Cherry Blossom Girls Box Set

by Harmon Cooper

  “You aren’t the only one,” I said, cracking a grin at her. “Angel had just beat the living shit out of me, and Mother and Angel were planning to kill me not long after.”

  I explained to her what had happened. (Don’t you just love it when books do that so you don’t have to reread everything?)

  Dorian’s face scrunched up. “Damn, I didn’t know they were fucking.”

  “You and me both. Anyway, they wanted to get into my publishing account and take down my books. But they weren’t able to because Grace intervened. I don’t know how she did it, and …” I took a deep breath. “Never mind. First, Veronique. That’s our first target.”

  “She’ll be easy to find. In fact, I already know where she is on the base. They only have one holding cell made of plastic and it was recently constructed just for her.” She stuck her paintbrush in her mouth and quickly made a schematic of the base, drawing a big ‘X’ where they were holding Veronique. Her map fizzled as it moved to the wall and burnt into the wallpaper, filling the room with a sickly sweet stench. “We’ll get her out; just give me a couple hours of downtime.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four: YOLO

  The first thing I did was take a long, hot shower. It wasn’t the nicest hotel, and I hadn’t yet looked outside to see where we were exactly. Not quite a roach motel, but there was definitely something in the way the room looked overall (the walls, the furniture, the carpet) that told me it was pretty run down.

  But it was better than my cell back at Camp Mabry. No doubt about that.

  I made a mental list of things we needed: a mini USB cable, food, and clothing. I still wore the vomit-stained Houston Texans T-shirt I’d picked up back at the mall in Longview. I definitely had some swamp ass going on, and my jeans were stained with my own blood.

  I looked like I was auditioning for a role in a HuluFlix dystopian movie.

  So as soon as I got out of the shower and got dressed again in my dirty clothes, I asked Dorian if she was ready to go out.

  “Yeah, for sure,” she said from her position on the bed. “I’d love to eat and get some new clothes.”

  Dorian had more of a personality than Veronique, and she wasn’t as naive and innocent as Grace. My guess was that she’d been out a lot more, especially since it would be hard to keep a teleporter locked up.

  “We could both use some new clothing,” I told her, looking down at my shitty jersey.

  “Here.” Dorian tossed me the rubber-banded roll of money. Damn, it looked gangster.

  “I’m the bank manager now?”

  She raised an eyebrow at me. “That’s how it worked with Veronique and Sabine – I mean, Grace – right?”

  “Something like that, but only because I had more experience on the outside.”

  She stood, smoothed her hands over her black jacket, and said something about the temperature in the room.

  “I thought it was hot too,” I told her. “But that jacket must make it worse for you.”

  “Yes, but I’m wearing it as a disguise … sort of,” she said.

  “A disguise?”

  She took off her jacket to reveal full sleeve tattoos on both arms. You name it, she had it – skulls, dragons, dice, Japanese waves, Sailor Jerry’s iconography – and somehow, she’d managed to fit it all on both arms, but there was nothing past her wrists.

  I’d never noticed it before, likely because she was always wearing that jacket.

  “You don’t like them?” She pulled the jacket back on.

  “They’re hot as hell. I’ve never been brave enough to get tattoos.”

  “It’s not that painful.” said the super hot punk rock goth emo you-name-it sub-genre chick in the leather jacket, tank top, and fishnet stockings. “Only problem is, I’m a little more obvious when I’m showing them off,”

  Sure, it’s the tats, I thought.

  “What?” she asked as I gave her a funny look.

  “You know what? Never mind. Keep the jacket for now. We’ll get a long sleeve shirt or something when we go shopping. Or maybe a lighter jacket. I know it’s hot as balls out there. I never thought I’d miss New England so much.”

  “Hot as balls?”

  “An expression about testicles and how spicy they can get in the heat. At least I think it’s about testicles. It could be about actual balls. Beach volleyballs are pretty hot.”

  Rather than go down that rabbit hole, I busied myself making sure the door was locked behind us and we headed downstairs. It was a creaky old hallway, and we passed only two other rooms before we hit the stairs.

