Mayan December (5 page)

DECEMBER 16, 2012

CHAPTER 9

“Mom?” Nixie stood in the kitchen, clutching a towel. “Oriana doesn’t get here for an hour. Can I go down to the beach?”

Her mom wore work clothes; khaki pants and a neatly ironed white shirt, her hair pulled back into a high ponytail. Her face had pinched up tight. “I’m sorry, honey. I don’t have time to go with you today.”

It wasn’t fair. She needed air and sunshine. “You let me go the day before yesterday. I came back in an hour like you wanted me to, and I didn’t go in the water, except up to my ankles, just like you said.” She tried to sound innocent. “There aren’t any waves at that beach, and there’s a lifeguard. I’ll come back in half an hour this time.”

Her mom looked away, out of the window, and for a minute Nixie thought she saw a tear sliding down her cheek. It took two sips of coffee and a cough before her mom turned back to her. “I have some free time tomorrow. I’ll take you then. Why don’t you draw a picture of your feather, or watch TV or something?”

“You never want me to watch TV.” Nixie picked up Snake and her book, a paperback about flying horses, and went out onto the porch, not quite slamming the door behind her. She curled Snake into a soft green pillow for her head and crossed her bare feet in front of her on the railing. She opened her book, but instead of turning the pages she fingered the bead Ian had given her, and looked out over the low broken jungle canopy between their room and the water.

How had she gotten to that old time? Her mom must think it had been real, or it would be okay to go to the beach.

She tried to read her book, but the words kept fading to hash marks. She fetched her journal and colored pencils, and drew the walkway below her, and the tops of the jungle trees, and the bright blue sea meeting the paler blue sky. The ruin she’d walked through yesterday stuck up just above the trees, and from here, it was clear there was no tall-tree jungle and no cenote. Just resort.

She added color and a quetzal bird flying up toward the sun, then sat and stared at her drawing. It hadn’t seemed scary to be there, or maybe she should think,
then
. But what if there hadn’t been a path home?

After a long while, her mom came out and stood beside her on the balcony. “Nix, do you want ten dollars to go shopping with Oriana today?”

“Where?”

“I’m going to ask Oriana to take you on one of those tours to Tulum. You haven’t been this trip, and you liked it before.”

Nixie blinked at the new plans. “But . . . but I thought Oriana was going to take me snorkeling.”

When her mom didn’t answer right away, Nixie said, “You don’t want me near the little ruin. Tulum’s just a big ruin.”

“But there’ll be a lot of people there.”

Like strangers would keep her safe? “Mom—I promise I’ll be careful.”

Her mom’s arm snuck across her shoulders and she found herself looking into her mom’s blue eyes, at least two shades paler than her own. Summer sky washed by the sun. She looked really, really worried. Maybe even a little scared. “Please Nix? For me? Unless you’d rather stay in the pool.” Her jaw quivered, and she looked away, out toward the cluster of ruins. “You’ll have fun.”

At least there was a beach at Tulum. She didn’t remember if it was okay to swim there, but all of Tulum looked down on the ocean. It was the prettiest ruin in Mexico; a neat, whitewashed set of Lego-like buildings perched by the open sea and surrounded by a low stone wall. She brightened at a stray thought. “Will Ian come with us?”

Her mom shook her head. “Just Oriana.” She held out a ten dollar bill. “American money will be fine anywhere on the resort, and you should be able to use it in the little shopping village outside Tulum, too. I’ll give Oriana a little more for snacks, but this way you won’t be broke.”

“Thanks.” Nixie shoved the bill into her pocket. “Will you be home in time for dinner?”

“No. I have to go to a party.”

Nixie brightened. “A party?”

“Boring. Archeologists and scientists.”

Oh. “I like scientists.” Fat chance of her going.

“You can take Oriana to one of the restaurants. We get two adult passes with the room anyway, so Oriana can use our extra one. She can get towels, too.” She bent down over Nixie’s drawing. “That’s very good.” Her voice quivered as she asked, “But why did you color the ruin blue?”

