April - The Flood 11 страница

Callie came back with a smile and handed Dean a plate a food. I could tell, maybe from my years of watching other people fall in love around me as I had waited for Gerard, that Vivian's suspicion was right, at least on one end. Callie was into Dean. I wondered if he knew it, or if it was too soon for them to get together. I thought back to what Vivian had said, and I hoped for the best. It wasn't my story to get involved in, though, I just thanked them again as they walked into the kitchen. I was about to go back into the room where everyone was when I heard the doorbell again. Finally, the last person had arrived.

Lydia was not what I expected her to be. She showed up in a rich pink dress that draped closely around her arms and her slender body. It actually surprised me how skinny she was when she got closer to me, because her clothing made her appear curvy and ample. Her face was strong and angular; her hair rigid and unmoving underneath a similar pink headband. She appeared strong and solid as she stood on the doorstep after ringing the bell. She smiled when I opened the door and said, "You must be Frank," and then waited for me to invite her inside. I almost forgot to do just that until she stated that she was Lydia, Jasmine's midwife. She waited again and then tilted her head to the side, trying to knock some sense into me.

"Right, of course, come in," I said, holding the door open for her. She nodded her head and her face returned to its strong and determined countenance. She did not smile very often, Jasmine had warned me, but her unmoving face was not a look of anger or of condemnation. Her slow movements into our house were not acts of rudeness because I had forgotten my own manners and failed to ask her inside right away. She was always this slow and deliberate with how she spoke, acted, and contained herself. She was on a different time than everyone else and seemed to operate on a different emotional frequency. It wasn't bad, Jasmine told me, it was just different, and I would get used to it soon. When we were in the front hallway, Lydia handed me what she had made for the potluck. The dish's ceramic surface was heavy in my hands and the thin sheet of plastic wrap on top could barely contain the smells that wafted out.

"This dish does not have a specific name and I do not have a recipe card for it. It has roasted root vegetables and quinoa, cooked with some ginger, raisins, and spice. I have been making it for Jasmine, she will know what it is by the smell. For about a week, it was the only dish that didn't make her sick. I hope there is enough here for everyone," she stated calmly. I thanked her again and was about to make small talk as I entered the kitchen, but she had already left my side. I placed the last dish that we were getting in the center of the table, completing our feast. Grabbing another paper cup of red wine, I went back into the side room where everyone was now. It was overflowing with adults and children, sleeping babies and hormonal teenagers. Some of us stood by the walls and near doorways while others were lucky enough to get couches (David was still asleep on the longest one, though Mikey had pushed his way through and held Elizabeth, lazily nodding in her head in and out of sleep, in his lap on half a cushion). Lydia was sitting on the arm of the couch that Jasmine was sitting on, right beside her and Hilda. Although her positioning made her take alliance with the people that she already knew, she began to lean over and talk to Vivian, and the two of them engaged in a brief conversation before I announced that all the food was here, and everyone could help themselves before we headed off in our separate directions.

"Wait a minute, please," Lydia asked. "Food is important, but so is who we are feeding. I would like to know everyone's names. I'm Lydia. I'm Jasmine's midwife."

Leading by example, and going counter clockwise, Jasmine went next. "Although it's fairly obvious at this point, I'm Jasmine. This is mine and Gerard's and Frank' housewarming party. Thank you for coming."

Hilda was next and held her drink up in the air as well. "I'm Hilda and I'm also a preggers person that Lydia is watching over."

I smiled, and was surprised, but mostly delighted that Hilda had not named her association as "I went down on Jasmine before this party started."

"I'm Callie, and I'm an art grad with Vivian as my supervisor."

"I'm Dean, and Callie took what I had to say so I don't sound as original, but I'm another art grad with Vivian as my supervisor."

"Don't worry, honey, all good art is stolen," Vivian cried from across the room. Our counter clockwise function was broken, and now Vivian started the wheel of names at her end. "And I'm Vivian, their supervisor and I used to let these two live in my place before they came here. Gerard and I go way back, isn't that right?"

