Fairy Thief (5 page)

She coughed and hacked, trying to remove the impossible amount of sand that filled her mouth and throat. She lay still, her mouth hanging open, hoping the sand would just fall out of its own accord. Every bone in her body was broken, she was sure. She couldn’t move.

Ny raced to her side, half running, half flying; he was perfectly meticulous, as always, and unharmed.

“
Don’t touch me, Ny. I’m broken!” She meant to scream at him, but only managed a pathetic moan. Her eyes widened in fright, afraid of the pain she would feel when he moved her.

His eyes gentled as he looked upon her, and skimmed her body with a loving, nurturing look. “No, Saffron. No, no. Look, you are just fine. Move yourself, you will see.”

And Saffron realized she
was
okay. Her bones weren’t broken! There was no pain!

Saffron turned to look up at Ny, her grey eyes swimming in tears.

How could you, Ny? How could you make the waves do that to hurt me and trap me here.?

“
How could you, Ny? How could you make the waves do that to hurt me and trap me here?”

Ny didn’t speak. He averted his eyes. He was hiding something from her. Typical. Then, a forlorn look washed his features.
Ah, Saffron, I am not doing this to you. This is your mind, those waves the matter of all that you are.… You cannot escape by running away….
He wondered if the moment had come. Could he finally move to her now? Could he scoop her up, hold her, and claim her once more? His smile was sad. “You have always been a runner.”

Saffron stiffened.

Ny held back, barely. He was so close to her now.

She sat up, her mouth hanging open in wonder. Why didn’t she understand before? She looked at Ny. He saw the look in her eyes and became frightened. She sat there, drenched, her long hair, the hair he adored so much, hanging in wet clumps about her shoulders and back. Her lips were full and red, her grey eyes bright and penetrating. Her cheekbones were high on her heart-shaped face. He had loved it, he had loved the way she worshipped him, lived for him, and died for him. It was why he always came back for her. Why he always wanted her around, lifetime after lifetime. He had been with a million whores, homemakers, and adoring virgins — but he always came back for her.

Now she realized why — because her adoration for him endured. Impossibly, in all incarnations, Saffron always lived to lay her eyes upon Ny’s perfection…at any cost.

Above all else, Ny absolutely lived for adoration. He got adoration from all of those other women, but their lust, love, obsession – whatever it was that held them to him — eventually, always waned.

But this was not the case with Saffron. He gave her a sheepish smile.

She closed her eyes in disgust.

He chucked her in the shoulder. No, Saffron went right on adoring him. She was his constant electrical supply when the batteries ran down on the others.

Saffron opened her eyes, stared at the cloudless blue above her and sighed. Then her look changed. A fresh look of hope washed across her soft cheeks and tired eyes, like a long-awaited breeze on a stuffy, hot day.

Ny watched the light of recognition ignite Saffron from the inside. He froze.

I have complete control. I only have to sustain the effort.

“
I have complete control. I only have to sustain the effort.”

Ny’s arms went limp when the wind whispered her thoughts in his ear. Her voice was so sweet, soothing. So deceptive.

I have complete control.

“
I have complete control.”

“
Very good, Saffron.” Ny sounded flat and irritable. “So you finally realize you can control everything in your life. But, what will you do with this new-found knowledge? Ha! That is the question. How long before you give up and let your cravings take over for you?”

“
I will walk away from here, Ny, from you. I don’t
have
to run. Running never worked because I didn’t have to do it. I’ll wake myself up now, and get on with my life. I’ll stop regretting and feeling guilty.” She pointed a finger at him. “And I’ll stop being afraid.” She stared hard at him. “I’m getting on with my life – this is it, now.”

It was the same lesson she had learned when dealing with Jethin. Did it apply to all of life’s difficulties? How had she forgotten the lesson so quickly? How often in life would she have to remind herself that she was the captain of her own ship? Would she forget to remind herself? She rolled her eyes and stood up. “Yeah, you’re hot. Yeah, looking at you right now — even though you tried to murder me…” her eyebrow arched, “…murder me repeatedly — I’m still attracted to you. But I don’t need you.”

Ny scoffed.

“
And I’m going to walk away.” She pursed her lips and turned away from him. She started to walk away. The sea was quiet as a lake at midnight.

He yelled after her, “In time, Saffron, you will come back to me!” He stomped his foot in the soft sand. “You cannot deny me!” He watched as her hair shortened to the length she had cut it.

She never turned around.

It’s time to wake up.

“
It’s time to wake up.”

The ocean pulled back.

It’s time to wake up…

Palm trees and cypress began to tip over like stage props.

C’mon — wake up, wake up, wake up
.

The seabirds shimmered away. Everything faded, till she was surrounded by blackness. A new sound floated to her ears — an alien sound from far away. She finally identified the blips and bleeps as hospital monitors, and grew excited because she knew it meant she was almost there. She opened her eyes with tons of effort because they felt grainy and weighed down by a bag of cement. Without turning her head, she saw her mother in a chair by the bed. Audrey was reading a book. A headache ice-picked at Saffron’s temples, the fluorescent lights pulsed and slapped at her eyelids. She felt like she weighed three hundred stiff pounds. “Sorry I took so long, Mom.” Her voice was croaky.

“
Oh, hi, Saffron….I was just about to find out if Sofia runs off to the Caribbean with Eduardo!”

“
No,” Saffron grunted, and with difficulty, pulled one of the monitoring cords out from under her butt, “she doesn’t. She wants more out of life than electric eyes and a nice ass.”

Audrey beamed as she stroked Saffron’s soft, shoulder-length hair, “Ah…I see.”

A silent tear rolled down Saffron’s cheek as she looked into her mother’s love-filled eyes.

