13. The Rooftop Revolution of Selly Avilés #3
Whose plan? What plan? I text back furiously, trying and failing to be somewhat slick about it since I’m onstage.
At the podium, a grinning retiree in an evening gown introduces herself as Laina Faxwell, the chief executive something or other of the vice chair committee of whatever-the-hell.
She insists that she’s so excited to get to the main event and then immediately dives into a mile-long list of donors.
OMAR SOLOMON: Okay, I admit this favor was a bit more complicated than I originally let on.
SellyDA: COMPLICATED?! Try batshit insane. I need an explanation now or I walk.
OMAR SOLOMON: Please don’t walk. This is incredibly important, also more urgent than I can express here.
SellyDA: You’re still being vague. I’m standing up.
I’m not standing up.
Something in Laina Faxwell’s tone alerts me that she’s finally moving on to the meat of the matter, and that’s when she halfway turns and gestures at me. “And, of course, besides the esteemed Dr. Hodge—”
“It’s an honorary degree!” Barnabas interjects gamely.
“—the museum board is pleased to introduce you all to a rising star of the juvenile literary world…” She pauses to check her notes, and about a hundred eyes of varying geriatricness turn to me.
Like an asshole, I go, “Ah ha hrmf!”
“… Selly Dianamaria Avilés!” She hits the A in my last name too hard and stumbles right over the rest of it, blowing the whole thing, then chuckles quietly and yelps, “And her canine companions!”
Horrifyingly, the crowd erupts into cheers.
Barnabas Hodge nudges me kindly. “Got some fans, eh?”
“Miss Avilés’s work has been praised by none other than the museum’s own dear and elusive friend, Omar Solomon, as ‘A breath of fresh air and a bright light in these ever-dimming times.’ ”
Gasps of approval ring out as I frantically tap on my phone.
SellyDA: WTF!?!?!?
OMAR SOLOMON: Oh, did they do the introductions? It’s all true. I never lie about these things.
Too many emotions crisscross my brain at once.
I must’ve shorted out, because I’m pretty sure I’m just sitting here staring blankly into the sky as color splotches from the stage lights swirl past. Togo, always sensitive to my feelings, nuzzles my leg thoughtfully.
Fortunately, Laina Faxwell has moved on to more thank-yous, so I have a few moments to just be.
And then a realization slaps me right out of it all.
SellyDA: Iuhgsuhfgsikhufgs! You’ve been what, stalking me??
OMAR SOLOMON: Absolutely not.
SellyDA: THEN HOW DO YOU KNOW ABOUT MY WORK??
Am I mad? Yes. Am I thrilled? Yes. Nothing makes sense. Lain Faxwell tries to tell some jokes. The crowd chortles obligingly.
OMAR SOLOMON: How did you happen to get a job walking dogs in the neighborhood one of your favorite writers lives in?
SellyDA: It’s not my fault you posted your info online, buddy!
OMAR SOLOMON: So you did do it on purpose.
Oops. Told on myself. Absolute chad move. But that’s beside the point.
SellyDA: How have you read my writing??
By way of reply, he forwards me my own message: It’s not my fault you posted your info online, buddy!
Right. “Torque Phantoms of Old Havana.” In Peapod Magazine, an online kidlit site. My first publication. Shit. But still!
SellyDA: Touché, asshole, but how did you know I was a writer in the first place??
Barnabas Hodge starts to stand with an old guy groan.
Dimly, I register that Laina Faxwell has just rounded off a gushing introduction to his work after saying he needs none.
Now thunderous applause sounds and Barnabas Hodge looks like he might not make it all the way up.
I pocket my phone and grasp his arm, helping the old man rise.
He puts his warm, wrinkly hand over mine and chuckles.
“Too kind, my dear, too kind.” We promenade to the podium arm in arm like he’s walking me down the aisle.
I’m just trying not to let it show how eager I am to get back to whatever explanation Omar Solomon has concocted now.
But before I can turn away, Barnabas Hodge pulls me into an embrace and whispers: “When it’s time to go, we go.
No hesitation, my dear. You understand?”
“No,” I whimper, but he’s already turned to the crowd—they’re all melting and awwing at this moving display over cross generational support or whatever—and I’m just standing there speechless once again.
“If you had told me thirty years ago, when the world was coming apart and all we had were stories to save our lives,” Barnabas Hodge begins as I stumble back to my seat in a daze, “that one day I’d be speaking at a fancy rooftop soiree with a bunch of rich white people in the shadow of a life-size Tumult the Dragon here, well…
” He trails off with a whimsical chuckle, and the room explodes with applause and laughter again.
