CHAPTER 1
Cherie wiped her eyes in disbelief as she drove home. How was this even happening? How? Nothing worked out for her. “I’m sorry,” she cried as she drove. “I’m trying to change things! I’m trying!”
Since she’d moved to Breaux Bridge, nothing had gone right. This had to be a curse by God. He’d given her the dream to go there so he could punish her for her sins. She could accept that if she was sure that’s what it was. But she was never sure about anything anymore. She lost her third job within three months because of her mouth. Why couldn’t she just keep it shut? A closed mouth is food, rent money, electricity!
She replayed her ex-manager’s sexual come-on and the anger that got her fired returned hot as ever. No, it wasn’t her mouth, it was their mouth. What was it with white men and black women? Did she have pussy for hire written on their forehead? Apparently black women from up north were seen differently by white men down south, at least in this town. She’d paid attention. Other black women didn’t get looked up and down by white men like she did. She’d expected it from her color but of course they didn’t do right either. They looked at her like a mutt. She was a lot of things, but a mutt wasn’t one. She was thoroughly black, blacker than many of them, inside and out.
Screw all them jackrabbits. White, black, and whatever other colors looked at her funny. She was sick of being judged by outward appearances. If her voluptuousass wasn’t getting her into trouble, her mouth or the color of her skin was and none of those were her fault. Except her mouth but she wasn’t going to take that kind of treatment. Not ever again. Not. Ever.
She took her turn too quick and plowed into a man on a bicycle. Slamming her brakes, she screamed when his body landed right on her windshield. “Oh no! No!” She flew out the car looking around for help then at the man, motionless on her car. “Sir? Sir, are you okay?” she sobbed. “Oh no,” she whispered, seeing blood on his forehead.
Oh God, the police. If they came, she’d be done. She fought to get him off her car and managed to slide him onto the ground, crying when his head hit the cement again. “I’m sorry,” she wailed, wiping her eyes. “I’m gonna pull you to the side of the road and call an ambulance. I can’t stay, I have to go but you’ll be okay, okay?”
Finally managing the feat, she hurried back to her car and got in as a mountain of shame and judgment crashed down on her. “Oh God, please, help me.” She couldn’t add more crimes and sins to her stupid life.
She hurried out of the car and opened the back door. She’d bring him home and make sure he was okay. That’s how they did things back in the day, right? If she saw he was seriously injured, she’d…she’d figure out how to help him, that’s all.
It felt like ten kinds of wrong to thank God that nobody happened by while she got the man in her car. She put his crumpled bike in her trunk and spotted a bag. She hurried over and picked up, seeing plumbing pieces. Had to be his. She threw the bag in the front seat and got in, hurrying toward home while keeping her eyes on every mirror, waiting for sirens to show up any second.
Mumbling came from the back seat, and she glanced over her shoulder several times. “Sir? Are you okay? I’m taking you to get help,” she called. “You were in an accident.”
“What…where…” His mumble slurred.
“You’re in my car. My name is Cherie.” She couldn’t hold back a sob as she went on. “I’m so sorry sir. I accidentally hit you, I…I didn’t see you. I’ll get you another bike, I swear,” she said, wiping her eyes.
“My head…”
“I have stuff for that,” she assured. “When we get to my house, we’ll call your family. Who’s your family? What’s your name?”
“No…family,” he muttered.
No family? “We don’t have to call family maybe you have friends.” Would be more than she had. “What’s your name? Do you remember your name?” Please don’t let him be too injured.
“…Revelator.”
Did he say revelator? What did that mean? “Just try to rest, it’ll be a few minutes more. I live in the country just a little bit,” she went on, hoping to keep him conscience. Pretty sure that was the right thing to do.
“Are you from Breaux Bridge? I haven’t seen you before. Course I’ve only been here for three months. You may have seen me at Piggly Wiggly, I had a cashier job there. My current job is peeling crawfish.” She glanced behind her and found him sitting up.
