Magic Time

by Marc Scott Zicree

  Devil night. That’s what old Granny Marxuach had called it, making him tremble and quake back when he was a little pissant on the rancho. All the demons and witches and hell shades take to the sky, so you better dig yourself under the covers and keep tight your soul.

  But Papa Sky hadn’t believed any of that crap for the better part of eighty years. Real life had been woolly enough.

  His own brand of night had come on him back when he was straight and smooth-skinned and fine, his hair black and gleaming like oil. At first, it had been merely ripples in his vision like smears on glass, then a fog, and then darkness.

  Still, it hadn’t been all bad. He hadn’t had to watch himself grow bent and lined and worn, a lank tree that had stood too many storms. And he had his axe, the 1922 Selmer alto sax that was part of his body, that he could make sing like Jesus himself humming. Blind as he was, he could still cut his own reeds, shaving down the Le Blanc bamboo with the straight razor he kept by his bed, in the one-room walkup he’d had since that glory night when he’d subbed for Johnny Hodges with Ellington at the Cotton Club.

  How New York had changed since then. The elegance and grace and courtliness had sluiced away, leaving the young who had never known it desolate, abandoned, longing.

  Of course, it had changed a good deal more in recent days, now wasn’t that the truth. He could smell it in the wind, feel it on the air. And the stories he’d been hearing, like hophead D.T.s out of Bellevue. Some crazy badness was running the streets, no two ways about it.

  But for some reason, no one messed with him. He’d gone about his business, gigging on street corners for quarters and dimes, that butterscotch sound booming up sweet and mournful along the concrete canyons. And the take had been good. The coins jingled warm in his pocket, a tambourine accompaniment to the tapping of his fiberglass cane as he made his way home along the uneven stones of the familiar alleyway. He’d sensed the desperation in the listening ones, their fear. They needed to be soothed, and maybe that was the answer: they hungered for just one thing that wasn’t all screwed up, even if it came wafting off some old blind black Cubano.

  And sometimes, when no one else was around, there’d be a soft shuffling of something in the corners, swaying to “Body and Soul,” to “Stardust,” saying nothing. He’d catch a musky stink at those times, and a shiver would run up his back. He’d be glad he couldn’t see whatever it was that was hearing him.

  Now it was late night, the summer heat leeched away and the cold seeping into him as he eased along the path like a shadow, his case clutched tight, the axe silent and drowsing.

  Ahead of him, a low moan sounded, a timber that swelled and tremored through him. A hot liquid iron smell assailed him, like a whole lake of blood, like a slaughterhouse.

  He was seized with a panicky, frantic urge to turn, bolt headlong away, never mind what he might plow into, what stick-thin chalky bones might snap.

  But then the moan faded down, was broken by something like a sob of pure anguish. This cat’s in a world of pain. Papa Sky’s heart rose in him. And he’s alone, in the dark.

  Tentatively, he stepped forward. The tip of his cane found a shape along the ground, resilient and large. He could feel heat radiating off it, hear a raspy, resonant breathing.

  Nervously, Papa Sky licked his lips, tongue running over the ridges of callus. “How we doin’ there?” His throat was dry, the words shaky.

  The breathing stopped, and there was a long, hanging silence. Finally, a voice croaked through the pain, “I’ve had . . . better days.”

  Papa Sky laughed, and there was tenderness in it. He bent down, put a gentling hand on the figure’s back. Slick with blood, the leather felt hard as armor, bone projected at odd angles.

  “Well, you just take it slow.” Papa let out a breath that would have been exquisite through the axe. “We gonna see what we can do for you.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  NEW YORK

  They got Tina to the apartment without incident. Fortunately, few were out on the lightless streets. She drifted between them as though air had become water, as though the gravity and atmosphere she inhabited were of an alien world.

  Her tears subsided, Tina drew back from Cal, from, it seemed, his touch, and did not speak all the long way home. Stung, Cal ached to hold her but did not press the issue.

