Crosses, stars and angels and a Christ lined the cemetery lane and the sun shone through white clouds. She expected the boy to reappear any instant to lead the way. Where could she go from here, she wondered, when flowers with multicolored petals popped out of the gravel in her path? 'What kind of flowers are these?' She knelt on the ground and inhaled a lungful of its aroma and coughed up the name of "orcharosamum" for no apparent reason.
Impressed by the beauty of the blooms, she couldn't resist them. Her fingers reached for one the stems when she heard someone sternly state, "Don't you dare pick that flower!"
Shocked by the cruel-sounding voice, her fingers loosened their grip on the flower’s neck and she quickly got to her feet, afraid the guardian of this garden might be God Himself. Instead she saw a young man standing before her. He was tall, thin and handsome with a well-trimmed moustache that was as black as his wavy hair. He looked like a cross between the young boy with glasses and her dad. But she wasn’t really sure, except for his green eyes. Was she in for another moral lecture? There was nothing she hated more than adults with no more wisdom than a worm's, telling her how she should behave. She was in no mood for a sermon from anyone. 'And who knows,' she thought, 'he might be Satan himself' preventing her from getting out of the cemetery.
Instead of greeting him, she turned away and ran down an alley that led to the gates. The path, however, reshaped itself and took her back to the reflection of the girl she had left behind.
"Hi," he uttered calmly, and waited.
She didn't answer. She knew if she did, the words out of his mouth would be full of charmed snakes accusing her of being a flower-killer. Her heart started pounding loudly. She grabbed her chest, fell to her knees and began watering the flower with tears. She heard the petals whisper, "We forgive you." Words from a sentient being other than a human made her heart ache. "I'm sorry I wanted you all to myself. I wasn’t thinking."
She got up and suddenly felt as if the scene she had experienced never happened. The flower retreated underground. But instead of commenting on its sudden disappearance, her tongue rattled off a list of complaints that had no end: how her mother treated her like a child; how her mother lacked trust in her judgment; how her mother called her names; how her mother treated her like a prisoner; how her mother went through her stuff, looking for condoms, drugs, pills, cigarettes; how her mother sniffed her like a bitch; how her mother called all over town to pry into her secret life; how her father. . .
"What about your father?" the young man asked.
"He just agrees with her lately! I think she's a witch who's stolen his heart."
"I'm certain he loves you and your mother only wants what's best for you."
"P-LEAZE!"
"What about you?" the young man asked her.
"What about me?" she replied, confused by his question.
"You've cursed your mother for being a tyrant, and you sound like a martyr, but I heard only enjoyment in your tone. Who are you without her?"
"I'm me! Lauren!"
"So, what are your faults?"
"I don't have any! Why are you torturing me? Why are you turning things around? It's my mother's fault. Can’t you hear? And my father doesn’t care lately," she cried out.
"Where do you go from here, Lauren?"
"I have no idea. All I know is I have to find my dad's heart and my mom's brain!"
The young man's green eyes abruptly turned dark and malicious. She was certain he was aware of her pains and frustrations. But he just stared and smiled like a Devil full of love, joy, and contentment. If she gave in to his temptation she would have to give up her anger and possession of the girl she no longer wanted to be but was afraid to let go.
For the moment, she decided he was unholy. His name had to be Lucifer, not Philip. She had seen movies about him setting whole cities on fire while his fanged followers sucked gallons of blood to keep from dying. The young man sensed her thoughts. And to give credence to the image she was forming of him, he showed his fangs. Then he turned into a raven and perched on the right shoulder the young man he still was, standing before her. Lauren was more frightened than surprised by his new magic. Could the boy, who had resurrected a pigeon and made all the beautiful flowers in this cemetery, have an evil side? Could angels and even God have flaws? Could they be malevolent? But could the Devil have kindness in his heart? Did the Two ever meet and blend into One?
"Why are you thinking such thoughts?" he asked.
"You're Dracula!!" she exclaimed.
"Do you want me to be him?" he asked as the raven.
He transformed himself into Bela Lugosi, the Dracula of all Draculas, with cape, bloody lips, fangs, and a deep Transylvanian accent.
