Cry Havoc lf-3

by Baxter Clare

  Gail's response to Frank's compliments had evolved from self-deprecation to bemused silence. She smiled at her lover and Frank relaxed into their embrace.

  She said into Gail's hair, "Let's go eat creepy-sounding food," but made no motion toward that end other than to glide her lips along Gail's neck. Gail tilted her head, encouraging the silky kisses. Like a candle left in the sun, Frank's tension liquefied. She felt her towel slip to the floor, unable to imagine how she could have ever found Gail's touch irritating.

  When Frank staggered back from her, they were both bewildered, staring wide at each her. She heard Gail asking, "What's the matter?" but couldn't answer.

  "Frank, what is it?"

  Frank felt like a zombie. She could hear and feel and see but she couldn't respond. Gail stepped in front of her, looking scared. She touched Frank, and like the princess kissing the toad, she broke the spell.

  "Jesus," Frank gasped. She groped for the sink and leaned over it like she was going to be sick. Gail hovered over her, asking "What's wrong? Baby, what is it?"

  All Frank could do was shake her head, croaking, "Gimme a sec."

  She remembered to breathe. In and out. That was enough for right now. In and out. She focused on the effort, aware of Gail's worry and the slick porcelain under her hands. Time was long for Frank, but after what was probably no more than a quarter minute, she swallowed hard and straightened. She brushed past Gail, saying, "I gotta get some clothes on."

  Frank dressed quickly, ignoring Gail's silhouette in the doorway. When she tried slipping around her, Gail grabbed her arm, demanding, "Frank, what happened?"

  She tried to find an answer in Gail's face, but it wasn't there. She put her hands on Gail's waist. She shook her head. "I don't know," was all she could say, and then she repeated it.

  "Are you hurt?" Gail asked. "Is it your hand?"

  "No," Frank insisted, folding the doc against her. "Jesus fucking Christ. I don't know what happened."

  Her lips dumbly sought the comfort of Gail's neck, but Frank made a point to keep her eyes open, lest she slip back into that eerie place. The doc pulled away.

  "You're starting to scare me."

  "Shit," Frank choked with a half laugh-half sob, "I'm scaring myself. Come on," she added, tugging Gail to the couch, "I gotta sit."

  She'd just as soon have a couple drinks and put the whole bizarre scene out of her mind, but Gail's silent expectation made Frank fumble for an explanation.

  "It was like . . ." She couldn't go on because it was unlike anything Frank had ever felt before.

  "It was like I left my body and walked into the bathroom and was watching us. It was so . . . vivid. I could see the towel and the loops it's made of. Then your arm shifted and in the shadow between us I could see the flatness where your breast used to be. It was so normal. It was natural, like it had always been that way, like it was supposed to be that way. It felt like the whole thing had already happened—us, standing there, making out, me in a towel. It was like I'd scripted a movie and now I was watching it being filmed."

  Frank gave her head a hard shake and swore.

  "I been having these little deja vus," she continued, "but this one. It was overpowering. I mean I wasn't even there. I was gone, Gail. I was watching us. From somewhere else. I wasn't me. I wasn't inside my own body."

  Frank stood up and started pacing in a tight circle, Gail watching her. The doc's silence disappointed Frank. She wanted Gail to make it go away, to say something that would explain it all. Suddenly Frank demanded, "Am I losing my fucking mind or what?"

  Gail's chuckle was small but comforting. She approached Frank and put her arms around her.

  "While it's certainly a possibility I don't think it's the first conclusion we should jump to."

  "Give me a better one."

  "Well," Gail pointed out. "You've been working as hard as you always do. You swill coffee all day and never eat. You drink too much," she added gingerly. "And when was the last time you got a decent night's sleep? You're getting older, you know. You can't push yourself like you used to. At some point your body's going to rebel."

  "So you do think I'm crazy."

  "That's not crazy. It's just your body's way of saying maybe you'd better start taking care of yourself."

  "So you think it's perfectly normal to have an out of body experience while you're cupcaking your girlfriend?"

  Gail swooned against Frank, exclaiming, "Well, if cupcaking's what I think it is, I always have an out of body experience when you cupcake me."

