Ghost Sickness

by Amber Foxx

  Before doing the journey, though, she had to get cleaned up and changed. In her bedroom, she found that Jamie had not only put away the laundry but organized her closet. He’d folded so meticulously that her panties fit squarely into the corners of the drawer, with the black satin ones on top. In the bathroom, the towels hung in tri-folds, evenly spaced on the rack. Jamie wasn’t normally this neat, but he could obsess on anything if he was anxious or eager to please. No doubt, he’d been both and had stayed so long that he must have missed his yoga class. Mae wished he’d gone to it. He needed it more than she needed soup and cookies and new kitchen equipment or perfectly folded panties. For any normal boyfriend, one generous act would have been enough. This much domestic effort carried some baggage, love coated with a layer of neurosis, that little buzz she always sensed around Jamie, his personal cloud of emotional gnats.

  She showered, dressed, and called to thank him. He didn’t pick up. She left a message, stumbling around the topic of his doing too much.

  Voices in the backyard drew her attention. Niall and Kenny, working on the deck. She should see if they needed anything before she started the psychic search for the parrot.

  Kenny, a short, muscular young man with dark curly hair and multiple piercings, was kneeling in the dirt holding a measuring tape while Niall stood on a ladder holding the other end, making a mark on the house. Mae asked if they needed anything to eat or drink, but they were set.

  She noticed a piece of black cloth stuck under a board. “What’s that for?”

  “No idea. It’s not mine.” Niall let go of the measuring tape and climbed down the ladder. “Must be trash that blew in.”

  Kenny said, “The same stuff blew into our yard. We had to shake it off the sunflowers before we could throw it away. It was weird. It looked like someone had been blacking out windows.”

  Mae picked up the fabric. The shape did suggest a window, and bits of masking tape stuck to it. She used heavy curtains to make her room dark at night, but taping the windows dark didn’t make sense. “Why would anyone do that? You’d have to take it down to let the light in, or you’d have to turn on the lights if you left it up.”

  “Idiot’s attempt at a darkroom?” Niall shrugged. “Who knows?”

  Mae wadded it up to take it in to the trash and said she would let them get on with their work. As she put her hand to the doorknob, Niall said, “Hold on. You’ve got a back gate now. Check it out. You can go straight out to the dumpsters.”

  “And to visit your neighbors,” Kenny added.

  The portion of fence that bordered on the alley now sported black iron hinges, a latch, and a chain she could use to lock it from the inside. Mae had wanted such a gate since she’d moved in. She thanked them, used the gate, got rid of the cloth, and went back into the house to be met once more by the view inside her hyper-organized closet.

  She understood what was behind Jamie’s efforts to please her—the whirlpool of anxious good intentions and inner chaos that led him to waste his morning this way—and it made her want to hug him and reassure him that he didn’t have to try to so hard. But until he believed he was worthy and whole, nothing she could say or do would change anything. He would be like this.

  Mae imagined herself complaining to the Chino sisters. He’s too considerate, too generous, and too eager to make a commitment. And what, they would ask, is wrong with that? She wouldn’t have an answer except that she wished he could relax.

  She sat cross-legged on the living room floor, holding the green feather, a quartz crystal, and her grandmother’s amethyst. After a short meditation to settle her mind, she set the question for her journey. Is this Placido’s feather?

  The tunnel took her slowly and twisted as she moved through it, as if her energy was being pulled two ways, before her vision opened in a long room with many windows and a view of a street bordered by a red dirt bluff. Florencia’s studio.

  A green parrot sidestepped back and forth on the perch in his cage, talking to himself in a voice that was sweeter than she had imagined parrot voices to be. The bird cocked his head to the side and said, “Hello.” He tried it several times, and then seemed to answer an expected question. “Good. Good.” He flapped and resettled. “Parrot. Green parrot.” Perhaps this was a conversation he’d had that day, or he was practicing his words, like an actor going over lines. Hello. How are you? Good. And what are you? I’m a parrot, a green parrot. “Ma-a-a-ate. G’day mate.” He looked around and cocked his head. “Ma-a-a-ate. G’day mate.”

