From Black Rooms (21 page)

Calvin looked so morose, so utterly overcome by the awareness of his own failure, that Natalie felt guilty for bringing up the subject. "I'm sorry," she said, preparing to drop the matter. "It just seems like...such a waste."

"Not that much of a waste." His gaze wandered from her, and at first Natalie thought he wanted to avoid looking her in the eye. Then she fol owed his line of sight to the portrait she'd drawn of Cal ie embraced by Dan's spirit. The slanting light from the kitchen cast it in an even more ghostly aura.

"You want to know the truth? Why I copy the masters?" he asked. "Because I don't have what you have: a vision. I can look at one of your pictures, I can recognize its bril iance, understand how it works its magic. I can even replicate it in a mechanical, Xeroxmachine way. But when I try to come up with something myself...Nada."

Natalie watched him, wary that he might be handing her a come-on line, but his dispirited, wistful tone

convinced her of his sincerity. Calvin Criswel , the most gifted artist she'd ever met, envied her--and his envy flattered her more than his praise. "Thanks," she began,

"but I don't think you give yourself enough credit."

"I don't think you give yourself enough credit, Natalie. If I could do what you do, I'd never mess with dead people."

Cal ed upon to justify how she'd squandered her own gifts, Natalie didn't know what to say.

"I never had a choice," she whispered, doubting her own rationale. She'd always blamed the Corps for

denying her admittance to its Art Division and

railroading her into law enforcement. But wasn't that merely another excuse she'd used to postpone her

artistic ambitions, to put off final judgment of her own creative worth? Even now, wasn't she doing exactly what Calvin had done--churning out the work of Dead White Guys instead of her own?

"Maybe you're right," she admitted. "But you don't need to mess with dead people, either. I know you have a vision of your own, Calvin. You just have to find it and have faith in it."

He let out a dry chuckle. "Something you believe in."

"What?"

"Nothing. Something your daughter told me." Before she could inquire what that was, he brought out his usual raffish grin, his shield against seriousness back in place. "Okay, you got to ask your personal question. Now it's my turn."

Equal y eager to change the subject, Natalie propped herself on one elbow. "Yeah? And that would be?" He fluffed a few locks of her black, pixie-cut hairdo.

"Why this wig? I like the red one better." Natalie didn't know whether to laugh or groan,

remembering how Dan had charmed her by

complimenting her hair, no matter which color she wore.

"For your information, a disguise is supposed to divert attention, not attract it," she said to explain why she'd picked her drabbest hairpiece for the undercover

operation that afternoon. "And while we're on the subject of hair...lose the bil y-goat look." She indicated his would-be beard. "The Beat Generation ended in the fifties."

"Oh." He fingered the goatee as if he'd forgotten it was there. "Part of the whole image thing. To some of my customers, the beard's the only thing that separates an artist from a homeless person. Which isn't far off, actual y."

Natalie laughed. "You know, you'd actual y be kinda cute without that fuzz on your face."

"And you'd be gorgeous even with a goatee." The earnest way he said it threw her. It took her a moment to crack a grin. "Now I know you're just trying to butter me up."

"No, I'm serious. I couldn't believe it when you showed up at my apartment. Munch's drawing didn't do you justice."

Natalie ignored the fluttering acceleration of her pulse.

"Oh, yeah, I'm beautiful, al right. But not when I have black hair." She tossed a few strands of her wig for emphasis.

"I didn't say that. I only said I liked the red one better." Calvin admired her with those green-violet eyes, which now seemed miraculous rather than misbegotten.

Natalie didn't know who moved closer first. Certainly not her. She hadn't kissed a man since Dan died, for her attempts at romance inevitably ended in disaster. Nevertheless, her face and Calvin's gravitated toward each other until his breath warmed her lips...

...then jerked back from the brink the moment they heard the slap of her father's slippers on the stairs. Clad only in an old hotel bathrobe, Wade descended until he came in view of the living-room couch.

"Hey, kiddo, could I borrow some of your floss? I ran-Oh, gosh." Shading his eyes to emphasize that he wasn't watching, he did an about-face and hurried back the way he'd come.

"Sure, Dad. Help yourself!" Natalie cal ed after him. She put a fist over her mouth to keep from laughing aloud.

