Rebirth (Cross Book 1)

by Hildred Billings

  It took every ounce of restraint in his adult-brain to not dump everything that happened on his best friend Clyde when they met up in the practice room. The only reason he didn’t let anything slip was because their mutual friend and bandmate, Serge, showed up with his electric guitar slung over his shoulder.

  Between the three of them, the only topic of discussion allowed was music. Preferably, rock music.

  “So on ‘Slide,’” Clyde said five minutes into practice, “I was thinking we might wanna change the tempo during the interlude. Slow it down a bit, because let’s be real, half the people listening to use are stoners. We should throw them a bone.” He nudged Devon’s shoulder. “Hey, you listening? Man, you tune that guitar any more, it’s gonna bust!”

  Devon snapped out of his thoughts. Right. Maybe he didn’t want to break half the guitar strings he had painstakingly threaded two nights ago. “I’m listening. Sure, we could try that.”

  “You are not on this planet, man.”

  On the contrary, Devon was so on this planet that he was obsessing over it.

  “Speaking of strings,” Serge said, “if I pull enough of them I’ll be scoring us that gig at the study bar a few weeks from now.”

  “Funny, isn’t it?” Clyde rolled his eyes while turning on his laptop. Without a drummer for their session, they had to rely on a music program to keep the beat. “Guy doesn’t even go to our school. Guy scores us gig at our school.”

  “Technically it’s not at your school. It only happens to be right next to your campus and frequented by college students. Difference, huh?”

  Devon decided to throw himself into this sense of normalcy. “We’re gonna have to pray to get a paying gig like that.” It would be their first one. Although the three of them had been writing music and putting together a demo over the past year, the only public performances they had put on were at university music festivals that were sign up and get on the list in time and hope that someone pays attention to your music. A few people signed up for their mailing list and were nice enough to download their practice room demos, but they were far from being a “legit” band. Didn’t help that they were on their third name in as many months.

  “Why pray when we could hit up St. Lucia’s? My girlfriend swears by it.”

  “St. Lucia’s?”

  Clyde clasped his hand on Devon’s shoulder. “He’s been in the senioritis hole too long. He doesn’t remember St. Lucia’s crown, also known as the favorite freshman crying corner.”

  “Oh. Right.” Devon shrugged his friend’s hand off his shoulder. “The crown.”

  That thing had been around since Devon was a kid. Nothing more than an old and battered jizo statue left in the middle of where Japan Town used to stand before every citizen was shipped off to an internment camp during WWII and the buildings were repossessed by the government. Mexican and Guatemalan immigrants set up a neighborhood after that. Gone were the acupuncturists and hole-in-the-wall ramen shops. For most of the twentieth century, St. Lucia’s Courtyard was surrounded by Spanish-speaking salons, bookstores, and authentic Mexican restaurants.

  St. Lucia – since no one could remember the original Japanese name of the jizo statue – was considered a good luck charm in that corner of the city. One minute the local council debated destroying it or moving it to China Town, and the next every God-fearing man and woman in the neighborhood swore the Lord would punish them if they took away their beloved child-saint. Nobody burned incense for him anymore. Not unless they were one of the many daily Asian visitors to town seeking St. Lucia’s blessings of fortune. Instead, saint candles burned at all hours of the day and night. Sometimes two of them. Sometimes twenty. After September 11th, one hundred candles were counted in the small courtyard and along the sidewalks leading from the rest area.

  The crown referred to the daisy chain crown wrapped around St. Lucia’s circular head. Whenever someone said a prayer or made a wish, they added a small flower to the chain. This kept it perpetually fresh, with the old, dead flowers added to a compost pile that was burned every Sunday by local believers.

  Many jokingly referred to the belief in St. Lucia’s good fortune as “the jizo cult.” Tourists beelined for it. Locals revered it. College freshmen and job seekers went in droves to add to the flower chain. Sick people, couples trying for babies, pregnant women… anyone who had a reason to pray but didn’t necessarily think the local church was doing a good enough job stopped by St. Lucia. Sometimes they made a ritual out of it. Oftentimes, they simply snuck in and scooted out again before anyone they knew recognized them. Oh, and they would take the time to line up in the booming line for Pedro’s Tacos, one of the most successful Mexican food trucks in town. Naturally.

