by Nick Cole
And where did I hear that line once long ago? In another life not this one.
She beckons me to the door of the main tower, holding out her cold fiery sword toward its tiny barrier, indicating we must go through. That we must go on. That we must enter.
I wipe the dark blood from my sword with a cloth and turn to the door. Its warped wood is bound in ancient black iron. Old text, all curlicues and half loops, litters its face like unholy graffiti. All of it is alien to me. And somehow, I know we’ve come to the heart of the matter. As though what lies beyond is some final moment to all of this.
I cast one last glance out over the hauntingly beautiful forest in the midnight moonlight. Whatever this world is, I don’t want to leave. I want to go on exploring it forever. Finding all its secrets. Its adventures. Its wonders. Like an eternally promised childhood of adventure and terror intermingled.
But if feels as though things are coming to a close for me. That I am close to leaving.
And I wonder where I’m going next.
And if I will still be me.
We step through the door, and there indeed is the heart of the matter. It climbs up through the core of the twisted tower. It is horrible and wonderful at the same time. And it is so shocking that I…
Chapter Forty-Six
I wake with a start. A sudden start. My heart is pounding and I’m covered in sweat. I can’t remember what I was dreaming about. I lie back, my heart thudding, and wonder if I should stop smoking.
I listen to the waves slap against the side of the hull. Right near my head. Then I light a cigarette and lie there for a while, and in time I can’t hear my heart pounding like it was.
She shows up later that morning in an old sports car. But it’s cherried out. I hear it from a long way off, its loud muffler tearing up the silence of the sleepy port. She gets out and waves from the top of the ramp leading down to the dock. She’s wearing a red plaid schoolgirl skirt, short. Shiny metallic boots and a gray sweater. Her hair is in a ponytail. Her skin is alabaster with a little olive. And of course there’s the body I have not forgotten.
But it’s the smile I don’t remember seeing that night in the bordello that seduces me from the start of what is to come.
I walk up the dock, and we stand awkwardly before each other. The last time we met she was naked, mostly, and she tried to kill me. Her smile falters as though she knows I’m remembering that desperate fight for the knife in that tiny room. Or the soft curves of her unmasked body as she tried to kill me.
She bites her bottom lip.
“It’s okay,” I say, not really knowing what’s okay and what isn’t. Just thinking something needs to be said. And that telling her things are okay is a good place to start.
Suddenly that smile is back. And that’s when I realize it’s what I was looking for. Wanted to remember. Would remember… about her. That smile that seems determined to be happy, no matter what.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
“Surprise.” The soft purr of her voice in our late-night conversation is still there. But now she speaks with all the lightness of an easy breeze drifting this way and that along the old California coast.
In her car and headed back off the island and onto the mainland, we take the coast road. Any conversation that can’t be yelled above the roar of the tiny engine is lost. Instead she turns on some music coming from the local official Calistani radio station.
She leans in close to my ear at a stoplight.
“We have to listen to this junk until we get beyond the zone. Plus, it helps when they do their state-mandated call to prayer.”
I’m looking into her eyes. They’re deep brown pools, warm and alive. She suddenly realizes I’m doing this. Then I lean slightly forward and kiss her.
And does she ever kiss me back.
Someone honks at us and she puts the car in gear, casting a glance at me. At first I can’t catch if it’s naughty or seductive, or some role she plays, but then the smile. The no-matter-what happy smile. And even though we’re listening to all the lies of some terrible Middle Eastern cheesy crooner who’s singing in a language neither of us understands, all sappy and over-emotional, we don’t care.
We kissed.
And anything is possible.
We pass out of the zone, through the official boundary of the Gold Coast, the mustachioed angry guards casually murdering us with their contemptuous stares. A block later she pulls out a tape cassette because this old sports car has a tape player. Or some retro vintage version of one that plays things that look like tapes. She glances at the one she grabbed from a knapsack behind her seat.
