The Haunting of the Gemini (14 page)

* * *

I struggled to get louder, trying to drive Eddie's voice out of my head, staggering around on the sidewalk. I didn't even care who saw anymore. I had to get him out. I saw the station on Forty-Third and had the hope that I could run in there and yell, “I'm the next Zodiac Killer, and I need to be stopped!”

His voice came through my head like a lion's roar. “No, you don't! Not yet, not so fast. First you have to feel the lust of murder, the rush, the thrill. I'm not done yet.” We fought, yelling at each other. I clutched my head and tried to make my voice—Jackie's voice—as loud as his. But I couldn't.

* * *

I stopped her yelling and looked around, forcing Jackie into the background, where she belonged. And what did I see standing in front of me but cartoons. Two fuckers dressed up in knockoff Elmo and Minnie Mouse costumes. Trying to get tourists to pose with them for a few bucks. And they were in my way. I pushed past, and one of them protested.

“Hey, who are you supposed to be?” Elmo asked my masked self. I went up to him and whispered into his mask where his ear would be, “Your worst fucking nightmare.” I saw right through his costume to the young man whose face showed that he knew the devil had just spoken to him. He backed up and grabbed Minnie's hand.

I saw them as lovebirds getting shot dead. No, better yet, cut up and left on the corner for all to take pictures with. Oh, the news headlines would read, “Disney Gets Cut Up in Little Pieces.” I was like a child in a candy store. So much to choose from. And I was doing it all for you, Jackie, my Gemini.

I moved through the crowd, looking for my dinner. Who shall stray into my path? Behind me, I heard a commotion. I turned and saw that Will person coming toward me, pushing people out of his way. I had to get away from him to complete my transformation and accomplish my mission. I moved like a pro on the football field as I dodged the crowds and ran away from him toward the West Village.

I turned down a dark city block and saw an old homeless man asleep against a building. A shopping cart full of his pathetic life was next to him as he lay covered by a filthy old blanket. I kicked his half-busted shoe. “Hey, drunk,” I growled at him.

* * *

That's when my anger surfaced. Eddie always picked on the helpless. On the lost, the left behind, the ones most easily hurt. The ones who befriended me all my life. I pushed that anger forward and spoke in my own voice. “Don't hurt him! Leave him alone!”

“Why?” Eddie replied. “Because the old hobos on those railroad tracks were the only ones that accepted you, you pathetic, motherless child.” He bent down toward the man, who was now awake. “After tonight, everyone will know who you are. Get up, old man, I have a gift for you!”

“No!” I screamed. A hand was trying to remove the mask, but it wasn't mine. I wanted that damn mask off, but not if it was going to harm someone else, so I struggled to keep the mask on. “Don't take it!” I yelled at the poor man, whose face was frozen in fear as he started to crawl away from the possessed person. He said what I felt when he screamed, “Help me, God!”

Eddie yelled out and threw my arms wide, like he was nailed to a cross. One arm swung toward me and hit me on the head, and I started to feel faint. I couldn't fall now. “God, please help me,” came out of my mouth in a mixture of two voices.

The homeless man, who had made it to a doorway and pulled himself up to a standing position, began to pray. In an instant, I pulled off the mask and fell to the ground. In my own quivering voice, I said, “Don't come near me. Stay back.” I tried to look at the man, but one of my eyes was closed in pain, and the other made everything seem like I was seeing through a fish-eye lens.

I heard footsteps pounding up from behind me. It was Will. I held up the mask and begged him to take it. He stuffed it into his back pocket and picked me up.

He carried me across the street and looked into my eyes as they began to clear. My sight was spotted and hazy, but it was mine again, not Eddie's. Will wiped blood from my face and covered me with his coat.

The homeless man came over and put an old, broken string of rosary beads in my hand. “She saved my life,” he told Will, as he wrapped my fingers tightly around the beads.

Will shifted, and a large knife fell out of my jacket pocket. Will snatched it away and put it into his own pocket. “Don't put that knife near that mask,” I whispered into his neck as he held me. “Don't do it.”

The homeless man gaped at me. “Look,” he said, pointing at my face. “Her eyes, they're changing. She had one black eye . . . completely black . . . no whites, no pupil. Just a big, black hole. Now they're both sky blue.” Just then, a drop of blood fell from that eye. It was Eddie, leaving my body.

The sweet man asked if we should call an ambulance. Will shook his head. “This isn't medical, my friend. It's spiritual.” It certainly was. And as Will held me on that city street, I knew that every fire I walked through, he would be right there with me. I had known him before, I knew him now, and I would know him forever.

