
“Oh, I do. It’s just that it’s kind of noisy in here. Maybe we can go somewhere more quiet?”
“After the show.” She looks away. Guess we know who is the true take-charger.
Ty perches on the couch’s armrest, and I watch his face. He radiates a deep rose. Cheradon has gone from bronze to a faint peach seeped with silver. The silver reminds me of someone but I can’t place who, and I find myself wishing that when I gave up magick I had remembered to recharge my photographic memory charm now and then. And then I realize that the silvery bits are a lot like Gru’s aura, when she was relaxed.
Someone comes by and hands Tyson a beer. Dos Equis with lime. I keep expecting him to reach out for Cheradon, to grasp her hand or claim a kiss. He takes a pull on his beer and starts talking to one of the carpet loungers.
“Something to drink?” Cheradon asks.
I almost say sangria but remember Ty’s warning. “Just water is good. Or fruit juice.” Cheradon doesn’t even raise an artistically sculpted eyebrow (five shades darker than her hair) as she signals the bartender.
“I like the article you wrote about Ty’s band,” Cheradon says, her slight overbite charming the bejesus out of me.
“Thanks.” I pause and decide to be truthful. “I really didn’t feel it was all that special. It was just, you know, typical.”
“Are you kidding? No, no, no, no, no.” She grips a pillow with one hand, her nails clean and natural. “It really got to the heart of the band. I think you could be their biographer. Shit, fuck that. I think you could be Yeah Right’s biographer.”
“You’re joking.” I try to meet Tyson’s eye, but he’s getting his palm read by a Cheradon Badler wannabe. More like stroked and tickled.
“Well. Of course we’ll have to see. But sure, why not? I mean, if these two shows go well, it could be the start of something, you know.” She shakes her head. “Madcap, baby.”
“Madcap.” I like it.
The bartender sets down a bottle of Evian and a glass of pineapple juice topped with a tadpole of maraschino cherries, melon, and a paper umbrella. Cheradon holds out her wine glass to me and I obligingly clink. The noise is loud enough to turn Tyson’s head. He looks at me, and I know he’s heard every word we’ve said. And even though Cheradon hasn’t acknowledged her, I’m sure that the girl who is practically licking his fingers will never ever get the privilege of entering this room again.
I look over the questions I’ve written in my notebook. “What do you do,” I say, “to get ready for a performance?”
Cheradon looks around the room. “This.” She puts her hand near my knee. “Ty says you were best friends with Alice.”
Hearing Alice’s name takes me by surprise. We’re going there? I look in Cheradon’s eyes, but they are all friendliness and ease. Her aura has gone coppery again. I am instantly distracted from the interview.
“We were friends,” I say. “That’s right.”
“I wish I could have known her.”
I nod. “She was…she was a really good person.” This is the highest praise I can think of for anyone. In Alice’s case, I mean it.
Cheradon mirrors my nod. “That’s what I hear. She was a saint.”
“I don’t know if I’d go that far.”
“How could she not be, going to Africa to help the little starving mommies and babies, only to get—” She searches for the right word. “Only to get punished.”
Some things are easy to know, like Cheradon’s possessive hold over Tyson, and his adoration of her. Some are not so easy. Like the reason why Cheradon would bring up Alice and say such things in this situation. Maybe she’s just trying to make a connection with her interviewer. Or maybe she’s prodding my weaknesses.
My heart, that old barometer, is beating rapidly, and I silently ask it to quiet down. It does me the favor of listening, and I feel the heat in my skin cooling, the tension on my face dissolving. I put my hand on her shoulder as I say, “You would have loved her.”
When I touch her skin a puissance spell tings against my senses. It sparks up my arm and I see stars.
You’ve got to be kidding me.
It’s weak. Any half-trained pellar could break it. Underneath it though, I read through her guise and recognize for a moment the iron-like grasp she has or plans to have on everything she desires. But then she adjusts in her seat, delicately brushing away my hand, and her false front is back. Still, I am no longer under her charismatic pull. All I can do for the moment is pretend I didn’t see that glamour, and wonder who it is that’s helping her.
Chapter Fourteen
There isn’t much time to process Cheradon’s magick act, as production assistants pop in and kick out practically everyone who isn’t a band member from Cheradon’s vampirish party room. Ty manages to slip out the door with me, mumbling something about being my escort back to the kids’ room.
