Cherokee Bat and the Goat Guys

C
herokee Bat loved the canyons. Beach-wood Canyon, lined with palm trees, hibiscus, bougainvillea and a row of candles lit for the two old ladies who had been killed by a hit-and-run, led to the Hollywood sign or to the lake that changed colors under a bridge of stone bears- Topanga Canyon
wound like a river to the sea past flower children, paintings of Indian goddesses and a restaurant where the tablecloths glowed purple-twilight and coyotes watched from among the leaves. Laurel Canyon had the ruins of Houdini’s magic mansion, the country store where rock stars like Jim Morrison probably used to buy their beer, stained-glass Marilyn Monroes shining in the trees, leopard-spotted cars, gardens full of pink poison oleander and the Mediterranean villa on the hill where Joni Mitchell once lived, dreaming about clouds and carousels and guarded by stone lions. It also had the house built of cherry wood and antique windows where Cherokee lived with her family.

Cherokee always fell closer to animals in the canyons. Not just the stone lions and bears but the real animals—silver squirrels at the lake, deer, a flock of parrots that must have escaped their cages to find each other, peacocks screaming in gardens and the horses at Sunset Stables. Cherokee dreamed she was a horse with a mane the color of a smog-sunset, and she dreamed she was a bird with feathers like rainbows in oil puddles.
She would wake up and go to the mirror. She wanted to be faster, quieter, darker, shimmering. So she ran around the lake, up the trails, along winding canyon roads, trying not to make noise, barefoot so her feet would get tougher or in beaded moccasins when they hurt too much. Then she went back to the mirror. She was too naked. She wanted hooves, haunches, a beak, claws, wings.

There was a collage of dead butterflies on the wall of the canyon house where Cherokee lived with her almost-sister Witch Baby and the rest of their family. At night Cherokee dreamed the butterflies came to life, broke the glass and flew out at her in a storm, covering her with silky pollen. When she woke up she painted her dream. She searched for feathers everywhere—collected them in canyons and on beaches, comparing the shapes and colors, sketching them, trying to understand how they worked. Then she studied pictures of birds and pasted the feathers down in wing patterns. But it wasn’t until Witch Baby began to bury herself that Cherokee decided to make the wings.

Witch Baby was Cherokee’s almost-sister but they were very different. Cherokee’s
white-blonde hair was as easy to comb as water and she kept it in many long braids; Witch Baby’s dark hair was a seaweed clump of tangles. It formed little angry balls that Witch Baby tugged at with her fingers until they pulled right out. Cherokee, who ran and danced, had perfect posture. Witch Baby’s shoulders hunched up to her ears from years of creeping around taking candid photographs and from playing her drums. Cherokee wore white suede moccasins and turquoise and silver beads; Witch Baby’s toes curled like snails inside her cowboy-boot roller-skates and she wore an assortment of whatever she could find until she decided she would rather wear mud.

One day. Witch Baby went into the backyard, look off all her clothes and began to roll around in the wet earth. She smeared mud everywhere, clumped handfuls into her hair, stuffed it in her ears, up her nostrils and even ate some. She slid around on her belly through the mud. Then she slid into the garden shed and lay there in the dark without moving.

Cherokee and Witch Baby’s family, Weetzie Bat and My Secret Agent Lover Man,
Brandy-Lynn Bat and Dirk and Duck, were away in South America shooting a movie about magic. They had left Cherokee and Witch Baby under the care of their friend Coyote, but Cherokee hated to bother him. He lived on top of a hill and was always very busy with his chants and dances and meditative rituals. So Cherokee decided to try to take care of Witch Baby by herself. She went into the shed and said, “Witch Baby, come out. We’ll go to Farmer’s Market and get date shakes and look at the puppies in the pet store there and figure out a way to rescue them.” But Witch Baby buried herself deeper in the mud.

“Witch Baby, come out and play drums for me,” Cherokee said. “You are the most slinkster-jamming drummer girl and I want to dance.” But Witch Baby shut her eyes and swallowed a handful of gritty dirt.

Cherokee heard Witch Baby’s thoughts in her own head.

I am a seed in the slippery, silent, blinds breathless dark, I have no nose or mouth, ears or eyes to see. Just a skin of satin black and a secret green dream deep inside.

For hours, Cherokee begged Witch Baby to
come out. Finally she went into the house and called the boy who had been her best friend for as long as she could remember—Raphael Chong Jah-Love.

Raphael was practicing his guitar at the house down the street where he lived with his parents, Valentine and Ping Chong Jah-Love. Valentine and Ping were away in South America with Cherokee and Witch Baby’s family working on the movie.

“Witch Baby is buried in mud!” Cherokee told Raphael when he answered the phone. “She won’t come out of the shed. Could you ask her to play drums with us?”

“Witch Baby is the best drummer I know, Kee,” Raphael said. “But she’ll never play drums with us.”

Raphael and Cherokee wanted to start a band but they needed a bass player and a drummer. Witch Baby had always refused to help them.

“Just ask her to play for you then, just once,” Cherokee begged. “I am really worried about her.”

So Raphael tossed his dreadlocks, put on his John Lennon sunglasses and rode his
bicycle through sunlight and wind chimes and bird shadows to Cherokee’s house.

He found Cherokee in the backyard among the fruit trees and roses knocking at the door of the shed. Witch Baby had locked herself in.

