I waited outside my apartment for Fadil, whose parents had also let him ditch school, because, even though it was sticky and hot, it was better than sharing breathing space with Sean. Lago Vacia wasn’t in what anyone would consider the fancy section of Arcadia, but it was decent enough. The apartments were old, but not rundown, and mostly occupied by folks struggling to survive on life’s jagged edge. Like Mrs. Haimovitch, in the apartment below us. She was an elderly woman on a fixed income who cooked dinner every Sunday for a family that never visited. Then there was Missy Tanner, which I doubted was her real name, who’d run away from an abusive boyfriend and who read more than any person I knew. Mike D. sold weed to pay his rent and cover his video game habit. We were each living our own story, and while some, like Mama, were fighting to change the narrative, others struggled to escape the circumstances of their past and the specter of the future, while a few had given up completely.
“Are you Elena Mendoza?” A tall blond woman in a tight blouse and short pencil skirt walked around the side of a black SUV with dark tinted windows. She had the kind of face most men would call bitchy, but which I suspected simply reflected determination.
“No.” I craned my neck to look for Fadil, but didn’t see him and considered running back upstairs to the apartment to wait for him.
“Elena, my name is Carmen Ballard, and I’m an attorney for a party who would prefer to remain anonymous.” She walked toward me slowly as she spoke, like I was a stray dog she was attempting to corner.
“Yeah, because that’s not creepy at all.” I let my purse drop from my shoulder to my hand, figuring I could take a good swing at Carmen if she got too close.
Carmen Ballard, if that was even her real name, flashed a pearly, toothy smile. “I grew up in a place just like this,” she said. “But if you can do the things you claim, you wouldn’t have to anymore.” She was talking about the place I lived like there were coke dealers hiding under the stairs and rats chewing our toes while we slept.
“Look, I don’t know who you are, but if you don’t get the hell out of here, I’m going to call the police.” I reached for my phone.
She backed up a step. “I get it,” she said. “You’re overwhelmed. Have you been approached already? Whatever you’re being offered, I’m authorized to beat it.”
“No one’s offered me anything, lady.” The squeal of car tires caused us both to look toward the entrance of the apartment complex, and my entire body unclenched when it turned out to be Fadil in his little orange hatchback. He pulled up in front of my building and rolled down the passenger-side window. “Elena Mendoza?” he said. “I’m looking for a miracle worker named Elena Mendoza.”
I quickly slung my purse into the car and hopped in after it. “Get me out of here.” I watched Carmen Ballard out of the back window as Fadil drove off.
“What’s going on?”
“Nothing,” I said. “Just crazy people showing up at my apartment.”
Fadil glanced in his rearview mirror. “Should we call the police?”
“I’d rather not,” I said. “Let’s just go.”
“Where to?” he asked.
“The mall? I need to change my number. I think someone doxxed me online.”
“Seriously?”
“I’d turn on my phone and show you all the calls and texts from random strangers, but I’m afraid it might burst into flames. Plus, you know, creepy lady outside my apartment on behalf of an anonymous party.”
Fadil pushed his glasses up on his nose. “Should we skip the mall? You can change your number online.”
The offer was tempting, but I shook my head. “I refuse to hide in my apartment for the rest of my life. Besides, Sean’s there.”
“My house, then? Dad spent the night stress-baking.”
That offer was even more tempting, especially since Fadil’s dad was an amazing baker, but I didn’t want to deal with anyone asking me any more questions about what had happened. “How’d your mom react to everything?”
“I’m not sure she believes what I told her.” Fadil drummed the steering wheel with his fingers. “If I’m being honest, Elena, I’m not sure what I saw. You did heal Freddie, right?”
“I think so.”
“Did you make the shooter disappear?”
“His name’s David Combs,” I said. “Deputy Akers called last night and told me that the gun was registered to his father and that David is missing.”
“Okay. David Combs. Did you make him disappear?”
