Savage (Daughters of the Jaguar) (14 page)

“That’s a premonition. My grandmother has had a lot of them. She always gets them while she is in the bathtub. Imagine that. Then she comes running out to us and tells us about them dripping all over the floor. It is mainly catastrophes that she predicts. Like earthquakes and tsunamis and tornadoes and stuff. Last month she predicted the attack on that airport in Paris and the hurricane Alicia that hit the
 
Texas
 
coast a couple of weeks ago. Last year she predicted an earthquake in Chile that killed around three hundred people. She told us it was going to happen three weeks before it did. That was a bad one that left her crying and screaming in her sleep for days. My mother and my sisters also get premonitions from time to time. And even if she is only seven, Halona knows a lot of stuff. A lot more than any of us. But she has only had the one premonition, the one about me. At least that is what we think. Since she doesn’t talk it is hard to know for sure.”

I looked at her feeling all stirred up inside. It felt so good to be able to finally talk about these things to someone and especially to someone who knew what I was talking about and going through. Someone who thought of this as the most natural thing in the entire world. Someone who didn't think I needed to have medicine or be locked up somewhere treated with electro-shock. I felt like kissing her in mere relief, but I held it back. I really wanted to, though. I don’t think I had ever been so attracted to anyone in my entire life. The time just wasn’t appropriate. We had, after all, just met, even though she knew a lot more about me than I did of her.

 “I even had another one where I just out of the blue told a woman she was about to have a baby, even though she didn’t know she was pregnant,” I said.

“I know,” she answered. “You told me about it afterwards. I could hear you when you were in the yard after they had left. ”

“And I heard Heather’s thoughts when she was in my room!”

“I haven’t heard about that,” Aiyana said.

“But I did. At first I thought she was talking to me, like mumbling, but her lips never moved. Then I thought I was crazy.”

“The part about being crazy I heard. You have been thinking a lot about that lately. Don’t go to the doctor again. No doctor will ever be able to help you. They will say you are sick, that you need medicine and then the pills will make you lose your abilities again. Your gifts are like plants. If you don’t nurse and water them, if you forget about them, they will wither and die.”

I sighed. I had grown up with a dad who was a doctor and was about to become one myself. I felt so torn between these two worlds. Having had these spiritual and supernatural experiences, I could no longer accept the scientific explanations to such things. It wasn’t something I had imagined, none of it was. I knew that now. I had to believe that. I looked at Aiyana and smiled at her. She had experienced it, too. So had most of her family. But I knew what my father would say. It is all in your imagination, boy. Don’t be such a fool to believe in the supernatural. That is only for mad people. There is no spiritual world, no higher level of consciousness, there is no God or heaven above. It is all made up by people that are dreamers and who aren’t able to keep their feet on the ground. People who’ve lost it. People with no proper education. Don’t be an idiot. Don't be naive.

I was torn. I knew what I had seen was real. I had died and come back. I had predicted those things and heard Heather's thoughts. There was no doubt in my mind. But how could I believe in such things? Me? What about my mother? I had seen her die. I had seen how much pain she was in and then she just died. Her eyes lost their light in them. She was gone. And then we put her body in the ground. There had been nothing supernatural about her death. It was nothing but pain and when that was gone nothing but emptiness.

Aiyana’s eyes stared into mine and filled me with warmth inside that I hoped would never go away.

“But how did this happen to me? How? Was it because I died and came back?” I asked.

She tilted her head slightly and looked at me with her soft melancholic eyes. I wanted so badly to kiss those lips. I wanted to grab her and make love to her right there on that bed. It was like torture how badly I wanted to posses her.

“Sweet Christian. You’re asking too many questions. How do you explain the universe? How do you explain love? You don’t need to know everything. If you want an explanation for everything it will only drive you mad or at least make you even more confused than before. Consider what happened to you as a gift. Receive it. Embrace it,” she said and got up from the bed. “It is time for lunch. The food is on the table.”

 “How do you know that?” I asked and walked towards her. I will never forget how beautiful she was standing there in her red dress as the light from the window hit her and gave her a sparkle in the eyes.

She shrugged with a smile. “I just do.”

Less than one second later I heard the older sister call from down the stairs, yelling that the food was on the table.

Chapter 16

Even the food in this house was divine. Never had I experienced such a meal or such an ambiance at a dinner table. The whole family of women was there eating, talking and even singing at times. The silver-haired mother, Wyanet, came down with a distracted and distant look in her eyes. She walked like she was still floating on notes. She smiled when she saw me.

“Christian. You are still here. How wonderful,” she said.

I was surprised. I didn’t think she even saw me when we looked inside her room while she was playing. “I love your music,” I said politely.

“Aiyana tells me you’re a musician as well?” she said joyfully, as she sat at the long oak table. One plate remained empty next to Nina.

“We always have one extra place for anyone who might stop by unannounced,” Aiyana whispered when she saw that I was looking at it.

“What kind of instrument do you play?” Wyanet continued.

“I play the guitar,” I said.

“Enchanting.”

Nadie and the grandmother were busy putting things at the table that smelled heavenly. Roasted deer cooked with herbs I had never tasted before, that they said came from their own garden. Vegetables that had simmered in sauce, salads with all kinds of fresh herbs and nuts in them, avocado dip made from avocadoes from their own garden, delicate olive oils that I tossed over the salads. I fully enjoyed both the food and the company. With that many people at the table it never went quiet like I was used to when I ate with my father. That awkward silence from two people who had forgotten how to talk to one another and therefore just eventually stopped doing so. The kind of silence that occurs when hurt and sorrow and ugly things said have come between them. The kind of silence that would make me eat alone in my room instead just to avoid it. Just to avoid facing my own father. Here, there was constantly someone talking and people laughing. Nothing was unsaid. No one was hurting. It was so vibrant, so alive. Not like any place I had ever been before.

