by Dalya Moon
I spit in his face and he lets me go, stepping back stunned. My legs in position and stable beneath me, I feign movement with my right hand, then land a straight left on the side of his face. Something makes a crunching sound. He's distracted, and I bring down a hammer fist near his neck.
I don't see it coming, but he hooks me on my right cheek. His arms are up, blocking, and I go for an uppercut, but he's too fast. Everything's a blur and my nose cracks, fire shooting up behind my eyes.
“Don't make me mess up your face,” he says, his voice coming from everywhere at once, on the wind. My arms are being pulled off, twisted up behind my back. Hissing in my ear from behind me, he says, “Relax, kiddo. She'll do the job and be back here in ten minutes. Twenty minutes, tops. The money's already in my bank account. Don't make easy things difficult. Money is easy. And I told you I'd take good care of you.”
It's a struggle to breathe the way he's holding me, let alone talk. “No! I won't let you.”
“How are you going to stop me? Or her? Are you going to fly there? Would you like me to give you a head start?”
He throws me forward with incredible strength, and I land against the thin metal railing, facing the street below. Some people have stopped and are gathered together, looking down at something—my smashed cell phone. None of them are looking up here.
I steady myself against the railing and seek my breath, gulping for air.
“Ready to play nice and be a good boy?” Rudy asks.
I turn and face him, still holding the railing. “No!”
“Your Gran sure will miss you, though you have been behaving oddly lately. I wouldn't have guessed you were suicidal, but you have had bouts of depression in the past.”
Why isn't Detective Wrong doing anything yet? She said she'd intervene if things got violent. “Detective Wrong, help!” I call out. “A little help!”
Rudy's face twists with mirth and he lets out a horrible sound, finishing with something resembling a laugh. “Your little friend in the big plant pot? Somebody hit her on the head and she had to take a little nap.”
“You killed her!”
Rudy makes a tsk-tsk sound. “She's not dead yet. I've only injured her. I think. She shouldn't have been there. Spying on people is wrong, don't you know that?”
The sun has set, and the violet sky is now cool blue. Think, Zan, what next? I'm strong, but he's stronger.
Rudy takes off his dress jacket and lays it on the bench. The copper of his shirt glows like metal, and his front is all shadow now, except for the glint of his belt buckle. Another light, dim and eerie, seems to come from his eyes.
“What do you say, boy?” He takes two steps toward me, unbuttoning his cuffs and rolling up his sleeves. “Are you with me, or against me? Last chance.”
I need time to slow down so I can think, but everything's moving too fast. What can I do? Why is Rudy so much stronger than me? All I have are ... the bees.
“Join me,” he says, extending a hand.
The bees rumble in my lungs. I'm not wearing the ring, though, so I won't be able to control them. But what are my other choices? I could summon my bees, or join forces with evil witches, or become pavement pizza.
Rudy's waiting for my answer, his hand still extended.
“Join me,” he says again.
Before my breath is gone, I respond with, “OH HELL NO, OLD MAN!”
The first few bees hit the insides of my teeth as I'm yelling. I open my mouth and they shoot out, buzzing and angry. I'm totally doing this! I'm breathing, through my nose, and not suffocating.
DON'T STING ME, I order them with my thoughts. GO TO AUSTIN AND WAKE HER UP.
The bees hover in front of me in a cloud, preparing to swarm, but caught between me and Rudy. I glance quickly down behind me. People on the street twenty stories below are going about their business under the light of the street lamps. Cars streak by on the street, headlights and tail lights, but no blue and red flashers or sirens. The police aren't coming.
How can I summon help? The people below are too far away for me to hear any words, even if I could pause the torrent of bees coming out of my mouth long enough to call out to them.
“I'll be damned,” Rudy says, looking up at my cloud of bees. “That's pretty good for someone your age. But I don't want to get stung, so, over you go!”
From the shadows, he leaps at me, faster than I've ever seen anyone move. I struggle against Rudy, grabbing his shirt, his tie, his hair, his face, anything I can, but I can't control my body. I'm nothing but a vibration, a hive. My mass is disintegrating, into bees.
Now I'm looking at the pavement. I don't know how he did it, but he's got me by the ankles and I'm hanging over the side of the building, head down. I can see one of the stone grotesques now, from this angle. It has wings. The statues aren't dogs or dragons, but griffins—mythical beasts part lion and part bird.
My thoughts swirl, and I'm losing consciousness.
The bees continue to pour out of my mouth. I'm losing so much mass now, I can feel myself caving in.
It's too late for me.
I'm going down. Strong hands around my ankles start to loosen.
I close my eyes and think of Julie's music, the calming songs. I search inside myself for tranquility, control, acceptance.
The bees are listening. They're hesitating, but confused. There are so many, and their thoughts combine, a hive mind. If they sting Rudy, I'll fall. But if they don't sting him, I'll still fall.
I reach out for the stone statue, my fingers just grazing the edge of a wing. If I could grab hold of something, I could swing onto a ledge below. Can Rudy even see what I'm doing down here, through the cloud of bees?