“If I did, it wasn’t on purpose.”
“What’d he say to you?” Fadil asked. “He said something to you after he shot Freddie.”
My memory flashed back to those brief moments. The entire encounter had lasted barely a minute, and yet it had expanded to fill every second since. I remembered healing Freddie. Her smiling when she saw me. That the boy who’d shot her had known my name and had said his mother would have liked me. That he’d had the opportunity to shoot me but hadn’t.
“Nothing important.”
“Come on, Elena. I told the cops you freaking healed someone and that the shooter got raptured into heaven. They think I’m crazy. My parents think I’m crazy. I deserve the truth.”
I clenched my fists and dug my fingernails into the palms of my hands. “Can we not talk about it? All I want is to forget it happened.”
Fadil muttered under his breath but kept driving. We parked at the mall and went in. He browsed the phone selection while a short-tempered salesperson changed my number. When we were done, I texted Fadil and Mama the new one, and we walked toward the food court. It was still early, but we bought pizza anyway and found a table in a corner.
As much as I didn’t want to discuss what had happened or what I’d done, Fadil did deserve the whole ludicrous truth. Of all the people in my life, he was the most likely to believe me.
“The siren told me to heal Freddie,” I said. “The creepy mermaid logo? She told me to heal Freddie, so I did. I have no idea what happened to David Combs or where he went.” I poked at my greasy pizza, unable to eat.
Fadil had eaten only a couple of bites of his pizza, and now as he sat across from me, his lips pursed and his brow furrowed, I wanted to crawl through his ear into his brain and see his thoughts.
“So the Starbucks siren told you to heal Freddie?” I nodded. “Was that the first time she’s done that?”
“Yes.”
“And do inanimate objects often command you to perform miracles?”
“They don’t order me around, but I’ve heard them for as long as I can remember.”
Fadil fell quiet again. I assumed he thought I was delusional or lying or worse. Not that I could blame him.
“I healed a cat last night,” I added. “Lucifurr. He has a bum leg—had. I fixed it. I needed to find out if healing Freddie was a one-time thing, but I guess it isn’t.”
“Did anyone disappear?”
“Not that I know of.”
Fadil picked up his pizza, folded it down the middle, and took a bite. “That’s good, I suppose?”
“Is it?” I said. “How do we know if it’s good or bad or whatever?”
“We try again.”
“Try what?”
Fadil wiped the pizza grease off his fingers. “Heal someone.”
“Here?”
“Why not?” He scanned the food court. “What about him?” Fadil motioned toward an elderly man in a wheelchair.
“What am I supposed to do? Casually bump into him and make him walk again?”
“Sure.”
“I’m not doing that,” I said. “And screw you for suggesting it.” I stood and started walking back toward the parking lot. I didn’t care if Fadil was following me or not; I’d walk home if I had to. He caught up to me outside and was out of breath from running.
“Don’t you want to see what you’re capable of?” Fadil asked.
I stopped and rounded on him. “I’m not some carnival freak.”
“I didn’
t say you were.”
“This morning Sean suggested we charge to heal people,” I said. “He doesn’t even believe me, but he’s already trying to figure out how to make money off this.”
Fadil took my hand and held it. “I’m not Sean, but I am curious. Aren’t you?”
“Yes,” I said. “Which is why I healed Lucifurr.”
We kept walking back to Fadil’s car. When we got in and he’d cranked the engine, he said, “Will you heal me?”
“You’re not even hurt.”
Fadil reached over me into his glove box and pulled out a Swiss Army knife. He unfolded the blade and held it to his palm. “Do this,” he said, “and I’ll drop it.”
“Are you serious?”
“Totally,” Fadil said. “And this is win-win. If you heal me, then we’ll have proof Freddie and Lucifurr weren’t flukes. If you can’t, all it will have cost me is a minor injury, and at least we’ll know.”