  Surprise almost broke Mae’s concentration. The feather really had come from Jamie’s favorite parrot.

  She renewed her focus into the vision. A small canvas sat on an easel at the far end of the studio, dots of some dark substance outlining the shapes that might become a painting. Colored sketches on paper, versions of the same work, were taped to the wall with masking tape. One was the exact size of the canvas and punctured with tiny holes along every line, a picture of a bright pink parrot against a background of blue and red corn. Mae’s first reaction was that she didn’t like it, followed by an inner voice that sounded like Niall’s saying, That’s because you don’t know much about art.

  The parrot spoke a few more words, a little more loudly. Was he lonely? Did he want attention?

  Reno and Florencia came in. She looked as frail as when Mae had met her. Reno held her arm, steadying her.

  “G’day,” said the parrot.

  “What the hell?” Florencia asked.

  The parrot spoke again in his small sweet voice. “Pretty lady.”

  She glared at Reno. “Is this a joke?”

  “No.” He guided her to the stool in front of her canvas. “It’s a gift.”

  “I don’t remember asking for a parrot.”

  “But you’ve been so depressed since Violet died. I feel like you’ve given up. You need a new bird to love and take care of.”

  “I miss her. But I’m not depressed.”

  “You act like it. You never go out anymore. You stopped your treatments. It’s like you quit on yourself.” Reno walked over to the cage. “You’ll love him. He’ll be good company.” He opened it slowly and urged the bird to step up onto his forearm. “You’ll feel like trying again.” Reno stood over her, petting the parrot’s breast, and whispered to it, “Talk to her, introduce yourself.”

  The bird climbed his arm and ducked into Reno’s hair.

  “What were you thinking?” Florencia snapped. “He’ll live to be fifty or sixty.”

  “You’ll have thirty or forty years with him when you get well. You could live to be ninety.”

  “No. I didn’t stop treatments because I’ve given up. My doctors have. I’m dying.”

  Reno’s eyes widened. “What?”

  “I didn’t tell you everything. I waited too long. By the time I got diagnosed, it was already spreading. It’s in my liver and my bones now. The most any more treatments could give me would be an extra month or two of sick, miserable life. I’d rather feel a little better and try to finish this painting. It’s going to be my last.”

  “I’m sorry. How ... how long do you have?”

  “Not long.” Florencia turned away from him. “Take the bird back to the store. I’d be stupid to let him get attached to me. How could you even afford a parrot?”

  Reno reached one hand to gather the parrot from his shoulder and sheltered the bird against his chest. Placido squawked, as if Reno had not handled him well. “I sold some paintings.”

  “Paintings?” She faced him again. “How many? You sell one every other month if you’re lucky, for two hundred bucks that go straight into the Rabbit. Hell, I paid for that damn car’s last repairs. Where in the world did you get the money?”

  “I ... I had help buying him.” He moved the bird onto his forearm again. Placido struggled to get a good perch. “I got a discount.”

  “You couldn’t afford even a half-price parrot. Did I pay for my own bird? Should I see if anything’s missing?”

&nb
sp; “No. How can you say that?” Reno tried to adjust his arm position, but the bird only worked harder to balance on it. “I got a really good price. Your nephew’s wife works in a parrot store.”

  “That greedy little vulture?”

  “She’s not—”

  “She is. They all are.” Florencia’s eyes flashed with anger. “I told you not to have anything to do with them.”

  “But they helped me get you a parrot.”

  “Because they want to get into my will.” A long silence. When Florencia spoke again, her tone was flat and resigned. “And that’s all you want, too, isn’t it? A parrot. You didn’t think I’d live thirty or forty years. Look at me. You knew, didn’t you?”

  “No—I ... I want you to live. I love you.”

  “When was the last time you said that? Or showed it?” Florencia stood and smacked her palm on the stool, punctuating her words with the sound. Placido flapped off Reno’s arm, flashing the patches of red and blue under his wings, and Mae’s vision followed him out of the studio. He landed on the chair in the living room, tail fanned, body quivering. “Get out.” Florencia’s voice shook. “And catch that damned bird and take it with you. Don’t even think about coming back.”

