Jack in the Green

  Jack in the Green

  A novella by

  Charles de Lint

  Copyright 2012 by Charles de Lint

  Jack in the Green

  It's not the audacity of the invasion that shocks Maria so much as that she recognizes one of the robbers: Luz Chaidez. Maria hasn't thought of her in years.

  Maria is cleaning windows in the second floor master bedroom of the Armstrongs' house when she sees the gang in their green hoodies, legs propelling their skateboards up the curved driveway of the house next door. The white boy in the lead has a handsome, puckish face and a crowbar in his hand. A few strands of long red hair escape his hood, but his skin is almost as brown as her own.

  He glances up before she can duck away and for a moment their gazes hold. She reads a promise in his eyes—the possibility of…everything—and an unfamiliar flutter moves in her chest.

  He gives her a wink, then wedges the crowbar into the doorjamb by the lock. Wood splinters. The largest of the gang, a tall black man, kicks the door open like it's balsa wood. They all troop inside. Luz is last. Except for the white boy in the lead, none of the others have looked in her direction. A moment later the door shuts and it's like they were never there.

  Maria half-expects an alarm to go off, but many homeowners in Desert View feel secure enough with the management of their gated community not to bother. Most criminals just pick easier targets.

  She wonders how the hooded gang got past the guards. It doesn't matter how long she's been working here, she still has to show her I.D. every time the bus lets her off at the front gate, and the guard always checks her name against his list.

  She looks up and down the street. No one seems to have noticed the intruders or even heard their boards as they rolled through the neighbourhood. In the barrio everyone notices everything, but here, people shut themselves away in their houses. Most are at work right now anyway.

  She knows she should call 911. If it were happening to one of her clients, her cell would be out the moment she saw the gang turn into the driveway. But the people next door mean nothing to her. She doesn't even know their names.

  She goes back to cleaning windows and thinks about how that white boy looked at her, how it felt like they were connecting on some deep level, if only for a moment. Then she thinks of Luz. She wonders what her relationship is to the gang. Specifically, to that handsome red-haired boy.

  Luz.

  Once upon a time they were best friends.

  One night when they're fourteen, Luz comes tapping at the shutter of Maria's window. It's late, late. Past midnight, closer to dawn than not. Maria has been asleep for hours. Luz grins at her, bouncing on her toes like she's been chugging Redbulls all night.

  Maria throws back the covers, then raises the window and leans out into the cool night.

  "What are you doing out there?" she whispers.

  "Stuff. Do you still have those silver and turquoise earrings we got at the thrift shop?"

  Maria nods.

  "Come on out," Luz says, "and bring them with you."

  They bought the earrings together a few months ago at Buffalo Exchange, promising to share them like they do most of their fashion finds. When it's something special like these earrings, it's one week on and one week off. Maria knows a pang of disappointment. It's her turn this week and she's only had them for three days. She was going to wear them to school tomorrow.

  But that's not the real problem.

  "I can't come out," she says. "It's the middle of the night."

  "Almost morning, actually."

  Maria sighs. Luz can talk her into anything, so there's really not much point in fighting it.

  "What are we going to do?" she asks.

  "Brujería."

  Magic. The word hangs there in the air between them like the echo of a promise. Maria waits for the joke, but all Luz does is give her an impatient look.

  "You're not going all boring on me, are you?" she asks.

  There are many crimes in the law book Luz keeps in her head. Boring is on page one.

  "Give me a sec'," Maria says and ducks back inside.

  She leaves her tartan pajama bottoms on, but adds runners, a plain black T and a long-sleeved grey hoodie with a bulldog crest on the arm. She opens the cigar box where she keeps her jewellery and takes out the earrings. They're silver feathers with fine turquoise inlay that highlights the feather design. What a find they were. Vintage Teme Navajo, signed and everything. Not only are they beautiful, but they seem to weigh no more than a real bird's feather. Sighing, she puts them in her pocket and goes outside.

