A Quarrel Called: Stewards Of The Plane Book 1 (21 page)

56. SAM

Same place, same time, same bat channel.
Yep, the rave was going good and I felt like I was home. Several of the dancers
remembered me from the last one and came up to tell me that they liked my
mixes—especially my finale song—and that really made my night. Of course, it
didn’t hurt that Lily had changed back into her risqué outfit of red vinyl
heart pasties and black stretch pants.

She hung out in the DJ booth more this time than last time,
but she still was on her
walkie
a lot, or sometimes
her cell phone. I gathered that she was coordinating some sort of big event for
the finale, though I couldn’t fathom what would be more amazing than the
incense dropping out of the ceiling like that.

The owl was still on the wall behind me, still lit up like a
psychedelic Christmas tree and pulsing in time with my music, but this time
there was a screen up on the opposite end of the warehouse showing movie clips.
Most of the movies were older and had some sort of cult status. A few I
recognized, most I didn’t.

“The crowd likes your music,” she said, coming up to yell in
my ear.

I felt her naked skin brush against my hand, and I snaked my
arm around her waist. “That’s the point.”

Her red lips turned up at the corners, and she leaned in a
little closer. “I’m still waiting to see what you’ve done with the song I gave
you.”

I glanced at the clock and then up at the owl, which
curiously, because of the play of lights across its face, seemed to be staring
down at us. “We’ll find out in thirty minutes.”

“Oh, is that the time?” She pulled back a little bit. “I
better go get you a drink then. Something stronger than all these red bulls
you’ve been drinking.”

“I wondered if you were going to foist mystery substances on
me again.”

“What kind of hostess would I be otherwise?”

And just like that she was gone, and I was left to set up
the last couple of mixes and wait for her to come back.

Another creepy vibe slid along my back, this sort of
ticklish sensation over my left shoulder, and I couldn’t help but look back at
the owl again. It was still staring at me, and it freaked me out a little bit.

“What the hell do you want?” I asked it, irritated.

Fuel
.

I stared up at it in disbelief.

WTF was that?

I got a serious set of heebie-jeebies, and the hair on my
arms stood up like it was suddenly twenty-below in the room. And then Lily was
back, grinning at me like a vixen, waving some sort of blue drink in a martini
glass at me. “What took you so long?” I asked, shoving the psychedelic owl, and
what I
thought
it said, out of my
mind.

“There was a line at the bar, but I had Hugo make this
special for you, on the side. I got one for myself, too.”

“So do we toast or something?”

“Not yet. We wait until the finale.
Then
we toast.”

“Two songs left.” I gestured at the board.

“Then I guess we dance.”

I snaked my arm around her waist again; her version of
dancing looked a lot more like making out.

Ten minutes went fast, and I had to let her wipe the red
lipstick from my face before I turned around to queue up the last song of the
night. I watched the clock count down from thirty seconds to three o’clock in
the morning, and as I pushed the button for my dubstep mix of “Riders on the Storm,”
the lights on the dancefloor dimmed. Smoke machines rolled in at the four
corners of the dance floor, and the screen across the way now showed a desert
landscape, just after sundown, the sky over the mountain range filled with
swathes of orange and purple. The film sped up and storm clouds rolled in. I
grinned. This was freaking awesome.

The dancers cheered and swayed to the opening bars, gyrating
wildly as the electronic beats slammed home. Lily rubbed up against me from
behind, and her hand swung around, arm curving around my chest, blue concoction
in a martini glass held up to my lips.

“It’s now or never, Lover,” she purred.

I drank the liquid, cool and citrus-y as it went down my
throat, and wondered idly why it was now or never. As the liquid warmed my
belly with that familiar alcohol feel, I watched the floor and almost laughed
in amazement as a large plasma ball descended from the ceiling. Purple and red
electrical surges pulsed from the center and flickered to the circumference of
the sphere as the dancers cheered and lunged in to touch it. As they touched
it, their hair rose on end and thin streams of purple energy swam through the
fog, joining them all together.

“That’s freaking cool,” I said, watching as sometimes one
person, sometimes a group of dancers, were added into the gyrating mass,
connected by the thin, translucent stream of purple energy. As the energy
moved, sinuous and snakelike, it came closer and closer to the DJ booth. I felt
the hairs on my arms rise again, as if static were everywhere in the air, but
curiously, even though I reached my fingers out to touch it, the stream of
energy pulled away from me and Lily to find dancers farther down the line near
the speakers.

“I wonder why it didn’t connect to me like everyone
else?
” I asked, vaguely disappointed.

Lily danced around to the front of me and slid her hands
beneath my shirt. She stepped up on her tiptoes and nibbled on my neck. “Who
knows?” she breathed against my skin. “Who cares?” And she pulled my head down
toward her inviting red lips.

57. MELODY

Gram had me weeding the garden again, which I didn’t mind so
much now that I remembered how to feel the energy of the earth. And Tara had
come over early to help since G. had to work. She promised to hang with me and
watch stupid movies and then join G. later for hotdogs on the grill with his
Dad.