“Jesus!” she gasped. “You’re up, that’s good.”
****
Revelator looked around, dizzy and confused. Why was he in this car? With this woman? Pain shot through his skull, and he winced, touching the left side of his head. He pulled his hand away, confused at the sight of blood. “What happened?”
“You had an accident,” the lady said too loudly.
“Where?” And when?
“Back a ways,” she said, smiling over her shoulder at him.
“What happened?” He looked out the window trying to figure out where he was and the accident she referred to.
“I was driving and didn’t see you. I hit you on accident, I’m so sorry. I’m taking you to my house to make sure you’re okay and you can call friends to come get you. Or I can take you wherever you need me to. I’ll buy you another bike, I’m so very sorry. Do you hurt a lot? Can you tell if…if you have serious injuries?”
“My head,” he muttered, as the pain ricocheted in his skull.
“Just…relax, try to be still, please.”
Why was she crying? “Who are you?” he murmured, suddenly exhausted.
“Cherie, my name is Cherie.”
“Cherie,” he mumbled.
“We’re here already, see I told you it wouldn’t take long. I have aspirin and Tylenol and band aids,” she sang. ”We’ll fix you up. I have left-over soup if you’re hungry too, are you hungry? God, please don’t let him die, please don’t let him die,” she whispered.
Die? He didn’t feel that injured.
“Don’t move, let me help you,” she said, getting out of the car and making her way around. “Now,” she said, opening the door near him. “I’m going to take careful hold of your arm and put it round my shoulder,” she said, demonstrating. “And you’ll try if you can, to scoot out. I got you in the car but let me tell you, pretty sure that was a one-time miracle.”
She gave a nervous laugh making him realize something was wrong, more than him being in her car, and more than him not remembering what happened. Something was wrong with her.
She lifted his arm and he struggled to help her get him out the car. Then she put her hand in his other one and he paused, looking at her, seeing.
“What’s wrong?” she worried.
Revelator struggled through the pain in his back and side, needing to get out of the car and think about what just happened when he held her hand.
Once out, he leaned himself against the car, distracted with the pain again. He remembered. He could see some things about people when he touched them. What else was he forgetting? Where was he coming from when he was hit?
“Can I see the bike?
“It’s a pretty bad mess, I don’t think it can be fixed but whatever it cost to replace, I’ll pay it somehow.”
She’ll pay it somehow. He regarded her home behind them, understanding the somehow. Wasn’t the poorest shack he’d ever seen, but definitely belonging to somebody who might not pass up a penny lying on the ground.
He felt in his back pockets for anything to help his memory, encountering a large something while the woman rattled on at the trunk about faith. Odd how she gave sermons to the conversations in her head. He groaned at the sharp stab in his shoulder as he pulled out whatever was in his back pocket. A wallet. He stared at it and struggled to loosen the leather strap wrapped around it.
“Here’s a bag I found nearby,” she said, coming around to him. “I figured it was yours.”
He glanced at it. “What’s in it?”
She looked inside. “Looks like plumbing parts and zip ties and then…pantyhose.”
Pantyhose. He leaned to see. Why would he have that? “I don’t remember getting any of it.”
She eyed him a few seconds. “Oh no. You think you lost some of your memory?”
He nodded carefully, closing his eyes while struggling with the wallet in his hands.
“You want me to help?” she asked. “Here, let me.”
He let her, watching her begin to pull things out and lay it on the car next to him.
“Wow, is this a handwritten account of Revelations? In…alligator hide?”
It appeared to be. There was something vaguely familiar about it.
“Did you make it?”
“I don’t know.” He spied the piece of glass she pulled out of a pocket and lay it on the car.
“Not your typical wallet ingredients,” she said kindly, arranging the pieces.
“It’s coconut,” he finally realized. “And something else I know and don’t remember the name for.”
“What is?”
