The Elementals (16 page)

“I do.”

“You look thin.”

“These guys? They cook almost as well as you do. They feed me all the time.”

She smiled. “Well, that’s good to hear. I haven’t been cooking much lately.”

I pulled my T-shirt over my knees and sat huddled like that, looking out the window. She kept watching me. Then she said, “I didn’t want to bring this up, but that thing you said about Jennifer Benson a while back, about looking for her before you started therapy? I was wondering if you’re still doing that.”

I could tell by the tone of my mom’s voice that she really didn’t feel like talking about it but had worked herself up to ask me anyway.

“I was freaked out when I got there. It’s better now. I’m sorry if I scared you.”

She smiled a little and I was glad I had lied to her. “That’s good to hear. I know this has been hard.”

“Don’t worry about me,” I said. “You need all your energy to get better.” And I meant it, too. But part of me wanted her to be my mommy, to worry and fuss and ask countless questions and not let me go away again.

She did not ask questions, though, when I asked to take the car that night. Besides, she always went to sleep by nine now.

I drove by Mr. Kragen’s house and parked in the shadows. His Taurus wasn’t there and only the porch light was on. I wanted to run to the back, smash a window with my sweater-wrapped fist, stalk around that bookless house to find the evidence I needed. If Kragen came home I wanted to slap him in that pudgy face and tell him to fuck off before I ran. But my body wouldn’t move from the car seat and my thighs were sweating so much they stuck to the leather upholstery.

My phone signaled a text and I jumped as if Kragen’s eyes were peering bulbously through the window at me. When I saw it was from John, the adrenaline continued to pump, but for a different reason now.
pick u up 2morrow nite 8.

Then a car—pulling up into Kragen’s driveway; the headlights shone in my face and I ducked my head reflexively, turned the key in the ignition and drove away.

*   *   *

The next night I sat waiting on the front porch. It had rained that evening—an unexpected spring shower—and the air was still fresh. The streets were greased with rainbow puddles and the roses were hung with quivering drops of water. I didn’t smoke, but sitting there made me want to take out a cigarette and light it, watch the tip smolder against damp darkness.

They pulled up—it was all of them. Part of me had hoped it was just going to be John. They were dressed up as usual and I was prepared this time. I’d rummaged through my mom’s closet and found a velvet dress with an embroidered corseted bodice that she’d worn to the Renaissance Faire when she was young. She even had a pair of brocade slippers. I’d curled my hair and put it up on top of my head with some loose strands falling around my face. I’d also found some fake pearls to decorate it with.

Perry whistled as I lifted my skirt a little around my ankles to get into the car.

“You look beautiful,” John said.

I smiled at him and he leaned over and kissed my cheek. I was blushing right away, thinking about Tania watching us.

“Where are we going?” I asked. I felt bold and free, much less self-conscious than usual. This was my world now, I thought, a city whose secrets I knew, not the dreamworld of the house where they had all the control.

“Our friends are having a party,” John told me.

We headed east down the broad, flat expanse of Ventura Boulevard. If you came from outer space you’d think all we did was drive and eat and shop; perhaps it was true—then south up Laurel and into the canyon itself where the road narrowed, twisting among the trees where water had once cut out a path in the rock.

“Wait,” I said, “this is one of the secret places I was going to tell you about.”

They were all quiet and I looked back to see Tania and Perry regarding me calmly. Of course, they already knew. I had nothing original to give them. In Laurel Canyon there were the haunted-looking ruins of the mansion where Houdini had once lived and there were castles and cottages where rock royalty had stayed in the 1960s and ’70s. Neil Young. Jim Morrison. Frank Zappa. Joni Mitchell. Fleetwood Mac. Everyone had lived there. Now bands still rehearsed in ramshackle buildings, hoping to channel the music that had been made before. Evening primrose and poppies covered the hills. There were rumored to be underground catacombs. Deer and coyote ran, sometimes to their death, darting across the road in darkness.

But where we went wasn’t like anything I’d seen before.

The house tumbled down the hillside, a cascade of crumbling stone steps. There were thick balustrades lining the front and stone lions crouched on either side of the entrance, guarding it. Thick, squat palm trees crowded around and morning glory vines clambered over the terra-cotta-tiled roof. Bougainvillea and oleander bushes added splashes of bloodred and pink color. Luminarias in paper bags lit our path as we climbed up to the front door.

