Orphans of Paradise

by Laekan Zea Kemp

  She didn’t want them to see the bruises on her neck, the dark shadows spread wide like open blooms. She didn’t want their eyes trailing across every crimson seam, consuming her in pieces. But most of all and worst of all she didn’t want Nadia to see her through that pastel lens of putrid yellows and translucent shades of pink, her skin twisted in that place on the edge of healing.

  Some were starting to fade. She could see it happening. Each morning she lay there, her shirt folded just below her chin, examining every gradation and stray mark as if they were text—ripped across her skin, fissures fading to scars. But even after she’d healed she would never forget. And there was a part of her that didn’t want Nadia to forget either.

  She thought about that moment she’d stepped out from behind the car and Nadia saw her for the first time—that vision that had spurred her sister’s lungs as she tried to piece Rani back together. At first, she’d been afraid for her sister to see her, in that way, in that body. She’d dreaded it. But now she hoped it haunted her—when she was waiting for sleep, when she was putting on a new pair of clothes, when she was trying to pretend like she hadn’t abandoned them, like it wasn’t all her fault.

  It was. All of it. And maybe what Max and Breezy and Enzo had been through wasn’t recorded along their skin. Maybe it wasn’t something you could see at all. But that didn’t mean it wasn’t there. Rani knew it always would be. And now Nadia could have a piece of it too.

  So Rani didn’t leave her room. Not to check on the twins, not to eat, or even to use the bathroom. Instead she lay there, eyes on the ceiling, waiting to forget the things she hoped Nadia never would.

  Chapter 36

  Jax

  Jax had always been good at surviving, at maneuvering alongside Pascual as if he belonged there, as if he belonged anywhere. He used to think that’s what made him—strong, capable, worthy. But really all it meant was that he was good at going through the motions.

  It didn’t matter if he slept on the beach instead of the apartment his brother owned, winter adhering itself to his skin, making him numb. It was only temporary and so was he. Because no matter where he went, or who he tried to be, he had seen things, he had done things and he carried those things whether he pretended they were there or not. They were there and they were heavy and sometimes he wished they’d just bury him. But they never did, not completely.

  Jax was still replaying Medina’s words when a storm started making its way up the beach. He could feel it rumbling and rising from the soles of his feet, the silence finally swollen with something other than his own thoughts and he was relieved. He made his way to the window, searching for the waterline, watching the light spring along the beach, and then he saw Rani.

  She was sitting in the dark, her small silhouette on fire as another flash of lightening tore across the sky. There was a low groan as the light blinked out and then she was gone again.

  He saw the rain moving toward the beach and he searched the kitchen for a plastic trash bag, some old newspaper, and then he spotted the small quilt. He tucked it under his shirt and then he was running. He found her sitting near the water, hands clutching her knees, foam lapping at her ankles.

  “Rani.” His voice sounded far away, as if he was the one that needed tethering, the one floating out there in the darkness. “We need to get inside.”

  He reached for her jacket sleeve but his fingers gripped the sand instead. She didn’t move. He knelt there, hands still clutching the quilt tucked under his shirt. He tried to find her eyes but her hair fell in a wild tangle over her face, her fingers gripping her scalp. She was shaking.

  And he knew he shouldn’t. He knew he should keep his distance. But just for a second, in that moment, the truth indistinguishable there in the dark, he wanted to be the kind of man she would not…could not be afraid of. And so he laid the quilt across her shoulders, his body braced between her and the storm, as they waited for the rain.

  Chapter 37

  Jax

  Medina fixed the flesh colored wire to Jax’s chest as they waited for one of Pascual’s drivers to meet him in front of the jail. Jax stood in the small metal breezeway by the front entrance, trying to let the cool air dry the sweat from his palms. He tried to take a deep breath and pressed his back to the cold glass window, trying to slow himself down.

  He thought about the speech he’d given Pascual about needing to have people around that he could trust, about their being a rat in his inner circle. Now he was the rat and he hoped he could slip into the role with ease, that because he was the “good” guy in all of this, that the odds would be stacked in his favor.

