“How did they act with the chicas? You told me already, didn’t you, Puss? Humor an old lady and tell me again.” She dropped into her rocker and began to move back and forth at a furious pace, causing her chair to inch toward the fire. Peasblossom flicked his tail out of range and discreetly rescued the trailing end of one of her shawls.
He recounted the creatures’ actions toward Xochi and Pallas. The Hag’s wild brows rose on her mossy forehead. “They were scanning ’em, man! Running their priors. They know who’s naughty and nice, like Santa Claus. They can tell.” The Hag was silent for a moment, working her long gray hair into knots with sharp-clawed hands. “But why, man, why? Why’d they come? Those freaks never show up anymore, but they used to, baby, once in a blue moon. Weren’t even calling it California back then.” She snorted and sat back in her chair. “What do you think those babies want? What’s their angle, Cat?”
“Babies?” Peasblossom purred—to calm himself or the Hag, he wasn’t sure which.
“You know, man. Tlaloques, Chaneques. Waterbabies.” Seeing Peasblossom’s confusion, the Hag snorted. “You been hanging out with the squares too long. They’re fey, right, but came outta the water? Hella old school. I’m surprised you even saw them. They’re slippery, baby. Here one second, gone the next. But the freaks you saw sound a lot like the ones I remember—big-eyed kids with hair down to the ground.”
“That makes them sound so . . . harmless.”
“Harmless, my ass!” she said. “They’re the bill collectors, baby.” The Hag rose and began to tidy her madly organized burrow, moving things inexplicably from one location to another. “One girl floats, one girl sinks,” she singsonged. “One smells like a rose, the other one stinks!”
Peasblossom had been careful to keep the urgency from his voice, but now it broke through. “Is it significant that Pallas was levitating?” His mind raced to witch hunts and inquisitions—situations in which floating was not ideal.
“Levi-what? Speak English, baby. We all had to learn it. But you mean the floating, don’t you, amigo?”
Peasblossom nodded. Just discussing those uncanny children raised the fur on his spine.
“Wish I could tell you, Cat. Who knows why the oldsters do like they do? But I’ll tell you what: somebody did somebody wrong. Somebody’s jive, and someone’s gotta pay. Banditos, baby. It’s an old story, Cat. Old as it gets.” She stopped suddenly and returned to her rocker, exhaling noisily. “Don’t get me wrong, baby. Lo siento about the rock stars’ kid and the foxy señorita. I see ’em around sometimes. They feed the birds, pet the dogs, look at the sky. Good energy. Me gusto, you dig?”
“My greatest concern is for the girl, Pallas,” Peasblossom said. “She’s under my protection. It did seem to me that the creatures were most interested in the young woman, Xochi.”
The Hag rocked faster. “She’s a little long in the tooth. Those coppers usually work for kids, man. But the señorita’s not a kid, is she? Not a grown woman, either. In between, baby. No-man’s-land. But they stayed with her longer than they did with the kid, isn’t that what you said?”
“Yes, several minutes.” Peasblossom’s head ached. The room was stuffy, the Hag’s odor intense.
She turned away from the fire and met Peasblossom’s eyes, something she’d never done in all the years he’d known her. “You be careful, amigo,” she said. “Those narcs are old school. Not like the candy-ass airy fairies we got around here now.”
“So you think someone might have hurt one of the girls?” Peasblossom said. “And these . . . Waterbabies . . . are here to take revenge?”
“Cat! Listen, baby. They’re the fuzz, not the mob!”
“So they’re operating by some sort of moral code?”
“That’s how they used to do. They were righteous, you dig? Like the Alcatraz Indians, baby! Like Martin and Malcolm. Like Cesar Chavez. Power to the people, Cat! Right on.” The Hag raised her small brown fist in the air, suddenly young, her eyes fierce and bright.
Peasblossom purred in solidarity. After a moment he asked, “So the creatures are dangerous? You’re sure about that?”
“Does a hippie spare change in the park?” The Hag spat into the fire. “Those creepy little cop kids lay down the law, baby. Anybody in their way better pull over fast. You better hope it was just some good acid you had, baby. Kickass acid and too much smoke.”
