Cristina
Page 23
Cristina heard her new boss at Artifacts complain that the Development Association was trying to do the same thing to her as well. And her place had been open since the 70’s.
Cristina hated the idea of losing her new job. She really liked it, even if the pay wasn’t great.
There was definitely a lot more to life than money, anyway. All she really needed was a house, her family, and a sense of purpose.
For the first time, she felt like she had all those things.
Unfortunately, as had happened on so many occasions during Cristina’s relatively short life, the time when the sun shined brightest turned out to be the moment just before the storm moved in.
46
“What do you mean they aren’t going to renew it?” Casey asked into the phone, having excused himself from dinner halfway through his plate of spaghetti and meatballs.
He paced up and down the hallway.
The call was from a real estate agent who’d been negotiating with the Development Association on a new lease for Bula’s.
Casey added, “You’ve got to be shitting me.”
Anise gasped from her place at the table.
“Mamma,” she whispered. “Casey said a bad word.”
“I know, chica. It’s OK. He’s an adult. Just eat your food, OK? We have to get you into a bath and ready for your big day tomorrow.”
“Aww,” Anise said as she twirled pasta with her fork. Over the past few months, she’d become a lot more talkative at the table. “I want to go to my old school. All my friends are there.”
“I know, baby.” Cristina was trying to listen to what Casey was saying, but he’d gone upstairs. All she could hear now was a buzzing noise coming through the ceiling when he spoke. She continued, “Anise, you’re going to make lots of new friends. Now, I want you to be a good girl and finish your dinner.”
The ceiling-buzz increased in volume, and then a single word rang out, yelled loud enough to be heard perfectly well.
“FUCK!”
“Mamma,” Anise said thoughtfully, no longer interested in Casey’s choice of language. “What if no one likes me?”
“Chica, that’s not going to happen. You’re the sweetest, prettiest, loveliest, wonderfulist girl in the whole-wide-world, and everyone is going to love you.” She added, “As long as you’re a good girl and do what your teacher tells you.”
Anise thought about that for a while, still looking into her spaghetti.
Footsteps down the stairs.
Cristina didn’t know what to expect. Up to that moment, the strongest anger she’d seen from Casey had been when he yelled at a group of kids driving by the beach – they were so busy snapping pictures with their phones, they almost ran into an old woman who was crossing the street. Casey had let them have it.
“Anise,” Cristina said. “If you aren’t going to eat, I want you to go upstairs and get ready for your bath.”
“OK, mamma,” Anise answered, looking relieved.
As she passed Casey in the hallway, she initiated what had become their usual greeting.
“Hello, walrus.”
“Hello, dandelion.”
Cristina had no idea where they’d come up with that one, but she smiled every time she heard it. Especially now, because she at least knew he wasn’t going to fly into some fit of rage. Not that she could imagine him capable of it. But she’d once thought the same thing about Anthony, too.
Casey walked into the kitchen looking completely dejected.
“Aw, come here, baby,” Cristina said, pulling him down toward her and kissing him softly on the lips. “What’s up?”
He sat in the chair next to her, but didn’t turn her way. Instead, he seemed to be searching for the answer to her question somewhere on the blank wall.
“Babe?” she said, a little worried.
He finally met her eyes.
“Huh?” he said.
“What happened?”
Sounding a bit like he was explaining the situation to himself, he proceeded to tell her about the phone conversation.
The real estate agent had informed Casey that, despite the fact he was willing to pay almost 20 percent more in rent than before, the Development Association was refusing to renew his lease.
“They never wanted to,” he told her. “Even my real estate guy says so. All they want to do is corporatize the whole area down by the beach. I’m not sure why I thought I could do anything about it. The rich and powerful always win in this world. Always.”
Beginning the night of their first date, Cristina had seen that Casey wasn’t afraid to share his feelings with someone he trusted. It was one of the many things she loved about him. But he wasn’t the kind of guy who cried.
Until now.
“My store is everything, Cristina. Everything. I put all I had left toward making it work. Not just money, but my whole soul. I’m nothing without it.”
She stood and then straddled him in his chair, pulling his head into the firm softness of her breasts, holding it there.
“That’s not true,” she said. “That’s not true at all. First off, you have us. I love you. Anise loves you. No store, or anything else, is going to change that. Second, just because those greedy assholes won this round, that doesn’t mean it’s a done deal. There has to be something we can do.”
“There’s nothing. It’s all over.”
47
Cristina was starting to enjoy having a lawyer as a friend. And Danny Dee seemed more than happy to embrace any excuse to take on the powerful and corrupt.
She called him and explained what had happened with Casey. He said he would be delighted to help, and that he thought there was a good chance a judge would grant an injunction against the eviction, given the fact it sounded like the Development Association wasn’t negotiating in good faith.
“It might take a few weeks,” Dan said. “But I’d postpone the going-out-of-business sale for now.”
