"Just had to know which bell to ring."
"On a street that doesn't exist."
"Maybe you should try a different glamour spell," Merle said. "Or maybe you simply tired of playing at goddess-hood."
"One does not turn one's back on what one is," Morgana said.
"Only you, princess, still consider us even close to gods. We never were. We were ideas. When people cease believing in gods, the gods die. When they cease to believe in ideas…" Merle said.
"They cease to dream."
"They cease to exist."
"And we're still here." She set her chalice down on a table he couldn't spy within the foyer. She guarded her home and her secrets and wasn't going to let him nose around any more than she had to.
"Your son seeks you."
"Our dance is almost over."
"He says you have one last lesson to teach him."
"Does he now? An ambitious little scrapling. I have more than a few tricks left in me."
"He thinks it's almost time."
"What do you think, mad mage?"
"I think…" Merle adjusted the fit of his aluminum cap. "You are harder to get rid of than most things. The hardiest of cockroaches."
"Sadly, I know you mean that as a compliment." Morgana's eyes never left Merle. Secrets within agendas within schemes. The woman was maddening and fascinating. And had a way of stirring up old feelings.
"It's not in my best interest to be rude."
"Ruthless, but not rude. You don't have me fooled, mage. I did learn one lesson while under your… tutelage."
"What was that?"
"Never teach your student all of your tricks."
"And you do have many… students."
"Is that a hint of jealousy I hear? Don't worry, mad one, you will always have a special place in my heart."
"And I shiver at the thought of what a cold, dark place that is. What about Dred?"
"Leave my son to me. You've done your duty. Consider me warned."
"The least I could do. For old times' sake."
Now that Mountain Jack's had closed down, Rick's Boatyard was King's favorite restaurant. Tucked away on the west side, it overlooked Eagle Creek Reservoir itself, on the other side of I-465, a man-made boundary that separated Breton Court and the apartments and neighborhoods surrounding it from the neighborhoods that bled into the suburbs. A chalkboard proclaimed the day's special: the chef's soup of seafood and andouille gumbo, a main course of South African lobster tails, with Mojitos as the featured drink. The clink of silverware and the thick murmur of pleasant conversation speaking above the easy-listening jazz coming from the speakers filled the air as a live band warmed up, playing some lukewarm Kenny G impersonation.
The ceiling recalled the inside of a lighthouse. Fish and flatscreen televisions, each like prize catches, were mounted on the walls alongside New Orleans jazz scene paintings and hanging ferns. Sails created canopies for the booth. The evening proved too cool to sit out on the deck but they could still see the waves of the reservoir. Ominous and calm, deep and mysterious. The perfect place for a romantic dinner. Just King and Lady G.
And Prez.
A blue dress, a silky number with a plunging neckline, stopped high on Lady G's thigh. She had borrowed a pair of evening gloves from Big Momma that ran to her elbow, which she decided finished her elegant look. King wanted to take her someplace special, he said, and she wanted to dress the part. Though he lived on his accrued Social Security benefits from his mother's passing, he wanted to be the man, the knight, she deserved. She wanted to play the sophisticate yet she felt so young and inexperienced around him. She rummaged through Big Momma's closet forever, eventually finding herself in the low-ceilinged attic which housed artifacts from her aunties. Outfits dating back decades. She searched through every box until she found the perfect dress. No relationships happened by accident. She couldn't shake the nagging feeling that there was something degrading about the whole thing. That sense that she was little more than arm candy. So very devastated, an emotional cripple in many ways, she scrambled to be good enough for him, to please him. And part of her struggled with the notion that she wasn't with him, but rather with the idea of him.
She sighed, too loud, drawing the attention of both King and Prez. She decided that her mood was probably put off because King decided to bring his newest puppy along with them.
Not quite hidden behind a menu with the words "Fresh Jazz, Live Seafood" splayed across its front, Prez stared at the array of silverware before him. The letters in gold script on his black hoodie read Light Fingered Brigade. He wondered why he got followed in stores.
"Start from the outside in," King said.
"What?"