"Oh yes, way back," Gerard smiled. "I guess that means I'm Gerard. Hello."

He was so awkward and nervous, it made my heart hurt. I expected him to be so arrogant and nonchalant with this entire party stuff, but he was quiet and subdued. He stood next to his brother and Alexa near the wall. He and I exchanged looks from across the room, and he nodded coyly. He raised his own drink when he saw I had another, and we nodded. A part of me wished that he had named his association as, "And I am taking care of Frank, so he will take care of me." This would have to do for now.

"I'm Gerard's brother, Mikey. The sleeping people you see around me hogging this space are my children. The person to my left is my son David, my daughter Elizabeth is on my lap, and the baby you see here is Jonah. And, go ahead guys," he said, motioning to his other children who could speak for themselves.

"I'm Isaac," he said quickly and pushed his glasses up.

"Rachel."

"I'm Alexa, their mother, and Mikey's wife. I'm also a spiritual advisor, and Frank, seriously, how come I have not come along and blessed this house yet? Or done space clearing?"

Everyone laughed, but I didn't think it was supposed to be a joke. Lydia nodded and was the only person other than Mikey who didn't crack a smile. I guessed that Alexa had to get her advertising done some way. I was going to be surprised if she didn't hand out business cards by the end of this.

"And that would make me Frank," I said realizing I was the last one. "This is the house I have with Gerard and Jasmine. Thank you all for coming."

"Way to forget us, dipshit," Cassandra called. She and Noelle came down from the stairs and ran right into the room. "We totally missed the introductions now. How could you have missed us?"

Vivian sighed and step forward, "This is my daughter Cassandra and her girlfriend Noelle. They were too busy finding spots in the house to make out in to be introduced properly."

Another peel of murmured laugher erupted from everyone but Lydia and the two accused. Cassandra's face went red, but she tried to play it off. "Well, any introduction is better than no introduction," she stated. "I'm Cassandra."

"And I'm Noelle. We both go to the same school, at least for now, and play in the band."

Everyone nodded, the comical air lighting. We all began to murmur amongst ourselves again, and when I announced the food the second time, everyone listened and came walking in and heaped their plates up high. I began to doubt whether or not we would have leftovers by the end of all of this. It didn't matter - so long as everyone was getting a good amount now and having a good time.

We began to divide up our party shortly after that. The kids were already becoming tired (at least the ones that weren't already asleep) and Callie and Dean moved to the room we had all gathered in from before, while the rest of us headed upstairs. On Jasmine's floor, she had set up her larger room with some snacks and spaces where people could just sit and talk. There were a lot of people around - almost too many. It was intense all of us going up the stairs; we literally filled a flight all at once. Most people were engaged in conversations all over the place, and I found myself bouncing between groups. I made sure Cassandra and Noelle were okay, even in spite of the small embarrassment and I hung around a bit more to get to know Noelle a little better. She was a nice girl, and a good match for Cassandra. I told Cassie that I approved of their relationship out of earshot of Noelle, and Cassandra had hissed at me that she didn't fuck girls for anyone's approval. I had backed off then, but we had both smiled as we left one another, appreciating the others' honestly. I wondered how late the two of them planned on staying; I seemed to extract the best conversations from Cassandra at night, away from others.

I was about to go to Vivian when I noticed that Gerard was sitting alone in the corner of the room. He wasn't even on a chair; he was just on the floor and supporting his back against the wall. He had his knees up and his sketchbook in front of him, drawing the crowd aimlessly. A glass of wine was next to him.

"Hey," I said, making my way over to him and standing above him. He looked up and nodded, then went back to his work. "Are you okay?"

He moved his wine glass to the other side and signaled for me to sit down with him. I did and leaned my head against his shoulder.

"I'm fine," he assured me. "I just can't keep up. I'm used to being alone or being with people from afar. I don't want to be alone right now, so I figured this was the best place for me."

"Do you want me here?"

