Touched Read online

  Table of Contents

  Part I

  March, 1992

  Genesis

  August 27th, 2005

  August 28th, 2005

  Kettling, Minnesota

  New Orleans, Louisiana

  The month of June, 1990

  Part II

  Author's Note

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  Touched

  Copyright © 2017 by Mara White

  Cover by Bex Harper Design

  Edited by Leanne Rabesa

  Formatting by Integrity Formatting

  All rights are reserved to the author. No part of this publication may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. The unauthorized reproduction for distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. While some of the business establishments, locations, and organizations mentioned in this work are real, they are used in a way that is purely fictional. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  When I die, Hallelujah, by and by,

  I’ll fly away.

  -Albert E. Brumley (1929)

  Part I

  March, 1992

  Genesis

  August 27th, 2005

  August 28th, 2005

  Kettling, Minnesota

  New Orleans, Louisiana

  The month of June, 1990

  Part II

  New Orleans, Louisiana

  Genesis

  Author's Note

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  March, 1992

  New Dawn Home for Children

  Kettling, Minnesota

  “Does your sister let you touch her, Gemini?”

  “Barely, but yes, more than anyone else.”

  What the heck kind of question was that? She thought a group home would be more or less housing and meals, but instead they were all Florence Nightingale, Mother Theresa, getting all up in your pathology and trying to fix it. Good luck, Gem hmphed silently at the therapist. Diagnosis doesn’t change reality. June was sick, or else she was just being June and there was no way to fix her.

  “Who else does she allow to touch her?” the therapist asked. She was earnest, but also curious. Gem scrutinized her with her large brown eyes; the expression she wore was mature beyond her seventeen years, a wizened adult inside of a child, born out of necessity—not choice.

  “No one,” were the words that came out of Gem’s mouth. But Alaric was what resounded in her head. She had her reasons for not saying his name out loud. Like getting him in trouble or telling secrets that were better left untold. June had been untouchable ever since she could remember. Even in preschool when the teacher would grab her hand, she’d stare at the spot where their skin connected like it was an affront to her existence. Just stand there and glare like she wanted to hurt someone.

  “Junipera suffers from a rare phobia.”

  “Please, what does June not suffer from?” Gemini stared at the crisscross of scars on her knee. Like an infinite game of tic-tac-toe, chalk on blacktop. She traced the bigger ones with her finger, trying to remember which particular fall or tumble had given her that specific bloody kiss.

  “Hopefully here at the center we’ll be able to give her the help she needs,” the therapist said. Gem stared at the poofy bangs which the woman had hair-sprayed into a blossoming flower on her head. She could see tiny frozen droplets of spray on the strands like insect eggs on a blade of grass or water drops on a spider web. Gemini nodded her head in agreement for the sake of ending the session on time, all the while her gut told her June wasn’t broken. Her sister was made exactly how she was supposed to be. Untouchable.

  Junipera

  Under the window was a cabinet that housed supplies like rock salt and kitty litter, scrapers short and tall, spare gloves and jumper cables, anti-snow tools for the walkway and cars in the parking lot. The blizzard was late in the season, but not uncommonly so; Kettling, Minnesota loved winter, probably more than anything else. The heat source came from behind the cabinet and the hot air blew upwards, surrounding June in a billowing cloud of heat in sharp contrast to what was happening outside. She shifted off her numb legs, which had fallen asleep curled under her. The attendant, Tom, looked up from his video game when she moved.

  “Pins and needles,” June said. Tom nodded and yawned.

  The sun was bright and bounced off the pristine white snow like an assault on the eye. June’s eyes ached from keeping watch and from the lustrous whiteness. A burst of wind kicked up the weightless top layer and sprayed it back into the air. It shimmered down in a cascade of pure glitter, illuminated in thousands of miniscule rainbows reflected off of the glass. Diamond rain, frozen into invisibly intricate lace.

  June lubricated.

  She placed her hands on the glass.

  “Stop touching the window,” Tom the attendant said, barely looking up from his video game. June lowered her hands and shifted again so that her heel pressed into her clitoris. She could feel the warm slickness that had likely already wetted her nightgown.

  She whimpered.

  If only she could tell Tom how delicious it felt, the freezing cold on her hands, the hot breath of air from the vents blowing up her nightdress. Gooseflesh and tingles ran across her flesh, a band of wild horses spreading parsimonious pleasure with the thunder of hooves. June shuddered. She’d try one more time.

  “Can I go outside?” she croaked, her eyes glassy, face flushed with arousal.

  Tom didn’t notice.

  “It’s a blizzard, Junipera,” was his only response.

  June didn’t even hear him, her mind and body were so lost.

