A Time of Anarchy- Mayan's Story

by Roberta Kagan

  “We could,” he said. “But I think we should tell Red what has happened between us.”

  “No.” She shook her head violently and, turning to face him, she propped her head up on her hand. “No, he would never understand.”

  “Oh, Red might just surprise you. He isn’t as bad as he looks.”

  “I don’t know Cricket. I think we should just split. Just get the hell out of here before he gets back.”

  “He’s my brother, I can’t just go and not tell him what’s going on. Can you imagine how he’d feel if we just deserted him, and he had no idea why or what the fuck happened?”

  He sat up to level himself so that he could look directly into her eyes. “May, once he realizes that we love each other, he’ll let you go.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t believe it.”

  “Well, let’s not dwell on it. You’re getting all wrecked out, and I don’t like to see you upset. We have some time before he gets back; let’s just enjoy being together.”

  “Okay. But you promise not to say anything to him unless you talk to me first right?” she said. Sitting up, she crossed her arms over her chest and rubbed her shoulders. The night air had chilled her, and as she massaged her flesh she felt the goosebumps rising.

  “I told you I won’t, and I won’t. I promise…”

  Chapter 34

  Cricket became the family she’d never had. He was the friend she confided in, the lover in her fantasies, the keeper of her secrets. He was all of this, and more.

  The days that followed blessed Cricket and May with laughter, tender affection, friendship, and love. They took long walks in the brisk fall air, talking about everything while crunching the crisp, brightly-colored leaves beneath their feet. Every evening they joked as together they prepared food; it seemed to May as if she’d never shared so much with anyone before. Oh, but it was when the sun went to sleep, and the moon and stars twinkled in the velvet sky that they found true ecstasy. Their nights were filled with passion. The passion of a love that found itself rooted in need, the need of two young souls who’d been lost and had never had anything worthwhile to hold on to. And they grasped on. They grasped on with a white-knuckled death grip.

  When they were spent, they slept safe and contented in each other’s arms. And the world took on a different glow. A glow the color of rose gold.

  One afternoon they took the motorcycle out to a small village in Wisconsin where they wandered through antique stores and had lunch at a quaint Italian restaurant. It had small bud vases with red carnations on each table and classic red and white cotton table cloths. The waitress was from Italy, and her accent delighted May. She told them that it was a family business and everyone who worked at the restaurant was related. All the food was prepared to order from recipes handed down through the years.

  As they sat at a small booth in the corner gazing out the window, Cricket reached for May’s hand.

  “I never knew I could be so happy,” he said as he caressed her tiny fingers. Then taking her palm to his lips, he gently kissed it.

  “I know. The only thing standing in the way of our happiness is Red.”

  “Are you still worried about Red?”

  “Yes, Cricket, and I think you’re being foolish not to be. He will be so mad when he finds out what we’ve done. And he can be so mean. I’m scared.”

  “If you really want to leave town, then we will. Just let me make some money first. I meant to tell you, I got a call from the hospital. I got the job.”

  “Hey, that’s great! You forgot to tell me? How could you forget something so important?”

  “Yeah, I did. I was so wrapped up in how fucking beautiful you are that it just slipped my mind.”

  She laughed. “Now how the hell can I fault you when you say something like that?”

  “Ah, so I’m pretty damn smart, right?”

  “Did you mean it or were you just being a smart ass?” She tilted her head to the side in a flirtatious gesture.

  “I meant it with all my heart,” he said, and he kissed her palm again. “And I am glad that I got the job. It’ll be good for us. We can save some bread. Let’s face it we can get a hell of a lot farther with money than without it, right?”

  “Yeah, that’s true.”

  “So if you really want to move away, this is our chance. Now, here’s what I’ll do. I have a little money right now, but once I start work I’ll save everything I can. I’ll get a nice pile of cash together. Then we’ll make our plan.”

  “I don’t want to tell Red anything about what were going to do, Cricket.”

  “Okay. I hate to lie to my brother, but if it makes you feel better, then we won’t tell him. At least not now.”

  “Not ever!

  I don’t want to tell him…for sure I don’t want him to know.”

  “Whatever you say, Baby. You’re my love and I’ll do whatever you want.”

  “That’s what I want,” she said, and her hand trembled slightly.

  They shared a pizza and two sodas while watching the people outside the window. An old man wearing a heavy plaid wool jacket that he’d left open revealing his suspenders walked by, holding his silver-haired wife’s hand. Cricket and May smiled at each other. The elderly couple were bent with age, but it looked to the young lovers as if the years had only strengthened the love between them.

  “That’s gonna be us one day,” Cricket said. “We’re gonna get married and have five or six kids, and when they grow up, they’ll bring our grandkids over for Christmas. We’ll be old like those two, but still in love. I’ll still hold your hand when we walk down the street.”

  “Hold on, five or six kids? What the fuck, Cricket? Besides, if I have all those kids, I might be so worn out that I won’t be able to walk.” She laughed.

  “I really want to have a big family.”

  “We’ll see. Two kids should be plenty. I don’t need to have a big family. You’re not the one giving birth to all those kids, or taking care of them,” she teased him. “That would be the end of my figure.”