  He remembered his mother’s rosary and suddenly he wished he had it with him. Not to wear like some kind of declaration, but still and quiet in the pocket of his jeans. Just close enough for him to trace his fingers along the smooth wooden beads.

  A pair of headlights appeared up the road. The car moved slowly through the parking lot, winding through the parked police cars, though the harsh glow of the beams never seemed to move, their rays fixed on Jax. It finally pulled to a stop and the back door was thrown open. It was too dark to see who was inside and Jax wondered for a minute who his brother had sent to get him.

  He took a deep breath and instantly felt the cold plastic wires taped to his chest. They’d seemed to disappear the moment he slipped his shirt back on, but now he could feel them, rigid and thrumming there like a second pulse.

  “Hurry up,” a voice said.

  Jax slipped in beside the dark figure and closed the door behind him. Someone pulled out a cell phone and lit up the inside of the car. He made out the back of Pascual’s head behind the wheel, tattoo of their mother’s initials faint beneath his buzz cut. His right hand man Chavo sat in the passenger seat and next to Jax, his girth swallowing up the moon outside their window, was Salazar Marcum.

  “So, Jax how was it?” Chavo asked, laughing.

  Jax felt his throat tighten as if Marcum’s hands were already fitted there. He swallowed, trying not to look at him, at any of them. He’d seen Jax that night in the empty field, cowering with the rest of them behind Medina’s car, a loaded pistol aimed at Marcum’s head. He was sure of it.

  “Fuckin’ sucked,” Jax finally said.

  “You mean they didn’t treat you like royalty in there? Didn’t they know who you were?” Chavo asked.

  “Oh, they knew,” Jax lied.

  “Jesus, some people ain’t got no respect.”

  Jax found his brother’s eyes in the rearview mirror. He hadn’t said a word, hadn’t looked away from the road for a second, and it made Jax’s stomach turn. They finally pulled to a stop in front of a small townhouse surrounded by a low chain link fence. Marcum went up to the door first and Jax watched as he knocked a few times before a woman pushed back the screen and moved to let him inside.

  “Marcum’s sister lives here,” Pascual said. “Those fuckers who started the fire probably have the apartment staked out.”

  So they don’t think I did it, Jax thought. He sunk against the seat, drawing in a deep breath.

  “We’ll stay here for now.”

  “Who do you think it was?” Jax asked.

  “Toly,” Pascual said.

  Chavo grunted. “Those fucking Russians.”

  Anatoly Gusarov was a Russian transplant and a skinhead. Other than the fact that he was the biggest meth dealer in the city, there wasn’t a lot Jax knew about him. His cohorts liked to leak stories about him that were more like folklore, like that he once cracked a bear’s spinal cord with just his teeth. It was all a bunch of psycho bullshit but Toly and his white supremacists had been growing in numbers recently.

  “Why them?” Jax asked.

  “I may have acquired a few of their buyers,” Pascual said.

  “But you don’t sell meth.”

  The porch light clicked on, then off, then on again and Chavo stepped out of the car and walked inside. Pascual lit a cigarette and let the ashes flutter into the center cup hold
er.

  “So you gonna tell me what happened?” he said.

  “What?”

  “How the hell did you end up in jail?”

  “I told Navarro on the phone.”

  “Yeah, well I want to hear it from you.”

  “I was coming down the back alley when—”

  “Were you there when it started?”

  Jax tried to read the lack of inflection in his brother’s voice, the coldness that seemed to be all knowing. Stick to your story.

  Jax cleared his throat. “Not when it started, no. They’d already put the fire out by the time I got there. The place was completely dark. I tried to get in through the door behind Mateo’s restaurant but it was jammed. That’s when Medina—”

  “Medina’s the one who picked you up? How long were you with him?”

  “No. I mean, yeah he’s the one who saw me but then he had someone else take me downtown.”

  “You keep your fucking mouth shut?”