  "Very funny."

  "It's true," Gail insisted. "I wouldn't worry about it if I were you. But I would consider taking better care of myself."

  Gail tried to hold her, but Frank was too jumpy.

  "Maybe you're right. Maybe I'm just getting old and need to get some sleep. I should go home, have a peanut butter sandwich and a glass of milk. Go to bed. I'm sure everything'll be fine in the morning," Frank lied, trying like hell to believe her own bullshit. Gail looked crestfallen and Frank had to step away.

  "Baby," Gail started, "just stay. I'll make you something to eat. It's not a big deal."

  "Making something to eat's not a big deal?"

  "No. I mean whatever's going on with you. I'm sure it's nothing. Why don't—"

  "Oh, you're sure it's nothing," Frank bridled. "Does this diagnosis come from your years of expertise in dealing with humanity or is this something you actually learned in med school?"

  "What are you getting so upset about?"

  "I'm not upset. I'm insane, remember?"

  "Frank, I never said that. I just think you had a mild reaction to something. It happens all the time and you're making a mountain out of a molehill."

  "Oh, really?" Frank said, nodding. "Is that what I'm doing?"

  "Well, look at you."

  Frank didn't want to look at herself. She wanted to get the hell out of there and go home. And fuck the peanut butter and milk— she was headed straight for the Scotch bottle. She gathered her work clothes, refilling the pockets with what she'd emptied onto the kitchen table.

  Gail watched her, finally muttering, "You are being such an asshole."

  "Then I guess you'll be happy when I'm gone," Frank answered, yanking at the door and slamming it shut behind her.

  Frank was making love to Gail but Marguerite was in her head. Marguerite, naked and dancing, her huge breasts unbound, pushing into Franks face. Franks desire grew like rage. She felt starved for Gail and bit at her neck. The doc cried out, on one side or the other of the thin line between pain and passion. Frank didn't care which. She followed the exquisite hunger, steering Gail backwards toward her darkened bedroom. She chewed at Gail's neck, dragging her lover into the dark, like a lion dragging a gazelle into its lair.

  Through the red haze of desire, Frank saw candles burning. Someone was beating a drum. Then she was dancing around a fire with a billion stars in her hair. She was naked and Marguerite was naked and the Mother was there, all of them dancing around the fire. Around and around they paraded, and Frank's hunger grew and swelled, roiling and crashing like waves pounding a sea. The Aegean sea at midnight. Fire on the shore. Women dancing under an ageless moon. Drums pounding in their heads like blood.

  As happens in dreams, Frank was suddenly clothed, and she pulled the 9mm from under her jacket. Its grip was comforting. She trained the sight on the Mother. Fired. Again and again, but the Mother only laughed. She wouldn't go down. The bullets didn't even seem to hit her. Frank was a good shot and she was close. She couldn't have missed. How could she not be killing the Mother?

  She trained the gun on herself, staring down the barrel.

  "Go ahead," the Mother laughed. "Pull the trigger."

  Marguerite kept dancing, a thousand secrets smiling from her eyes.

  "You always have a choice," she shrugged.

  Frank's finger was squeezing the trigger. She was afraid she was going to fire but she couldn't turn the gun around. She couldn't move it and her fi
nger was getting tighter and tighter on the trigger.

  She woke up screaming, "Drop the gun! Drop the gun!”

  Frank rolled off the couch. She was up in an instant, looking for the Beretta, waiting to see the Mother holding it on her. There was nothing. Just the familiar reality of her den. Frank's head pounded and the overhead light hurt her eyes. But she didn't want to turn it off.

  She stumbled to the bathroom, disgusted with the nightmare sweat sticking to her skin. She couldn't get into the shower fast enough. Not for the first time that night she wondered what the fuck was wrong with her.

  She remembered storming out of Gail's, amazed at the pique she'd gotten into. She'd felt pretty stupid by the time she got home, but still angry. A couple stiff shots brought her down. She paced and drank, trying to figure out if she was just stressed like Gail said, or going postal, or something else. It was the something else that Frank had done a dark tango with all night. While not appealing, going nuts didn't seem nearly as frightening as Marguerite's postulation that the Mother was fucking with her head.

