Silver Millennium Soldier
-13- A Little Piece O' Heaven
by
Mike Macdonald
(Age: 27)
copyright 10-13-2006
Age Rating: 18 to 127
Lita's shirt was still damp when she took it out, but at least the stains weren't so visible anymore. She threw it back in and set the dryer for another ten minutes, then dove back into the novel she'd borrowed from Darien while her right hand fidgeted with a string of Tibetan beads.
Lita wasn't fond of the Laundromat. She didn't necessarily hate it. She didn't really hate anything; hate was a waste of energy. But everything in the city cost money, and she was in short supply as it was without having to worry about emergency laundry runs. She'd had to borrow a good sum from Darien to pay for her van's repairs, which she was paying back by cooking his meals three times a week for the next couple months. There wasn't even much guarantee the damn thing would ever start again. It was a relic given to her by Daddy, bless his soul, and he'd used it for years before she acquired the keys. Gas cost money, too. So did motels and apartments, so she'd lived out of the van for as long as she could remember. If it was kaput, she didn't know where she'd go. Didn't have the heart to ask Darien to take her in. Not like he would ever need her around for anything. He was already so much of a homebody and a chef, himself, it was like he was trying to make the point as clear as possible. He'd do nice things for folks he barely knew, yet he hated the thought of someone taking care of him in any respect. Especially her, because she was always eager to help. Maybe a little too eager.
The money left in her pocket--her total income--amounted to two dollars and forty-seven cents. Minus a dollar for washing the bloodstains out of her shirt. That was another thing that cost money: hospital bills. It wasn't her blood this time, though, which was nice. Twenty blocks and one hundred mantras away two boys laid unconscious in an alley, one with a broken leg and missing teeth, the other with a broken wrist and two or more fractured ribs, and keeping them company was the second boy's loud-mouthed girlfriend, sobbing next to a dumpster with a shattered nose. She didn't know which of the three the blood belonged to, nor did she care so long as it would come out of her favorite green babydoll. She wasn't worried about the police. The battered trio would be too scared to talk to them.
It was a pretty cramped Laundromat, too, but not crowded. Only a few others were there to wash their loads. To her right, a little old woman was still glancing over at her with stiff lips, apparently still shocked that the tall bronze-haired girl came in spattered with blood and stripped her shirt off right there in public, and now stood five feet away in blue jeans and a sports bra as if everything was perfectly normal. She refused to make eye contact, even if Lita smiled. A middle-aged mother had come in a little while ago with two boys, probably eleven and twelve, stationed across the room behind her. The boys were staring at her curiously. The mom was giving her dirty looks much like the little old woman, except she was more alarmed than disgusted. Did she think she was gonna seduce her kids or something?
One of the boys had the same dirty blonde hair as the mom, so Lita figured he was the son. The other had black hair and a round Asian face, likely no blood relation. She smiled at the son over her shoulder and winked. He flushed red as a cherry and turned right around to help Mom unload her laundry. The other kid exclaimed something under his breath in Korean and rushed to help his friend. Cute kids.
The babydoll was nice and warm when she finally left. Her eyes still skimmed the pages of the book, her right thumb hooked in her pocket to give her prayer beads a rest. They were pretty worn as it was from frequent use and constant absent-minded fidgeting.
Darien greeted her at the pinball tables twenty minutes later with that handsome smile of his. She smiled back and tossed the book at him, ignoring the hot tremor inside her chest.
"We still on, Dear Darry?" Lita said. She had a habit of giving pet names to everyone she met, and almost refused to call them by anything else afterward.
"Expected you an hour ago," he said.
"I hadda do laundry," she said. "Fell in a puddle. You know my clumsy ass."
"Yeah, right. I've seen alley cats trip more than you do."
"Wager's ten bucks each, right?"
"If you top the high score. Twenty if you do it with one ball. And if you lose, you serve five days a week."
Darien flipped her a quarter, which she fed to the machine with the highest score. She'd beaten so many of those machines already he refused to believe her skill unless he saw it for himself. She wouldn't have bothered if money wasn't involved. Twenty bucks was quite a haul for her. Forty was even better; one of the arcade employees wanted in on her culinary services, too.
"How was the book?" he said, waving the novel in question.
Lita sucked her teeth and tilted her head this way and that, then finally said, "Didn't like the ending."
"Aw, nuh-uh," Darien said.
"Aw, yes-huh," Lita said. She reached one-third of the high score before Darien's next sentence.
"What's wrong with the ending?"
"It was dumb. Books ain't supposed ta change genres partway through."