  “Yeah, but I’m gonna be the one to support them.”

  “And don’t you think that’s gonna cost a small fortune?”

  “Yeah, probably, but I’m going to be really rich. You’ll see. I’m gonna do great things with my life and make you proud to be my wife.”

  “Right now, let’s just worry about getting enough money to get the hell out of here,” she said.

  “Where do you want to go?”

  “Anywhere, but if I had my choice, it would definitely be California. I want to go to Haight-Ashbury and see what everyone is talking about.”

  “Califorina, huh? I’ve always wanted to see Cali. Yeah, if you want to, we can go.”

  “Really, Cricket? Are you serious? It’s like a dream come true.” She felt the tears well up in her eyes.

  “Yeah, why not? I just wish we could explain things to Red first.”

  “I wanted to ask you something,” she said.

  “Sure, anything.”

  “When the gangs fight, do they really shoot each other?”

  “Yep, sometimes they do.”

  “And do people die?”

  “Yeah, it happens.”

  “Don’t the police get involved?”

  “Not if it stays within the gangs; the cops don’t care about us. We are on the outskirts of society. As long as nobody outside of our fucked-up world gets hurt, then the police stay out of it. But Red’s been in jail. He beat the shit of out some guy in a bar. The guy was a kid from the suburbs; his folks had money and the cops didn’t take that too well. Red served four years.”

  “Wow, he never told me.”

  “Yeah, he probably figured it was over and you didn’t need to know.”

  “I think he’s pretty dangerous, Cricket.”

  “I think you’re right; he is, but not to me. He’s my brother. Like I told you, when we were kids all we had was each other. In many ways, Red raised me.”

  �
��I’ve seen his anger and it isn’t pretty.”

  “I know. But he will understand about you and me…when you decide that it’s okay for us to tell him. I’m not gonna push you. When you feel comfortable, you’ll let me know. Red’s had lots of girls. He never takes them too seriously for too long.”

  “You don’t think he’s in love with me?”

  “Red? Nah. He just isn’t like that. To him women don’t mean a hell of a lot. He gets hot pants, and then they cool off.”

  “And to you?”

  “Until you, May, I felt the same way. But now…you mean everything to me. You’re my whole fucking world. When I get up in the morning, the first thing I want to see is your face, and once I see you I feel like everything is all right. I sound like a real idiot, but it’s true. All that shit they tell you about being in love, I mean how beautiful it is, well it’s real; it’s so real.”

  “Cricket, let’s go home and make love.”

  That night she took off her clothes and stood naked before him as he sat on the bed. From the look in his eyes, she could see his approval. Her hair had been clasped back into a ponytail. Now she released it and shook her head. Her wild black mane cast a magnificent shadow in the darkness. She moved her hips in a slow circular motion. He swallowed hard. Then she licked her moist ruby lips and walked toward him. It didn’t take a great deal of strength to push him down on to the bed. He yielded to her touch. She unzipped his pants and pulled them off. Standing over him, she smiled a sweet and alluring smile. Then she straddled him, taking him deep inside of her. He sighed.

  “You amaze me, May. You constantly amaze me.”

  Her body was agile, like a panther, and she moved in a circular motion at first, teasing him controlling him. Fueling his need, then stopping just before he found release. He was breathing heavily, and his skin glistened in the moonlight that shone through the window. She stopped moving and sat back with him buried safely inside of her. For several minutes she stood frozen.

  “Please, May, I can’t take it anymore.”

  Her laughter rang like a crystal bell in the night. Taking both of his hands into her own, she pushed them back over his head, holding him down. Now she began to move her body building momentum with heated passion. She cried out with satisfaction as she climaxed. The sweat was building on his brow as he tried to hold back from releasing. But finally he gave up the fight. His entire being surrendered to her.

  “I love you May. I love you more than I ever thought I could love any other person in the world.”

  She loved him too, but she was afraid to trust the intensity of her feelings. He said he loved her, everything he did proved again and again that he spoke the truth, and she wanted to believe him.

  Chapter 35

  For Cricket and May, the morning sun brought with it the joy of love and the light of a new day. But May could not help thinking that each precious day they shared was one day closer to Red’s return. It had been years since she bit her nails, but she found herself starting to do so again. She tried to be calm, but she couldn’t help feeling like they were on the brink of a nuclear war, and at any time the explosion could obliterate everything. With each passing moment, May grew more insistent about leaving for California. She could think of little else, and so she continuously talked about going. The edge in her voice made it known that she was on the brink of panic. She didn’t want to face Red when he returned. Since she and Cricket had become lovers, she was afraid to look into Red’s eyes, afraid that he would know instinctively what she was feeling and what had happened. And the thought of his response paralyzed her with fear. Cricket was patient; he explained again and again that he would start his new job on the following Monday and he hoped to save some money before they left to begin their lives in the west.

