Across Carina (28 page)

He turned to the driver.

“On to Perunda,” he instructed.

It was hard to forget. Everyone always wanted me to just
forget
.

The driver held his reins in silence. His back was nearly straight, and it was the first time I’d seen a chariot driver anything but at ease in his greedy comfort zone.

The ride to Perunda was quick and quiet. Sal and I held each other close, not one speaking, and I marveled at all I had seen.

The chariot skidded to a halt in the parking lot of an abandoned warehouse, and Sal and I were jolted out. We hit the pavement and watched our driver disappear into the night.

I stretched out my leg, having landed the wrong way. My ankle felt like it was sprained. But getting injured was not on our docket. We didn’t have the time.

Sal helped me to my feet, and we stumbled out of the lot. The moon was clouded over, and we could scarcely see our hands. We wandered down the road, our path lit only by street lamps and stars.

My leg felt better after walking on it for a minute. I brushed the dirt off my clothes as best as I could so that I would look presentable to the people on Perunda. Sal and I needed to make a good impression, network with some people to find El, and go home.

Admittedly, part of me still worried about going home. I worried that Earth would change my relationship with Sal—that either he or I would be different there or that the culture shock would send him over the edge.

I was eager to spend at least one fine day with him on Perunda. And in case we never found El, I wanted to live on the best alternative to Earth. Getheos was too volatile, Lendon was too naïve, and The Mango Sun no longer existed. Not that I would have chosen Charlotte over the others.

As Sal and I approached an intersection, we saw several cars driving between tall, slender buildings and a few others stopped at a light. It was like a scene from Earth. We became so excited that we nearly forgot we
weren’t
on Earth.

Sal pushed me under the awning of a closed bookstore and kissed me. It was only the third time he had kissed me, and I’d almost forgotten what it felt like. There had been too many disruptions in our journey.

I pulled on Sal’s collar until he was completely pressed against me. His warmth radiated through our borrowed clothes. I ran my hands through his thick hair, and he parted his lips just enough to slip his tongue to the roof of my mouth.

I lifted off. I was floating in the best way. Sal kissed me again, lingering on my bottom lip, and then gently pulled away.

Our gaze broke at the sound of a couple walking by. Sal stepped back, clearing his throat, and I began to straighten my shirt. My cheeks were flushed.

We walked along. Sal asked me what the plan was, but neither of us knew. We passed a dimly lit gas station and then a large stone building with a dome top.

“This place is a lot like Earth,” Sal said. “And on Earth, people don’t always take too well to strangers asking them where to find God. I’m not sure how to go about this.”

“Is that who we’re looking for?” I asked. “God?”

“I would imagine creators and gods are the same,” Sal said.

I sighed. “Religion just seems like a strange concept, considering what we’ve seen. I’ve almost accepted Cruz, Artemis, and the rest of them as alien leaders or something.”

“Can religion and science not coexist?” Sal asked. “Can a god not have created science, even magic? Isn’t it all the same?”

I didn’t know how to answer his questions.

“Well I don’t know how to reach El,” I said. “Aside from just trying to talk to him, I guess.”

“Right . . .” Sal said slowly. “Because we’re in his channel now.”

I gasped. “Of course! Why didn’t we think of this before?”

Sal opened his mouth to say something, but then stopped. There were five teenage boys in baggy jeans and graphic tees loitering at the next street corner. They gave Sal a once-over and then let their eyes wander to me.

Sal took my hand and led me around them. I noticed that one of the boys had a scar that stretched from the corner of his left eye down to his chin. He caught me looking at him, and our eyes locked. Then all of the sudden I couldn’t see him.

I was in a kitchen. There was a man standing at the counter, where a little boy was sitting with his legs dangling over the edge. The boy’s diaper was full and much too small for him. He was crying, and the man, presumably his father, was screaming at him with a knife in hand.

The man threatened the boy with no dinner, then with no food for a week. Tears matted the boy’s eyelashes as he reached for his father, who had started to pace the kitchen. The man was rubbing his temples, and I could see how sweaty his hands were.