"As they bring you out dishes, salad and appetizers and stuff, use the forks starting on the outside."
"Can't just use one fork through the whole meal? Seems awful wasteful," Prez said.
"White folks got too much time and too much kitchen help to worry about that," Lady G said.
"Just a different way of doing things is all." He resented the unspoken implication that he was trying to turn the two of them white.
Though pissed that King had brought his latest special project along with them, Lady G couldn't stay mad at him. He was so good with Prez, almost like a father. Probably doing what Pastor Winburn did with him years ago. She always gave into King's wants and requests. Partly because she wanted to please him, partly because everything he did seemed so… important. King was large, not just physically imposing, but his life seemed lived on such a grand stage. His every action and decision seemed to carry such weight. It was intimidating. Timid and hard-headed, yet boisterous and fierce-sounding, she was still the shy little girl whose time was better spent in a book. And she resented the flash of sentiment that perhaps she was every bit the special project to King that Prez was.
"You sure I'm not intruding?" Prez asked.
Yes, Lady G thought. "Naw. King too scared to be alone with me."
"It's cool." Though pleased that Lady G acquiesced to letting him bring Prez along, King knew he might have been pushing things a bit. A hard, impenetrable man who would die for those he loved, inside he was still the frightened boy fearing the monsters that came for him in the night. "I just wanted to take two people I care about out for a nice evening. It's all about possibilities, you know."
"Yeah." Prez's eyes glazed over, not knowing what King went on about. The food felt good in his belly though.
The dinner passed uneventfully. King and Prez talked of the Pacers' penchant for big white farmboy acquisitions, and the holes of the Colts' defensive line. They talked about the best places to eat ribs. They talked about school and passed knowing glances at women, King's arched eyebrow asking to Prez's shake of disapproval as waitresses walked by. Nothing too deep, though the conversation about school was cut short by Prez as it veered too close to thinking about the future and making plans. No, tonight was about being: being still, being present, and being with each other.
Back at Breton Court, Prez ducked immediately into King's place. King walked Lady G over to Big Momma's place.
"Sorry about that. Just thought with him having no place to go, it would be a bad idea to leave him by himself," King said.
"I don't care that he came along, it's just…" Lady G hated to sound pathetic and needy. Like a girl. "I just thought it was going to be only us."
"I thought I could do both: be with you and help him along."
"I'm not some item you can just multi-task to check off your 'to do' list."
No competition, no domination, they held on to each other, rushed into each other. What one had to give the other was pleased to take, like sweet-tasting fruit. But too much of even the best fruit spoiled one's diet.
"It's just… there's so much work to be done. Not enough time to do it all. Not enough workers. Not enough people care. And as much as I want you beside me, it's also dangerous. So I want to keep you as far from it as possible."
"There you go again. Trying to determine folks' business. Who elected you our Black Messiah?"
"What?" King thought he'd opened up and poured out his romantic soul. He didn't expect the sharp sting of words.
"You don't get to decide that for me. It's my decision to make. I'm tired of the men in my life trying to tell me what's best for me."
"Is that what's bothering you?"
"I said it, didn't I?" She held a steady gaze behind a deceptive mien. He made her see old things with new eyes. He gave her confidence, shared her secrets and felt loved. He helped her define herself. King was the one person who accepted her. Who knew her. Who had been real with her. She couldn't hide from him.
"You just seemed off is all. A little preoccupied," King said finally.
"Just a lot going on. Life with you is hectic. Still getting used to it is all."
"All right then." He read her face like emotional tea leaves. Whatever he saw there he decided not to press the matter.
She kissed him, which lately she did more often, when he asked too many questions, camouflaging her discomfort in an expression of love.
CHAPTER TWELVE
A sculpture of Robert Indiana's agape-inspired painting "LOVE" and the huge series of fountains were the first things people noticed when they entered the grounds of the Indianapolis Museum of Art. Three main areas made up the IMA: the museum proper, with its Oval Entry Pavilion, a three-story, glass-enclosed jewel box of a building, the Gallery Pavilion, and the Garden Pavilion; the Virginia B Fairbanks Art and Nature Park; and Oldfields, Lilly House and Gardens.