He grabbed my knee. "I always want you here."

I nestled into his side more and he went back to his drawing. In spite of not having anything to amuse myself with him, it was nice to be apart from things for a while and to not make conversation. I enjoyed the silence, along with the subtle sound his pencil was making as he sketched and I began to concede his point. There were too many people; perhaps we had been too ambitious with this party guest list. I didn't even understand how we had grown to know this many. We had all of the adults in one room, but then when I factored kids into the equation, that was when it became so much. I wondered if we should have invited them to begin with, but we really did need to. If not for our own sake in order to prepare for our own upcoming person, then to really make us all realize that the people in this room did not start and stop solely within themselves. They could not be contained, and any appearance of this definite singular person was merely an illusion. We always multiplied, we always became multitudes. Even Lydia, the most contained and refined person outside of Cassandra, could not be evicted from this crowd. She brought babies into the world, even if she never had any herself. And Cassandra, well, she was learning that having another person around wasn't really a bad thing after all. I smiled, now thinking of Callie and Dean struggling with the young kids downstairs, and also hopefully struggling with one another. They only saw each other as students, clearly, and I knew how restrictive that role could be. Not the type of student I was with Gerard, but the academic type of student. That was too prescriptive and there were too many administrative boundaries. Vivian had been trying to work on breaking those down, but even she was having enough. She needed people to fuel her energy, not drain it with wanting approval.

I watched as Vivian began to talk more and more to Hilda and Jasmine. There was a lot of uproariously laughter between the three of them, and a lot of stomach touching too. Jasmine kept going in and out of that conversation, bouncing from Hilda's hand to Lydia's side. Lydia seemed to be an astute watcher of the crowd as well. A few times she saw Gerard and myself across the room. At one point, she locked eyes with me for so long that I thought she was going to come over and see us. But no; she had been waiting for Gerard to look up from his sketchpad. Once he did, she nodded and went right back to her conversation with Jasmine.

"Who was that?" Gerard asked.

"Lydia. She's Jasmine's midwife."

Gerard nodded, trying to keep it all straight in his mind. "And the other pregnant woman is...?"

"Hilda."

"Right. Hilda. I can do this," he told himself. He took another drink from his wine glass and then looked at me. We kissed briefly, and he went back to his drawing. It was another portrait of Jasmine, I noticed, and I went back to my people watching. She seemed to be having a good time. Her hands were locked with Hilda's for most of the night, and sometimes they would lean on one another's shoulders. Noelle and Cassandra were the same. They were sticking to themselves for the most part, talking on a couch together holding hands or moving to ask Jasmine and Hilda some questions (no doubt, about their relationships, and possibly exchanging tips). They were a strong couple, though so young. I originally thought that Cassandra was the more dominant one in the relationship, the one who got her way more often than not, but I became to notice the subtle ways that Noelle directed where they went every once in awhile. Cassandra even put her head down on Noelle's chest in a moment of weakness and vulnerability that I had never seen before, and let herself be held by her partner. I probably watched the two of them from across the room the most; they were definitely in love. The small acts I had witnessed were past the stage of pure mindless fucking, of pure lust and hormones. They were committed, and as the buttons on Noelle's purse about the school closing began to get more attention, I began to see even Cassandra get in on that conversation.

Mikey had been talking to Vivian for a lot of the night, anytime Vivian wasn't engaged with Hilda and Jasmine. The two of them seemed to be going on about something serious for a while, but it was hard to tell since I could only see the back of Vivian's head and Mikey's facial expression was nearly as hard to read as Cassandra's since they were both so poised a lot of the time. Mikey's eyebrows were furrowed a lot of the time, and since I had gotten to know him from work, I knew that this wasn't exactly the most positive sign. But then a rip of laughter would be heard as it emerged from someone's lungs, and I would forget that negative feelings even existed. Mikey was even smiling, especially when Alexa came over and joined their conversations, placing her hand around her husband's waist. She seemed to be a lot more open and gregarious than she usually was - and that was saying a lot. She kept walking around the room and would sometimes clap when she got into a corner. She came by us the one time when she started to do the clapping again and I had to stop her and remove myself from my fly on the wall status.