  Cricket was constantly trying to lighten May’s worries. He tried to make her laugh, but she was so edgy that she could not relax. On their way to the grocery store one afternoon they noticed that piles of leaves had accumulated throughout the yard outside of the apartment building. Cricket turned to May and winked. She looked at him curiously. Then he took May’s hand and led her running through the leaves. The masses of crisp fall foliage were deep and they made a wonderful crunching sound. When May tripped, she pulled Cricket down beside her. They lay for a moment, gazing up at a sapphire, cloudless sky. The smell of the neighbors burning leaves surrounded them. Cricket leaned over, just above May. “So beautiful,” he whispered as he studied her eyes.

  Her raven hair had fanned out over the leaves and was filled with tiny bits of color from the broken pieces. Her eyes danced in the sunlight. Tenderly, he kissed her. Then, gently, he ran his finger from her forehead down her nose and to her chin.

  “ I had no idea that life could be this good,” he said, and kissed her lips softly.

  She smiled a sad smile. “Me either.” Then she reached up and touched his face. “Cricket?” There were tears streaming down her face.

  “Yeah?’ He touched her cheek wiping a tear away. “Don’t cry, Baby. Please…”

  “Sometimes, I’m afraid that something bad will happen. It’s like things are too good, you know?”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean, but we can’t think like that. We should be happy. We have so much to be happy about.”

  “How are we going to get away once Red comes back? I mean, if we leave now, we’re free. We won’t have as much money to start out with, but we won’t have to see Red either.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want to tell him?”

  “Really sure,” she said, and she trembled.

  “Shhh, it’s okay. Take it easy,” he said, and put his hand on her shoulder to steady her.

  “Okay, then we’ll wait until he’s out of the apartment one day, and we’ll split. As soon as I have enough money, we’ll take off, if that’s what you want.”

  “Yeah, it’s what I want. I don’t want to have to handle Red’s crazy anger again.”

  “Fair enough. Do you trust me?” he asked.

  “Yeah, I do,” she said, and she wanted to. Never in her life had she trusted anyone, not completely. Life had shown her too many disappointments, and trusting was the hardest thing for her.

  He kissed her softly.

  “Then let me handle this, all right?” he said. His smile was soft, and his eyes warm and glowing.

  “Yep.” She wanted to take over, to take control, to be sure that nothing terrible happened.

  He helped her up and brushed her off. As they rode on the motorcycle with the wind in their hair, May squeezed Cricket tighter. She would trust him. She had to try.

  At the grocery store they walked through the aisles together.

  “You don’t think Red will come looking for us after we leave Chicago, do you?” May asked as she put a box of cereal in the cart.

  “Nahh. He’ll be shocked that we’re gone. But he won’t come looking for us. He’ll probably be pissed that we didn’t tell him we were going. But by the time we get back, he’ll be over it. Knowing Red, he’ll have a new chick and all kinds of new problems.”

  “I don’t ever want to come back.”

  “I know, but after a couple of years you might change your mind.”

  “I doubt it,” she said.

  When they returned from the food store and put everything away Cricket told May that he wanted to go to a car dealership and trade the bike in for a car. She lit a cigarette and looked at him, surprised.

  “Really, Cricket?” she asked.

  “A car is safer than a bike, and if we are going all the way to Cali we’re going to need more protection than the bike can give us.”

  “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  “Yeah, I’ve been thinking about it for a while.”

  “And until we leave, is better in the winter to have a car,” he said.

  “Right, the bike is a bitch in the winter.”

  “You want to go to the dealership now?”

  “Yeah, let’s get it over with,” h
e said.

  “You don’t want to.”

  “I have mixed feelings, but I do want to. So lets go.” He smiled and squeezed her shoulder.

  She nodded and grabbed her jacket.

  The salesman at the dealership appeared to be in his early forties. He wore a cheap, badly-made suit with a loud tie that clashed with his shirt. Heavy bags hung under his eyes, and his oily strawberry blond hair stuck to his head, badly in need of a good shampoo. He looked over at Cricket and May. Then he put the pile of papers he’d been working on to the corner of his desk and came out of his small office.

  “Hi. What can I do for you kids?”

  “I have a Triumph 650 I want to trade it in for a used car. I want something where I don’t have any payments.”

  “Hmmm,” the sales man said and rubbed his eyes. “Lemme see the motorcycle.”

  While the service department evaluated the bike, May and Cricket, waited in a large waiting room.

  “Cricket, are you sure you want to get rid of your bike?” May asked. “You’ve had it a long time haven’t you?”

  “Yeah, I have, May, and even though it’s only a piece of metal, it’s really hard to say goodbye. It’s been with me since before ‘Nam. But, I think it’s time to grow up.”

  She looked at him and said, “I hate saying goodbye to anyone or anything. It seems like I’m always saying goodbye, or I’m afraid I will be. Everyone and everything I have ever loved has left me.”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean.” He took her hand and squeezed it. “Promise you’ll never leave me?”

  She swallowed hard. Then she nodded. “I promise,” she said. “You’ll probably think this is silly, but my cat was my best friend, and when he died, I wanted to die too.”

  “I don’t think it’s silly at all. Sometimes animals can be more understanding and better friends than humans.”

  “It’s just that my folks were too busy fighting to notice when I needed them. They had their own problems, and so when I would hear them yelling at each other through the walls at night, I’d hug Harry, my cat, and cry into his fur. I told him my dreams and my wishes because no one else would listen.”