She shrieked like a heroine in distress, stepping back, hoping someone would rush in and put a stake into Dracula's heart. She closed her eyes, praying that when she opened them again, she would be back in her trailer, safe under a warm blanket. Instead, she felt Dracula sinking his fangs into her neck. She fainted.
When she came to, the young man was giving her a drink of water.
Her tongue was confused. It didn't know how to react. Should she tell him he was cruel for playing games with her? Should she thank him for the crappy water or slap him because underneath his teenage body was the boy who was toying with her?
She pushed the bottle of water from her lips but held her tongue in check.
"The boy can be so cruel, but he can be very kind. It all depends what people feed him. Whatever you evoke from him is what you get!"
"If I gave him candy, he'd be sweet, and if I fed him garlic, he'd stink, is that it?"
"You're so simplistic. Do you always think in black and white? Those movies you watched must have corroded your brain! Do you still think you're Xena the female warrior? Here, take this!" the young man cried out as a sword appeared in her hand.
The young man exposed his bare chest, pointed to his heart, and said, "Go ahead, pierce my heart, but if you do, you'll have to eat it. I dare you!”
"I don't know if you're the Devil, Dracula, a young man, a raven, a boy, or one of God's angels."
As she exhaled those words, the young man’s arms were beginning to sprout wings again.
"Could you stop changing all the time?" she asked.
"Nothing remains the same, even if you think it should."
"I don't want to change."
"You will, whether you like it or not. That's why you're here."
"I don't want to die! I haven't lived yet!"
"We die every day we live to be what we must become."
"I want out of this cemetery."
Lauren wondered what she was supposed to do with the pictures her grandmother had given her. Without looking at them the young man said, "She gave you the wrong ones! God, that's funny. Imagine you looking for your uncle Roger's stupid, ugly wives! How could she have given you Bette Dunlap's pictures when she's been dead for years and her body was never recovered?"
"These aren't my dad's wives?"
"No! Look at the man next to them. That's your uncle Roger."
"Why were they so nasty?"
"Not everybody thought so. Your grandma didn't like any of her sons' wives, except for Amy, one of your father's better picks."
"What about my dad drowning at sea and appearing at his own funeral like she said?"
"That was your grandma's imagination at work. She could spread such good tales everybody was constantly confused. Your Aunt Flo heard so many lies about herself, she actually thought she had worked in a whorehouse, stabbed a man to death, run off with a sailor to Tahiti where she lived with Gauguin without ever leaving this village. That's how good of a storyteller your grandma was. She'd told so many lies about her own miserable existence as a coal miner's daughter, who'd been raped by soldiers from a war that never happened, she could no longer remember her own name. Why, your grandpa became a simple smell because of her mindless tongue."
"So, everything she told me was a bunch of lies? What good are fake pictures?" Lauren asked desperately.
She tore the pictures and threw them in the air where they reconstituted themselves and returned to her hand.
"What do I need with them?"
"They're the truth to your grandma. They belong to her!" the young man said as he took the pictures from her and slid them under the old woman's mausoleum door to be put back inside the book of ancestors.
"I'm relieved those weren't my dad's wives!" she exclaimed.
"His might be worse."
"Why did you just say that?" she asked.
"To get you ready."
"Ready for what?"
"Pain, confusion, fear. . . hope, pleasure, contentment. . . whatever you choose to feel."
"It's not like I choose to feel what I feel!"
"You do choose."
"No, I don't. Feelings just happen!"
"Okay! You don't choose."
"How can you say that?"
"Make up your mind!"
"Sometimes, I don't feel I have one. I know why I came here and I should follow through with my goal."
"Here, this might help," the young man said, pulling a blue lizard with white spots by the tail out of his mouth.
Lauren didn't consider the birth of the lizard unnatural. She found its colors fascinating as he placed it in her palms. Its small feet and tail tickled her skin. She wondered aloud what it ate, mosquitoes, flies or herbs? Would it bite her? Was it magical? Would it grant her three wishes if they were halfway reasonable? She didn’t want it to be just a simple reptile with spots that did nothing extraordinary. As soon as she began to form her first wish, the lizard became metallic. It retained its colors, but it was now dead and shaped like a necklace.