  Luz leads her down to the dry wash where a couple of meth heads were found dead last week. This is forbidden territory. Not just by her parents, but by her older brother Pablo, too.

  The chill desert air sends a shiver down Maria's spine. She looks around nervously, starting at every sound. An owl's hoot from the top of a distant saguaro. A packrat scurrying in the dry brush under the mesquite. Luz tramps down the sandy bottom of the wash with the comfortable stride of someone who simply assumes that she has every right to go wherever she wants.

  When Maria catches up to her, Luz pulls out a small Player's cigarette tin with a cute sailor painted on it.

  "What's that for?" Maria asks.

  Luz opens it and points a small flashlight's beam inside. There's a picture in it from the photo booth at the mall, the two of them squished together, laughing.

  "We're going to put the earrings in here," Luz says, "and then we're going to hide the tin. Years from now, when we've maybe gone our separate ways and one of us is looking for the other, she can retrieve the tin and it'll bring the other one back to her."

  "But how?"

  "Brujería," Luz says like she did before, outside Maria's window.

  She lifts the edge of the picture with a fingernail. At the bottom of the tin Maria sees a mix of things she can't identify. Powders and twigs, flower petals and bits of dried leaves.

  "What is that stuff?" she asks.

  "Pollen and barrio dust," Luz says. "Mixed with marigold petals, cactus thorns and mesquite leaves. Abuela gave me the spell. It only works if we don't tell anybody about it."

  At that point Maria still thinks Luz means one of her grandmothers. She stares into the tin. The whole night feels haunted, like it's full of ghosts. Like she's walking on a thin mirror and any false step will make the glass shatter and she'll fall forever into some strange abyss. She shivers again and feels dizzy.

  Maria blinks and the moment is gone. The world is as it should be once more, except that they're still in the forbidden dry wash with the dawn pinking the skies on the other side of the Hierro Madera Mountains.

  "Are we really working magic?" she asks.

  Luz nods. "Give me the earrings."

  Maria takes them from her pocket and drops them into the cigarette tin that Luz holds out to her. Luz closes the tin with a snap and puts it in her pocket.

  "Now we just have to hide it," she says, "and the spell is done."

  "We can't hide it here," Maria says. "Somebody will find it."

  "I know. We have to hide it in a place where, even if it's found, no one will dare to take it."

  The only place Maria can think of like that is the headquarters of the 66 Bandas—the local gangbangers. But when she mentions it, Luz shakes her head.

  "I know a scarier place than that," she says. "The bottle man's yard."

  Maria's eyes go wide.

  The bottle man is a witch—a bottle witch who keeps his magic in the bottles he hangs in the trees around his home. He lives in a shack made of saguaro ribs and cast off pieces of tin and mismatched sizes of clapboard spray-painted with images of animals and pictographs in bright Oaxacan colours.

&nbs
p; "Oh, I don't know," says Maria, a tremor in her voice. "They say he's loco and can make bad magic."

  "Which is exactly why no one will ever find it there," says Luz, grabbing Maria by the hand and pulling her along the wash toward their destination.

  Twenty minutes later they arrive at the bottle man's yard and stand quietly across the wash from his shack. It sits on the edge of the desert, an old mesquite tree towering above it, bottles of all shapes, sizes and colours tied to the branches where they tinkle softly when the wind taps them against each other.

  The ground under the tree and all around the shack is thick with broken glass, but the pieces have no sharp edges. It's like they've been rolling against each other in an ocean for years until they're smoothed like pebbles, even though they actually come from when the monsoons blow hard and the bottles in the tree smash against each other.

  Luz grins at Maria and pulls her into the yard. Maria's heart is pounding so loudly in her ears that she's certain that it, alone, will wake the sleeping bottle witch, but Luz proceeds steadily toward the river of broken glass. When they reach its edge, Luz lets go of Maria's hand and removes the tin and a clear sandwich bag from her pocket. She presses the tin against her lips, then offers it to Maria. Maria kisses it as well.

