Swansong (40 page)

“How’s it going?” she quips.

* * * * *

My entire body shakes.

“Ah, man,” Modesto says.  She slaps her hand against her earpiece in annoyance.  “You’d think bugging tech would get with the times already.”

Judas lies face down in a pile of his own blood, a bloody hole drilled into the back of his skull.  His eyes are wide open.  Gray eyes have lost their wet translucence.

“Wake up,” I beg him.  He’s my brother.  I don’t care.  I don’t care what he’s done.  “Wake up.”

“Pipe down, will you?  And hold still,” Modesto says.  “I want a clear shot.”

He won’t wake up.

Modesto raises her pistol.

I see red.

I lunge at her as the gun goes off.  The bullet streaks past my shoulder.  I can hear it dislodging the plaster in the wall behind me.  I slam into Modesto’s chest.  I slam her back against the wall.  I punch her—her stomach—whatever I can reach.  It’s no use.  She’s wearing a vest.  My knuckles split open against her brick armor.

My left hand is covered in a large red burn.  Bumpy skin grafts climb up my wrist.

The barrel of a gun presses against my skull.

A hand grabs my hand.  A hand pulls me out of the way.  The stray bullet pierces Judas’ drawers, blowing them apart, splinters and shredded paper raining across the room.

Azel pulls me behind him.  His curls fill my vision, my vision blurry.

“The heck did you come from?” Modesto says.

She sees—

“Wendy,” Azel says.

“Judas.”  I can only say my brother’s name.  “Help him.  Help—”

Azel turns around.  Azel takes my hand.  My left hand—my scarred hand—my scarred hand in his—

—It’s bright.  It hurts—

—The brightness is the watery winter sun pouring in through the factory window.  A swan sleeps soundly on my paint canvas.  Messy books clutter the red silk prayer rug.

Kory and Annwn lift their heads, as if alerted by a sound.  Maybe it’s me.  Maybe I’m crying.

I’m crying.

“Wendy,” Azel says, and kneels with me.  Id, Ego, and Superego all in one room with me.

“We have to go back,” I tell him.  Judas isn’t dead.  Judas is—  Judas isn’t Judas.  Judas isn’t dead—

You were at the center of the universe.

“Did something happen?” says Annwn, sounding dazed.

“Bring him back.”  I can’t stop stammering.  I can’t stop crying.  My tears feel cold.  My head feels hot.

“We can’t,” Kory says.

How?  How can’t they?  They are me and I am the universe and the universe is dreaming and we are all that dream—

My burn scar came back.

“I want my brother back.”  I won’t take no for an answer.

“Wendy, for God’s sake,” Kory says irritably.  “Forget about that for a second.  We have to hide you; you’re in danger.”

Jocelyn and I were in danger.  Jocelyn and I were going to run away.

“Be kind,” Azel rallies back at Kory.  “Put yourself in her position.”

“I
am
in her position, you twit!”

“Are we safe here?” Annwn asks.  She still sounds dazed.  “Can that woman find us?”

Kory sits cross-legged on the floor.  “If she’s been bugging the apartment…”

“I’ll keep a lookout,” Annwn says.  She mills out to the balcony, azure ribbon tangled in her 1950s curls.

Judas is gone.  Judas is dead.

No way.  Not him.

Everybody I love leaves me.

Azel takes my shoulders in warm, soft hands.  Azel left me.  Azel came back.  That’s one person I love.  That’s—

Where are my meds?  I don’t have my meds.  Will I lose him again?  I don’t want to lose him.  I’m tired of losing everyone.  Id and Ego and Superego.  My mind’s been fractured.  I don’t care.  I’ll stay broken.  I’ll stay broken if it means I can keep him.

Maybe—maybe I can break my mind up even more.  I’ll be just like Adam.  I’ll break my mind into tiny splinters and one of them will be Judas and Judas will come back to me.

That’s it.

Adam, don’t you dare wake up yet.

