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15

Caballeros For Justice

V incent tossed a legal pad on the dinner table. Marisol wheeled to the table. He took a seat and spun the legal pad to face him. He started to sketch. The pencil scratched swift lines onto the pad, reconstructing the layout of Vincent’s ballroom.

Marisol interlaced her fingers and stretched her palms outward. A satisfying click of her joints announced she was ready to work. “Whoever is behind all this, I think they went to your ball.”

“We’ll try to relive your memory of it.”

“Annie always had theories but only would share them with me… until that night.”

“What did she know?”

Marisol bit the inside of her cheek, and a knot twisted in her stomach. She made a discovery about Vincent’s dad and made a serum from it. And someone killed her for it. Her mind jumped to that fateful night in the lab, as if she opened a door that she wanted to close. She didn’t want to re-see the teeth, to re-hear the screeching and the gunfire. What did Annie create? “She thought we could create gene therapy by coding the chemical compounds ‘superhuman’ traits. Perfection in a pill. Sort of... a sharing of power?”

“Superhuman?” He raised an eyebrow.

“I know, right? Crazy theory.” She forced herself to roll her eyes, hoping Vincent studied the sketch instead of her face. Marisol rotated the legal pad and drew stick figures around the room. “She mentioned her theory at the ball to the board and you.”

“Anyone seem suspicious?”

“No offense, but you’re all weird.” She studied the stick figures on the legal pad, remembering Annie rattling off the possibilities of her research. She recalled the snickers and raised eyebrows of the board members. All of them thought Annie was a joke. All but one.

“Which one?” Marisol nibbled her lip. “The board.” Marisol dotted above each stick figure. “Dad ‘Stache, Jowly Paunch, White Updo, Fluffy Brows, and the Skeleton.”

Vincent’s expression tightened as if he bit into something sour. He was obviously confused.

“I gave them nicknames. They all thought Annie was a crazy drunk — except one. I can’t even see his face.” But she could remember the way he made her skin crawl and shuddered. “I just see his terrible smile. ”

Vincent frowned. “We’re not jogging your memory well.”

“Trauma’s turned my head into a fog. You were across the room. Anyone stick out to you?”

He closed his eyes. “I see it now.” Vincent held out his hand, spreading his fingers apart. “I’m in the ballroom, next to the French doors. Whit is across the room at the staircase, posing for more photos. My board, who have names because they’re human beings and not fairytale dwarves, is gathered around your friend. Wentworth, Edward, Hillary, Francis, and Ruthven. And then? I see something strange.”

Marisol ran a thumb over her knuckles, anticipating a clue that would bring her closer to finding justice. “What is it?”

“I’ve never seen anything like it. Shining, shimmering, silver. The most amazing woman in a dress.”

Marisol crumpled the yellow paper and threw it at Vincent. It bounced off his forehead, landing on the table. “Do you ever take anything seriously?”

“It’s my board. They’re not exactly criminal masterminds.”

Marisol hit her forehead on the table, punctuating her frustration with another bump.

“Give your memory time. It will come back to you. I’ll try to send a message to Quinlan about your hunch if I can get phone service out here. ”

She really needed to punch something. “Great. I can’t wait to sit on my ass and twiddle my thumbs while the menfolk figure this out.” Marisol exhaled until the last of her breath cooled her lips. In another breath, she might settle for flicking something. “If I could get to the city, I’d tell him. The man who saved you? The real Patron Saint? I know him.”

Vincent rolled his eyes and tossed his pen on the table. “If you want justice, the courts should deliver it. Not some souped-up cop.”

“Maybe we need to fight crazy with crazy.”

“If he’s so great, you wouldn’t be here. He would’ve saved you and your friend.” Vincent crossed his arms and tensed his jaw.

Why does he seem so angry at him? It’s not like the Patron Saint could control the whole world. In Spanish, she repeated something Abuelita said fresh out of Mass: Bad things happen because people choose to do evil, not because good people can’t stop it.

“If evil is a choice, where does good even come from? How do you know if anyone, including him, is good?” Vincent asked, confrontationally, sounding like Marisol after Mass without the scolding pinch from Abuelita.

As with any existential question, Marisol didn’t know the answer. All she knew is that the Patron Saint sure as hell felt good. “I know he’s good,” she answered with a purr. Her memory of her last night with the Patron Saint on the rooftop spread heat across her face.

“You have feelings for him.”

“Jealous?” Marisol gulped, wishing she could take back the word because, in truth, she wanted him to be.

