by Laura Bickle
There’s a distant sound, slicing through the droning of insects. It’s a thin, high wail. Like a siren, keening.
My mother looks over her shoulder. “They’re calling. I have to go.”
“No.” I lock my hands over her wrists to hold her here. Tears are screwing up my vision—I know she can see it.
“I have to.” She leans forward and kisses me on the forehead. She slides her gauntleted wrists from my hands and gathers her sword. She hugs Carl and gazes for a moment at the unconscious Lily. She glances up the tree at Bert. “Take care of them for me, will you, Bert?”
Bert nods. “I would, even if you didn’t know my real name.”
My mother smiles, that brilliant smile I remember from photographs. And she turns, running away, into the darkness, toward the source of that siren call. I think I see the shadows of wings on the horizon, like birds.
“Why can’t she stay?” I whisper to Bert.
Bert hangs upside down from the tree. “She’s dead, man.”
I stare up at Bert, slack jawed. “She’s here... How do... How is...?”
“She doesn’t smell alive. And I’m guessing that sword means she made a deal with the angels. Which, in its way, is worse than making a deal with a demon.”
I feel as if I’m being left all over again. My breath hitches in my throat, and a dark pit opens in my chest.
WE RETURN THE WAY WE came, through the door in the basement of Wong’s Dragon Buffet. Without prompting, Bert pauses to pluck a giant pink flower for Bai Yin on the way. She buries her nose in the flower larger than her head. Gazing over the petals at us, she says, in the most melodious of voices: “You guys stink. Do you want a cab?”
I take a deep breath. “Yeah. Yeah, we want a cab.”
She calls three before we get one that will stop for us on the curb in front of the building. We’re a sad lot; covered in mud, beat up. Carl sits on the sidewalk. He’s lost one shoe in the mud. Not that you can really tell. But his face is swollen like a prizefighter’s.
I have no idea what image Bert is projecting, but his tail is bent at an unnatural angle. I sit on the curb next to the fire hydrant with Lily. She’s naked, wrapped only in my jacket, sitting in my lap. The bleeding seems to have stopped. I can only see pinpricks in her flesh from where the threads of the dress were chewing.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter into her hair.
“It’s okay.”
I glance down, startled.
She’s awake. She looks up at me with sleepy eyes. “It was one hell of an unforgettable prom.”
I touch her cheek. “How are you feeling?”
“Like I’ve been in a motorcycle accident and have road rash.” She smiles with swollen lips. I really want to kiss her, but that would be bad form.
A cab skids to a stop, sliding into a puddle before us. We all growl, swear, and shriek as the wave of water sluices over us.
“Sorry, guys,” the cabby yells through the open window. “Where you headed?”
“Stannick’s Pawn shop,” Carl tells them. “Home.”
“Jesus, did you guys enter a mud wrestling tourney or something?” The cabby’s nose twitches when he sees us. Carl pulls at the handle, but the door doesn’t open.
Bert leans in the window. “Look, man. I’ll give you a hundred bucks to take us home. It’s been a real shitty night.”
I wonder what glamour he’s using until I glance in the side mirror and see he’s using none at all. He’s talking to this cabbie as a giant lizard.
“Um. Okay.”
The back doors unlock with a thunk. Carl and Lily and I pile into the back, Bert in the front.
We drive in silence for blocks before the cabbie says. “So...is there a story to go along with this?” His hand sketches all of us: the half-naked girl, the mud, the giant reptoid.
Bert shakes his head. “Nah. No story. Just a regular Saturday night.”
The cabby nods and turns up the radio for the rest of the ride.
He’s pleased when we finally get out of his cab and Bert hands over the money. By then, Lily’s somewhat on her feet, and I take her to her door.
Funny. The hamburger shop should be closed at this hour. But all the lights are on. Maybe Mrs. Renfelter is waiting up for Lily.
I open the door with the clanging bell. I have no idea how to explain what happened to Lily. No clue what I’m going to say to Mrs. Renfelter... I took your daughter to prom and we wound up in hell. How does one even begin to have that discussion?
