“I can’t share your religion then. Whatever.” I was too tired to argue.
“I dislike religion, Gemma. Religion does a lot of damage to people. It takes what should be the simplest, purest expression of God’s love, something even a child can understand, and replaces it with some kind of formula—a complex and impossible set of rules and behaviors—when it is really about God’s gift of grace and his power to transform us.”
I tried to huff, but came out more like a sniff. “God’s power to . . . transform? That’s exactly my point. Aunt Lucy took us to church for years. It never helped the one person who needed such a thing.”
He looked puzzled. “Who are you talking about?”
I waved my free hand—not that he saw me do so. “Genie, of course. My sister is messed up, Zander. Sick. You only met her once and yet somehow you noticed it. She’s, um, very good at hiding what she is. If anyone needs ‘transformation’ as you call it, it’s her. We went to church for years. It never helped her one bit.”
Zander’s lips pursed and he rubbed them with his other hand. I got the sense he was trying to frame or word something complicated. Turns out, it wasn’t so complex—he was trying to say something difficult to hear.
Difficult for me to hear.
“Gemma, you are as much in need of God’s grace and forgiveness as Genie is.”
I was stunned. And hurt. “Why would you say such a thing to me?”
His gray eyes were direct. “Because it’s true, Gemma. You aren’t perfect. Maybe you aren’t as ‘messed up’ as Genie? Maybe not as messed up as I was. But you’re still messed up.”
“That’s ridiculous. I—” I frowned and bit my lip.
He took a deep breath. “Look. God knows how messed up we—all of us—are, so there’s no sense in trying to deny it. We can’t hide the truth from him, because he sees everything. We are actually hiding the truth from ourselves, not from him.”
I disagreed. I shook my head.
But he couldn’t see me and continued, “Our ‘mess’ is what the Bible calls sin. It includes the things we know are wrong but do anyway, the things we aren’t proud of but that we excuse, that we laugh off or brush aside with an insincere, nobody’s perfect or I shouldn’t have done that—but oh, well.”
I had a sudden, vivid recollection of the many things I’d excused lately . . . and not so lately. I was perturbed by how many things.
Zander wasn’t finished. “The worst kind of sin, though, is more insidious. It hides inside of our comparisons of ourselves to others. It says, ‘I’m not as bad as her,’ or ‘He’s really a bad person but I’m nothing like that—so I must be all right.’
“It’s the sin of hubris, Gemma, the sin of pride and its close cousin, presumption. Presumption justifies our actions when we rank another person as beneath or below us. Presumption tells us that it’s okay to talk down to a weaker individual or to treat them badly based on our own sense of superiority; pride allows us to denigrate another human being—someone made in the very image of God—for their weaknesses and flaws.”
He looked at me, his words more pointed. “When we presume, we excuse bad behavior and even rationalize our taking the law into our own hands. Hubris blinds us, Gemma. We don’t see our own faults because we’re too busy finding the faults of others.”
Ouch.
“But the church let us down, Zander. Let me down. Everyone believed Genie’s lies, believed what she said about me, all those things she did and blamed on me! Do you know how many times I was punished for what she did?” My voice sounded shrill, even to me.
Zander’s eyes grew sadder, the tiny lines around them more pronounced. “I’m so sorry, Gemma. So very sorry. The church is full of imperfect people just like us. I’m sorry they failed and hurt you. If they knew the truth, they would be appalled at what they’d done. But blaming them doesn’t fix your problem, does it?”
“My problem?”
“Don’t you also have flaws and blind spots?”
I was silent. He was kind but persistent.
“Come on, Gemma. Have you never failed anyone? Have you never hurt or . . . betrayed anyone? Those offenses and failures must be paid for, and you can’t do that. Only Jesus can do that. You need him.”
He looked down. “Gemma, you are braver than you think you are. You have overcome so much! But until you admit that you need to be rescued as much as Genie does, you will remain far from God, and far from what you desire the most.”
Before I could reply he asked, “Look at me, Gemma.” He traced up my arm until he reached my shoulder and ran his fingers up my neck and my cheek until he touched my eyes. He fixed his gaze where his fingers rested.