Nixie bit her lip. That was the color the ruin had been yesterday, from the magical old side. She remembered that now, the steps red, and the lintel the bright blue of the sea more than the blue of the sky, maybe even brighter. Like the blue in the quetzal feather down by the spine, a shining blue. “The colors are pretty.”

Her mom was silent for a few moments. “I must have told you that in the old days, the Mayans used bright colors on their houses and temples. They’re only gray today because the color has all worn off.”

Nixie didn’t remember that, not exactly. She just remembered what she saw.

A knock sounded on the door. While her mom let Oriana in, Nixie picked up her drawing materials. Before she went inside, she stood at the edge of the balcony, looking at the sea.

Nixie laughed as Oriana zipped the car into a tiny parking spot at the edge of the gravel-strewn parking lot under a small copse of trees. She climbed out, swinging her backpack over her shoulder and clutching her camera. The dark oily smoke belching from the tourist buses running between them and the entrance to Tulum stank, huge things with high dark windows and sun-cracked paint. The sides were pasted with big, bright signs saying things like, “
Riviera Maya 2012! The dream of a people
,” and “
Best sacred places tours. See Tulum and Xel-Ha!
” Painted snorkelers the size of whales swam along the sides of some of the buses, peering at painted fish the size of Oriana’s little purple Volkswagen beetle.

Nix stopped to snap pictures.

Oriana grinned. “The morning crowd will be gone soon. That’s why we drove—they come here in two big clumps for the morning and the afternoon tours, as if two hours were enough to see this place.” She held her hand out, and Nixie took it, liking the dry, rough scratch of Oriana’s palm against hers.

They threaded through a pile of busy open-walled shops just outside the ruins. Nixie stopped to take a photo of brightly dressed young men hanging by one foot from a pole high in the air. The pole began to spin, and the five men descended slowly, upside down, each tied by a single rope wrapped from thigh to ankle and held at their waists. The pole turned faster. The men swung in fast, wide circles high above the heads of the crowd, eliciting entranced sighs from the audience.

“Do you want to stay and watch?” Oriana asked.

Nixie shook her head. She’d seen the same dance at Xcaret, only with the men in bright red-and-green macaw feather headdresses and white loincloths. “Let’s go in.”

“All right,” Oriana said. “Can I be your guide?”

“You bet! The last time our guide was a fat guy who kept making bad jokes.”

Oriana clapped her hands together and started toward the entrance. “How old were you last time you were here?”

“We came two years ago, so I was nine.”

“Do you remember much?”

“It was a place for priests.”

Oriana nodded. “It used to be called Zama, which they think was a word for “sun.” It was a sacred place, and also a trading port. See how small it is compared to Chichén Itzá? The archeologists think the priests and warriors lived inside the walls, and that they held ceremonies here. But most of the people lived in villages outside, or came here by traveling. This was a key defensive spot, the way it’s on the ocean here.”

“Can we go to the beach?” Nixie asked.

“Sure. But we have to get in first.” They fetched up against a line of tourists shifting impatiently, waiting to gain entry. A pair of gray-green iguanas watched the people, cocking their heads from time to time, as if having a silent conversation. Nixie used the 3D setting on her camera and got two good pictures before a little boy in bright yellow shorts came too close. The reptiles skittered under rocks.

Ten minutes later, she and Oriana were inside, going upstream against tourists beginning to drift back toward the shopping area and the parking lot. “Can I walk you around once before we go to the water?” Oriana asked. “It’s emptying out some, and this would be a good time to go see the temples.”

Nixie looked up at her. “Can we go to the beach, first? Please?”

Oriana cocked her head at Nixie, as if deciding whether to assert her adultness. Then she smiled. “Okay.” She led them down a wide dirt path flanked with brown grass and short palm trees. They picked their way around a corner, and the path gave way to fine white sand that clung to their tennis shoes. In front of them, the sea stretched light blue in the midday sun. Small waves licked at the beach. Oriana pointed. “See how there is a huge break in the reef here? That’s part of why they built Zama here. They could get boats in and out.”

