by Ee, Susan
“Financial district.” He knows the area well enough to identify the city’s districts. I briefly wonder how but let it go. I suspect he’s been around a lot longer than I have to explore the world.
“I think the freeway goes through that, or at least near it. That's assuming that the road is clear that far, which I doubt.”
“There is order near the aerie. The roads should be clear.”
I throw him a sharp look. “What do you mean, order?”
“There will be guards at the road near the aerie. Before we get there, we'll need to prepare.”
“Prepare? How?”
“I found something for you to change into at the last house. And I'll need to change my appearance too. Leave the details to me. Getting past the guards will be the easy part.”
“Great. Then what?”
“Then it's time to party at the aerie.”
“You're just full of information, aren't you? I won't go unless I know what I'm getting into.”
“Then don't go.” His tone is not ungentle, but the meaning is clear.
I grip the steering wheel so hard, I'm surprised it doesn't crumple.
It's no secret that we're only temporary allies. Neither of us is pretending that this is a lasting partnership. I help him get home with his wings, he helps me find my sister. After that I'll be on my own. I know this. I've never for a moment forgotten about it.
But after only a couple of days of having someone watch my back, the thought of being on my own again feels...lonely.
I clip the open door of a truck.
“I thought you said you could drive this thing.”
I realize I've been pressing on the accelerator. We're weaving drunkenly at 40 miles per hour. I pull it back down to 20 and force my fingers to relax.
“Leave the driving to me, and I'll leave the planning to you.” I still have to take a calming breath as I say this. I've been mad at my dad all this time for leaving me to make all the hard decisions. But now that Raffe is taking the lead and insisting on me following him blind, it churns my stomach.
We see some ragged people along the side of the road here and there, but not a lot. They scurry away as soon as they see our car. The way they stare, the way they hide, the way their furtive, dirty faces peer at us with burning curiosity brings to mind the hated word: monkey. This is what the angels have turned us into.
As we get closer to the city, we see more people. The path on the road is less labyrinthine.
Eventually, the road is mostly cleared of cars, although not of people. Everyone still looks at the car, but there's less interest, as though a car moving on the roads is something they see regularly. The closer we get to the city, the more people there are walking on the road. They look around warily at every sound and motion, but they're out in the open.
Once we enter the city proper, the damage is everywhere. San Francisco got pummeled along with a lot of other cities. It looks like a smoldering, post-apocalyptic, melting nightmare out of some Hollywood blockbuster.
Coming into the city, I catch glimpses of the Bay Bridge. It looks like a dashed line across the water with a few crucial chunks missing from the middle. I’ve seen photos of the city after the great quake of 1906. The devastation was staggering, and I’d always found it hard to imagine what that must have been like.
I don’t have to imagine anymore.
Entire blocks are charred rubble. The initial meteor showers, quakes and tsunamis only caused part of the damage. San Francisco was a city that had rows and rows of houses and buildings built so close together you couldn’t fit a piece of paper between the buildings. Gas pipes burst and caused fires that raged unchecked. The sky was choked with blood-tinged smoke for days.
Now, all that’s left are the skeletons of skyscrapers, an occasional brick church still standing, lots of pillars holding up nothing.
A sign proclaims that Life is G_od. It’s hard to tell what product the sign was selling because the sign is singed all around those words as well as on the missing letter. I assume the sign used to say Life is Good. The gutted building behind it looks melted, as if still suffering the effects of a fire that just won’t stop, even now under an alien blue sky.
“How is this possible?” I don't even realize I say it aloud until I hear my voice choked with tears. “How could you do this?”
My question sounds personal and maybe it is. For all I know, he could have been personally responsible for the ruin around me.
Raffe stays quiet for the rest of the drive.
In the middle of this charnel, a few blocks of the financial district stand tall and shiny in the sun. It looks almost completely undamaged. To my utter amazement, there is a makeshift camp in the area of the city that used to be South of Market, just outside the undamaged portion of the financial district.
I weave around another car, assuming it is dead, until it suddenly lurches in front of me. I slam on the brakes. The other driver gives me a dirty look as he drives past me. He looks about ten years old, barely tall enough to see over the dashboard.
The camp is more of a shanty town, the kind we used to see on the news where refugees flocked by the thousands after a disaster. The people—although they aren't eating each other as far as I can tell—look hungry and desperate. They touch the car windows like we have hidden riches in here that we could share with them.
“Pull over there.” Raffe points to an area where a pile of cars are stacked and spilling onto what used to be a parking lot. I drive the car there and park. “Turn off the engine. Lock the doors and stay vigilant until they forget about us.”
“They're going to forget about us?” I ask, watching a couple of street guys climb onto our hood. They make themselves at home on the warmth of our car.
“Lots of people sleep in their cars. They probably won't make a move until they think we're asleep.”
“We're sleeping in here?” The last thing I feel like doing with all this adrenaline rushing through my veins is sleep under glass surrounded by desperate people.
“No. We're changing in here.”