He stretched back in his chair and tossed the yellow wad of paper in the air. “I can’t be. He’s an idea. It’s like being jealous of Freedom.”

She certainly wasn’t attracted to an idea, but there was something in the way she wanted the Patron Saint to reach inside her and pull her darkness to the surface—to make her feel like she wasn’t holding back. “I think I’m made for someone unconventional.” Marisol snatched the crumpled paper from the air and crinkled it in her hand. “I’ve never been good at relationships. Too much work, they say. And he swoops in, takes my breath away, and disappears into the night. It’s—”

“Convenient.” Vincent enunciated the t at the end. The sound of his elocution lessons in his voice had returned.

Marisol held out the ball of paper to him. He reached for it, and she snapped it away just out of his grasp. She challenged, “Magical.”

“Give it a few days. A week. He’ll be a nice story you tell yourself when you look at the sky.” He yanked the ball of paper from her and tossed it like a basketball into the bin across the room. “With no danger in the equation, you’ll wonder what you ever saw in him. ”

“It’s not like that. When I look into his eyes, I feel that… spark.” Damn, she got swept up in some unchecked earnestness. Marisol looked down at her hands, wincing. She braced for his inevitable wise-ass retort. Instead, silence. What was Vincent thinking? Marisol peered up from her hands, her eyes meeting his. His gaze searched hers as he inched closer to her. She tensed, transfixed by the shimmer in his eyes. Was there something on her face? “What?” she asked.

He laughed, mocking and haughty.

“Go ahead. You’re not the first person this week to laugh at my romantically challenged life. Annie said—” Marisol pictured Annie laughing and waving a finger at her the morning after she had met the Patron Saint. She would never see those teasing eyes behind those cat-eye glasses again. Marisol’s eyes brimmed with tears. “Annie said I have a mask kink—that I’m into masks because I lose interest easily. She said that in a mask, he can be whoever I want him to be.” Laughing at herself might fight back her tears, so Marisol pushed out a chuckle that came out more like a defeated sigh.

Vincent’s eyes grew wide while he sputtered from holding in laughter.

“At least I’m admitting my potential kink. I’m sure years of prep school wired you into some bizarre humiliation roleplay or spanking fetish.” Marisol shifted in her wheelchair, thinking of Vincent’s backside turning pink after a slap. Her slap. She had a bad case of transference .

He shrugged his shoulders and rubbed his chin. “Maybe.” His mischievous grin faded. “But, you’re not alone. As in, you’re not the only one who’s romantically challenged.”

Marisol wiped away the tears that escaped down her cheek with the heel of her hand. “Probably shouldn’t let PR play matchmaker.”

“I am aware.” He cleared his throat. Again. The guy needed to keep some lozenges around. “I haven’t wanted to subject anyone to a serious relationship.”

“Realized you’re too insufferable?” Marisol crossed her eyes in case her sarcasm wasn’t thick enough.

“Um.” He tapped the table rapidly. He exhaled and looked at Marisol. “I can’t have children.”

His elegant posture caved. He looked as if this one thing turned his everything to nothing. She gasped. “Oh.”

“Been poked and prodded repeatedly all to say, ‘case undetermined.’ I’ve wondered whether it’s my grandfather’s work studying the biological effects of nuclear energy finally rooting into my generation of the tree.” He shifted his gaze as it briefly met Marisol’s. “I haven’t told anyone that before. I suppose I should have you sign an NDA.” He looked down, resembling one of Abuelita’s pictures of a saint, a being of suffering and serenity.

Marisol hadn’t noticed how thick and long his eyelashes were until then. She wanted to touch him—anything—to show he could trust her. “I wouldn’t… and you shouldn’t let that hold you back from something real. You can have children if you want.”

He shook his head.

She wondered at what point in the conversation she’d sound like her mom by listening to protests about becoming a breeder and unquestionably demanding a brood. Children never seemed like something anyone sane or responsible would want. They belonged in a world of plentiful resources and love, a world so far out of reach that Marisol saw it as a tree she’d nurture but never derive shade from. But Vincent didn’t seem irresponsible or selfish or anything else she’d use to describe most parents. His need to give love made him wholesome.

She said, “You’re not quite as insufferable as I’ve suggested. You’re kind and caring in an empirically attractive package.”

“A package that comes with quite a few disclaimers.”

“Just a package. Besides, if you’re shooting blanks, I know a lot of women who would think that’s a dream.” And what a dream! Beautifully messy intimacy without barriers, pills, ovulation schedules, or side effects. No latex and chemicals. Just free. The mental rise in her body temperature moved from her face to her belly. She cooled off by blurting, “They’re not heiresses looking to merge world power with offspring, but you should try something unconventional. And I’m not talking about the hair color of your date.”