Nixie frowned. “I wish I’d brought my fins and mask.”

Oriana shaded her eyes and looked out. “There are better reefs just off the resort.” She pointed at an old Japanese couple walking slowly through water over their knees. “Sometimes they don’t let anyone in the water, but it looks like it’s okay today.”

Nixie grinned. “Good.” She took off her shoes and raced down the beach, the hot sand stinging so much she cried out before plunging into the sea. She went as far out as the old couple, water lapping her thighs. She turned to look back at the beach. Oriana clutched Nixie’s pack in her right hand. She walked quickly across the sand, set their gear near Nixie’s abandoned shoes, and waded in, her face tight and her brows drawn together.

Oriana slid easily toward Nixie, as if she and the water were the best of friends. Her brown eyes snapped with the reflection of the sun on the sea as she said, “Don’t do that. Please. I only want you to go in the water when I’m with you.”

Nixie glanced at the couple, now wading shoreward, hand in hand, heads bent close in conversation. “It’s safe here.”

“But if I’m going to teach you to snorkel, I need to know you’re going to do what I tell you around and in the water.”

Nixie stiffened. But Oriana had brought her down here and, in truth, she sounded more worried than mad. “Sorry.” She turned, looking away from the gray stone bones of Tulum toward the vast Caribbean. Something flashed in the warm water at her feet. She bent down. A school of tiny fish. She pointed. “Look.”

Oriana peered at the seafloor. “Baitfish.” She glanced over her shoulder at the ruins, and then said, “Let’s go out a little further. Maybe we can find something more interesting.”

“Does it get deep?”

“Not for a while.” Oriana waved a hand out towards the open sea. “It changes color when it gets deeper. Stay on this side, where the water is lighter. And stay close to me.”

“It’s so clear.” Small stones and bits of shell speckled the white sand, disappearing as Nixie’s steps sent clouds of fine white powder up into the water, a trail of fairy dust following her.

“Be careful,” Oriana said. “Watch out for sea urchins or stingray tails—they look like barbed brown sticks poking out of the water. Shuffle your feet so you won’t step on one.”

“Wow.” As Nixie obeyed, the cloud of fairy dust thickened.

“When we snorkel, we’ll see parrotfish and angels and big groupers. We might see baby turtles. Last summer’s first crop should be big enough to swim to the reefs. I saw one yesterday morning, off of Akumal.”

Good. All she’d seen so far was more of the little silver fish. She headed further out, the sand sloping ever so slightly under her feet. She stubbed her toe on a rock and hopped up and down on one foot, losing her balance and falling sideways in the water. She same up spluttering, but laughing. “Sorry.”

Oriana was laughing, too.

Her mom wouldn’t have laughed, at least not this year.

Nixie stood dripping in the water, still laughing, stopping when Oriana’s eyes widened at something over Nixie’s shoulder. “Ssshhh,” she said. “Look.”

Nixie turned. Just a few feet behind her, a turtle poked its yellow-green head out of the water and regarded the two women. It was gray and green, with pinkish spots, and ridges that went from the front to back of its shell. “That’s no baby,” Nixie said.

It was almost longer than Nixie was tall. “An old leatherback,” Oriana whispered. “That shouldn’t be in here. Not this close to the beach.”

Nixie took a step toward it, holding out her hand.

CHAPTER 10

Alice sat in the back of a small hot bus, surrounded by locals going to work at Chichén. She’d left her car in a lot in Cancun. Gas was so dear, even in Mexico, that she’d started taking local buses on long trips.

Today, she drew attention from the brown faces around her as she glanced repeatedly at her phone. She’d turned the tracking on even though she knew the webs were lousy on the roads. It worked, though. Her light blinked in the center, Nixie’s at the edge. As she watched, the background re-drew, showing Alice’s movement away from Nixie, toward Chichén Itzá. She licked her lips, wishing Nixie were beside her.

The bus dropped Alice off near the gate. The lot looked more crowded than she’d ever seen it. To get in, she dodged buses, rental cars, and gaggles of brightly dressed tourists gathering around guides with megaphones. She headed directly toward the gate, where she flashed a pass to get in.

