Matchbox Girls

by Chrysoula Tzavelas

  “Thanks,” Marley said grudgingly.

  Branwyn continued, “The wildfires are worse today. They’ve started talking about evacuating certain areas. Keep an eye on it. I’m taking this—” she hefted a duffel bag “—to work, just in case.” With that, she left, abandoning Marley with the two preschoolers.

  The morning passed. Chaos occurred.

  It was a beautiful day despite the fires charring the mountains. A nearly annual occurrence, the danger they represented to the civilized parts of the Valley varied from year to year. Right now, they were a television worry compared to the continued mystery of Zachariah’s disappearance. Marley tried to listen to the news on the radio as she navigated her way through some errands, but the chatter of the girls in the back seat drew her attention. They hadn’t liked changing clothes at all and she was anxious to keep them in good moods.

  Their last errand was to the Pasadena Central Library. She wanted to do some research while the girls entertained themselves in the children’s section; Penny and Branwyn didn't call her Research Girl for nothing. Finding a library was always her first recourse when she ran into something new, although it had been months since she'd felt inspired to research much of anything.

  The reference librarian suggested the encrypted book was a prank or prop, which Marley rejected purely on gut instinct. She spent an hour moving back and forth between the stacks and a bank of computers, and finally collapsed into a chair, rubbing her eyes in annoyance. She’d learned nothing about Zachariah, a little about Senyaza Corporation, and quite a lot of utterly useless information about encryption techniques. She could have spent all day there, but the twins were getting bored despite their basket of books.

  Lissa knelt on a chair at a table, pretending to read in a voice too loud for a library, while Kari sat under the table, playing with her doll and listening. Marley moved to their table to quiet Lissa and smiled to herself as she noticed that the book, full of pictures of a pixie’s adventures, was upside down. The little girl noticed Marley and abruptly fell silent.

  “Would you like to go back to the children’s section and I’ll read this to you?”

  Lissa shrugged and pushed the book across the table. Marley glanced at the open page as she picked it up. She frowned and ran her mind back over what Lissa had just been saying.

  “Can you really read, Lissa?” She'd been more fluent than Marley had believed possible in somebody who wasn't even in kindergarten.

  Lissa shrugged again, acquiring a familiar uncomfortable expression. “I dunno.”

  Kari scrambled out from under the table. “She can!”

  Marley said, “It’s all right if you can, Liss. It's very good! I just didn’t know.”

  Lissa addressed the table sulkily. “Can’t. Not properly. Real reading is with all the letters.”

  “Oh.” Marley frowned. “You've got the book at home, then? You've memorized it.”

  “No...?” said Lissa uncertainly. “Kari just found the book and wanted to hear the story.”

  “Because it's like the dolls Miss Penny gave us,” explained Kari. She glanced sideways at her sister. “Reading is reading, Liss.”

  Lissa hesitated until finally Kari poked her viciously. “I just say what the book tells me. That’s all.”

  Marley realized that Lissa's body language was identical to Kari's right before she admitted she could open the SUV. There was another secret here. She shook her head in wonder and said brightly, “Let’s check it out so you can finish reading it at home.”

  As she started to the self-checkout counter, her gaze fell on a man sprawled in a soft chair, who was looking at her. He had a worn paperback closed over one finger. Something about him was familiar. He seemed lanky, even sitting down, with unkempt black hair and shadowed eyes. He wore hiking boots, faded black jeans, and a worn grey t-shirt.

  He met her eyes and stood up.

  Marley’s breath caught in her throat. He’d been at the park the day before, eavesdropping on her conversation with Jeremy the lawyer. At first she’d thought he’d been Jeremy’s ally and then, when the lawyer had left, she’d thought he was just a passerby.

  There was an intensity in the way he stared at her that made her certain she’d been right the first time. She dropped her gaze quickly and hustled the children with their books to the manned checkout station. He followed her.

