Part 4: 1 - Headphones
2019, Kiko meets Rebecca Smith
Things That Can’t Be Broken is a novel presented as a live draft, one chapter every week.
Last week: Part 3: 12 - Face the Music • 2019, Caleb changes course
Part 4 | This Storm is Called Progress
1 - Headphones
Kiko Gonzalez
September 27, 2019
Dehesa Valley, California
Kiko tilted his head and put a hand on his tattered hat as a cloud of grit blew by from the east on a hot wind. A tall sycamore waved its browning branches ahead, welcoming him from beyond the fence-line at the edge of the Vasquez property. In a practiced motion, he turned the combo on the gate’s lock, loosened the chain, and let himself in. At the edge of the garden was a raised spigot and a short water hose. He pulled the bandana from his neck to wash the dust from his face, letting the warm water flow to cool before turning the hose up for a long drink. Then he filled his canteen, let himself out, and relocked the gate.
An old igloo lunch cooler sat wedged in the lowest crook of the sycamore. He heard the rattle of paper as he lifted it gratefully in toast to the house at the top of the hill. Tilting back the top, the aroma of chicken, spices, and sweet citrus lifted his spirit. Inside, a paper lunch sack held two large homemade tamales still warm in their ziplock next to three fragrant tangerines. Bobito and his wife Marisa were always good to him. Marisa was not only an ángel del cielo, she was not a bad cook. He rolled the paper sack closed and continued up the trail. Wary for wildfires, he would find a rattling place facing east tonight.
Blackwells shut down after old Jimmy retired and right away the lot was turned into rows of apartment buildings, three stories high. Work was harder to find after that, but Kiko found ways to get by. And he still had a job to do. He kept watch for the evil-spirited-ones, luz malo, those who would harm the children. Ocampo’s daughter, Chanel was a deputy now. She gave him a magic Star Trek phone he kept in his pocket. When he saw something, he called. He never had to explain how he knew. Chanel knew Dani, too.
Lately, he had been keeping an eye out for a girl he called Headphones. She did dangerous things. He had seen her a few times near the Circle K after dark, her head in the clouds, bright red headphones hung around her neck, looking neither left nor right, and walking fast.
Kiko was slower to climb, but when he sat down to rattle, he had Dani to show him where the girl went. Headphones liked to climb the fire break behind the abandoned horse ranch to the very top. She would perch there on the highest boulder. He had seen her sitting in silhouette against the moonlight, headphones on, swaying, arms in motion or outstretched. Una alma gamela. A kindred spirit.
He was careful not to interfere with Headphones. He only guarded to keep her safe.
Rebecca Smith
September 27-28, 2019
Dehesa Valley, California
Rebecca hung her Beats around her neck and grabbed her high-tops from the corner. She stepped softly across the living room in her socks and carefully unlatched the front door. When she stepped outside to the cement stairwell, a Santa Ana wind blew through the darkness. She smiled to herself as she sat to lace her sneakers, watching a giant brown palm frond scrape the sidewalk below like the dead reanimated. Her knees rose and fell below the strings of her cutoff shorts as she glided down the stairs to freedom. It felt good to move. The wind pushed at her back, lifting her like a sail as she swept up the block, happy to be away from the confined space.
Her foster mom, Julia, was the best she’d had so far, but some nights it was better to be out. Julia was on the phone tonight. Sometimes she had calls until early morning. The headphones were a gift, Julia’s compensation for hearing and not telling. She was supposed to sleep with them on so she wouldn’t hear any moans or dirty words through the thin walls. To hell with that though.
It wasn’t worth complaining. Rebecca had been an extra-cash-source in two previous households since she was seven. Julia was easy to live with however she made her ends meet. She was nice and there were always groceries in the fridge, a clean place to sleep. If Julia knew she was sneaking out at night, she never said a word about it. Rebecca was twelve after all, not four; she knew how to take care of herself.
It was only a mile to her favorite hilltop boulder, but it was a steep climb, especially at the end. Passing the Circle K was the worst of it. She felt the stares from the bright lights on the conspicuous sidewalk and always thought of vampires. There were no real vampires of course. There were worse things. Those thoughts kept her moving fast into the safety of the darkness.
Once her sneakers hit the sand over the first hill, the muscles in her thighs began to loosen and she could breath. Her heartbeat slowed to a steady pace. Away from the roar of vehicles and harsh voices, she could start to hear again. The night was not truly dark. It rarely was. The moon and stars gave more light than people gave them credit for. Away from the streetlights, she could see every granite fleck, every beetle track across the trail.
