by J. R. Rain
“You still miss him,” I said.
“I do, Sam.”
“I’m sorry, sweetie,” I said.
She nodded and looked away, a glob of mayo in the corner of her mouth. I didn’t bother telling her about the mayo. It looked kind of cute on her. The tears in her eyes, not so much. It had only been a month since Allison’s adventure in Oregon—an adventure that had seen her not only battle the Wicked Witch of the West, but also fall in love... and fall hard, too. To say that things didn’t end well was an understatement.
“I dream of him, Sam. He comes to me in my sleep, and I wake up crying.”
“It’s still fresh, sweetie.”
“He was a good guy.”
“I know.”
She wiped her eyes with her napkin. Allison was in top shape. She should be, considering the other half of her life was devoted to whipping the rich and famous in Beverly Hills into shape, too, being a personal trainer. She was dressed in a black t-shirt with a strange, triangle-shaped necklace resting on top of it, a necklace that I suspected had something to do with her other half... her witchy half.
“I bought it at Ross,” she said. “Ten bucks. Nothing witchy about it. And your thoughts leaked out like they went through a sieve.”
I sighed, took another bite. I might have made a moaning noise. Yes, the sandwich was that good.
She said, “Are you still having dreams about New Orleans?”
I nodded, my mouth too full to speak. I sipped from my Coke, washed it down. “Almost every night.”
“Any answers yet?”
I shrugged. “None that I can put my finger on.”
Over the past few months, I’d been having vivid dreams of life in nineteenth-century New Orleans. As in, the 1800s. As in pre-Civil War. True, I’d gone to New Orleans to work a missing person’s case... but then came right home once the case was completed. Mere days. But since that time, I’d been plagued by dreams of antebellum mansions, too-tight corsets, slaves and voodoo. So much voodoo. I dreamed of a kindly colonel and ballroom dancing and slaves. Of a doctor in love. I dreamed of murder, too. Most interesting, perhaps, were the dreams themselves, as I rarely dream—and usually only when the dream is of the utmost importance.
“Maybe you should go to a hypnotist. Maybe they could help you figure out what the dreams mean?”
“Maybe,” I said. “Except they would likely find out lots of other miserable things about me. Or accidentally release”—I paused, took in some useless air, and I might have said the next word through clenched teeth—“Elizabeth.”
“Then give the hypnotist a suggestion of his own. Not to go there. Not to go anywhere but your dreams about New Orleans.”
“Or maybe I should leave well enough alone,” I said. “Maybe I don’t want to know what happened in New Orleans.”
After a moment of silent chewing, Allison said, “Millicent thinks you might be a bad influence on me.”
I almost laughed. I almost had to block my latest bite from rocketing across the table... until I noted the somber quality in Allison’s tone. “You’re being serious?”
“I am.”
“Bad, how?”
“First off, she loves you. Or she used to love you. We were closer than sisters. Really, we were. You have to believe me. But she no longer trusts you.”
“Well, fuck her. She doesn’t know me.” I’d lost my appetite for the sandwich and pushed the rest of it aside.
“That’s just the thing, Sam. She does. Better than you realize. She’s been watching, for years now. And she thinks there is a chance of...”
“A chance of what?”
Allison looked away, tears suddenly in her eyes. “That we might have lost you.”
“I’m not lost, Allie. I’m right here.”
Now, the tears were streaming down her face. And I could hardly believe what I was seeing and hearing. “One of them is in you, Sam. And not just any one of them. One of the most powerful ever. Millicent says that maybe I can’t trust you. Or even trust your thoughts. That maybe, just maybe, they have succeeded in taking you over.”
“Are you hearing yourself?” I asked.
“Millicent thinks I should stay away from you.”
“Screw Millicent—”
“I can’t, Sam. She and I and Ivy Tanner... we are part of something big going on. Something powerful. I need them.”
“What are you saying, Allison?” I felt sick to my stomach, which, for me, was saying something.
