Cricket thought of the haggard, skinny bikers pulled from the police station and murdered.
“Now, thanks to my wonderful nature and trinity of drugs, I gained not only a lot of money over the last decade but a small army of gangbangers and bikers. A remarkable achievement bringing those warring factions together. Don’t you agree? And just think what I could have accomplished on the world stage! Or at least a bumper sticker in my honor showing true coexistence. Upgrade that lame “coexist” sticker you see everywhere with the world’s religions all jammed together. How pathetic. My symbol is the only symbol that should be on a bumper sticker—the setting sun. I’ll shove the rest right out the window, bury them alive, standing by to hit them with a shovel when they come up through the dirt.”
“What do you want with me?” Cricket said, glancing about the room, pretending to ignore everything the Brazilian had just said.
“That should be obvious. Sex. I haven’t been turned down since that little bastard walked away from me even after the bear ate his girlfriend.”
“Forget it. You’re disgusting.”
“Of course I am. Use it as an aphrodisiac. What else do you require—drugs, booze, movies—a guy to get you going—a guy to finish you off? I’m quite liberal that way and, dare I say, quite innovative. You’re gorgeous, tough, and have more kills notched into your girlie belt in two weeks than I had after several years of murder.”
Cricket slid to the side of the bed. She was fully dressed but her Glock was missing.
“Sorry, you’re dangerous with a gun. What, you think you could shoot up the place and make it out alive? Let’s have a fun night, not a night of mayhem.”
“Fun?”
“Sure. This is a big night on a lot of levels—Cricket’s in my bed and Electron Larry is making history tonight. The first handheld EMP weapon. As the world comes online, Larry will set it back on its ass a few centuries. Locally of course.”
“The world is coming back.”
“Sure it will, right … like a lame horse. The kiddies will have the lights on here and there; brief love affairs with their cell phones, iPads. But it’ll be very limited and short-lived.”
“You’ve told me enough to put you away for a thousand years.”
“Are you even listening to me?” The Brazilian looked about for something to throw at Cricket. Then made Hindu prayer hands and drew a centering breath. “Hey, want to watch me take a shower?” she added, like it was part of a test.
Cricket’s heart hammered for escape. She tried to played it cool “And get dirty? Don’t think so.”
The Brazilian studied Cricket with the look of a porn star ready to devour her next catch. “I can see you like men, but you’re willing to experiment. I’d not only be your lover, friend, father, mother for the years to come, I’ll get you the best food and the smartest exercise and supplements. Not far from here, near the freeway, I have another secure place with a private clinic and a dentist on staff. You’ll be beautiful fifty years from now. And you’ll get all the inner-circle stuff, if you can handle it. You’re not one of the hoi polloi. Larry takes care of them with laptops, cell phones, and pretend shopping; movies for the most highly favored, who’ll shoot you in the face if you borrow Star Wars and forget to return it. See, I don’t just use sex to control people. A lot are happy just holding some electronic device. Even if they don’t get anything on it. They have a screen, icons, something to stare at. Something to hope for.”
The Brazilian excused herself and soon returned with food and wine. Cricket was famished but resisted eating and drinking. Her captor placed the food on the nightstand.
“You really think I’d drug you? I could have given you Heaven, smoked you up, sweetheart, and you’d be worshipping me right now. But I get that all the time. You know, I’m crazy about you because you’re the chick in the Barracuda, shooting up the bad guys, wheeling a Mustang across the sky—although I hate planes—Cricket, my love, I want you—all of you.”
“Oh, please.” With a flip of her hand Cricket waved her off. “That’s gross.”
“Listen to me. You’re young. You have time to enjoy your sins like Saint Augustine. Later on, I’d let you worship your washed-up religion in private. I’m not heartless.”
“So after plenty of boy toys, comforts, weekend murder, you’d permit me a private chapel off the dungeon to say the rosary?”
“Of course. Listen, Peaches, we’re on top here. We can have whatever lives we desire.”
