Chapter 6 Faye
Iwoke up the following morning to a head-splitting banging and drilling coming from my bathroom.
I could faintly hear the birds chirping in the near distance as the sun shone its light through the small crack of my blackout curtains.
What the hell? I threw my thick blankets off of me and quickly paced to the bathroom where I spotted a rugged, husky man working on the new mirror he was seemingly replacing.
He was wearing dark Levi jeans, Redwing boots, and a Carhart thermal long sleeve that hugged his toned and muscular arms.
He turned and my face immediately went pale. I knew his face and he knew mine. All too well. My eyes went wide as his hazel ones went to my hardened nipples that he could clearly see through my white tank top. Panicking, I grabbed a sweater off my chair and covered myself in embarrassment.
“Good morning, sunshine.” His rugged yet silky voice taunted my flesh.
It’s too early for this. “What the hell are you doing here?” I was both genuinely curious and pissed off that this man was invading my space, way too early in the morning.
“Your ma called me last night, said she needed something fixed in the house, so, here I am.”
I swallowed hard, convinced I had to be still asleep. This was a nightmare. Yes, a nightmare. Next thing I knew Vadon would come out. I rubbed my bed-head. Nope, this was real. My vision focused on the bearded, backwards-baseball-cap-wearing man before me.
He looked the same, yet different. He was a boy the last time I saw him.
Now a full grown man stood before me. A complete stranger, yet familiar.
He rubbed his dark auburn beard. That was new.
He wasn’t that scrawny farm boy that I used to know.
He stood before me all rugged, tall, and muscular, with his body full of Nordic tattoos.
What the fuck? Surprised wasn’t even the emotion I could describe in this moment. It was pure shock.
“So, how did this mirror shatter anyway?” he asked, looking at me for an answer I didn’t want to give him.
“That’s none of your business,” I snapped, crossing my arms.
He looked at me up and down, amused. “Uh-huh.” Jax grabbed his toolbox and started to walk out my door, but stopped. He handed me my scissors full of my dark brown locks. Oh my gods, my hair! I forgot about my mop-chop. I wanted to crawl into a hole.
He lifted his gloved hand to the end of my uneven hair, tugging at a few loose strands, groaning as he analyzed my hair between his gloved fingers. His hazel eyes interlocked on mine, and I gulped, feeling his presence everywhere, like he was inside of my skin. I swear I got as pale as my walls.
I took my hair back from his grasp and tucked it behind my ears, breaking the awkward silence between us.
He was always so damn smug, that one. I wanted to rip that beard right off his face.
I must have forgotten to put the scissors away.
I got so busy cleaning up the glass from the mirror, I left them out right on top of the bathroom counter.
My hair was still in the sink, so I grabbed as much as I could and flushed it down the toilet, rolling my eyes.
“You can leave now, thanks.” I was still holding the sweater to my chest.
He just looked at me and smirked, “Yeah, you’re welcome” he said, before leaving.
What in the actual hell and Guadeloupe! Ma had some serious explaining to do.
I went down to the kitchen to demand answers from this woman.
If she didn’t think I knew what she was up to, she was dead wrong!
I didn’t know what was more embarrassing: him thinking I threw the scissors at the mirror, or me not fully understanding how I even did it.
No, that can’t be right. I was drunk and angry which was always a bad mix.
Ma came inside with her garden hat and shovel, rain boots, and a face full of soil, taking one look at me.
“Mija, have you eaten? Your clothes are wearing you.” I know Ma meant well.
She came from an immigrant family with one brother and a half sister, so she could be…
well, a little harsh at times. She had a rough life but didn’t look like it.
I don’t know how she shined so bright all the time.
I often wondered if she stole the rays from the very sun she basked in.
I just sighed and rolled my eyes. “For your information, I had exactly three pieces of bacon and a cup of joe this morning, thank you very much.”
“Mija, if you’re gonna fight the Diablo, you’re gonna need your strength. And three pieces of bacon ain’t gonna cut it,” she emphasized, slapping more eggs on my plate with freshly made tortillas and beans.