Just beyond, two men and a woman sat on a gray stone bench, watching for her. Her friend, Don Carlo Agapito, and two people from IndiStudy, a private foundation he funded.

The woman, Julia Highland, spotted her first. Julia was dressed almost identically to Alice, in khakis and a light shirt with wearing a dull green canvas expedition hat to shade her fair skin. Even dressed alike, they didn’t look alike. Julia might have stepped out of a magazine cover, complete with makeup and blonde hair that looked bouncy even in the humid air.

Alice shook her hand quickly. “Hello, Julia. You look wonderful.”

A nod. “Ready?”

Alice met Don Carlo’s sparkling brown eyes. She genuinely liked him. Two summers ago, they had traveled together with some graduate students on a trip to decipher the paintings on a new mural unearthed north of Merida. He had been respectful and curious, if sometimes slightly drunk and talkative after dinner. Although he had the dark skin, delicate features, and wide brown eyes of a Yucatecan Maya, Don Carlo had been raised in the United States. He’d invested the millions he made in technology to study his heritage, anonymously funding Mayan research and schools. He smiled down at her. “Hello, Alice. You’re as beautiful as ever.”

She blushed a little at his comment, even while knowing it for his usual manner with all women.

Michael Lingen looked like the perfect tourist, all tan and lean muscle, almost six feet tall, blond and confident. He wore jeans and a T-shirt. The hand he clasped Alice’s hand with was cool and soft. “Pleased to see you.”

“Likewise.” Michael was better looking than Don Carlo, except his flirting wasn’t as harmless. But he could give her more work. She was traveling on the last of the money IndiStudy had paid her, and she needed a way to feed Nix next year. A tough line to dance on. She smiled along that line, stepping back a bit from him. “What can I show you?”

“Can we start at K’uk’ulkan?”

The temple of the snake god. At least he didn’t call it “the castle” like so many tourists did. She glanced over at Julia and Don Carlo. “Is that all right with you two?”

Julia said, “Sure,” and Don Carlo grinned, his smile lightening her mood. He felt like an almost-authentic version of Ian. Funny, since Don Carlo was native and Ian imported. She shook her head to clear the thought and led the trio toward the large stepped pyramid, falling a little behind to glance down at her phone.

No Nixie. Damn. She pushed the message button and whispered an instant voicemail to Oriana. “Is everything okay?”

Michael waited for her. She must be showing her worry because he echoed, “Is everything okay?”

She nodded quickly, an instinctive reaction in front of a client, and then shook her head. “I think so. My daughter is at Tulum, with a friend. I was just checking on her.”

He looked as if she’d just brought a monkey into a crystal showroom. “Trixie? Isn’t she young?”

“Nixie. She’s eleven. I brought her down to see this.” She struggled to keep her voice light and even. “Something she’ll remember her whole life.” She smiled at him, hoping to disarm.

His smile didn’t reach his cool, blue eyes. “Tulum’s got enough military presence to keep it safe.”

“I’m sure you’re right.” But she couldn’t help glancing down at her phone. There was no reply, and Nixie’s light was still missing.

As they dodged a woman pushing a baby stroller awkwardly on the cobbled walkway, he changed the subject. “We appreciate your work. I’m looking forward to being here when the stars line up like the legends.”

“Not legends,” she said. “Science. The Mayans were excellent astronomers.”

“So have you noticed anything different here?”

What was he looking for? She chose her words carefully. “Chichén has become a popular destination. Mayans are coming, too. In droves.”

“Will there be trouble?” he asked, echoing the tabloid headlines.

She held her hands out, shrugging as if to say she didn’t know. “We saw some protests yesterday in Playa.”

Michael sounded worried as he said, “Miss Marie’s having an international environmental conference starting in Cancun in a few days. Conferences seem to need demonstrators and terrorists.”

One more way the world was going crazy all at once, trying to hold to a world view that was slowly killing them all. Then the name he said sunk in. Marie Healey.