  Once safely inside, Cal let Doc examine her. He changed his clothes, cleaned the congealed offense of Stern’s blood off him as best he could, then joined Colleen and Goldie by the open window of the living room. Peering silently out at the night, they were drinking coffee made on the camp stove. Cal braced his shoulder against the side of the frame and let the cool air waft over him, grateful for the quiet. His mind felt washed out, his body leaden.

  In the room behind, he became aware of a growing darkness. The shine about Tina that had cast the space in shifting pastels had softened. He glanced to where she sat curled on the sofa, or rather floated just above it, her face to the wall. Doc rose from her side and approached him.

  Even in the gloom, Cal could see his face was disturbingly pale, drawn. He motioned Cal off a bit from the others.

  “Is she suffering?” Cal asked. “I mean, is she in pain?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Not physically.” He looked to Tina, and Cal saw that Goldie had joined her, crouching by the sofa, his lips moving softly.

  Doc turned back to Cal. “The plan you had before, it was a good plan. Smart people are leaving; they sense what’s in the wind. High time for you to leave, too.”

  “And what about you?”

  Doc looked toward Tina; pain flashed in his eyes. “Calvin, if my bag of tricks could help her—” He trailed off, shook his head. “Roosevelt General might have use of me. I don’t think they’ll be too picky about credentials.”

  Cal thought of the dreadful corridors crowded to bursting with the stunned, frantic ones. “You sure you want that?”

  Doc nodded, then fell silent. Cal sensed a tension in him, as if he were deciding whether to speak further. Finally, he said, “There were those in Ukraine—Chernobyl—like a light had gone out in them. They could summon no hope, you understand? And they would want . . . an end.”

  “What are you trying to tell me?”

  “Calvin, your sister, she asked if there was something in my bag that could—she wanted me to—”

  The air in the room suddenly felt cold. Cal shivered. Doc’s fingers brushed his arm. “I’m sorry, my friend, but I thought you should know.”

  As he drew near the sofa, Cal saw that Tina had fallen asleep. The glow about her was gone and, cradled by gravity, she lay on the deep cushions, her hair like spun glass across the pillow.

  Goldie squatted nearby, singing softly to her, a sweet, mournful hymn. “There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole/ There is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin-sick soul. . . .”

  Seeing Cal, Goldie cut his song off and rose.

  “Thanks for finding her,” Cal murmured.

  “Hey, Mr. Keene, Finder of Lost . . .” Goldie’s voice faltered; he grew serious. “Sorry, man.”

  Cal nodded. Goldie left them alone. Cal settled in the tatty burgundy recliner. Tina looked younger than her years and troubled even in repose, as ever. But she was terribly changed.

  She wanted to die. Anguish flooded him. A vicious wind was battering her, trying to tumble her away, to sever them.

  Whatever caused all this . . . it’s calling us, Stern, that psychotic monstrosity, had said. Could it be true? If so, what in God’s name did it want them for?

  Cal felt a brightness on his face and jolted awake, realized he had dozed. Tina’s eyes were on him, mosaic tiles, turquoise, unfathomable. Her aurora shimmered outward, and her hair drifted off the cushions as in a current.

  “Tina.”

  She turned from him, toward the wall. An impotent rage rose in him at her despair. He fought it down, spoke softly. “I couldn’t stop what happened to Ma, I couldn’t keep us safe—but we’re
still here.”

  “Am I, Cal?” Her eyes found his, and her voice was a whisper. “Am I, really?”

  “Yes.” He reached a hand to touch her, but she flinched, gaze averting, and he let it drop. Then, for a reason he could not have given name to, he added, “To the west and the south, there’s a power.”

  Startled, she again faced him. “Yes.” There was music in her voice, subtle tones accompanying. Her glance diffused inward, on memory. “In bed when I was little, I’d hear Mama’s records through the wall. It was like the melodies were reaching inside, you know, like they were pulling me.”

  “And that’s what this is like?”

  She nodded. “Only . . . not beautiful. It’s jangly. Scared and angry and sad. Sometimes . . . I dunno. Crazy. I hear it all the time, getting louder. Telling me there’s something I have to do.”

  “What?”