  It was one of those stories a young man like Devon always knew, but never had anything to do with. He had never been by to see St. Lucia, which shocked tourists and was considered sacrilege even to other locals who had also never been. To be fair, the neighborhood was a bit out of the way. Close enough to the college campus to attract kids out for a day walk, but not close enough for Devon to bother.

  Serge had simply made a joke. He had been to St. Lucia, after all. So had Clyde, but only when drunk enough to be convinced to go down and throw flowers on top of the statue’s head and jokingly blow out candles – and to be chased away by old Mrs. Gonzalez who lived in the apartment overlooking St. Lucia. One could swear that woman stayed up all night keeping vigil while sleeping all day.

  “Think I’ll pass on St. Lucia for now,” Devon said. “I’d rather concentrate on figuring out how we’re changing ‘Slide’ before we get any potential gigs. Wouldn’t do us any good to start playing it and be on completely different tempos.” He glared at Clyde. “Again.”

  “Only happened once, dude.”

  Devon picked up his guitar and tested the opening bars to the song. When he was pleased enough with his tuning, he motioned for Clyde to start the beat. They’d get a drummer. Eventually.

  At the end of practice a few hours later, his calloused fingers picked up his phone to find a text from Alicia.

  “Out with friends. Might hit up St. Lucia to pray for my own finals. Wish my fumbling fingers luck with that flower crown.”

  Something ticked in the back of Devon’s brain. St. Lucia. A public saint that was a mish-mash of cultures and attracted people from all over the world. Heralded as a good luck charm powerful enough to summon the flocks. An icon for the religious, the spiritual, and the forgotten.

  He’d rather go back to band practice. He wasn’t supposed to freak out about the world ending 24/7.

  Never mind it was that attitude that got billions of people killed over the past one thousand years.

  ***

  “Honestly, who gives a shit whether or not milk is good for you?” Heidi snatched the first thing she found in Miranda’s refrigerator. “It tastes like crap, anyway. Where the hell do you keep the beer?”

  Miranda blew debris off her nails as she filed them. Her long, dark bangs tickled the tip of her nose, but she did nothing to remove them. “I don’t have any. Why the hell do you want to drink more, anyway? We just got back from a bar.”

  “Because you usually have good stuff, but apparently not tonight.”

  “Get over yourself.”

  Heidi slammed the refrigerator door shut, a burst of cool hair hitting the room upon impact. She glanced over at Miranda’s frame and approached with a determined gait. Without a second thought, Heidi draped her arms around Miranda’s shoulders and snorted into the nape of her neck. “You’re jealous because you’re too old to hold it in anymore.”

  Before Heidi could move, Miranda snapped her nail file in two and grabbed Heidi’s left arm. “What was that?”

  “Oh, bite me, scratch me, you naughty woman!” Heidi snatched her arm out of Miranda’s grasp and shoved her hand through a thin mess of brown hair. “Do anything to me but love me!”

  “That could be arranged.”

  “Eh.” Heidi shed her playful de
meanor as she glanced at the clock. “It’s after ten already. Are you going to bed soon? You kept whining that you have to get up at six for your review.”

  “I might go to bed, but that doesn’t mean I’ll go to sleep.”

  “Oh?”

  “Meet me upstairs in ten minutes.”

  Heidi obeyed, her young legs tearing up the nearby staircase. Miranda opened her purse and took out her spare cigarette. As she stood up from the counter and wandered over to the nearest window, lighting her cigarette and inhaling the first drag, her cell phone rang inside her pocket and prompted her to answer it and open the window at the same time. “What?” she asked, blowing her smoke out the window.

  There was a short pause, allowing Miranda to take another drag from her cigarette. “That’s rather pompous of you,” came a female voice from the other end.