Five tails wag enthusiastically when I get back to my seat. I distribute bacon treats and skritches and then shakily pull out my phone.
OMAR SOLOMON: It’s also not my fault that you talk about being a writer on the phone when you’re in my apartment.
SellyDA: So you HAVE been watching me from afar, Creepo!
OMAR SOLOMON: Not exactly, no. I can’t help it, that is.
SellyDA: CREEP!
OMAR SOLOMON: No, I mean I can’t help it because I’m always there.
Something in the way he phrased that jumps out at me, but I can’t put my finger on what.
SellyDA: Wait. Please don’t tell me you died and this is some cursed AI recreation I’m talking to, because I will throw my phone off this rooftop right the fuck now.
OMAR SOLOMON: Selly, I hope you know my work well enough to know that I would never let those tech bros anywhere near my brain or legacy, and if I had died and they did that, my spirit would never leave them in peace.
OMAR SOLOMON: A few years ago, I did almost die though. And the experience did take a lot from me. Almost everything.
SellyDA: WHAT DOES THAT MEAN??
But even as I hit Send, it dawns on me. He’s typing, too, but I get there first.
SellyDA: THE AQUARIUM??
Rather than finish whatever he was explaining, he just hits my post with a thumbs-up.
“And so, friends”—Barnabas Hodge’s voice has taken on the vibrant, embracing church sermon baritone he was once renowned for—“what I’m here to remind y’all of is that a revolution ain’t nothin’ but a story, and it’s told by tens of thousands of people all at once.
And storytelling, just like conjure work and cookin’, is just a matter of putting all the right ingredients in the right pot at the right time. You feel me?”
They do, apparently. Hoots and hollers arise from the crowd. If anyone starts pretending to catch the Holy Ghost, I’m out for real.
When I look back down at my phone there’s a brain emoji, and I let out a little shriek. Barnabas looks back at me with a smirk, then continues.
OMAR SOLOMON: It’s too much to explain over text, but suffice to say, yes that’s all that’s left of me for the moment, and I desperately need your help, but it’s not the kind of thing I’m comfortable writing on such an unsecure app, so I’m afraid I’ll need you to put the pieces together a bit and go with the flow, so to speak.
“Revolution is not a single battle or even a few years’ worth of fighting.
It’s every single day. It’s what you do when you look in the mirror.
It’s how you listen. How you grow. That’s how we—not just get to paradise—that’s how we create paradise, together.
Every day, every moment. Paradise. We do it with stories. ”
SellyDA: I’m sorry about your body, but I’m gonna need a little more than that to go on, Mr. Solomon.
“With stories,” Barnabas Hodge booms, wrapping up, “we can go anywhere, do anything. Not just change the world, but create it anew, hm?” He turns back to me and offers a genial old wink. “So let’s get started.”
Standing ovation.
OMAR SOLOMON: How bout this: those museum bastards would much rather have me stashed away in a murky vat than out in the world causing more trouble, and they’ve made sure to keep a tight rein on anything that would help me get back on my feet.
OMAR SOLOMON: So to speak.
Barnabas Hodge. It has to be. Omar Solomon sent me here to help him out of a difficult situation.
The museum is probably keeping him somehow against his will, too, and when the two of them reunite, all hell will break loose in the best possible way!
That explains the winking and nudging: the old rebel team is getting back together, and I get to play one small part in making it happen.
Dream come true. All I have to do is escort old Barnabas out the door and away.
The applause is still going when he hobbles back over to me.
The dogs greet him with enthusiasm. I don’t know what to make of these museum folks, given what I’ve just been told.
They seem genuinely excited and adoring.
Laina Faxwell launches into some more mid-level punnery.
She’ll be dragging me up there next, I’m sure of it. I don’t have much time.
I wrap a firm hand around Barnabas Hodge’s arm. “Let’s go, Mr. Hodge,” I whisper. “I’ll walk you out.”
He scrunches his face at me, low-key appalled. “What, back to the elevator, my dear? Why would we do that?”
“Solomon sent me here to help an old friend leave a tense situation,” I hiss. “So that’s what I’m doing.”
“Ridiculous,” Hodge insists. “Solomon and I were comrades and always will be, but friends? Not likely. He’s too freewheeling for my milieu, the rascal.” And with that, he sits definitively.
“… who needs no introduction,” Laina Faxwell concludes, “Selly Dianamaria Avilés!”
I stand, take in the applause. Try to still my trembling hands. Fail. Walk a few shaky steps to the podium, and only then do I realize I still have the five leashes clutched tightly in my left fist.
In front of me, a hundred expectant eyes, hungry even.