A Mound Over Hell

by Gary Morgenstein

  “He’s fine.” Pablo paused, waiting for the waitress to leave with Zelda’s vodka order. “I know Puppy told you.”

  “What?’ Her eyes widened innocently.

  “Please. He can’t keep a secret.”

  “We’re not supposed to keep secrets from each other, Pab.”

  “Except this one.” Pablo glanced around uneasily.

  “Course. So what’s the next step?”

  “Forget you knowing about it.”

  “Okay. Okay.” Zelda munched on a breadstick. “Anything else we should forget?”

  Pablo broke off a piece of bread, pulling out the inside dough. “You’re the one who left in the middle of the night.”

  “I like my own bed.”

  He sighed slowly. “We just skip over it then?”

  “You’re like my brother.”

  Pablo cringed in horror. “Which is expressly forbidden. Incest is a capital offense…”

  Zelda squeezed his wrist. “I had a weak moment.”

  “Thanks. I’m like a comfy pillow?”

  “Yeah.” She squeezed tighter. “I felt bad about myself, honey. My fat butt. My life.”

  “So screw around with Pablo and get through the night.”

  “Yes. That so wrong?”

  The waitress brought Zelda’s vodka, which Pablo sipped.

  “Pab?” She nudged him.

  “How I felt clearly doesn’t matter.”

  “I’m here to listen…”

  “Let’s just forget about it.”

  “Sure. Emotional suppression is much healthier.”

  “It’s not like it hasn’t happened before.”

  Zelda held up three fingers; he yanked down her hand.

  “I can’t do things like that anymore, Zelda,” he said. “All my emotions need to be focused if, you know, it happens.”

  “The thing I don’t know.”

  “Yes. If we were exploring a union, that’s different. But a one-night stand.” He shook his head, slightly horrified.

  Zelda blushed. “That’ll teach you to get aboard the Zelda Jones slut-a-rama. Sorry I seduced you.”

  Her voice carried to another table. Zelda stuck out her tongue at the customers.

  Pablo took her hand. “You’re not a slut. Passion thinks, sometimes wrongly,” he quoted Grandma’s Twelfth Insight.

  “Where would we be without Grandma in awkward moments like this?”

  Pablo paused. “We can’t ever do this again, Zel. It’s too much for me.”

  “Same here.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really, Pablo. I have feelings…”

  “I didn’t say you didn’t.”

  Zelda looked off. “We did something dumb, we won’t do it again and we’re sorry. How does that sound?”

  “Perfect. And I did enjoy myself.”

  “I’m a good lay. All the boys and girls say so.”

  “Yes you are.” He frowned. “And I’m not?”

  “That’s a very egocentric thing for a Cousin Candidate to worry about.” Zelda opened a menu. “You’re paying, right? Because I’m really really hungry.”

  Pablo ordered a Bloody Mary.

  • • • •

  UNLIKE BOCCICELLI, AT least Fisher would let Puppy sit in his office, where he had the option of bruising his lower back and thighs in the medieval furniture. Boccicelli made no pretense at any hospitality. He’d nodded reluctantly when Fisher had sat carefully on the edge of the thick, black leather couch. But the Hawks owner was in a meticulous suit. He looked washed and cleaned.

  The Falcons owner was less overjoyed when Puppy planted the butt of his faded jeans on that expensive leather chair and leaned back, wrinkled shirt and all, with a soulful, pleased expression.

  “I don’t have much time.” Boccicelli looked like a mad baker had glued together different doughs. Even his eyes were pasty.

  “Neither do I,” Fisher chimed in.

  “Good thing I talk fast.”

  They didn’t respond to his charming smile.

  “I have a great idea to make this last baseball season memorable.”

  “Who cares?” Boccicelli asked.

  “Who cares is right,” Fisher added.

  Puppy paused to allow his deep concern for their welfare to blanket his face. ““I’m just trying to keep you from qualifying for special assistance from the Sports Commission.”

  Fisher’s eyes glazed in alarm. “What’re you talking about?”

  “If attendance continues under ten people a game, the business will be considered a failure.”

