The plane started to taxi toward the runway. Lance and Ricky looked at each other nervously. Hands clasped, they felt whole and strong, though still terrified.
Behind them, the wide-eyed Kai and Dakota gripped their armrests firmly as the massive plane rolled onto the runway in preparation for takeoff.
Reyna sat comfortable and relaxed, her eyes roving the cabin, taking in the luxury and functionality of the aircraft. It was a flying series of offices where the vice president could conduct the same kinds of business he would on the ground.
Almost in awe, she turned to Esteban and saw him clutching at his armrests as though fearful of falling. His face looked ashen, his eyes closed. Shaking her head in wonder, she reached out a hand and took one of his. He nodded her way gratefully, but refused to open his eyes.
Suddenly the engines roared and the plane picked up speed. Faster. Faster. Faster still. Lance and Ricky kept their wide, terrified eyes fixed on each other as the plane bumped and thumped and then rose into the air. The boys squeezed each other’s hand tightly, green eyes locked on brown, their hearts thumping wildly with unabashed terror.
Behind them, Dakota gripped the armrests so hard his knuckles were turning white. Kai had his eyes pressed shut as the sensation of suddenly leaving the ground made his stomach drop. A hand whipped out and grabbed one of his. In surprise, he opened his eyes and looked down to see Dakota’s hand gripping his. The Lakota boy’s head was pinned to the back of the seat, his eyes pressed so tightly shut Kai thought they’d never open again. Dakota looked pale and more scared than Kai had ever seen him. The sensation of Dakota’s hand in his felt right and proper, and he gently squeezed it to ease the other boy’s fear. In so doing, he eased his own.
Up, up, up the plane rose into the sky. To Lance, it seemed they would never stop climbing, and it reminded him way too much of Apocalypse, the roller coaster at Manic Mountain that had nearly killed him last summer. He could see in Ricky’s eyes the same memory surfacing. Finally, after what seemed an eternity, the plane began to level off.
A loud noise and slight jolt sounded from beneath them. Esteban flung his eyes open and turned a fearful gaze on Reyna. “What happened? Did we hit something?”
She heard the Secret Service agents laughing and that irked her. She just squeezed Esteban’s hand lovingly. “Just the wheels pulling back into the plane. No worries, baby. We’re fine.”
Ghostly white face sharply contrasting with the brown of his hand, Esteban squeezed back, struggling to quell his frantic heart, and cursing himself for being such a wimp.
Dakota finally opened his eyes as the plane leveled off and glanced hesitantly over at Kai. “We’re still alive,” he whispered.
Kai nodded.
Then Dakota saw his hand in the other boy’s and turned red with mortification. Slowly, he released his grip and Kai let him go, eyeing him uncertainly.
“I’m sorry, Sir Laughs A Lot,” he mumbled, finding it difficult to make eye contact. “I didn’t mean to embarrass you.” He looked away. “Or me.”
Kai reached over and touched his arm. Dakota turned his head uncertainly and Kai said, “No worries. I was scared shitless, too.” Then he offered a smile. To his astonishment, Dakota returned it.
Lance and Ricky had calmed down, as well, but kept their hands clasped because it relaxed them. They leaned in and rested their foreheads one against the other, and smiled. “We’re a couple of dumbasses,” Lance said softly. “You know that, right?”
Ricky grinned. “Damn straight.”
“Let’s not tell Dad how scared we were, okay?” Lance suggested.
Before Ricky could answer, both of them heard Reyna call from two seats back, “Don’t worry, baby boy, I’ll tell him. He’ll love it.”
Lance craned his neck to look back and saw her leaning around into the aisle grinning broadly. He scowled. “Thanks, Reyna.”
“Hey, what are big sisters for?” she riposted happily and then settled back into her seat.
After about ten minutes in the air, the captain announced that everyone could walk about the cabin freely and use their electronic devices. Lance and Ricky gingerly unfastened their seat belts and stood cautiously, as though expecting to be thrown down by buffeting wind. The carpeted floor of the plane felt weird beneath their skate shoes. It thrummed and vibrated, but the roaring of the outside engines was muted. Probably has shielding, Lance surmised, since it does usually carry the vice president.