  Frank stood in the shower, thinking that when you put all the weird events together, it made sense. As much as any of this could make sense. She'd had baby deja vus before—she couldn't remember where or what about, but Frank had recognized the feeling when it happened at the Mother's. It had been a little odd and kind of disconcerting, but she'd forgotten about it. Then it happened again, twice, when the dog bit her. The deja vu about the dog attack had been wildly clear. Frank hadn't been able to dismiss that so lightly, nor the freaky vision of the Mother standing in pools of blood. That had been slightly less real, but just as uncomfortable. Then it had happened again at the church and last night at Gail's. That last one was the granddaddy of the deja vus, more powerful and absolutely real.

  Realizing the visions were getting stronger, she shivered in the hot water. She turned it off, and put on her robe, even though she was still wet. Frank connected the dots, starting with the little deja vu in the Mother's office, then the dog. No, she corrected, then she'd seen that thing in rags, right after the first deja vu, right after she'd left the Mother's.

  Frank had never seen this bum before, then all of a sudden the fucking thing's everywhere, even seeming to follow her. But that was impossible, right? As impossible as its being able to see out of those ruined eyes or let itself out of a locked interrogation box. (Frank had subsequently quizzed the entire station house—no one except Darcy had even admitted to seeing the relic).

  There was the dream, too, with the relic and the soldier. That hadn't been as intense as the deja vus, but it had been awfully realistic. Familiar, was the word. Like Frank intimately knew that soldier in the carnage. Then the dog mauled her, a red dog, just like the Mother said. Coincidence? Possibly. As coincidental as anything else. But how coincidental was the timing of the events, and their growing frequency and intensity?

  Frank wandered into the kitchen. She made coffee even though she'd rather have a drink. She rationalized that despite it being Saturday and despite that she wasn't on call, only drunks drank first thing in the morning. She might be going crazy, but she wasn't a drunk. Throwing away yesterday's coffee grounds, she saw Marguerite James's business card lying on top of the garbage like a little white surrender flag.

  Frank took it out and put it on the counter. She ignored it until after she got the coffee brewing, then she smoothed the crumpled card against the tiles. It was barely five AM, but Frank grabbed the phone. If she didn't do it now she never would.

  "It's Lieutenant Franco. Look, I'm sorry to wake you but I have to ask you something."

  Marguerite had answered sleepily, but she sounded fully alert when she answered, "Yes?"

  Frank sucked in a deep breath and told Marguerite everything. The deja vus, the thing in rags, the dog, the dreams—everything.

  "What the hell does it all mean?"

  "I'm not sure," Marguerite came back. Frank thought Marguerite was hedging until she said, "For want of a better explanation, I'd liken it to a psychic awakening."

  "What the fuck does that mean?" Frank asked in another abnormal burst of impatience.

  "Lieutenant. It's five-fifteen in the morning. I don't care to be sworn at."

  "I'm sorry," Frank gritted out. "This is a little new to me."

  "Of course it is."

  Marguerite sounded strong and reassuring.

  "Basically, whether you believe it or not, Mother Love has awakened an innate psychic ability within you. At an instinctual level, you are aware of the threat she represents to you. Your psyche is trying to defend you, regardless of your lack of belief in her abilities and your ignorance of your own."

  Bullshit, Frank wanted to say and hang up, but she'd made the call and she'd tough it out.

  "What am I defending myself against?"

  "Her intentions. That's the black pall I feel around you. Thoughts are energy, Lieutenant. Intentions are energy. Subtle yes, but effective in quantity and over time. And especially damaging when the source is able to focus her will and concentration as effectively as this woman apparently can."

  "But why me?" Frank interrupted. "There are two other cops working this case. Why isn't she attacking them?"

  Or maybe she is, Frank thought and they're not spilling. Impossible. She knew her cops too well. If this shit was going down on them, Noah would be the first in line to bitch about it and Frank was sure Lewis wouldn't be far behind.

  "You there?"

  "Yes. Bear with me."

  Frank held on, wondering what the hell Marguerite was doing.