“Hey, guys!” Rose’s voice greets us cheerfully.
I look around, but don’t see her. The shop’s empty...but the jukebox’s standing in the corner, right where it was before the Mob destroyed it. Rose’s feet stick out from behind it, and her Tiki cup is balanced on the top. Tools are strewn on the checkerboard floor around it.
“What on earth are you doing?” Lily asks.
“I fixed it!” Rose’s voice is triumphant. The lights come on, and the jukebox begins to play “Everybody Wants to Rule the World.” Rose crawls out from behind the jukebox, feet first, then ass. Her shirt hikes up, displaying her Tesla tattoo.
She glances up at us, taking in our mud- and blood-soaked appearance. “What the fuck happened—” Startled, she bumps back against the jukebox.
The orange Tiki cup wobbles on the top. I lunge forward, too late.
The cup tumbles down, the lid breaking off, splattering a full thirty-four ounces of rum and Coke down on the jukebox, Rose, and the floor.
Electricity explodes in a blue flash. Rose shrieks and convulses on the floor in a shower of sparks. Lily screams behind me.
Bert grabs a broom and strikes her with it, rolling her away from the connection with the electricity, breaking the circuit. Her body smokes on the floor, twitching. The jukebox behind her gutters with flames. I’m dimly conscious of Carl doing something with a fire extinguisher and the alarm going off. The overhead sprinklers pelt us with water.
Lily falls to her knees beside her sister. Something smells like burned meat. The Tesla tattoo is charred and both Rose’s flip flops have been blown off her scorched feet.
“She’s not breathing,” Lily howls.
Carl elbows me out of the way to do chest compressions. But my gaze is fixed on Rose’s slack face. Her eyes are open to the ceiling, and her lips are parted and rubbery. I can’t wrap my mind around this, this freak accident. It feels like when the train hit Zach...
And then I remember what Hoodie said...
“I will take the blood that’s mine.”
I WANT THIS TO BE DONE. Over.
In the early light of morning, I slip out of the house. Sid’s snoring in his room. It’s a soothing, familiar sound, like a bear growling. It gives me hope that he’ll recover fully. Carl’s asleep in his sleeping bag on the floor beside his father’s bed. He’s sleeping like he always did as a child: on his back, with his mouth open, drool rattling in the back of his throat.
I peer in on them, close the door. I pause in the doorway to my father’s room. He isn’t there; he’s still in jail. I walk into his room, sit on the edge of his bed, and stare off into space. The room smells like burned things, like the hole blown in the safe. I stretch back out into the bed. The pillow smells like my dad: like Aqua Velva.
I’m not angry at him anymore. Not like before. I brush the watch on my wrist with my thumb. He loves me, in his way. Not in the way most people love. But as much as he can.
I get up and finally go to my grandpop’s room.
Pops is asleep. He snores softly, curled on his side. His hair is all screwed up and his white T-shirt shines in the darkness.
I sit down in the chair opposite him. I watch him sleep for some time, the way parents watch their children, as if they want to memorize each sigh and gurgle. That wonder and that fear of forgetting this moment.
I sit until the gray light becomes lighter then quietly pad across the floor and kiss his forehead. I haven’t done that since I was a little kid.
&n
bsp; Pops doesn’t stir. He’s steeped in his thick, dreamless sleep. Maybe dreaming of the fox woman.
It should be this way. I know it.
I close the door softly behind me and slip down the hallway. It’s like Christmas night. Even Bert is asleep, curled up in a tight ball on the couch. His tail is wrapped tightly around his head. I don’t think he ordinarily sleeps like that, but something about going to the hell dimension is haunting him, and small reptile gestures leak through his human façade.
He may not be human, but I love him like family, anyway.
I pad down the hallway to climb out of the window, out onto the fire escape. I’m halfway down before a voice stops me.
“Where are you going?”