Casey was thankful for the help, but it wasn’t enough to get him out of the deep funk he’d fallen into.
Cristina started to worry. Over the next couple of days, he hardly ate. His strong, confident demeanor became buried under a droopy sadness.
He kept going on about how unfair the world is.
“It doesn’t matter if you’re the hardest working person in the world. If you don’t come from money, all you’re ever going to get is the shaft. The deck is stacked against the little guy, Cristina. Always has been and always will be.”
She tried to cheer him up with a blow job, but he didn’t even seem interested.
“I’m sorry,” he told her with a distant sadness in his eyes as he sat on the edge of her bed. “I think I need to go be alone so I can figure some things out.”
She unsuccessfully begged him to stay, worried that he might do something irrational.
She didn’t know what, exactly.
Except, didn’t she?
Yes, with all her heart, she was sure he was going to relapse.
The last thing she did before going to sleep was send him a text saying that she loved him, and she hoped he would keep himself safe.
48
That night the dreams returned.
Again, it began with her in bed. After a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dark, she almost screamed at the sight of little Annie Stewart standing in the doorway.
Cristina caught her breath and realized that Annie appeared to be much more solid than the ghostly image she’d witnessed in the hallway. But somehow the girl still lacked color and definition. And when Cristina moved her head, Annie and her polka dot nightgown faded like a hologram.
The girl’s eyes drooped sadly toward the stuffed hippo dangling in her hand.
DON’T TRUST HIM.
Those words, whispered by an unknown voice, echoed in Cristina’s mind.
Annie’s eyes darted around the room. A kid trying to make sense of an overwhelming situation.
Cristina sensed that Annie wanted her to follow.
Cristina made it to the door just in time to see the trail of smoke disappear down the steps. It crossed her mind to check on Anise, but she no longer seemed in control of her movements. As in the previous dreams, she felt compelled forward by some powerful, unseen force.
She made her way down the stairs, hearing them creak with each soft step. The smoke led into the hall closet, through the miniature doorway in the back wall. Cristina crawled into it, finding herself first enveloped by white light, then falling in the dark.
She expected to come out by the red cabin.
But this time was different.
When the world came to life, Annie stood next to her, still in the same polka dot nightgown, still with her stuffed hippo. But no longer ghostly, now appearing as real and solid as Cristina herself.
As if confirming her own reality, Annie reached up and took hold of Cristina’s hand.
Cristina looked down at frightened eyes.
The two were in some kind of abandoned building. It didn’t seem like any place Cristina had been before. From what she could see through the darkness, the place had once been a storage warehouse. There were empty crates and pallets strewn across the floor, rotted out as if they’d been there for a long time.
Windows near the high ceiling allowed a few sunrays to cut a path of light through the otherwise dark room. It was impossible to tell what waited for them beyond.
Cristina recognized instantly the rank odors of urine, feces, and mold, reminding her of pretty much every squat she’d ever spent time in.
The scent of rotted dreams.
Mixed almost delicately into the background was the crisp tartness of salt in the air.
At first, it felt like they were alone. But as Annie tugged on Cristina’s hand, moving her across the room, strange noises faintly echoed from somewhere in the depths of the building. Sounds that were either squawking birds or the wails of a dying human.
With the girl pulling her along, Cristina stepped over countless pieces of debris and garbage, and an occasional puddle of dark liquid, until they came to a doorway. She sensed something horrible on the other side. But Annie continued forward, her hand gripping so tightly that Cristina wasn’t sure she could let go.
Covering the doorway was a piece of black cloth. She heard a hissing sound coming from the other side, reminding her of the handheld blowtorches she used to use to cook heroin. She slid the cloth aside and saw that a gas-powered lantern dangled from a nail in one corner, illuminating half the room, leaving the other half in darkness.
Bathed in the lantern’s yellow glow was the dirtiest mattress Cristina had ever seen. Its surface was blotted and stained with countless unknown liquids. Most of the splotches looked black under the harsh light, but Cristina guessed the majority of them to be either urine, vomit, or blood. Scattered around the mattress were dozens of used hypodermic syringes, their sharp tips caked with dried, milky redness. Mixed into the debris was a scattering of vials and baggies and blackened pieces of tinfoil.
As they walked closer, Cristina could see tiny bugs scurrying among the goo and the garbage.
She wanted to turn and run, but couldn’t.
Annie’s hand gripped her now with so much force it hurt.
The mattress felt like it wanted to reach out and grab Cristina. She imagined herself being held down on it, her body soaked in a wetness teeming with Hepatitis and HIV.
Thankfully, Annie pulled her past and continued into a hallway lit only by a single high window. A focused shaft of light ran the length of the long corridor. Across a sea of random articles of clothing and garbage was another doorway, this one with an actual metal door.
A new wave of intense, primal fear rose from the pit of Cristina’s stomach, settling into her chest and spine. She wanted to vomit. Her bladder tingled to the point she was afraid she might wet herself.