9
Our Heaven
Xochi hadn’t seen Leviticus in the kitchen since the first time Pallas brought her home to Eris Gardens. Leaving the aquarium, she and Pallas had stepped into the cold, clear light of Golden Gate Park, talking nonstop. It had been windy and bitterly cold that day, so they’d stopped at The Unbearable Lightness of Reading to warm up.
Loretta’s stash of money had gotten Xochi from Badger Creek to San Francisco, but it was dwindling fast. Xochi worried about browsing when she couldn’t buy, but Pallas seemed to think it was fine. She introduced Xochi to Peasblossom, inquired after the owner, and used the bathroom like she was the one who owned the place. “I come here a lot,” she said.
Back outside, Pallas announced, “It’s family dinner night. You have to come!”
Xochi felt weird accepting the invitation, but she’d been living on peanut butter sandwiches for almost three weeks. Her anxiety raced as they climbed the small mountain Pallas claimed was her street and the houses changed from apartment buildings to ornate, colorful houses, like the toys of some lucky child giant.
Pallas stopped at a brick stairway bordered by a tangled hillside garden. Above it loomed the gabled roofline of an enormous picture-book Victorian.
“You live here?”
Pallas had only laughed.
The steep stairs went on forever. After a switchback, the second flight was shorter, landing Xochi smack in the middle of Wonderland. A wrought iron gate covered in winter-dormant vines demanded a pause, providing theatrical timing for the big reveal: a tall, Swan Lake ballerina of a house, complete with ornate floral moldings and elaborate lacy trim, white on white like the prettiest embroidered lingerie, its tower crowned with an onion-shaped dome straight out of the Arabian Nights.
Through the gate, another set of steps led to the front porch, flanked by two stone lions with marigold wreaths around their necks. Above the door was a painted crest: a flaming, sword-pierced heart, the words eris gardens printed in gothic script across its blood-bright surface.
Pallas opened the massive wooden door without a key. After nearly a month of walking the city, longing to see inside one of its fabled Victorians, Xochi couldn’t quite make the journey across the threshold. Pallas had rolled her eyes and grabbed Xochi’s hand. “I smell dinner,” she said. “My dad’s an excellent cook.”
The light-flooded foyer opened into a ballroom. A filigreed grand staircase arched to the second floor. Xochi imagined turn-of-the-century ladies making velvet-gowned entrances, their jewels outsparkling the chandeliers.
Pallas stomped past all of it, unaware of the bits of dirt her turquoise cowgirl boots left on the gleaming wooden floors. She led Xochi past a formal living room and dining room. “We only use them for parties,” she explained.
The cluttered kitchen was deliciously warm and smelled of candles, incense and curry. When Xochi closed her eyes, it could have been the cramped Badger Creek kitchen, with random neighbors dropping by and Loretta sending Xochi to the garden for extra veggies to stretch the stew.
Pallas introduced her to everyone that night, their names a blur as they bustled around, setting the table, filling water glasses, opening bottles of wine. If they were surprised Pallas had brought home a stray girl she’d found at the Academy of Science, they barely let on. Only Kylen seemed suspicious, his eyes narrowed and his too-firm handshake held slightly too long. The rest of them acted like she was a family dinner regular, filling her wine glass without asking, making sure she had enough to eat. They invit
ed her back the next week for Indian takeout and board games and out for pizza the week after that. Then one day, there was a message at the front desk of her Tenderloin hotel: We have a proposition for you. Please call ASAP.
“Don’t bring your tricks in here,” the clerk said, smirking. “I don’t want trouble with no underage hoes.”
An hour later, Xochi had packed her things and said goodbye to the cockroaches and her moldy window with its heating duct view. She’d spent five of her last eighty-six dollars on a taxi to Eris Gardens and never looked back.
That first evening, Leviticus stood barefoot at the stove, yellow curry bubbling in a big enamel pot, humming along to Billie Holiday. Today, it was blueberry pancakes and old-timey gospel with a sin-voiced singer and tricky rhythm guitar. He sang along, tapping the rhythm with a spatula on the side of the cast-iron griddle.