He reaches to the back seat and grabs his pack. He pulls out a scarlet party dress. It’s so small that at first, I think it’s a scarf. It's the kind of shapely and tiny dress that I once borrowed from my friend Lisa when she talked me into going clubbing with her. She had fake IDs for both of us, and it would have been a fun night except that she got drunk and went home with some college guy, leaving me to find my way home on my own.
“What's this for?” Somehow, I don't think he has clubbing in mind.
“Put it on. Look as good as you can. It’s our ticket in.” Maybe he did have clubbing in mind.
“You’re not going to go home with some drunken college girl, are you?”
“What?”
“Never mind.” I take the skimpy bit of fabric, along with the skimpy matching shoes and to my surprise, a pair of silky pantyhose. Whatever Raffe doesn’t know about humans, women’s clothing isn’t one of them. I shoot him a piercing look, wondering where he learned his expertise on the topic. He returns my glance with a cool look of his own, telling me nothing.
There’s no private place to change away from the prying eyes of the homeless guys on our hood. Funny I still think of men like that as homeless even though none of us have homes anymore. They were probably South of Market hipsters back in the day. The day being only a couple of months ago.
Luckily, every girl knows how to change in public. I pull the dress over my head and under my sweatshirt. I pull my arms out from the sweatshirt’s sleeves and wiggle into the dress using my sweatshirt as a personal curtain. Then I pull it down to my thighs, and then take off my boots and jeans.
The hem doesn’t go as far down as I’d like, and I keep tugging it to make myself more modest. Too much of my thigh is showing, and the last place I want this kind of attention is where I’m surrounded by lawless men under desperate conditions.
When I look at Raffe with anxiety in my eyes, he says, “I
t’s the only way.” I can tell he doesn’t like it either.
I don’t want to take off my sweatshirt because I can feel the skimpiness of the dress. At a party in a civilized world, I might be comfortable in it. Might even be excited at how cute it is, although I have no idea if it’s cute or not since I can’t see myself. I can tell, however, that it might be a size too small for me because it’s tight. I’m not sure if it’s meant to be this tight, but it only adds to the sensation of being naked in front of savages.
Raffe has no qualms about stripping in front of strangers. He pulls off his t-shirt and slides out of his cargo pants to button on a white dress shirt and black dress slacks. More than anything, it’s the feeling of being watched myself that keeps me from blatantly watching him. I have no brothers, and I’ve never seen a guy strip before. It’s only natural to have the impulse to watch, isn’t it?
Instead of looking at him, I look forlornly at the strappy slippers. They’re the same shade of scarlet as the dress, as though the previous owner had one custom made to match the other. The high, thin heels are made for accentuating legs while sitting cross-legged. “I can’t run in these.”
“You won’t have to if things go according to plan.”
“Great. Because things always go according to plan.”
“If things go awry, running won’t help you anyway.”
“Yeah, well, I can’t fight in these either.”
“I brought you here. I’ll protect you.”
I’m tempted to remind him that I’m the one who dragged him off the street like road kill. “Is this really the only way?”
“Yes.”
I sigh. I slip into the strappy, useless sandals and hope I don’t break an ankle trying to walk in them. I take off the sweatshirt and flip down the car’s visor to access the mirror. The dress is as tight as I’d guessed, but it looks better on me than I’d thought.
My hair and face, however, look like they’d be more at home in a ratty bathrobe. I rake my hand through my hair. It’s greasy and matted. My lips are chapped and flaking, and my cheeks are sunburnt. My jaw is a splash of mango colors from the bruise Boden gave me during our fight. At least the frozen peas had kept the swelling down.
“Here,” he says, opening his pack. “I didn’t know what you’d need so I just grabbed some things from the bathroom cabinet.” He takes out a men’s tuxedo jacket from his pack before handing the pack over to me.
I watch him staring down at the jacket, wondering what he’s thinking that makes him look so somber. Then I turn to dig into the pack.
I find a comb to run through my hair. My hair is so greasy that it’s actually easier to style, although I’m not fond of the look. There is also some lotion that I rub onto my face, lips, hands, and legs. I want to peel the flakes of skin off my lips, but I know from experience that doing that will make them bleed, so I leave it alone.
I smooth on lipstick and mascara. The lipstick is a neon pink, and the mascara is blue. Not my usual colors, but combined with the tight dress, it sure makes me look slutty, which I figure is exactly the look we’re going for. There’s no eye shadow so I just smear a tiny bit of the mascara around my eyes for that extra sultry emphasis. I take some foundation and smear it over my jaw. It’s tender and the parts that need the makeup the most are the parts that are the most sensitive. This better be worth it.
When I finish, I notice that the guys on the hood are watching me put on my makeup. I look over at Raffe. He is busy rigging some sort of contraption involving his pack, wings, and some straps.
“What are you doing?”
“Making a—.” He looks up and sees me.
I don’t know if he noticed when I took my sweatshirt off, but I’m guessing he was busy at that time because he looks at me with surprise. His pupils dilate when he sees me. His lips part, momentarily forgetting to marshal his expression, and I could swear he stops breathing for several heartbeats.