“Come out. Witch Baby,” said Raphael. “I need to hear your drumming for inspiration. Even if you won’t be in our band.”

Cherokee kissed his powdered-chocolate-colored cheek. There was still no sound from inside the shed.

Cherokee and Raphael stood outside the shed for a long time. It got dark and stars came out, shining on the damp lawn.

“Let’s go eat something,” Raphael said. “Witch Baby will smell the food and come out.”

They went inside and Cherokee took one of the frozen homemade pizzas that Weetzie had left them when the family went away, and put it in the oven. Raphael played an Elvis Presley record, lit some candles and made a salad. Cherokee opened all the windows—the stained-glass roses, the leaded-glass arches, the one thai looked like rain—so Witch Baby would smell the melting cheese, hear it sizzle
along with “Hound Dog” and come out of the mud shed. But when they had finished their pizza, there was still no sign of Witch Baby. They left two big slices of pizza in front of the shed. Then they set up Cherokee’s tepee on the lawn, curled into their sleeping bags and told ghost stories until they fell asleep.

In the morning, the pizza looked as if it had been nibbled on by a mouse, Cherokee hoped the mouse had tangled hair, purple tilty eyes and curly toes, but the door of the shed was still locked.

Witch Baby would not come out of the mud shed. Cherokee finally decided she would have to ask Coyote what to do. With his wisdom and grace, he was the only one who would know how to bring Witch Baby out of the mud.

Early that morning, Cherokee took a bus into the hills where Coyote lived. She got off the bus and walked up the steep, winding streets to his shack. He was among the cactus plants doing his daily stretching, breathing and strengthening exercises when she found him. Below him the city was waking up under a layer of smog. Coyote turned his head
slowly toward Cherokee and opened his eyes. Cherokee held her breath.

“Cherokee Bat,” said Coyote in a voice that reminded her of sun-baked red rock, “are you all right? Why have you come?”

“Witch Baby is burying herself in mud,” Cherokee told him, “She won’t come out of the shed. We keep trying to help her but nothing works. I didn’t know what else to do.”

Coyote walked to the edge of the cactus garden and looked down at the layer of smog hovering over the city. He sighed and raised his deeply lined palms to the sky.

“No wonder Witch Baby is burying herself in mud,” he said, looking out at the city drowning in smog. “There is dirt everywhere, real filth. We should not be able to see air. Air should be like the lenses of our eyes. And the sea … we should be able to swim in the sea; the sea should be like our tears and our sweat—clear and natural for us. There should be animals all around us—not hiding in the poison darkness, watching with their yellow eyes. Look at this city. Look what we have done.”

Cherokee looked at the city and then she looked down at her hands. She felt small and pale and naked.

Coyote turned to Cherokee and put his hand on her shoulder. The early sun had filled the lines of his palm and now Cherokee felt it burning into her shoulder blade.

“The earth Witch Baby is burying herself in is purer than what surrounds us,” Coyote said. “Maybe she feels it will protect her. Maybe she is growing up in it like a plant.”

“But Coyote,” Cherokee said, “She can’t stay there forever in the mud shed. She hardly moves or eats anything.”

Coyote looked back out at the city. Then he turned to Cherokee again and said softly, “I will help you to help Witch Baby, You must make her some wings.”

A strong wind came. It dried the leaves to paper and the paper to flames like paint. Then it sent the flames through the papery hills and canyons, painting them red. It knocked over telephone poles and young trees and sent trash cans crashing in the streets. The wind made Cherokee’s hair crackle with blue electric sparks. It made a kind of lemonade—cracking
the glass chimes that hung in the lemon tree outside Cherokee’s window into ice and tossing the lemons to the ground so they split open. It brought Cherokee the sea and the burning hills and faraway gardens. It brought her the days and nights early; she smelled the smoky dawn in the darkness, the damp dark while it was still light. And, finally, the wind brought her feathers.

She was standing with Coyote among the cactus and they were chanting to the animals hidden in the world below them, “You are all my relations.” It was dawn and the wind was wild. Cherokee tried to understand what it was saying. There was a halo of blue sparks around her head.

“Wind, bring us the feathers that birds no longer need,” Coyote chanted. “Hawk and dove. Tarred feathers of the gull. Shimmer peacock plumes. Jewel green of parrots and other kept birds. Witch Baby needs help leaving the mud.”

The wind sounded wilder. Cherokee looked out at the horizon. As the sun rose, the sky filled with feathery pink clouds. Then it seemed as if the clouds were flying toward
Cherokee and Coyote, The rising sun flashed in their eyes for a moment, and as Cherokee stood, blind on the hilltop, she felt softness on her skin. The wind was full of feathers.

Small, bright feathers like petals, plain gray ones, feathers flecked with gleaming iridescent lights like tiny tropical waves. They swirled around Cherokee and Coyote, tickling their faces. Cherokee fell as if she could lift her arms and be carried away on wings of feathers and wind. She imagined flying over the city looking down at the tiny cars, palm trees, pools and lawns—all of it so ordered and calm—and not having to worry about anything. She imagined what her house would look like from above with its stained-glass skylights and rooftop deck, the garden with its fruit trees, roses, hot tub and wooden shed. And then she remembered Witch Baby slithering around in the mud. That was what this was all about—wingg for Witch Baby.