"What on earth are you doing?"

"Space clearing. I told you I would. I can't believe it's taking me this long to do it. I should have taken care of this when you first moved in!"

Gerard snorted. It was loud enough in the room that Alexa couldn't hear him over her clapping.

"What's the clapping supposed to do?"

"The noise breaks up the vibrations from any type of negative interference that's in the house. By clapping I'm moving the energy to another place, and then, eventually, chasing it out of the house. I'm trying to get rid of it, not play patty-cake with it," she teased, then clapped with a devious smile.

"It?" I questioned. I swallowed hard but my throat was dry. In spite of her smile, her words and actions seemed very cryptic to me. "You mean that there is something here already?"

She dropped the smile this time, and nodded. "I wasn't sure when you all first moved in. I thought it was just from the stressful day we had all just had. But now, even with all of the positive energy radiating from this party and from everyone here, there is definitely something up. I still feel it."

"Feel what, exactly?" I knew it sounded like I was criticizing her and trying to make her appear foolish and wrong, but in the back of my mind, I was dreading the response. I didn't want validation. I kept thinking of all the intense things that had happened so far, about how powerful we felt like we were in the house, and about the drinking that had been daunting me. Gerard took a sip from his wine class, tuning out the conversation. But I swore I saw the wine move itself as Alexa kept clapping her hands. She walked away a bit, trying to catch the wave or ray or something of the negative energy, but still stayed within ear shot.

"I don't know what exactly," she stated, trying to answer my question. "It's not like it could be a ghost because no one lived here before you two. It's something else. I don't think it has anything to do with the house at all, but that it's just living here."

"I thought you said this stuff wasn't real?" I asked her, shifting my weight. "I mean, you said Tarot cards don't tell the future."

"That's true, but I study them for a reason. I study ghosts and other superstitious things like that, too. When people talk about things like that though, they are never really speaking about it in a material sense. These are all metaphors for bigger things. And there is something big here, and it is not good. That much, at least, I am sure of."

I was about to ask, does it have something to do with us? But Lydia had gotten up and began talking with Alexa as well. Most people had stopped what they were doing and had been watching as Alexa clapped her way around the room, and now were listening to the exchange going on. Even Gerard took his nose up from his sketch and paid attention. Alexa was hypnotic; I supposed she almost had to be. She needed to deal with things that clearly weren't there - monsters or ghosts - but deal with the underlying issues that made them real, made them manifest. In order to do that, she needed to get you to believe that there was something wrong. I hated how I got sucked into her stories, especially the bad ones. I wanted the Strength card again, about our horoscopes and about the animals we were like and what our names meant. I wanted to know my twin. Not my downfall from the tower, not what was bad and had been sucking the life out of Jasmine and Gerard and myself those bad weeks. I thought it had been over, but apparently, it had been hiding, masquerading itself for the time being.

"I think I know what you mean," Lydia said, setting herself in between where Alexa had been clapping and the wall, effectively stopping her. "It has nothing to do with the house. The clearing you're doing won't really work. This is a good house. "

Alexa put her arms down and crossed them in front of her chest. "What can we do then? What do you think it is?" Though her methodology was being questioned, Alexa knew it was also being validated. She rarely had a person who also knew this type of occult jargon, and was eager to communicate with them. Lydia was not as energetic as Alexa; this seemed to be a more serious and practical matter for her. She seemed to be more concerned with materiality, with real things. She was a midwife, she delivered babies, and she had complemented the house. But she was still acknowledging something unseen. She had reason and logic, but I was still trying to figure it out.

"It feels like a soucouyant lives here. "

"A what?" Alexa asked, having never heard this term before.

"It is a jumbee, part of folklore. She is something like a witch-vampire hybrid. A soucouyant disguises herself as an old woman and lives at the edge of a forest. She then takes off her skin at night and turns into a ball of light and takes things from people. She steals things. It feels like that, wouldn't you say, Alexa?"