  She attended with rather less than half an ear to the librarian’s idle conversation as she scanned the books. From the corner of her eye, she could see that the tall man had paused a couple of yards away, still looking intently at her.

  She took a deep breath as the librarian slid the books into a bag for her. What could actually happen, surrounded by the patrons and staff of the library? If he made a scene, they’d kick him out. Better to have a bad encounter inside than out. So she wandered over to the New Books section, towing the kids after her, and waited until he approached her.

  His voice pitched low, he said, “Miss, I need to talk to you.”

  “No,” she said firmly, giving him only a cursory glance. “Go away.”

  He stared at her, mouth tightening, “I know you’re one of Zachariah’s allies. I know you’re trying to keep the kids safe. But—”

  “I said no,” Marley repeated, raising her voice. “Please leave me alone.” She looked over at him again. It was a mistake.

  He shimmered, as if tears were pricking her eyes. Her stomach twisted and crimson crept across the blur of her vision until the man’s face was covered in blood. Something bad was going to happen soon. The idea—no, the understanding—slammed into her head like a spike: He would die soon. The frustration on his blood-washed face was the beginning of a path that led directly to... emptiness.

  She swayed, trying to gulp down the panic. This hadn't happened in years, and it had rarely been this bad. She squeezed her eyes shut until she felt the insane certainty recede. She knew it was insane; hadn't she had visions like that growing up, visions which were no more likely to come true than a horoscope? For a moment, the light over his head seemed very bright, and then all was a blur again, from the real tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she gasped out, and turned and fled.

  Five steps away, she realized Kari had slipped out of her grasp and was standing four-square in front of the man, staring up at him defiantly.

  “Kari!” she cried. The little girl jumped and then raced after her, grabbing her hand again.

  They made it through the science fiction section to the library foyer before he caught up with them, darting past Marley as she juggled books and children to stand in front of the second set of doors, blocking their exit. He spread his hands. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  Just outside the library entrance, a teenage girl sat on a bench, holding in one hand the leashes of three good-sized dogs that lay at her feet. She turned from watching the parking lot to peer through the glass windows of the foyer. She looked from the tall man to Marley, and frowned.

  Marley fumbled at the inner doors behind her, ready to retreat into the main library again.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” he repeated. “But those people out there might.” He pointed out at the parking lot.

  She couldn’t watch him and look at the parking lot at the same time. He lifted both hands as if to show they were empty, and then pushed the door open and went outside. When it swung shut behind him, she quickly scanned the parking lot.

  It wasn’t even half-full on a day like today, and the minivan from the day before leapt out at her. She could see two people inside it. It was right next to her car. On the other side of the minivan, a sky-blue sedan’s doors opened and people spilled out and began milling around both the sedan and the minivan.

  Marley’s shoulder blades touched the wall of the foyer, and she found herself sinking down it. Lissa climbed into her lap as soon as she was sitting on the ground. “What's going on?” the little girl asked. “Are we going home?”

  Marley squeezed Lissa with one arm, and pus
hed herself back to her feet, sliding the girl onto her feet again. “Soon. I just have to talk to this man.” As if he heard her, he opened the foyer door again.

  Kari turned around. “You said no. Why? How are they going to hurt you? Will they push you down? Or hit you?”

  He looked down at Kari and said, “Maybe. They might take her stuff, too.”

  Kari turned serious eyes to him. “Why?”

  The tall man opened his mouth to answer and then hesitated. He shrugged. “I don’t know.” He raised his eyes to Marley. “I know them, though. I know who... sponsors them.”

  Marley looked at him sidelong. The overwhelming certainty that he would die soon did not reoccur, although she still vaguely felt that something unpleasant would happen. That feeling, at least, was one she was used to.

  She peered out through the window again. The people surrounding the minivan were laughing and horsing around with each other. They were young and casually dressed, clean-cut and well-groomed. “Sponsor? They look like college students.”