They stepped around their seats to Kai and Dakota. They were eying each other in a way that gave Lance pause and set his soul-whispering gene into overdrive. Then the boys noted Lance and Ricky staring and turned their heads.
Kai laughed. “Some warriors we make, huh?”
Lance laughed with him. “C’mon, it’s safe to walk around. Let’s check the windows now.”
As Kai and Dakota hesitantly unbuckled themselves, Lance led Ricky to the nearest window and they looked out. He nearly gasped at the sight of clouds… underneath them! He and Ricky looked at each other in astonishment, and then they giggled like little boys.
“This is so cool!” Ricky gushed, and Lance excitedly agreed.
Kai and Dakota took up residence at the windows beside theirs and stared out in abject wonder. It was clear from their facial expressions that they’d never expected to find themselves in such a position. Kai clapped Dakota on the back and laughed. “I told you a Cloud Eagle could fly.”
Dakota turned to him with a childlike grin on his normally unresponsive face. Lance noted how handsome the boy looked when he smiled and wished he’d do so more often.
Reyna finally dragged Esteban to his feet and they joined Ryan and Justin at the other row of windows, gazing out at the clouds below and occasional patches of land when the cloud cover seemed to open up a hole in the sky.
“This is amazing!” Reyna gushed excitedly, dragging Esteban down the side corridor to explore the offices and rooms.
The Native Knights also wandered the plane, marveling at both the lavishness and practicality of its layout. Once they got used to how the plane moved and felt beneath their feet, they relaxed and enjoyed the ride.
Settling on the room up front with the sectional couches, Lance sat and Ricky kicked off his shoes to stretch out on the sofa, his head in its rightful resting place on Lance’s lap. Tired from lack of sleep the previous night due to trepidation about the flight, both boys dosed off quickly.
Kai and Dakota found them a short while later and Kai hurried to get his backpack. While Dakota watched, Kai pulled out a sketchpad and charcoal pencils and sat sketching the two sleeping boys. Dakota had never seen Kai draw before, though he’d seen many of the boy’s art pieces at the powwows.
Despite his derisive comments some months back about Kai not being a true warrior because “He draws,” Dakota secretly loved the other boy’s talent and wished he had some talent of his own, other than what Ricky called his horse-whispering. As he sat and observed Kai’s deft, slender fingers grip the pencil at just such an angle and bring the sleeping boys to vivid life in shades of gray, he thought back to their days as children, to all the powwows they’d shared since they were six.
Even at that age, Kai had been the social one who wanted to dance with every girl he could find. Dakota had been cloudy and reticent from the get-go, and he usually just watched everyone else dance. Even his mother couldn’t get him to participate.
He’d always known Kai was Two-Spirit even before he knew what it meant. It was just something he sensed about the other boy. Growing up as he had, wanting so much to be a warrior like the Indians of old, Dakota tried desperately to be a man at an early age. But he knew he wasn’t a man. He’d always been just a boy trying to act like a man, nervously hiding his fears and insecurities behind the welcoming bliss of alcohol, or firewater, as he’d heard it called by older Indians on the rez. And that firewater destroyed everything it touched.
Watching Kai scrunch up his face as he narrowed his eyes and studied the two s
ubjects of his drawing for details, Dakota marveled that his Native brother had never succumbed to the temptations of drink. Maybe cuz he’s okay with himself, Dakota considered, and I don’t like who I am? Despite his dismissal of the other boy as not hard and tough because he couldn’t shoot or wrestle or fight as well, Dakota sadly realized that of the two of them, Kai was the stronger. He was the greater man because he was secure within himself.
Should I tell him, Dakota asked himself? Would he laugh like he always does? If he did I couldn’t take it. Allowing the fear to win out over the strength, Dakota merely sat back in this wonderfully comfortable sofa and watched his fellow knight create magic with just his hand and a charcoal pencil, wishing, not for the first time in recent months, for a drink to calm his nerves and free him from reality.
