Xochi turned the dolphin-shaped knobs on Pallas’s bathtub until the water was almost scalding. She’d put Wings of Desire on repeat, and the poem was playing again. This time, she could pick out some of the words in German.
Als das Kind Kind war. When the child was a child.
She lowered herself into the tub, willing her insides to unwind along with her tight shoulders and back, but when she closed her eyes, she was back in Badger Creek.
When they first moved in, Gina complained about the lack of a bathtub. Evan found an old horse trough and went to work, polishing it to a high shine and setting it up on a stone pedestal over a firepit so Gina could soak in a circle of ancient redwoods under the stars. The last time Xochi had seen it, it had been orange with rust, full of spiderwebs and debris.
She sat up, shook her head, grabbed a washcloth to cover her eyes. With the room shut out, everything was water and music. Xochi slid down so her ears were covered, her hair floating lightly around her head. The tub was so long, her feet barely grazed the end. The water was part of her, a protective skin. She drifted, lapping at the edge of sleep.
Riding out to the creek always made Evan feel better. It was green now, but in a month, the meadow would be the exact color of Gina’s hair. Gina again. Not a day went by when Evan didn’t think of her. So beautiful. Beautiful like the babies they should have made, the ones she promised him, the family they’d never have.
He remembered Gina crying, asking why she and Xochi weren’t enough. He’d tried to explain so many times. Xochi was already half raised, and besides, she was some other guy’s kid. Evan wanted a family he could call his own.
At first, right after Gina ran away, Evan couldn’t stand to be in the same room with Xochi. But after a while, he felt sorry for her. He knew what it was like to be abandoned. His own mother had stuck her thumb out one day when he was five and never came back. If his dad hadn’t gotten married to Vangie, who knew where he’d be? His stepmom had made him feel wanted right from the start. When Loretta moved onto the property after his twin half brothers were born, she said to call her grandma. Evan loved being part of a big family, being a big brother. That part of his life had been good.
Then Vangie got sick. He’d been out of high school a few years, was working on hybrid plants with his dad. He’d surprised everyone with his knack for nursing. If Vangie had lived, he never would have met Gina. His dad would be okay, his life would be different. As it was, Evan took off the day after Vangie’s funeral and didn’t come back for almost a year. When he did, he had Gina and Xochi in tow.
Everyone was mad at first—two more mouths to feed, two more people who knew their business. But it was easy for Gina to make people love her. When she left, they all blamed him. But what was he supposed to do? If it hadn’t been for the trouble with Gina’s IUD, the awful infection, he would have always believed he was damaged goods when she never got pregnant. Being a liar and leaving your man was one thing. But leaving your own kid? Evan gunned the engine over the rise. A woman like that was capable of anything.
Evan braked down the hill and parked the four-wheeler. He stretched, rolling out the kinks in his neck, and unhooked the bungees holding the empty water jugs. He was right where the water’s edge should have been when he realized it: Badger Creek was gone.
It was dangerous to fall asleep in the bath, but Xochi wasn’t worried. She could hear Wings of Desire like it was spinning on an underwater record player. The poem was playing again, recited over a gorgeous cello line. The words were in German, but Xochi understood.
When the child was a child
it walked with its arms swinging,
wanted the brook to be a river,
the river to be a torrent,
and this puddle to be the sea.
Evan followed the dry creek bed to a clearing where a heap of boulders and logs were piled into a neat dam. Bile rose in his throat. The hijacked creek had collected into a small lake, wider and deeper than should have been possible, given what he knew about his land.
He tried to walk the pool’s perimeter. Trees parted before him and the water seemed to move away, manipulated by some invisible force that could subtract a redwood or stretch a pool into a lake at will.
Evan’s stomach cramped. He could smell his own sweat, a beacon shouting his fear to the world. The morning was growing hotter. The cool blue beckoned. Evan licked his dry lips and tasted blood.