The knife began to slide out of his shaky, wet grip. He stopped and stood still, looking down at the knife and then at the boy.

In a climax of rage, he slashed his own son.

The kitchen pulled away, and I found myself back on the sidewalk. My knees buckled.

“What is it?” Sal asked, catching me.

He looked at the boys, but they had started to move. The one I’d locked eyes with glanced back at me once before shuffling along.

“Jade?”

Sal shook me slightly.

“I think I was just in his mind,” I said.

“Whose mind?” Sal asked.

I pointed. “That
guy’s
. Something happened when we looked at each other. There was this man with a knife, and a baby, and . . .”

Sal looked at the boys again, but they had almost rounded the next corner.

“Let’s keep moving,” he said.

We walked a few more blocks and stumbled upon a café with its doors open. The smell of fresh pies and coffee was flowing through the air.

Suddenly, I remembered how hungry I was.

“What do you think the currency is here?” I asked.

Sal frowned. “Probably something we should have been looking for in space.”

“I guess our driver wasn’t so crazy,” I said.

I looked as a young man walked out of the café holding a plate of assorted pastries. He sat down at one of the tables lining the sidewalk and picked up an éclair. I watched him eat it in slow, savoring bites as chocolate and icing smeared across his lips. Every few bites, cream spilled on his fingers, and he licked them, not missing one drop.

“We’re not going to be able to last here for very long,” Sal said.

“In front of this café or on Perunda?” I asked.

“Both.”

We hurried across the street, nearly bumping into a man who was crossing the opposite way. He and Sal exchanged glances, and I nudged Sal to ask if he’d seen anything. He replied that he had not.

“I’m not crazy,” I said. “I know what I saw.”

“I believe you, Jade, but right now I’m not worried about that,” he said. “We need to get out of here, and none of these people look like good contacts for reaching El.”

“Well that’s a bit of a blanket statement,” I remarked.

He sighed. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I’m just anxious, and I can’t see how we’re going to make it out of here.”

“Can’t we just summon El like we summon the drivers?” I asked.

Sal didn’t reply. There was a woman walking toward us in knee-high boots and something red and lacy—either a long shirt or a short dress. Her hair was thrown into a sloppy updo, and she had makeup smudged around her eyes.

“Ma’am, do you have the time?” Sal asked.

She started to brush by him without a word.

“Ma’am?” Sal repeated.

She stopped and turned around, doing a double take. Finally, she looked down at her watch.

“It’s just past midnight,” she said.

Her mouth was caked in red lipstick.

Her eyes met Sal’s, and his hand fell out of mine. After a few seconds, he quietly gasped, and then the woman ran out of sight.

“I saw it,” Sal said.

“What is it?” I asked. “Are we seeing their thoughts?”

“No. We’re seeing their memories,” he said. “And they can probably see ours.

“It’s too late for us to be out in a place like this. We need to find somewhere to sleep for the night. We’ll figure this out in the morning. Look for a park—anything.”

He wrapped his arm around me and led us to the sidewalk in long strides.

“I’m surprised you remember what a park is,” I said. “How are you doing? You haven’t been anywhere like this for years.”

He nodded several times. “I’m fine. I’m a little out of my comfort zone, but fine.”

“Just making sure,” I said, wiping my cheek.

It was suddenly wet, and I looked up to see that it had started to rain. I quickened our pace, blinking back the raindrops.

“Great,” I muttered. “We don’t need a park—we need shelter.”

As we scampered between awnings, I feared that I wouldn’t get any sleep that night. It didn’t help that I was wired. I wasn’t sure if I had been sleeping too little or if I had been sleeping too much. The days had amassed into one cloud of time.

Thunder rumbled as we turned onto Dewey Street. It was a dark and empty street lined with vacant buildings and burnt-out lamps rattling in the storm.

We ran until we reached the end of the street. It was a dead end. The rain was pouring now, and we had nowhere to go.

There was only this building across from us. It sort of looked like a house, except it didn’t have a mailbox. It was comprised of twenty stories of weathered brick that narrowed at the roof, and it had rows of shutterless windows reflecting the outside. There was a
333
crudely painted in black on the awning over the front door. It was the only door. One way in, one way out.