Marie Healey, the President of the United States’ Science Advisor and Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy. The woman who ran his international program of shared responsibility for climate change. A mixed success, but more than anyone else had managed.

“I went to school with her,” Alice said.

“Really?” He sounded intrigued. “What was she like?”

“Smart.” Alice could see her, a year older, laughing as she came to Alice for last minute tutoring, or chided her for studying too hard. Marie the lucky, the one who always knew the moment to strike, the act to take, the person to meet. Marie who might be saving the world. No other woman at Stanford had burned as bright as Marie. “She’s brave. We used to get in trouble together.”

“So are you brave?”

Alice shook her head. “Marie used to make me brave. Besides, courage is for the young.”

He arched an eyebrow at her. “Really? You’re brave enough to come down here on your own.”

They were near the bottom of the pyramid, and Alice stopped so Julia and Don Carlo could catch them. Maybe she could start them all up the steps and then call Oriana again. “Ready to see if you’re in shape?”

Julia’s eyes flashed at the challenge. Don Carlo showed his white teeth in a faint grin, and Michael simply started up. His long legs made the tall steps easy, while Julia climbed slowly, placing both feet on each step before taking the next one. Although she stayed close to the metal chain running up the center of the steps, she didn’t actually grab for it. Don Carlo went up at Julia’s pace, at her side, but one step at a time. He looked like a Mayan priest might have, taking the steps reverently, his back straight and his head high.

Alice glanced back at her phone. Nothing new. She sent another message and forced her legs up instead of letting them run back to the parking lot and hail a cab to Tulum. Midday sun whitewashed the sky to barely-blue and heated the steps so they produced faint shimmers of heat.

Seven steps from the top, her phone vibrated. Alice hesitated, suddenly scared to listen. She pulled ahead of the other two, rushing her breath, and sat down on the top, her toes barely reaching the step below her. She tapped her wrist. “Oriana?”

An unfamiliar voice said, “Call for Ms. Alice Cameron.”

Her hands shook so hard she almost dropped the phone. “I’m here.”

The voice on the other end of the line was very formal. “Please hold for Director Healey.”

Surely it was coincidence she’d just been talking about Marie. Although maybe it made perfect sense they’d both be here at this time.

Marie was calling her?

“Alice?”

She recognized the voice. Marie
was
calling her. “Yes? Hi. How are you?” She sounded like a tweener talking to a kid-band lead singer.

“I’m fine. A little busy lately.” Marie’s warm tones calmed Alice’s racing blood. “Are you sitting down?”

“Yes.”

“I want you to show me around Chichén Itzá.”

Alice’s mouth dropped open. “I’m . . . sure! I’m there right now. When?” What a dumb question. Surely for the summit.

“Me and a few of my best friends. On the twentieth. Yes I know the site is closed. But not to us.”

Wow. The V.I.P. showing. Oriana could watch Nixie. If Nixie was now . . . Damn. Alice licked her lips. “All right.”

Marie’s voice warmed even more. “Look, I saw your name on a list of people who could do this. So I picked you. I’d like to see you again. There’s a dinner afterwards, too. For even more of my best friends. Can you come to that, too? The president will be there.

“I . . . I’d love to.” Her knees felt watery. Not a good thing on top of a pyramid. At least she was sitting down. Marie Healey. And the President of the United States, and other leaders of the free world. Or the not-so-free if you counted China, where they kept up an invisible electronic wall that almost worked around the whole country. “I . . . yes. I’ll be happy to do it. Of course I’d like to see you again.”

Silence fell for a beat. When Marie continued, her voice was serious. “I wanted—
needed
—someone I can count on. Someone who won’t play politics.”

Michael’s impatient voice called to her. “Alice!”

She shook her head at him. He glared at her with an
I’m more important than you and you work for me
look. Don Carlo showed up beside him and said something Alice couldn’t hear and the two men stepped away. Alice refocused in time to hear Marie ask, “Are you busy?”