  “What do you want?” Miranda maneuvered her head so more smoke went outside. “It’s late and I’m about to go to bed.”

  “Oh, really? Wouldn’t happen to have a girl there, would you?”

  Miranda coughed. “Not that it’s any of your business, but yes.”

  Another pause. “You gonna fuck her?”

  She extinguished the cigarette as she wandered back into the kitchen and rummaged for a replacement to put in her purse. She used to only smoke a few times a week. So much for that, lately. “He called me the other day. Said something about overseeing his latest project.”

  “You are his protégée. All I do is grunt work and occasionally mess around with you.”

  “As you keep reminding me.”

  “Because I like it. Don’t you?”

  “If I liked it as much as you, don’t you think we’d be living together?”

  “Touché.”

  “Look, I know,” Miranda mumbled, continuing to pace. “Appreciate the effort on your behalf but I have to get some sleep tonight. Good night.” Miranda mashed the off button on her phone. The bitter taste left in her mouth as she ascended the stairs to a waiting Heidi was not the result of her smoking her fifth cigarette that week.

  It was the result of not being able to control herself, or what happened in the world she was forced to inhabit.

  Heidi was the least surprising person. She insinuated she wanted to spend the night, and what? Miranda let her? Because she was convenient? Because she was easy? Because she was an assuredly good time and a guaranteed orgasm or three? So what if she was young? What was ten years between two grown women? Miranda had slept with women even younger. Who cared?

  She cared. Not because of Heidi’s mid-20s outlook on life, the fact they would never be real girlfriends, or that Miranda had to publicly stay in the closet while unabashedly sleeping around for most of her post-pubescent life. She cared because her heart was never in it.

  Long ago, Miranda Hotchner had given her heart away. But unlike A-Ha’s assertions that hearts were perpetually given away the very next day – and damnit, now that song was stuck in her head – Miranda’s heart had stayed with the same woman for much longer than she had been alive on Earth.

  She couldn’t get it back. She couldn’t grow a new one. Every few decades she was reborn with that hole in her chest, and some woman who would never remember her was born with two hearts instead of one.

  Sleeping with these other women felt like cheating. But what could Miranda do? She had sexual needs. Sometimes, if she closed her eyes hard enough, she could make love to these other women like she once made love to the only woman she wanted to touch again.

  Of course, it was never the same. The wrong sounds, tastes, smells. Not enough fat in some places and too curvy in others. Hair fried from bleaching instead of soft and healthy. Eyes dim with the kind of innocence that turned her off – spiritual innocence. Miranda wanted a woman who knew what it was like to live for a thousand years, always searching for that long-lost love.

  No one could understand that emptiness within her. Especially not Heidi, who was as green as they came in the world of spirituality.

  But it also meant she was easy to please and eager to please in return. Miranda could retreat to the other place that was filled with nothing but comforting memories.

  She sat at her vanity to remove her jewelry while Heidi rolled around the bed behind her. “Gosh darnit, you’re so pretty,” the young redhead said. Or was her hair more orange now? Depending on the lighting, Heidi’s hair color could go either way. “You could belch right now, and I would still be aghast at how beautiful you are.”

  Miranda hoped Heidi couldn’t see her rolling eyes as she removed her earrings and placed them in the corner pocket of her black lacquered earring box. “You’re not so bad yourself. Why don’t you take off that dress and show me?”

  Women always fell for that. Whenever Miranda threw her dominant weight around, showed off her bottomless bank account, showed up wearing French perfume unknown outside of Europe, or hiked up her skirt and casually lit a cigarette… every queer woman within a one-mile radius fanned herself.

  Some skills were innate, after all. Miranda had been seducing her fellow girls since she was a ripe fourteen years old. Once that was awoken inside of her? Nothing stood in her way.

  Except for circumstance. Except for treason.

  Miranda opened the small jewelry box on the far end of her vanity. There was only one piece of jewelry in there. A ring.