“Perfect!” she screams with delight. Then looks at me and smiles.
Later I will find out it’s a band called Social Distortion. From way back. Last century back. Before the Meltdown back. For now I only know they play searing hot guitar licks and driving beats while the singer thunders through a barrage of down-and-out anthems.
I know, heading into the old OC—she tells me that’s what they used to call the area once known as Southern California, now known as Calistan—I know I will remember that sun shining moment and the girl next to me forever. And the music surrounding us.
Nothing lasts. No matter how perfect an unexpected moment can be. Nothing lasts in this life. In the end, everything burns. And if you know that… then that perfect moment becomes even better.
So I lean back and watch the third world while listening to some good music from a long time ago and being driven by a mysterious and beautiful girl on an afternoon date.
Buy the ticket, take the ride, someone once wrote.
We drive through the slums beyond the zone. Crushing poverty and despair compete with satellite dishes and clothing lines strung across streets. Business seems piled on top of business in some places. In others, not a soul is to be seen and I notice the scarred pockmarks along the bullet-riddled walls and the old rusty sprays of not-spray-paint. We cross over an old freeway long perma-frozen with dead vehicles. Only one lane is open. The rest of the lanes are the permanent residences of cars and trucks and the occasional motor home that has been turned into a house. There are even vegetable gardens in containers along the medians.
And there’s always the constant hovering presence of Calistani helicopters. Old Russian Hinds and even the occasion Mexico war-surplus Cobra gunship. All of which must be at least a hundred years old. Somehow they still run. And still bristle with guns.
We weave through blocks of suburban waste that have burned down only to enter whole new blocks where gangs of children play in the street like small armies. Some neighborhoods are strictly Arabic, others definitely Hispanic, by what I can tell from the business signage. The Arabic neighborhoods seem generally better off, but only slightly so. It’s hard to believe places like this still exist in the modern world.
We enter a Mexican neighborhood known as Santa Ana.
“We’re safe now,” she tells me at a light over the mutter of the engine. My eardrums feel like they’ve been beaten to death by the sound of the engine. And… I didn’t realize we weren’t safe. “This is my barrio,” she says with pride.
A few streets later we pull up along an old Main Street USA from the last century. Brick-and-mortar buildings. Chipped gargoyles and crumbling scroll-worked stone. But every sign is in Spanish. Maybe it always was. Which seems odd considering the restaurant we’ve just pulled up in front of.
“This is my cousin Frankie’s place,” Chloe says. “They make the best pizza. And the Vietnamese mojitos are to die for.” She laughs and sets the parking brake.
She tows me inside. Angry young Mexican men lingering on the street cast those same casual glares of murder that the Calistani guards at the border of the zone did. But Chloe smiles at them and they seem suddenly helpless to do anything other than smile back. As though she has broken them and turned them into bashful little boys.
Inside the restaurant, little red-netted hurricane lamps on the tables cast dim illuminatio
n. Massive paintings of regal bullfighters dominate the walls. In candlelit alcoves, somber candles burn softly. The place feels more like a cathedral than a restaurant. High above, a stained-glass window—an Aztec warrior holding a bloody heart atop a pyramid—casts the room in a wash of crimson. Somewhere, someone quietly seduces a guitar.
A short, squat woman who looks more Chinese than Latina leads us to a table deep within the labyrinthine maze that is the restaurant. We slide into a deep banquette of ancient red vinyl. All around us candles are like fading stars in a universe that is only the color red.
“Neat place, huh?” she says with zest and slides close to me. Now it is her turn. She kisses me hard and bites my lip after the woman leaves us with no menus. A few minutes later we come up for air.
“Let me order, okay?”
Buy the ticket, take the ride.
I nod that this works for me. For some reason I can’t find my voice. And maybe that’s for the best.
Frankie arrives from the kitchen. He looks like her, but Asian. His hair is slicked back in dark thick strands and his forearms are covered in arcane tattoos. His smile is bright and white beneath his enigmatic Asian eyes.