  The receptionist, an older Mexican woman with gray streaks in her hair, greeted us with a grunt. She gave me a double glance, having not remembered seeing me go up to the room.

  “You were in the restroom,” I told her. Satisfied with my answer, she shrugged and went back to her smartphone.

  Which gave me an idea.

  “Hey, so I’m going to be honest with you,” I said to the receptionist. “We’re kind of off the grid and we need a cable.” I reached into my pocket and pulled out forty dollars. I knew the mini USB to mini USB cable couldn’t cost more than five bucks, but I wanted to give her an incentive to cooperate.

  “Okay,” she said, looking at me suspiciously.

  “All I need is for you to order us a mini USB to mini USB cable,” I told her. She was a Millennial, which meant she was in her 50s or 60s, which meant she definitely knew how to quickly order something like that. “Do you have EBAYmazon?”

  She snorted. “Who doesn’t?”

  “Yeah, that’s a good question. Okay, just type in ‘mini USB to mini USB.’”

  She pulled up the app and did as I instructed. When she tapped the purchase button, a notification popped up telling her it would be delivered within two hours.

  “Perfect,” I said and slid the money over to her. “Also, do you know where we could go shopping and get some food?”

  She eyed me skeptically for a moment, then finally said, “You’re on South Congress Avenue. We’re about a mile away from more expensive food and shopping. If you want something cheaper, you can go to South First Street.”

  “Can you call a cab for us? Sorry for the inconvenience, we just don’t have phones.”

  “Do you need a phone too?”

  “Actually, that’s not a bad idea,” I said and plunked three hundred more dollars on the counter. “Anything that doesn’t require much registration. A smartphone and a couple of prepaids too would be best.”

  She found what we needed online, verified that it would serve our purposes, and ordered it. “Now, about that cab …” She whistled and a heavyset Mexican guy with dark eyes came from the back room. “Listen, mijo, I want you to drive these people around and they will pay you.”

  “Sí, Abuela,” he said.

  “Make sure to take good care of them.”

  “Sí, Abuela.”

  “Does he speak English?” I asked.

  He looked at me like I was an idiot. “Sí.”

  I glanced at Dorian and back to the grandmother behind the counter.

  So that was how we ended up with a chaperone that looked like a member in a drug cartel.

  He led us out to his car, which I wish I could say was some type of badass lowrider, but it was actually a Honda Civic with aftermarket hubcaps, and like a gentleman, he even opened the door for Dorian. She got in the back seat and I scooted in next to her. I would have tried to sit in the front, but he had a garbage bag full of something up there. I couldn’t tell if it was closed, and it definitely wasn’t food, so the back seat would do.

  “You want to go to South Congress?” he asked me.

  Having no idea about Austin or what was available, I just nodded. “As long as some food’s there, that’s fine by us. Also, I’m Gideon.”

  “I’m Diego,” he said with a grunt, not unlike his grandmother’s.

  “My name is Dorian.”

  He looked at her in the rearview mirror for a moment, “So, you want cheap f
ood or expensive food?”

  “Cheapish,” I told him. “What do you recommend?”

  “Torchy’s Tacos, not too cheap, not too expensive, very good.”

  I noticed he had a Longhorns ball cap sitting on the dashboard. “Hey, do you mind if I wear your ball cap?” I asked. “I’ll be honest with you; I’m trying to keep a low profile.”

  He started the car and shrugged. “Fine by me, but don’t mess it up; don’t get it all sweaty.” He tossed the hat into the back seat.

  His car smelled like burnt vanilla, mostly because of the Little Trees vehicle air freshener hanging from the rearview mirror. Abuela was right; it really wasn’t very far from the hotel. And looking over my shoulder at the place we were driving away from, I wondered how Dorian had found it anyway.

  The hotel was completely run down on the outside, its parking lot filled with potholes. It was across from some private Catholic university called St. Edward’s University, and seemed incongruous to the manicured campus across the street.