  She shrugged, not knowing. “But if I stopped fighting it, if I let go . . .” She looked at her bloodless hands, the nimbus casting shifting colors on her like stormclouds coming. “Near the end, when Nijinsky was in St. Moritz, he went for a walk in the snow at night. He heard a voice; he thought it was God. It told him to jump off a cliff into the darkness, that he wouldn’t fall. . . .”

  “Did he jump?” Cal asked.

  Tina nodded. “A tree caught him; he hadn’t even seen it. He climbed back up, went home. But it was the moment his whole life changed. He went from being what he had been to . . . what he became.” Cal thought of the glorious, singular moment that had been Nijinsky at the height of his brilliance and prowess, and the forty years in the asylum that had followed. Tina’s face twisted. “I don’t want to go into that darkness, Cal. I’d rather—rather—”

  “I know.” He reached to stroke her starlight hair, and this time she allowed it. The pastel luminescence around her eddied about his fingers, sparkling off them. At the far side of the room, Goldie had settled near Doc and Colleen, strumming his guitar softly, the music drifting with no particular tune.

  Within the corona of light, Tina’s eyes had closed again, not sleeping but meditative. She’s hearing it even now, Cal thought, this pitiless force with its grasp on her. Perhaps on all of us.

  He wanted to run, take his sister and hide. Some dark hole, some mountain fastness. But where?

  Where wouldn’t it find them?

  Then suddenly, her words registered. “Tina?”

  Her eyes opened.

  “It’s getting louder . . . stronger?”

  She nodded.

  “When you say it’s to the west and the south, is that one location, or two?”

  She considered, cocking her head, seeming to listen to a sound he could not hear. “Two. The one in the south’s weaker, kind of confused, like it’s—” She intertwined her fingers, pulled at them as if battling.

  “In turmoil?”

  “Yes.”

  “Anything else? I mean, can you tell what it looks like, what it is?”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “I know, but can you?”

  Again, that concentration. “No. Only—there’s these words I keep hearing in my head. Wish . . . Heart.”

  “Sounds like part of a prayer. What do you think it means?”

  “I dunno. Maybe . . . it’s a place?”

  “A town?”

  She took in the thought, searching, but over what unsettled landscape Cal could not guess. At last, she whispered, “South.”

  “South,” he repeated. “Tina, is this a place you can find?”

  Her face flashed alarm.

  “You feel it’s growing stronger. Like something forming, but maybe not formed yet. Supposing—”

  “No.” She shook her head vehemently. The aura about her flared up bright, and Cal felt an unseen force shove against his chest, press him and his chair several inches away.

  Cal touched his breast. It didn’t hurt but felt momentarily numb. He wondered how strong the power filtering through Tina might be, how controllable. Somehow, he managed to keep his voice calm.

  “Tina, do you remember—maybe not, you were really small—when I came home from school and you were so upset because the Gage boys had set out those squirrel traps?”

  She had withdrawn into herself again, behind the angry slashes of moving light. After an aching silence, she said, “I remember.”

  “We’d sneak out after midnight, you’d help me find them.”

  “And you’d break the lock from the inside, like they were super squirrels.” Though she wasn’t smiling, her face held an animation, a vibrancy, that summoned back a sweet ghost of what she had been.

  He shook his head, the recollection was so vivid. “They were so damn mad and so damn sure it was a trick. Only—”

  His eyes again met his sister’s. And it was the two of them again, spliced in the tide of remembrance, before law school, before New York. Together, they said, “No more traps.”

  Cal smiled, the chilled hollow within him sparked warm. He didn’t know if Tina had the strength to save herself, or the willingness to let him try. But he knew her heart, and what it encompassed.

  “What I’m thinking about,” he continued, hesitant, “is all the other ones. The ones who hear it calling, who can’t resist.” This time, she didn’t look away. “What if—before it gets any stronger, while it’s still in turmoil—we find it? What if—I don’t know how yet—but what if, together, you and me, we could stop it? What if we could save them?”

  She was gazing at him now, into him, weighing all the myriad hopes and dreads, the territories they had journeyed over and might yet encounter.