“What I smell on you.” She stepped away a little as he fingered the little book, then the piece of glass. He knew both well even as they remained behind a cloudy veil.
“I don’t believe in wasting money on luxury perfumes. And it’s lavender, I use lavender because I like it, it’s not for everybody but I don’t wear it for everybody, I wear it for me.”
He eyed her at hearing her sermonizing herself again. And him. But only because she assumed he agreed with the demons that argued with her. He instinctively knew he could learn more about those demons and their origin if he touched her again but something else said touching was a bad idea. Why, he wondered?
“I like both,” he said, back to studying the items on the car. He felt his other pocket and pulled out another rectangle.
“You have a phone!” she said, excited. “You can look on it and see your contacts.”
He stared at it, pressing on the surface. It finally came on and he knew to slide his finger across the screen but when the five empty circles came up, he drew a blank.
She looked. “Your password.”
“Yeah.”
She eyed him. “You don’t remember it,” she mumbled.
Definitely not.
****
Cherie had gone from worrying she may have picked up a serial killer to realizing she’d picked up something worse. A religious man of some kind.
“All these items,” she muttered, feeling the need to suddenly hide. “They’re…of a religious nature. You remember anything about that?”
She watched his head barely shake. “Only what’s in me but…I can’t remember beyond that.”
What’s in him? What did that mean? She eyed the piece of glass and wondered. “You remember anything about any of this stuff? The glass and the alligator tooth has my inner Sherlock Holmes in a tizzy.”
He looked at her and she lowered her gaze again. Those eyes were so blue and intense. When he looked, you knew they were seeing more than you wanted to show. And that scar. Why did that piece of glass feel linked to it?”
“What are you looking at?” he asked.
“So sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to stare.”
“At what?”
“Uh…your scar.”
He reached up and touched his face, his brows pulling together.
“You don’t remember that either?”
He remained with his eyes closed as he moved his fingers along it, giving her a moment to catch her breath. “I remember it,” he whispered, making her curious over his tone. Seemed angry. Wonder how he got it.
He opened his eyes before she could look away, and now she couldn’t. She didn’t want to stare but didn’t know how to stop. Panic hit her. “You’re not using voodoo on me, are you? I don’t do that, you stay away from me with that kind of stuff.”
The slow smile that spread on his face was quite a show. Took him from handsome-scary to scary-handsome.
“Glad to hear it,” he muttered, that earth shaking smile getting stolen by a painful grimace.
“Can we please get you laying down? Let me help you.” She lifted his arm and put it around her shoulder. “I’ll get all your things and bring them in after.”
Thankfully he didn’t fight her as she carefully navigated him down the grass path to the porch, her thoughts racing between what the delicious cologne he wore and what kind of condition she’d left the house in. Had she changed the trash? Left a mess?
“I don’t have much, but whatever I have I don’t mind sharing,” she said under his weight. He wasn’t massive but he surely wasn’t scrawny. “Once we get your pain under control, we’ll figure out the missing pieces and call your family or friends. I left in a hurry this morning for work, so I can’t promise what kind of mess we’re walking into. Peeling crawfish sounds like an easy job, but believe you me, it’s not!” she huffed, his weight increasing as they went like maybe he was helping and getting weaker with every step. “Six to three of sitting and peeling on those lil” hot beasts isn’t a dream job. Sad thing is, they pay you by how fast you peel. Needless to say I need to find another job if I’m going to make enough to pay bills.”
She leaned him against the wall next to the front door, panting and sweating. They both were, she realized. She didn’t like how pale he looked. The gash on his forehead was clotted and no longer bleeding but it was also a little swollen. Where else was he injured was the question. Judging by how slowly he moved, he had plenty more.
She unlocked the door and opened it, giving a sniff. Eucalyptus and mint. Thank the Lord. “Gonna get you to the couch,” she said, putting his arm back around her shoulder and leading him in. Crap, the couch was full of the holiday décor she’d found thrown in somebody’s trash.