“Right. Almost forgot—you’re the Jap sun goddess—”
“Cricket, such talk has a very racist twang to it. Okay, in this new world we can be monogamous for a while and you can keep the Barracuda and the Mustang, solo that is. Everyone else walks.”
She poured herself a glass of red wine.
“Now Saint Augustine was a fella who didn’t go through life with one hand tied behind his back. Good inspiration. Cricket, I can offer sin upon sin, a world of sensation. You see, I reject both God and Satan. Only a moron would kick God to the curb and pick up his wimpy little brother to live with, believing you’re getting to the heart of life, close to nature, by sucking up to the devil. You see, I’m done with the three-thousand-year history of Judeo-Christianity. I’ve eliminated the Christian idea of fairness; make up my own rules and break them at will. I didn’t know it, but I’ve been preparing for this day by ridding myself of every cancerous cell of that insipid religion and its polar opposite.” She lifted her glass and smiled. “A radically new perspective arrives that singles us out from the herd. Only a handful of us deserve this beautiful earth. People are the enemies of the planet anyway. They live only for our comfort and pleasure.
“Burning Man showed me I could lead a group of half-wits by finally giving them the real deal. No more playacting. This epiphany was so powerful that I’ve been murdering ever since and constantly evolving. Cricket, you’re not letting the sensation of murder blossom. You get to enjoy the revenge part but there’s so much more. Flying with Jimmy Stewart, killing a few gang members, blowing up a fuel tanker? What, killing savages with a little crocodile tear in the corner of your eye? Really now, you need more than that, my little flower.”
“No tears.”
“Well, that’s a start, sweetie. Perhaps—” She tapped her red mouth with a finger, thinking. “I’m being quite aggressive here. Maybe we should start with a simpler plan.” Her large eyes grew even larger. “You’re a hairdresser. I insist you wash and cut my hair.”
“Payment?”
“You and your silly friends can live. Surely, you know you could have been dead hours ago? I could do terrible things to you, but you have too much spirit. And what a waste of good skin. Ultimately, it would be exhausting, unrewarding.”
Sitting on the edge of the bed, the Brazilian said:
“Really, Cricket, driving around with a nun in a pantsuit, a doddering old vet, and those two ridiculous men you picked up along the way. Oh, you did have some action with Dick and Jane and front-row seats as my vehicles were taken out. But that kind of fighting really takes it out of you. It becomes drudgery trying to stay alive, always on the run, looking over your shoulder. I offer bliss, moments of eternity. Your religion only talks about such things.”
“I’m not a very good Christian these days, but I think I can change that. It beats being trapped in your disturbing little world. You’re the evil stepmother I thankfully never had.”
“You’re not going to go all Joan of Arc on me? Probably not.” She put her wine on the nightstand. “You know, I’m looking at you and starting to see physical imperfections. I’m astounded. I wouldn’t kick you out of bed, and I’ll still pledge my love to you all day long, but you’ve made me tired and frustrated trying to seduce you. And I’m seeing these…. Your eyes are all wrong. You still have the look of a simpleton, infected by two thousand years of Christianity. No one, and that includes flyboy, is ever going to drown in those eyes. You have the eyes of a cheerleader: hard, resistant, craving sex
and violence and always falling for the substitutes—religion, patriotism, falling in love, acts of righteous vengeance. Look into my eyes—men and women have written about these eyes from the dawn of time: liquid pools of light, drowning metaphors—one of my favorites—doors to the soul. Where do your doors lead—Walmart?
“Before this lovely attack initiated by the sun, enhanced by the Iranians, I had been cleansing myself for this day. Long ago I reached a sublime state where thousands of years of the Judeo-Christian ethic were washed from my DNA. It took some doing. But the experience was thrilling, and what’s on the other side is even more thrilling.”
“The other side?”
“Freedom. Not the silly idea of freedom your little nun or the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion have. Freedom of the ancients is pure royalty. Some of us have it and know it. You dream about it I’m sure, and when you wake up you’re embarrassed by these lingering images. But in the deepest recesses of your soul there’s an alchemy you cannot deny. What is that famous saying? Summoned or not, God will come. Oh, it’s not the god of Walmart shoppers, it’s the god of those great enough to bury entire civilizations just to spend a summer evening looking down from their marble balcony on the sewer of humanity below.”