  The vision faded as questions flooded into Mae’s mind. She took her crystals to rebalance in salt water in the kitchen and sat at the table, the feather cupped in her palm. After she’d rested and cleared her head, she might need to try another journey with it. What she’d seen bewildered and disturbed her.

  When she’d thought Reno was in love with his teacher, that had been troubling enough, but pretending to love her would be worse.

  Why did Florencia call Shelli a greedy little vulture? Had they met? Had Reno put Will and Shelli up to stealing the parrots? If so, why hadn’t he given the hyacinth as a gift?

  Florencia had implied that Reno not only wanted to get in her will, but that he might have used her money or sold something of hers to buy the parrot. It was probably only a petty comment, rubbing in his poverty and how much she paid for, but maybe not. Did his secret involve stealing from her?

  Taking cash from her purse wouldn’t involve other people, though. As poor as her health was, she had to be on pain meds and quite likely medical marijuana. Could Reno have stolen and sold some of the drugs? He had the opportunity. Mae couldn’t see Zak getting involved, though, and Reno could only have accessed a small amount.

  Mae was still lost in thought when her phone rang. Jamie. Her message had asked him to call her back, and he would want to know about Placido. After some affectionate small talk, she gave him a short version of what she’d found out. “I wonder if Reno kept him. If that was what he was hiding from Misty.”

  “Nah. Placido likes to talk. And Reno doesn’t. Don’t think he’s the type to want a parrot. And he’d have left him alone all weekend and you don’t do that to parrots.”

  “He came back early.”

  “Not early enough for a bird. Jeezus—early bird. Didn’t mean that. Sorry—drifting. He came back to do some weird thing with black fabric last night. And to get that tabletop. He doesn’t want you fucking with his secrets, y’know?”

  “Black fabric? There was some in my yard, and in Frank and Kenny’s yard.”

  “Yeah. Scared the crap out of me. Thought it was a giant bat.”

  “I wish you’d told me about it. Kenny and I both threw it away. If it was Reno’s, I could have found something out.”

  “Nah. Shouldn’t have mentioned it. My brain’s a few steps behind my mouth. We need to let go of all that. I was going to explain yesterday, but, y’know how my mind works ... I forgot. But now I remembered. The thing is—they need the money. And they’re not hurting anyone.”

  Mae listened to Jamie’s explanation of Montana’s financial needs. He didn’t care anymore that she had gotten drunk and hit his van, only that she was broke because Will owed her money.

  “I’m sorry she let that happen,” Mae said. “But you’ve got no proof they’re not hurting anyone. I worry about Misty marrying into this mess.”

  “You want to stop them from getting married? Jeezus. Projecting your issues or something?”

  “And you’re not projecting your issues?”

  “Bloody hell. Of course I am. I know what it’s like to be that poor.”

  “I was talking about Reno and Misty getting married. Even if they love each other, it doesn’t mean they should. Not yet. There’s something so sneaky about that black fabric—Reno blacking out his windows, like he didn’t want anyone to know he was home.”

  A long silence.

  “Jamie?”

  “Don’t think he was home. He was carrying that stuff from somewhere else. Dropped the bag or lost a few pieces. That’s the only way he—Jeezus. I wasn’t going to tell you this.” Jamie described the hand at the gate. “He knew it had blown into your yard. So he wasn’t at home.”

  “He’d been blacking out windows somewhere else?”

  The first place she thought of was Florencia’s house, which was three and a half blocks up Foch Street from Reno’s place on Austin. He lived one block east of Foch. Mae’s place on Marr, the next block down, was just two buildings to the west of Foch. On the west side of Austin, a small parking lot connected with the alley between Austin and Marr. He could have been on his way home and done as Jamie said, dropping the bag or losing some fabric to the wind. If he’d chased it, he’d have seen it blow over her fence.

  Why hadn’t Reno stopped at the first dumpster he came to, though, behind one of the businesses on Main or Broadway? She tried to imagine what would make it hard to toss a paper bag into a dumpster. If she carried several bags out, she had to put them down to lift the lid. Reno might have had his hands full of something he didn’t want to set down.