About halfway across the room, she tried to plant her feet. Her body wouldn’t respond. And the small girl seemed to possess a supernatural strength.
They reached the door, and Annie once more looked up with frightened eyes.
Silently, she pointed to the doorknob.
Cristina tried to speak. She couldn’t even open her mouth. All she managed was a few warbled murmurs through sealed lips, a noise that sounded like a radio playing in another room.
Annie again pointed to the door. Her tiny eyebrows creased.
Cristina woke up.
Her bedroom was dark. The feeling of impending doom lingered in the air. She felt her own forehead, expecting to find sweat pouring off her face. Instead, there was a cold chill. All the usual elasticity of her youthful skin had disappeared, replaced by the deadness of a raw piece of chicken.
Leaping out of bed, she barely noticed the plastic crunch under her foot as she rushed into the hallway and toward Anise’s room. In the glow of the girl’s nightlight, it was difficult to tell whether the lump in the bed was indeed her daughter, or if the blankets had perhaps been ruffled in some kind of a struggle.
Before she made it to the bed, she stopped.
Listening to the peaceful sound of Anise snoring, Cristina’s lungs released a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding.
The sense of dread receded like a crashing wave.
Then hit her again. Even harder this time. A pulsing nervousness deep in her chest. Something bad was going to happen. She just knew it.
The sensation dropped into her stomach. She ran toward the bathroom.
A waterfall of Aba’s tamales, half-digested from earlier in the evening, went spewing from her mouth and into the sink. In the grey moonlight, the liquid reminded her of the ooze she saw soaked into the diseased mattress.
Hands trembling, she turned on the water and stepped back, unable to look elsewhere as the clear water swirled away the contents of her stomach.
With her back against the wall, she slid to the floor, wiping her mouth and feeling tears rush down her cheeks. She tried to remain silent as the onslaught of sadness and worry and doubt overwhelmed her, but the intense emotions were impossible to hold in.
It felt like the end of the world.
The dream had left her completely empty, as if someone cut a bottomless hole inside of her. There were only two things she could compare it to. The intense desire for a fix when coming down from heroin, and the hopeless longing for death she felt when she contemplated suicide as a means of escaping Anthony’s torture.
If she’d been alone in that moment, there’s no telling what might have happened. What she might have done to free herself from the shadow of infinite sadness the dream had cast upon her.
The only thing that snapped her out of it was the quiet whisper of Anise’s voice coming from the hallway.
“Mamma?”
Cristina lifted her head from between her knees and looked at her daughter, dressed in a polka dot nightgown. Not quite the same as Annie’s, but close enough to seem like more than a coincidence.
The girl walked up to her mother and hugged her with the gentleness only a child knows.
“It’s OK, mamma. It’s OK. Everything will be alright.”
Her daughter’s love made Cristina cry even harder.
After a long time, she finally found the strength to stand, hoisting Anise in her arms as she did. Together, they made their way down the hallway and sat on the edge of Cristina’s bed.
Directly across the room, illuminated by the grey light of the moon, she could see marks on the mirror attached to her dresser.
Writing.
With Anise still in her arms, Cristina cautiously stood and walked toward it.
Plastic crunched under her foot.
She saw now what she’d stepped on when she bolted into the hallway.
A tube of crimson lipstick.
Scrawled onto the mirror were th
ree words.
DON’T TRUST HIM.
49
Cristina managed to sleep at least a few hours with Anise cuddled next to her.
When she awoke, the writing on the mirror was gone. And just as before, the entire thing felt like a dream, harder and harder to remember with each passing moment.
The only part that didn’t fade one bit was the sinking feeling in her gut that something bad was about to happen. A concern that only deepened when she looked at her phone and saw Casey hadn’t returned any of her texts.
She immediately called him twice. The phone went straight to voicemail both times.
There were plenty of reasons why she shouldn’t panic. Maybe he was surfing. Maybe he just needed a little space to clear his head. If so, her pushing him probably wasn’t going to make him feel any better.
But something told her that wasn’t it. She kept picturing him sad and alone, crying as he contemplated sticking a needle in his arm to dull the pain.
After dropping Anise off at school, Cristina drove directly to Bula’s.
Lindsay, the blond cashier, said Casey hadn’t been there when she came in at eight to open the store.
He most likely wasn’t out surfing, though. His favorite board still leaned against the wall near his cot, right next to the framed picture of he and Cristina riding the wooden roller coaster at The Wharf on their first date.
Casey’s duffle bag full of belongings, which he usually kept neat and orderly under his bed, was open, the clothes and most of its other contents poured out onto the floor.
Was he looking for something?
“His Harley isn’t in the back alley where he usually parks it,” Lindsay told her. “I also found this.”
She handed over a note written on a small piece of paper:
Dear whoever,
In case you’re concerned since I’m not at the store, I just need to take care of a few things. Don’t worry about me.
-Casey