by K. G. Duncan
Stump had been listening intently the whole time, the smile never leaving his face. When Abby finished, he leaned back and his smile widened. “So, you got a dragon inside you, hmm?”
Abby scrunched up her face and let out a deep breath, discouraged. “You think I’m a crazy person, don’t you?”
“Hold on now,” Stump chuckled and rocked forward to catch Abby’s eye. “I say nothing of the sort.” He paused and studied Abby’s face for several, uncomfortable moments, and Abby got so self-conscious of his scrutiny that she had to snigger and turn away.
Stump finally spoke, “I don’t see nothing crazy about you—inside or out. And believe me, I would know.”
Abby turned back to face him and coyly smile, before venturing a little retort. “Crazy knows crazy, right?”
“Ha!” Stump exploded into laughter. “Now, you too young to be such a flirt!”
Abby laughed with him. As she finally regained her capacity for speech, she asked him more solemnly, “So, you don’t find it odd that I have a dragon inside of me?”
Stump sobered up quickly, but his eyes still twinkled brightly. “Well now, I suppose there are stranger things on this earth. My Granny Jane used to talk to possum and squirrels—varmints of all type, actually. She had to set the rules straight about pilfering the walnut and pecan trees that grew in her yard. Sounds perfectly reasonable to me. So, if you got a dragon inside of you, I reckon there’s a reason why. You ever think about that?”
“Yes, I have,” Abby responded matter-of-factly. “I do believe there is a great purpose for me in this life, and for that matter in all of my other lives as well.” Abby smiled at that, and Stump smiled back at her. She reached over and clasped his hand in her own. “I believe I’m here to help people. Make them whole and better than they think they can be.”
“Yeah, sis,” he said, and he squeezed her hand affectionately. “You got the picture. Right quick. Quicker than most who got the gift.” He paused and seemed to be appraising her in a new light. After several weird moments, he spoke, “I think you’re all right.” He turned around and unzipped a canvas bag that was strapped over his shoulder. He began rummaging through it quickly, before producing a banana and a bag of sunflower seeds. He offered Abby the banana.
“Hungry?” He asked. Abby reached out and took the banana, which was slightly bruised on one end. Still yellow and green at the tips, just the way she liked them.
“Thank you,” she said.
“Potassium,” Stump announced. “An essential part of any young lady dragon’s diet.” He tore off the top of his bag of sunflower seeds and began cracking them, one by one. He produced a small, bright red plastic cup and used that to carefully and expertly spit out his seeds.
Abby peeled the banana and began to nibble on it. It was good, and her belly gurgled. She took a bigger bite, not realizing how hungry she had become. They ate in silence for a while, comfortable in each other’s company. Only the cracking of Stump’s seeds and the soft “Ptah!” of his seed spitting punctuated the night.
At length, Abby turned to study Stump’s face for several moments. She could still see the child’s face beneath the care-worn lines of the older man. The little boy dancer. The same smile. Then she thought of something that made her sit up in a jolt. Stump glanced up at her sudden movement.
“How did you do that?” She asked. “Just then, a while back. I took your hand and nothing happened. I couldn’t feel or see anything. It was like you blocked me or screened me—and I don’t mean to say that you were rude or unfriendly—it’s just that there was like a shield between us, and I couldn’t see any of your folds.”
“My folds?” Stump laughed and put his bag of sunflower seeds away. He spit out one last shell before turning back to look at Abby. “Well, Miss Rubideaux,” And here he paused and smiled down at her, “Abby. My “folds” are my own business. And what you seem to take for granted is that a man don’t always want someone else to come in and stir up all of his skeletons.” Suddenly his voice turned stern—still gentle, but stern. “Like I said, you got to learn how to keep that little trick of yours under wraps. For the sake of others and their right to privacy. But also, to protect yourself!”
“I’m sorry, Stump. I don’t mean to do it. It…it just happens, and I can’t stop it.” She glanced down at the banana peel in her hand, looked around for a place to put it. Stump reached out his hand and took it, packing it away in his cup. She smiled in gratitude before continuing.