  Boccicelli glared. “I never heard of that.”

  “When’s the last time you read the major league baseball by-laws as amended by the Closure and Demolition Act of 2065?”

  Boccicelli dreary eyes said never, but he stiffened gamely. “Not for a while. And you have?”

  He tapped his chest. “Baseball historian.”

  “He is,” Fisher agreed.

  “Despite the destruction of all the major league ballparks, Amazon Stadium will continue to be run as a business as well as a shrine to remember treason,” Puppy carelessly tossed out the pertinent clause.

  “The Cousins know this is a failure. That’s why we’re shutting down.” Boccicelli was proud of his mental acuity.

  “Yes,” murmured Fisher like a drum keeping tempo.

  “Failure doesn’t mean giving up. If you make an effort, that’d be noticed. Failure opens up many doors. I was a DV.”

  Boccicelli paled. “This isn’t a DV scenario. That much I know.”

  “Are you sure?” Fisher whispered. Boccicelli slapped his clammy hand away.

  “Who knows?” Puppy shrugged at the many enigmas of Grandma’s House. “The laws can be vague. Maybe I’m over-reacting.”

  “I think so,” snickered Boccicelli.

  “Could just be a matter of them freezing any property settlements until it’s decided.”

  “Freezing?”

  “But we’ve paid a lot of money in rent,” whined Fisher. “Tell him, Boccicelli.”

  “Does Grandma reward failure?” Puppy said. “I’m sure your mother taught you that, Mr. Fisher.”

  Fisher thought about the childhood spankings for mispronouncing a word.

  “You were put in this situation by your mother.” Puppy waited for Fisher to lift his head from his lap. “And Mr. Boccicelli, didn’t you inherit the Falcons from your grandfather? Good, decent, law-abiding heirs…”

  “Yes we are,” Boccicelli insisted.

  “Which will be taken into account. But failing to uphold the value of an inherited business is…”Puppy’s voice faded away.

  “What?” Fisher grasped his elbow. Puppy’s sad eyes painted a dire picture that might include more spankings.

  Boccicelli nervously ate a bar of Effie’s Chocolate without offering any. Fisher went straight for Simpy’s South Dakota Single Malt Scotch. They munched and gulped for a few minutes before Boccicelli wiped his smeared face clean like a boxer returning for a painful last round.

  “You mentioned an idea, Nedick,” Boccicelli asked haughtily.

  11

  Every so often, one of the orphans would try crawling under or over the chain-link fence, searching for some way out. The silent sensors went off a good twenty feet before they even approached. A smiling, slightly scolding Parent would wait on the other side, arms crossed, shaking their head. They’d sit the child down on a tree stump suddenly growing out of the ground, subduing the youngster with the magic, and wipe away the tears of a loved friend leaving, the fear they’d never be taken themselves.

  That never happened. All the children from Muslim Europe were wanted eventually.

  Even though Grandma hadn’t arrived, Tomas wolfishly watched the cluster of Cousins gathering on stage for the ceremony. This was the safest place in the country. Twenty stealth ‘copters flew in vectors while creaky old M-3 tanks watched on the adjoining hills. HG flower gardens swept up and over in bucolic
duplicity.

  There was no set timing for a Cousins Adoption. When the children were old enough to learn never to discuss their experiences, they were placed on the Loving List. There was no reward system. There were no good children and bad children, just children who were sometimes good and sometimes bad.

  Tomas never quite got the way a Cousin was selected as a new parent; Grandma had once tried explaining over numerous pots of tea, but the metrics, the emotional/intellectual tests just danced over his bald head. Trust always ruled. That much he got, Tomas thought, rechecking the position of his first platoon as Cheng neared in his small purple car.

  Trust and love.

  Eventually, a Cousin had to have a family, whether their biological own or from someone else. And while a Cousin needed greater skills to lead, they couldn’t lead and not be as one with anyone else. The grand dichotomy ruling all of Grandma’s Family as her Second Insight: How to show and yet be shown.