“It’s good to see you, mi flamenca,” he says and bends down to hug her.
She babbles to him in Spanish and he back at her.
I continue to smile and dig on the cathedralesque weirdness of the place. Each facet reveals some new enigmatic twist.
Frankie leaves and Chloe throws herself at the menu he left. It’s as though she’s reading some holy and sacred text that reveals the meaning of life, the universe, and everything, if one could but pick the right combination.
Frankie comes back. Chloe throws down the menu in mock disgust and commences to beg.
“Frankie… can you make us your Pizza Ravi? Please, please, please, please?”
The way she begs has me wanting to make her a Pizza Ravi, whatever the hell it is.
And again… it isn’t the innate seductiveness she can’t help but exude… it’s something else. Some knight-in-shining-armor disease I have that makes me want to storm castles and slay dragons for her.
I really need to have that looked at by a specialist. It’s gotten me into trouble before and if I could think straight for a second I’d probably realize it’s going to get me in trouble again.
But she seems like fun trouble at the very least. At the most… something different. Something better than the last eighteen months. Something I’ve been looking for for a long time and didn’t know it.
“Of course I’ll make it for you, mi flamenca. Why else were such things created if not to offer to the most beautiful woman in Santa Ana? And of course… two Saigon Whores?”
Chloe laughs wickedly and clasps her olive-skinned hands together like a little girl who’s just discovered candy.
“The extra-special kind,” she purrs.
Frankie leaves as though on a mission. He isn’t just a cousin. He adores her, and she probably doesn’t know how much. Any man could see that.
She dives at me again. And when once more we come back up for air she doesn’t pull away. Instead she prefers to remain close as though interrogating me for some lie I’ve already told.
“You’re different,” she pronounces. “Very different.”
“Not so much,” I reply.
She shakes her head slightly.
“No. That’s a lie. But it’s what you’re supposed to say. So it’s okay.”
“What’s a…” My voice cracks. I’m thirsty. I clear my throat and try again. “What’s a Saigon Whore, exactly?”
She smiles devilishly and bounces her head side to side. “It’s fun. Vietnamese version of a mojito. Made with tequila instead of rum. Mescal. Some say it can even make you see the spirit world. But only when the moon is full. Game? Or are you scared?”
“Me…?” I shrug. “I’m the bravest man in the world. And thirsty too.”
Our drinks come out. They’re tall and slushy. Thai mint springs from rims in jungle-worthy profusion. The sweet herbal taste competes with the hot jet-fuel-grade tequila.
We raise our glasses and smile at each other like we’re daring the other to survive. And of course we laugh. The look in her eye is daring me to go for it. As though she told me a monster’s tale on a dark and scary night. And now it’s time for me to go touch the back of the cemetery wall all alone. A kid’s challenge.
I put the drink down.
Her smile falters.
She puts hers down.
“I know…” I begin, unsure where I’m going, but knowing I need to say what I feel. “I know this is all fast… and weird.”
Her face is suddenly sober and… still beautiful.
“I’m not with…” I struggle because I don’t want to profane this place, this afternoon, her… with Rashid’s name.
“Them,” she finishes when I can’t bring myself to say the name of our devil. I’ve gotten hung up on all the dead bodies from last night.
“No,” I croak. “Not with them at all.”
She murmurs those words back. But in another order, one she chooses.
“Not at all.” Like she’s in a dream. Or under some witch’s spell. Or reciting some sacred text. Or a forgotten song.
“No,” I say after I look around, checking the shadows for state-sponsored listeners. “I came because I was paid to. And…”
I gaze at all the enigmatic Hispanic beauty of this strange restaurant lost in the barrio. “And if I had known what I know now… I probably never would’ve come.”