Suddenly, Audrey leaned forward and let her head fall on Saffron’s stomach. She began crying silently at first, but soon couldn’t control herself and began sobbing openly. She soaked the bleached, hospital-issue sheet as she clutched blindly to grab at her child. She stood and gripped Saffron by the shoulders, leaned down on her elbows before her body could collapse, and cried some more.

Audrey smelled fresh and beautiful to Saffron, her citrus perfume the most beautiful memory, her many bracelets a soothing, cacophonic symphony. Saffron ran both hands through her mother’s tousled hair and whispered, “Ssshh, ssshh.” It was all she could do to console her. “Ssshh, ssshh.”

Derek came running into the room already honking and blubbering like a sea lion. Saffron looked over at him and smiled. If the shock of seeing Saffron sitting there, awake, wasn’t enough — he was further perplexed by the look on the girl’s face, and the strength in her features. There was something else, too. He studied her through his tears and frowned.

Audrey turned and crumbled into his arms, but still his eyes were on Saffron’s face. He had seen a face like hers before — in artist renderings of saints, in movies of heroic underdogs. He read about such gazes in works by Shakespeare and Plato. A chill ran through him. Saffron appeared wise beyond her years. She exuded a strong confidence, and blessed him with a smile that said
all will be well, we have nothing to fear.
“Jesus Christ,” he breathed. She looked…
old!

“
Derek, why are you looking at me like that?” Saffron forced out in her hoarse, just-out-of-a-coma voice. She tried to hack to clear her throat. He was making her nervous. He looked like he had just been struck by lightning. “I’m okay, you know.”

Derek didn’t move.

Saffron began to panic. Just a little. “See, I’m awake.” She was stating the obvious, but all the same, it seemed to do the trick.

Derek snapped out of the spell that held him, a smile started on his lips. He reached for Saffron’s hand. “Don’t do that again, Saffron. No more going into comas. Dilly girl.”

“
Yeah, okay, Daddy. I promise.”

They all held onto each other as tears of relief streamed down their cheeks.

Chapter 4

S
everal weeks passed. Most of the hubbub concerning Saffron finally quieted down. Audrey was improving with each day, and finding an outlet for her pain through her art. With Saffron home safely, Audrey could relax and mourn her mother. The piece she was working on was of a black lake at midnight, the full moon hanging above, and a beautiful goddess — radiant in her happiness — sitting in a small, glass boat and floating towards a distant beach. The painting made Audrey smile; she had no idea what inspired it. She had never done a painting like it before. It was so otherworldly and dark, and she had never felt such a fire within to complete a piece, either. Maybe, she mused, her talent was taking her in a different direction — a new beginning. She thought of her mother often as she painted and listened to the ethereal sounds of R. Carlos Nakai's flute. Sometimes she was brought to tears, but more often it brought a smile to her face as she thought of all of the funny things her mother used to say and do. Audrey remembered one time, when they could no longer deny the Alzheimer’s, how she and Derek had gone over to her mother’s house. It was the last week of November and they had helped her string Christmas lights. Two days later, New England experienced an unbelievable streak of several very warm days. When Audrey, Derek, and a disgruntled Saffron had visited Grandmother that following Saturday, they found her in the middle of taking the Christmas lights off the bushes — frantically working to remove them all. With all of the warm weather, Grandmother assumed it was spring, and was embarrassed that she hadn’t taken her lights down after Christmas.

Now, in the waning light of the afternoon, Audrey smiled and continued to reminisce as she stroked the canvas with a fine brush — a shade of rich cognac for the eyes of her Asian goddess. Saffron asked if the painting could be hung in her room – that she would hate to see it sold, and would treasure it forever. Audrey was so touched that she couldn’t stop the tears as she hugged her only child to her chest and rocked her slowly for a long, long time.

Markis was gone. He had asked Saffron to go to New Mexico with him, but quickly backpedaled when he saw all the color drain from her face. “On second thought — better not — you’ll lose your job at the Chicken.” He couldn’t believe it — after all they’d been through, she wouldn’t relent.

***

Saffron sat on her panda, on her chair by her window. She watched the stars. There was one that flickered green and yellow. If she wasn’t so lazy, she’d get Derek’s binoculars and look for the supernova just discovered by the handle of the Big Dipper. Derek told her the star had exploded over 200 million years ago. A cold thrill ran down her spine at feeling so small.

The wind changed direction, and brought a faint noise with it that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. She sat up straight, craned her neck, and looked towards the sea. The noise grew louder. It pitched lower and became a moan. Then the moan turned into a cry of such wretched grief, that Saffron knew instantly —
she
was down there. “OMG, lady – you’re kidding me, right?” Her muttered statement held none of her usual cockiness. She stayed perfectly still for several moments, leaning out the window as she considered. She shrugged, brought her head back in, and stood up tall to stretch her back. She walked to her bed and grabbed the quilted satin jacket that hung over the footboard. With minor stair creaks, she was down in the kitchen in two minutes. She slid her feet into her flip-flops, took the flashlight off the shelf, gripped the handle on the screened door and stopped. She raised her eyes to the ceiling and took a deep, cleansing breath before stepping out into the night.

She flip-flopped through the wet grass, buttoning her jacket as she walked across the front yard. As she made her way along the path to the cliff over the ocean, she continued to take deep breaths of salty, sea air. She had to remind herself to blink as her eyes dried out in the howling wind. When she neared the bluff, a sudden gust of wind screamed past her ears. She faltered. The dark of night suddenly felt too close. The green and yellow flickering star was behind black clouds – she was cut off from the universe; and the here and now was so constricting she had a difficult time breathing. She heard another strange sound, a whine, and felt the sudden press of something wrong. Fear turned to anger as she berated herself for being out in the dark searching for a dead woman.