  “Yeah, of course.”

  Pascual took another drag of his cigarette before pinching out the glowing end. Jax watched the smoke trail out from between his lips, long wisps slinking toward him.

  “I know you, Jax.”

  Jax inched behind the driver’s seat, his fingers slipping over the door handle.

  “I know you were just sick of freezing your ass off,” Pascual said. “But it’s not gonna work like that anymore. You’re either in or you’re out. You’re either my brother or you’re not.”

  Jax tried to find Pascual’s eyes in the rearview mirror again but all he could see were the harsh lines across his forehead. The wires taped to Jax’s chest started to burn and he felt the urge to rip them off and stick them in the pocket behind the driver’s seat. He felt himself teetering on the edge and he was afraid to push one way or the other. Maybe if he just stayed quiet. Maybe if he just pretended to be invisible he could stay off Pascual’s radar, at least long enough for Medina to get everything he needed.

  That night Jax slept between a dirty clothes hamper and a small twin bed. Marcum’s sister was kind enough to let him sleep on the floor of her sons’ room. One of them seemed to be about ten while the other was no older than four. They shared the bed and not just for their houseguest’s sake.

  Jax didn’t know how much money Marcum made being a bounty hunter on the wrong side of the law but he was sure it was probably enough to get his nephews an extra bed and a decent house. The whole place was shit with dirty clothes covering almost every inch of floor space and cat hair spiraling into the air every time someone took a step. Jax could smell the piss and dirty dishes from the front porch and he couldn’t believe Pascual had agreed to sleep there.

  Jax turned his back from the door and tried to sleep with his face to the wall. He curled up into a ball, trying to take up the least amount of space he possibly could for fear of absorbing too many odd and disgusting smells. He thanked God on behalf of Marcum’s sister that he wasn’t some kind of kiddy murderer or sick creep. How many times a week did those boys’ mother let random strangers camp out on her couch? Fucking junkies, Jax thought.

  Jax had never wanted to be a part of that world. That’s what Pascual had known. It was his world, his kingdom. And not one he’d created but one whose existence he continued to help perpetuate. But this wasn’t what life looked like, Jax realized, not real life. It was just an escape, a fantasy. It was a black hole that slipped into people’s existences, robbing from them every ounce of light, or joy, or hope, and replacing it with a need so incessant, a desire so ferocious that it destroyed everything in its path.

  Jax managed to doze off for a few hours but woke with a start when something smooth traipsed across his arm. When he opened his eyes the cat whose piss he’d no doubt been sleeping in was trying to balance on his shoulder so it could jump onto the bed. Jax shrugged it off and it hissed at him, hips raised. It scurried under the bed and that’s when Jax noticed a faint light pooling under the door seam. He followed it out into the living room where Pascual was standing by the window, his fingers spreading the blinds.

  “Good, you’re up,” he said without looking away from the window.

  “Yeah.”

  “We’ve got a problem.”

  Jax stopped in the middle of the room waiting for Pascual to turn around, to say something about the wire, to rip him in half.

  “You were right.”

  “About what?”

  “About there being a rat.”

  Jax felt his knees shaking and he moved toward the couch, using the arm to steady himself.

  Pascual turned to him. “Those fucking bitches.”

  “What?”

  “The mules. The fucking mules. They’ve been playing informant for that son of a bitch Medina.”

  Jax felt his heart slow and his limbs solidify again. He moved closer to the window, to Pascual so Medina could hear every word.

  “How do you know?” he said.

  “Chavo saw one getting into one of Medina’s black sedans. Bitch was acting weird, real jittery, like a runner. So Chavo followed her and saw a suit in the driver’s seat. Next day we got a call from Vargas in Sinaloa asking for the bitch and their fucking money.”

  “Maybe she’s the only one.”

  “She’s not. We caught two more. One making a run for it to a black car parked on Holston Avenue and another standing in front of La Puerta.”

  “You got them though, right?”

  “That’s why I’m glad you’re up. I need you to do me a favor.”