We heard laughter and a young woman answered. She had elegant features and her long hair gleamed in the candlelight that filled the house behind her. Her dress had the same dark sheen.

“There you are!” She hugged them all, John last, her fingers tightening around his shoulders so that I found myself tensing with the same force she exerted.

“Claudia, this is Ariel,” he said, extricating himself.

She took my hand regally and raised her thin, arched eyebrows. “Ariel. So you’re the missing piece?”

I blinked back at her and Tania swept past me, pulling me into the house. The paint was peeling off the walls, the lace curtains were torn and the Persian rugs on the tiled floor were faded and threadbare but the whole place still had a feeling of grandeur. Large old oil paintings of vibrant fruits and flowers against dark backgrounds—I thought of Danish still lifes I’d seen in museums with my parents—hung in chipped gilded frames on the walls. Like in the Berkeley house, old books were everywhere. The air inside the place had a cool, piney scent.

We walked into a large room. There were more paintings on the walls but these were portraits of young people—pale, and with large, haunted-looking eyes. I felt a chill go through me like a ghost on its way across the room.

“What are those?” I whispered to John.

“Eamon made them,” he said, nodding at a tall blond in a white suit who had walked in.

Eamon hugged and kissed Tania, Perry and John, then greeted me the same way. He smelled minty and his hands felt cool.

“I like your work,” I said, looking back anxiously at the paintings, although “like” wasn’t exactly the right word.

He smiled thinly. “Thank you, Ariel.”

John took my arm and led me toward the open window. It looked out over the canyon below, what had once been a gorge made by rainwater now overgrown with wildflowers and eucalyptus trees and built up with houses. The lights of cars and windows shone out of the darkness. Crickets chirped a mating song, creating a vibrating wall of sound. A breeze with a slightly citrusy scent, and fresh from the rain, came in and cooled my neck.

I wished John and I were out there, in the night, alone, away from this place.

“Come eat!” called a voice and a girl with rather large ears sticking out from her short red hair appeared at the door of the room, waving her hands around. She giggled hellos to everyone and gestured for us to follow her into the dining room. Large picture windows overlooked a rectangular tiled pool, aglow with blue phosphorescence in the night, and, beyond that, the distant lights of the city.

The smell of the food made me ache almost like the thought of John did. We took our seats and Claudia, the woman who had answered the door, came in with another young man, also very tall, dressed in black and with long black hair like hers. Both of them were carrying plates of food.

He and the redhead were introduced as Demitri and Fallon. I smiled vaguely at them, eyeing the food; I hadn’t eaten dinner and my stomach was growling. There were an array of what looked like Italian dishes, bruschetta, polenta, pasta salad, grilled vegetables, fettucini in a light green sauce. There was also red wine to drink, like the kind I loved in Berkeley. I hardly paid attention to anything except the food and the wine. Even the fascinating faces around me seemed to fade—even John’s face seemed to fade.

Then, as my stomach ached full and I leaned back against the green velvet chair in a stupor, I heard someone say, “If you partake of the food of fae you can never leave. Isn’t that how it goes?”

*   *   *

I woke in a candlelit bedroom, in a large canopied bed. I sat up, startled, and looked around, trying to place where I was.

“It’s okay,” I heard John’s voice say. “It’s okay, sweet one, I’m here.”

He was beside me, I saw, fully clothed. I could smell a warm, sleepy scent wafting off of him. His hands stroked the hard lines of my back. My bare back. I realized I was only wearing my underpants and a thin cotton nightgown. My hands reflexively covered my breasts as I sat up.

“Tania undressed you,” he said. “I hope that is okay. The dress seemed so heavy and hot.”

I could hear the worry line on his brow in his voice. “It’s okay,” I said. “Thank you for staying with me. What time is it?”

“About five in the morning.”

“Shit! I have to call my mom.”

He handed me my bag and I found my cell phone and called. No one answered so I left a message saying I was fine, still out with my friends. Then I dove back against John’s side, snuggling up to him, winding my bare legs over the rough, heavy fabric of his jeans.

“Who are they? Your friends?”

“They’re old friends,” he said. “Eamon and Fallon are brother and sister. Eamon’s the painter like we said. Claudia’s an actress and Demitri is independently wealthy, although no one knows exactly from what.”