“So, you weren’t going to tell me you called a Grimwood to come fix the mirror this morning?” I sipped my coffee and side-eyed her through the steam.
“Well, you fell asleep with Birdie. I didn’t want to bother you. You seemed exhausted from your late night activities.”
I nearly choked on my coffee. “I’m sorry about the mirror, Ma.”
She looked at me with worry in her eyes. “Faye, don’t worry about the mirror, worry about piecing yourself back together.” She glanced at Birdie playing Lego’s.
“I’m trying, I really am.”
Who was I to question her in her own house anyway.
I had just broken a mirror and I’m still not sure how it was possible.
I tried to convince myself it was all the cerveza (beer).
I wasn’t going to try my luck this morning.
Ma was kind but not to be trifled with. As long as I didn’t have to see Jaxon Reed Grimwood in my house again; as long as he stayed out of my way, there would be peace in my world.
Well, as much as peace as there could be, anyway.
“Can you give me a warning next time?” I placed my coffee down on the counter. “That machista almost saw my chi-chi’s this morning, and he scared the hell out of me.”
Ma laughed as she made her way back outside. “You should be focused on your twenty-fifth birthday coming up.”
I watched her from the screen door, as she poked and prodded at her herb garden, gathering some chamomile, lavender, and thyme in a bundle, and wrapped it in string.
“How are your night terrors, mija?”
I didn’t want to speak about the night terrors that have haunted me since I was a child.
Noting that for some reason, ever since I’ve come back home, the dreams have gotten so much better.
I’d wake up from my own screams, drenched in sweat most nights.
Thankfully Birdie had her own room and bed where she didn’t have to hear me become senile. The dreams shook me to my core.
“Take this. A nice salt bath and some herbal tea will do the trick.” Ma handed me the bundle of herbs and a tourmaline crystal.
“You really expect me to believe this stuff works, Ma. A damn bundle of herbs and a rock?” I eyed the herb bundle she placed in my hands.
“When’s the last time you had a bad dream?”
“I don’t know, I don't keep track, but it’s been a while… A couple weeks.”
“Pues si.” Ma left me with the bundle in my hands like a deer in headlights.
After a much forced second breakfast, by none other than Ma herself, I had planned to do more job hunting and let Birdie enjoy her grandmother, while they sang in the garden and drank homemade sun tea. I festered up as much energy as I could to get myself looking decent.
I passed myself in the mirror, seeing a reflection I no longer recognized.
My collarbones were protruding and the dark circles under my eyes felt like they were permanently tattooed there.
While I had a few of those, these ones I particularly had a disdain for.
I stared at myself in the mirror ruthlessly; at the clothes that hung from my bony body.
An abrupt glance of a dark shadow stood behind me, in my reflection.
For fear of my life, I turned around, ready to stab whatever I was seeing with the sharp side of my brush, but nothing was there.
I turned back to the mirror and it had vanished, gone.
I was losing my mind. Yup, that is what was happening.
The chronic stress made me permanently delusional.
I sighed, taking a deep slow breath. “Now, you listen up, we’re gonna get ourselves back, Faye Robles. We’re just weathering the storm right now. I got this. You got this.” I ironed out my jeans with my palms in a nervous sweat. Who the hell was I trying to convince?
I made a call to Raquel, who thankfully was a mortician, or busy reading the dead.
The amount people paid for “channeling” a passed loved one was astonishing.
She honestly did well for herself. I just wasn’t really into any of that superstitious mambo jumbo.
Having to grow up in a town where the rumor is you’re a bruja was not the highlight of my life.
Raquel was the sister I never had and was bat-shit crazy.
Just one of many things I happened to love her for.
She was a gothic queen fit for a throne made of thorns.
Raquel was like a rose—full of dreadful beauty, indeed.
If you were careful and tender, you could avoid the thorns and she bloomed beautifully.
She only let in a certain number of people, and she was in love with the dead more than the living.
Could I blame her? People sucked. I felt like I was losing my faith in humanity everyday.