Before long, Rebecca was sitting on her rock, high above it all. She felt safe there. She knew Bobby3’s Super-vato from Webtoon™ was a real dude. She had seen him from the corner of her eye more than once on her way up to the rock. Skinny little old man, roses embroidered on his jacket, the tattered old white hat gave him away. She even might have heard his rattle one night, but she knew from the comic strip that he might move somewhere else if he found out she saw him and knew who he was, so she kept quiet about it.
She listened to the sounds all around her, creatures scuttling, a pack of coyotes in the distance. The wind weaved itself through the kinks of her hair and the loosened fringes tickled her neck. She gathered it up and rebound it in its tie, giving one last survey of the panorama around her before slipping the headphones over her ears and starting the playlist.
She carried two things with her from her life before, a CD from her mother, and the tiny plastic baby rattle that would have been her little brother’s first toy. She kept the rattle in her front pocket, the music on her phone. After a moment, she closed her eyes to the wind and let the music take her. Her arms lifted and moved on their own to the sounds and voices singing in a language she did not know but felt through to her bones.
Would she see the horses tonight? If anyone ever found out what she did up here, what she saw, there would be drug testing for sure, and another foster placement after that. Most nights the horses would come, especially when there was a good breeze. Every time they came to play was better than the time before. And tonight it was not just a breeze.
“Come and play,” she whispered into the wind, feeling it against her teeth.
A rush of air brought faraway feathers. She opened her eyes wide. The horizon had begun to pulse. Diving and surging, manes flying and hooves churning the air, they took shape in the distance, forming from a blend of darkness and starshine. Winged horses. The music brought them, and they flew to meet her.
She watched a stallion swoop and dodge the other horses. Hooved weapons and bared teeth grazed glistening coats in their agile sparring. Powerful bodies clashed and swept away from one another, diving and surging up again. A few enormous feathers fluttered down to litter the ground, turning to tangled branches and palm fronds as they landed.
If all of this was in her head, Rebecca didn’t care. No one could take this from her.
Suddenly, the light was blocked by the blackest horse, diving straight above her, giant wings fanned out for several yards. His belly turned vertical, hind hooves pointed toward her for a landing. She flinched and ducked her head, watching under her arm as he settled behind her. He gave a friendly low nicker and folded his wings tightly against his sides. He stood a few feet away, stretching his sleek neck and reaching his velvet nose cautiously in her direction.
Rebecca could see the skin on his chest twitching. She slowly lifted a hand. His delicate nostrils flared and he lifted his head high to give a loud clicking snort, twisting his neck to one side but not stepping away. Her mouth dropped open in awe. She stood her ground and waited. He stamped a hoof on the granite. She lowered her gaze slightly but did not move. He was testing her. She tilted her head to the side and looked back up at him.
He nickered again and reached his face to her outstretched hand. His velvet nose was softer than she had ever imagined. His breath was warm, audible, flowing through her fingers. His coat was so fine and soft, the veins raised just below the skin, damp with play. He shifted, lifted his wing, and moved forward until she was standing under it.
The feathers were smaller near his withers, downy where they met the sleek coat just behind his shoulder. One of her foster families had a cockatoo that liked her feathers stroked and she tried to do the same awkwardly. The horse turned his head and bumped her between the shoulder blades with his nose. “That’s rude,” she said, smiling.
He wrapped his neck around her and nudged her into his shoulder, squeezing the breath out of her. She knew it was friendly, but it was still a little frightening and she tried to step back. He bumped her again. “Okay, Buster. I’m not sure about this. I think you want me to climb on?”
This is crazy, thought Rebecca. I’m going to climb onto an imaginary winged horse right now? But she grabbed a handful of thick mane with her left hand, stood on tiptoes, lifted her knee as close as she could, and reached over to hook her hand under his right wing. She slipped back down to her feet. Not so easy.
He lowered his left wing and she wedged herself between it and his shoulder to try again. This time she had a platform. It was like lifting herself out of a pool. She was up!
She sat back on the horse’s withers, her knees tucked up jockey-style, and hooked her calves under the wings. She leaned forward over his neck grasping handfuls of thick black mane. Her heart beat victorious fists against her sternum. A tiny voice in her head warned her she would surely fall to her death, but it vanished like smoke when he bunched up his haunches and drew out his wings wide for the takeoff. Nothing existed but this.