  As wonderfully as the children were treated in The Camp, they were still children saved from the Allahs. Most of them came from ME orphanages, traded for food. All of them had scars. How long would it take for the scars to show? The trauma of losing parents could be felt in a newborn, much less a two-year-old who watched their father beheaded or their mother raped. Or their father raped and their mother beheaded. Combinations of cruelty tested finity.

  Confidence in the ability of a Reg to handle such a situation could be risky. Even training by the Parents didn’t guarantee success. Nor did being a Cousin. But they were a Cousin for a reason. So the childless couples bonded with the kids in The Camp.

  When the first wave of orphans were rescued just after The Surrender in 2073, some simply didn’t adjust. There were stories of children turning on their new parents, friends, teachers. Acts of violence like the twelve-year-old who chopped up his parents and two sisters while screaming Allahu Akbar wasn’t isolated, if rarely reported, but the whispers spread. Kindness and generosity and loving fell before the fear of a knife in the chest in the middle of the night.

  Some around Grandma even feared the children were plants, brainwashed in the orphanages and sent like ticking time bombs to begin the final Islamic assault by once again poisoning America from within. Remember Los Angeles. Washington. Manhattan.

  Grandma would have none of that. Tomas remembered the angry meeting where she nearly twisted off the head of a Second Cousin who suggested, no, insisted the shipment of orphans must stop. Keep them in The Camp, but forever. A compromise was reached. Orphans would continue, but their existence wouldn’t be publicized. Private routes would be found. Children would be saved, but secretly. Cousins as parents made perfect sense.

  The decoy ‘copter hovered directly over the stage. The several hundred children sitting patiently in their white shirts and purple pants gasped excitedly; some applauded as if at the start of a show. Tomas slid into position as the second decoy prepared to land behind the audience. The children stirred, calling out for Grandma, the adults on the stage grinning knowingly.

  Tomas checked the security positions. All was quiet. These orphans were especially well-behaved. Surviving terror at a young age was a strong teacher. A third ‘copter fluttered along the stage, dipping over the children, who stood and waved happily with more shouts of “we love you, Grandma.”

  He always hated this part. Alone, Grandma bounded out of her tiny car and sat beside a little boy in the back row. She joined in the applause, waving as a fourth ‘copter dashed back and forth. The children slowly recognized her, whispering and nudging while Grandma handed out sweets up and down the aisle like she’d just wandered in, waiting for one of them to tell her what to do.

  Today it would be a dark-haired kid around ten.

  “Grandma’s here!” he sang out.

  “Are we covered?” Tomas voice rose over the din. All points quickly reported. A squirrel would’ve been arrested thirty miles away.

  Grandma lifted the boy into her arms. She was so damn strong, Tomas marveled. Grandma’s face brightened; her smile was a ray of sun captured in a cup, someone once wrote. The children stood as one, as did the adults.

  “Don’t I get a kiss hello?” she asked. The little boy peppered her smooth, light yellow face with wet smooches as the rest of the children surrounded her.

  “Do we have eyes on her?” Tomas barked. North, south, east and west all answered affirmatively. He still pressed forward nervously until he was by her side; Grandma held two new children while at least five others held onto her flowing purple dress. With a cluck of her tongue, she scolded Stilton for intruding.

  Too bad, he thought.

  Grandma climbed easily onto the stage, watched by fifty snipers. As the children returned to their seats, Grandma held up a little girl around four, who squealed in sudden delight. Second Cousin Dana Torryes and her wife Cleo jumped out of their seats; Grandma stepped back, beaming, to allow the new family to get acquainted with hugs and kisses before sitting on a simple wooden stool. She waited until all the chocolate had been distributed to the children.

  “Dome,” Tomas whispered into his comm device.

  The invisible protective cone slid down, the stealth helicopter holding a position directly over Grandma. Only she heard the faint hissing as the dome clicked into place. She hated the Dome. She fired a brief glare his way before concentrating on the children; better a scowl than a missile, Tomas thought grimly.

  “Are we happy for Freja and her new parents Dana and Cleo?”

  The children cheered through their envy. Grandma gently waved them back down with her girlish laugh.