I stared at him. He stared back. “Don’t shut out the God who made you, Gemma. He has a plan for you. I’m not saying everything that happens is his plan. I’m saying if you seek him, you’ll find him. And if you find him, he will work even this,” he ran his hand back down my arm—my invisible arm—and rubbed it gently, “for good. According to his will. I trust him. And I’m willing to wait for him to reveal his will.”
We didn’t say anything more for a long while, lost as we were in our own thoughts. Zander held my hand and I was glad that he did, in spite of the insurmountable gulf between us. The sun was sinking when he broke the brooding silence.
“Are you certain this Cushing woman is coming for you?”
I was not thinking just then about Cushing, but about Zander. Through my entire recitation—as I had explained about Dr. Bickel and the nanomites and what they had done to me—he hadn’t once expressed doubt. Astonishment, yes, even incredulity, but not doubt in me as I presented the facts. He had asked for details but he had not called my integrity (or sanity) into question. Even now, he accepted at face value the threat I told him Cushing represented. He was merely asking for clarification.
“Yes, I’m certain. The clerk at REI will remember me. We had a nice conversation about her year abroad. It won’t take Cushing’s people long to show the girl a picture of me. And Cushing knows me; she’s the one who had me fired. Yes. She will come.”
“What will you do?” It was then that I heard the pain in his voice and saw it in his eyes.
“I have to leave. Tonight. I have . . . somewhere in mind, a safe place,” I whispered. “I’m weak, though, and before I leave I have stuff to do. Right now. Will you help me?”
“Anything,” was his instant response.
“Afterward, I need to talk to Abe.”
“Does he know?”
“No. I’m glad you’ll be with me when I tell him. Show him.”
At my direction, Zander burned my notebook and the marked-up copy of Memoirs of an Invisible Man in the fireplace. He doused them with some charcoal lighter fluid before he put a match to them. We watched, mesmerized, as the flames licked at the books and reduced them to pages of ash and a lone, crusted metal spiral.
When the fire had completed its work, Zander pressed his lips together. He took up the poker and beat the pages until they were dust. “So Cushing can’t reconstitute anything,” he said through tight lips.
“Thank you.”
I grabbed the cell phone Dr. Bickel had given me. Zander helped me don the filled rucksack and shopping bags. In my weakened condition, my burdens might as well have been bags of bricks.
Zander stood back to view the results. My baggage stuck out from the rest of me, bulgy, awkward, and parts of the bags were visible upon my invisible body as the mites scrambled to cover them.
“This is kinda weird looking, y’know?” he cracked, but his gray eyes swam with worry. “Don’t you want me to carry something?”
“No, thank you. Watch this.” I pulled my uncle’s old shirt over my head.
He watched the shirt settle about my shoulders and cover the bags. Watched the quick flash of shimmer as the mites made the shirt and all under it as undetectable as I was.
He gaped. “Um, whoa. I mean wow. That’s crazy.”
“Yeah. Tell me
about it.”
“Are you ready?” he asked.
“One sec,” I replied. I picked up the laptop and stuffed it under the shirt where it, too, disappeared. I crossed my arms across it and held it tight.
“Nice trick,” he mumbled.
“I can’t leave it here.”
He nodded his understanding.
“Can you walk with me to see Abe?” I needed to talk to my friend, beg him to take Emilio, but it would require more exhausting hours of explaining and answering questions.
We crossed the cul-de-sac together, Zander with his hands in the front pockets of his jeans and me with one unseen hand leaning on his shoulder for support. As we reached the other side, Abe came out to greet Zander.
When we were close enough, Zander said quietly, “Hey, Abe. Can we go inside?”
“Sure, sure. You see our girl yet?”
“Uh, not exactly.”
I had to smile a little.
While Abe was putting coffee on, I snuck into his guest room and unloaded my “burdens.” I came out as Zander was, awkwardly, trying to prepare Abe for my revelation. He was working hard to gently break it to Abe—but how do you “gently break” something like this? He was making a hash of it and confusing Abe instead.