Calvin lay back with his hands behind his head,

whistling with exaggerated innocence. When a couple of minutes had passed without further interruption, he shot her a mischievous look. "Think it's safe to try again?"

"I guess we'l find out." She listed toward him, and his mouth rose to meet hers-"Mom, I can't sleep." Calvin and Natalie peeled away from each other again, and she craned her head around to face Cal ie, who stood at the foot of the stairs in her bare feet and flannel nightgown. "What is it, baby girl?"

The girl stiffened with den mother disapproval as her gaze shifted to Calvin. "I had a dream about Dad." Natalie wondered if her face had turned as red as it felt.

"Oh? What was it?"

"Never mind. It was only a dream. Didn't mean to
bother you." She thumped up the stairs and out of sight.

"Cal ie! Cal ie!" Failing to draw her daughter back for an apology, Natalie turned to Calvin. "You'l have to forgive her. She--Hey, wait!" She caught hold of his T-shirt as he was about to climb out of bed.

He shook his head and tried to rise again. "I don't think this was such a good idea. You take the bed. I'm not gonna sleep much, anyway."

Natalie did not let go. "Don't take it personal y. Cal ie was very close to her father...she's done this to every guy I've seen since."

"Oh, that makes me feel better." Calvin rol ed his eyes, but reclined beside her again.

"We could give it one more try...

"What? And have Serena barge in on us? I can't wait to see how passive-aggressive she'l be."

"Relax. Serena's gone." She prodded his side, a teasing lilt in her voice. "Third time's the charm."

"Or the jinx." He pushed himself onto his side again and gazed into her face, stroking her drab black locks with his fingertips as if it were her real hair and red, the way he liked it. "What the heck."

Calvin lowered his lips onto hers, and this time no interruption prevented the contact. Natalie curled her hand around the back of his neck to hold him there, pul him closer. Pressure, soft yet insistent, growing with the release of inhibition. Mouths widening as tongue-tips darted out to touch and dance...

Then the giddy head-rush of the kiss ended with a sharp intake of breath as Natalie's lips drew air. Calvin pushed away from her, and Natalie almost growled in frustration.

This was no petty disturbance, however. Shock had bleached Calvin's face bone-white, and his entire body vibrated with the tremors of incipient seizure.

"Calvin! What is it?" She reached to comfort him, but the gesture only panicked him.

"D
on't touch me!" He practically fell out of bed to get
away from her, landing in a sitting position beside the couch in an embryonic crouch. "My God. I can feel your mom--and your stepmom--and Lucy--and

Arthur and... He slapped his head as if it were a radio with poor reception. "...Ruskin? Russel . And more-too many. They're al here." In awful comprehension, Natalie raised her fingertips to touch the deceptively tender contours of her lips. That kiss had been the first time that Calvin had come in contact with her bare skin. "Jesus, Calvin." In the heat of the moment, she'd forgotten that she, too, could be a touchstone for al the dead people she'd known and loved: Nora Lindstrom, her mother, and

Sheila Lindstrom, her stepmother, both butchered by Vincent Thresher, as wel as Lucy Kamei, Arthur

McCord, Russel Travers, and al the other friends Evan had eviscerated during the Violet Murders. Like

Clement Maddox, Calvin apparently soaked souls up from the environment like a sponge, without a true Violet's ability to sift the knocking and select the inhabitation.

"Take slow, even breaths," Natalie instructed him. She took her own advice so that Calvin wouldn't see her own alarm at his condition. "You're going to be fine." He did as she said, and his tremors subsided.

"That's it. Stay nice and calm. I'l be right back." She scampered to the kitchen and pawed past the bottles of cleanser under the sink to grab a pair of rubber Playtex gloves from a box beneath the drainpipe.

Natalie slid her hands into the gloves and pul ed the cuffs of her long-sleeved knit sweater down over her wrists so that there would be no exposed skin. When she returned to the living room, she was gratified to hear Calvin reciting the alphabet again.

He won't end up like Maddox, she told herself.
Squatting beside Calvin's hunched form, Natalie

displayed her insulated hands to get his attention. "I won't touch you again, I promise. See? These wil

protect you. And tomorrow we'l go to Boston, and Dr. Wax wil tel us how to keep this from happening to you. But you've gotta hang in there, okay?"