  "I don't think this is about your work. Maybe inadvertently it is, but this . . . malice I feel around you, is much older than any case you're working on. It feels extremely old. It has an archaic form. I can't explain it more clearly than that. And I'm not sure it matters. What does matter is that you need help."

  Marguerite abruptly switched gears.

  "Are you a Christian, Lieutenant?"

  "No. I'm not anything."

  "Do you believe in any spiritual beings?"

  "No."

  "Yet you're calling me at five o'clock in the morning. Why is that?"

  "I thought you could explain this."

  "A Catholic priest could give you an explanation as well. Why didn't you call one of them?"

  Frank almost shuddered, seeing Father Merrin stumbling in the ruins.

  "Look, I'm sorry I bothered you. I didn't—"

  "I'm not bothered, Lieutenant. What I'm asking is, why are you seeking an explanation from me when you know the answer I'll give you?"

  Ah, now Frank saw it. Marguerite was good. She'd backed Frank into a corner and blocked the only exit. She should have been a cop.

  "All right. You win. Can you help me?"

  "I've won nothing, Lieutenant. This isn't about me. This is between you and that woman. I wanted to tell you this earlier, but I knew you'd laugh. I think you're finally ready to hear it."

  Christ, now what? Switching the phone to her aching right hand, Frank sank her head into the palm of her left. The silence was so long Frank said, "You there?"

  "Yes ... I think it's so easy for me to see this because you are completely unaware and make no effort to hide it. I saw this when you walked into my house with Mr. Hernandez. It stunned me actually, but what could I have said? You wouldn't have believed me."

  Another silence. This time Frank waited. She'd kill for a drink. Great, she thought, Johnnie and I should be going to AA meetings together.

  "You have a tremendous power about you. I can see it as easily as I see this other woman's power. But where hers pulls in energy like a dark star, yours is bright. It pulses a wonderful light. And it seems very old, something you've carried for many, many lifetimes."

  Frank rubbed at her eyes, not believing this conversation. Not believing she hadn't hung up yet.

  "It's more like a shield, really. It envelops you and protects you for the work you do. You see, you've always been a warrior. For a very lo
ng time. Maybe always."

  Marguerite's words jarred loose the image of the dream soldier, forever fighting.

  "You're in a battle now," the mambo went on. "And it's not the first time. I can't see all your enemies, but I feel Mother Love so strongly upon you. And just as strongly, I can feel your courage and compassion. You will fight because you have to, not because you want to. You don't like to fight, but it's what you must do and you do it well. It appears to be your destiny."

  Just like the soldier's, Frank thought. He didn't like it either, but it was what he had to do. He left the dead in the blowing sand and went on. Father Merrin, running after him, out of time. The dogs snarling in the desert. The red dog. "Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war."

  "And Lieutenant?"

  Marguerite brought Frank back.

  "Make no mistake. This is a battle to the end."

  Sure it was. Frank could see that with the soldier's eye. Her mind still tripped in puddles of confusion, but her bones knew. They understood what her brain couldn't. Darcy had said he accepted without understanding. Yeah, she could go that far. It all made sense in a way that couldn't be made sense of.

  "A battle," Frank repeated.

  "Yes."

  And though she was sure of the answer, she had to ask.

  "Who's winning?"

  32

  Lucian had the gift too. And it had been getting stronger. He hadn't told his mother that. Though he worshipped her with the awe of a child, like a child, he had come of age.

  "You know, that decided it for me when Mama made me lay which you," he said to Lavinia. "Don't matter that we was already. She didn't know about that. That was what decided my mind for me. That she could go against her own children like that. It ain't right."

  Lavinia snuggled into his ribs. Marcus was out collecting receipts and Mama Love was at the church. She had Lucian all to herself. Her silence helped Lucian justify his decision.

  "She gonna bring us all down, she keep goin' on like this. I tried talkin' to her, but she just give me that bug-eye stare like she about to pop sense into my head. I love my mama, I do, but she won't listen to sense no more. Her head's got too big, n'mean? This seems harsh but it's the only way I can think of that you and me can be free and that this family can go on, n'mean?"