She nodded. "Yes, yes I like that. It's like something that makes things, but is taking them away at the same time. That makes perfect sense."

"No, it doesn't," Gerard said, participating in the conversation. He almost seemed angry, but it could have been him misgauging how loud his voice needed to be in a room this big. "There are no such things as witches or vampires or soucouyants. It's a myth. There is nothing like that living here, living with us."

Lydia nodded. "I never said it was an actual soucouyant. I said it feels like one. There is a large difference there."

Gerard nodded, sheepishly. He eventually looked down at his sketchpad again, not wanting to participate in the conversation anymore. He, as an artist, knew what Lydia was talking about all too well and because he had taught me, I knew this too. There was a big difference between reality and fantasy and we all knew that logically. But that didn't mean that something so foolish, so ludicrous and completely illogical couldn't feel real. That didn't mean, either, that we had to give up those feelings. I thought of ceci n'est pas une pipe, and I wondered if I could explain his lesson to me back to him, back to everyone in the room. Well, this was not a soucouyant. But these two people - Alexa and Lydia - were saying that there was something like a soucouyant living in our house. I shivered voluntarily. I hated being manipulated like this. Our house was fine, I tried to tell myself. But of course, they had said it wasn't part of the house. Even if we moved, it wouldn't matter, this feeling like a soucouyant would still be around. What was that feeling, even? How could I resolve that? I repeated what they had told me: something that makes things but also takes them away. I had no idea what that meant and I didn't want to think about it anymore. It was foolish. Sure a few bad things had happened, but we were recovering. We were having fun and this was supposed to be a party. Gerard took a drink from his glass and then I suddenly grabbed it. I didn't want him drinking anymore. Something that makes things as well as takes them away, I repeated in my head. It was alcohol, right? That had to be it.

He looked at me odd when I grabbed his glass, but Vivian had decided her own way to break up the awkward and heavy silence that had fallen over all of us.

"Okay, enough ghost story time. If there really is something here, let's give it a show and scare it out of the house. Let's start painting."

It was unanimous. This was the best way to get it out, if something ever really existed here at all. Gerard and I - and everyone else - sprung to their feet and began to find empty bedrooms to change in. All the couples, and the people who were close, went into rooms together, kissed, touched, and took off clothing, only to put back on some rags that were going to be born anew in a different type of backwards dress-up. And then we went upstairs to paint.

Vivian was one of the first people done changing, and aligned herself with me as we began to set up. I had spent so much time with her recently being on the other end of things: I was setting up her art production, and now, she was helping me with my mural. It was a nice switch, but she caught my grin from the corner of her eye and told me to not get any too big ideas too fast. While she began to shred the newspaper and put some of it down with the old sheets, I began to pour some paint into long trays and set up each individual color. I tried to use them all, to help get a variety, but we stuck with the main ones: the reds, oranges, yellows, greens, blues, purples, and some pink. There was glitter paint that I had also found, but it had somehow worked its way downstairs with the kids and their craft supplies. The five of them were brought up after a while with Callie and Dean and then claimed those colors as their own tools for this production, along with the shimmering golds and silvers. After we had all changed, we all gathered around the acrylic rainbow that I had just poured out. My heart began to pound with anticipation. Vivian had finished preparing the last newspapers and rags to help gather the mess, and then we all stood back and waited to begin. Gerard touched me on the back, suddenly and gently, as he whispered in my ear, "I remember everything, Frank. I remember doing this." I got chills up and down my spine, and they feelings seem to reverberate through all those who stood around, passing from person to person. Alexa was jumping side to side, waiting for our call to start. Her kids were doing the same thing, David and Elizabeth surprisingly well behaved amidst all of this. Most people were in ripped t-shirts and old jeans, everyone but Mikey and Hilda who had both worn old suits to stain. They gave one another high fives when noticing the professional nature to their attire, and although Mikey looked awkward, he smiled proudly, glad that someone else was dressed like him.

