Just Wanna Testify (6 page)

Abbie had always felt sorry for the spirits that Hurricane Katrina had disturbed so roughly and who were now doomed to wander forever in search of a decent pot of gumbo, not to mention a final resting place. She knew some of them had found their way to Atlanta. It was pretty obvious when the headless chickens started showing up, lying in a pathetic heap of shiny, blue black feathers at the crossroads of two wholly innocuous southwest Atlanta streets along with the first wave of displaced New Orleanians.

Around the same time, a tiny, dimly lit candle shop opened on the outskirts of West End, carrying everything from black cat bones and High John the Conquerer incense to a dizzying array of roots, herbs, and various potions guaranteed to get the job done, whatever that job happened to be. There had even been a few reports of headless goat carcasses showing up in city parks, but
vampires
? That was something else altogether.

Standing at the kitchen sink in the small apartment that had been her first home in Atlanta, and that she now maintained as a kind of informal West End Women’s Center, Abbie felt nervous in a way she never had before. She hardly noticed the colorful bunch of flowers she was carefully arranging in a big, blue vase that matched the color of the walls in “the ocean room,” as she called it, at the front of the apartment. She was glad Blue was on his way over to tell her what was going on.

She took a deep breath and headed back down the hall. Abbie placed the vase carefully on a table in the center of the sunny ocean room, and sank down gracefully on one of the deep purple meditation cushions that made this space a favorite among the women who came to her seeking solace or enlightenment or both. She loved this room, painted floor to ceiling in the most beautiful shades of blue, from turquoise to navy to the palest gray with touches of just-before-dawn pink. She had told Aretha that she wanted it to feel like the ocean and that’s exactly how Aretha had painted it.

Abbie closed her eyes and took another deep breath to calm herself. She was surprised she hadn’t picked up some kind of disturbance in the air indicating the presence of something as unnatural as vampires, but why would she? They weren’t the same at all. She and Blue liked to call themselves
reincarnates
. They had died and returned many times, but there was no real connection between them and these strange creatures who never died and, according to Blue, never cracked a smile.

That would be awful, she thought, to live forever without any possibility of laughter. Abbie loved a good laugh. One of the things that had drawn her to Peachy Nolan and kept her by his side for the last four years was his sense of humor. The sex was great and the company was terrific, but the glue that held them together was their laughter. They laughed when they cooked, when they made love, when they watched the sunset, or toasted their good luck in finding each other. What if she’d been a vampire and missed all that? Abbie wondered, and she shivered a little.

At sixty-five
plus
, Abbie was in her prime and she knew it. Fit enough to turn cartwheels on her favorite Tybee Island beach whenever the spirit moved her, she had greeted the first signs of approaching menopause with the confusion and dread that seemed to be expected of women. But she had emerged on the other side, with determination and deep trust in the wisdom of her own natural femaleness, a self-described visionary, vital and invigorated, who could not only look deeply into her own heart and soul, but could help others navigate that often unknown territory as well.

She had been wrapping this new role around herself as if it were a gossamer shawl when Regina had emerged from a disastrous love affair, shell-shocked and shaken to the core. Abbie eagerly embraced the opportunity to bring her new gift of wisdom to bear on the life of her favorite niece, and they both emerged stronger from the collaboration. Soon after she had predicted that Regina would meet Blue in Atlanta, Abbie met Peachy at their engagement party and the two had been inseparable ever since.

Peachy had a house in Savannah that he had shared for twenty years with his late wife, and they both had carte blanche at Blue and Regina’s Tybee Island beach house. The four of them regularly gathered there, with Sweetie in tow, begging her father to build her a sand castle. Two years ago, Peachy had opened a small restaurant on the island, called it Sweet Abbie’s, found an amazing chef in Louie Baptiste, formerly of New Orleans, and now had so many customers that you needed reservations even during the off-season.

Abbie’s work often kept her in the city, but Peachy shared her love of their independent lives, as much as they cherished their time together, and both were thriving. When Blue called, she told him she was driving down to Tybee that afternoon, but when he told her what was going on, she agreed to meet him immediately.

When he arrived a half an hour later, she had calmed herself and greeted him with an affectionate hug. “You okay?”

“Absolutely,” he said.

“And how’s your beautiful daughter?”

He smiled and nodded as she closed the door behind him. “Fine.”

“Gina?”

“Fine, too. She’s out with Aretha on the shoot.”

“Does she know?”

Blue shook his head. “Not yet.”

He followed her into the living room furnished simply in white wicker with lots of bright pillows. The white walls were unadorned by design, since Abbie felt that a person could more easily access her own dreams and visions without the presence of paintings, posters, or other artwork. Although it looked a little bare at first, its very neutrality was somehow more soothing than the dramatic walls of the ocean room.

Blue liked this room and they often talked here as confidants. When Regina first brought Blue home to meet Abbie, they had greeted each other like old friends, and so they were. She took a seat in a small rocking chair. Blue sat down on the love seat and placed his hat beside him.

“Aretha doesn’t know either?”

“Neither one has any idea.”

Abbie had so many questions, she didn’t know where to begin. “Are you sure?”

“I’m positive,” he said. “One of them came by the West End News. When I confronted her, she admitted it.”

“How did you know?”

“I’m not sure,” he said slowly. “I must have run across them before, but I can’t remember when. There isn’t any doubt in my mind, though. These women are the real thing.”

“Are they dangerous?”

“Not anymore. Seems they’ve been able to substitute tomato juice to quiet any problematic cravings.”

“Tomato juice?”
Abbie sounded as incredulous as Blue had been when Serena first said it to him a few hours ago.