  She didn’t like where this was leading her. “If he had a key to his teacher’s house—”

  “Nah. Chuck asked him at the coffee place and Reno said she’d wanted it back.”

  “That’s not the same as saying he gave it to her, or that he didn’t copy it. What if he’s been stealing stuff there?” Not drugs but art. The paintings and sculptures in Florencia’s living room were too big to steal without a truck or a van, but the pieces in her bedroom were small. The back of the house faced a bluff and her neighbors were away, but the front overlooked Main Street, where even in the middle of the night in July, there was an occasional passerby. He’d have needed to darken those windows. “Letitia’s probably got art connections. She might know who’d buy it.”

  “Don’t see how Zak or Will is connected, or David and Shelli. And Reno’s teacher just went into hospice. He couldn’t have stolen anything until now.”

  Mack had stolen money from Mae on a regular basis, claiming it wasn’t theft since they were married. She’d endured it until she fell out of love with him. If Florencia had loved Reno, she might have let him steal from her, too. “He could have slipped some small stuff out while she was sick.”

  “Can’t see it. He had to be close to her, y’know? Studying with her all that time.”

  “He’s not honest with other people he’s close to. He lies to his daddy and to Misty. He’s been keeping her out of his place for months. He tells her it’s his housekeeping, but I bet it’s not that bad. Nothing he’d be ashamed of.”

  “Mm. Reckon. He was never a messy kid.”

  Mae rose and began ladling the soup into containers for the freezer. “So you know he’s lying.”

  “Doesn’t mean he’s stealing. Or that we should try to stop whatever he is doing. Or that we can. Lonnie said it’s like a stew. We can’t uncook it. It’s been made.”

  “But the marriage hasn’t.”

  “Jeezus. You and marriage. Good thing I’m at Dr. G’s office. Heading in as we speak. I need therapy after I talk to you.”

  “Sugar—”

  “I know, I know, I need therapy because I’m fucked up.” He snort-laughed. “It was a joke.”

  “Not one of your best.�
�

  “Sorry. No worries, all right, love? I’m a work in progress.”

  They wound up the call. Mae tried to reassure herself, but the conversation left her tense. It felt unfinished. Not because of his clumsy joke, but because of his defense of his friends. It was well-meaning but short-sighted. She finished putting the soup away and washed the crockpot, thinking about Lonnie’s analogy. Maybe Reno’s activities were a stew that couldn’t be uncooked, but Misty still needed to know about them.

  Mae dried her crystals, went back to the living room, and sat on the floor to journey with the feather again. She left her intention wide open this time. Maybe she would learn where the parrot was. Maybe she would learn more about Reno and Shelli and Will, how and why they had stolen the bird.

  Her vision opened in an art gallery. Traditional Southwestern landscapes hung on the walls and classic pueblo pots filled the glass shelves. Shelli and a petite woman who had the same deep-set eyes and oddly indented nose as David were talking with a tall white woman of about fifty. Placido or another Eclectus perched on Shelli’s shoulder.

  The Anglo woman said, “I was hoping for something by Florencia Mirabal.” Her stiff platinum hair and crisp, preppy-casual clothes suggested money and non-New Mexico origins. So did her accent—old South. Richmond, if Mae had to guess.

  “We carry her nephew’s work.” The woman who looked like David’s relative was as hard as he was soft, not an ounce of fat on her body. The only thing about her that flowed was her hair, long and abundant, barely starting to gray. “As far as selling her work ...”

  “I thought you’d be expecting me. I’m Dorothy Clemens. Letitia Westover-Brown sent me.”

  Shelli and the gallery proprietor exchanged glances. “I need to go in and clean the parrots’ cages anyway,” Shelli said. “I can show her what we’ve got.”

  “Thank you.” The small woman shook hands with the visitor. Her manner was warm, but it was the practiced warmth of a tour guide or a salesperson. “I’m Kathy Chavez-Mirabal. I was married to Florencia’s brother. We do have a very special legacy here. It belongs to my son—my husband gave it to him when we separated. I hope you’ll understand how we feel about selling any of it.”