I command the bees: GO STOP AUSTIN. I picture her as clearly as I can. Austin, radiant and back lit by sunshine, laughing. STOP HER.
The pressure on my ankles is releasing now.
The wing of the griffin moves further away from my hand.
I'm falling, down, down, down.
I close one eye and see from the eyes of the swarm, a boy falling down the side of a building into something dark, something black.
Before I lose myself, I think of her.
* * *
The blackness claws at me.
Confusion.
Pain.
Black wings, black feathers.
The ground, rushing up.
The faces of people, horrified and screaming.
Blackness.
* * *
I lift my head and touch it with my hand. Not wet, not bleeding.
My arm, not broken.
My legs, not broken.
The crowd of people around me, hushed.
I sit up.
Crows. A murder of them, interspersed with the legs of people standing on the sidewalk.
All at once, the bystanders turn and walk away without speaking, leaving me alone with the crows. There must be a hundred of the birds. A big one pecks at my leg. I lift the leg to reveal one of them, limp and lifeless.
Behind me, where my torso landed, are two more crows, also dead. I stand and brush myself off. I'm not concerned about dirt or dust, but it's a reflexive motion. My hands confirm I'm here, not broken.
In all, five of them are dead, and the others peer at me with a multitude of dark eyes as I take off my jacket and nestle the dead birds within the silk lining. I fold the jacket over, tucking them in.
“Thank you,” I say.
At once, the crows take flight, blacking out the sky.
The jacket and the suit pants I'm wearing have small tears and pulls in them from the birds' beaks and claws, but the front of my copper-colored dress shirt is ripped to shreds. If I hadn't been wearing the sturdy vintage suit … I can't imagine what would have happened.
With the folded jacket and the crows' bodies in my arms, I shiver against the air as it begins to rain. Sirens ring out in the distance. The rain starts to come down hard.
I walk back into the Hotel Doccione, to the front desk.
“Call the police,” I tell the woman at the counter. “Someone's been injured on the roof. A cop. Tell them to hurry.”
Gran. I don't know where Austin is, but Gran's here, and I have to protect her.
I make my way to the atrium, where the party's going strong. For a moment, I can't find Gran, and I fear Rudy's come and taken her away.
But she's here. She's talking to James and Julie, and they all look up when I walk in. I set my bundled jacket on the table with the wedding presents and go to Gran.
“Have you seen my husband?” she asks. “He said he was going for a cigar, but he should have been back by now.”
Her eyes move down to my torn shirt and she freezes.
I take her hand and ask her to come away from the party with me, somewhere quiet. She tells me to calm down and tell her what's wrong, and explain why my nose is bleeding. I touch my fingers to my face. Blood. But I don't have any pain.
The words don't come easily. I was suspicious about some of Rudy's business deals and asked some questions. He became violent and tried to kill me to cover up his secrets. He tried to throw me off the roof, but first he admitted he had a man killed for a business deal. Rudy's a murderer.
She grabs me and squeezes me tight against her chest. “He tried to hurt you?”
James and Julie are also shocked, but run to get me and Gran some chairs. The party continues and we find a dark wall and a place to sit.
I explain that the police are coming, but we have to stay together until he's caught. I have to protect the people I love. Gran is crying and now Julie is too. James keeps repeating, over and over, that he can't believe any of this is happening.
My face and my neck are bleeding, and I've got blood soaking my shirt, which has transferred to Gran's beautiful blue suit. I try to wipe the blood away. “I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I couldn't protect you.”
She tries to tell me to be calm, but I see my mother.
I'm so small and he's so powerful. I see my father, and my mother's eyes as they go dim.
Everything's a blur. Music starting and stopping. I'm flying, floating, on wings of birds. Some people scream when the cops charge in. I close my eyes.
* * *
Hours later.
Some medics gave me fluids, and I can stand again now, I think, but for the moment I'm sitting.
I understand the police searched the entire building, but Rudy wasn't found. Detective Wrong was discovered unconscious on the roof, and they took her to the hospital. We went to the hospital too, with Gran driving, and James and Julie in the car with us. Everybody else went home to await news. Gran and Rudy's honeymoon suitcases were in the back seat of her car, and we had to move them to the trunk.
At the hospital, information is hard to come by, as there have been strange things happening all across town tonight, but we found out a young woman in a blue dress matching Austin's description was brought to the emergency room.
We're now wait in the waiting room. Some men and women in police uniforms are here as well.
I've been to this hospital many times, to visit Austin after her surgery. None of the nurses recognize me. We ask about Austin, and describe what she was wearing, but they refuse to give us any confirmation or information.
Gran hasn't asked me for any more details about Rudy, but I can't stop talking. I tell her how I met Detective Wrong when Julie and I found Newt's body, and I've been talking to her ever since I became suspicious about Rudy's earnings. Now wouldn't be the worst time to break the news to her about my power, and I want her to know my secrets, but there are too many strangers sitting all around us.
Gran nods, but she isn't hearing me. She checks the time and says we have to get home soon to take care of Mibs.