My friend took in some air and steeled herself. “I’m saying that, until I am a stronger witch, until I can protect myself, I need to stay away from you.”
“Jesus, I only see you once a week for lunch.”
“I’m sorry, Sam.” She got up and dropped her wadded-up napkin on the table.
By the time she got to the front doors, she was crying pretty hard. She pushed through them, and was gone.
Just like that.
Chapter Seven
I was sitting with Jacky in his office.
It is not much of an office. Stark walls. Simple desk. A printer that looked forgotten. Pictures on his wall. Famous boxers I should know the names of, but didn’t. A series of photos of Jacky himself, fighting back in the day. In a number of the photos, Jacky was delivering a jaw-busting blow to his opponents. In others, his hands were raised in victory. All were in black and white.
“But he’s a champion, Sam,” Jacky was saying. I had just delivered the worst news, quite possibly, of his entire life. And Jacky had lived a long, long life.
“He’ll always be a champion to me.”
“Sam, you’re not getting it... your boy... he’s the best fighter I’ve ever trained. Ever. And that includes you. He can go far. Scratch that. He can go all the way. Your son, quite frankly, is unstoppable.”
“I know that, Jacky.”
“Maybe you’re not hearing me, Sam. I’ve never seen a fighter so tough, so fast, so accurate, so strong, and at such a young age. Your son could fight now, at twelve, and beat ninety percent of the pros. Are you hearing me, Sam? At twelve, your son could go pro, and he would be a champion.”
Jacky’s face had gone red. So had his neck and nose. His hair was already red, so that didn’t count. Wait for it... okay, now the tops of his ears were red, too. Yeah, he had gotten himself worked up, which concerned me. Jacky was not a young man, and his health seemed to be failing at an exponential rate. He still ran the club, and still worked with me at times, although he preferred to work with Anthony. Recently, he had made house calls to a disabled homicide investigator in Los Angeles. Blind, deaf, and mute—courtesy of an explosion I’d read about years ago—Jacky had taught the man to fight blind, so to speak. But after yet another attack that had nearly killed the man, Jacky swore the ex-investigator had developed a sixth sense or something. I thought maybe Jacky was losing it.
I reached out and took Jacky’s hands in mine. His were about the same size, but gnarled. Some fingers had been broken, and his knuckles were thick and heavy. Street fighting, back in the day, without the benefit of gloves. Arthritis might have been a factor, too.
“Why are your hands so cold, Sam?” he asked.
He looked from my hands to me. I had made a point to close his office door when I came in to see him after our workout. I was still sweating, which I always found interesting. How could someone who was so cold, sweat so much? I wondered if it was an old bodily memory, maybe a conditioned response to working out? Or maybe that was one way I released any excess water weight since I rarely—ahem—used the bathroom.
Jacky had been pushing hard for the past few months to allow Anthony to work his way up through the amateur ranks in boxing. To the point he wouldn’t let up, even when I kindly told him no. I liked Jacky. My son adored him. Jacky had taken over a fatherly role in Anthony’s life, for which I would be eternally grateful; which, for me, actually meant something. The two usually spent a lot of time together after workouts. Jacky would drop him off later, often with ice
cream or a Coke in hand. Anthony would tell me all about his time with Jacky, the workouts, the talks they had, Jacky’s life as a young fighter. Anthony seemed less impressed about the boxing than the fact that a father figure had taken an interest in him. It wasn’t so much about the boxing; it was about the bonding. And I didn’t want to lose that for my son. But it was, perhaps, time for Jacky to know the truth about us.
I prayed—I hoped—Jacky would understand. I prayed I didn’t have to resort to plan B.
“Jacky, you know how I feel about Anthony fighting...”
He tried to move his hands, but I held them tight. Not too tight, but tight enough for him to know he wasn’t going anywhere. He blinked when he realized he was staying put.
“Jesus, you’re strong, Sam.”
“That’s not a surprise to you, though, is it?”
“Not really. I see how you hit. Your speed. Your son, he’s even faster, I think. Maybe not. Hard to say, you’re both freaks. My freaks.”