I hadn’t been able to speak to Freddie since she’d been shot, and Lucifurr was a cat. If I healed Fadil, he could tell me what the experience felt like from his end. Besides, I needed answers and the voices were not being particularly accommodating. “Fine. But don’t cut too deep.”
Fadil gritted his teeth and slashed the fleshy spot under his thumb with the knife. He hissed in pain, but the cut was so clean it took a second before blood welled up and streamed out of the gash to pool in his cupped hand. The fatty layer poked out, meaty and white.
I touched Fadil’s arm and closed my eyes. His light was brighter than Freddie’s and Lucifurr’s had been. I knew I wasn’t looking at him with my eyes, but I still felt blinded by Fadil’s energy. Having already done it twice before, I was able to quickly find the hurt. It looked like a toothless, gummy mouth trying to find a teat to nurse on. It was so real in my mind that I heard the suckling sounds from it. I healed it and opened my eyes.
“Whoa!” Fadil grabbed a rag from his backseat, wiped the blood off, and held his hand out for me to see. The cut was gone. No scar, nothing to indicate he’d been injured.
“What was it like?” I asked.
“Nothing,” he said. “One second my hand was throbbing and then it wasn’t. I thought it would tingle or that I’d see the skin stitch back together, but it was instantaneous.” Fadil sat there and gaped. “You really can perform miracles. I feel like this moment should be bigger.”
“I feel like I’m going to puke. Can you take me home now?”
EIGHT
ON FRIDAY, MAMA decided I should go to school. The upside meant not having to spend time with Sean in the apartment. The downside was that we had a pep rally instead of our first and second periods. I hitched a ride to school with Fadil and then we headed toward the gym. Forced cheer that early in the morning should be against the law. Fadil needed to run to the restroom, so I hung out in front of the gym waiting for him. As I stood outside, kids passing whispered in my direction and gaped in disgust, not even bothering to hide what they were doing.
“You planning any miracles today, Mary?” shouted a boy I thought I’d had a class with once.
“Sorry,” I said back, “nothing I can do to fix your micro-dick.”
I’d done my best to prepare myself. This was no worse than how I’d been dragged on social media. I didn’t understand them, though. I’d saved someone’s life and they were treating me like I was the shooter. I’d performed an actual miracle, but they still thought I was a freak. I wasn’t sure if there was anything I could do to change their minds, and I was even less sure I cared enough to try.
Fadil bumped my shoulder and grabbed my hand, pulling me into the gym. We found a couple of seats at the top of the bleachers and settled in. Fadil was a nerd. He was a math-and-science-loving geek who played video games and loved his parents and was serious about his religion and did the extra credit in his classes even though he rarely needed it. He’d been a target of bullying in middle school when he’d been the new student—mostly by idiot boys who thought a brown-skinned kid with a Middle Eastern name was automatically a terrorist—but he hadn’t let it bother him. Once they’d gotten to know him, they’d loved him, even the ones who’d initially taunted him. It didn’t make sense that he chose to hang out with me. He had his marching band friends, but he spent the majority of his time with me, and I’d never understood why.
In high school, your reputation is the only real currency you have. Some of us were perpetual paupers. Some, like Tori Thrash, were born into wealth and could have run naked through the halls in a clown mask and not exhausted that wealth. Then there was Fadil. He was sweet and kind and helped those who didn’t deserve his time, which earned him bankable reputation that he spent slumming it with your local neighborhood social reject. I didn’t question it out loud because without Fadil high school would have been a much lonelier place.
Ten minutes into the Arcadia West Otters’ dance routine, I noticed Freddie watching me. Her eyes were narrowed and the space between her eyebrows creased. I couldn’t tell whether she was disgusted or confused or about to stand up and declare that I was a witch who should be burned alive for what I’d done. It was disconcerting no matter which way I interpreted it. I’d considered calling Freddie after Fadil had dropped me off from our trip to the mall, but I didn’t know her phone number. I was desperate to talk to her and discuss what had happened. Maybe she’d known David Combs and could tell me why he’d shot her. Dylan Hartman caught Freddie staring and started whispering to Ned Powell and soon Freddie wasn’t the only person looking at me.