I hear murmurs of people around us talking about killer bees swarming downtown, stinging people. The police, fire trucks, and ambulances were busier than they've ever been. Lightning struck City Hall and took out the power for an entire quadrant of the city.
How much involvement I had, or Rudy had, in any of this is anyone's guess, but I'm certainly not going to volunteer information to the police.
Gran's hands are folded together and her head is bowed. James and Julie do the same, and finally, so do I, though in my own way, there hasn't been one second since I went over the roof that I wasn't praying.
We wait.
* * *
Near midnight, a doctor comes out and says to the other police officers waiting in the room, “Detective Wrong is a little woozy, but she's going to be just fine. She asked me to send someone in to get the recording device that was on her person.”
The burly officer who patted me down the day I was at the police station stops in front of me. “Thank you for looking out for our girl,” he says. “She should not have been up there without backup, but Wrong's got some unconventional ways of doing things.”
“I shouldn't have put her in danger,” I say.
“That's our job. We do what it takes so folks like you don't have to.”
He offers me his hand, which I shake, then he disappears down the hall to see Detective Wrong.
“Excuse me,” Gran calls out to the doctor. “Any word on the young woman who came in?”
“She's our … she's my sister,” Julie says.
The doctor tells us to wait and disappears through the doors.
Gran's got one of my hands and Julie's got the other. I analyze the artwork on the walls of the waiting room. Typical generic prints of paintings of pretty countrysides. Terrible art that says nothing. It's all I can do to not cry.
A nurse comes through the doors and says one of us can come in, perhaps the sister. Julie doesn't admit to the fib, but insists I go in, as I'm “the boyfriend.”
I follow the nurse, who says, “She was stung over a thousand times. She should be dead, but she's making a remarkable recovery.”
She should be dead.
My bees—no, I—nearly killed her.
Chapter Twenty-Three
I step into the room, where a very red and swollen Austin is lying in a hospital bed. Only her pixie-cut hair assures me this person is her.
I clench my jaw to prevent reacting to this visual. The nurse leaves us alone.
“Funny meeting you here again,” Austin says.
I can't tell if she's smiling, because her face is so swollen. Seeing her like this makes me hurt.
“I am so sorry.” I want to reach for her hand, but hold back for fear of harming her more.
“I shot the sidewalk a bunch of times with a gun when the bees started stinging me,” she says.
She's not in handcuffs, so that's a good sign. “You didn't shoot any people, or rob any stores?”
“Not that anyone's told me.”
I take a breath for what feels like the first time in days.
“Zan, I don't know how I got there,” she says. “Or how I had a gun. The last thing I remember was watching your grandmother walk down the aisle.”
“I'm so glad you're not hurt.”
“I can't say the same for the sidewalk,” she jokes, but neither of us laugh.
“Are you in pain now? Can I get you anything?”
“Someone stopped,” she says. “I thought they were helping me, but they tore the necklace off my neck.”
“Good riddance,” I say.
“It was a gift from you.”
“No, it was a mistake,” I say, and after I look around to double-check we're alone in the room, I tell her everything I know. My theory is the necklace had some hypnotic power over her, and she was going to do Rudy's dirty work while he had the perfect alibi of being at his own wedding.
Tears come out of her swollen eyes and slide down her face into the hospital pillow.
“I think the necklace really was the same one The Hound Girl wore,” I say.
“She killed her entire family.”
“I know.”
Austin reaches for my hand. The swelling has already diminished in the time I've been here, and I can tell
she's smiling. I lean over and kiss her very lightly.
“You're so sweet,” she says.
The nurse appears at the door and tells me to let Austin rest. I beg her for five more minutes. She says, “Two minutes,” and leaves us.
“Zan, you're a sweetheart,” Austin says.
“Your next gift from me won't be cursed, I swear.”
“I want to talk to you about something. It's very mundane and has nothing to do with witches or cursed necklaces.”
“Phew!” I say jokingly.
“I went to that fashion school to show them my portfolio, and I might be able to get in, even though the course has started.”
“What? I thought you were just visiting your parents.”
“I did both.”
My legs tremble, so I sit in the chair next to her bed, pulling my hand away from hers. “When are you leaving?”
“I haven't decided yet. But I want to make the right decision. I want to be free to do what's best for me.”
“I'm graduating in June, and I'll go wherever you are. We'll be fine.”
Another tear pools in her eye. “I think we should take a break from each other. You're so young.”
This room is bright and uncomfortable. Nothing happening today is real.
Austin, don't go. I think it but don't say it, my throat shut tight.
“This is for your own good,” she says.
“Don't tell me what's for my own good. I love you. I want to be with you. I don't care about any age difference. We have a future together, I've seen it.”
“You see what you want to see.”
The nurse returns, knocking on the door frame.
I turn away from Austin, away from her face.
She doesn't call me to her.
I keep my head turned, so I don't have to look at her as she hurts me for my own good.
I stand and leave the room. Austin says my name and tells me she's sorry, but I don't look back, because I won't let her see me cry. I won't let anyone see, ever.
* * *
I pull myself together before I step through the doors to the waiting room.