  She withdrew it. She didn’t dare put it on.

  “You said you knew Danielle?”

  Heidi flopped back down onto the bed, her dress on the floor and her bra straps falling down her arms. “Yeah? Why?” She snorted. “You crushin’ on your grunt, girl?”

  Miranda knew it was obvious, but did Heidi have to point it out? “Just wondering. Amazing how small of a world it is.”

  Heidi splayed herself across the bed. If she thought she was seducing Miranda, well, her technique could use a little finesse. “I used to tutor her girlfriend. Er, ex-girlfriend, apparently.”

  “I see.” Miranda put the ring away and stood up. No sense fixing her skirt or blouse when she was about to take them off. “You staying the night tonight?”

  “If you need me to leave later, I can. I know you have to be up early tomorrow.”

  “I don’t mind having someone to sleep next to.” That was the most romantic thing Miranda could bring herself to say to another woman. Probably because that was one of the things she missed the most from her old relationship.

  She could still remember the last night they slept together. Paranoia. Frustration. The urgency screaming at them to make as much love as possible, for it could be the last time.

  A thousand years ago, it was.

  TEN

  Twelve hours later, Danielle scrambled into work a full fifteen minutes early again. Before she forgot why, the universe thought it pertinent to place Colonel Noyes, the officer tasked with that day’s department review, right in front of her elevator.

  Danielle continued to not know her own strength. Either that, or Colonel Noyes needed to work on his own strength training. A Second Lieutenant should not have been able to knock the burly colonel over like he was nothing.

  “Excuse me… sir!” Danielle’s heart leaped into her throat once she recognized the colonel, a man who could decide the fates of separate departments in M-Town. Standing next to him was Miranda, her face washed white as she stared Danielle down.

  “No, no, pardon me… Lieutenant.” The man needed glasses, too. What was he doing, squinting that hard to read Danielle’s insignia? “I was in the way.”

  The elevator doors chimed shut behind her. Danielle shuffled away as quickly as possible, head down aside from the quick look in Miranda’s direction.

  “Saw the show out there,” Troy said the moment Danielle approached their adjacent cubicles. “Nothing like starting the day off right by killing the one man who decides if Hottie stays or goes.”

  Danielle said nothing, since she was too absorbed with making sure she sat down before the colonel saw her again. Altho
ugh she was not Miranda’s biggest fan around the office, she did not want to be the main reason Captain Hotchner was ousted from the building. On account of a clumsy underling? Even worse.

  Shelley hustled up and down the aisles, handing out pieces of paper that contained last minute information about the impending review. It landed on Danielle’s desk when she turned on her computer. She snatched it up and read over the hasty typing. Nothing new. Nothing terribly important. Into the recycling it went, another waste of dead trees.

  A hush fell over the office as nine in the morning came and went. The room used their collective nerves to fuel themselves to work faster than usual. Weren’t they aware that the colonel could appear next to them at any moment? Danielle blocked out the stagnate air around her and focused on her data. Now was not the time for rookie mistakes.

  Close to ten, the command rang out. It echoed through every cubicle and carried with it the reality that this was, in fact, the military – regardless of how casual things could get in that delinquent corner of M-Town.

  “Attention!” In another life, Miranda would have made a formidable drill sergeant or a mediocre commanding officer in the field. Here, however, she exercised her authority in front of the colonel with as much pride as she could muster. Her deep voice sent shivers and adrenaline down the spines of everyone sitting around doing their jobs, and within seconds everyone was up and standing beside their desks.

  Troy and Danelle stood shoulder to shoulder, waiting for their unfortunate turn to be sniffed and prodded by a man out to find every flaw and fault they possessed. Did they take enough care of their uniforms? Was everything straight and level? Did they smell acceptable, but not overly perfumed? Were their shoes shined and posture perfectly erect? Danielle barely recognized when Colonel Noyes was only a few feet away from her. Oh, so she couldn’t smell like a gallon of perfume, but he could choke her with his aftershave?