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Nalli had taken Ava Lynn through the tunnels and showed her how to climb inside that bear and see through its eyes and even have it walk around with her inside. She told Ava Lynn to tell Dewey his boat was still off in the redwoods where we’d left it. Ava Lynn gave him a scrap of paper with coordinates on it. They were to take the boat to a Naval flotilla out in the ocean.
“The animals will be in the parade tomorrow, and we will, too,” Dewey said, quiet and unsure. “Me and Ava Lynn will be inside those bears. Somehow we’ll get from the parade to the boat. That’s all Nalli told her. That’s all I know.”
“You have to take me to her,” I said. “I have to see her.”
“No, Mazzy.”
“I have to. Where is she?”
“The Pearl know she’s gone,” he said, trying to keep his voice steady and calm. “They’re looking for her. They’ll be watching you closely. Like you said, we have to be careful. Even me being here is a risk, but I had to let you know she’s okay. That she’s healthy, and safely hidden. I had to let you know I’ll take good care of her. I promise you that.”
The tires hummed over the grating of a bridge. Through the windows I watched the black stanchions pass.
Dewey leaned against me. “Ava Lynn and I talked about how it was before all of this,” he said. “I remember your mama’d work every Saturday. You didn’t want to be stuck up on that mountain with Ava Lynn, so you’d have me meet you all at the movies. I’d sit on one side of your sister, you on the other, and we’d watch whatever was showing. Sometimes I worried the movie wasn’t right for Ava Lynn, but you’d just say it’s a big ugly world and the movie wasn’t even real. You’d sit close with the girl and I knew she felt safe because I felt safe, too. She’s such a brave girl, Mazzy. Just like you. I know things won’t ever go back to how they were, but maybe there’ll be enough of the old world left that someday the three of us can go see a movie together again.”
Dewey drew my head into the warmth of his chest. I closed my eyes and listened to his breathing. The closer we got to the meadow, the more the longing of helplessness grew inside me.
We drove the steep rise to the plateau, the barrier’s lunar whirl looming through the windshield. Then the road flattened and the limousine’s headlights shone upon the paling of aspens.
I lifted my head from his chest. We looked at each other, not knowing what to say. He sighed and kissed my head, then returned to the back of the car and lowered the seat and crawled into the trunk and closed the seat behind him.
Instantly, he felt far away. My heart was aching, a pain literal and clenching. I hurried and opened the seat and reached into the lightless trunk and felt the muscles of his shoulder.
“I love you, Mazzy,” he said from the darkness.
I wanted to say it, too, but the words shriveled in my throat. Then Donta’s flashlight beam burst into the car, and I quickly closed the hatch and slumped against the seat, flowers of frost on the side window’s glass obscuring the frozen world outside.
ON THE MORNING OF THE PARADE, a new uniform was delivered. I heard my bedroom door open, then felt the thump of a box tossed onto my bed. Donta sarcastically offered her congratulations, calling me General before turning back out of the room.
I didn’t know what she was on about until I lifted out the uniform’s top. The body of elastic white fabric, a hood ringed with white feathers, a golden 40 pinned to the collar, and five golden stars, general’s stars, stitched down each shoulder.
Standing before the bedroom mirror, I hardly recognized my reflection as me. I wondered what Mama would think, and hoped she’d understand that I, too, saw the uniform as a betrayal, but somewhere Dewey and Ava Lynn were climbing into bears like hands into puppets and I had my own spurious skin to don.
It was still quite early when I went out into the living room. The house lay starkly quiet. I realized the barrier’s electric hum had gone silent. I looked out the windows and saw the meadow no longer enclosed, the aspen’s leaves shimmering in the breeze, the natural light of day streaming down over the snow-swaddled land.
I’d been paroled into obedience. The quietude of that tree was nothing but a trespass of shame. I knew I had to repent my misdeeds before they themselves became like cages.
I passed into the kitchen where Donta slept. I stood at the foot of her cot, looking down at my dutiful protector, who lay on her side, facing the wall.
“I’d like to apologize,” I said. “For what I said to General Özdemir. I didn’t mean it. Not how it sounded, at least. I care for more than just my sister.”