“Play something for us,” Wyanet said after we were done eating.

“I don’t have my guitar,” I said.

“We have a couple,” she said and asked Nina to go get the guitars in her room. Nina returned with two magnificent Spanish brown guitars in her hands. She gave one of them to me and the other to her mother.

“Play one of your own songs, Christian,” Aiyana said.

I felt a little shy and intimidated by all the eyes that were staring at me. Carefully I began playing a song I had written right after my mother had died—the very first of my songs. I had never played it before to anybody except my father but this moment felt like the right time to do it. Don’t ask me why. I just knew that they would enjoy it and appreciate its depth. They would never react like my father had done when I had sung it for him. “Don’t waste your time with that nonsense," he had said. “It will never pay your bills and besides, holding the guitar makes you look like a girl. We are real men in this family and you will grow up to be one. You will become a doctor like your father and grandfather, and you will support your wife and children while they carry on the family name.” And that had been the end of that discussion. I hadn’t stopped playing, naturally, but I tried to only do it when he wasn’t at home, and I never did it in front of him again.

Even if my fingers still trembled, I soon became more comfortable exposing myself. The notes floated beautifully in the air and I sang with more strength and beauty than I had ever done before. Wyanet closed her eyes and seemed to be feeling the song as deeply as I did. As the lyrics flew through my lips, I felt a sigh of relief inside of me. These were the words I had written down immediately after losing my mother; they were filled with all my sorrow that I couldn’t express at the time and all my emotions that I had repressed over the years. This was a forum where I could let it all out, these were people who understood. I played with all I had inside of me and realized how much the music was a part of me, was a part of my soul. I had neglected that part of me for so many weeks now and it was about time I got it back. The music was what had kept me sane during all that had been going on earlier in my life. This was my lifeline. There were no doctors or psychiatrists that would be able to make me feel the way I did when I played my guitar, no pills or treatment could heal me like this did. And for once, the voices became so low they were almost quiet and there were no pictures flashing before my eyes.

I put down the guitar as I finished my last note, completely exhausted and emptied inside. The family clapped. Wyanet nodded her head and told me she thought it was “absolutely captivating.” Then she told me that I should do something about it.

“What do you mean?”

“You should become a singer. A professional singer and guitar-player,” she said.

It sounded so strange to me, so far from what I had ever heard or known. So far from what my father had always told me. “It doesn’t pay the bills,” I said.

Wyanet laughed. “Bills? Who cares about bills? This is your soul we are talking about. Your soul wants this, it craves to become an artist. You can’t deny your soul for very long, my friend. That will only lead to misery and bitterness. Look at the world outside these windows. It is filled with people who never followed their dreams. People who gave up. Mediocre people living small mediocre lives filled with bitterness and resentment because their heart wanted to do something completely different. You, my friend, you could be something truly great. You have an amazing gift. You need to listen to what is inside of you. What is your heart telling you? Only the heart knows your real purpose in this life.”

Then Wyanet picked up the other guitar and started playing it real fast, like Spanish flamenco-style. She said it was the only good thing that ever came from the Spaniards, and all the girls got on their feet and started dancing with their skirts fluttering, making them look like big beautiful flowers in all colors. They dragged me up to dance with them, and I was terrible at all that stomping. A couple of cats stared at us from the windowsill looking like they didn’t know what I was doing there either, but I didn’t care. I laughed so hard and felt like I was transported to a completely different place and time. I didn’t care about anything. I danced with Aiyana and all of her sisters, even Halona, who seemed to be laughing without a sound leaving her lips. I was so enchanted by the music and laughter in this house, I hardly noticed the chairs and tables moving around in the kitchen, floating in the air along with books and pictures, or even the apparition of an old lady in a white dress that showed up and started dancing with us. I later learned the apparition was Aiyana’s great-grandmother who hadn’t been ready to leave the house and cross over to the land of the spirits yet. It was told that she had something she needed to do first, only no one knew what it was so they let her stay in the house till she had finished whatever it was that was holding her back. “Poor Granny,” Aiyana would always say when she appeared. “I think she just doesn’t know how to find her way out of this world.”

Unfortunately the fun had to end at some point, and I had to return to my own world. I thanked Aiyana and her family for hosting this nice lunch for me, but now I had to go because my host-mother was in the hospital and I had to visit her, plus I had an article for the newspaper that I had to send.

“I had a blast,” I told Aiyana as she walked me out the front oak door.

“I know,” she said with that gentle smile on her lips.

I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want to go back to reality. I wanted to stay in that bubble of happiness and let myself be wrapped in a blanket of music.

“We will see each other again soon,” Aiyana said, and I knew she was right.

Chapter 17

That afternoon, after I had sent my article to the newspaper, I drove out to the hospital to visit Mrs. Kirk. I was still humming in the car the wonderful tones from the flamenco-guitar and tapping along with my feet. It was like the music inside of me had come alive, like every fiber of my body wanted to tap and sing. I turned on the radio and started singing along, wondering why I had been so busy keeping the music out of my life when it always brought me so much joy. Wyanet had been right. I knew it inside of me. I had to at least try and pursue my dream, otherwise I would end up a bitter old man. My fingers were tapping on the steering wheel as I began making plans for the future. Maybe I could earn a living by writing articles for this newspaper until I could live off my music? If only I knew if I was any good at writing, if they would want me. But then again, it really didn’t matter what I did for a living as long as I had time to play my music.