"It died on me! What's so magical about a dead lizard?"
"I didn't say it was magical!"
"It's supposed to be magical!"
"Why must it be? Just because you're on a quest, you shouldn't expect some formula potion or amulet to solve your problems. Besides, there are no such things as wizards or witches! Or magical potions or wondrous lizards! You expect too much! Here, put the necklace around your neck!" the young man insisted.
As soon as he placed it around her neck, Lauren felt a warm pulsating sensation on her skin. "Is it alive again?"
"So are rocks."
"Why am I wearing a lizard? Does it have a purpose or meaning?"
"It'll do whatever you want it to do for you. I don't know exactly. It may talk to you. It may give you advice if you ask it to."
"What will it say?"
"It might tell nothing but lies."
"Lies? Why lies? Always lies! What are you trying to do to me? Why are you giving me a lizard that lies?"
"Because you're not in some vampire novel. Get real!"
"What will I do with lies?"
"Take them at face value. But then, the lizard may tell you the truth. Or it may talk to your mind without ever uttering a word. It's just a present to keep me in your thoughts."
Lauren's lips wavered as she juggled two words on the tip of her tongue. As she was about to swallow the consonants and vowels to avoid exposing her good side, she felt the lizard's feet push against her throat.
"Thank you," Lauren let escape as she choked a little.
The lizard had to have magical powers or she wouldn't have thanked the young man. She was now confident she could get the right pictures of her father's wives from her grandmother. So, she pounded on the mausoleum door, expecting it to open. She screamed and demanded, but the lizard remained cold to her thinking. The young man looked at her calmly, without saying either an encouraging or discouraging word. She chanted incantations with nonsensical words she had heard at the movies, but none were able to unlock the door.
Just as she was about to accept death as a final destination, she heard the young man say, "Go see Aunt Flo.”
"And does she lie too?" she asked, not willing to go through another useless exercise for the sake of going through it.
The young man smiled and said, "Lies run in your family. But as long as you recognize them as such, you should be all right. Your Aunt Flo is a lot of fun. She can make anybody's head spin with crazy tales. Go visit her! And don't you forget your Uncle Albert!"
"Is he the one who was supposed to have practiced black magic?"
"He did practice it. I actually saw him turn a priest into a pig, and two pigs into cops! He's an amazing guy! And he could make potions that caused people to fall in and out of love in an instant."
"Right! Whatever! I don't trust anything you say anymore. And I'm sick of visiting dead relatives. I don't want to hear any more of their stories. I want this quest to be mine!"
"Well, the gates to the cemetery are open. All you have to do is step out and you're on your own. You can be on a quest all by yourself. How would you like to be in the Great Chamber of Mirrors and Echoes looking at yourself and hearing your own voice all day and all night?"
Lauren knew nothing about her Aunt Flo, except that she was her father's sister and died at thirty-three. Anything else that might have happened to her could have been a pack of lies reshuffled so many times her Aunt Flo probably needed therapy.
So when the young man opened his mouth and began Aunt Flo's tale, she decided to accept his words at face value, making allowances for the lies. She stopped trying to believe or disbelieve the stories and allowed words to live on their own.
"Aunt Flo worked on the docks, unloading fish since she was sixteen. Sailors and fishermen wanted her for her good looks even if she smelled like cod. But she retained her virginity. She worked long hours, but she didn't want to end up filleted like by old age. So, one day, she packed one suitcase, and without saying a word to anyone, hitched a ride out of town.
“Nobody ever heard from her again. Your father was the only one who ever visited her, but he never told anyone of his visits.
“One day the sheriff showed up at your grandparents' house. No sooner did he deliver his condolences than tongues spread the news like the Gospels. Your Aunt Flo's body was found hanging in the whorehouse where she worked. Some were delighted she’d died because of her sins.
“No one knew why she hanged herself. But as with every mysterious happening, rumors outnumbered the facts. If you ask Aunt Flo why she hanged herself, she’ll probably come up with everything but the real reason. It's not that simple. But it might help you to talk to her. She loves to talk and talk and talk."