By the time Lance and Ricky awoke they had been in the air for several hours and it was lunchtime. Some of the middle rooms had tables with thick, high-backed black leather chairs, and that was where the yawning and stretching boys found the others eating. There were bowls of fruit, platters of vegetables, plates heaping with French fries, bottles of water and cans of soda. Most of the knights were munching on thick, juicy-looking hamburgers that would put the ones from In-N-Out to shame.
Justin and Esteban gave them the chin nod in between mouthfuls of food, but Reyna smirked lovingly. “So, you boys sleep well… together?”
The mortified looks on their faces drew a hearty laugh from her.
“Just kidding, baby boys,” she chided happily. “Get some of this food before the two garbage disposals shovel it all in.” She indicated Esteban and Justin with her thumb and they froze with their own chagrined looks. She laughed and shoved Esteban and he grinned around his mouthful of burger.
Lance and Ricky smiled and sat at the table with Kai and Dakota.
“We saved you seats,” Kai announced proudly as the boys lowered themselves into the plush softness of the chairs. “The native knights gotta stick together, right?”
Lance laughed and raised a fist. “Right.” The other three raised a fist and all bumped at the same time.
Then they settled down to eat the amazing food provided by the chefs aboard Air Force Two. Lance marveled that this food was easily as good as what the hotel staff at New Camelot made in their enormous kitchen, and here they were aboard a plane thirty thousand feet in the air.
As they ate, Lance noted a manila folder with part of a pencil drawing sticking out of it on the edge of the table near Kai. “You been drawing again, Kai?” Since joining the Round Table, Kai would often be seen sitting here or there in the house or out in the lush gardens sketching something, and Lance loved his talent. His wedding portrait of Arthur and Jenny had gotten thousands of likes on Facebook.
Kai nodded shyly, but didn’t offer to show it.
Lance glanced at Ricky a moment, but the other boy shrugged. Lance looked back at Kai and Dakota. “Can we see it or is it, like, a big secret? Maybe even someone you’re crushing on?”
He smiled to assure the boys he was joking, but even as the words left his mouth he found his eyes drifting from Kai to Dakota. Kai’s own gaze flicked involuntarily to the Lakota boy, as well, and quickly down at his food. Dakota also lowered his eyes, as though fearful Lance might see something in them.
Kai cleared his throat. “It’s just a drawing of… you guys. I did it while you were sleeping.”
Lance’s eyes went wide. “Can we see it?” he asked, suddenly very interested in how the Navajo boy saw them.
Looking uncharacteristically shy, Kai picked up the folder and handed it across the table to Lance. He took it, wiped his hands clean on a fine cloth napkin, and then slid out the drawing. He gasped slightly, and heard Ricky do the same.
It showed Lance sleeping back against the high cushions of the couch, Ricky’s head in his lap. One of Lance’s hands clasped one of Ricky’s and the other rested within Ricky’s long dark hair. The hair splayed out beside Lance’s legs onto the couch and dangled over the edge. Lance’s own silky mane draped down around his face to partially spill onto Ricky’s chest. The details were astonishing and so lifelike both boys gazed upon it in amazement.
But the most striking feature was the expression on the face of each boy. Displayed was such a mix of contentment, love, peace, and almost beatific radiance that Lance couldn’t bring himself to speak for a long minute. Neither could Ricky. This was clearly the best work they’d ever seen Kai produce.
“Wow,” Lance finally whispered, realizing he’d been holding his breath.
“Double wow,” Ricky muttered, still pinning his eyes to the drawing.
Finally, Lance looked up with a mystified smile. “Do we really look like that?”
To his great surprise, both Kai and Dakota nodded simultaneously, which amused Kai and seemed to embarrass Dakota.
“You guys are beautiful together,” Kai said, almost a whisper. “I hope someday to have what you have.”
Slightly embarrassed, he lowered his eyes, but Dakota turned his gaze on his Native brother uncertainly.
Lance smiled warmly and handed the folder back to Kai. The Navajo shook his head.
“No, I drew that for you.”
Lance stopped in mid-motion, the folder suspended over the food like an eagle looking for a landing site. “You sure?”
Kai’s face reddened a little. “Yeah. Look at the back. I called it ‘True Love’. Lame, I know.”
