Novel - Arcanum 101 (with Rosemary Edghill) (2 page)

Dragging Rosalita by the arm, Tomas shoved the gunman out the door. The still-burning man stumbled across the threshold and into the street, where even the normally unflappable denizens of Spanish Harlem began shouting and screaming at the sight. Tomas didn’t care. The doorway was clear, and he was the next one through it. Rosalita was screaming and fighting now, as if she was more afraid of him than she’d been of the ladron who’d held a gun to her head, but after a few steps she went as limp as an old dishrag, and he was able to pick her up and sling her over his shoulder, and run.

All the way up the hill to their apartment he could hear the horns in the street behind him—he knew, from the one glance back he’d risked, that the guy was still trying to run away. By the time Tomas reached the top of the hill, he could hear sirens as well.

He wrenched open the broken door to the foyer, dashed past the mailboxes and pelted up the stairs. Rosalita was getting heavier every second, but he wasn’t going to stop or even slow down. He reached the fourth floor and ran down the hall, fumbling out the keys. When he got to the door he slid Rosalita down off his shoulder, then fought with his own shaking hands to get the keys into the locks and the door open. Rosalita stood beside him staring up at him with a strange, scared look on her face as he worked his way down the deadbolts to the door lock.

Finally he got the last lock open, wrenched the door itself open and dragged Rosalita inside. As he locked up again, she seemed to shake off her shock. She looked at him for a moment as if she didn’t recognize him. And then she went crazy on him again. She started sobbing, and backed away down the hall, shaking her head.

It hurt. He was her hermano, wasn’t he? He’d rescued her, hadn’t he? Just because he was throwing fireballs at a guy didn’t make him a monster, did it?

Did it?

Doubt made him angry, and he lunged for her, grabbing her shoulders and shaking instead of comforting her like he might have before this all happened. Like he always had in the past whenever something went wrong.

“Dammit, Rosalita, stop that! Stop that right now!” Her sobs turned to outright wailing and he shook her harder. “You listen to me! ¡Oye! You didn’t see nothin’, you hear? ¡No vea nada! We got to the bodega, the guy was already in there rippin’ the place off, and we ran! You hear? You understand? You can’t tell nobody about this, never, no way!”

“Mama—” she whimpered, looking up at him. He hated to see the fear in her eyes, but he was frightened too.

“¡Especialmente no madre!” He didn’t even want to think about what Mamacita would do if she heard about this. She was funny about stuff like that. Anything with even a hint of brujeria. and she just went off. Maybe it was because of the way Papi had gotten before he disappeared. Even ‘Lita didn’t talk to her invisible friends around Mama. Not any more.

Tomas couldn’t really remember when ‘Lita had first come up with them. It wasn’t cool for boys to pay attention to what girls did, especially baby sisters. He’d always thought that ‘Lita was talking to her dolls. Back when there’d been money—back in the good times—her room had been filled with them. There’d been one of them, a bride doll, almost as big as she’d been. She’d only been four then.

And one day—he’d been ten, and ‘Lita had been five, and Papi had just started drinking, and Tomas had still been young enough, and stupid enough, to think things were going to get better and they’d all go back to being the way they were—he’d come home from school to find ‘Lita sobbing in her room and the whole house and yard filled with the stench of burning plastic. Mamacita had taken all her dolls—every one, even the bride doll—and burned them in the incinerator in the back yard. She’d slapped Tomas when he’d asked why, and Mamacita never hit him.

After that, there’d been very little money to spend on luxuries like toys.

“Nothin’ to Mamacita or anyone else. Aye nada.”

Rosalita choked down her sobs and nodded silently, face tear-streaked.

“Now go clean up. I fix us some cereal or rice or something.” There wasn’t a lot left in the kitchen, but it was going to have to do until Mamacita came home with another check. At least they’d gotten home safely.

He turned Rosalita around and gave her a little shove towards the bathroom.

“Get cleaned up, mija. I fix something to eat.”

Food would take her mind off what had happened. For that matter, food would take his mind off what had happened. Whatever it was, it had to have been some fluke, some freaky thing, and it would never happen again….

But what about tomorrow? Tomorrow he’d have to walk past that corner again, and right down that street. What if someone recognized him?