Before the shooting, I would have given my left toes, and probably my right, to have captured Freddie’s attention, but now that I had it I wished I didn’t. I wondered if turning invisible was part of my Miracle Girl powers. I shut my eyes and imagined my body becoming transparent, my molecules refracting the light around me instead of reflecting it. But when I opened my eyes again, Freddie and the others were still gawking at me, so I slumped down and tried to make myself as small as was humanly possible.
Cheer up, Elena, said a voice coming from the Otter mascot painted on the wall beside me. You’re special and they’re not, and when the end comes, most of them will die horrible deaths after suffering unspeakable agony!
“Yeah,” I said under my breath. “At least I’ve got that going for me.”
Fadil nudged me with his elbow. “What?”
“Nothing.” I risked a glance up, but instead of Freddie, I caught Javier Matos Vidente watching me, and I kept my eyes down for the rest of the presentation.
Javi and I had dated for six weeks during sophomore year. He’d been new to Arcadia West and hadn’t known asking me out was social suicide. I’d liked him because he was outspoken and handsome and hadn’t tried to kiss me until our third date. After that first kiss, I’d spent the next month and a half wondering why we were together, especially when he was on top of me, pawing at me with his sausage fingers and panting at me with his onion breath—two things that are great on pizza but not boyfriends. Our relationship eventually became a protracted siege in which he attempted to starve me out from behind the protective wall of my cotton underwear because he’d assumed I’d be an easy lay. Ugly girls are always easy, right? It’s an honor just being nominated, right? We should feel special that some boy, any boy, wants to stick his penis in a part of our anatomy he can’t even say without giggling. Right?
Wrong.
Javi reacted badly when we broke up, retroactively deciding that I wasn’t the type of girl he wanted to associate with anyway. We hadn’t spoken since. He thought he was a “nice guy,” and that, being a social outcast, I was practically obligated to want to sleep with him. To boys like Javi, being nice was a means to an end, where to boys like Fadil, being nice was the end itself.
When Principal Gonzalez released us from the pep rally, Fadil walked with me to my third-period class, which was gym.
“You see Freddie checking you out?” Fadil asked.
“If by ‘checking me out,’ you mean ‘star
ing in utter revulsion,’ then yes. Yes I did.”
“That wasn’t revulsion.” Fadil nudged me. “You saved her life. If there was ever a better opening than magically healing the girl you’re into, I don’t know what it is.”
“I healed her because I wanted to. She doesn’t owe me anything.”
“Of course not, but don’t you want to talk to her?”
“Freddie, sure, but what about her friends? The ones who call me Mary?”
“They don’t understand,” Fadil said. “Give them time.”
“Drop it, all right?”
Fadil pulled me out of the flow of students heading to their own classes and leaned against a bank of lockers. “I get that this is difficult, and I read what they wrote about you online—”
I flared my nostrils. “It was hard when I was the freak whose mother conceived her as a virgin. Now I’m the girl who claims she can perform miracles. It took them less than a day to turn me into a joke, so they can go to hell for all I care.”
“You can’t hate everyone,” Fadil said. “Not if you refuse to give them a chance.”
“Javi tried to stick his chance down my pants.”
Fadil let out a long sigh. “They won’t all turn out like Javi. Some of them might even surprise you, and you owe yourself the opportunity to see if Freddie is one of the ones who could.”
“You always think the glass is half full, don’t you?”
Fadil nodded. “And you think it’s full of poison. That’s why we make such a great team.”
“I’m not sure that’s how it’s supposed to work.”
“Yet it does.” Fadil flashed me a bright smile and I couldn’t help laughing.
I tugged his shirt. “Come on. Coach Foster will give me detention if I’m late.”
“Promise you’ll at least consider talking to Freddie.”