  If I’d had my smartphone, I may have looked some of the stuff up just to see more about where we were, but my little research binge would have to wait.

  I put the Longhorn hat on, and we continued down the street to the sound of Tejano rap.

  I was starting to like Tejano music, and a little rap in there really added something to the mix. It was upbeat, and even though I had no idea what they were talking about, it made me feel happy, a little positive. True, I’d disliked it on our drive to Austin, but my little stint in military prison had made everything on the outside radiate with positive energy.

  And boy, did I need some positive energy at that moment.

  We stopped in front of Torchy’s and got out of the car.

  Diego pointed to a side street, told us he’d park there and wait for us. The shopping district was about a block away from Torchy’s, so I told him that would work.

  With the baseball hat covering as much of my face as I could get it to cover, we entered the hip Mexican restaurant.

  Their logo was a cute devil with a yellow pitchfork. All of their tacos were named, and I ordered two Trailer Parks, which were tacos with fried chicken, green chilies, and poblano sauce on a flour tortilla. Dorian went with a taco called Brushfire, which was Jamaican jerk chicken with grilled jalapeños, mangos, and sour cream. It looked yummy as hell.

  “Order two,” I told her. “Actually, three. Fuck, I’m hungry. Chips and queso too. Two drinks,” I said to the bearded and tatted dude at the counter.

  The food came, and by the time it reached our table, my mouth was watering. I practically inhaled the first taco. It was the taste of freedom. Just a few hours ago, I’d been served a half-eaten apple and a loogied-up slice of bread. Now I was eating like Pablo Escobar.

  I hadn’t even been a prisoner for more than two days, and I suddenly had a hatred for the prison system, even though I understood its purpose. I guess experiencing anything will do that to you; it levels you, makes you realize how much you have in common with other people.

  But the tacos. Goddamn, they were good.

  Dorian ate one and a half of her tacos, and I finished the other half, apologizing for eating like such an animal.

  “It’s fine, I’m sure you weren’t fed very well in there.”

  “Let’s get some new threads,” I said.

  I used a spoon to scoop what was left of the queso into my mouth, and we left Torchy’s Tacos, heading down the street.

  I wasn’t one to shop at high-end boutiques, but right now I could use anything, including some new underwear.

  We entered the first shop and started looking around. There were some douchy shirts here, so that wasn’t going to do, but they did have a pretty extensive collection of undergarments. Unfortunately, the only underwear I could find cost twenty bucks a pair.

  “They’re made of Lenzing MicroModal,” the female sales associate told us. “It’s so soft!”

  “I want some too,” Dorian said. I watched as she chose two thongs and a pair of boy shorts.

  “Yep, get whatever you want,” I said as I grabbed three more pairs myself. So I spent nearly one hundred and fifty dollars on underwear. Sue me.

  We went into the next boutique, which mostly had women’s clothing.

  “Get whatever you’d like, and get a few extra shirts,” I told her. My fuck, did it feel good to say stuff like that. I’d never gone into a store before and just told someone to get whatever they wanted. Yet this had happened several times now since meeting Grace.

  It really felt good to be rich, even if I was hood rich.

  She picked out some T-shirts and asked me which ones I liked.

  “RIP Willie Nelson is pretty sweet. The Leslie shirt too.”

  Apparently, Leslie was a cross-dressing Austin homeless man who died just around the time I was born. The shirt just had a silhouette of him (her?) standing over the words ‘Local Hero.’

  She showed me a shirt that said ‘Magnolia Cafe, Sorry We Are Open.’

  “Get that one too.”

  I had a feeling we’d need to get clothing for Veronique, so I wanted to have extra shirts around.

  “My jacket is so hot,” she reminded me as she went to the jacket section.

  The female sales associate had heard what I said earlier and started telling Veronique about a form-fitting, light ribbed sweater. “It was designed for summer weather in mind,” she said. “For people who like to cover up. And the buttons on the front allow for a little air, if you get my drift.”