  An unexpected smile briefly quirked the corner of the man’s mouth. “You could say they’re interns.”

  “Uh-huh. Scary, dangerous interns. And what do you want?”

  “For starters, I’d like to find Zachariah.” There was an edge to his voice.

  “So would we. I'd like to have a little chat with him about his idea of advance planning.” She looked outside again. Some of the college students were watching them. So was the girl with the dogs.

  “How did you end up with his kids?”

  She transferred her gaze back to the man. “You know what bothers me about you? How you found me at that park yesterday. How both you and that other guy found me, if you’re not working together. I mean, I left Zachariah a note, but I didn’t include a last name, an address, or an intended schedule. So, okay, if the lawyer guy has been watching Zachariah for a while, the park was a pretty good guess. We meet there a lot. But you just asked me how I ended up with the kids. Which was in the note. So how did you know I was involved? How did you know to find me yesterday if you didn’t see the note? Something doesn’t make sense here.”

  He stared at her, his eyes wide. His mouth opened, and then closed again.

  Marley looked back out the doors. “On the other hand, that’s the same van Lawyer Jeremy was in yesterday. Which makes me quite uninterested in buying any magazine subscriptions, or whatever they’re selling.”

  He cleared his throat and said, “I can distract them.”

  “How sweet. I’ll just bet you can.”

  He frowned at her and shook his head. Then he went outside and spoke to the teenager with the dogs. Marley shifted her weight uncomfortably. She’d believed the teen was just a random observer, just like she’d hoped the tall man was a random observer the day before. Marley wished the girl didn't look so young.

  Kari whimpered. “I want Uncle Zach back.”

  Lissa took Kari’s hand and stared out the window. “Somebody made him go away.”

  Shocked, Kari said, “Nobody could do that.”

  “And Marley’s scared of people out there,” Lissa continued, in a dreamy voice.

  “What?” said Marley sharply. “No, I’m not. I was just surprised.” Kari glanced up but Lissa didn’t seem to hear her.

  Something clunked in the library ventilation system, and Marley could suddenly smell the wildfire as if she were right beside it. Outside, the tall man and the teenager stopped talking and looked around, and the dogs sniffed the wind. The tall man looked at Marley and frowned again, and then nodded to the teen.

  The girl slipped the leashes off her three dogs, and then snapped her fingers and ambled in the direction of Marley’s car and the minivan. The dogs raced ahead of her while the dark man followed behind.

  Marley crouched down and put an arm around each of the twins. “We’re going to play a game. We have to get to our car and get inside without the people next to the van noticing.”

  Lissa looked over at her. “I don’t want to play a game,” she said, her voice flat.

  Marley hesitated. Something about Lissa’s voice made her ask, “What do you want to do?”

  “Make them go away.”

  Kari laughed suddenly. “Look at the doggies!” At the same time, there was a chorus of barking.

  Two of the dogs had scrambled onto the roofs of both the sedan and the minivan, and were barking hysterically down at the college students. The third dog was growling at Lawyer Jeremy himself as he stepped out of the car, while the teenage girl pulled vainly on its collar. The tall man was waving his hands in the air dramatically. Somebody shouted.

  “Come on!” said Marley. She picked up Lissa around the middle and kicked the door open. She almost started to run, but then she remembered that running attracted attention. So she walked. Briskly. Lissa hung from her arm, a sulky dead weight, while Kari trotted beside her. The chaos around the vehicles attracted a flock of crows that circled only a few feet above, adding to the assault of sound. The noise seemed to be seriously hampering the college student trying to use a cellphone. A few yards from her car, one of them turned.

  “Hey—” he began, and the brown dog on top of the minivan landed on top of him, growling.

  Marley froze for a moment, the real cries of fear triggering an instinctive need to help. Then she squeezed her eyes shut, shook her head, and kept moving.

  As she unlocked the door and piled the children in, the cries became angry swearing and shrill demands. “What the—get—move—Hey!” She didn’t look over. Instead, she put her seatbelt on and started the car.