He walked to the water’s edge and knelt to touch the tantalizing blue, but the air above the pool was thick and impassible. The heat became unbearable. He sat down in the dirt and took off his boots and socks, peeled off his shirt. On his knees again, he knew something formal was required to enter the lake. “Please.” His own hoarse whisper echoed in his ears. The water was so bright, it seemed to sing. A cool breeze blew toward him, stopping short of his burning skin. He bowed his head. “Please, let me in.”
Now there was no resistance. He stroked the surface of the water the way he used to comb his fingers through Gina’s hair, cool seeping from his palms to his wrists to his forearms, a pleasure made of exquisite relief. He waded to his waist and plunged into the pristine cold. He kicked and tried to rise, but his legs were too heavy. Next came the horror-movie moment he should have seen coming: something was touching his feet, pulling him down.
He clutched at his ankles and found two pairs of miniature hands.
He clawed and thrashed his limbs, but every movement seemed to add weight to his body, quickening his descent to the bottom of the impossible lake. Evan’s fear ebbed and flowed with the water, peaking toward the impossible and dissolving into denial. This couldn’t be real.
Evan’s feet hit silt. That was real enough. They must have reached the bottom. He opened his eyes. His captors were child sized, stark naked but smooth as dolls, no way to tell if they were female or male. One of them was brown and black haired. The smaller one was greenish and pale with white hair swimming around its head like a bag of albino snakes. Both had huge eyes and wide cheekbones like the kids in the kitschy velvet paintings Vangie used to collect. They were cartoon characters. Aliens. Totally unreal.
Breathing was less of an issue than it should have been. His lungs had somehow adapted. He touched his face. Expecting what? Gills? The freaky kids weren’t holding on to him anymore. He told his legs to push off, kick away, but nothing happened.
You will stay.
The words formed in his mind like letters on a page. A small hand touched his chest. His eyes were closed. He couldn’t open them. Another hand rested on his forehead, calming him. Waves rocked the water around him, seaweed brushing against his skin. No, not seaweed. The movements were random, alive. It was hair. Long, freaky, snaky hair.
Evan curled into himself and tried to check out, but they had invaded his mind, digging around in his skull. They pulled themselves back in time, stomping through the swamp of weed and booze, discarding fantasy and thought, shooting straight into memory. His head began to pound as they herded his attention ruthlessly back to the months after Gina had left him.
Evan began to see a story take shape, a movie starring Xochi. There she was at twelve, a grubby kid, brown as a bear and fast as a fox. Loretta had bought her a guitar, and he’d started to teach her some chords. Xochi’s little-kid soprano sounded right with his bass. She was a natural with harmony. It made him feel human again, right with the world for the first time since Gina had bailed.
The images blurred. The creatures were looking for something. Something specific. His brain itched with their probing. They didn’t want seeds and stems and bars and bong hits. They didn’t want him. It was Xochi they were after. And there she was again. Older now, about fourteen. She moved like a woman as she helped Loretta in the kitchen before a party, managing the work in a way Gina never could. In a faded apron, her long hair hanging down her back, she could’ve been Vangie, laughing as she chopped vegetables with Loretta l
ike the old days were back.
The movie faltered and went black. Evan hurt, an unspecific pain that had no physical place to land. He imagined the two of them with headlamps and blowtorches, blasting away at his brain. Finally, they found the memory they wanted, glowing in the dark like a radioactive penny. Evan wanted to move away, take cover. The thing was toxic. Cursed. But that didn’t matter to the creatures. They held it in their webbed hands. The water reconstituted it. It unfurled in Evan’s head. There was no place to hide.
It was hot.
An afternoon in early September.
The day Loretta died.
Xochi and Evan had been up for forty-eight hours. It had been three days since Loretta had lost consciousness, four since she’d eaten or drunk. “Leave her be,” the nurses said. “Women sometimes need to be alone to let go.”
So Evan and Xochi had gone. He’d showered, eaten something, was on his way back to check on Loretta when he heard sobbing in the flower garden. There was Xochi, face buried in the lamb’s ears. The last few months had bonded them. He’d been surprised to find her so tough. As strong as he was. Stronger. In all this time, he’d never seen her cry like this. He pulled her up, held her close.