  “Families make us happy. There is nothing more important than love,” she recited her First Insight. “Nothing gives us greater joy. You might think that chocolate is pretty tasty,” this generated some hesitant smiles, “but to feel a mommy and daddy around you, that is what we live for. That is the hardest thing of all.”

  Grandma cleared her throat. Damn, Tomas realized. I forgot the lime water. Damnit, man.

  “All of you are lucky to have escaped to America. All of us are lucky to have you. You have all been through a great deal. I know that. You can cry. Go on. Cry if you want.”

  She waited for the sniffling to stop before continuing in that gentle voice like fluid in the womb. “You are strong. The stronger you are, the stronger will be the Family. But you must leave behind something. For all that you endured in Muslim Europe…”Grandma sat erect until the collective shivers faded. “For all that you endured, for all that they did to you, remember what you cannot keep here. You brought it, as much as if it were an extra finger.” She chuckled at some of the children examining their hands for the additional pinky or thumb.

  “It is hate. Hate is natural for our enemies. They worship hatred. But the strong overcome that. The strong know that hate is like a,” she paused, searching for the simplistic metaphor. “Like a bad cold. Everyone gets infected. No one can say to you, what’s wrong, why don’t you hate? Because you will say. I have hated. And now I am above that.”

  The children squirmed, confused. Grandma smiled. The words were for the Cousins behind her. She felt their unease. So did Tomas, who wasn’t even aware of his hand resting on his .38. His eyes landed on Cheng’s blank face. Too blank, trying to conceal his reaction. Tomas frowned.

  “You’re the vanguard of a new Family, my darlings. Does anyone know what vanguard means?”

  After a puzzled moment, a blond boy raised his hand. “It means in the front of something.”

  “Good, darling. What’s your name?”

  “Dietrich Mueller.”

  “Lovely name, Dietrich. Where are you from?”

  “Berlin.” He paused, grimacing. “It used to be in Germany.”

  Grandma stood.

  “Dome up, up, up,” Tomas hissed. He didn’t want Grandma walking into the wall of the damn cone.

  She stopped at the edge of the stage. Tomas breathed a little easier. “It is still Germany, Dietrich. It will always be Germany. And De
nmark.” She nodded at Freja. “Or Paris. London. Madrid.” Grandma’s voice thundered and, as always, Tomas half-expected lightning to strike.

  “Someday, you will return. As part of this vanguard of ideas. A vanguard that will conquer the world like no other weapon.”

  Grandma’s blazing eyes connected with Tomas’s. His head ached.

  • • • •

  ALL THEY NEEDED were streamers, Cheng grumbled silently, watching the children waving candles at Grandma’s departing ‘copter. Next time fireworks. Oh no, too much old America. Dare not do that. Someone might wave the flag.

  The First Cousin was in a foul mood and Hazel being late only aggravated it. Just being here aggravated him. Needless nonsense, wasteful showmanship. If you had nothing to do all day since someone else was running the damn country, then maybe this was a useful allocation of energy, followed by soaking down in a bio-regen bath and letting your toady shampoo your hair.

  And how the hell did Lenora have her own hair at her age? Cheng angrily ran his fingers over his thinning scalp, finding another reason to be irritated.

  Hazel passed through three checkpoints, posted every five feet outside the sitting ‘copter. His press pass, a large square dangling around his neck, stamped him sufficiently; even in a closed ceremony, reporters couldn’t roam about without identification as if they were ordinary people. No one trusted them.

  The First Anti-Parasite Laws originally outlawed all media, but Cheng made a persuasive case that they could be useful, if watched. Grandma, ever eager for openness, agreed. If they didn’t question, they were no better than the Allahs. But how to maintain honesty in a job that begged for duplicity? No one wanted a repeat of their dangerous unchecked power; all journalists were interrogated on a monthly basis for signs of personal bias seeping into their reports. Not quite on the level of the police monitoring potential pedophiles, but not far, either. They are what they are because of what they do.

  “Apologies, First Cousin.” John bowed insincerely and half-hopped onto the opposite seat in the ‘copter cabin. “The adoption scene always touches me.”

  Cheng rolled his eyes, but Hazel continued as if he were alone.