“Is it always like this?” I ask him, and even as the words leave my mouth I know they are naïve, but I sense he wants to know that I’ve been impressed.
“Pretty much.” Tyson lets go of a tired sigh as we walk. “So. What did you think?”
“About Cheradon?”
“Yeah.”
“She’s really something,” I say, pleased with my prevarication. Nice and neutral. “Tell me again how you two met.”
“Just outside Portland in Vancouver, Washington. She caught our show at this little club. Or her manager did. Told her we’d be good together. As bands.”
This must be the manager who liked my story on Arsenic Playground. “Is he here?”
“D.B.? Of course. I’m surprised he hasn’t talked to you yet. He’s kind of a control freak. Likes to have his hooves on every little detail.”
I make a mental note to be sure to talk to D.B. “So as a reporter, I feel it’s incumbent upon me to ask if you’ve set a date for your nuptials.”
Tyson stops walking, hands in pockets, and leans against the wall. “Off the record?”
At this point, I’m not even thinking about the article. I nod.
“After the tour. We’re heading up to Anderson Valley. Cheradon’s got a place there. Vineyards and whatnot.”
“Whatnot, eh? Sounds divine.”
“It is.” He smiles a secret little smile, and I wonder what he’s thinking. “She told me that it was okay to tell you,” he says. “Off the record.”
“Why all the hush-hush?”
“It’s fun. And it tells the gossip-rag rats up yours. And…I don’t know. I just do what I’m told.”
We look at each other for a moment, and I have to tell myself to turn my frown upside down. He smiles back.
“Do me a favor,” I say.
“Yeah?”
“Take off those five-hundred-dollar sunglasses.”
“Actually, I think they were a grand.” He removes them. There are fierce little indentations where the nose pads have settled into his skin. The beginnings of crow’s feet frame his brown eyes. He glances at me and away, unable to hold my gaze. I see grief. Good grief, grief that should be there, but the strange thing is that there’s nothing else. None of the rosy pink glow that surrounds him when the glasses are on.
“Cheradon gave you those glasses, right?” I reach for them.
His face clouds, but he recovers with a light, confused laugh and pulls them away fr
om me, cleaning them on the bottom of his T-shirt. “I didn’t hear her tell you that.” He puts them back on and looks down at me. “What are you, psychic?” The grief is there still, but it’s been smothered way down.
I look back at him until he glances around. We are alone in the hallway, and, it seems, alone in the building. He reaches for me, his hand cupping the back of my neck and pulls me towards him. We kiss and my eyes close. It’s a long one, not at all innocent, and after he pulls away I admit to myself that I wish we could do it again.
A door at the end of the hall leading to the staging area bursts open, and a blond middle-aged man hurries towards us. “There’s my guy!” he booms, a bundle of jazzy bonhomie. “Ty, we gotta go. You’re already fifteen minutes late. Let’s not have a riot like we did in Cleveland, capiche?”
He glances at my press pass. “Ah, you must be Ned’s gal.” He holds out his hand. “Chad Beane. Good to meet you.”
I take his hand and get a good look. Everything about him is on the surface: all he wants is for Ty to get on the stage ASAP. “They treating you good? You going to write about our legendary boys and girls and the fans who just can’t get enough?”
“Like Depeche Mode.” I can’t resist. He is still holding my hand, long past overdue on giving it back.
“Hey hey!” he crows. “This chicky-babe knows her mod bands. I like it. Listen, hate to break up this cozy klatch, but the boy really does have to skee-doo if he knows what’s good for him. Sweetheart.” He lets go of my hand only to wind his arm around my waist so we are pressed hip to hip. “I’ll see you afterwards, and we’ll talk. Okay? Okay. Ty, let’s vamoose.”
He steers Tyson by the shoulders down the hall and out the doors.
****
Viveka’s girls are curled up on either end of the couch. Someone, probably Zanna, has covered them with blankets. I smooth back their hair and Romola stirs without waking, sighing through her nose. Cleo opens and closes her mouth once. The video game is still going strong, although it’s on mute, and the boys and Saville are still in its thrall. The Buer demon salutes me and I give him a nod.