“We’ve all got to look out for our own,” Donta said, without turning from the wall.
“Forgive me. Please.”
Donta sat up in a lurch, snatched her jacket off the end of the cot. “Why do I have to forgive you?” she said, her eyes livid. She thrust her arms through the jacket sleeves, one and then the other. “My whole life people like you have been asking me to forgive them. Everything I’ve ever loved has been taken from me, but I should forgive you? You have all this power I don’t have, can change things I can’t even touch, but you don’t change a goddamn thing, and now want me to forgive you? No, ma’am. No way.”
I wanted to earn back her trust, and to prove she had me wrong. “Your son,” I said. “What’s his name?”
“Don’t you dare mention him.”
“Please.”
“Fuck you.”
“I can’t save him if I don’t know his name.”
Donta swung her feet off the cot and rose before me. “You’re so full of shit, just like the rest of them. But fine, sure. His name is Durant Williams, would be nine a week from today.” She roughly buttoned her jacket. “Go on and save him, angel. Save us all. Who the hell am I to stop you?”
* * *
A GRANDSTAND had been erected in the plaza for the highest-ranking Pearl. General Özdemir introduced me to the others as Seraphine, Supreme General of the Nation of 40. They all bowed before me, many of the generals and majors having just arrived from across America, men and women with golden cords hung from their shoulders, sabers at their belts, and white sleeves of stars.
The buildings surrounding the plaza adorned with white banners emblazoned with a gold 40, we celebrated in our box high above everything. Excited banter kicked about the grandstand, how the parade would conclude with Jo Sam’s arrival, with speculation on how he’d enter and what message he’d share.
The marching band roared a furious tenor, the drum line cracking like rifle shots. They wore golden helmets festooned with tall white plumes, darting and swerving across the plaza in an intricate dance, weaving through the golden arch that no longer suspended the cage that once held Whit Miller.
I looked about at all the Pearl brass smiling and clapping along with the music, but couldn’t find Nalli. I was worried about the plan she’d laid to get Dewey and Ava Lynn out of the valley, and wanted to know what she likely couldn’t tell me.
“To the General Supreme,” rang out behind me.
Others cried in response, “To Seraphine.”
I turned to find a circle of Pearl hoisting their glasses to me and urging on Raja Garbos, who sloppily chugged his bottle of beer.
* * *
THE PARADE started at the dignitary checkpoint, a half-mile march through the streets to the plaza. First came the original regiment of Pearl who’d laid siege to New Los Angeles, who’d ordered adults at gunpoint onto the hyperloop, whisked away the children, and cleared the valley of everyone but loyalists.
A flag unit twirled flags. A rifle unit twirled rifles. Cavalry troops danced white stallions down the thoroughfare. The new citizens strolled in ragged lines, starched in their ceremonial golds, led by drones carrying banners announcing their group and township.
I played my role amid the other officers, smiling and saluting. The Novae in the plaza poured into the surrounding streets. Soon a whoop flared from down the avenue. I leaned out over the grandstand and saw that they were cheering for the parade of animals.
White elephants fitted with plumes emulating those of the soldiers, 40 painted on their pale sides. A pair of white tigers. White musk oxen. Albino giraffes elegantly striding with golden wreaths stacked the length of their long bobbing necks, followed by cages on flatbeds inhabited by all brand of beast.
A golden chariot trailed them all, drawn by two mammoth bears with yellowed-white fur. My jaw clenched when I saw the chariot was driven by Nalli Sandoval, wearing a helmet and breastplate, her white cape wafting out behind her.
I folded my arms over my chest, hoping to muffle the thumping of my heart. Were the bears walking differently? Were their sides unnaturally inflated? But the bears seemed just as bears, one roaring to the raving crowd as the chariot circled the plaza, then turned out of sight behind the buildings.
* * *
WITH THE ONSET OF NIGHT, the last of the faithful on parade carried electric torches between the weary clog of revelers along the darkened city streets. These were the walking wounded, Pearl troops hobbling on crutches, arms slung, heads bandaged, veterans of the Novae Terrae War awarded a moment’s solemn praise.