The twenty-six-acre Oldfields estate was named for the former farmland on which it was sited. A French chateau-styled mansion, Oldfields overlooked the White River valley. The twenty-two room mansion was built for Hugh McKennan Landon and his family between 1912 and 1914. In the early 1920s the Landons built the Ravine Garden, a design masterpiece of bulbs, perennials, wildflowers, ferns, and flowering trees and shrubs that featured a bubbling brook that descended the fifty-foot hillside and fed three rockrimmed pools. In the 1930s, Josiah K. Lilly Jr. acquired Oldfields. For all of the IMA's picturesque beauty, no one ever asked why it was closed on Mondays.
"Where are all the ladies in bikinis?" Prez asked.
"This ain't a rap video, fool." Lott shoved him playfully in the back of the head. Wayne, Lott, and Prez took up positions as escorts, feeling every bit as ridiculous as Wal-Mart greeters, but King wanted the arrivals to be respected and welcomed.
"They're going to be late," King reassured them. His leather coat swirled around him like a low-lying cloud, perfectly framing the image of Dr Martin Luther King Jr on his black T-shirt. His Caliburn was safely tucked away, but not on his person, per the rules of parlay.
"Had to prove who's the biggest man. Make the others wait," Wayne agreed.
"So we could be here all night just waiting for them to show." Detective Cantrell stood arms folded over one another, his face a sculpture of solemn, bemused, skepticism. His posture the incarnation of the words "I told you so."
"Someone has to be first," King said.
In the face of the event possibly flopping on its face, Pastor Winburn beamed in silence toward King with something akin to pride.
The cleaning staff came through Oldfields every other evening with great care, erasing any traces of that day's traffic. Eight historically refurbished rooms reflected their 1930s appearance. Pristine furniture of a bygone era, preserved, restored, dusted, polished dead dreams. Visitors typically started at the Entrance Hall, with its circular staircase and then moved into the Great Hall, the grand artery of the house that accessed most of the other rooms. It was the main room for entertaining.
However, the players weren't gathering to entertain.
Lined up within the long drive of Oldfields, the various crew leaders pulled up with their respective security entourages. Sports cars, SUVs, long green Continentals, all freshly washed, with immaculate rims: a funeral procession, built on the backs of a poisoned community. The first out of the vehicle was always bodyguard. Foot soldiers guarded the cars. No one worried about any beefs because all parlays were respected and any issues squashed.
"I think that's Rellik's ride pulling up," Prez said.
Garlan stepped out of the Cadillac CTS-V first, followed by The Boars and Rok, checking the place out with a quick scan before giving a nod to Rellik. He shook out his shirt in one final act of preening, then walked toward Oldfields. Lott and Prez moved to greet him, but Wayne put his arm up to hold them back.
"I got this," he said in a flat tone devoid of any humor or joy, a tone so unfamiliar to either of them it froze them in their tracks. Wayne walked toward Rellik. He didn't have any words prepared. He hadn't rehearsed this moment in his head. Once his brother left the family, his name was hardly brought up. A ghost who ran the streets, he might as well have been as dead as his other brothers. He had heard Gavain was out and given the worlds they ran in, knew the possibility of them running into one another was constant. But not necessarily inevitable. When King detailed his scheme, the idea of seeing his brother still didn't seem real to Wayne. Yet here they were.
"Wayne." For his part, Rellik didn't know how to play the situation either, besides cool. It had been too long and without any vibe of brotherly affection, wasn't no point in going too far out the way to be… brotherly.
"Gavain." Wayne moved in. The scar of the back of his neck itched. Garlan took note, ready to move, but relaxed as the two embraced. More cordial than any true warmth. It was a start.
"Don't no one call me that no more." He cut his eyes toward Garlan. "It's Rellik."
"I heard that's who you were now. Which is it, killer or relic?"
"Which do you hope it is?" Rellik let the question hang in the air. "You look good, money. Played a little ball, I heard."