He nodded. “I know. It sounds crazy, but she seemed to be on the level.”

“Can you read her clearly?”

One of Blue’s gifts was a talent for mind reading, but a small frown flickered across his handsome face. His eyes, which changed colors as often as his mood, were now a deep gray. “Not as clearly as I’d like to. I knew what she was, but I can’t seem to access what they’re really doing here.”

“I thought they were doing a fashion shoot for
Essence.
”

“That much is true,” he said, leaning back and crossing his legs. “Regina negotiated the whole thing.”

Abbie smiled a little at the pride in his voice despite the seriousness of the topic. “Based on what I’ve heard, she got a pretty good deal, too.”

Blue smiled back, his square, white teeth almost as startling as his eyes in that Africa-dark face.

“Go on.”

“They got here yesterday. Aretha had dinner with them last night, and first thing this morning the leader of the group shows up to pay her respects.”

“Do you think she knew that you had been here before?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. She seemed surprised that I knew so much about her, but I can’t be sure. Their faces don’t show much emotion.”

“What did she say when you told her you knew?”

“She said they were from New Orleans, like I told you, and that they weren’t dangerous as long as they had access to tomato products.”

That would never be a problem in West End, Abbie thought, where bountiful community gardens provided enough fresh tomatoes to supply every family and neighborhood restaurant with them, fresh or canned, all year round. She hoped they weren’t here to buy up the tomato crop. Somehow she didn’t think the Growers Association would like that one bit.

“So where’d they go when they left Louisiana?”

“Somebody bought them an island,” Blue said, like that was something that happened every day.

“An island?” Abbie said, incredulous. “Where?”

“She didn’t say, but there’s nothing much on it, so they come to the mainland every so often to make some money and lay in supplies.”

“Including tomatoes?”

Blue smiled a little and shook his head. “No. I think they grow their own tomatoes.”

“Good. Anything else?”

“They’ll be here a week or so and then they’re flying to Paris for another shoot.”

“Nice work if you can get it,” Abbie said. “Do you believe her story?”

“I don’t know yet,” Blue said slowly. “I don’t think they’re dangerous, not now anyway, but I think there’s more to them being here than a magazine spread.”

Abbie thought so, too. “What are you going to do?”

“I need more information,” Blue said. “That’s why I wanted to catch you before you went down to Tybee.”

“Do you want me to talk to Regina before I go?”

“No,” he said quickly. “I’ll talk to Regina when the time is right. I want you to talk to Louis Baptiste and see if you can find out anything about a family named Mayflower back in New Orleans. A big family, probably had a lot of beautiful daughters. The one who came to see me was named Serena, but she’s traveling with five others and I think they may be related.”

“You think they’re sisters?”

Blue shrugged. “I don’t know, but anything he can tell me would help. The sooner, the better. I want to stay one step ahead of them.”

The urgency of his tone made her realize how serious he was taking this whole thing. She could tell he was trying as hard not to alarm her as he was trying to avoid spooking Regina and completely freaking out Aretha, but Abbie needed to know it all.

“You’re not telling me everything,” she said gently. “What else did Serena Mayflower have to say?”

She wanted to feel the name in her mouth. It felt fake, like an amateur actor’s attempt at a stage name.

Blue chose his words carefully. “She said this was a moment when they had to adapt or die, and they knew it.”

“Adapt how?”

Blue stood up and reached for his hat. “That, Miss Abbie, is what we have to find out.”

At the door, he kissed her cheek and she promised to drive carefully.

“When will you be back?”

“Sunday afternoon,” she said.

“Good.” He nodded. “Then don’t call me from the island. Until we know more about how they communicate, it’s probably better to talk face-to-face.”

“I’m sorry you and Regina can’t ride down with me.”

Blue touched her shoulder lightly as he started down the stairs, and his eyes twinkled slightly for the first time that day. “I am, too, but somebody’s got to stick around here and keep an eye on these vamps.”

Abbie watched him walk out the bright blue front door and found herself suddenly hoping Aretha’s sources were correct about its power to ward off evil. At this moment, she felt like she needed all the help she could get.

Aretha was in a zone. When the models and their stylists were finally satisfied with clothes, hair, makeup, and overall ornamentation, the Too Fine Five made their way upstairs, walked out into the Friday morning sunshine, and struck a pose as effortlessly strange and graceful as waterbirds taking flight over the Okefenokee Swamp. The crowd of students and onlookers, which had grown now to about one hundred, let out a collective gasp and fell back, heads tilted upward, eyes glued.

Regina knew that Aretha had intended to start by posing them at the base of the two-story King sculpture out front, but like any good artist, she recognized an opportunity and she took it. Instructing the models to simply walk among the young men without making any contact with them resulted in a wonderful series of shots that fully exploited the contrast between the students and their very ordinary environment and these frizzy-haired Amazons who seemed to
have wandered in from a planet even more bizarre than this one. Without touching a single person, the girls cut a wide swath through the adoring assemblage, leaving in their wake besotted admirers who never spoke a word.

Once again, Regina was struck by the silence surrounding the women. As she was watching from just across the narrow street, she could hear the soft click of Aretha’s camera shutter and her almost whispered instructions.

“Yes. Stop there. More with your arms. Yes. Just like that.”

If Aretha harbored any ill will toward them based on their being bad body-image role models, you couldn’t tell. The models obeyed her commands while incorporating the unique gyrations that had first made them lust objects for these same hormone-stuffed guys who had now been literally struck dumb by the women’s physical presence. They were close enough to touch, but not one boy lifted a hand in their direction. Most of them were too intimidated to even make eye contact.