  Genesis

  October 21st, 2015

  Harlem, New York

  She didn’t hate the city, she just wasn’t used to it. Every Friday night her mom called and she would vent about all the things that bothered her. For one, she didn’t like the subway—why suffocate yourself on a packed train car so you could ride smooshed up in misery to get to class on time? She would have preferred walking if it wasn’t so damn cold. Then there were the prices that still made her gasp. Sure, there were grocery stores on every block, but she refused to pay ten dollars for a carton of Greek yogurt. New York was so diverse that it could make your head spin. Food, clothing and culture from every corner of the earth, and she’d overheard plenty of conversations where she couldn’t, for the life of her, even guess what language they were speaking in.

  Back home life was slower, sweeter and there was room to be sad. Flowers bloomed full and brash; birds were happy, not ruthless scavengers. In New York City, there was only time for hustling and bustling, and getting mad was the only public sentiment afforded to you. Yelling and speed-walking were the tenets of social interactions on the street. At home, it was call and response, a slow dance arm in arm while you admired the sky. She lived in the NYU dorms and that was fine. She’d never complain about her living situation because her mother broke her back making this arrangement work. She did second shift cleaning hotel rooms, and even weekend jobs, because tuition didn’t pay itself.

  Grateful but homesick, she fit in fine with the scenery just about everywhere until she opened her mouth.

  “Are you from the South?” they’d ask her, as if the South were an alternate realm of the universe. Her words were rounded, drawn out, some of the syllables so soft they whispered away at the ends. Here people spoke clipped and whiny. Their language didn’t seduce, it was spat out, maybe by necessity.

  “Do you go to church?” she’d asked her white roommate a month into the semester. Genesis missed church almost as much as she missed her family.

  “Hell, no!” Angela replied. “Sunday, I sleep, eat a giant burrito and catch up on all the week’s reading assignments.”

  “How do you think you find a church here, just Google and pick one?”

  “Try Yelp or see which one has the highest ratings,” Allison yelled as she pulled on her jogging sweatshirt. “Let me know if you want to get ramen later.”

  “Mmmkay,” Genesis said, already Googling away on her phone. Best Baptist Church in New York City, she typed into the search bar. She knew her mom and grandma would get a hearty laugh out of reading church reviews.

  Best church I ever stepped foot in was Emmanuel Baptist Church in Harlem. The service was moving, the Reverend isn’t a fire and brimstone type, more hopeful and into real service to God and community. The choir, hands down, gave me more chills than any other. The food afterwards—off the chain. I’d go every Sunday if I could. They don’t get all crazy about membership or denomination. If you show up to worship, they take you in with open arms and a smile. 5 stars

  Wiser-through-worship was his handle and he’d sold her on Emmanuel already; she didn’t need to read more. She’d watched Showtime at the Apollo growing up and of course read about the Cotton Club, the Roaring Twenties, The Savoy Ba
llroom and the jazz speakeasies. Harlem in its heyday, from the Renaissance all the way to the 1960s Black Panthers, the spirit of the place was a source of pride although she was in no way connected to any of it. She watched the live feed from 125th Street when Barack Obama won his first term in office. Harlem was legendary, and she knew the black churches here rivaled those back home.

  She took the number one train all the way uptown, got off at the elevated stop above Martin Luther King Boulevard and looked down. She joined the bustle, fell in line with the rhythm of a thousand steps. The neighborhood made her want to smile fully, showing the space between her two front teeth, shake her hair out into a 1970s-style afro, put on a beret and some platforms, sing Nina Simone at the top of her lungs, tell every single person she passed that she was from New Orleans. It also made her itch to go shopping, talk to people on the streets, finally eat from one of those food carts without worrying about getting sick. The pep in her stride kicked up a spark; it still didn’t feel like home, but at least she felt something, excited—a start.

  She followed the stream of people, glancing down at the map on her phone. Half a block out from Emmanuel she could hear the singing—no, she could feel the rhythm of it in her bones. There was clapping and call back and what sounded like foot stomping. The pianist was making the keys sing and Genesis ran the rest of the way to the unassuming little church which she might have walked right past if not for the great reviews and the fervor of the music. It looked more like a storefront with an old brick building behind it. Ma always said where you worshiped didn’t matter, but worship you must.

  Worship we must.

  The sign in the front lawn said: ALL OF GOD’S CHILDREN ARE WELCOME HERE.

  The doors were flung wide open to the street, so she tiptoed in and took a seat in the very last pew. The place was packed; some of the ladies had folded fans to help cool them off. The sermon warmed her heart and the music uplifted her spirit. Here, she felt New York was a good idea and maybe she didn’t just make the worst mistake of her life. This was sweeter, slower, softer, more attuned to the natural rhythms of her life, than downtown. She didn’t think it was only because the majority of the parishioners were black, but because they were taking the time to recognize that beauty was happening—right here, right now. Genesis believed that every day was a gift—unwrap it with gratitude and savor every little bit. It was how her mother had raised her to see the world. And she knew first hand that when love was put into action, it was enough to save us all. Love wasn’t just a band-aid, it was the cure. She closed her eyes, licked her lips and sang the hymn she knew from childhood loudly from her heart.