The energy of the crowd surged as a swarm of drones buzzed through the chute between the buildings, setting their blanket of security over the route. White tanks rumbled down the road, followed by a motorcade of white motorcycles rolling so slowly many of the white-helmeted riders let their boots drag on the pavement.
The hiss of the crowd rose wild as a glowing cube crept into view. Constructed of glass, floating untethered above the road, the cube emitted dazzling white light, which illuminated the screaming faces of bystanders and gleamed off the lower floors of the golden buildings.
An old man stood alone inside the cube. He wore a white fur coat with a high collar, and a tricorn hat fringed in feathers. He wore mirrored sunglasses, waving to one side of the thoroughfare and then the other, his cragged, unsmiling face broadcast across the video screens around the plaza.
This was Jo Sam, a real man, the movement made flesh. The dignitaries in the grandstand fanatically swooned. A woman beside me wept into her hands. A man raised high his saber blade and rapturously shrieked. Surrounded by ecstatic veneration, I stood sober in my discomfort, the lone atheist in the chapel of tongues.
I turned to find General Özdemir locked on to me, reproaching my display of indifference with his piercing gaze. Only then did I begin to clap. The general glared at me a moment more, before whirling about and proclaiming to all who could hear, “I’ve never in my life been so moved. This moment will be remembered for a thousand years.”
* * *
THOSE IN THE GRANDSTAND were shuttled off to the penthouse of a nearby building, a large room with brick walls and exposed beams. Waitstaff served champagne and hors d’oeuvres. A jazz band played in the corner, and I stood near them, pretending to be engrossed in the music as to avoid conversation.
At the stroke of ten o’clock, General Özdemir said something into the guitarist’s ear. The guitarist stopped mid-song, counted in again, and the band played a version of a royal march.
The general had Raja gather the room’s attention with a cry of, “Zip, zip, zoorah.” From doors that opened from the rooftop, Jo Sam strolled down the stairs alone and without guard, smiling and waving as he had from his glowing cube.
The room vibrated with exuberant applause. Jo Sam still wore his sunglasses, was even taller than I’d expected, but also older, dark heavy creases down his neck, white in his whiskers, an unhealthy yellow cast to his skin.
He balked when offered a flute of champagne, and demanded a glass of good old Kentucky bourbon. Once his drink was promptly delivered, Jo Sam raised his glass and toasted the room, his voice hoarse and straining, “To a world made better by the force of our efforts. Long live the Nation of 40.”
* * *
JO SAM DRANK much and quickly. He seemed wholly unremarkable, not unlike other military men I’d known. Brash. Overconfident. Our great liberator, loved and feared by many, seemed a pedestrian old drunk, the likes of which you’d find holding forth at the end of the bar.
How could this be their glorious leader? Why would anyone follow him? Or maybe that was what made him compelling. Maybe people thought he was no different than them, no better, no smarter. Through his inadequacies, they felt seen and empowered.
Jo Sam pestered the band to play certain songs. They shook their heads saying they didn’t know a couple of his requests. Then the bandleader nodded and asked Jo Sam to give him a minute while he worked out the song with his bandmates.
Soon the band broke into an old tune, the name of which I couldn’t recall, but which I had heard many times. Jo Sam took the microphone. Though the band was rough, Jo Sam’s voice was deep and raspy, and he sang in-key and swung his drink to the beat and seemed comfortable enough on a stage.
At the chorus, he sang, “‘Bye, bye Miss American Pie, drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry…’”
Raja Garbos stumbled in beside Jo Sam, and they sang like old pals: “‘And them good ole boys were drinking whiskey and rye,’” though Raja shouted bourbon instead of whiskey, which made Jo Sam howl.
The entire room joined in. Even I remembered the refrain, though I didn’t sing: “‘This’ll be the day that I die.’”
* * *
JO SAM REMOVED HIS HAT. He was bald but for a few wiry white hairs, ridges of skin traversing his skull like tracks rain had clawed down a hillside. I sat beside him in a booth, sipping a glass of soda water. He smelled my drink and scoffed.