  Doubt iced through Cal. Perhaps he’d just be hastening her death, or worse. But it was as if he were looking at an hourglass, the sand ever more swiftly running out. And he didn’t know what else to do.

  Tina’s aura faded into its cooler colors. Concern etched her face. “It’ll kill you, Cal.”

  He said nothing, let silence answer. Then he asked, “You think what Nijinsky heard was God?”

  It wasn’t what she expected. She contemplated it. “No.”

  “If somebody could’ve stopped that voice before he jumped off the cliff, what do you think would’ve happened?”

  She stared at Cal through her shimmering haze, and he felt, astonishing and harrowing, the current of her faith in him.

  “He would have kept on dancing,” she said.

  Toward dawn, Tina fell into sleep at last. Cal withdrew from her side and sought out the others. He found them in his room. Doc lay across the bed, dreaming fitfully. Colleen sat curled in the big chair, napping, but with a wary tension that reminded him of a sleeping cat. Goldie sat cross-legged on the floor, still fingering his guitar. When does he sleep? Cal wondered, and the thought came back to him, illogically, Never.

  Although Cal strove to keep his footfall soundless, the creak of the door roused Doc and Colleen. Blinking, they turned to him, inquisitive.

  “We’ll be leaving as soon as I can get everything together.” His gaze swept over them. Strangers who had become so much more than friends. In words awkwardly, embarrassingly inadequate, he began, “There’s no way I could ever hope to—”

  “Listen,” Colleen bounded from her chair, trying for an easy tone. “I been thinking of stretching my legs, so if you and Miss Emergency Flare could stand some companionship from the other side of the tracks—”

  “No,” Cal said, and it hit her like a blow, her surprise at his rejection cutting him to the heart. “It would be great, Colleen,” he added quickly. “But there’s been a change of plans.”

  Goldie lost just a beat but kept on playing, while Doc drew up beside them.

  “At first, I thought we could run from this force that’s gotten into Tina and Stern and who knows how many others, get somewhere it couldn’t reach us, reach her. But Tina sensed—saw—it’s far off, part of it to the west, part—the weaker part—to the south.” Cal gazed through gauzy curtains onto the city. He thought of dying things, and the k
ind of life that fed on them. “If it can reach us here, I think it probably . . . I don’t know where it’s safe.”

  “And so what do you propose to do?” Doc asked quietly. “She’s still plugged into it. Like a receiver that’s off the hook. If she can home in on it, we might be able to locate the part that’s not strong yet.”

  “And then what?” Colleen’s tone was glacial.

  “Strike at the heart of it, if we can, and make it stop.”

  “This thing that can smash the world to pieces? That can shoot lightning from the sky? Boy, Griffin, it’s not enough for you to launch yourself from the top of a skyscraper latched to some fire-breathing dinosaur—”

  “That’s why it has to be just the two of us.”

  Colleen’s green eyes flashed protest. But before she could speak, Cal put his hands on her shoulders. “You’ve done enough.”

  All of Colleen’s bravado deserted her then; she deflated. “Fine.” She stormed out of the room.

  “Colleen . . .”

  Doc shook his head. “Calvin, my friend, I don’t want to presume to tell you your business, but I’m going to tell you your business.”

  “Doc—”

  “Kindly sit your behind in that chair and cease speaking.” Doc cut off Cal’s protest. “Sit.”

  Sighing, Cal sat.

  “You may have noticed that certain events have been transpiring around us, demanding we extend ourselves to new and surprising heights. I think we are in a process of transformation. Not physical, all of us, but . . . in other ways.” Doc moved closer. “I know it feels terrible. Painful. Frightening. Some won’t even survive, but that’s how birth is.”

  “What are you getting at?”

  “Calvin,” Doc’s tone now gently scolded. “Three days ago I was serving hot dogs on the street. I could smile, make jokes, but I was a dead man. Or at least, in deep coma. And Goldman here. A derelict soul, friendless, living—” He gestured the image away. Goldie continued strumming, seeming not to have heard. “And you. A timid rabbit in a business suit, denying who you are.”