  August 27th, 2005

  Fairfield, Connecticut

  “June’s gone.”

  Those were the first words Gemini heard at five o’clock in the morning. Her uncle, with a hint of exhaustion in his voice, had rung her, not knowing what else to do. June taking off was more commonplace than not. But she’d just come out of rehab, and while Ben and Allison encouraged her weather obsession, they discouraged her putting herself in danger.

  Too bad, thought Gemini, that Junipera loves danger more than anything else. Danger is June’s lover.

  “Did you check the storm tracker or the Weather Channel?” Gem asked her uncle in a gravelly voice. She and her boyfriend Dean had celebrated the night before with too many drinks, too much sex, and to top it off, a spontaneous pizza ordered near one in the morning.

  “She was following a storm off the coast of Africa. A tropical depression. She talked about the Mississippi River, possible storm surge. She was positively manic with the idea of it. So, you know your sister, I’m guessing that’s where she’s headed. The Gulf Coast.”

  Gemini stretched one arm above her head and stood. Her back cracked as she left the bed. Dean was naked beside her, still snoring, dead to the world.

  “She’ll be fine, Uncle Ben. Try not to worry. I’ll let you know if she contacts us.”

  “Your aunt wants to take her car away,” Ben said sadly. He had a soft spot for Junipera and her brand of crazy. He was protective of her, like a surrogate father. June was the daughter he’d always wanted but never had.

  “Let her do what she’s gotta do,” Gem said. She respected her aunt and had a close relationship with her. Gem knew how June’s peculiarities ran up a high bill on Aunt Allison’s adrenal glands, not to mention her blood pressure medication. But controlling Junipera was a lost cause, an absolute exercise in futility. “June is still going after storms, Beamer or not. The girl has two legs and isn’t afraid of hitchhiking or asking for favors.” She’d ride the bus all the way to Mississippi, not caring a bit about the crappy accommodations. “She’ll come back, just sit tight and tell Aunt Alli not to worry.”

  “All right, kiddo. Will do. How’s Dean?”

  “He’s a lush. But I love him.” She patted his sleeping form.

  Dean sat up suddenly.

  “Let me guess, your crazy fucking sister’s got your aunt and uncle upset again?” He threw off the sheet and strutted naked and stunning to the bathroom. Dean thought Junipera was a pain in the ass, a pain he tolerated because of Gemini, but wasn’t shy about showing his disapproval of June and her peculiarities. None of her idiosyncrasies were endearing to him like they often were to those who loved her.

  “I’m not mean because I refuse to tiptoe around her like everyone else does,” Dean said to her.

  He was right. But Gemini loved her little sister and would do what it took to take care of her.

  August 28th, 2005

  June drove almost all night. The farthest south she’d ever been was Oklahoma, going after a tornado, and she’d flown past the Louisiana state line around four in the morning. She wasn’t exactly sure where she would stay since she’d heard on the radio that all of greater New Orleans had been placed under a mandatory evacuation order. Experience told her that there would be at least one hotel open downtown where reporters were holed up. She’d followed their lead before, pretending to be chasing the story and not the storm. They usually had the best intel and she would leech off of them if she could. The storm had been given a name when she turned into a hurricane—Katrina, they called her, and she’d become a category three when she hit land in Florida. But now she had free rein over warm open water. That meant her hunger would gain and when she touched Louisiana, she’d do it with a vengeance. She was expected to hit land around six in the morning, as a category five. June had never actually seen a five before, but she knew roofs, cars and trees would go flying through the air like paper dolls, sucked up into the vortex and spit out indiscriminately.

  Traffic snaked away from the Gulf in impossibly long lines of chrome and glass, rubber tires packed full of momentum wishing they could go faster. June had the speed they wanted as hers was one of the very few cars racing in the opposite direction. She came down I-55, and when she hit the I-10 bypass, the seriousness of the evacuation became apparent. Anyone who could was getting the hell out of New Orleans.

  Storm excitement felt very much like a hormone—tipsy, punch-drunk and out of control. June got high off the anticipation; she tuned out the radio and the long line of evacuees and listened to the storm. She spoke its language. June lowered the windows in the Beamer so she could feel the pressure in the air. Her blood surged in her body like the ocean tides do in response to its pull. Her extremities tingled; so did her nose. She could taste the storm on the tip of her tongue, like a spike, a live wire, a sharp blade laced with coppery blood. Katrina called to her and June’s thigh muscles quivered.

  June laid into the gas. Sometimes municipal law enforcement would block incoming traffic as well. June knew how to pose as a news reporter, but she wasn’t the most convincing candidate. Stringy blonde baby hair, lithe body like a cattail reed, clothing that was two sizes too big for her. She looked more like a painter or a homeless person despite driving a BMW. But her passion was always convincing, and her hope was that if Katrina was as big as she promised to be, whoever was watching would be too distracted to waste precious energy on just one life when hundreds of thousands were at stake.