Gerard was wearing his dove jacket. He had confessed to me in one of our earlier conversations that he had wanted to be naked to do this mural properly, even in spite of everyone there. When I mentioned that the kids were also going to be a part of this, he had sighed. We both knew that the kids would probably have so much more fun with this if they were naked too, but people were still very strange about that type of thing. I was sure that Callie and Dean as well, our distant cousins, would have been more uncomfortable with that idea than any one of us. Callie and Dean were hanging at the back, and it was Callie who finally bridged the silence that awaited us.

"So what do we... do?" she said. "Just stick our hands in and go for it?"

"That's the idea," I said, and then briefly began to explain my idea for the mural of the garden when Vivian suddenly produced a can of powder paint from her shirt and then blew a huge amount of it right at her graduate students.

"Lighten up, you guys," she joked. The color she had thrown was, appropriately, yellow. They stood shocked; Callie's hair was covered and Dean's shirt was stained first. The surprise attack had worked, though. All of a sudden, everyone descended into the paint trays, Vivian took out the rest of her secret arsenal of powder paints (a new item for Gerard and I to work with, especially with bodies involved), and the mural had begun.

It was a mess. A complete and utter mess. When Gerard and I had fun with paint, we knew we were going to be doing some damage to whatever was around, but it was never anything like this. I actually stood back and just watched it all unfold for some time before I began. I had always been in these tidal waves of color, but never actually an observer. I got to see what it was like from afar, and Gerard hung back with me as well. I saw Jasmine peek her head out from the other side of the room and we all nodded at one another. This rainbow was swarming all around us, this tidal wave of primary and secondary colors, golds and glitters and glimmering silvers, and it was amazing.

Alexa was front and center and I had never seen her move so fast. She pulled her husband down onto his knees with her and then about halfway through her epic flailing of paint, she began to kiss him. She placed her red hands over his chest and left handprints there, then dipped them in blue and touched his backside. He became awash of all the hands Alexa could touch him with and he laughed harder than I had ever seen. He began to go after his wife with the pink he had found moments after, and then it was her turn to be in hysterics and handprints. As I watched it all unfold, I began to realize that people were going after their loved ones with the paint first, and then moved onto the wall after. People bounced and buzzed from one person to another, creating patterns from bodies to bodies. There were triangles of hands together, squares of paint slashes between four people, powdered circular exchanges between two people, and then sometimes the lone and single dot on the horizon of the canvas. Lydia was alone for most of it. She spent a lot of time dipping her hand in each tray and feeling the paint as it washed all over her dark skin. She dabbed the tips of her fingers delicately inside one tray and then began to make tiny petals in the corner of the mural. She worked by herself, but then also stood to watch with me.

I turned around and was about to get some green when Gerard placed both of his hands on the side of my face. I felt the cool paint dribble down my cheeks, and then I felt his mouth meet mine. I wrapped my arms around his back and shoved whatever paint I had on his jacket, trying to recreate that yellow handprint we had left behind on the back of his faded black jacket. All of a sudden, when I opened my eyes we were showered with blue again. Blue powder paint fell from all around us and I looked to see Jasmine grinning close by. Her face was covered in purple from what Hilda had done, but she had left Hilda shortly thereafter to play with some of the kids. All the children but Jonah added their paint to her belly, and once that was over, Jasmine had seen an opportunity with the blue she could not have missed. "Sacré bleu," she said, and then I said it to Gerard, who said it back to her, creating a chain. All three of us wrapped our arms around one another and kissed between the bits of blue everywhere. I loved Jasmine so much right then. She knew what she was doing, she knew how important blue was to us, and she was helping us create that charged emotion. Gerard wrapped her in a hug and left handprints on her back before he went off to find Vivian and flung orange paint onto her shoulder. Jasmine wrapped her arm around me and I dobbed a bit of red on her nose.

Дата добавления: 2015-11-14