His heart pounded, an underwater sound.
Was he hearing it in memory, or now, in the acid-trip present?
He’d been excited, turned on to be that close to her. Now there was only dread.
Continue.
There it was. That creepy voice slithering into his head.
Show us.
He thought about fighting, but couldn’t see how. They would get it out of him in the end. The creatures couldn’t be stopped.
Xochi sat up in the tub. The water was cold. She must have fallen asleep. Was she about to throw up? Maybe the coffee was poisoned, she thought, knowing it was crazy but thinking it anyway. She was afraid, afraid of something. She’d fallen asleep, she’d been dreaming. It was something bad, but she couldn’t remember. “Fates,” she sang softly, “Fates and Furies. Open, open, open up the door!”
Pain bloomed as if it were the substance of the lake that had swallowed him. The creatures cranked a knob in Evan’s brain, replaying that fucked-up day. It was afternoon. It was hot. Loretta’s room droned with all the fans they’d been able to scrounge. You could even hear them out in the garden.
Evan had been walking back to check on Loretta when he’d found Xochi. She was on her knees, crying her eyes out. Not at the flower bed as he’d thought at first, but in a shaded spot behind the shed, secluded. It had been Loretta’s dog’s favorite place in the yard. The old wolf dog had died in the spring before anyone knew Loretta was sick. That’s what Xochi was doing. Putting flowers on the dog’s grave.
She was on her knees, hair in a messy braid down her back, a bunch of lavender and wild roses in her lap. He’d pulled her up. Brushed leaves from her hair. Held her, tried to comfort her. Then he kissed her. Her eyes flew open, all pupil. She was out of her mind, but her body knew what to do. When she kissed him back, she was all fire. His hands were in her hair, under her skirt, she was pulling him into her, nails digging through his T-shirt, her leg wrapped around his hip. It was fast and fierce. At the time, he thought she came. But now, watching, he wasn’t so sure.
It began again, played over and over on an endless loop—slow, fast, slow again—but the little creeps wanted more. They studied his pleasure, questioned his regret. Over and over, they made him watch. By the tenth time, it didn’t seem sexy. By the thirteenth, the whole thing made him sick. After twenty, he lost count but couldn’t look away. Right when Evan knew he was going to lose it, the images changed.
It was the same scene, the same day, but Xochi’s colors were faded, her outline indistinct. All the energy of the memory was now focused on him. He’d been skinnier that summer, with matted dreads and bloodshot eyes. Loretta’s cabin smelled herbal and witchy. The vibe was intense. Xochi had agreed to go take a shower and a nap. The hospice ladies shooed him out. He’d gone to his cabin, microwaved a burrito, gotten an hour of sleep.
He watched himself walk through the gate into Loretta’s garden. He was exhausted and sad, but he’d been through this before with his stepmother. He knew how to ration his energy, when to fill up. Xochi didn’t. After he kissed her, something snapped. She had been so miserable for so long. And Evan had known it. He’d known what he was doing. With his hands, his mouth. Not like her fumbling virgin boyfriend. And in that moment, Xochi would have done anything for one second of relief.
Afterward, alone in his bed, he’d told himself it was mutual. A freak moment born of grief. But the truth was, he’d been after this for a year, at least. After her. There had been an opening, and he’d taken it. Right or wrong, he’d wanted her.
Xochi got out of the bath, turned off the stereo and opened the windows on the west side of the sitting room. She stood wrapped in her towel in the afternoon sun, limbs tattooed in shadows of lace.
Leviticus. His name bounced around her head. She’d been strict and strong, determined not to obsess. Now, she curled into the sunny window seat and allowed the images to come: the ride through the city, the bookstore, the bar, Wings of Desire. Dancing at Ray’s. She let herself have his involuntary smile, the effort it took him to look away, the missed chord changes, Kylen’s glare. All of it. She picked up the cassette case. He’d taken the time to copy the liner notes and the translation of the poem. Had he been thinking about their day together?