“Second thought, I’ll put you in my bed if you don’t mind. At least till I clean the couch off. In the middle of decorating,” she mumbled, not getting any resistance from him, thankfully. Probably because he was about to pass out.
In her room, she spied feminine items that made her cringe. “Just don’t look around too much,” she said, as she struggled her way to the bed grateful for once in her life that she believed in making it. She sat him on the edge and helped him lay down. “I’ll have to check your injuries but first I’ll get something for pain.”
“No,” he murmured with barely a headshake. “I don’t need it.”
She stared at him, laying there, the preacher vibe returning as she eyed his all black attire. Either that or an outlaw. Which was an outdated notion from one of her cherished romance novels from a previous life.
“Food,” she remembered. “I’ll make you some left-over soup.”
“I’ll take that.”
She talked from in the kitchen while she got everything ready, tidying as she went. Was easy enough to gossip about her life, which she did. “I tell myself I can’t complain, but yet here I am, doing just that,” she admitted, entering her bedroom with a tray of food. She set it on the bed next to him and fetched the quilt folded at the foot. “We’ll use this to help prop you up.” She worked her arm under his shoulders, and he grunted as he attempted to help.
“There, is that okay?” She adjusted the pillows. “Do you need anything behind your head?”
He barely shook it, keeping his eyes closed. “I’ll eat and then sleep if that’s okay,”
he murmured.
“Of course it is.” She got the tray and put it in his lap, suddenly worried he may spill and burn himself. “Would you mind if I help you eat? Let me just help you eat,” she said, deciding to remove the option.
“I can manage.”
“No, I’ll do it, no arguing,” she said, drawing from the inherited bossy strength of her mother.
“Yes ma’am,” he said, making her snicker as she stirred his food.
“What’s funny?” he wondered after a few seconds.
She could feel his eyes on her as she filled the spoon with his first bite. “I always find it a little funny hearing a white man call me ma’am.” She presented the spoon, staring at his mouth just to avoid his gaze she felt on her still. But that put her staring at his perfect lips. They were kind of full for a white man.
She was told her lips were in between black and white lips. Many people thought she was mixed because of that. And her nose didn’t help. How many times she was asked if she’d had surgery she couldn’t count. It was her God given nose and she was damn tired of being sorry she had it. She didn’t care about nose sizes other than everybody made such a big deal over it, making her care. It was all getting very old fast and yet not fast enough.
“Is it good?” she wondered, immediately regretting the question with a headshake. “Don’t even answer that. Cooking is not my strength, but it will keep you alive.”
“It’s good,” he murmured.
At hearing his exhaustion, she looked up and found his eyes closed. Thank God. She let out a breath, staring at him. “I’ll get something to clean that off in a bit.”
His eyes slowly opened, and she quickly looked down, getting more food in the spoon and bringing it to his mouth. He ate without saying a word and she kept her mouth shut, focusing on getting the man fed before the food got cold.
“Would you like something to drink? Maybe a shot of whisky?”
His head lolled side to side. “I remember I don’t drink.”
She nodded, bringing a cracker to his mouth. “Definitely a preacher, I’m thinking.”
“Maybe,” he said, sounding exhausted. “I’ll take water.”
She hurried to the kitchen and found the only glass fit for company and opened the fridge, grabbing the pitcher of water and filling it. She returned to the room and handed it to him, deciding to let him do that much.
She went back to feeding him till the job was done, ready to get that gash on his head tended. Then it was on to her indentured servitude chores before the landlord came for the day’s yields. She’d never in her life milked a cow before she came to live there. Was strange at first and scary, but once she saw the moms didn’t mind and were gentle, she got good at it and even enjoyed it. Just as she liked gathering the eggs and feeding the animals. Wasn’t a life she’d ever dreamed of having but there was something rewarding and satisfying about it, even the gardening stuff. Was just too bad every man she dealt with had to see her as something they could obtain if they gained enough leverage. And so far, all of them managed to get that leverage which ended up costing her things she needed, like a job. Her landlord had been mostly nice, but all his sexual innuendos were feeling more and more like a prelude to something coming. She dismissed them as best she could, always struggling for being respectful with him while letting him know she wasn’t that kind of girl and wouldn’t ever be.