His voice was deeper than the one on the record, but just as raspy—probably from last night’s concert. Then, his songs had been spells, enveloping the crowd like the thickest liquid, the softest smoke. Xochi had been as starstruck as anyone. But now, he was a regular person again—still gorgeous, of course, but contained, private and untouchable.
“Good morning,” he said.
“Good morning.” Xochi sat at the massive yellow kitchen table.
“You’re my hero,” Bubbles told Leviticus, coming up behind him to press her head against his back. She handed a glass of water and a bottle of painkillers to Aaron, settling between him and Xochi and angling her chair so she could rest her bare feet in Aaron’s lap.
“Who’s first?” Leviticus asked.
“Better do Aaron and his monster hangover,” Bubbles said. “Oh, but Xochi, are you okay to wait?”
“I’m fine,” Xochi said. And she was. Relaxed, surprisingly well-rested. It felt like a good day, almost normal.
“Anyone else want bacon?” Leviticus opened the refrigerator.
“Um, yes,” Bubbles said. “Duh.”
“None for me,” Xochi said. “I’m vegetarian.”
“Me too.” Leviticus turned to her and smiled.
Xochi got the feeling he’d just seen her for the first time. He’d always been nice, but distant. But then, so had she, with all of them. This morning was different. Warmer. Leviticus set her coffee down, a perfect frothy café au lait. “I should have asked—is milk okay?”
“It’s perfect. Thanks!” Xochi blew on her coffee and took a small sip, testing her fresh piercing. It tingled, that was all. She sat back in her chair.
Kiki stood at the counter in a paisley bathrobe, her curls knotted at the nape of her neck. Her skin was a flawless beach-sand brown, a shade darker than her eyes. She looked like she’d been to an all-night spa instead of an all-night party. She hummed a harmony with Leviticus, her highs to his lows, as she pulled the lever of a large silver contraption, filling a pitcher with tangerine juice. Io stood at the center island, preparing a tray for a solitary breakfast, her normal routine. With her hair in two messy braids and cat-eye glasses, she was even prettier than she’d been onstage. She smiled at Xochi. “Did you have fun last night?”
“It was great,” Xochi said, suddenly shy.
“How about you?” Kiki asked Io, something pointed in her tone.
Io didn’t seem to notice. “Same as always: peopled out. Not really the party girl. I read for a bit and went to sleep, but I had a weird dream. I think I’d rather have a hangover.”
“Tell,” Kiki commanded.
Io frowned, butter knife poised over a pancake. “First, Pal and I were in a city—London, I think—but then it became a forest. I was wearing this wild floral nightgown, sort of like the one I used to have, the one from my mum?”
Kiki snorted. “I can’t believe you lost it. It was early Pucci, for fuck’s sake! I’ve never seen another one like it.”
“Can we please let go of the Pucci?” Io said, “It’s gone, love. Ancient history.”
“Fine,” Kiki said. “Go on. What happened?”
“Well, for a long time, we just held hands and walked. The woods were completely quiet, kind of spooky. Then we came to a stream, and Pallas basically melted away and turned into a big fish—a salmon, I think? I reached down to touch her, but she jumped out of the water and transformed again into an owl. I kept jumping, trying to catch her. I finally jumped high enough and could almost touch her, but then I fell. Cue my classic nightmare ending—fell forever, hit the bed, woke up sweating. The birds were chirping and the bus started running. I never got back to sleep, just laid there, feeling terrible. I need a nap.” She yawned, her tight-shut eyes and pink tongue reminding Xochi of a kitten’s.
Bubbles dipped her finger in the syrup on the edge of Aaron’s plate. “What do you think it means?”
“I don’t know. Most of my anxious dreams are about losing people I love.” Io sighed, tucking a stray hair behind her multiply pierced ear.
Without deciding to speak, Xochi heard herself say, “My grandma used to tell me that a lot of cultures see the salmon as sacred. When you eat them, you’re absorbing part of the collective soul.”
“But what about the owl?” Bubbles asked. Everyone in the kitchen was listening, curious.
“I thought they just represented wisdom,” Leviticus said. Xochi remembered the owl tattoo on his bare arm at the concert, wings lifted, ready for flight.