Before Badger Creek, Xochi and Gina used to lay in their freshly washed underwear in front of a box fan on summer afternoons, watching soap operas while they waited for Gina’s cocktailing shift to start. As entertaining as Xochi found the cheating couples and elaborate schemes, she knew she’d never live her life like that. But somehow, here she was. Last night, she’d kissed both Bubbles and her douchebag ex. Now all she could think about was Leviticus, and that went beyond kissing. Pallas would surely consider anything between Xochi and her father an epic betrayal. And even if not, what about everyone else? What about Io? As welcome as they’d all made her feel, Xochi wasn’t sure free love was actually free when it came to the governess.
She replayed what had happened in the alley with Leviticus. The way they’d leaned against the wall, close but not touching, the fire that had shot from her palm to her piercing when he’d touched her hand. If Andi hadn’t come out when she did—what then? Xochi shuddered. One kiss from Leviticus would end her.
Evan longed for release, but the creatures were tireless. They pored over the weeks after Loretta had died. Xochi did nothing but sleep. Evan left her alone.
At least, she thought he did. Hard nights found him in her bedroom with its clothes-strewn floor and musky scent, female and warm. He never touched her, just sat on the floor and listened to her breathe. After an hour or so, he’d leave, knowing he’d be able to sleep. They replayed these visits three times and moved on to the wake.
It was the biggest party in the county that summer. Loretta had a lot of friends. Xochi wore a red dress he’d never seen before and started drinking at three in the afternoon. By sundown, she had a bottle of Bushmills in one hand, a cigarette in the other, a pack of guys sniffing around her, her boyfriend sulking in the corner.
She got her shit together long enough to sing the song they’d planned to start the party, but as they stood side by side on a stage lit with fairy lights and a harvest moon, Evan was invisible. Every eye was on Xochi as she sang Loretta’s favorite Joni Mitchell song. Her voice always cracked on Loretta’s favorite line about fear as a wilderland, and Evan waited for it to break. But it didn’t. She was different up there. All grown up.
Someone put P-Funk over the PA, scratchy and familiar—Loretta’s music for fall and winter, the lonely months to come. People started to dance. Evan was a coyote outside the circle of fire. Food was there in the light. Food, water, warmth. Xochi danced at the center of the flames, red dre
ss, red mouth, raccoon bandit eyes. Bile rose in his throat as she pressed against some college kid one of his brothers had brought along. Frat boy asshole.
By then, there was a bottle in his own hand. He could almost feel its weight. He lifted it to his mouth and sucked in water, not booze. So much water. This freak show of a lake had kidnapped his creek, and now it was going to kill him.
But it didn’t.
He was spinning, time flying on a circular current. Now there was air where water should be, leaves blowing in the wind. A blustery day. Words from childhood, a story Vangie used to read his baby brothers. Then he heard it. The mind voice. It held a single, magic word, both lock and key.
Homecoming.
It echoed in an empty canyon.
Pressure built in a place he’d once called his head.
Show us homecoming.
Xochi huddled on the sofa. She’d been so hot after the bath but now she was freezing. Collier’s Led Zeppelin shirt lay folded on the easy chair. It smelled of laundry soap and lavender. She remembered where it had been, right on Leviticus’s skin. And before that, Coll’s. Her best friend. Her first love. He didn’t even know where she was. She remembered the last time things were good between them. The picnic dinner in the woods, his weight over hers, rocks poking through the blanket. Sex between them had been awkward before, but somewhere between his summer away and all the messed-up things that happened after Loretta died, they had acquired a certain grace. Xochi was light with relief, his touch proof of forgiveness, erasing the mistakes she’d made those wasted weeks after the funeral. She lay there on his chest, his heartbeat the only music she wanted. The sun was setting. They were going to be late.
“Thanks for asking me to homecoming.” She picked bits of the forest floor from her sweater and grabbed one end of the quilt.
All of Us with Wings Page 13