  Luz seals the tin inside the bag, then removes one sandal and uses it to gently push aside the glass shards until a small well forms. Maria doesn't breathe, certain they are about to be caught by the bottle witch, but the sound of shifting glass only blends with the soft clink of bottles high in the tree branches above them. Luz places the tin in the hollow and smoothes the glass back over as quietly as she can. She slips her sandal back onto her foot, then reaches for Maria's hand and together they tiptoe back across the yard. When they reach the wash they run like cats being chased by coyotes.

  Maria has been cleaning the bedroom windows until she's afraid her hand will go right through the glass. But curiosity has the better of her. It's almost an hour later and the gang still hasn't come out of the house next door. If they're planning a "surprise party" for the owners, the busted door's a dead giveaway. If they're robbing the place, they're sure being choosy about what they take.

  Finally she goes on to other work, glancing out windows on that side of the house whenever she can. By the time she's finished her day's work, the gang still hasn't emerged. As she locks the Andersons' door, Maria is tempted to peek in the windows next door to see what they're up to, but she doesn't risk it. She learned a long time ago that while minding your own business might be boring, it also keeps you alive.

  She wonders if Luz still has that law book in her head: The World According to Lucia Chaidez. Back in the day, everything was Luz's business if it piqued her curiosity.

  Maria walks down the street, takes one turn, then another. When she reaches the gate, the guard lets her out. She crosses the street and waits for the bus. A few moments later Connie sits down beside her, looking as tired as Maria feels. Connie undoes her hair, runs her fingers through it, then puts it back in a ponytail. She's dressed like Maria, in work clothes: sweats, T-shirt, sneakers. She leans back against the bench and stares up into the sky. Santo del Vado Viejo might be a city, but it's also in the desert. It's a desert sky up there, blue and sharp, and it goes on forever.

  "The VVers are skating tonight," she says. "Are you going?"

  Maria nods. She wants to say something about what she saw today, but the words feel locked on the tip of her tongue. Instead they talk about Baby Luna, the new jammer for Los Vampiros. They're still waiting for the bus when the first police car pulls up at the Desert View gates. They watch as two more vehicles enter the gated community.

  "I wonder what's going on in there?" Connie says.

  Maria shrugs. She's feeling a little bad about not having called 911—even if Luz was one of the gang invading the house next door. She doesn't care if the people who own it got robbed, but she doesn't want anybody to have been hurt.

  "I'll bet it's Los Murrietas," Connie says. "They've been hitting gated communities all over the city."

  Maria gives her a blank look.

  "Everybody in the neighbourhood’s talking about it. That's what this new gang is called."

  "But what's it supposed to mean?"

  "They're like Joaquin Murrieta. They only rob people like bank managers and CEOs. Poetic justice. None of those guys ever lose their own money— they just bleed the rest of us dry and collect their big bonuses. Supposedly, the gang has been giving most of the money they steal to people who've had mortgage foreclosures."

  "For real?"

  "I don't know. Nobody's ever come right out and said that's where they got the money. But I heard that's how Señora Morales was able to keep her house."

  Maria wonders how Señora Morales explained her sudden windfall, but all she says is, "cool. "

  Her roommate Veronica is still out when she gets home, but that's no surprise. Veronica works late more often than she doesn't—it's how you keep a job in this economy. Maria drops her knapsack on the floor and heads for the shower. When she comes out of the bathroom, drying her hair, she hears a knock at the door.

  There's a cop standing in the hall—a black guy in a dark suit, white shirt, no tie, excellent hair. He shows her his badge. She doesn't look at it. She doesn't need to look at a badge to know he's a cop. Standing in the hall behind him is another one. This one's Hispanic. All she's wearing is an oversized T-shirt. He gives her an appreciative once-over but doesn't meet her gaze.

  She leans against the doorframe, arms folded across her chest. She doesn't invite them in and they don't ask.

