Elysium (16 page)

He swallowed and leaned in and put his head on hers. She put down her bowl and found a place under his chin to rest her forehead. She could smell his smell. It was her Daddy’s smell. A sweet musky scent that filled her nose and made her feel safe.

“Before all this, my biggest problem was finding a job,” he said. “I looked and looked and there was always someone more qualified. Someone with more education. Someone better. I beat those streets like they had done something to me to find work. A black man never stood a chance in this city. They fixed it so that we always got a raw deal. Then all of this happened and none of that mattered anymore. Now all I want to do is protect you.” He kissed her tenderly on the forehead again.

“I want you to have a future,” he said wiping away the flow from his nose and eyes. “All I want is for you to be all right. And these here wings, that’s just what happened. Maybe they’ll be the only thing that’ll happen to you. And that’s alright. I’ve seen things out there, baby girl … people twisted into all kinds of shapes …”

He touched her on the head and said, “I’m sorry for the world I’m leaving you. … You gotta be strong now, gotta be stronger than strong.”

He got quiet. She wanted to ask about what he had seen. She wanted to know what more might happen to her body and what more had happened to his. She knew he didn’t have the answers, so she said nothing.

“Tomorrow I’ll take you with me on a food run,” he said to her surprise.

“Really?”

“Yeah, really. You got wings now. You might as well learn how to use ’em. I’ll teach you and then you’ll come with me.”

She swallowed.

“But Daddy, what if I can’t fly? Mine might not work as good as yours.”

“There’s only one way to find out now, isn’t there?” he said.

She touched her dad’s hand, and then he said, “You should eat your dinner before it gets cold.”

11.

Adrianne followed her father down the stairwell and through the barricades to the fourth floor. She hadn’t been down there since they’d moved into the building. The floor was empty, with only a few unadorned columns to fill the vacancy. The glass from the windows had mostly fallen out, like in the rest of the building, so that the wind flowed freely through, almost as if they were outside. And yet, even with its vacantness, there was something less lonely about the fourth floor. Since no one had ever lived or worked on it, it was as if nothing bad had happened there. It seemed only unfinished, still waiting for the workmen to come.

Her father stood by a window and stretched out his wings. He waved them back and forth, then up and down. Adrianne, awed by his wondrously surreal beauty, remained still — watching. He motioned for Adrianne to join him. She stepped up to the window frame and stretched open her wings. Hers weren’t as wide as his. But she did as he did, waving her wings back and forth, then up and down.

“Flying isn’t flying exactly,” he said. “It’s coasting. You have to catch the wind in such a way to let the air lift you. It’s a trick. Follow me and do as I do. I won’t let you fall.”

Adrianne
was
worried, though. She’d seen him fly many times. He had to know what he was talking about, she thought. He jumped out the window. Her eyes followed him as he swooped and coasted. An eternity seemed to pass before he returned to the window and gestured for her to come while fluttering his wings. She glanced at the street below and her stomach sank.

“Don’t look down,” he said. “Just dive out. Don’t worry. I gotcha.”

Adrianne, with her eyelids shut so tight that all she saw was hazy red darkness, jumped. The wind rushed against her face and body as if she were on an out-of-control carnival ride. Her arms swung violently, waving like crazy. Her eyes opened, and her heart panicked as the ground grew nearer.

“Stretch out your wings and feel the air!” she heard her father shout.

The pavement was closing in when the strong arms of her father grabbed and pulled her up.

“Feel the air!” he said, in a not very calm way.

Her thin third and fourth arms shakily stretched out. She felt a sudden lift as the wind gathered beneath her wings and picked her up like a giant spatula. The air became hard and real as if it were a solid thing like her father’s arms. Adrianne went higher and higher. Her dad had let her loose long ago. She was flying.

“Good, good. Now you’re getting the hang of it,” he cried. “See, that wasn’t so hard.” He smiled and waved his wings.

Her father darted away. Adrianne followed. The wind dragged at her wings, making it difficult to control her direction and speed. Her father lingered for short moments as she struggled to catch up. When she drew near, he flew on — forcing her to fly harder and to be stronger. It was working. With every moment there was an increase in her coordination until she too was coasting, side by side with her dad.