  Nobody stopped her. Nobody flung themselves in front of her car. Nobody tried to open the door. She wasn’t even sure if anybody noticed.

  As she pulled into traffic, she glanced in the rearview mirror. The dark man was walking across the parking lot again, and the teenage girl and her dogs were nowhere to be seen. The college students were all clustered in a tight huddle as Jeremy climbed back into the van.

  Marley looked at each of the twins in the mirror. Kari met her eyes and said solemnly, “Bad doggies.”

  Lissa, looking out the window, said in a tone of satisfaction, “Yeah!”

  -eight-

  By the time Marley got home, her thoughts on the encounter at the library had become a confused mess of speculated motivations. The tall man had been almost convincing in his desire to help her. But the knowledge he didn’t explain and those dogs that had attacked the college students were both troubling. Was setting your dogs on people the act of a good guy? And the college students hadn’t seemed threatening or thuggish; they’d had the cheerful demeanor of those out to do good and unburdened by moral ambiguity. But they’d had Lawyer Jeremy, and there’d been so many of them.

  She finally concluded that the whole thing was impossible to sort out based on the available information, and settled for being glad that she’d gotten out of it. She even found a moment to be reassured that Jeremy was relying on college students rather than the police. That was mysterious in and of itself, but supported her belief that whatever Jeremy was up to, it was No Good.

  Penny waited outside her door, smiling.

  “Penny!” said Marley. “You would not believe the morning I had. There was this guy—”

  Penny’s eyebrows went up. “You too?”

  Marley remembered Penny’s date with possibly-Lawyer Jeremy. “No, not like that. More like—he said he knew Zachariah, but he was—” She shook her head. “It was complicated. How was your date?” She unlocked the door and gestured for Penny to go inside.

  Penny danced through the door and picked up Neath from the back of the couch, twirling her around. “It was lovely. He missed me! Which was more than I expected. We spent hours over wine, just talking.”

  “Yeah? What about?” Marley watched the kids settle down to play.

  “Oh... stuff. Me, my friends, his friends, the places we went when we were in Rome.” Penny collapsed on the couch into a graceful pile of limbs. �
��He knows some fascinating people. He said they all really liked me, too.”

  Marley always thought that Penny worried a lot more about people liking her than was necessary. But Penny was rarely convinced anyone believed she had intrinsic worth. In high school, her money and busy parents had made her the envy of other students, but Marley had often seen how little there was to envy. “What did you two do in Rome?”

  “Oh, we went to clubs. Dancing. A couple of parties.” Penny smiled. “I wasn’t sure if he was actually interested in me or just being nice while killing time. He flirted with me, but... well, he kept introducing me to other people and then leaving me with them for a while.” She considered. “He’s very busy, though. He’s on the board of this private charitable organization. I think they build bridges or something.” She rubbed her left wrist and frowned. “I had the strangest dream last night.”

  “So did I,” said Marley. “A fairy doll wanted me to come save his flower kingdom. What was yours about?”

  “Light,” Penny said simply. Then she shook her head. “I don’t remember. I don’t even know why I thought of it. Anyhow, I can’t wait for you to meet Jeremy. I'm dying to know what you think of him.”

  Marley regarded Penny steadily for a moment. She hoped, oh so desperately, that it was an innocent coincidence. The sick twisting in her stomach believed otherwise. But when was that ever right? She couldn't rely on an anxiety disorder to make decisions for her.

  Finally, she sighed. She couldn’t make it better, but she could make it a lot worse by remaining silent.

  “It’s funny, because I met a Jeremy White yesterday. A lawyer. He was interested in the disposition of the kids. A common name, I guess.”

  Penny’s eyes widened. “Really?” Then she looked away. “My Jeremy didn’t recognize your name when I mentioned you.” She paused. “What did you think of the one you met yesterday?”