“What do you think he meant?” I asked finally, breaking the
unspoken silence between us regarding the Spirit Board.

“Who, Matthew?”

“Yeah. ‘
She’s not who she seems.’
It’s vague.
Really vague.”

“I guess it’s only vague because we don’t know who he’s
referring to. We could make a list?”

“So let’s see: me, you, Gram…”

“Shelby, Brittney,” she added. “We know Orla is a place and
not a person, so I guess we can leave that out.”

“Yeah.
Who else do we know? Lily?”

Tara paused and shared a long look with me. Her expression
was thoughtful. “That’s a good one,” she said. “I had pretty much forgotten
about her.”

“Have you met her?” I asked, decidedly not meeting her gaze.
“What does she look like?”

“No, I’ve never met her. I don’t think G. has either, unless
you count that weird dream he had. But the way he tells it, she didn’t look
like a normal person in his dream, so I’m not sure that counts anyways.”

“What do you mean, not normal?”

“He said her eyes were black and beady, and shadowed as if
they were sunken into dark pits. He made her sound ghoulish.”

I frowned. “She can’t look too ghoulish in real life or else
Sam wouldn’t be so smitten with her.” Did that sound bitter? I couldn’t tell. I
snuck a glance at Tara to see if she noticed. “I wish Sam would figure out the
audio on that recording we did already,” I said to change the subject.

“He’s probably not even awake yet.”

“Are you kidding? It’s, like, two o’clock in the afternoon.”

“Yeah, and it’s freaking hot outside too. The shade from the
tree has moved on… I’m going to be really burned after this,” she said. “You’re
going to owe me big-time.”

“You know I love you,” I said, throwing a clod of dirt at
her. “Let’s quit here. I can finish the rest tomorrow.”

“Hallelujah,” she said, and fell backwards onto her butt in
the grass. “I wish you guys had a pool,” she said suddenly.
“Because
I really need a shower or something.”

“You know what we could do?” I asked, a sudden idea
glimmering in the back of my mind. “We haven’t done it for ages.”

“What?”

“We could run through the sprinklers!”

“I don’t have a swim suit.”

“You can borrow one of mine.”

“Yeah, like my rack will fit in your suit. I don’t suppose
it’s also an itsy-bitsy, teeny-weeny, yellow bikini, is it?”

I grinned. “Come on, I have a one piece that will fit you
fine.”

We spent about thirty minutes acting like six year olds in
the cool water from the sprinklers before decorum got the better of us, and we
decided to air dry in the shade, glasses of cold lemonade at our side.

“You know what’s weird?” I said, suddenly.

“Everything’s weird with you lately,” she said, dodging my
punch in her arm.

“I feel all tingly.
Energized, except it’s
all over my skin.
My hands especially feel weird. Good, but weird.”

Tara nodded sagely, her yellow, curly hair draping down her
back like thick, wet ropes.
“Well that sort of makes sense.
If you’re going to cleanse a crystal of negative energy and influences, you
either put it in the sunlight, or on the ground, or out in running water, and
it drains the negativity away. And basically, that’s what we just did with our
bodies, right? Our bare feet on the ground, water running over us in the
sunshine. That’s
gotta
be like the mother
load
when it comes to cleansing. The only thing we didn’t
have with us was rock salt. But that would probably ruin your grass…” She took
a sip of her lemonade, peering at me over the rim of her glass.

I decided to surprise her and just nod. I didn’t protest
because it was all starting to make a weird sort of sense in my brain. Science
was magic. Magic was real. Magic was everywhere all the time, and all I ever
had to do was be open to it? Is that how it worked? “So I guess that’s why some
people get that seasonal affective disorder. They need the sun to charge them
up. Like batteries.”

She shrugged. “I suppose so, I’ve never thought about it.”

After a time I said, “I can’t stand it anymore. Let’s go
over to Sam’s.”

“Okay. To be honest, I am as anxious to find out what he’s
got as you are.
But food first.
I’m famished.
Cavorting in the water like a little kid is hard work.”

“Who knew?” I said, grinning.
“Sandwich?”

“Big sandwich,” she said.

58. SAM

Mom didn’t wake up until ten, which gave me and Lily plenty
of time to get dressed and pretend that she hadn’t spent the night in my room.
I made pancakes, Lily made coffee, and Mom sat at the kitchen table and talked
to us both. I could tell that she liked being home and feeling normal. I think
she liked Lily, too, but it was too soon to tell for sure.

“So you travel for work?” Lily asked, setting a cup of
coffee down in front of Mom, sugar and milk just how she liked it.

“More than I’d like,” my mom admitted and took an
appreciative sip of the coffee. “Japanese coffee is good but very different.
It’s nice to have a cup of regular old
joe
.”

“I thought Japanese people drank mostly tea?” I asked,
flipping some fresh pancakes onto a plate and passing it over to Lily, who gave
it to Mom.