I look up. Lily’s leaning out of her window. Her hair is tangled, and she’s pale. She’s looking at me with eyes that are hollow and hungry. Her T-shirt sticks to her body on all the red marks made by the dress, sticking to antibiotic ointment. I know she hasn’t slept. How could she? Her sister died in front of her. I want to say that I understand, but...this is all my fault. All of it.
I pause. “There’s something I’ve got to do.”
She nods. I think she knows. “Be careful.”
“I will.”
I want to say other things. I do, so badly. But now isn’t the time. Not while she’s hurting.
To her credit, she doesn’t seem to blame me. She nods and presses her mouth into a kiss she blows to me. The dark circles around her eyes lighten a bit when her eyes crinkle. I have hope.
I swing down into the alleyway. My boots hit the gravel, and I walk out onto the street, toward my destination.
In the east, the sun is cutting a gold gash into the horizon. The lights of the casinos are still bright and lurid against the purple sky.
I’m going there. To the casino. To see Young Don and give him what I have.
To take care of all our unfinished business.
CHAPTER 30
I don’t try to sneak into the Byzantium. This time, I walk right up to the front door.
I stand on the sidewalk before the casino. The fountains burble behind me, with the first sleepy pigeons of the morning waddling in to bathe. The sun rises over the ocean behind me, and a stiff wind drives the smell of the salt from the sea in. The gulls shriek at the Sand Zamboni driving by on the beach.
But in front of me, in the casino, it’s still night. It will always be night in the casino. Lights burn and voices bubble. No end of heartache and trouble.
I put my head down, zip my jacket up to my neck, and walk through the glass doors.
The jangle of mechanical noise, the slot machines, assaults my ears. Colored lights play before me, elderly people perched on stools in front of the one-armed bandits, plastic cups of nickels balanced between their legs. It’s so funny to me that people who are at the ends of their lives still have such hope in the fiction of making it big, breaking the casino. I wonder if people grow more naïve when they age, or whether I should be heartened that they still have hope.
The guards dressed in black at the door glance at me, but say nothing.
I swallow. I’m probably not fooling anyone. I’m expected.
I keep going, hands in my jacket pockets. Women in uniform hold drinks on platters. Whoops and hollers sound from the poker pit, where a bunch of bleary-eyed middle-aged men continue to battle each other. The fluffy remains of a bachelorette party linger by the bar: women with long hair and pink feathered boas. Only one is sober enough to count out bills for the tab.
I keep walking, walking to the back. Maybe it’s instinctive, that desire to get into the guts of the monster. In the backs of the cave are where dragons guard their treasure, and the dragon can’t be far away.
I walk across the red and gold patterned carpet to the cash-out cage. The men behind the windows in bow-ties exchange chips for money. I guess I should wait in line. I queue up behind an old lady with a Kleenex box full of yellow chips.
I nearly jump out of my skin when a hand falls on my shoulder. It’s attached to one of the guards from the front. He’s dressed in a black shirt and pants, black jacket. There’s nothing on his outfit that says ‘security,’ but his stance shows him for what he is. It’s the same wide-legged, barrel-chested stance proffered by every bouncer at every bar and strip club from here to Vegas. His face is covered in pock-marked scars, and under the shadow of a cowboy hat, his expression is unreadable.
“Come with me.”
I nod mutely. I follow the Man in Black to an elevator, very much like the one I was in with the Man in White, Pearly. I stare at our reflections in the polished elevator doors. I look very small next to the Man in Black.
“He’s been expecting you,” the Man in Black says.
I glance at him. “Aren’t you going to search me or something?”
The Man in Black shakes his head. “That would be disrespectful.”
I swallow. That could be a good or a bad sign. It could mean that Young Don’s willing to deal. Or it could mean that they think I’m too harmless to fuss over.
The Man in Black inserts a key into the elevator, punches some buttons.
I expect the guard to take me to a wood-paneled office without windows. There would be nude paintings, red velvet chairs, maybe even an antique globe. It would smell of cigar smoke and fear. I expect to be threatened over a vast mahogany desk.