They soared together above the large main street that divided the caverns of the midtown in two. Adrianne had not seen this much of the city in a long time. Broken glass, smashed-up buildings, and overturned cars crowding the streets and sidewalks. Blackened scars from the intense out-of-control fires that had burned themselves out, charcoal-marked the streets and sidewalks. In the silence and stillness, only the birds moved among the ruins, unharmed by the mist. The remains of several military drones lay crushed and broken on the ground. Adrianne remembered watching them shooting at the crazies and hitting normals instead, back in the days when they thought the disease had a military solution. Now, her dad guided her to a roof where they could set down. She stood next to him, the whole city spread out before them. The river beyond was black against the purple-gray sky, and smoke floated off the water. Adrianne felt a sudden chill.

“Every time I come out here I’m amazed at how messed up the world is. It will never be the same again,” he said. It was hard to tell what he meant by that. He didn’t exactly seem sad while saying it. He put his arm around her shoulder and asked, “How ya doing, Adrianne?”

“I’m okay, dad,” she said.

“I wanna show you how to shop for food,” he said. “There are lots of supermarkets and bodegas with good stuff still left in ’em. In the early days, after the change, most of them were stripped bare, but some still have stuff if you know how to look.”

He climbed to the edge of the roof and dove off. Adrianne held her breath, stopped herself from looking down, and jumped too. This time with her eyes open, staring ahead as she sailed in midair with a sick elevator-drop feeling in her stomach. She flapped her thin back arms once in a while to remind herself that it was her wings keeping her aloft.

They maneuvered through the city caverns, between buildings, stopping to rest occasionally on rooftops that her dad knew well. Skimming over the river thrilled her. Seeing all that flowing water without anything to obstruct her view made Adrianne feel powerful, exuberant.

The neighborhood where her dad led her had many two-level buildings that remained somewhat intact. In places nature had taken over, miniature forests where broken townhouses had given way to the weight of decay. Her father pointed at moving things. Five or six of them. The trees interrupted the view. There they were again, awkward and bow-legged — used-to-be-humans — crazies, throwing rocks at Adrianne and her father.

“Happens every time I come here. Just stay high out of their range and you’ll be fine.”

They swooped over the borough. They flew towards an old storefront with windows and door smashed in that looked pretty picked over. They landed anyway. Her dad was a very smart man. He knew that the shelves would be empty. But they always forget the basement, he said. He forced the front door open with his shoulder, and they went inside. They found the door to the basement in the back. The steps down led to a nasty-smelling room mostly filled with empty boxes and dead rats. Her dad kicked around at the boxes until one of them made a thud. Gold mine: a box of canned Vienna sausages! He picked up a can.

“Always look to see if it’s bloated or not. If it looks like it’s getting ready to burst, toss it, ’cause it’s no good. These, on the other hand, are just fine,” he said. The white of his smile shined even in the dark. Her mouth watered just thinking about the soup they were going to make with the new ingredient. They grabbed a few plastic shopping bags from an open box and put all the cans they could carry in them.

Upstairs there was a crash, the sound of moving feet. Adrianne and her father stayed quiet in the basement for what felt like a long time, until it sounded like whatever was up there was gone. Her father climbed the stairs, and she followed. All was quiet and still but for the few birds that pecked on the floor, mechanically nodding their heads.

Outside, Adrianne and her dad found men who weren’t men waiting for them. Bowlegged, twitching and jerking, they had scales all up and down their necks and faces and were swatting at invisible flies.

Her dad moved in front of her before she could do anything. Adrianne had never seen him fight before. He scratched and punched and threw bricks and rocks. Adrianne was horrified and also mesmerized watching a father fight to defend his child. Adrianne threw one of the cans she was carrying and hit one of the used-to-be-men square on the shoulders. She was aiming for its head. She threw another can and another and another. He father grabbed her from behind and pulled her aloft. A gust caught under her wings and lifted her as she threw another can. When one of the things grabbed at her ankles, she dumped all the cans left on its head. Her dad pulled her up high, and they watched the creatures pick up their treasure.

After that, her father decided that Adrianne wasn’t ready to go with him after all. He said she was still too young. He left again to look for survivors, leaving Adrianne behind. What he was searching for might not be out there.

It had been over a month and still no daddy. He was never away this long. The mist was back, too. It choked the sky. Adrianne had set off the flare gun on the roof, and still he hadn’t returned. She had always been afraid to think of the day he didn’t come back. Now the day had come. Adrianne was alone.

Adrianne heard noises in the night. A large crowd of something passed by the building. She couldn’t see what they were because the mist was so thick. Her flare might have caught the wrong kind of attention. All she could do was hide in the deepest corner with her kitten, her wings covering them like a blanket.

Adrianne decided to look for her dad. She pictured him hurt, moaning in some darkened alley in need of help. He would never approve, but he was not around to stop her. She had wings. She could fly. And she could be strong, too. Stronger than strong.