“Oh, they do. But they also have these crazy vending
machines everywhere. Some of them have cans of creamy, sweet coffee in them and
you can order it hot or cold. It’s called Georgia coffee and it’s good, but
it’s really more like a dessert than something to kick-start you in the
morning.”

“Do you go to Tokyo often?” Lily asked, clearly intrigued.

“Several times a year.
Also Beijing, Saigon, and Taipei.
Basically once a month I
head off for the Far East. One of these days, maybe I will get to drag Sam with
me on a trip.
Before he heads off to college anyways.”

“Really?
That’d be cool, Mom,” I
said, surprised. She’d never mentioned the idea to me before, but then there
are lots of things she says that she doesn’t follow through on. I might as well
add visiting Japan to that list.

“Sure. Harris said it was do-able. I talked to him about it
last week. Probably not until after the first of the year though, because the
holidays are such an expensive time of year for airfare, etc.”

I raised my brows and flipped another batch of pancakes onto
a plate for Lily. I smiled over my shoulder at her, and Mom and spooned out the
last of the batter onto the hot griddle. Going to Tokyo would be freaking
awesome, if she actually followed through, and I was beginning to wonder what
had gotten into my mom. She seemed more like her old self this morning than she
had in a long time.

Echoing my unspoken thought, she said, “I really feel
refreshed this morning. I thought for sure I would be crazy-jet lagged, too.
Traveling back from Asia is always tedious. Oh, speaking of travel, I have some
errands to run this morning. Can you throw my travel clothes in the dryer for
me while I’m gone? And if you don’t mind hanging them up…”

I turned the griddle off and brought my plate to the table.
Lily slid a hot cup of coffee at me and I gave her a wink and a smile, like a
cheap Humphrey Bogart impersonation. Then I glanced sidelong at Mom. “I don’t
know. That might cost you extra,” I said.

She took a forkful of pancakes and weighed it against an
empty hand. “Let’s see…. Trip to Tokyo,” she said, lowering her empty hand, “or
hanging up my clothes,” she lowered her other hand for a second and then raised
it back up.
“Hmm, tough choice.
I can see where you
might have to think about that one.” She trailed off and after a moment she and
Lily giggled at my dumbstruck face.

Lily laughed out loud. “I see laundry in your future,” she
said, reaching out to grab my hand.

I grinned.

#

“So what’s this
audio
from again?”
Lily
asked,
scooched up next to my desk on a kitchen
chair. “It looks all choppy.” She pointed to a section on the graph.

“I know. It’s from a… Spirit Board thing we did the other
night. It was pretty
sick
.”

“Really.
A Spirit
Board?
How old are you guys anyways? Twelve?”

I sat back in my chair and gave Lily a long, steady look. “I
know,
its sounds stupid. But trust me when I say that
weird shit is happening, and I managed to capture some on tape.
Er
, hard disk.
Except I can’t seem to
decode it.
It’s like
it’s
encrypted or
something, which actually doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. Whoever heard of a
ghost speaking in GPG?”

She leaned over and tweaked my mouse, going through the
settings and options of the software. “What if it’s just a codec issue?”

“How could that be?” I asked, frustrated. But I took the
mouse from her and scanned through the list of codecs I had installed and
downloaded a few that I didn’t have. I plugged them in and was about to restart
the audio again when I heard the dryer buzz. “Crap, give me a minute, will you?
I have to go hang those up for her before they get wrinkled.”

“Sure,” she shrugged.

I hung Mom’s blouses and pants up as quickly as I could,
anxious to get back to the computer and to Lily. Then the doorbell rang and I
heard Lily call from the front of the house.

“I’ll get it,” she said.

Coming from the laundry room, I felt a weird vibe in the air
before I even got close to the front door. And when I saw who was there, I knew
why. Tara and Melody were standing on the stoop, trying to act natural, and
Lily hung in the doorway, her body draped against the doorjamb like she owned
the place.

“Sure, I’ll tell him you’re here,” she said coolly.

“Oh, hey.
I see you’ve met my…
Lily?”

I ignored the curious look coming from Lily’s corner and
concentrated on Tara and Melody, neither of whom was actually looking at me at
the moment. Their eyes were all for Lily, who I had to admit, looked hot in a
pair of cut-offs and one of my favorite t-shirts. And then I realized which
t-shirt and cringed –
The Ramones
.
Melody recognized it. I know she did—she was the one who gave it to me.

“I, ah, am working on the audio from the other night. Maybe
you guys want to come in and see what I’ve—”

“We’ve,” said Lily firmly.

“—come up with so far?” I finished. This was awkward. The
only thing that would make it worse is if I were naked.
Seriously.

Tara recovered first. “Sure. Maybe you can bring your rig
out here though, so we don’t have to … crowd in your room?” she finished
brightly.

“Yeah,” I said.
“Great idea.
I’ll
meet you guys in the living room.”