“I’m sorry I passed out again,” I said. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Maybe I should see a doctor.”

Now I could hear the smile on his lips. “You’re fine. Just sometimes it takes a while to get used to us, especially the drinks.”

“But I felt like I was going to pass out the night I met you.”

He stroked my hair, pushing a strand behind my ear. “Maybe you were overcome with wonder at my charm, as I feel when I am with you.”

“Weirdo!” I said, poking his rib cage.

He slithered down so we were face-to-face on the pillows. “May I kiss you?” I tilted my face up and his lips fastened to mine with a gentle pressure that made me feel as if I were falling, falling down through the earth among the roots of a tree, in a cascade of leaves and flower petals. I clutched at John’s shoulders through his shirt. I didn’t think I could wait much longer to have him naked beside me.

“I want to feel your skin,” he said as if he’d read my mind. “May I?”

I nodded and pressed my fingertip against the pad of his lower lip, staring up at the planes of his face. A glimmer of light was coming through the curtains. My hands traveled down to his collar, to the buttons of his shirt. I slowly pressed the button through the buttonhole with my thumb and forefinger. His chest was smooth and hard, very pale with only a little hair. He winced slightly.

“Are you okay?”

“My heart is very open right now,” he said.

“Should I stop?”

He took my hand and moved it back to his heart. “No.”

I finished unbuttoning his shirt and slid it off his shoulders. They curved white and defined as sculpture against the dim background of the room. I gasped to see him and he silenced me with his lips again.

I could feel myself going to the otherworld but I didn’t want to go. I wanted to stay here with him. I held onto his back tightly, trying to remain in the room.

My hands found his belt buckle and fumbled with the metal.

“I should take that off,” he said. “I don’t want it to hurt you.”

I laughed. “Yes, that’s a good reason.”

He unbuckled it with one hand, the other still holding me close to his chest, then pulled the belt out of the loops. I could see the long, hard shape in his jeans. My hands went there of their own will, my fingers running along the ridge of his zipper. Now, in turn, he gasped.

“I need to lie with you,” he said. “I want you so badly.”

I nodded, suddenly mute. Words seemed impossible to find.

John took off his jeans and lay naked on the large bed. His body gave off a pulsing white light. There were framed mirrors all over the walls and they reflected us again and again. I put my arms around his chest. He was broad enough that I couldn’t encircle him, but I tried, stretching myself out. He shuddered softly. He was erect and I wanted to stare at him but I kept my eyes on his face. I pulled myself closer, lying on my side, my legs over his. I couldn’t tell if the shaking came from him or from me.

“I will make love with you soon,” John said. “If you will have me. But I want this part to last as long as possible.”

I nodded and kissed him again.

*   *   *

In the woods a small thatched cottage shone with firelight. Smoke swirled like ghosts from the chimney. I walked up, leaves crunching dry under my feet. An owl whoo-ed in the tree above me. I saw it take flight, a span of white wings ruffling the darkness.

An old woman opened the door. Her hands were gnarled and she was smiling toothlessly. She beckoned me in. The room was small and cozy with large pots of boiling liquid on the stove and bunches of dried herbs and flowers hanging from the ceiling.

John was there, seated by the fire, hunched over with his back to me, holding something in his hands. I came and knelt before him. He kissed my forehead. His lips felt cool on my burning skin. He offered me the object he was holding and I took it—a locket on a chain. I opened the filigree heart. Inside was a portrait of a girl, very similar to the paintings Eamon had made.

The girl, with her soft-looking hair and big dark eyes, was Jeni.

*   *   *

I gasped and reached out my hands in the dark and John held me close to his chest so that I felt the reverberations of his voice.

“I’m here. We’re here,” he said.

We lay in that bed with the thick canopy, in that room of mirrors, and kissed and touched each other and dozed and woke and kissed again throughout what was day but felt more like a timeless floating. I went in and out of the otherworlds. John, he tugged the nightgown down over my shoulders and kissed my breasts, massaging them with his hands, his tongue flicking against my nipple, then his whole mouth sucking. I groaned and threw back my head and his fingers found my throat, lightly circled it so that when I swallowed I felt the slight pressure of him there. I kept thinking,
This is John Graves here with me. This is his body that contains his brain and his lungs and his heart. This is where his soul lives. This is not just sex; this is us going somewhere together. This is us finding each other. Again.