Lance slipped out the drawing and looked at the back. In flowing script were just those words, “True Love.” He grinned happily at Kai as he slipped the drawing back into the folder and set it aside away from the food.
“Thanks, Kai,” he gushed. “It’s amazing, man, and we love it.” He elbowed Ricky hard.
“Ow!” Ricky glowered and then laughed. “We do love it. I just never thought we looked like that. Crazy, huh?”
Kai laughed and resumed eating.
The remainder of the flight was uneventful, and soon enough they were told by the captain to turn off electronic devices and buckle themselves into their seats for landing at Reagan National. It must have been windy in the skies approaching Washington because the plane buffeted and rolled as it made its way into the airport, sending renewed tremors of terror through all of the inner city boys, and generating amused chuckles from Reyna and Justin.
The bumpy landing also provided each of them with another white-knuckled mini-freak-out and Lance had to confess he’d never felt so glad to be on the ground as at that moment.
The air was balmy with humidity as they debarked Air Force Two to find another enormous black limo waiting to take them to their hotel. Two Secret Service agents met them at the limo and rode with them. There were other agents in unmarked cars leading and following.
They checked into the Westin Washington Hotel, a monstrous edifice of glass and light that straddled a corner in downtown Washington six blocks from the White House. While Reyna’s parents were still not one hundred percent on board with what she was doing, they were so excited that she would be meeting with the president that they footed the entire bill for hotel and food, and this was some swanky hotel, Lance noted as they entered the cavernous interior atrium that was its lobby.
It was already four-thirty p.m. Washington time and dinner at the White House was scheduled for six thirty. That meant everyone had to get checked into his or her room quickly and cleaned up for the presidential dinner. This meant no exploring for the wide-eyed boys, none of whom, Justin included, had ever been in a hotel this nice in their lives. Since Reyna’s parents had made all the arrangements, they’d booked rooms with two beds for all the males except Ryan, who had a single, and Reyna who also had her own.
She laughingly told Esteban as they rode up in the elevator that her parents booked her a separate room and made her promise “No funny business.” She punched him hard and he looked embarrassed, turning to meet Lance’s eye.
Lance recalled the conversation he and Este had on the roof of New Camelot a lo
ng time ago about the bigger boy wanting to marry Reyna someday, and smiled knowingly.
Lance and Ricky shared one room with two gigantic beds, while Kai and Dakota had the room next-door––identical in layout. Esteban and Justin shared the third double-bed room. Reyna and Ryan’s single-bed rooms were just as elegant.
Lance knew this whole trip hinged on him more than anyone else. He was The Boy Who Came Back and The Boy Who Wants to Amend the Constitution. He needed to look and act such that the adults would take him seriously, starting with the president and his family. He and Ricky tossed their suitcases and backpacks onto the two beds and briefly scanned their room. A forty-inch flat screen hung on the wall above a large wooden dresser. There was a writing desk beside that, complete with Internet access, a large comfy chair for reading and huge bay windows looking out at the city below. They were on the eighth floor, and the view wowed them.
They felt excited as they gazed out at the nation’s capitol. Arms wrapped around each other, bodies pressed together, the boys looked out in wonder and fell into a thoughtful reverie.
“We’re having dinner with the president of the United States,” Lance whispered in awe. “Can you believe that?”
Ricky smiled. “Because of you. Because you’re the most amazing dumbass in the world.”
Lance laughed. They turned and rested their foreheads one against the other. After a moment, Lance grinned wickedly. “I call shower first!”
He shoved Ricky aside and bolted for the bathroom, vaulting over one corner of the bed and beating the other boy to the open door. Both laughed and Ricky shoved him inside the lavish-looking bathroom. “Get your dirty ass in there ’fore you stink up the whole hotel.”
Lance stuck out his tongue and closed the door quickly before Ricky could retaliate.
When Lance emerged a short time later, hair blow-dried and spilling about his bare shoulders and back, wearing only a thick, luxurious bath towel around his waist, Ricky was laying out clothes for both of them on each bed.
And The Children Shall Lead Page 23