His mumbling trailed off, and he lifted his head as if it were the weight of the earth. "I'm trying. Please don't
give up on me."

She avoided his weary, wanting gaze, and Serena's warning replayed in her head. I wouldn't get too

attached to Calvin if I were you, Nat. Things don't look
good for the boy.

Maybe her friend was right. Maybe that doomed kiss was an omen, a warning. Bad things befel the men Natalie became involved with. She couldn't do that to Calvin, too.

"I'm sorry," she said. "It's my fault. I shouldn't have-it won't happen again. Try to get some sleep." With the passivity of the hopeless, Calvin got back into the sofa bed, and Natalie careful y arranged herself beside him so as not to brush against any part of his body. At some point during the molasses hours of early morning, however, Calvin slipped his bare hand into her gloved grasp, which he gripped the way an infant

wrings comfort from a security blanket. They remained linked like that until dawn, united yet separated, the only boundary between them a thin layer of latex and the unresolved threat it represented.

17

Queen of the Wannabes

TO THE WORLD AT LARGE, SHE WAS AMANDA

BETHANY PYNE, AN UNDERACHIEVING highschool senior notable only for her predilection for black lace clothing, heavy eyeliner, and a garish assortment of neon-colored wigs. But here, in the sanctum of her bedroom, with her wig off and her violet contacts on, she became Amalfia, world-famous conduit for the

North American Afterlife Communications Corps.

The ecstatic chil she felt as she admired her gaunt reflection in the vanity mirror made it easy to imagine that a soul was knocking, eager to inhabit her. As always, she began by buzzing an electric razor over her bare scalp, which she shaved more assiduously than her legs. The pattern of dots she'd had tattooed there a couple weeks back had final y stopped hurting. They weren't actual y node points since she didn't have node points, but there were twenty of them and the tattoo artist had distributed them in a realistic fashion. Amanda thril ed at the authenticity they gave her. Her parents would doubtless freak if they ever found out that she'd spent two months' al owance to deface herself for life. She giggled at the thought. Maybe seeing her head spotted like an Easter egg would make Mom and Dad stop bugging her about the wigs she

wore. Better purple or lime-green hair than no hair at al , from their point of view.

Amanda's violet lenses gleamed in the wavering light of the sandalwood-scented candles that burned in

sconces at either side of the mirror, thickening the air with their musky incense. She leaned close to the mirror, her dul brown eyes staring through the stained glass of her contacts at the captivating irises of the Violet before her.

Amalfia.

Stroking her stubbly scalp until she raised goose bumps beneath the tatted black webbing of her top, Amanda rose from the chair at her vanity table and swayed to the music smoking from the speakers of her boom box:

ambient trance laced with Gregorian chant. She shut her eyes, pretending that the lul of the melody and the scent of the candles were the sense-memories of a forlorn spirit seeping into her psyche.

From the world you know to the world you knew, she
rhapsodized. Come to me, come to me, come on

through!

Her spectator mantra. Unlike some of the Violet posers she knew, she had composed her own rather than

cribbing Goth song lyrics or snatches of Poe and

Baudelaire. So whom would she permit to possess her tonight? Chopin, possibly, eager to draft a new concerto with her hands? Or maybe Cleopatra would relate, with coquettish insouciance, how she intoxicated and

subjugated the most powerful men of the ancient

world--advice Amanda could use in her own love life. She had taken French and Latin classes for just such an occasion, garnering the only A's she'd received in high school.

Perhaps the knocking soul was simply some forgotten murder victim whose only hope for justice was to reveal her kil er to Amalfia. Amanda had once aspired to be a homicide detective, having always loved murder

mysteries and true-crime books. In fact, it was one such book that led to her infatuation with conduits: Plucking
the Violets by Sidney Preston, the New York Post
reporter who initial y broke the story of the Violet Kil er's murder spree. After that, Amanda col ected every Violet tie-in item she could--DVDs and posters from the various movies and TV shows that featured conduit characters, art prints of posthumous

col aborations painted by Violet artist Hector Espinoza, even CDs recorded by NAACC musician Lucinda