  "Maria Martinez?" the black cop asks.

  She nods.

  "And you're an employee of Vado Viejo Maid Services?"

  She nods again. She has an idea what this is about, but she's not going to make it easy for them.

  "Your boss says you were working in the Anderson House in Desert View today."

  "So?" she says.

  She hopes nothing shows in her face.

  "We were wondering if you saw anything unusual on the street while you were there."

  She shakes her head. "Why? What happened?"

  "The house next to where you were working was broken into this afternoon."

  "If you saw anything, chica," the Hispanic cop adds, "now's the time to tell us. That way, maybe we won't put Immigration on your ass."

  "Screw you," she tells him. "I was born here."

  "Dial it down, Gonzales," the black cop says over his shoulder, then turns back to her, "And you, watch your mouth."

  Maria gives him a cold look. "Are we done?"

  "Almost. Are you sure you didn't see anything?"

  "I was working. You don't exactly get time to daydream out a window if you're going to make your quota. Why are you pushing on this anyway? Since when does the law get all worked up about a simple break-in?"

  "We take every crime seriously."

  "And it's got nothing to do with it having happened in Desert View?"

  "Of course not."

  "So," she says, "let me get this straight. Last year my apartment got broken into and you guys did nothing. Nada. But a few weeks ago the cops shut down a party we were having and it wasn't even late. And now I'm supposed to give a crap about a bunch of rich gringos living in Desert View?"

  The Hispanic cop frowns and takes a step forward, but his partner puts up a hand and he stops. The black cop sighs and hands her a business card.

  "If you remember anything," he says, "call me."

  Maria watches them until they turn into the stairwell. They're talking, but she only catches a bit of their conversation.

  "…going to catch those bastards sooner or later."

  She steps back inside her apartment. Closing the door, she tosses the business card in the trash.

  When they are fifteen, Luz gets suspended from school for fighting, which is completely unfair since she'd only been standing up to a bully. Maria says as much when she comes by Luz's hou
se after school, but Luz only laughs.

  "Don't you get it yet?" she says. "This is a life lesson."

  Maria shakes her head. "No, I don't get it. Do you mean you shouldn't have stopped Blair from picking on Perlita?"

  "Of course not," she says. She taps her index finger against Maria's forehead. "Think about it. This just reminds us that if you're rich and white, you can do whatever you want. You're always in the right. It's the brown-skinned girls like us who are always wrong."

  "I hate this," Maria says.

  Luz doesn't respond. She doesn't have to.

  Maria points to some pebbles laid out in a line on the bedspread in between them.

  "What are you doing with those?" she asks.

  "It's something Abuela taught me."

  By now Maria knows Luz doesn't mean either of her real grandmothers. She's talking about the old woman who lives in the small adobe building at the end of the block. Her yard is always full of stray dogs. She has the desert on one side of her, the headquarters of the 66 Bandas on the other, but the gangbangers never bother her or her clients. They wouldn’t dare.

  That's because she's a brujá. She's like the bottle tree man, except her magic is in potions and the silver milagros she makes and sells. People use them to ask favours of the Saints. They're simple compared to the commercial kind in the stores, and they cost more, but everybody believes they work better so she has no lack of customers.

  "They're magic stones?" Maria asks.

  "Not yet. But she told me if you choose right, and if you carry that pebble around for a long time and fill it with the intent that it become magic, one day it will actually happen. And then you will be able to use that magic."

  "Verdad?"

  Luz nods.

  "What are you going to do with it?" Maria asks.

  "I don't know yet. Abuela says your intent has to be pure. I can't make my mind up yet, but I can focus on the pebble so that when it's ready, I'll be ready, too."

  Maria's not sure what to think. Luz is always talking about brujería and the spirits. She says hawks are actually old men who have been drinking mescal tea to free their wings, and that some people walk around with animals under their skin. Maria believed the stories when she was younger. Now she's pretty sure that's all they are. Stories.