“Sounds like the devil to me.”
“Oh, Cricket, you’re so pedestrian. What a waste. But I’m not going to bore myself with deadlines and ultimatums. I have plans for Teensy Weensy Falls, and if you continue to be a roadblock I’ll remove you swiftly and your friends slowly, horribly—God, what am I, the adverb queen—” She shook her head. “C’mon, wise up, you’re a smart young woman. Change! The entire world awaits you!”
“What about getting old? You seem to have a real hatred for ugliness and old age.”
“No matter how much you loved your Uncle Tommy, do you really want to be old like that someday? Paper-thin skin, wrinkled, unpleasant odors, just a bag of water festering with disease, unattractive to the nth degree. Not I, missy. I’ll live vicariously for a while through someone like you, then depart in the throes of pleasure, or at least after several throes of pleasure. I’ll lift off in the extreme, all my lust and jealousy intact when I depart this vale of tears.”
“You sound crazy mean, like that mess in a dress, Jane.”
“Jane was hot. You felt it. But she had real limitations. I was surprised that she made it as long as she did.”
Cricket walked toward a long teak table minus any chairs.
“I guess you don’t have visitors often. You forgot the chairs.”
“This is temporary. For my captains. The drugs they’re on, they’ll never sit down again. Besides, I’m moving soon, taking Saint Andrew’s and living in that fine rectory for a while.”
“Thanks for the heads-up.”
“After tonight, your citizens will be bringing over pot roast and banana bread for me while I corrupt the youth. Maybe without smiles on their faces, but they will be prompt.”
“You’re not taking that church.”
“What, you and flyboy are going to swoop in and save the church, the town?”
“My flyboy’s gonna kick your ass.”
“You are in love. Oh well, I wish you could see what a mistake you’re making. Really, the twenty-first century arrives and one of the hottest gals on the planet is falling for a guy who’s at best a stand-in for an old movie star? For a moment I thought you were going to sic that Nun with a Gun on me.”
“I love men and he’s the best—”
“After Dad, that is.”
“Did you have anything to do with his death?”
“Of course not. Women really lose their marbles without men. It doesn’t have to be like that. Tap into your daddy gene.”
“You sick bitch—I loved him—don’t you get that?”
“You’d be surprised how well I understand love.” The Brazilian got in bed, lay on her side, and brought her long legs up to her chest, showing the bottom curve of her perfect white ass. “You and your little gang are still alive because of me and how I feel about you. Taking lessons from flyboy. How revolting.”
“I love flying.”
“Sorry, but I really hate airplanes. You can quietly keep your religion, but the planes—except the P-51—have to go.”
“Sounds like a mental problem.”
The Brazilian sat up in bed. “You must hate something else besides me. We all have our likes and dislikes.”
“Actually, I only hate you. I’m going back to the Falls.”
“Silly girl. The rocket car was always there to take you back to Kansas. You just had to click your heels and ask Leroy—Leroy!” she yelled, and an enormous black man waddled in.
“Take Ms. Hastings home.”
Cricket turned away and said nothing, following the two-legged hippo out the door.
“I’m still wondering, isn’t there something else you dislike?” the Brazilian called to her. “When you’re not saving the world.”
Cricket flippantly replied, “Horses. I never liked horses.”
“Me neither!” The Brazilian jumped out of bed, delighted at the response. “Let’s eat one sometime.”
Cricket was moving along a hallway dimly lit by a couple of torches when she heard the Brazilian call out one more time—
“And you owe me a wash and cut.”
43
Proposal
Near midnight, Tony and Mr. Holaday were out walking the perimeter, and Cricket was back in Fritz’s arms on the front porch swing less than thirty minutes after departing the sun goddess. At first, Sister Marie said little, sitting off to the side in a wicker chair, rosary in hand. The moon was hidden and the porch in shadows. Inside, a single lantern, turned low, softened the living room with its warm light.
