Steve Cash - The Meq

“I don’t believe you,” she said, “something like that just can’t be.”

“Well, it is,” I said.

We were walking in the heart of the park, not along the laid-out paths, but through and around the trees, kicking dead leaves as we went. She stopped and looked at me, waiting for me to explain. I couldn’t.

“You mean you’re just going to stay twelve and that’s it?” she asked.

“I guess so. I don’t know.” I wanted to tell her more and make it clear for her. She was my best friend and we shared everything, but I knew I couldn’t. She was Giza, I was Meq, and I was learning the difference.

“How do you know any of that stuff is true,” she said, “and how do you know what we saw that girl do in the alley wasn’t just some trick?”

“Because I know.”

“But how?”

I took off my jacket and rolled up one of my shirtsleeves. I reached into my trousers and pulled out my penknife. I opened the blade and held it up in front of her. Sunlight glinted off the steel blade. She started to speak, but I made a motion for her to keep quiet. I slowly dragged the sharp edge of the blade across my forearm. Carolina jumped back.

“No, Z, what are you doing?” she screamed.

She put her hands to her mouth and looked at me wild-eyed. I stared back at her with as steady a gaze as I could hold. The knife blade hurt.

“Wait,” I said.

“Now I know you’re crazy,” Carolina hissed with real anger.

We both watched as the blood poured out of the cut and down my arm. A minute passed, then Carolina said, “Please, Z, stop this now. Let me put something around that.”

“Wait,” I said again.

In less than three minutes the bleeding had stopped and the wound began to close. Carolina stared in fascination. In another minute there was only a dark red line where there had been an open wound. I knew that even that would be gone by the next day.

“You see,” I said, “I’m not like you, Carolina. I’m something different. something else.”

Carolina stood still and straight, barely breathing. I watched her face. She had a band of freckles that crossed her cheeks and nose and were barely visible unless she was flushed. Right then, I could count every one of them. She was still angry, but confused and amazed at the same time.

“I don’t believe it,” she said, “I saw it, but I don’t believe it. It doesn’t make sense.”

“I know it doesn’t make sense. That’s why I’ve got to find some things out,” I said.

“But, Z, that’s a miracle. It’s something out of the Bible.”

“It’s not out of the Bible,” I said. “It’s in my blood.”

She reached down and grabbed a handful of leaves, then walked over to me. “Give me your arm,” she said. I let her take my arm and she wiped the last traces of blood off my skin with the leaves. “Is that girl, Geaxi, like you?” she asked.

“Yes,” I said, “and a lot older. I’ve got to find out some of what she knows. My mama said to find Sailor and I’ve got to do it. I don’t know how yet, but I’ve got to do it.”

I looked into Carolina’s eyes. They were a gray-blue with little flecks of gold reflecting sunlight. She took my hand in hers.

“I’d go with you,” she said, “if Georgia wasn’t so happy here.”

“Well, I don’t know if I’m going anywhere yet.”

We started walking toward home, kicking leaves again.

“You’ll go,” she said.

She was right. Not six weeks later Mrs. Bennings and a lady friend of hers, who introduced herself only as Natalie, came home late one night accompanied by two men. I should say that although Mrs. Bennings was running a successful and respectable boardinghouse at the time, she was becoming more and more drawn to a life after dark, a life of saloons and whiskey and men. Georgia was troubled by this and always stayed up late, waiting for her, ready to brush her hair and help her to bed. Carolina and I were up with her that night, sitting by candlelight at the long kitchen table when the foursome arrived, loud and drunk.

Mrs. Bennings led the way, almost crashing through the door, arm in arm with a skinny man I’d seen before, but couldn’t place. Behind them and laughing like hyenas were Natalie and a shortish, red-faced man with a full beard and wearing a tam-o’-shanter tilted at an angle.

“Hush now, darlin’s, we’ll wake the boarders,” Mrs. Bennings said to the others. She was trying to put her finger in front of her mouth, but she was swaying too much to find it.

“Let the buggers wake up and piss themselves!” the skinny man yelled.

I recognized that voice. I looked closer at the man’s face. I remembered the slicked-back hair and the gaunt, sunken cheeks. I was sure of it — he was Corsair Bogy, the promoter who had brought Geaxi to St. Louis only to be booed and humiliated when Geaxi disappeared.

Mrs. Bennings said, “Shhh! I’ll not be hearin’ that kind of talk. I’ll have you know, we don’t—” But she never finished her sentence. Instead, she stumbled into the kitchen table and suddenly saw the three of us. “Children!” she said.

Corsair Bogy was drinking whiskey straight from the bottle. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve and looked at us. He smiled at the girls. then he noticed me. Suddenly all his features narrowed into a look of fierce rage.

“Why, you little son of a bitch,” he snarled, “I don’t believe you got the nerve to come back around here.”

The other man and Natalie stopped laughing. Mrs. Bennings looked at Corsair Bogy, completely baffled. I stared straight into his bloodshot eyes. He went on. “Well, Spider Boy, I think you owe me about five hundred dollars.” He turned to the other man and said, “Ain’t that right, Mr. Woodget?”

I glanced at the other man. He was looking hard at me, but said nothing. I unconsciously moved my hand up and grabbed hold of the Stones, which I now wore all the time, around my neck and under my shirt, just like Geaxi.

“Or maybe I’ll just take it out in pleasure,” he said, taking a step toward me and smashing the whiskey bottle on the edge of the table.

Mrs. Bennings tried to cut him off, but she tripped and fell on the floor between us. Georgia and Natalie both rushed over to her. She looked up and said, “No, no, he ain’t no Spider Boy. He’s Zianno.”

Corsair Bogy held the neck of the broken whiskey bottle in one hand and with the other he took hold of Mrs. Bennings’s arm and tried to jerk her out of the way.

“I’ll decide who’s who,” he said. “Now, out of my way!”

I glanced quickly at Carolina. Her eyes were wide open and scared. I held the Stones tighter. “Stop right there,” I said. “You will leave this place now and you will harm no one.”

My voice was steady and firm. Corsair Bogy looked at me as if he were looking at a blank wall; no more, no less. He gently placed the broken bottle on the table and stared at it, as though he had no idea why he’d picked it up in the first place, then turned and walked out of the door, paying no attention whatsoever to anyone else in the room.

After the door shut behind him, there was nothing but silence, then Natalie said, “Why, Mrs. Bennings has passed out.” She looked at Georgia and said, “Help me take her to her room, will you, missy?” They got her to her feet and she murmured something, then they half dragged, half walked her out of the kitchen and up the stairs. The room was empty except for Carolina, me, and the other man, Mr. Woodget.

I looked over at him. He was still red-faced and his eyes were bloodshot, but they were staring directly at me, steady and focused. I wondered what he thought about what he’d seen. It was the first time I had knowingly used the Stones.

Then, still without saying a word, he bent down and started picking up pieces of broken glass, stacking them neatly in a pile on the table. He pushed the pile to one side and sat down slowly, deliberately.