“Not too busy to talk to you.” Unless my daughter calls. But she didn’t say that. “I’m honored. Should I meet you here, and when?”

“It’s not that simple. There will be background checks. I need you to meet with my security people. The first session will be tomorrow morning.”

“Tomorrow.” She’d planned the morning off, promised Nix she’d take her to the beach. “Hold on.”

She flipped to her calendar, noting along the way that Nix still didn’t appear to be in the real world if you counted on GPS. You could build great applications, but a bad network could take them all down. Or magic. Not. Surely not.

Her schedule popped up on the screen. Maybe she could rearrange her noon meeting, keep her date with Nix. It mattered. “I can be free at noon.”

Marie responded. “Staff has time at nine in the morning. At the Cancun Marriott. I’m sorry, I can’t change it. If you want to do this, you’ll have to be flexible. I’ll make sure to fix anything it does to your schedule. You’ll be paid, of course. For all of the time.”

She’d have to leave before breakfast. It was just wrong to leave Nix in the lurch, but December, 2012 would never come again, and she needed the money. And Marie Healey! “Of course I’ll do it.”

“But do you want to?”

Alice swore she heard something almost pleading in Marie’s voice. “Of course I do.”

“Okay. Be at the Marriott at nine. There’ll be follow-ups, too, I’m afraid.”

Alice let out a long breath. “I’ll do it.”

“Thanks.”

Alice was wondering what to say next when it came to her. Don Carlo. “May I bring someone who can help?”

Marie sounded startled. “Who?”

“Don Carlo Agapito. He’s American. Used to own a tech company he sold, uses that money to help Mayans down here. He’ll be good for PR.”

She could almost hear laughter in Marie’s voice as she asked, “Is he your sweetie?”

Alice did laugh. “No, I don’t have one of those. But he’s helped me get work down here, and I can use someone I trust to help me if the group gets too big. He can answer any question about the Mayans themselves. And they should be represented.”

“Hold on.” The phone went silent, and Alice heart her heart beating too fast for a long time before Marie came back on the phone. “He’s already on the possible list. We’ll move him up a notch. My folk will contact him.”

“Thanks,” Alice said again, a little surprised at her audacity, at how easy and hard it was to talk to Marie, all at once. Just like it used to be. “I’m looking forward to seeing you.”

“Okay. I’ll have the security squad contact you. You can give them your friend’s particulars.”

“All right.”

“Look, I’ve got to go keep working to save the world. But I’ll see you in a few days. I’m glad we found you and you’re down there. Bye.”

“Bye.” But Marie had cut the connection before she even said that. Alice sat up straight and looked out across the jungle. Wow.

“Are you ready yet?” Michael called.

She stood up quickly. “Yes, sorry.”

“Was that Nixie?” he asked.

“Just . . . ” What to say? “An old friend. Someone I wouldn’t have been able to call back if I hadn’t taken the call.”

He frowned, but led her around the top of the pyramid toward the others as if he were the guide.

She frowned, but followed him. He paid her, after all.

They came upon the others looking down at a whitewashed four-step pyramid.

Alice shook herself. Nixie . . . well, what could she do? Nixie had to be all right. She needed to focus, to do her job. Speaking of the job, she pointed. “That’s the Temple of the Warriors below you.” Tall stone columns holding up nothing but air and imagination surrounded a building as steep as the one they stood on, but squatter and shorter. “No one knows exactly what the columns held up. It’ll be decorated as a market for the equinox. Those are the tallest freestanding columns found so far in Mayan architecture, even though they look small from up here.”

Julia spoke softly, “It’s like looking down on the bones of a world. With all we understand, we don’t know what it looked like when the culture was alive. Maybe we never will.” She turned to Alice, sounding morose. “What if we had to look at our own bones some day?”

Don Carlos said, “Our bones keep being rebuilt and restored. Perhaps they’ll never be as bare and unclothed as these. Or as strong.” He looked down on the Temple, musing. “Imagine hundreds of my people, thousands, walking on the paths, going about their business. Artisans carrying pots and mosaics, warriors practicing, women with water and weaving.”