* * *

I don't know how we got home that night. I just remember a fog like the kind that blows off the ocean covering the ground. I awoke in bed, with Will sitting by my side and a wet cloth on my head. He took the cloth off and kissed me. I looked over at my nightstand and saw the broken rosary beads. Be it in this world or the next, I hoped that one day I would see that homeless man again.

That day I regained my strength enough to go to the bank. I put on dark glasses to shield my still-sensitive eyes from the light and went with Will to the branch where we have a safe-deposit box. We took both masks. I don't know why I hadn't thought of putting them in the safe-deposit box before. Along with valuable jewelry, it was where I kept things I didn't want in my house. And I sure as hell didn't want these anywhere near me anymore.

We entered the private little room in the back and put both pieces in the box. As we left, the box shook and moved along the table. I jumped back and called for the bank attendant. We told her we were done and watched her carefully as she used her key in unison with Will's to lock the box away. I could tell that we made her nervous and uneasy, but at least the box did not move again.

She worked quickly and then ran up the steps ahead of us. As we left, I stopped to tie my shoe, as the lace had come undone on the stairs. As I tied, I overheard her whispering to a coworker, “Those people gave me the creeps. The room turned ice cold, and I felt sick.” As I straightened up, Will and I looked at each other. Will squeezed my hand and told me he loved me. We walked back into the sunlight knowing that the war was not over but that we had at least won a battle.

On the way home, I decided to take a detour. I suddenly felt the need to go to church. I wanted to confess the murderous thoughts I'd had in my head last night. I wanted to confess what Eddie had made me think. Will took a seat in a back pew to wait, and I walked into a confessional booth. Although I'm a religious person, we're not much for going to church—I believe God lives in every person, in the human soul, not just in buildings—so going to confession was a very unusual thing for me. But then, so was walking the streets of Manhattan hoping to kill someone. So, I thought, why not?

The priest walked into his side of the confessional, and I kneeled down. “Father, I have a confession. Something got in me and I thought of murder—” He interrupted me by striking a match. A puff of cigarette smoke wafted through the mesh screen between us.

I knew immediately that this was not going to go as planned.

“Well, my child. Did you feel good? Or did you deny yourself?” he asked. His face pressed against the screen as I heard his pants unzip. He jerked back and forth. My hand went slowly to the doorknob but my eyes stayed on him. As I watched, his face became a demon—the wet, gray skin; the sharp features; a crusty substance in the corners of his mouth. He looked like a corpse. “You're right, Jackie, you're never alone. And this place is solace for all. It wouldn't exist without me. Now come and sit on my lap. Let me impale you. Touch me, Jackie.”

I threw open the door on my side and yanked open the door on his. A priest sat there who looked nothing like what I had seen through the mesh screen. Startled, he jumped up and demanded I remove myself from the house of God. I backed away and looked around the church. All of the statues seemed to be grinning. The devil could find me anywhere. I could lock him away in one place, and he would come after me in another. I felt very tired.

FOURTEEN

Every night now, I prayed for sleep. It had been more than two and a half years since Patricia first thrust herself into my life. My body was tired and worn, my eyes heavy, my thoughts scattered. I was holding on to a thin thread of sanity, and I knew it could snap—
I
could snap—at any time. I was at the point where I looked forward to exhaustion, hoping for that kind of deep, heavy sleep. Maybe then I wouldn't remember any details that would affect my waking hours. Maybe then I wouldn't remember the nightmares.

One night, when I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep, I found myself inside what looked like an abandoned warehouse, with dusty floors and shattered windowpanes. I could hear the wind blowing but couldn't feel it touch my skin. I walked slowly toward the center of the room and felt like I had passed an invisible line.

One step: nothing.

Two steps: the same.

Three steps: I'm not alone.

Four steps: I'm home.

And the room came to life. Or should I say death?

I saw two rows of white candles, making a perfect circle. Their flames swayed in unison. I stood just outside the ring of fire. And then that ancient book of spells slid out from a dark corner along the concrete floor and hit my bare foot. The candles flared, making the dark shadows around the circle dance fiercely. The book opened with a fury, and pages marked with the devil's ink flew out. Encrypted letters, symbols of the zodiac, the sign of the Gemini traced in blood—a scrapbook of murder and mutilation. The pages steadied themselves like a magic carpet would and then launched forward onto the walls around the flaming circle. I heard moans of ecstasy mixed with the sounds of a woman gurgling and choking on her own blood.