The elevator climbs up, up to the top floor, where it finally stops. The doors open on an expansive suite. This must be the penthouse. Minimalist white leather and stainless-steel furniture is arranged around a vase of calla lilies on the coffee table. Copies of Architectural Digest are stacked in a magazine rack. They’re rumpled, as if they’ve actually been read. The outer walls are windows, uncovered, open to the sprawling expanse of city.
“Wait here.” The Man in Black points to a club chair in the living area. I obediently sit, though I crane my head over my shoulder to look at the skyline.
I’ve never been this high up before. Below me spread the white caps of the ocean and the sandy strip of beach where it meets the boardwalk. The Ferris wheel is a small toy beneath me, and the cars on the street are the size of peas. From here, I can see all the ugly, leaky roofs on the buildings that no one can see from the street. From this distance, I can’t make out people. No sounds leak through the thick glass.
Is this what it’s supposed to feel like, this far up? Remote, removed from the world? Uncaring? It all seems like a game board of strategy from here.
“Come.” The Man in Black has emerged. He gestures for me to follow him down a hallway made of glass.
He takes me to a bedroom. The close morning sun is streaming through the glass in warm squares on the dark hardwood floor. There’s a large overstuffed bed with a white upholstered headboard and a mountain range of pillows. An old man lies in the middle, in his pajamas, hooked up to a squid of tubes on a pole.
I suck in my breath. This must be Old Don. His eyes are closed. His hands are clutched into fists beside him on the bed. His jowls are pale, and his liver spots nearly green. His throat is wrapped in bandages, and I see the plastic of a stoma peeking through. Throat cancer, I remember.
“I wanted you to see him.”
Young Don sits beside the bed in a leather chair. His dress shirt is unbuttoned at the collar, and a magazine lies open on his knee, holding his place. Architectural Digest. A cup of half-finished coffee perches on the nightstand beside him. He isn’t wearing shoes.
“Why?”
Young Don gazes at his father with such love and admiration. I’m sure I’ve never looked at my father like that. “So you would know what you’re doing, know it fully.”
I shift back and forth on my feet.
“Please have a seat.” He gestures to the chair opposite his father’s bedside. “Would you care for some coffee or tea?”
“No, thank you.” I gingerly take the chair.
“He can’t hear you,” Young Don says, placing his magazine on the table.
“You love him,” I say.
Young Don looks at his father with the sweetness of a young child. The air moving through the tubes in Old Don’s nose ruffles a tuft of nose hair. “Yes. I know he’s done terrible things. I’ve seen him do them. Some of them, he’s even done to me.”
“Then...why?” I struggle to understand.
“Because he’s my father. And he loves me. Without him, I would have no life at all. And for that...for that, I’m grateful.” Young Don’s jaw hardens, then loosens.
We sit in silence for a moment. Neither of us mentions the bloodbath at the pawn shop or the fire at Betty’s Burgers. A clock ticks on the mantle.
“What have you decided?” Young Don asks at last. His expression is pinched, and there are dark shadows under his eyes.
“I’ve brought you something.”
Tension drains from his face, and Young Don smiles over his father’s body at me. “I’m glad.”
I reach into my pocket. My hand closes around the offering I have for him. I pull it out, trying to ignore the lint in my fingers. I turn my hand up, over his father’s body, and open it.
Young Don’s eyes draw together. “What’s this?”
A white tooth glints in my palm, the size of a shark’s. Hoodie’s tooth. It’s clean of mud and gore.
“It’s a demon tooth,” I say.
“That isn’t what I asked you for.” Young Don’s voice is brittle in disappointment.
“This is better.” I take a deep breath. “When you have a demon’s tooth, you can demand a favor from him. He has to honor it.”
“What kind of favor?”
I shrug. “Anything that’s within his power to grant. And this demon, the one that traded with us for the hourglass, I know he can heal.”
Young Don stares at the tooth. His fingers are at the side of the bed, moving. I can tell he’s twitching to touch it. He folds his hands together in his lap. A man of self-control. “How is this better than the hourglass?”
“The hourglass requires a debt of blood to be paid. Someone has to die for the kind of miracle you want.”