  Dorian got that one too, as well as a shirt that said, ‘Keep Austin Weird.’ Four shirts, a ribbed sweater designed for summer weather (whatever the hell that meant), and two pairs of black form-fitting jeans later, we were down about five hundred dollars.

  Next stop was a men’s shop, and while I wasn’t going for the dapper-mustache-in-tweed-jacket look – of which they had plenty of options – I was able to find some T-shirts and some good Levi’s. I chose one T-shirt that paid homage to the short-lived hockey team Austin once had, the Austin Ice Bats.

  I decided to get two pairs of jeans, knowing full well that I might not be able to get clothes for a while. I also got some fancy-schmancy socks – argyle, with the word YOLO written on the heel, for some reason.

  If ever there was a word to define my life choices …

  The clothing cost about two fifty, which was at least cheaper than Dorian’s purchase, but still pricey. We were burning right through that five thousand.

  But, YOLO, right?

  Dorian and I were just about to head back to our car when I saw the candy store. I had to partake, and I was glad I did because the candy was delicious. We got about fifty dollars’ worth of candy, which was a joke, and which no man or woman should ever purchase.

  But I needed something. Yet as much as I tried to hide my anguish from earlier with shopping, I knew retail therapy wasn’t going to cure the after-effects of what I had just gone through.

  Candy would help though.

  Diego took us back to the hotel. I tipped him sixty dollars and gave him all the candy. We’d already eaten enough to get the shakes. As we passed his abuela at the counter, she told me that the USB cable and the phones had arrived. I took the package from her, and we hurried up to our room.

  “Glad we’re back,” I said after I shut the door and locked all the bolts. “I know you need some rest, so why don’t you just lie down for a moment, and I’ll plug in and see what I can fiddle around with?”

  Dorian set her packages down. “Do you mind if I change?”

  “No, definitely, do whatever you’d like.”

  Little did I know that meant she would take off her pants and jacket right in front of me. I started to look away, but she only laughed. “It’s not like you haven’t seen a woman naked before, right?”

  “I … sure, do whatever.”

  “You already said that.” She peeled her underwear off and changed into one of her new thongs. Then her top came off and I gulpe
d. I didn’t know when I’d become such a horny bastard, but what could I do?

  She put on the RIP Willie Nelson shirt and lay down on the bed.

  “Good, I’m glad you’re comfortable.”

  “I thought you’d like that.”

  “Yeah, sure, who wouldn’t? But let’s get down to business here.”

  I plugged into her neck, and the password screen came up. “Shit,” I whispered as she turned on the TV. I was just about to panic when I saw that the password had autofilled.

  Thank you, autofill.

  Passwords were such a bitch.

  Due to an increase in cybercrimes, everything these days required some intense password that involved at least ten digits, and companies had started rolling out a rule that you couldn’t use the same password for another login. There was even a group that had been put together that checked to make sure you weren’t doing this – of course, it was all part of the FCG’s six-billion-dollar war on cybercrimes.

  Point is, I hate passwords.

  I went straight to her abilities folder and opened up the teleportation subfolder, creating a shadow box with four dials.

  I looked at the options for a moment, wondering if I could adjust the Recharge Speed down a little bit and increase the Restoration Speed. Hovering over the option told me that it decreased the amount of time she needed to recharge from teleporting. Also, we would possibly have to increase the radius of her teleportation ability, especially if we needed to move a larger object.

  At first, the options looked like this:

  Tele-Sphere Radius: 2

  Conscious Spatial Awareness: 10

  Recharge Speed: 6

  Restoration Speed: 6

  By the time I had finished, they looked like this:

  Tele-Sphere Radius: 3

  Conscious Spatial Awareness: 10

  Recharge Speed: 5

  Restoration Speed: 6

  “I feel a lot warmer.” Dorian looked at me. “Touch my head and you’ll see what I mean.”

  I did and noticed it was a little warmer than it should have been.

  “My heart, too.” She moved my hand down to her chest, directly over her heart.