  Chapter 38

  Rani

  Rani pressed her face to the mattress, the sheets cold and twisted around her legs. She blinked, absorbing the morning in faint flashes until it didn’t make her feel raw. She glanced at the pile of clothes on the floor, stiff and still damp, a long dark puddle edging out from under the bed.

  She turned back toward the window and she saw the strange girl, pale against the sand, her long hair blowing in the breeze. She was holding it, blonde ends twisted in her grip as she sat at the edge of the tide, in the very place Rani had been sitting the night before.

  Rani could see the lightening, could feel it rippling up from the sand. She felt the quilt her mother had made slipping over her shoulders, the smell of rosewood faint beneath the first dank breaths of rain. She hadn’t heard Jax’s voice. She hadn’t even known he was there until she heard the rain, pouring over them in a rush, large drops sending up tiny flutters of sand, and she realized she hadn’t felt a thing.

  She’d looked up and seen his eyes, wide and pouring over her, and in that second, for just that one second she’d wanted to drown in them. But then she blinked. She blinked and she remembered everything. Again and again.

  She could feel Jax’s arms, hovering there inches from her, the collar of his shirt fluttering by her mouth as he tried to shield her and keep his distance at the same time. She’d watched the rain carve down his skin, settling in the soft line between his lips.

  They parted and she felt his words brush across her skin. I’m going to make things right. That’s when she’d reached for him, her arms finding that familiar tuft of his shirt, hands curling behind his neck, and suddenly it wasn’t raining anymore. Suddenly she couldn’t remember if it had been at all.

  When Rani heard that faint knock, brass handle quaking beneath someone’s grip, she didn’t bury herself again. She didn’t shudder. She opened the door, sheet pulled over her shoulders, and there was Breezy. Both of her hands were clutching a glass of orange juice, her top lip sinking where a tooth should have been as it curled into a smile.

  “You lost a tooth,” Rani said, the words catching and raw.

  Breezy nodded. Then she pulled out an American quarter from the small pocket of her jeans and pressed it to her lips.

  “And who gave you that?”

  “Franco is the tooth fairy,” she said.

  Nadia appeared at the top of the stairs, one hand curling over Breezy’s shoulder.

  “Ar
e you…do you need something?” She took a step closer.

  “I’m,” Rani started. “I think I want to take a bath.”

  “Of course. You can use the one in my room,” Nadia said, leading Rani to what seemed to be the master bedroom.

  It was mostly empty like the rest of the rooms. But there was a large four poster bed and a low dresser, a few of the open drawers already full of Nadia’s things—new ones Rani didn’t recognize among the clothes and cassette tapes Jax had salvaged from that dumpster by the beach.

  The bathroom was more than half the size of the room Rani was staying in. The cold tile floor looked like stone and it climbed the walls disappearing beneath the ornate crown molding that ran along the ceiling. There was a large shower with frosted glass doors and a deep tub that sunk into the floor next to a window that revealed almost the entire stretch of beach. Rani stepped to the glass, her fingertips leaving small translucent smudges as she watched the girl still frozen near the waterline.

  Nadia pulled a bottle of shampoo and a bar of soap from one of the cabinets above the his-and-hers sinks. She handed Rani one of those cloth sponges that rich people use, still in the clear mesh packaging and laid a towel out for her across the closed toilet seat.

  “There’s an extra toothbrush and bottle of toothpaste in the second drawer to the left and if you want to borrow another set of clothes they’re in the closet just on the other side of the shower.”

  Nadia bent over the tub and got the hot water running.

  “I can do it,” Rani said, her voice more biting than she’d meant. “I mean, thank you. Really, I can do it.”

  Nadia stepped aside, still examining her sister’s face in the mirror, eyes flitting across every inch of her skin before settling on her face, on her right eye, the lid still dark and swollen. Rani felt her watching, could feel her reaching, and as Nadia slipped an arm over her sister’s bare shoulder, Rani grew still and let her.