Tears streaked her cheeks as the strong wind rushed into her face—and they were in flight! The black horse held steady while other horses flashed past, exuberant in play. They bobbed up and dived down, like an overactive carousel, their ears flicked forward and then flattened back, their eyes bright with curiosity and a spirit of fun.
She could see everything from up here, the lights and traffic of the town below, the animal trails in the hills, the Circle K, people walking around. A red Camaro caught her eye and a split-second chill swept down her spine. When they passed over the bridge, she saw the little horse girl looking up, waving, a joyful smile on her face, dark straight hair swirling up into the wind.
The horses banked and glided up between boulder-riddled mountains and on until they met the city lights and the glimmer of ocean waves sweeping into the shoreline. After a slow turn back toward the valley, they seemed to settle from their play. Over her shoulder, Rebecca saw the others gliding, fanned out like geese behind her. The mood had changed.
They drifted back over the lighted streets with rows of houses, stores, and apartment buildings. A house on an ordinary street appeared to glow blue, and for an instant she saw the same girl she saw at the bridge, but she was no longer smiling. She pointed at the house that glowed. A red Camaro sat at the curb.
Fear slammed into Rebecca’s heart. She nearly slipped from the black horse when she saw a man in a shiny jacket pull a small dusky-skinned boy, maybe eight or ten from the back seat of the Camaro. She thought of her baby brother. Another man walked behind as he led the boy into the house. He didn’t belong there. That was the clearest thought she had.
Everything else disintegrated.
She pulled down her headphones, tucked her phone into her pocket, and slid down the back of the boulder, meeting the trail at a run.
As she ran, questions popped into her mind: How can I help the boy? Tell someone. Call 9-1-1. Tell the police . . . But how would she explain it? And what if Julia found out where she had been? Worse, if she called the police, Julia would be in trouble. She would be placed in another home. But that boy. . . She had to do something!
As she passed the abandoned horse ranch, she heard a voice from behind a tall patch of creosote, “Headphones! You need help?” He was crouched, peering up the trail as if to launch himself at whatever was chasing her.
Rebecca stopped. It was Super-vato!
“There’s a little boy. . .” She panted. “Two men. . . A red Camaro.”
Super-vato’s eyes grew wide. He said, “The Camaro—at the Circle K?”
Rebecca’s nodded vigorously. “You saw it?”
“Muy malo,” he shook his head. “I was watching those pendejos, but I did not see a boy.”
“I don’t know how to explain how I know, but I know they have a boy, and I know he’s in trouble. I know exactly where they took him. It’s off of Los Coches, close to the eight, but I don’t think anyone will believe me.”
The old man’s eyebrows crinkled together, “You see Dani?”
“What?” She looked both ways past his hat, as if someone might overhear. “You mean the horse girl from the bridge?”
“Sí, Dani Cartwright,” he said. “The spirit.”
“I see her sometimes. . .” Rebecca just imagined her sometimes. Or that’s what she had thought, “But . . . How did you know?”
He fished in his pocket for something. “I can help.”
“There’s one more thing,” said Rebecca. “No one can know I was out here.”
He pulled out a cell phone and said, “Tell me what you know.”
Next
Part 4 | This Storm is Called Progress
2 - Traveler’s Halo
Behind-the-Scenes Extra
I wasn’t sure I would get this chapter out this week, but here it is! I wrote a quick draft by hand last week. This week my eyes are less painful, but still light sensitive. For a few days there, I was pretty sure I was becoming a vampire. I’ve been rationing my screen time and working in Word, which is never optimal, but it has a dark screen mode that’s much better for my eyes. Anyway, I’m happy to be making progress both with my eyes and with the novel draft.
My nephew was helping me with some sketches of Kiko “Super-vato” for the Bobby3 comic strip idea. Here’s a small sample:
A lot of this chapter, the winged-horse sequence in particular, was part of a short story I wrote a few years ago called Co Ni Mire Rium, which is the name of a song on the Spotify playlist you can find under the Table of Contents. I cut the story down and made a lot of changes for it to make it fit with the plot.
I know it’s very fantasy with the pegasus, for those of you who like that, and very horsey for you horse people, too. If you go back really far, the sequence is inspired by the original The Black Stallion movie that I first saw as a child with my mom in 1979, and have since watched countless times. It’s also inspired by many a turn-out play time with my first horse, Sunburst. I enjoy the read myself every time. I hope you enjoy it, too.
Next week I’ll be introducing you to another new character and I’ll dip my toe into a little romantic meet cute scene, so stay tuned!