“And I got a whole bunch of questions. I ain’t never met someone like you—someone who could see what I was seeing—someone who knew that I could see inside of them…their memories and their futures. All of their folds. How many folks like you are out there?”
“Oh, you’d be surprised. Quite a few.” Stump said. “But we don’t like to bring attention to ourselves. Least not in the usual sense. Most other folks get a might bit uncomfortable around things like this because they don’t understand.”
“Oh! I do so want to find more folks who do understand!” Abby stopped and suddenly flexed her fingers. She felt a surge of electric energy all tingly throughout her entire body. The change was coming—it needed to happen soon. She stood up and stretched out her legs and the kinks in her buttocks.
Stump watched her, stoically, waiting for her to settle down as Abby paced their little clearing nervously. She suddenly stopped in front of him, looked right at him, leaned her back against the wall and almost comically slid down to a sitting position: Plop!
A whisper of an idea was beginning to form in her head. It was kind of crazy, but as she glanced past Stump, through the hedge and up at the white roof of the Superdome, she saw the glimmering blur of purple, green and indigo light warping and distorting everything. It was crazy. But it was perfect. Nobody would even think about something like that!
Yes, little flyer. Yes. Perfect.
The dragon inside of her stirred in approval, and Abby snapped out of her reverie and focused once more on Stump, who still sat unmoving and patient in front of her.
“About those questions,” Abby began through a slowly spreading grin. “They might need to wait till later. You and I have definitely got to talk! But I got one question I need to ask you right now.”
“I’m all ears,” Stump beamed back at her.
Abby pointed behind Stump and up at the roof of the Superdome. “What’s the easiest way to get up there?”
So, the plan had been hatched, and Abby was all nervous with butterflies fluttering feverishly in her stomach, not just from the change that was electrically looming, but from the fact that another person was present with her so close to the change.
“It’s too dangerous for you!” Abby was saying as they walked across the parking lot toward the main entrance of the dome. She scanned to the left and right—the lot was empty. They were walking quickly, but just a little too furtively for Abby’s comfort. Anybody who might see them would know they were up to no good.
“You ain’t gonna make it without a distraction. Plain and simple.” Stump was breathing heavily under his words as he quickly shuffled along beside her with the awkward hitch in his gait. He suddenly pulled Abby to a stop and stroked the baseball bat that he was holding in his right hand. “There is always security around the main building. Ain’t no big thing for you, but you can bet that they’re gonna want to do their job and shoo off the crazy homeless black man with a baseball bat in his hands.”
Abby objected, “It might take a bad turn… get ugly. You sure about that?” She gestured at the bat in his hand.
Stump leaned in closer to Abby, and she could smell the sunflower seeds still on his breath. The orange glow of the parking lot lights illuminated his head with a halo. “You know I would never hurt a fly. Just don’t tell the hobgoblins that!” His beautiful smile lit up the dim twilight below laughing brown eyes.
Abby knew he was going to s
ay that just before he said it because she had seen all of this before. Sure enough. She smiled back at him and nodded. “Let’s do this.”
“Yes ma’am!” Stump grinned and tossed the bat up, catching it with his other hand. “That’s my girl.”
“Soon to be your dragon!” Abby retorted and grinned. Stump guffawed, and they started toward the dome again, and as they drew in closer. Abby noticed the security cameras that Stump said would be there.
“Like I said,” Stump was whispering now. “The cameras are all over the entrance gates and the reserved parking garages where the rich folks like to park. Most of ‘em are aimed toward all those glass windows in the pretty shops by the main gate.” He paused and pointed with the bat. “You go up that ramp, stick to the inner edges where it’s darker. Main floor, you circle round to the back, and like I said, ain’t no easy way up top! No ladders or catwalks… the Superdome is a modern wonder of the world. I don’t know how they did it, or how they get up top without no ladders. You just gonna have to do…whatever it is you gonna do.” He smiled at her. “Should be easy for a little dragon. And that roof is made of steel. Even Hurricane Katrina couldn’t blow it off. You’ll be fine. Up you go, like a little dragon lady to her little roost. Ain’t nobody gonna pay you no never mind because all they gonna see is me, pacing up and down, gesticulating in front of all that pretty glass down below.” He patted the bat in his hand. He looked left and right, and Abby could swear that he was enjoying this a whole lot more than she was.