“Drink with us, Seraphine,” he bellowed. “Even the angels should celebrate tonight.”
A server brought me a glass of red wine, and Raja told the table about his first job as an actor, a commercial for toilet paper where he left a men’s room with tissue stuck to his shoe, which stayed on his heel through rainy streets and a walk in the park with his dog, and when his date that night pointed it out, he pulled the tissue from his heel and smiled.
“Two-ply, oh my,” Raja said, just like in the commercial, and we all laughed because we all remembered.
Jo Sam went to pour more bourbon into his glass, but the bottle was dry. He tapped the bottom, as if its emptiness was a mistake. He tipped back his head and balanced the bottle on his wide brow. Everyone laughed at the trick. Then Jo Sam banged the bottle down on the table, and the laughter fell silent.
“I’m no cushy actor,” he said. “My first job was as a postman. I drove a rural route, hitting these little shit towns. There was this one sad stretch that ran along the train tracks. Freights went through twice a day, shook everything.” He held up three crooked fingers. “Three times I found men who’d laid on the tracks. Bodies here, heads over there.”
He looked around the table. “Do you believe in ghosts?” he asked. No one answered. He swung his face to me. “Do you believe in ghosts, Seraphine?”
“Only angels,” I replied.
He sneered a smile and took off his sunglasses. His eyes were bloodshot, the sclera yellowed. “They claimed those tracks were haunted,” he said. “But I told those superstitious fools that with the first hard rain anything left of those men would be washed away. A little rain was all it took.”
Jo Sam slid his sunglasses onto his face and leaned back in his chair. “Tomorrow we’ll change the world,” he said. “After the rally, our people will fight anyone, anywhere. We own them, minds, hearts, and fists. They’ll fight the whole goddamn world if we ask them.”
THOUGH THE HOUR WAS LATE, Jo Sam staggered along. I wanted to leave, and was grateful when, in between rounds of drinks, General Özdemir checked his watch and cleared his throat to announce that tomorrow was a big day and he’d see Seraphine home.
I didn’t protest. I suspected nothing. In the limousine, the glands under my chin tender, my back knotted, Donta rode up front and the general sat across from me, his eyes closed as snow swirled down through the lights of the city.
I wanted to be alone with Donta, to ask if she’d heard anything at all from Nalli. Maybe Dewey and Ava Lynn were gone by now. I imagined them bounding camouflaged through the snowy woods, Ava Lynn inside her bear, Dewey charging hard. Maybe they were already on the boat, Dewey making soup for the girl.
Or it could’ve gone another way. I worried security on the waterways was heightened by Jo Sam’s visit. I worried they hadn’t made it to the boat, or if they had they’d been promptly captured.
The car slowed turning a corner. The glow from the streetlight flashed over General Özdemir’s little face jostling against the movement. He was peacefully asleep, a babe in his mother’s arms.
We pulled into an alley and the car stopped at the rear entrance of Bistro Novum. I didn’t know why we were going to the restaurant, but figured maybe the general wanted some quiet time to go over the plans for the rally.
Donta opened the limousine door. General Özdemir stirred awake. We climbed out into the falling snow, Donta pushing on ahead of us, scrutinizing every shadow.
We entered the building. Pearl troops lined the red-lit hallway. The general stepped to the freight elevator Dewey and I had always taken to the zoo. By my inner quake, I knew something was wrong. The zoo? Why would we be going to the zoo?
The general pulled aside the elevator’s grating, then gently took my arm. He told Donta we’d be fine on our own. Donta shot me a questioning glance. Though I was afraid, I gave her a nod that I’d be okay, for what else could I do?
The elevator trundled down. As we descended deeper, the compartment went dark. General Özdemir’s white uniform floated through the murk. We touched bottom and he opened the grating and I smelled the animals and we stepped out into the reservoir.
A single light shone from the middle of the expanse both dark and quiet. We walked toward that light, passing one empty cage and then the next. No animals, only silence. My stomach hollowed and my legs fell leaden when I recognized the light came from Dewey’s fishing boat.