Sal smiled and pulled me under the awning.

“Do you think someone lives here?” I asked.

“I hope not,” Sal said, “because when they wake up they’ll have two new pets on their porch!”

“Only if you’re the cat!” I teased.

Sal laughed and pushed me, and I almost slipped on the sidewalk. I clenched my fists and tried to growl at him, but we erupted into giggles. Energy was gushing from my brain into my hands.

I threw my head back and started to fist-pump to an imaginary techno song. Sal started to beatbox, his head shaking erratically every fourth beat. We danced until the front door of the house opened and a man in overalls and a beard emerged.

Sal and I stepped back, partially into the rain. I didn’t care that I was instantly soaked. I didn’t want to be close to the man in the overalls. His eyes were inhuman, all black between the lids.

“Are you here for the party?” he asked Sal in a deep voice.

He didn’t acknowledge me.

Sal didn’t say anything. He was still beatboxing, though under his breath, looking between the man and me.

After several seconds, his eyes turned black. They looked just like the man’s. I tried to tell him, but my tongue felt tied—literally forked and bundled.

He cast a pleading look at me, as if I knew something, and then out into the rain before answering the man.

“Yes,” he said. “We’re here for the party. Three-thirty-three Dewey Street, right?”

The man folded his arms across his chest. The buckles of his overalls were about to snap.

“I’ll need the password,” he said.

“The password,” Sal repeated. “Of course.”

His voice had become monotonic.

We had never received a password.
I
knew that, but for some reason Sal didn’t.

He stuck his hand in his pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. He opened the paper and showed it to the man. It had a few doodles on it, but that was it.

To my surprise, I wasn’t worried. In fact, with each second I was becoming less interested in what was happening outside the house and more interested in what was inside. My tongue was loosening with my thoughts.

When I focused back on the man, his eyes were drifting to my chest. I stared him down—not with repulsion, but with allure. He noticed me, and we locked eyes.

I saw all of his past conquests. Young, naïve girls. Many of them had tried to fight beneath the force of his weight, only to be left with rounded stomachs and pitted hearts.

Before I could say anything, the man ushered Sal and me into the house. I followed him eagerly, despite what I had just seen. I knew that he was vile, but I also knew that my thirsts could be quenched inside the house. And I had become increasingly hungry and aroused. I was sickened by it, and yet I couldn’t stop it. I was splitting into two.

The man told us to make ourselves comfortable and then strolled back through the door, promising to return. I didn’t dare tell Sal what I’d seen. He would turn us right around.

Or maybe he wouldn’t. His eyes were still black.

“What did you see?” he asked me.

“Just his childhood on a farm,” I said.

“I don’t believe you,” he said, but his placid tone indicated that I wouldn’t have to prove otherwise.

The foyer was dark. It was lit only by the crescent moon, which had come out and was shining through three skylight windows.

As our eyes adjusted, we could see an elevator ahead. It was illuminated in a soft gray glow. Sal pulled me to it and pressed the only button on the wall. The elevator doors swung open with a
ding!

“I guess we’re going up,” he said.

Inside we were faced with our reflections turned every which way. The elevator was a four-way mirror, a funhouse waiting to spin our reality.

“Eerie,” I said, smiling at myself.

It was all so distracting that I almost missed the panel beside the door. But there it was, embedded in the glass. There were twenty buttons marked for the floors of the house.

“Who in the world lives here?” I asked.

Before Sal could answer me, I pressed on.

“And why are we seeing people’s memories?”

He gasped at the sight of his eyes. I didn’t say anything, because I didn’t want him to feel bad.

There was something in the house—of that I was certain—but I didn’t know how to resist it. I was both aware of and subject to its lure. Even the infinite copies of my face and the back of my head had me stepping closer to the mirror.

I felt that I was moving toward another person, not myself. The longer I studied my eyes, my cheekbones, my clavicle, my ribcage, the more my features morphed. My hair lightened and curled, and I half expected to turn into Charlotte. The house seemed a place where she would be lying in wait to possess me.