“Owls are interesting,” Xochi said. Her piercing hummed in her mouth. “They can mean wisdom, but some stories say they’re bad luck. Others say they aren’t necessarily bad, but if you see them, you better pay attention. An owl sighting in the daytime can signal deception, usually deceiving yourself. They’re also known to carry the souls of the dead. I used to see them a lot, which my grandma said meant I was wise beyond my years and prone to being haunted.”
“Your grandma sounds cool,” Bubbles said. “How does she know that stuff?”
“Animal stories were her thing. Herbs and animals and babies.”
“I was thinking,” Io broke in. “If everything in your dream is you—”
“—or the parts of you Pallas represents,” Kiki interrupted.
“Right,” Io said. “The collective soul, family, motherhood, the band—the salmon. The owl is the solitary part. Pal and I are alike that way. But you’re right. It’s easy to get too isolated. I’ve usually got at least half my head up in the clouds.”
“That’s one way of describing it,” Kiki said.
“Shut up!” Io laughed, bumping Kiki with her hip as she reached for the container of blueberries. Pallas said they’d been best friends since they were little girls—practically sisters. Xochi wondered about the rest, how they’d come to live here and love each other. Their connections enveloped the room with a deep, complex comfort.
“What about the silence in the forest?” Bubbles asked around a mouthful of food. Her plate had arrived, a now-dented stack of pancakes dusted with powdered sugar. “That seems important.”
“Dude, look where she lives,” Aaron said. “Of course she dreams about silence!”
“And that ending,” Kiki said. “The way you fall and can’t react. I’ve often thought it was about not speaking your mind.”
“Or speaking your mind and not being heard,” Leviticus added, meeting Io’s eyes for a short moment before turning back to the stove.
“Maybe it’s just hard being a mom,” Aaron said. “One time, we found my mom down in the laundry room chanting, ‘God hates me’ while she sorted a massive pile of tube socks. We felt so bad we made her lunch, but then we burned the grilled cheese and the kitchen stank for a week.”
Everyone laughed but Io, who loaded a second plate, smearing jam on the pancakes, and quietly left the room. Xochi knew who liked jam instead of syrup. Io was going to have breakfast with Pallas.
“Just to get you started.” Leviticus handed Xochi a plate of perfectly s
tacked pancakes. They were golden and fluffy, with blueberries so dark they were purple. “Let me know when you’re ready for seconds.”
“I think this’ll be more than enough.” Xochi breathed in the sweet steam. “Thank you so much for making these.”
“It’s tradition,” Kiki said. “Kitchen service the day after a show. Helps him shed any leftover god complex from the whole rock star business.” She sat on a stool at the counter, flipping through an oversized fashion magazine, stopping to cut things out with a pair of nail scissors and arranging the scraps on the counter beside her.
Bubbles and Aaron were on seconds of pancakes, sharing the Sunday comics. Xochi was still working on firsts. Leviticus piled a towering stack for himself and sat down across from Xochi, drowning his plate in maple syrup. “I have a sweet tooth,” he said when he noticed her looking. “I’m always starving the day after a show.”
“You guys fast beforehand, right?”
“Io and Ky and I do. I don’t know about the rest of these slackers.”
“I do,” Bubbles said. “Aaron is another story. Four double cheeseburgers, a six-pack of crappy beer and he’s ready to rock.”
“Dude. You want a grounded rhythm section. When I drum, I need my chakras connected to the earth, not the freaking ether. That means meat.”
“Well, whatever you did, it worked,” Xochi said.
“You liked it?” Bubbles pounced.
“I know those guys sucked,” Aaron said, “but the drumming was awesome, right?”
“Give it to us straight,” Leviticus said. “What’d you think?” His expression was open and curious, like he actually cared about her opinion.
“It was amazing. I danced my ass off,” Xochi said. “I’m such a huge fan now, I can barely eat breakfast here without asking you guys for autographs.” She laughed. It was the opposite, really. It was suddenly easy to be with them, like she’d known them forever. She took a big bite of pancake.
All of Us with Wings Page 5