The fear was fading, and Tomas smirked. Mr. de la Yedra had never wanted to know him before, when Tomas had suggested he could work at his store as a way to earn some extra money. He wouldn’t want to know him now. And he’d been hiding behind the counter the whole time. What was he going to say? “This gato fresco showed up in my store and saved me from a malandrín by throwing fireballs’?

If Tomas couldn’t believe it—and he’d done it—why would someone else? He’d come up with another explanation—a cigarette lighter or something. Peoples’ memories were funny that way. They tended to forget things they didn’t want to know about.

It was two days later.

Tomas sat on the fire escape outside the living room window. Even now, the neighborhood was noisy; cars, music, people on the street. Nobody looked up, though, so he had his privacy, and behind him, the apartment was dark and quiet. It was nearly midnight. Mamacita had gotten home about half an hour ago; in six hours she’d have to get up to catch the bus for work. This was no way to live.

At least nobody had noticed what he’d done. Just as he’d thought. There hadn’t even been a story about it in El Diario.

He made himself as comfortable as he could on the rusting metal and made the little flame move from one fingertip to the next and back again, like someone flipping a coin across the backs of his fingers. It was like the flame of a cigarette lighter—pale orange and steady—except it came from his skin, and it didn’t burn.

He stared at it, fascinated. Each night he waited until Mamacita and Rosalita were in bed before trying anything. Each night he promised himself that tonight would be the last time, but it never was. The fire was too much fun to play with. Too… seductive. It just felt… right, somehow.

What had happened to him in the bodega hadn’t been a fluke, nor a freak thing. A few minutes later when he’d gone to turn on the stove to make some rice, the pilot light had blown out, and instead of reaching for the box of matches as he usually did, he had unthinkingly pointed his finger at the burner. It had lit with a tiny whoosh. Thank God Rosalita hadn’t seen it.

So now… here he was. Playing with fire.

It was ridiculously easy, actually. All he had to do was get mad. Annoyed for little stuff like lighting the burner. Hard, raging angry for the fireballs. He’d fire-balled some rats down in the basement yesterday just to prove to himself he could do it again.

Now he made the little flame dance over the tips of his fingers and wondered what had happened to him to turn him into a fenómeno—a freak—like this. And what the hell he was supposed to do with it.

It wasn’t like he wanted to be a superhero. That was for comic books and movies. And he couldn’t see just telling people he could do this. Either they wouldn’t believe him—and lock him up for being crazy—or they would believe him, and then he’d probably be arrested or dissected or something. And then what would happen to his family?

This power was his. So couldn’t there be some way for him to use it to help Mamacita and Rosalita? Only he couldn’t figure out what it was. Being able to set things on fire just didn’t seem very useful.

New movement in the street below caught his attention, and what was moving down there did more than catch it.

A man was staring up at the fire escape, watching him.

It was a dark man, in a dark, perfectly tailored suit. And even from where Tomas sat, he could feel the chill coming off the man, the sense that he would pop a cap in your head with one hand while eating lunch with the other if that was what he’d been ordered to do.

This was so not good.

The man crooked a finger at him, and pointed to his own feet. You. Down here.

Trying not to think about what this meant, Tomas nodded, and waved, and ducked back in through the window. Moving as silently as he could—though he knew that nothing would disturb either his sister or his mother—he slipped through the rooms and made his way down to the street.

The man was even bigger close up, and he hadn’t looked small from the fire escape. Still without saying a word, he pointed to a car parked on the other side of the street. A black Lincoln Town Car. Boring, but very expensive.

This was definitely not good.

He made his way to the car, and as he approached, the rear window rolled silently down.

He couldn’t see inside. The interior was entirely in shadow and the passenger a mere silhouette.

A soft voice drifted out of the interior. “Tomas Torres.”

His mouth felt very dry. “Si,” he replied, then added, “Señor.”

“Little incident at the store down the street two days ago,” the voice persisted. “Thief routed. Muy Bueno. I would hate for the gentleman who owns the place to fall behind on his payments.”