The walls turned to silken curtains, and I saw the tall man in black emerge slowly from behind them, directly across the circle of candles from me. He was dressed as usual, his hair perfect, his eyes like lit coals. As though performing a twisted striptease, he first poked one booted foot and a bloody knife into view, then stretched his arm out and made a fist. I could hear the leather of his gloves crackle.

“I am the Lord of Death, and this is your party. I will swallow your sins, Jackie, and drink from your throat, banishing you from this world once again.” The book pages on the walls fluttered as he spoke. “You stand upon the burial grounds of the crossroads. The night belongs to me. Your name has been written on my arrow, spelled out
e-n-e-m-y
. You can't stop what has been prophesied. Satan's powers!”

I was unable to move or speak. He walked through the candle fire, disturbing not a single flame. He stopped in the middle of the circle and drew his mask out of a back pocket. He threw it on the floor and asked me if I liked to watch. I still couldn't speak.

He turned from me and began to slowly dance in place, now holding something in his arms. I could see a bloodstained sheet—a body wrapped up, the arms and feet dangling out, lifeless. I caught a glimpse of the head and knew then that it was a woman. He saw that I had seen, and the evil laughter roared from his mouth like a lion. He laughed and he danced, dragging her body around and around like a rag doll.

I could not turn away. I kept looking and saw a flash of something on her foot. It was a toe tag, the kind used on bodies in a morgue. I squinted, but the flickering candlelight and his quick movements made it impossible to read. He laughed at me again.

“You're trying to read the name, aren't you?”

He dropped the limp body on the ground, leaped to my edge of the circle, and grabbed me by the neck. He shoved the tag in my face and ordered me to read it.

Jane. Jackie. Patricia.

DOA.

The limp body on the floor changed from a woman to a child. And then, in a flash, I was that body, wrapped in the bloody sheet and held in his arms. I looked outside the circle and saw two little girls sitting there. One was me, the child Jackie, the girl I had been when I died on the operating table, my Forever Guardian. The other wore a yellow raincoat. They both moved as if to flee.

“Run!” I screamed at them. “He's going to kill you!”

“I already did.” His fetid breath overwhelmed me as he whispered in my ear. “You can come back, and so can I. You'll never find that escape hatch, those golden gates to heaven. You're in my world now.”

His world glowed and crackled with fire. But over the flames, I began to hear a low growl, coming from beyond the circle. He dropped me like I was nothing but a bag of bones and turned. The growl became a roar, and then its owner broke through the ring of fire and attacked. The beast ripped into the devil's arms as candles went flying everywhere, setting the walls on fire. I tried to escape, but the inferno was too great. I heard the devil scream.

“I'll be back, you damn bitch. There is only so much you can eat and take in, Jackie, before you explode or become one with me.”

I knew what he meant. My work has always involved taking in evil from others in order to free them. It was finally catching up to me. The flames were getting closer.

But instead of heat, I felt coolness. The beast was beside me, licking me and jumping like a long-lost dog come home. And he had. It was my spirit guide, the Blackfoot wolf spirit assigned to me at birth. His painting hung on my bedroom wall, and I often spoke to him about the lost souls I encountered in my work.

He moved slightly and I saw the leather cord around his neck, partially hidden in his thick, gray fur. It was the one my father's father—the great medicine man—had used to put my mojo bag around my own neck.

I had not been forsaken. Thank God. I quickly grabbed the cord from around the wolf's neck. I knew to hold on and jump with him out of this nightmare. We leaped together, and I awoke back in my own bed. In my hands, I clutched my mojo bag, which I had certainly not taken to bed earlier. I sat up in bed and smiled at my wolf painting on the wall. The painted wolf's head seemed to tilt and his eyes to glow. We had made it back. Things were going to be all right. I tossed back the covers and swung my bare feet onto the floor. Something tugged at my toes and I looked down. A thin, yellowed cord was knotted tightly around my big toe. I swore and tried to pull it off, but it would not come untied. I raced to the kitchen and dug in a drawer for the scissors. They worked, thank goodness, and I pushed the cord into the sink garbage disposal—which was the nearest thing I could find—and ran water to flush the cursed thing away.

My rare moment of peace was gone. The exhaustion from my night of terror hit me hard. The smell of rotting death remained in my nose and worked its way down into my throat. I ran for the bathroom and leaned over the toilet, trying to cough it all up. Nothing happened, and the taste in my mouth grew worse. I went to the sink, grabbed my toothbrush, and went at my teeth as hard as I could. Foamy paste-and-blood bubbles swirled down the drain as I spit and rinsed. My smile was now white and shiny, but I knew as I stared at my sorry self in the mirror that it was only a superficial cleansing. The evil was still there.

