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Rolling
over Blackman Street, an invading army of live music jetted from open doors of
the cement block building. Even over the unmuffled roar of the Uohali Benny
could hear it, feel it. It thrust
into his brain and pounded with the beat of his heart until he lived it.
Stunned
by what he heard and saw he breathed a soft, “Yo.”
This
was his first, ever. Between the so-called reformatory and assorted crap, he
had never, ever, been to a real
party. Excitement made him queasy, kind of sick.
Angie
screamed a wild, wide-eyed shriek. She pounded a fist on his back and Benny
knew he was right to come. He belonged here, with her. Love blossomed in his
heart. Angie was the greatest. He was hers for life and she was his.
Snarling
a grin, Benny looped the Night Sun into the rough, coal dirt and rock parking
lot.
Carl
pounded down the road, slivers of sharp red rock cutting into gashes caused by
Leda’s shattered plates. Chilling wind slashed at his bare skin. Rain struck
Carl from a lowering sky. He felt none of it.
Benny
. . . Anna needed him. Really needed him. God, but with Anna he always felt so
useless. The kid was in the deep end, Carl sensed it. His stepson - his son
- had done something totally stupid, and now was going to suffer for it. You
didn’t have to be a Spirit-Master like Anna to know that.
Nearing
the small house with its sentinel white pines, Carl slowed. A sly, angry nenepi
clung to his back, trickled suspicion slowly into his mind.
What, the imp whispered, if
this were all of some kind of a trick to get you back? Faking like she needs
some bozo with lots of muscle and bone between the ears. That was the second
oldest female trick.
Carl
shook his head. Anna . . . She wouldn’t lie even if Benny’s life depended
on it.
Wouldn’t
she? Na, not
her. Jerk.
Carl
reached for the handle of the screen door. He paused. Once he entered this
house, there was no going back.
“Anna,
Anna, why do you torment me like this?”
He
wanted to shout it. It came out a whisper in the back of his mind.
“Let
it end, baby. Let me die for you.”
Pain
cut at him, slashed up from his heart. He felt the tears, tears he would never
shed but for his love of Anna. They splintered through the coarse stubble of
his cheeks.
Split
before it’s too late. Man, see what she does to you. She burns your brain.
She makes you less than a man. Beat it, jerk. Get out. Run before it’s too
late.
Uncertainty
ate at him. Carl rubbed at the high cheekbones in his gaunt face. He felt the
tears, the shaking that went deeper than his bones.
Don’t
let her use you.
“I
love her. Benny -”
Anger
came, then, dark and jagged.
“If
she let anything happen to that kid -” He clenched his fists.
The
fists loosened. He forced calm to flow into his aching skull. If anything had
happened to the kid, it would be his fault, not Anna’s. He was supposed to
be a father to Benny. That was the deal he, Carl, made with God. Hell, he was
from the day he had met the scrawny, too solemn runt at nutty old lady
Dubcheck’s foster home. From that day he practically raised the wasted
little jerk. The kid was way more like him than Anna, or even Benny’s uncle,
old Charlie Wya.
Benny
was tough, Carl knew with a deep well of pride, but had none of Carl’s
bitterness. The system hadn’t ruined the kid. Not yet.
Taking
a deep breath, Carl opened the porch door.
The
handle came off in his hand and the door collapsed on the flag stones with a
crash. It disintegrated into wood dust and rusted screening across his feet.
“Chrisake.
Ow.”
Snapping
in outrage, Carl jumped back, shattering the soft quiet of the night. He grasp
the wounded foot and glared at red, weeping slash lines from the wire and a
nail.
He
stumbled back, stepped on a sharp rock. It stabbed into a cut. He stopped,
head down, and groaned.
“Def’netely
not my night. Hell. Not my life, either. I wish.”
The
solid oak door opened and light flooded the porch.
Through
a golden haze, she appeared.
“Carl?”
The hesitant whisper floated gently on air perfumed by autumn and her scent.
“Honey?”
The
indignity of injury forgotten, Carl stepped into the stream of light.