Kory lets out a sound of impatience.  He rises off the floor.  “I’ll go with Annwn,” he grumbles.  “Make sure she doesn’t jump off the side of the building…”

He heads outside.

“Wendy,” Azel says.

It’s another world.  Azel and I.  It’s a world-within-a-world.  I can escape the world without leaving it.

“Judas is not dead,” I tell Azel.

He hesitates.  He doesn’t want to upset me, I think.  That’s okay.  He doesn’t know.  He doesn’t realize.

All of reality is inside your head.  Change what’s inside your head, and you change reality.

* * * * *

Azel sits with his back against the wall, his arm around me.  I’m wearing two jackets—but I don’t know where they came from.  I’m wearing his scarf.

His fingers are gentle in my hair, like the strings of a harp.

I smile at him.  I hope it isn’t as weak as it feels.

“I thought you were gone,” I say.

The burn on my hand.  It’s back.

I wasn’t in a car accident.  Why do I have burn scars if I wasn’t in a car accident?

“I’m never going to leave you,” Azel says.  “Not willingly.”

Why does he look so guilty?  It’s okay.  Doesn’t he know that it’s okay?

“Where are your sisters?” I ask.  “Are they alright?”

“They’re fine,” Azel says.  He looks cold in his cotton jacket.  I take his scarf off, drape it around his shoulders.  “Thank you.  Dad took them to the movies.”

“That’s nice of him.”  My dad’s not the movie type.  We watch soccer together, though.  He calls it football.

“It’s that new Wooper Looper movie.  The 3D one?”

“Ick,” I say, with a little smile.

“My sentiments exactly.”

I wonder what Kory and Annwn are doing.  I wonder whether it’s still snowing outside.

“Wendy…”  Azel’s forehead creases.

“We’re going to Cape Meares this summer,” I say.  “Right?”

He pauses.  He nods.

“I’ll teach you how to swim.”  The sun.  I love the sun.  I love the sea.  “You can meet my dad.”  I hide—not very well—another smile.  “He’s a big guy.  He’d get along with your dad.”

“What?  Wendy—”

“It’s fine, Azel.”  I know it is.  “It’s fine.”

He pauses again.  “I’m cold,” he realizes.  He looks tired, too, the skin around his eyes sagging.

I can feel Judas’ blood matting my hair.  “I’ll get you some blankets.”  I stand.

“Blankets…?”

Joss left them here.  The blankets.  We were sharing blankets.

I walk over to her striped pink curtain.  I pull it aside.

“Wendy—”

I find the blankets.  I take them back to Azel.  I sit with him.

“Thank you,” he murmurs, his mouth slack.  He takes the pile and parts it.  He wraps a blanket around his shoulders.

I pick up my badger brush.  I toy with it between my hands.  Azel rests his head back against the mural on the wall.  I look at the City High poster on the wall opposite us.  I don’t know anyone who listens to that band.

“That woman wants to kill you,” Azel murmurs.

“She’s not going to.”

“We’re going to protect you.”

“No.  It’s okay.”

“I want to protect you.”

“I’m the one who’s going to protect you.”

Azel wavers.  “Your hair.”

I don’t say anything about it.  I can’t.  There’s no blood in my hair.  Judas isn’t dead.

Azel walks over to his side of the hideout.  He talks to me while he moves.  I think he’s trying to calm me down.  It’s weird, because I’m already calm.  When he returns he’s got bottles of water in his arms.

“Do you need help?” I ask.

He sits with me once more.  He opens the water bottles, wets his fingers.  He combs his fingers through my hair, washing the blood away.

There isn’t any blood.

“Azel?”

“What is it?”

“We’re just a part of Adam’s dream.  Right?  The universe is having a very long dream.”

“Yes,” Azel says at length.  ” ‘We are such stuff as dreams are made on.’ “

“I’m going to find Adam.”

Azel looks alarmed.  It’s funny, though, because the look doesn’t last long.  “I’m going with you.”