“It’s better to keep things superficial,” he said, leaving her joke unacknowledged, “to stop the inevitable… pain.”

“You gotta connect, man. You have to share the pain, or you’ll end up…” Doomed like her or worse—hardened like Caz. “End up dead inside. I swear if you hadn’t been there for me last night, I’m not sure I would’ve made it.” Uh oh, she left her whole heart out there to be stomped on. She better reel it back, so he didn’t get the wrong idea. “And it was just a little bit of connection. A little bit can make a world of difference.”

“You never give up, do you?” His observation felt like an unearned compliment.

Marisol avoided him by tracing the pattern of the table’s wood grain with her fingers. “I’ve given up plenty of times. On my career. On people.”

“No. I’ve seen it.”

She fidgeted, feeling unworthy. “You barely know me.”

“I know enough. You’ve survived against the odds.”

She shifted in her wheelchair, poking her bruises. “Yeah. I’m doing great.”

“You’ve taken care of me.”

A bit hyperbolic there, Varian. “I applied basic first aid out of professional obligation. ”

He dug something out of his pocket and tossed it on the table, a crinkled package of tissue with the last unused one folded inside. It couldn’t be… the same fancy tissue she gave him when he almost upchucked off the fire escape?

She wanted to shrink away. It was like when patients who followed the doctor’s orders thanked her for their hard work. “It’s what nurses do. Anything to clean up the barf, even if it’s from a bad hangover.”

“A lie. It wasn’t a hangover.”

The memory, rearranging and reinterpreting itself, spun her brain to dizzying heights.

“That morning, Leonard asked to end the treatments prolonging his life. I needed a moment after we signed the documents and found you instead.” He held a breath while his eyes began to shine.

The way she understood that morning dropped out from underneath her, throwing her into a free fall. “Holy shit, Vincent, I’m sorry.”

He rubbed his hands together and stared at them. “I’m sorry. I lied because I couldn’t bring myself to accept kindness because…” He squeezed his eyes shut. “Kindness makes the pain too real. I’d rather do what I do. Put on the mask and become the fool.” Finally, he looked at her with clear eyes but a strained smile.

“It was just a tissue.”

“No. Me diste esperanza. ”

You gave me hope. His low, whisper-like voice tensed inside Marisol’s abs. The only one who could bother her that way was him. A notion she couldn’t quite place tugged at her.

She reached her hands to Vincent’s face to make the mask, to connect. But he couldn’t be, not with his average stature and lean frame. She folded her hands into her lap. Of course not.

“You’re thinking about something,” he said.

Vincent had a way of fishing out the truth, so she might as well admit a part of it. “Your voice. You’re not putting on that affectation.”

“I don’t speak with an affectation.”

“You do. I’ve noticed now that it comes and goes. It’s how I can tell when you’re performing and being real.”

Vincent scowled and clamped his mouth shut. “Hm.”

Damn, she touched a nerve again. “I didn’t mean to make you self-conscious. I’ll put my good foot in my mouth.” She released her brakes, backed away from the table to retreat, and wheeled halfway down the hallway. If she kept going, she’d wind up alone with her thoughts. She stopped. “Could you read to me?”

“Not put off by my voice?”

“The opposite.”

He cleared his throat. “Any preferences?”

“Something I’ll understand. ”

In her bedroom, Marisol popped a painkiller and heaved herself into the bed. She moved to one side to leave a space for Vincent. She ran her fingers through her hair and slid out of the bulky robe. Sure, he’d just read to her, but it’s not like she couldn’t try to look her best despite the circumstances. Her primping completed just as Vincent entered her bedroom with a book in his hand.

“What do you have there?” Marisol straightened the wrinkle in the sheet next to her.

Vincent fanned the pages and sat in the easy chair in the room’s corner, opening a tattered paperback. He cleared his throat. The Curse of Capistrano.

Eyes in the book and butt in the chair across the room from her, he hadn’t taken the bait. She adjusted herself again to sit in the middle of the bed, no longer leaving an inviting space. She listened to the tambour of Vincent’s voice. His true voice.

For the rest of the night, he read to her. As her eyes grew heavier, she heard him read, You seek adventure? Here is adventure aplenty, fighting injustice. Band yourselves together and give yourselves a name. Make yourselves feared the length and breadth of the land! And then you shall be caballeros in truth, knights protecting the weak, Senor Zorro said.

Huh, Zorro. Another masked hero. She drifted off to sleep.