“I’m making it look like I have wings on my back,” he says quietly. His words come out husky and velvety as if he’s saying something personal. As if he’s giving me a caressing compliment.
I bite my lip to focus on the fact that he’s actually just giving me a plain answer to my question. He can’t help it if his voice is mesmerizingly sexy.
“I can’t go where I need to go if they think I’m human.” He drops his gaze and cinches a strap around the base of one of his wings.
He puts the empty pack with the wings strapped to it onto his back. “Help me get the jacket on.”
He has sliced the back of the jacket with parallel slashes to let the wings peek through.
Right. The jacket. The wings. “Should the wings be outside?” I ask.
“No, just make sure the straps and pack are covered.”
The wings look securely strapped to the pack. I gently arrange the contraption so that the outside feathers cover the straps. The feathers still feel vibrant and alive, although they seem a bit wilted compared to the way they were when I first touched them a couple of days ago. I resist the urge to stroke the feathers even though he won’t be able to feel it.
The wings lie molded to the empty backpack the way they would mold to his back. For such an enormous wingspan, it’s amazing how tightly they compress to his body when they're folded. I once saw a seven-foot down sleeping bag get compacted into a small cube and it wasn’t as impressive a change in volume as this.
I drape the jacket material between and on either side of the wings. The snowy wings peek out in two strips through the slits in the dark material with no sign of the pack and straps. The jacket is big enough that he only looks a little bulky. Not enough to bring attention to itself unless someone is very familiar with Raffe’s form.
He leans forward so he doesn’t crush his wings with the back of the seat.
“How does it look?” His beautifully wide shoulders and clean line of his back are now accented by the wings. Around his neck is a silver bowtie shot playfully with curls of red that match my dress. It also matches his cummerbund around his waist. Aside from a little smudge of dirt on his jaw, he looks like he just walked out of a Hollywood magazine.
The shape of his back looks about right for a jacket that’s not perfectly tailored for wings. I have a flash of the magnificence of his snowy wings spreading out behind him as he stood to face his enemies on top of that car the first time I saw him. I feel a little of what his loss must mean to him.
I nod. “It looks good. You look right.”
His eyes look up into mine. In them, I catch a hint of gratitude, a hint of loss, a hint of worry.
“Not that…you didn’t look right before. I mean, you always look…magnificent.” Magnificent? I almost roll my eyes. What a dope. I don’t know why I said that. I clear my throat. “Can we go already?”
He nods. He hides the teasing smile but I can see it in his eyes.
“Drive past that crowd and up to the checkpoint.” He points to our left, where it looks like a crowded, free-for-all market. “When the guards stop you, tell them you want to go to the aerie. Tell them you heard they sometimes let in women.”
He climbs into the back seat and crouches in the shadows. He pulls the old blanket over himself, the one that used to wrap his wings.
“I’m not here,” he says.
“So…explain to me again why you’re hiding instead of just walking through the gate with me?”
“Angels don’t walk through the checkpoint. They fly directly to the aerie.”
“Can’t you just tell them you’re injured?”
“You’re like a little girl demanding answers to questions during a covert operation. Why is the sky blue, daddy? Can I ask that man with the machine gun where the bathroom is? If you don’t stay quiet, I’m going to have to dump you. You need to do what I tell you, when I tell you, no questions or hesitation about it. If you don’t like it, find someone else to pester into helping you.”
“Okay, okay. I got it. Geez, some people are so grouchy.”
<
br /> I start the engine and inch out of our parking spot. The homeless guys grumble, and one of them bangs the hood with his fist as he slides off.
CHAPTER 27
I drive through the crowd on Montgomery St. at a speed that’s maybe half of what I could do on foot. People get out of the way, but reluctantly, and only after giving me assessing looks. I check the doors again to make sure they’re locked. Not that the locks would stop anyone should they choose to break the windows.
Luckily, we are not the only ones in a car here. There’s a small line of cars waiting at the checkpoint, surrounded by a mass of people on foot. Apparently, they are all waiting to cross the checkpoint. I go as far as I can and stop at the end of the line of cars.
There is an unusually large percentage of women waiting to cross the checkpoint. They are clean and dressed as though going to a party. Women stand in high heels and silk dresses among the ragged men, and everyone behaves as though that’s normal.
The checkpoint is a breach in a tall chain-link fence that blocks the streets around the financial district. With what’s left of the district, it wouldn’t be too hard to permanently fence it off. But this is one of those temporary fences made of self-standing panels. The panels are connected together to make a fence, but it’s not embedded into the asphalt.
It wouldn’t take much for a crowd to push it over and just walk on top of it. Yet the crowd respects the boundary as though it’s electrified.
Then I see that it is, in a way.
Humans patrol the fence from the other side and poke a metal rod through whenever they see someone getting too close. When someone is poked, there’s a zap sound along with a blue spark of electricity. They’re using some kind of cattle prod to keep people away. All of the prodders except one are grim-faced men who show no emotion as they patrol and occasionally prod.
The female prodder is my mother.
I bang my head against the steering wheel when I see her. It doesn’t make me feel any better.
“What’s wrong?” Raffe asks.