I grip the badger brush against my knees.  He dries his cold hands on a particularly threadbare blanket.

Azel laughs humorlessly.  “My name means Noble Lion.”

“Really?”  That’s…  It’s really endearing.

“I’m named for Ali, the Prophet’s son-in-law.  His nickname was
Azel Asadullah
—Noble Lion of God.”

There’s something very poetic about that, I think.

“Ali was devastated when his wife died young,” Azel tells me.  “He loved her deeply.  He wrote, ‘She was my flower from Heaven who came and went, but whose scent will remain forever in my mind.’  He never remarried.”

It’s sad.  I don’t know why he’s telling me this.

“Please don’t be like that flower,” Azel says quietly.  “People love you.  I’ve told you that before.  I was talking about me.”

Oh.

Oh.  Of course.

A smile spreads across my face.  It doesn’t feel like a regular smile.  The way it pulls at my lips, it makes me think of sunsets on Tillamook Bay.  The ocean pulls the scattered sunlight across its waves like a child covering himself in a quilt.  Nothing can touch him in the safety of his home.  Not when his parents are just outside his bedroom.

I’ve always thought that all stories should be love stories.

“I’m not going anywhere,” I say.

“Yes, you are,” Azel says.  “But I’m going with you.”

* * * * *

That evening I step out onto the concrete balcony.  I hold onto the frail, rusted railing.  I watch the way the snow swirls in the sky, the way the dying sunlight bleeds into gray clouds.

“Hrm,” Kory says, disconsolate.

“This reminds me of a song,” Annwn says peaceably.  “The one from the Snowman cartoon.”

“What are you talking about?” Kory returns.  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Well,” says Annwn, mildly put off.

“Is she coming?” I ask.  I huddle under Jocelyn’s jackets.

“Not yet,” Kory says, troubled.  “I don’t know what we’re going to do when she arrives.  I suppose we could throw the kerosene lamps her way…”

“Boom,” Annwn agrees.

Kory looks at her funny.  “Yes.”

“It’s cold out here,” I say.  “Shouldn’t we go inside?”

“I’m not bothered,” Annwn says.  She rests her hands on the metal rail.  Nothing can ruffle her quaint smile, her curls, her sleepy eyes.  “Alighieri’s Hell is a cold one.”

No kidding, I think.  Right now I’d give anything for the warmth of the summer sun.

I look down at the empty city far below, the seamless sidewalks blanketed in white.  My stomach tilts.  I feel like I’m falling.

“You’re not,” Kory says; back against the railing, hands in the pockets of his camouflage jacket.  “We couldn’t possibly let you fall.”

I tuck the badger brush behind my ear.

* * * * *

From my bedroom window I can see all the tiny white cottages scattered about Tillamook Bay.  Their windows glow with uniform light.  It’s nighttime, the sky blue-gray-black and the moon half-cloaked with it, the stars as numerous as the foaming ocean waves.  It’s enough to make a girl go snowblind.

The moon rises and the night connects us.

Joss bursts through the door like she owns the place, long, dark hair streaming behind her.  She’s dressed in her pajamas already—Elvis Presley, go figure—a knapsack hanging from her arm.  Maybe we’re getting too old for sleepovers.  That doesn’t mean I want to stop having them.

“I brought Hyland’s
and
Premsyn,” Jocelyn informs me, with a great air of importance.  She drops her bag on the floor.

“Cramps that bad, Joss?”  I crack a smile at her expense.

“Why are girls the only ones who bleed like wounded jackals every month?  You can’t blame the world for being sexist when even God’s a sexist!  Another thing!  Those disgusting boys from Pacific West were sipping Listerine in the pharmacy aisle again.  I had to walk past them just to get my ouchie meds!”

I feel so bad for her, I make sure to give her a hug.  She reciprocates tersely.  She wrinkles her face at the posters beside my brass bed, the bed piled with wrapped bulk canvases.

“What?” I ask, wilting.