I stood in the hallway and said his name. “Abe.”
Abe looked for me then jumped up and backed away. It took a while to explain things, took him touching me, my face, my arms, my hands. Took many an earnest, “Dear Lord in heaven” and “Bless God, I don’t know about this. I just don’t know, Gemma,” before he settled.
The nanomites? I heard not a click or hum from them during my conversation with Abe. Had they given up trying to break me to their will? Did they now trust me, trust my judgment? I didn’t know the answer, but I was grateful for the silence. I could not withstand another battle with them.
I had known my “condition” would be a lot for my old friend to take in. It was. I had known my request concerning Emilio would be harder. It was.
“Emilio knows all of this?” Abe peered in my direction, still shocked. Not at all comfortable.
“He knows about my situation. Not the why or how.”
“And you want me to take the boy.” Because he couldn’t make eye contact with me, Abe stared at Zander. My old friend looked so tired!
“I can help you, I hope, but from a distance.” It was a feeble offer at best.
Zander grasped Abe’s shoulder. “I’ll help you, Abe. I’ll be Emilio’s big brother. I’ll come get him and run him ragged for you. Take some of the strain off your grocery bill—’cause let me tell you, that kid can eat.”
We shared a nervous laugh.
“And you think CYFD will just hand him over to me?” Abe demanded. “Just like that? What about Mateo? What do you think he’s goin’ to say about it?”
Zander spoke up again. “I’ll tell CYFD what I’ve seen—Emilio sleeping in the bushes, Mateo slapping and kicking him. Your testimony and mine should get the boy removed from Mateo’s care. And you let me handle Mateo. I can deal with him.”
I’d seen Zander and Mateo facing off. I believed Zander—as long as Dead Eyes didn’t get involved. I didn’t want Zander anywhere near that man.
“Besides, Abe,” Zander added, “We’ll pray on it. God will make a way.”
I wasn’t sure about that.
Abe asked, “Well, and I suppose you want me to keep that charming cat of yours for you, too?”
I cringed. I’d forgotten about Jake! “He was Aunt Lu’s cat. I—” I couldn’t finish. I kept remembering how he’d howled and mourned for her when she died.
“Don’t you worry about His Ugliness. I’ll take care of him. For Lu.”
Gratitude brought me to tears. “Thank you.” It was all I could offer.
I had been answering Abe and Zander’s questions for an hour when we heard a light tap on the front door. It was late evening now. Abe and Zander looked at each other. Abe hobbled to the door but did not turn on the porch light. Zander switched off the lights in the living room. Then he and I stood behind the door as Abe cracked it open.
Emilio hunched in the dark shadows of the covered porch. “Lookit,” was all he said. He pointed. We joined Abe in the door and stared.
At least five vehicles with darkened headlights halted around the cul-de-sac. At a signal, armed men and women raced toward my little house. Abe closed the door behind us, and we huddled in the shadows with Emilio. Without speaking, we watched Cushing’s people break through the doors to my home. I’d been expecting it, but I was still horrified.
Abe shifted his weight from foot to foot, fretful and apprehensive. “Dear Jesus! O Lord!” he prayed over and over.
Emilio came near me and felt around until he found my arm. He slid his hand into mine and squeezed it. I squeezed his back.
“Them the bad people you talked ’bout?”
“Yes.”
“We won’t let ’em git you.”
“No,” Zander agreed. “We won’t.”
More tears clogged my throat.
Two trucks with banks of spotlights in their beds arrived. A generator’s motor cranked up and the spotlights snapped on. The lights lit up the cul-de-sac like a night game at Isotopes Park, home of Albuquerque’s minor league baseball team.
A single vehicle rolled to a stop in the middle of the cul-de-sac and Cushing herself emerged from the back seat. Men and women jerked to attention as she passed by. When I spied her, marching toward my driveway, I realized I had been holding my breath. It whooshed out.
“That’s her,” I whispered.
In a way, I was relieved that I hadn’t been wrong about Cushing coming for me. Relieved that I hadn’t overestimated her or how swiftly she would act. I wouldn’t doubt myself in the future when it came to her.
