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I opened my mouth, but the front door swung open. “Hellion, I’m only getting older.”
“Coming, Weatherman.” I grabbed Art’s shoulder. “Later?”
He got up with me. “Yeah. See ya in the mornin’.”
Outside, dim porch lights glowed over Weatherman and Diesel’s grim faces. Chills ran up and down my spine like a yo-yo with much purpose. “Jesus,” I complained. “Do I even bother to sit?”
“Sticking to Spanish for this one, Hellion.”
Legs feeling weak, I nodded to Weatherman while misstepping to a chair that caught my tired ass. Barely seated, I suddenly noticed the sounds of nature. They were so familiar to me, having lived across the way at grandma’s. The bugs, the birds … all brought back soothing memories of me traveling the woods and water to see Rya. With all that had recently transpired, that felt like centuries ago.
Diesel rested his forearms on his thighs and wrung his hands like I had just witnessed Art do. “I didn’t know the language before your mother.”
I winced. “But I didn’t think you knew her long.”
“I didn’t, son. Only a day. Only part of a day, truthfully.”
Gawking, I insisted, “Not possible.”
Weatherman leaned against a porch post and stared into the night. He wasn’t screaming that Diesel had lost his mind. Nothing. Just stayed quiet. They had already compared notes from a past I knew nothing about.
Spaghetti and chicken started doing somersaults in my gut. “Be straight with me.”
Diesel’s nod was honest. “Only way to handle all this. Just keep being a badass, ’kay? Keep trusting and following that gut of yours.”
“Okay.”
Diesel rubbed the back of his neck. “Rosa, she uh, kind of … ‘gifted’ me the language. Claimed it would be important someday.”
Numbly, I pointed to my chest. “’Cause of me?”
“I’m starting to think so.” Determined blue eyes pierced me. “Do you remember at the rally, in the tent?”
“Hearing your shitty Spanish?”
His stare softened. “A good friend told me to hide my new talent, but I refused to hide her so… El-o comprende-o?”
Puzzle pieces began fitting together perfectly. “You compromised.”
“It felt wrong to not honor her in some way. I didn’t know what happened to her but…” He shook whatever he was thinking off. “Back to the tent. Remember me telling you about your mama having wings?”
I remembered every second of the night Dio found me. “A metaphor. Sure.”
Nervously running palms down his face, he exhaled and sat back in the wooden rocker. “They weren’t feathered wings like in drawings everyone has seen. They were … they were…” He grappled for the pack of cigarettes in the inner pocket of his black leather cut then quickly retrieved one. Lit and sucking in tobacco, Diesel stared into the night with Weatherman. “They were… see-through … tiny bubbles, floating in the air, behind her.” He took another long drag, lost in the time he’d spent with her. “She called them ‘borrowed wings’ and was surprised I was permitted to see them.”
He suddenly observed me as if checking to see whether or not I was considering his sanity.
I stared at him, not sure what the fuck to think, but I knew he wasn’t nuts.
He sighed, “Sorry, pup, to be throwing all this at you right now, but…”
Barely able to move, I gazed up to Weatherman and said , “But this is why you’re here tonight.”
The man pinched the bridge of his nose then nodded. “Hellion, Weatherman had to know what— I mean ‘who’—he is bringing to his club, with all the people counting on him for protection...”
I was struggling with the implication of such harsh words. “You-You…” I switched back to Spanish, understanding that these two men didn’t want other club members to hear my truth. “You think I, whatever I am, might hurt them?”
His expression filled with alarm. “Noooo!” He took a knee in front of me. “I have had the honor of watching you grow into a man…”