“Well, you survived my food,” she said, standing and bringing the tray to the kitchen. She emptied the food tray and used it to load the first aid-items from in the bathroom. Back at her bed, she found him sitting up with his eyes closed, appearing asleep. She hated to disturb him if he was resting.
“Three jobs in three months,” he murmured.
Shit, had she told him that?
“Just getting settled in, trying to find my footing,” she lied, sitting on the bed and ringing the warm water from the washcloth. “Gonna wipe this blood off,” she announced, preparing him.
“You don’t need to be afraid of me,” he barely muttered as she wiped along his brow carefully.
“I’m not,” she lied again. Not like he thought.
She froze when his hand closed over her wrist, bringing her gaze right into his. Stuck. He stared at her until her heart pounded in her chest but not in fear of what he was seeing. He suddenly let her go and she drew her hand back, rubbing where he’d touched while she wondered how to handle what he’d just done. She remembered she’d hit the man with her car and couldn’t afford to have the police involved. He was another man with leverage over her, but it wasn’t technically his doing, but hers. She couldn’t really hold it against him.
She wet the washcloth again and rung it out, getting back to cleaning the wound.
“I have a gift,” he said, or maybe confessed. She paused briefly then continued wiping at the skin carefully, listening.
“I can see things in people.”
She paused again, longer this time.
“I can see what’s inside, what…bothers them, usually. I don’t remember how I got the gift or if I always had it.”
She remembered the little bible book, dismissing the sudden wonder if he was some kind of voodoo priest all while wondering why he told her this.
“I can’t help it,” he added, closing his eyes. “Happens especially when I touch.”
She drew her hand back at that, looking at him. “Is that why you just touched me?”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I just…wanted to understand why you keep lying to me.”
She sat entirely back now.
“You don’t have to be afraid of me,” he said again. “I wouldn’t hurt you. Not in any of the ways you fear.”
She swallowed when her pulse pounded in her throat. “That’s good to know,” she said, wondering just how much he could see.
“I’m not a threat to you,” he said.
His layered tone brought her gaze to his, curious. Hidden tensions in her body suddenly let go, telling her she’d definitely been afraid. It was only his confession and yet she believed it, foolish as it seemed. At least her instincts were at ease. She could probably talk them back into paranoia if she worked on it but wouldn’t.
She rinsed the washcloth again and finished getting all the blood off his forehead then applied triple antibiotic ointment with some tissue. “Does it hurt real bad?” she wondered.
“Not too bad.”
She put the washcloth back in the tray and eyed him. “Are there other injuries I need to know about?”
He lay his head back on the pillow, that earth shaking smile threatening at the corner of his mouth. “Not that you need to know about.”
“Well…I have an old claw-foot bathtub if you need to soak your injuries that I don’t need to know about. And I have salts and things that may speed up healing. Not real sure how true all that stuff is.”
“Salt is a purger,” he muttered, angling his gaze at her. “It helps to expel things.”
She nodded with a smile. “You remembered something else, I see.”
He gave a small nod, his stare way too intense on her.
“Well…I have indentured servitude chores to do before my landlord comes to collect the day’s yield. There’s a full-length mirror in the bathroom if you decide to tend to those other injuries and have that soak. Usually takes me an hour to finish up.”
“Indentured servitude chores?”
She gave a small laugh. “Was kind of a joke. Kind of,” she added, feeling like he was seeing the truth of it.
He nodded. “I understand the sarcasm.”
She didn’t doubt he did but now she wondered what he thought about it. Did he agree? Think it childish?