“I can’t believe Tony’s still patrolling,” Fritz said. “My God, his best friend. Gone.”
Cricket started the swing with her feet. “Tragedy won’t slow him down. He’s here for all of us, and really loves Grace. I still can’t get over that he was the one to tell her.”
Cricket heard from Sister Marie that Tony had talked with Grace alone on the front porch. She cried briefly, and then asked if she could keep the silver dog that Ron was using in Monopoly. Before Tony left for patrol, Sister Marie had taken charge and helped Grace get ready for bed, both of them saying special bedtime prayers for Ron’s peace and glory in the next life. The Holadays’ kept to themselves, dimming all the kerosene lanterns in the house, blowing out candles to hide their tear-stained faces.
Cricket added, “I learned a lot from Tony and Ron tonight; hate to say it, the Brazilian, too—we have to protect Saint Andrew’s; keep Father Danko safe.”
Fritz said, “We have scores of people who will protect the church, many of them armed.”
Cricket countered, “Fritz, they have flatbed trucks with mounted machine guns and an armored personnel carrier and probably fifty to sixty armed bikers, not including the gangbangers who come in whatever contraption the key works.”
“There’d be a bloodbath at Saint Andrew’s,” Sister Marie said. “I’m going tomorrow morning and telling Father Danko what’s coming. We’ve been talking about this very thing. He needs to leave for his own safety and preserve the sacred vessels. He’ll return at the proper time. We can’t have people dying over a building.”
“Sister Marie, I can’t believe he’d leave so soon without a fight,” Fritz replied. “It’s a holy place.”
“And it’ll stay holy no matter how it’s defiled.”
“Sister, cutting and running, not what I’d expected.”
“Have you been listening to what Cricket has been telling us about this woman? She’s a depraved sociopath. Evil to the core. I pray that love can again touch her heart, but she’s been without it most of her life. However, I do think, because of Cricket, a slight warmth has awakened in that cold breast of hers.”
“Where will Father go, Sister?” Cricket asked.
“To the Ledges. The families settling there for win
ter have plans for a wilderness chapel. The cabins are warm and comfortable, and they’re stockpiling food. The people arriving there are strong and willing to defend themselves. Father will make it through the winter. And no matter the damage, Saint Andrew’s will be restored.”
“I’m a slow learner, Sister,” Fritz said. “I’m starting to see your logic, but we’ll stay here and fight. If we let them waltz into the church, what will keep them from taking any house, any family, and making them their playthings? But I am glad Father will be safe. Who’s taking him?”
“We are,” Sister said.
“Then we go tomorrow morning,” Cricket said. “We’ll take the Barracuda.”
Fritz ran the back of his hand down his two-day-old beard.
“If we leave early enough for the Ledges, we can make it back for an afternoon recon mission. How does that sound?”
“Like a full day,” Cricket said, and Sister agreed with a slow nod.
Grace wasn’t even up when the trio of Fritz, Sister Marie, and Cricket headed to the rectory in the blue Barracuda and knocked on Father Danko’s door at eight in the morning.
Patricia, his housekeeper, answered the door and escorted them to the study, where they found Father Danko sipping hot black tea. All three had dressed in clean clothes: Sister in a long blue skirt and white blouse, Fritz in tan pants and a green polo shirt, and Cricket in her jeans and boots, wearing a coral peasant blouse courtesy of Fritz’s mom.
“I prayed for everyone to survive last night, and when I found out an hour ago that Ron didn’t make it, all my prayers went to him. I’m so sorry for your loss.” Father lowered his head like he was again in private prayer. A long minute passed and he looked up, amazed, like he had caught a moment of eternity in the faces of the people seated across from him, the sun streaming in, the tea still hot. “The gift of life. It is so precious.” He lowered his head, as if returning to prayer, when he inhaled deeply, and sat tall in his chair, saying, “Thank, God, you three are safe. Though Cricket, it appears you ran into a tree.”
Pulse of the Goddess: American Blackout Book One Page 22