At that moment I was giddy with relief that Zander had parked in front of Abe’s house instead of mine—and I was just as thankful that I had carried my laptop and shopping bags on my person when we came over. If I had left them in my house? The prospect was too sickening to consider.
And I wondered what my neighbors were thinking. When the police had arrested Mateo, the residents of the cul-de-sac gathered openly on the sidewalk to watch and speculate amongst themselves. Not so this time. No, like the four of us cautiously observing from the shadows of Abe’s porch, my neighbors were also being careful. Something about Cushing’s team did that, made you want to keep well back—out of the way and out of their notice.
Mrs. Calderón peered from the safety of her living room window. The Tuckers stayed on their porch. The Floreses were out of town, but Mateo, arms folded defiantly, stood on his porch, too.
No, not you, Mateo. Not this time anyway. I scowled as I watched him through narrowed eyes.
“Will they come around to us, asking questions about Gemma?” Abe sounded concerned.
“Listen,” Zander hissed to all of us. “If they do come around, we don’t need to lie. They will ask if we’ve seen her. We can tell them the truth: that we haven’t seen her, right?”
“Well, you haven’t,” I grumbled.
Abe shook his head and snorted, but Emilio giggled.
About then a sleek rental car glided around the curve past Abe’s house. A silver-blue Lexus. I felt like I’d been punched in the gut.
Genie. Belicia Calderón had, no doubt, called her as soon as Cushing’s people approached my house.
An agent waved Genie off. Then, as he got a good look at her through the window, he shouted and pulled his firearm. He held it on her and yelled for her to get out of the car and get on the ground.
I laughed into my hand. “Oh, wow! They think Genie is me.”
Tough luck, Genie!
A raft of agents surrounded Genie now. They forced her to kneel on the rough asphalt and put her hands behind her head. Even from a distance I could see her—feel her—pulsing with frustrated rage.
The agents rifled through her purse and pulled her ID. One of them handed it
to Cushing. She studied it and then gestured the circle of agents away. She nodded for Genie to get up. Genie harrumphed, lowered her hands, and got up from her knees.
“I have to hear what she tells Cushing,” I told Abe and Zander.
“Are you strong enough?” Zander asked. He peeled Emilio off me and hugged him to his side.
I shrugged. “Yes.”
I have to be.
I whispered to the nanomites as I stepped from the porch. “Nano. I’m going near Cushing to listen in.” I paused at the bottom of the steps. “No tricks from you. I can barely stand as it is, so be quiet and play nice so I can hear what they say without getting caught.”
The mites were silent. I heard nothing from them as I came from behind Genie. I positioned myself a few feet off her shoulder so I could watch her and Cushing at the same time.
“. . . And you’re Gemma Keyes’ sister?”
“Yes. We’re twins. I’ve already told you that.” Genie sniffed. She eyed Shark Face and was not impressed.
Cushing’s black eyes bored in on Genie. “You live in Virginia, yet you are here. Why is that?”
“It’s a free country. I visit my sister once in a while. What of it?”
Cushing didn’t appreciate Genie’s attitude. For once I did.
“Miss Keyes, we are investigating an incident of national security. A serious incident.”
I told you! Didn’t I? Didn’t I tell you she’d dress it up as “national security”? My fingernails dug into the palms of my hands. I had to bite my lip to keep quiet.
“I would think you would be more concerned about your sister’s involvement in such a situation,” Cushing added.
Genie smirked. “Whatever my sister’s involvement in your ‘serious national security incident’ might be, I can guarantee that it is minimal—at best. She is not what you’d call the sharpest tool in the shed.”
I was not too tired to slap her!
Cushing’s face gave nothing away as she studied Genie. “I see. Yes, I believe Gemma likes to give that impression, Miss Keyes. However, I’ve become convinced that she is, ah, sharper than you credit her.”
Genie looked as though she didn’t want to believe the general, but Cushing’s unwavering gaze gave her pause. “Hmm. So you say.”
Stealthy Steps Page 34