Minos. Burt Weissbourd

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СКАЧАТЬ display case. Carefully presented inside the case were salads, cold cuts, and Greek specialties like grape leaves, gyros, or baklava. She took a moment to admire the display. Corey knew this was Johnny Boy’s responsibility, and he was rightly proud of it.

      Corey ordered a cup of the strong Greek coffee. “Nervous?” she asked.

      “Whenever I think about it.”

      “How’s Tiffany?”

      “Better than me. Her mom came all the way from Georgia to help her pick out her wedding dress. She hasn’t seen her mom in six years.”

      “Nice.”

      “I dunno. You have to picture this. Her mom, Martha, she cleans people’s houses; she goes to church twice every day; every Sunday, she helps with the Baptisms. Now Tiff takes her shopping on Broadway, to the Ave. I mean everywhere. At Retro Viva, this sales girl has the Dark Prince tattooed on her arm, and she’s fully loaded—studs everywhere, rings in her nose, her navel, this chain is hooked from her ear to her lip. So Martha blesses her, then she makes the sign of the cross with her fingers, and backs out of the store.”

      Corey smiled. “I need some help.”

      “Shoot.”

      “Remember Snapper?”

      “A little more than a year back?” JB bit his thumbnail as he put it together. “The smart-ass kid I hid in my squat? His old man wanted to bust him up.”

      “Yeah. What do you know about him?”

      “He hooked up with another guy. I think it was pretty serious. Snapper had some money, and I heard they split to California somewhere. I haven’t seen him in—I dunno—a year.”

      “You know the boyfriend?”

      “Un-unh. Once you cooled out the dad, Snapper left the rat hole I had him living in. I saw him around, after, but I never met his guy.”

      “He’s back. Snapper called me. Set a meeting then didn’t show up. I need to find him. Can you ask around?”

      “Sure. I remember one of his friends. I’ll talk with him.”

      “See what you can find out about the boyfriend, too.”

      “You got it,” Johnny Boy said. “Uh-huh.”

      “How about I take out dinner?”

      “I’ll put it together. Lemme see.” He looked over the display, tapping the window, mumbling to himself. JB turned to her, serious. “Can I ask you for something, a really big favor?”

      “Sure.”

      “Please say no if you don’t want to do it.”

      “Of course.”

      Corey watched him, taking a breath, screwing up his courage. “OK…here goes…” Another breath. “Would you be in my wedding, walk me down the aisle?”

      Corey smiled wide as tears came to her eyes. “I’d love to do that.”

      “You’re the only one I could think of that I really wanted to do it. So…so thank you.”

      Corey stood, taking his hands.

      ***

      Abe hadn’t moved much since Sara left. He was confused, floundering, and he wasn’t sure what to do. Much of his early work had been with felons. At one time, almost half of his practice came through post-prison programs. And often, he hadn’t known what to believe, what was real. He’d learned little things to listen for, what to ask, and he’d come to trust his impressions and his judgment. Once he ferreted out what was real, finding common ground and setting goals, even unconventional goals, became possible.

      Sometimes, and Corey was the best example of this, everything his client was saying was true. At those times, his work was simply to get that. It always took too long. In Corey’s case, before he understood what was at stake, she and Billy were gone, running for their lives. He’d found her, worked it out. It changed his life forever, especially the way he thought, the way he saw things.

      Since meeting Corey, Abe’s practice had changed, too. Though he kept his office in the dusty brick building under the viaduct with the fragrant Chinese restaurant on the first floor, he now spent most of his time working with troubled kids and their families, offering a practical combination of medication and therapy. Sorting out a child’s reality could be even more complicated than working with felons. Often, a troubled child believed something to be true in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Usually, it was part of some larger belief system, perceived to be held by a trusted or an intimidating authority. For example he’d known a child to insist that their euthanized pet was on a farm, because the parents had told that lie.

      In Sara’s case, he was certain she wasn’t lying. She believed what she said. He also thought that she’d created this entire complex universe—even developed her own language—by herself. No one—not her father, her teachers, nor her friends—was encouraging her to look to the Greek gods for a mortal hero, protection and guidance. And, he was sure, she’d fashioned that magical world in response to something. Yes, he sensed that she was trying, desperately, to communicate some terrible, otherwise inaccessible knowledge. It wasn’t something she could tell him—or she wouldn’t have created her world in the first place. No, he’d have to learn her language.

       His size thirteen feet, in ancient Italian brown leather shoes, were propped on his desk, and he faced the cherry leather chair that she’d been sitting in. It was close, kitty-corner from his own chair, a straight shot across the corner of his table-sized desk. He could still see her sitting there, taking in every nuance, as she carefully explained how the Beast would kill soon. A simple fact, plain as the nose on his face.

      He was taking a risk; he knew that. The conventional thing would be to medicate her, then, if necessary, have her hospitalized. But Abe knew he’d never be able to help her if he did that. Someone had to hang in with her, learn to speak her magical, made-up language. And figure out with her what she actually meant by it. Who was Theseus? Why did she need him? Who was the Beast? Why was he so dangerous? She was getting at something that was, he thought, too frightening for consciousness. And in spite of that, she was trying to warn him. Why did he believe her? He didn’t know. Hell, he admired her. That was the truth.

      And he didn’t know what to do. He didn’t think that she’d hurt herself—though the gods in her carefully crafted, universe could be dangerously punitive. She certainly wasn’t a threat to anyone else. And so far as he knew, no one had been hurt yet. He thought about her warning. He couldn’t see who, if anyone, was about to die. That was still vague. Harsh punishments, often death, were real consequences in her mythological universe. And her worry about someone dying could easily come from some past injustice, too frightful to bear. He shook his head—no—a gesture, he realized, he’d picked up from Sara. He was rationalizing, and he knew it. He didn’t know what she was getting at, and he didn’t know what to do about that, or even where to turn. She had no interest in talking about anything in the present—school, family, friends. No time for it. In fact, it made her mad. She rolled her eyes and started chanting whenever he asked a question about those things. Or she’d ignore his question and race back into the past.

      And she was right—he was hurting, not helping, that is to say slowing СКАЧАТЬ