I smiled at that. Sitting here, like we were, it would be easy to influence him, to dip into his mind and tell him what to think, to gently suggest that he back off about my son competing in boxing. Accept... accept I had seen inside his mind... and it was tortured, deteriorating, damaged from years of taking punches. I didn’t want to delve inside again, and I also didn’t want to influence my friend either, not if I could help it, and certainly not someone who’d given my son so much attention, warmth, and love.
With Danny gone, Jacky had been there for Anthony. In fact, the two needed each other, and it was always special to see them together. Kingsley had been super kind to Anthony, too—to both my kids—going out of his way to bring them presents and spend time with them. But it wasn’t quite the same. The connection wasn’t quite there.
With Jacky, it was there, and it only seemed to be growing, and not because of Anthony’s growing skills, either. I thought Jacky’s diminishing faculties had something to do with it, too. Often, I would see Anthony helping the old man up into the sparring ring, and consequently, out of the ring. When they spoke, Anthony wrapped his arm around Jacky’s shoulders, and I swear, he was holding the old man up. Already, Anthony was two or three inches taller than the little Irishman.
“Well, your freaks,” I said, “are freakier than you might think, Jacky.”
He squinted at me. More so than usual. His bushy eyebrows might have quivered. More so than usual. “That is a strange thing to say, Sam. Mighty strange.”
“I’m a very, very strange person, Jacky.”
“What are you getting at, Sam?”
Okay, this was harder than I thought it would be. I had known Jacky for so long... well over five years now. Maybe even six. Surely, he knew, on some level, that I was different than any of his other clients... or from anyone he’d ever seen before. Or maybe not. Maybe he was okay with a five-foot, two-inch tall woman kicking an undefeated Marine boxer’s ass (I still don’t feel good about that), or her son who routinely beat all the men in the gym. And when I say beat, I meant he beat the shit out of them.
“Jacky, a few years ago—ten to be exact—something happened to me. Something that makes me different from most people.”
One of Jacky’s eyebrows quivered like a caterpillar in the wind. Maybe Jacky was the strange one. “Different how, Sam?”
“I’m stronger than most people, for one. Surely you know that, Jacky.”
“No one hits harder than you... except for maybe your son.”
“No one, Jacky?” I asked. “No one you’ve ever worked with? Ever?”
“No one, Sam. Your speed and strength and timing and accuracy. I haven’t stopped thinking about you since the day we first met... and your son is no different. And he’s only going to get stronger.”
“Why do you think that might be, Jacky?”
“Because you’re freaks.”
“Okay, but why us?”
“It’s in your genes, I guess. Someone out there has to be faster and tougher and stronger than everyone else. I suppose it’s you two. And for all I know, your daughter, too.”
He seemed content with his theory: someone out there had to be the toughest among us, and I just happened to be it. Normally, I would have let him have his theory, his story, his explanation. Normally, I wouldn’t have pushed. Except that Jacky was filling my son’s head with dreams of boxing glory. Jacky, too, was already picturing Anthony in the ring with Floyd Mayweather, Jr. I could have let this play out. Maybe I could have let my son dominate the world of boxing. And maybe he might someday want to, for all I know. But, for now, my son was twelve years old and his strength was a fluke. His strength was supernatural. The fights would never, ever, be fair and, worst-case scenario, our family secret might just get out.
It wouldn’t take much to give Jacky a subtle suggestion. But I respected him too much for that, and maybe, just maybe, he deserved some real answers, even if he never asked the questions.
I reached across Jacky’s desk and picked up a letter opener. Now, you don’t see those too often these days, but guys like Jacky still had them on their desks, and his was shaped like a miniature version of King Arthur’s sword, Excalibur. In fact, it was even embedded in a mini-boulder. It came out easy enough. Maybe I was going to be the next king of England?
“What are you doing, Sam?”