A small silence falls between us. And I know somehow we’re each considering what that means. Or rather, that it somehow means we never would’ve found each other. Except we’ve just met. And that’s a lot to think about. The guitarist dances along some chords, plucking them out individually. Like he’s working on a moment that’s nothing but gossamer. Coaxing it to come alive.
“Probably?” she whispers softly.
“Except…” I begin, “for this. For you. And I get that I don’t really know you… but the other night when we just lay there… and now, with you, here…” I scan the crimson shadows and burning candles and the deep alcoves of strange paintings. “I feel like I would’ve done anything for… this.” But what I mean is… for her.
Her lips part slightly.
She takes my drink from in front of me and holds it up to those full cinnamon lips. Staring at me, she drinks.
Then says, “This one is poisoned.”
Chapter Forty-Seven
“We poisoned you…” she says as she sips from the drink that had been set in front of me. “I mean… we were going to poison you.”
Her eyes begin to glaze over.
“Not… really poison. Just… get you to answer a few questions. Truth or…” she giggles, “…or dare serum.”
She comes at me holding her drink, kissing me greedily, and suddenly she’s all hands.
I bring her chin up after a few hot seconds of this.
“Why?”
“Why what?” she asks, all doe-eyed and innocent. Her pupils are huge.
“Why poison me?”
She stares at me blankly.
“Me,” I prompt. “Poison.”
Awareness blossoms on her face like the sun suddenly destroying a perfectly beautiful rainy day.
“It’s not really poison.” She’s mostly in control of herself. A little… dreamy maybe. “We just wanted to know where Rashid will be tomorrow.”
“Why?”
“Oh,” she says with a sense of rapture. “We’re going to kill that pig dead, dead, dead.”
And then our meal arrives.
It’s gorgeous.
The surface of the pizza is a burnt golden orange with small pieces of sizzling charred chicken. Atop this, chopped cilantro a vibrant green dances with diced green onions. The aromatic punch of curry overwhelms the senses as steam rises up from the pie. I smell ginger and smoked paprika. The garam masala has obviously been lovingl
y cooked down with garlic and chilies.
Chloe gushes like she’s just won some major prize she didn’t deserve as Frankie stands proudly over our table. A moment later she has a piece up with both hands and is ravenously devouring it and moaning with happiness.
I down my drink, the one originally intended for Chloe. I’m still wondering if it’s poisoned too. And about that whole kill Rashid bit.
But I realize I’m starving and I pick up a slice and forget about everything that is the hellhole of Calistan.
The underside of the pizza is crispy. The top has bubbled and charred in places from the heat of the brick oven it was cooked in. As though the oven easily pushed into the thousand-degree range. The tangy tart bite of the tikka masala sauce hits me. It’s the very essence of savory. But it’s the dough, the crust of the pizza, that makes subjects such as being poisoned, and killing Rashid, seem like petty concerns read in some dime-store pulp ebook on a burner Kindle. The crust is both incredibly crisp on the bottom and chewy on the top. Thin, light, delicate… It’s like chewing a cloud with a nice crunch.
We devolve into a world of pizza for a little while. She moans and I eat. After a few slices I start to get thirsty again.
“Poisoned?” I ask, holding a slice up.
“Uh-uh,” she grunts between bites.
She catches someone’s eye and orders two more Saigon Whores. This time she doesn’t say “special.”
She keeps looking at me. Smiling and hungry.
Then she giggles.
“You know you can ask me anything… right now. I have to tell you the truth. I basically just roofied myself. Sorta…” She giggles again and tries to inhale more pizza.
I find her incredibly sexy at that moment and asking her questions seems inappropriate. But one does occur.
“Why didn’t you let me drink the poison?”
She puts down her pizza. I eye what’s left of this incredible pie and count the slice she’s just discarded as fair salvage once we reach the last division.
“Because you’re so sweet,” she says.
Our drinks arrive.
I drain half of mine in one go. Even the not-extra-special Saigon Whores are… special. The room swims and I feel… let’s just say groovy.