He nodded, then took a few steps away before turning back to her. “You got five minutes before I get to working on them in earnest. All their attention is gonna be on me. That’s five minutes for you to figure out how you gonna get up top. You think your little dragon bones up for that?” He reached over and patted her head.
“Right. I make the change and then I’m just gonna fly up there. Piece o’ cake. Let’s do this,” Abby said more to convince herself than him. He grabbed her just as she was turning to go. Puzzled, she looked up into his kind and crinkled eyes, and he winked down at her.
“Don’t you be falling or killing yourself, now,” he said, still smiling. “I would never forgive myself.” And with that, he turned and lurched away, twirling the baseball bat in his hand.
Abby stood and watched him go. As he walked out of the darkness of the parking lot and into the well-lit façade of the dome, he started whistling, a random tune that was oddly cheery and out of place. He started dragging the wooden bat along the ground, as he walked up the steps of the main ramp entrance, and it was loud as it thumped against each step and seemed to echo everywhere all over the place.
“That’ll work, all right…” Abby muttered under her breath before breaking her gaze away and slinking off toward the garage ramps. She darted from shadow to shadow, reaching the first ramp. She paused to listen, and she could hear Stump singing now, something about a hole in his pocket or his bucket or some such nonsense. His baseball bat was punctuating his delivery with loud echoing “thunks.”
She took one more look at the side of the dome which loomed above her now that she was so close. She glanced back down into the garage, then around the top walkway that surrounded the dome. Not a soul was around. Above her, and not more than 100 yards away was the highway overpass of the Pontchartrain Express. She could hear the cars and trucks whooshing by, but they seemed far away and out of sight. She took a deep breath, then walked quickly to the side of the dome. She had picked a spot where she couldn’t see any security cameras, and the white walls of the Superdome were dimly lit. She was struck by how, in the night time, the entire structure looked like a giant spaceship.
She smiled, gaining a little more confidence, then flexed the fingers of both hands, rotating her shoulders back and forth to help herself relax.
“Well, ain’t you a predictable little debbie-doo-right!” The voice came from a stone bench in the shadows near the garage ramp she had just emerged from. Abby whirled in an instant of panic before she saw the face that matched the familiarity of the voice. She relaxed as she watched her friend Olivia stand up from the bench and saunter over to her.
“Of all the places in downtown New Orleans,” Olivia was smiling brightly as she came into the light, “how did I know you’d come to the Superdome?” Olivia stopped in front of Abby and snorted back a laugh.
“Gold and black forever, baby doll!” Abby grinned back at her, then both girls clutched hands and squealed,
“Go Saints!”
They laughed and embraced, and Abby kept parting Olivia’s frizzy hair so she could get a better look at her. She was still a mess, with catsup and mustard stains all over her blouse and dried clumps still in her hair.
“Good lord!” Abby exclaimed. “What did the evil princess do to you? You such a mess!” Abby looked away suddenly embarrassed as she remembered Julia’s assault with the condiment bottles just hours earlier. It seemed like days ago. “I’m sorry I didn’t stop her in time, that snooty witch!”
Olivia lit up, all excited. “Well, don’t you worry about that. The more important question is what you did to her!” Abby’s best friend suddenly smiled wickedly and snort-snickered again. “If you could have seen the look on all their faces, especially Princess Julia’s! When that ol’ drill sergeant, Miss Trudy got a hold of her and grilled her like she was guilty of murder!” Olivia paused, and sighed in satisfaction at the delightful memory. Then she quickly turned back to stare right into Abby’s eyes, and she slowly adopted an over-the-top, dignified air of solemnity.