For an answer, I placed my open left hand on his desk, palm up. There was the smallest of chances that the metal was made of silver, but I doubted it. Steel, I was certain. Well, I would just take that chance. I dragged the dullish tip of the mini-sword over my palm, deep enough to open the skin and for it to hurt. But I kept dragging, even as Jacky stood up abruptly, knocking over his chair and showing flashes of his old brilliance. He swiped my hand, knocking the mini-sword out of it, and flinging it across the room, along with some of my blood.
That I got some perverse pleasure out of seeing my own blood was enough to alarm me, and enough to awaken the bitch inside me. I literally felt her clawing her way up through the darkness, up, up...
Yesss...
Relax, you bitch, I thought. This is just a demonstration.
Still, demonstration or not, she liked the sight of blood, the feeling of pain—all of which seemed to give her subtle strength, encouragement, and a reason for hope. I never, ever wanted her to hope.
Suddenly, I had the very briefest of flashes of what it would be like to be trapped inside of me... forever. It would be hell. Well, not entirely. I was, after all, kinda fun. Not to mention, I didn’t ask for this... she had brought this upon herself. And just as she receded back into the background, I heard the faintest wisps of what I was certain were her thoughts: I am not evil...
I nearly snorted, but I didn’t have time for her. Not with Jacky standing over me, mouth hanging open, both hands holding his little chest, a look of anguish on his face.
“Why would you do that, Sam? Why?”
“It’s okay, Jacky.”
“Sam, my heart. I don’t feel so good.”
“Sit down, Jacky. Sit down and watch.”
“Sam, we need to get you to the hospit—”
But he stopped talking—and for good reason. The wound in my hand was moving. Unlike special effects in Hollywood, where we watch, say, the Wolverine’s many wounds seal up magically and seamlessly, my own fast-healing wounds are a bit more dramatic. Before our very eyes, the skin in my hand pulsed and moved like a living thing, as tendrils of skin reached out from each edge of the wound to meet in the middle and form a thin, crusty, strange, reddish layer of skin. The reddish skin soon formed a thick, pulsating scar before our very eyes. I knew from experience such scars would take a few days to completely disappear. But, for now, the wound was healed.
Meanwhile, Jacky held his chest—which worried me—and stared down at my hand. Sweat had appeared all along his high forehead, beading in some places and dripping in others. The skin along his cheeks and neck and the backs of his hands was splotchy and getting splotchier by the second.
>
“Sam, I don’t feel too good.”
“Deep breaths, Jacky. You’re going to be fine.” Indeed, his aura suggested he was going to be fine, although his heart center was pulsating at a faster rate. No, Jacky didn’t have a heart problem; indeed, I’d noticed for quite some time now the dark spot in his aura where his liver was located.
That’s what’s going to kill him, I thought. Someday.
“I don’t understand what I just saw, Sam.”
“Sometimes, I don’t either. Sit down, Jacky. Good. Deep breaths. Good.”
“Your hand,” he gasped as he sat fully in his well-worn office chair. “The cut. What did I just see?”
It was her, I thought. You saw her in action. Not necessarily me. Any powers, any strength, any rapid-healing, and anything and everything else... was all her.
No, I thought suddenly. That wasn’t true. According to Allison and Millicent the ghost, I had been very, very powerful in my own right. Of course, I hadn’t seen a whiff of such powers growing up. Or had I? Had I been more psychic than I was aware? Had I been more intuitive than I was aware? Had my witchy powers been growing, only to be cut off by my attack ten years ago?
I didn’t know, and I might never know.
Although, I had a number of people I could ask. The librarian might have some answers, but there was someone else. Someone who had been with me for all eternity. Someone who had, apparently, fallen in love with me from afar. Or maybe from up close. I was thinking of my now-fallen guardian angel, Ishmael. He would know the life trajectory I was on. He would, in fact, know more about me than anyone.
Only problem was, I never knew where the bastard was. Was he watching me now? I knew he had taken up watching my son, who had subsequently lost his own guardian angel during those brief moments he’d been a vampire. Ishmael was a sort of surrogate angel... a job I had not asked of him.