I stopped trying to smile. The minute I closed my lips, the blood came back, tasting metallic in my mouth. My lower teeth felt tight, like there was something caught in them. I pulled a small flashlight out of my vanity and used the beam to see back toward my molars. I spotted what looked like a piece of bloody floss—but I had only brushed, not flossed! I grabbed the end and pulled to get it out from between my teeth, and the pain hit me like a shock wave. What the hell?

Dazed by the pain, I turned away from the mirror—and there she was. My roommate. My soul sister. My dead partner.

“Let's see, Jackie,” Patricia giggled as she moved toward me.

I covered my mouth with one hand and pushed her with the other, yelling, “You're crazy! Leave me alone!”

She slapped my hands away. “How dare you call me crazy! I'm not going back to that nuthouse, not without you!”

She smacked my hand away from my mouth and with the strength of ten men—or one crazy dead lady—pulled my mouth open. Her gray fingers had bits of flesh missing and cracked brown nails. I gagged as she forced them into my mouth and began to pull. She shouted out with success as I felt her grab the floss. I stopped struggling and stood still in the hope that would end this whole thing more quickly. Our eyes met, and for a split second, I saw empathy in the black holes where hers had once been. Maybe it was for me; maybe it was for herself.

Then the rage returned and she gave a tremendous yank. The pain blew through me as she held up what she had ripped from my mouth. It wasn't floss at all. It was the cord. From the toe tag. Blood dripped from my mouth as if I'd gotten socked in the face. I clutched my jaw and felt a tooth wiggle back and forth.

Naturally, Patricia thought this was funny. She shook the bloody cord in my face. “You tried to eat your death away,” she laughed.

That did it. I lunged for her. We pushed and shoved in my tiny bathroom, twisting and turning until I pinned her against the sink. I was facing the mirror and her back was reflected in the glass. I saw my face and the back of what was supposed to be her neck. But it was my neck, complete with my tattoo, a representation of my voodoo spirit doll that protects me—what I don't see coming, it will.

Well, I hadn't seen that one coming at all. Damn. I turned Patricia around slowly so that we both faced the mirror. We both looked like me. We had on the same clothes, same hair, same face. I was the only one bleeding, though. And her expression was different. I was out of breath. She was calm and studying me.

I swung her back around toward me and yelled, “What do you want from me?”

“I want to live,” she yelled back.

No way. I pushed her away, and she hit her back against the sink counter. She didn't flinch, but I felt a sharp pain in my spine. I quickly realized that anything I did to her would only hurt me. We were becoming one. We faced off, staring at each other—or rather, I stared at myself.

“Get out, or I will cut you out,” I finally shouted.

She retreated into the corner, her eyes still locked with mine, and turned back into the dead woman with her gray skin and stringy hair.

“My name is Patricia,” she whispered. “Someone killed me, and no one cares.”

What was I going to do? My heart ached for her.

“You care, Jackie,” she pleaded. “We can live together, go out and get guys . . .”

And then she threw in stuff like that, wanting me to live her freewheeling, party-heavy lifestyle. I pulled my own hair in frustration. She grabbed her head in pain. Well, at least it went both ways. I forced my thoughts to a stop. What was I doing? Trying to hurt a ghost? Trying to reason with a vision? I was losing my mind. This wasn't real. I pushed past her and ran into my bedroom. She followed me, leaped onto my bed, and started tossing a red ball into the air like a child.

“Where did you get this?” I grabbed the ball from her.

“Stop yelling at me,” she pouted.

“Patricia, where did you get this from?” I got in her face. “I need to know.”

She stuttered as she backed away from me. “A little girl gave it to me. I see her, too.”

What?

“You know, she was killed, too,” Patricia said. “She told me so. Yep, she told me so. She whispered it right in my ear. A man killed her.”

As she spoke, her words seemed to get further and further away, like they were echoing in my empty tunnel. My vision blurred, as though I were looking through a kaleidoscope, and in the middle stood this child in a yellow raincoat . . . waving . . . blowing out candles on a birthday cake . . . waving again . . .

The kaleidoscope twisted and the picture changed . . . a man now, dragging her away . . . tiny cries piercing my ears . . . the man, dropping her somewhere in the woods . . . turning toward me . . . closer and closer. Tilting his head from side to side and then squatting down, looking directly into the kaleidoscope lens at me . . . laughing . . .
I see you, too
.

I backed away and slapped my hands over my eyes. I sat down on my bed, next to Patricia, who hadn't moved while I saw those things.

I lost my temper. “God, make this stop.”

She leaned toward me. “God wasn't home that night I was killed.”