"For a minute. Blew out my wheel though."
"Now you out here saving kids."
"They save themselves. I'm just here to help them stay out they own way."
"Keeping them from drowning." He wondered if Wayne had any love in his heart for him. Gary. Rath. Their deaths weren't his fault but they were under his care. They were his charges, his responsibility, and he fucked it up. He fucked everything up. His actions blew up the family as they were never the same afterward. Just walking into the house made him sad. His mother's eyes betrayed the sense of blame and judgment she never gave voice to. Not that their eyes ever met. She spoke to him when she had to, always pleasant enough. But that was all it ever was. Brief. Courteous. Affectionless.
"Come on. Folks'll be lining up soon. Let's get you situated." Lott sensed the apprehension of the moment ushered them along.
"King," Wayne introduced. "This is Rellik of the Merky Water crew. My brother."
Rellik was the old brother and he shamed Wayne. He was the hope of the family, the one they all admired, and yet he proved himself every bit the fuck-up his father was. And his father before him. Wayne was the good one, the heart of the family. If pressed, the most Wayne might have confessed to was… annoyance at Gavain. His presence, the idea of him, to be caught up around him and his nonsense would have been too much for Wayne and what he wanted to do and how he approached the world. Better for Gavain to become Rellik, the villain he believed the family and the community viewed him as anyway.
King raised an eyebrow. Wayne rarely talked about his family and King hadn't pressed. Still, this might have been a bit of information he might've mentioned.
"What's up?" The pair clasped hands and bumped shoulders. "You can go on inside. Wayne will take care of you. Your people are free to hang out in the front room."
Rellik and Wayne departed, followed by his entourage. Within the door, Cantrell waved a metal detector wand as a security check. No weapons allowed past that point. The steps had barely been cleared when the next set of cars arrived. Mulysa and Tristan were the first out of the car. Broyn exited next. Colvin cut through the center of them, flanked by Mulysa and Tristan.
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"Colvin," Merle whispered. "He stinks of fey."
"He favors Omarosa," King said.
"He should. He's her twin."
"Keep an eye on your wallet then."
"Colvin of the ICU set," Prez announced.
"King, well met." Colvin ignored all except King. The two squared off, not with any tension, but in a moment of sizing one another up. Colvin a man of languid grace, King much larger, but with a fluidity of his own. They clasped hands and bumped shoulders, then King dismissed Prez to escort Colvin to the inner chamber. They led the entourage to the great room where Pastor Winburn began the dance of getting to know the kids. Flat-faced and downcast gazes, not a smile among the lot, they were a bored classroom with a substitute teacher. Lott remained next to King, not wishing to leave him alone as the last of their little gathering showed up. He knew the toll this must take on him and didn't want to leave his friend hurting any more than he had to.
"King." Dred's voice ran like ice water along his back. Dred's scraggily goatee never grew in right, adding to the natural boyish look of his face. His nest of hair coiled out in serpentine aggression. Eyes the color of cold onyx, though bloodshot and rheumy, fixed on him.
"Dred."
"Parlay's a beautiful thing. A time for old friends to reacquaint themselves and chat freely."
"Wouldn't have asked you here otherwise." A shuffle along the shadows drew King's attention. Baylon stepped into view. King remembered his once-flexing gait. Not quite the full pimping stroll, but enough to convey the fluid movement of his prison-built bulk. Eyes half-closed in onsetting ennui, as if bored with all he surveyed. The man before him was shriveled, not in size, but in the way he carried himself. Like a drained old man with a stiff-jointed shuffle. His jogging suit had seen better days, but not damn sight of a washer. "Damn, son. You look rough."
"Such are the winds of fortune," Dred said.
"Come on. Let's go inside."
Naptown Red scurried up the steps just as Detective Cantrell Williams was set to close the door. He wanted to arrive last, making the others wait on him. He parked his whip over in the lot of the museum proper and walked over, not wanting anyone to see his rusted-out '88 Oldsmobile. The car was pimping in its day, a classic, to Red's mind, but might have gotten him laughed out this here player's ball.
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