“But what did you do back there, Abby?” She asked in wonder. “What really happened? I mean, it all happened so fast and that Godzilla screech you let out was enough to break everybody’s ear drums. I mean, there’s just no way to make heads or tails out of it… and it was pure chaos after you left.”
Abby was suddenly not smiling anymore. “Tell me what happened after I left, Olivia.”
“Well,” Olivia licked her lips as if she were just warming up to her story. “I lit out after you right away, but I couldn’t follow you cuz you was moving so fast. I only got a few blocks, and you were gone. I couldn’t see which way you had turned. I had no idea, and nobody around me seemed to know anything. So, I went back to Popeye’s Chicken, and well, I tell you, it was like all hell had busted loose.” Olivia smiled at her recollection and wiped her nose before continuing. “With Miss Trudy and the other teachers trying to maintain order, and they were barking out questions and ordering everyone about, and all the other kids was just screaming and yelling all at once like a pack of rabid dogs. It was a beautiful thing to behold. Especially ol’ Balt, blubbering like a baby—I think you made him wet his pants, the coward. Truer colors were never revealed! But best of all was Princess Julia. She just sat there, still as a stone statue, all forlorn and thunderstruck. I think she was in shock. Miss Trudy had her by the shoulders, and she was shaking her, but Julia’s head just snapped around like her neck was made of rubber.” Olivia obliged Abby with her best imitation of a rubber-necked Julia. “I think it was the coolest day of my life!”
Olivia paused to leer like a loon, and it made Abby smile back at her. “How long did you stay? I mean what happened next?” Abby asked, her nervousness returning with renewed force. An overwhelming sense of regret rippled through her. She had been careless. The dragon was out of the bag, so to speak. And there might be no going back.
Olivia continued, breathless, “Well, the restaurant manager wasn’t very happy—you did some serious damage to one of the tables, and then the police showed up, and I decided it was time for me to skedaddle. The last thing I saw was Miss Trudy lining up the kids and heading back to the bus. There were a lot of police round about there, and they was talking to just about anybody who might have seen anything. I wasn’t gonna have some policeman interrogate me!” Olivia playfully punched Abby in the arm. “I guess the school didn’t go back to the museum to see what them Japs were
all about. In the end, I mean, might be a good thing, if you know what I mean. What was really looking like a long, dull day turned into the most amazing day of my life!”
Olivia was chuckling again, but Abby found that she herself had no more patience.
“So, wait a minute,” Abby began trying to regain her composure. “What did you do? How’d you get home? Did you even try to get back home? I mean, you still got Julia’s hot dog treatment all over you!”
“Are you kidding me?” Olivia almost looked offended. “I would not abandon you to the unknown perils of the city after night! I could see that things with Miss Trudy and the Police were not going to go very well. I slipped away before any of them would notice and came looking for you!” Olivia suddenly grabbed Abby’s arm as she just remembered something else. “Oh, yeah. I kind o’ need to tell you. It might be important. But just before I left, I heard one of them police asking Miss Trudy and some of them other kids about whether or not you had any weapons.” Olivia paused as both she and Abby let their eyes go wide. “That’s right, weapons! Like you was seriously carrying around some big ol knives or a machete.” Olivia hacked the air with Kung Fu moves, slicing and slashing with gusto.
“I guess they was trying to figure out what happened,” she finally continued in an almost comedic matter-of-fact voice. “Especially to that table you knocked over. You scuffed it up something good.” And here Olivia paused and held up three bent fingers to make a dramatic clawing motion. “That was one hell of a scratch you left behind. Three marks like the sign of the tiger! Too bad it wasn’t on Julia’s face!”
“Don’t say such a thing!” Abby suddenly turned away and looked down at her right hand. It was a normal looking hand with no claws or signs of the dragon. She was just then reminded of what she was about to do before Olivia popped up out of nowhere. She flexed her fingers and made a few fists before lifting her gaze back to Olivia and continuing.