Anna’s
so beautiful. So gentle. What did this babe, this very special babe, want with
a loser like him, anyway? Carl grimaced. Compared to her, he was trash.
Anna.
Man, but you would think a schmaltzy babe like her would find a real man, not
a war-torn nut case. Yeah. She got what it takes.
This
old dude, a skinny, punk-looking john, who was one of his mother’s regulars,
he used to tell Carl that. The dude had thick glasses, was paunchy, short. The
kind of man a kid wouldn’t want to look at twice for a father figure. But to
Carl he was ‘Pop.’ Always a kind word for a young, angry pre-teen. Always
willing to stop and toss a ball or just to visit with him after Carl’s
mother had taken care of ‘business,’ with the old dude.
‘You
gots der schmaltz. You, Carl Ivanovitch.’
How
wrong Pop had been.
Carl
was a son of a bitch and a bastard, literally. A whore’s son. Somebody kids
in the neighborhood spit at and men avoided, just in case their wives might
think Carl was theirs. Soon after that the old man died. To escape Greta’s
cold revulsion Carl ran away. And that was what landed him in Children
Service’s dubious care, working hard at being a normal kid in the day, with
old lady Dubcheck selling his tail to her female friends at night.
It
would have been great to have the old dude for a father, even if it meant
looking like that at fifty.
Not, Carl’s face grew wry, that
I’m doing any better like I am now.
Schmaltz.
Anna
definitely had it. A real woman. Not like that stupid pig, Leda. Anna was no
clinging vine. She never used anybody.
A
sour taste filled his mouth and he wanted to vomit all memory of Leda from his
soul. He wanted to feel Leda’s neck snap in his hands.
His
eyes slowly reddened, his breath tight in the deep chest, muscles hard and
tense as spring steel.
“Honey?”
The
soft accent drew Carl back from the brink of madness. She always did. The
insanity of war and prison came close to destroying his soul. Anna healed it.
She was selfless, sensitive of others’ pain.
Carl
smiled. And she was just the right height for a little heavy kissing.
He
stepped through the porch door, unable to do more than nod a greeting at her
tears. Man. Just the sight of her always drove him wild. From the first time
he saw her. It wasn’t her sensuality or some power of possession that made
the blood flow hot and rank.
It
was his pride in her.
Just
the sight of her.
A
gentle silence wove around them, binding more than could mere words. Neither
wanted to be the first to speak, the first to break that bonding.
Swallowing
hard, Carl raised his hand in an empty gesture.
“Anna?”
“Carl, I -”
Embarrassed,
each broke off.
Carl
took a deep breath. Anna’s eyes widened. A broad grin stretched over her
face. Anna stiffened in a salute.
Instantly
on the offensive, Carl snapped, “What?” She gave him a wink, nodded, and
finished the salute.
“I’m
saluting the little soldier,” she said. Her voice was innocence itself, but
her eyes were impish, filled with mischief. “Yo, Car-el, my man. You really
ought to get the li’l guy into some clothes before he takes a cold. He lost
his, um, hat.” Laughter danced in her eyes. “See? He already has a runny
nose.”
Carl’s
mystified gaze followed her pointing finger down. He closed his eyes and shook
his head. Trust Anna to be the one to break the ice. Looking again, he
muttered a soft, “Hey, dude. What are you doing? Standing at attention for
the lady, huh?” That was something it hadn’t done since their baby’s
death.
“You
better come in. Both of you,” she gently teased. “I’ll dig out a blanket
for you and some shorts for him. S-Some of your duds are still here.”
Twice
she had been married to men who loved her beyond reason. Men she loved and
near-worshiped. Twice she lost her men. Hoping, praying, he would come home,
Anna smiled at Carl.
“They’re
in the chest,” she whispered.
Leda,
thank the Light, refused to so much as drive by the cottage. Any thought of
Carl coming to gather his belongings made her wild with jealous rage. The idea
of coming herself and having to face Anna on this ancient, consecrated ground
drove Leda to the brink of terrified gibbering.
Anna
reached out and took his hand, drawing Carl into the house where he had found
so much joy and so much pain.
©2002 StoriesByEmail.com
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