CHAPTER FOUR
October 12 a€￠ 1:16 A.M.
Chaz:
Angelique leaned against my shoulder, babbling softly, staring into space. The city melted around us as one narrow fog-drenched street bled into another. We swung through that section of the Quarter where the streets changed names; St. Charles Avenue veered off into downtown and turned into Royal Street, leaving the nineteenth-century millionairea€?s row behind.
I tapped the Plexiglas that separated us from the taxi driver. A row of colorful tarot cards clung to the barrier with a handwritten sign: FREE READINGS WITH A TOUR OF THE CITY.
a€?The Carrington. Bourbon Street.a€?
He nodded. At least, I think it was a he. Long dreadlocks, black lipstick, massive biceps. I saw him studying me in the rearview.
a€?Newbie?a€? the he/she asked a few moments later, heavy-lidded eyes confronting mine in the mirror.
I nodded.
a€?You the Babysitter?a€?
Another nod. Followed by a yawn.
a€?Mind if I see some ID?a€?
I flashed my palm.
The driver shrugged. a€?Ever since that incident over in Barcelona last year, I always check.a€?
a€?Yeah.a€? I yawned again. a€?What can I say? The laws are different in Spain. You should be glad you live here.a€? Just then the Carrington Hotel loomed into view, a tall brick-and-mortar Baroque masterpiece. For seven days and nights I have no life. I eat, drink and sleep with my assigned Newbie. I dona€?t mean sleep in the biblical sensea€”nobody touches my baby like that, not even me.
Sometimes we stay in a hotel; sometimes we go to my place. On rare occasions, we go to the Newbiea€?s home, but there are usually too many memory pegs there, even after ita€?s been sterilized. My main requirement is that wherever we stay, I need my own room and a VR room. Once in a while a customer balks and says thata€?s too expensive. I usually raise an eyebrow and tell them to take their business elsewhere. Right about then I laugh. Not hysterically. Ita€?s more like a well-planned a€?ha.a€?
There is nowhere else. Wea€?re the only ice-cream store in town.
Angelique and I made it through the hotel lobby without incident. I take that back. There was a brief moment when she became disoriented, right about when I was getting the room key.
She looked up at me through half-closed eyes. a€?William?a€? she asked, confused. A tormented pause. a€?Jim?a€? She shook her head. I made eye contact with the concierge, then silently showed him my ID.
a€?Who are you?a€? Angelique asked.
a€?Chaz. Chaz Domingue. Your Babysitter.a€? I briefly debated which of the five Master Keys to use. a€?Recognize.a€?
She squinted her eyes, looked me up and down. a€?My Babysitter?a€?
a€?Focus,a€? I said, pulling another key phrase from my limited bag of tricks. a€?This is Day One.a€?
a€?Day One.a€? She looked at the ground, shoulders sagging as the weight of the world came rushing back. a€?Then William is really gone.a€? Her voice faded below a whisper. a€?And that means I must be dead.a€?
a€?No, Angelique,a€? I guided her toward the elevator, away from the concierge, who looked concerned. Few people see or remember the anguish of a Newbiea€?s first week. If they did, they might not be so eager to jump.
a€?Youa€?re alive,a€? I told her as the elevator took us almost instantly to the thirty-third floor.
But she just shook her head and kept mumbling the same dark phrase over and over.
a€?That means I must be dead.a€?
Sometimes this job is enough to break your heart, if youa€?ve still got one.
1:58 A.M.
Fresh Start keeps its word when we say we give our clients a new beginning. I may be part of the family, but I dona€?t have access to any a€?secret files.a€? I honestly didna€?t know who the hell she was or who she used to be, any more than she did. And I didna€?t care.
Like I always say, I dona€?t make the rules.
So, I tucked Angelique into bed, made sure she was safe and sound and asleep; then I locked all the doors and windows. Ita€?s habit, of coursea€”no one has wandered into a Babysittera€?s suite, even by accident, in more than twenty years. Still, it makes me feel better, so I do it. Lots of things make me feel better. Like black-market whiskey. Like jazz clubs. Like a midnight session alone in a VR room.
The moon had all but forgotten about us. It disappeared behind the rugged skyline, and headed off to seduce other countries with silver shadows. I was long past tired. But I needed absolution.
I shut the door to the room, slipped into a VR suit, then snuggled down in the sensory chair and closed my eyes while it morphed to fit my body. With a thought command I switched on the Grid. Narrow bands of red, blue and green light shot across the room, sought and defined its dimensions, creating a chart of horizontal lines. The light quickly formed a graph of horizontal and vertical bands.
The Grid was up.
I went to my home page, a glittering seascape where waves crashed against a mountainous shore. Sandpipers waddled across the narrow beach, following the tides like tiny Charlie Chaplin impressionists. I took a deep breath, sucked in the smell of saltwater, felt the charge of negative ions.
I always have a hard time leaving my home page.
It was well past midnight in my tiny corner of the universe, sometime between rest for the weary and insomnia for the troubled. And yeta€”elsewhere on eartha€?s canvasa€”dawn painted gray skies; sherbet colors layered the horizon; and the earth waited to run a rough tongue over the flavors of tomorrow. I spun a VR globe with my right hand, looking for places where the sun still cast long shadows, where the inhabitants had reached that point in the day where they could pause and catch their breath.
I have ten preselected locations around the world, ten different time zones, places I can visit whenever I have a chance.
Not everybody has a regular nine-to-five. Ia€?ve learned over the years to find my solace where and when I can. Tonight it waited for me in a tiny stucco building in George, South Africa. I always start on the outside, on the dusty street. I know I stand out from most of the regulars, me in my glittering VR suit, them in their brightly colored caftans and turbans. But there will be others like me, visitors from around the globe. One man comes from China; his almond eyes watch me as we stand beside each other. Ia€?ve never actually talked to him, but he nods and smiles, glances down at my right hand.
Ia€?m carrying my sax.
The building glows from within, the glimmer of a thousand candles. Ia€?ve come to fill up all my empty spaces, to patch the holes in my heart, to revive my ever-dull, ever-disobedient soul.
I sit in a back pew, my eyes closed, letting the song wash over me, cleansing me. Already I can hear her voice. Beulah. An old black woman, frail and tall, her nubby hair cropped close to her head, her neck long: her wide lips lift praise in a velvet-rich tone, her lungs an instrument as pure and clear as mountain sky. Then I lift the saxophone to my lips, joining the song. Somehow we always manage to stop at exactly the same moment. There is a hush, an expectant selah-pause as angels themselves draw nearer, eager to know more about this thing called salvation.
Sometimes I wish I fully understood it, how my part is going to add up to anything of significance in the end. Most of the time I think Ia€?m fooling myself, trying to convince myself that I really matter at all.
But for now I just have to take it like every other One-Timer does.
Like credit in the bank. Invisible, but there when you need it.
Like faith.