Ah. Now Tomas knew who he was talking to. Tiburon Prestamo, the padrone. Everyone had heard of him. If you had a problem, Señor Prestamo could solve it for you. But his help came at a price.

A high price.

“So I understand you have a way with fire.” A pause. “What interests me is that the policia couldn’t find a trace of what actually caused the fire. Very interesting, that. You know what that means?”

The shadowy figure leaned forward; Tomas caught a whiff of expensive cologne, saw a gleam of silver hair in the street lights. He shook his head.

“Come on, you look like a bright boy. Without having a cause for a fire, they can’t say it was arson, can they?”

Tomas shook his head again.

“Now, I could use someone like you,” the padrone said, settling back in his seat. “Sometimes people are reluctant to pay what they owe. Now normally, I would ask someone like Jorge over there to pay them a visit and reason with them.”

Tomas glanced aside at “Jorge” and repressed a shudder.

“But it would please me to be able to handle such matters with more finesse. And a man can’t pay his debt with two broken arms.”

“No, Señor,” Tomas managed.

“So I would like to employ your services, so that Jorge’s time can be more profitably spent elsewhere—unless, of course, a more vigorous reminder turns out to be required. But those occasions hurt my heart. I consider them a failure of trust, a matter that I hope will never arise between us. And to show you how much I value your participation in my little enterprise, shall we say… a thousand a week?”

A thousand a week!

Tomas did his best not to stare slack jawed. That was more money than both Mama’s jobs put together. Rosalita could stay in school and have the pretty dresses she craved—and even new dolls to replace the ones she’d lost. Mamacita could quit one of her jobs. Not both of them—Tomas wasn’t going to be crazy enough to tell her how much he was really making and who his boss was, but he could tell her he’d found a job and bring her enough money that she’d be happy to quit one of her jobs so that she could spend more time at home. It would be easy to sneak more cash into the house without her noticing, and the rest he could save for tools, for his own car…

“A smart young man such as yourself you knows a good deal when he hears it, does he not?” the padrone said.

You don’t want to be a runner but you’ll take his money?

Tomas’s conscience reared up and he crushed it down ruthlessly. Anyone stupid enough to take a favore—especially a loan—from the padrone and then not make whatever payment was owed deserved what he had coming to him.

“Si, señor,” he said, respectfully. “I will do this thing for you.”

“Excellent.” The padrone leaned back into the shadows of the back seat. “Jorge, give him the cell.”

The muscle-man fished a tiny cell-phone out of his breast pocket and handed it to Tomas, who could not help noticing the scars across the backs of the knuckles, as if Jorge was accustomed to hitting things often and hard.

“Do not give that number out to anyone. Your orders will come when someone calls you on that phone, so I don’t want it busy. Ever.”

Tomas nodded. “As you say.” He suppressed another reminder from his conscience about how this was just like the way the dealers operated.

“I see we understand each other. This is good. After you do your first job for me, Jorge will bring you your first week’s pay. And I do not want to discover that you are working for anyone else. I would be gravely disappointed.”

Tomas shook his head.

The padrone nodded, satisfied. “But I do not want you to feel as if you are being taken advantage of,” he added. He motioned again to Jorge, who again reached into his breast pocket once more and pulled out a roll of bills, peeling off five twenties. “Go take that little sister of yours for pizza. I’m sure she likes pizza.”

Tomas took the money and stuffed it into the pocket of his jeans. “She does, Señor. Thank you—”

But the padrone was finished with him. The window rolled up, Jorge got into the sedan’s front seat on the passenger side, the driver started the car, and the car rolled slowly away.

And only after he had gone back upstairs to the apartment did Tomas realize something. Nothing about these last few minutes—even the “gift” of money—had been an act of kindness. The money—and Señor Prestamo’s final words to him—had been a warning. We know you have a sister and we know where you all live. It would be a very bad idea to change your mind.

He told himself he wasn’t scared.

It had been three days since Señor Prestamo had given him the cellphone. Long enough for him to imagine that it might never ring, to pretend to himself that the whole night had never happened. Then this afternoon, while he’d been waiting outside Rosalita’s school to pick her up—the money meant they could take the bus to and from school, and there was pizza and ice cream after school—the cellphone he carried with him everywhere now had rung.