"I liked the ending."
"Then you're dumb, too," Lita said with a sneer. "Shifted the focus too much, too. Wasn't the dude the hero? Then by the end o' the book, all a sudden the bitch is the center of attention."
"It only does that once."
"Yeah. Which is too much."
Another drum line of flickering bumpers and her score was doubled before the first ball went down the table's gullet. Darien's laugh announced Andrew's arrival at the scene, the second of two nice young men who challenged her skill at pinball and who also had no interest in her whatsoever. Lita glanced over her shoulder and smiled at the sweet-faced blonde boy as her insides trembled again. She went back to the game and launched her second ball. Ten bucks a head was still pretty good bank.
"Hey, Pretty Boy," she said. "Hope you got yer moolah ready."
"She already winning?" Andrew said.
Darien shook his head in disbelief. "Yes…"
The ball was in play for eight seconds before going down the hatch, and the two boys applauded her finesse. She sighed and cracked her knuckles, if only to take her mind off the sagging feeling inside her chest cavity and focus on the game. At least Andrew had an excuse. He was engaged. Darien had been single for years. Never took much interest in any girl, seemed like, however blunt her advances. Didn't care for dating. Sex with her in particular would be awkward. Wouldn't touch her even when he was drunk. Just a friend, he always said. Maybe because she was poor. Maybe because she was clingy. Common reasons she couldn't do anything about.
The third ball was ready for takeoff and for a moment her train of thought broke.
"Last ball," Andrew said. "Can she do it?"
"You bet I can, Pretty Boy. I got the high score on three o’ these machines this week."
Darien waved his hand in front of her as she launched the ball.
"Just make sure you don’t lose your concentration!" he said.
"Dear Darry, you wanna keep that hand, you take it away."
She snapped at his hand, and he yanked it out of her bite radius so frantically the arcade resounded with the childish hyena giggle Lita was infamous for.
With a rackety-bing-bing-kathunk, down went the last ball. The room rattled with the two men's boisterous cheers, then Lita's as the total was added up; the high score was now plus three hundred points.
"Ha!" she laughed. "Make that four in one week! Cough it up, fellas."
Darien fished a bill out of his pocket and slapped it in Lita’s hand with a bitter smile.
"Here’s your prize, Ninja Girl," he said.
"How'm I s'posed ta be a ninja if you keep tellin' everybody?"
"I don't get paid 'til next Thursday," said Andrew, pulling his empty pockets out with a handful of lint.
"That's fine. You can pay me back in beer at ‘Fridays."
"No way. I’m not driving either of you home drunk again. You’re loud."
Lita laughed her trademark laugh again. That's when she noticed the blonde watching her with great big blue-green eyes three feet away, like a little kid staring timidly at Santa in the mall. She was awful tiny, even considering Lita's startling height; she felt like she was looking down at a six-year-old. She had a lot of hair, too, just like Rapunzel. It ran all the way down past her butt and made Lita a little self-conscious about her own. She undid her ponytail and shook the kinks out of her hair as she leaned back against the machine and gave the blonde a pleasant smile. The boys now took notice of her, too.
"Are we loud, Rapunzel?" Lita said.
"Actually, yeah," the girl said. This fished a hearty laugh out of everyone.
"Little sister?" Lita said to Andrew, nodding to the girl.
Rapunzel giggled. "I guess you don’t recognize me. We met over a week ago."
As she spoke, the girl split her hair and placed her fists on top of her head with one strand dangling from each. She looked so much like a big-eyed lop-eared bunny Lita’s eyes lit right up and she started giggling again. She did know her. The poor kid who almost lost her bag. She hadn't really thought about the incident since it happened.
"Oh, hey! I do remember you! Glad ya made it to school okay."
"I wanted to thank you for what you did," the girl said. "I didn’t get the chance."
"Don't mention it. Anybody woulda done the same."
"Bruce Lee couldn't have done the same!"
"You save S'ghetti from a hooligan, Ninja Girl?" Darien said.
Rapunzel nodded her head in Darien's direction.
"You’re friends with this asshole?"
Lita laughed again and slapped Darien on the shoulder. "Always popular with th' ladies, aren’t ya, Dear Darry?"
She noticed Andrew had vanished. He was across the arcade, talking with the manager. Got scolded a few times for hanging out during work hours, although "scolded" was probably not the most accurate word. The manager was one of those meek and friendly father-of-three types who'd never raised his voice in his life. He could still fire people, though. She was about to say something about it while she took a moment to look at the ten Darien had given her and discovered it wasn't a ten. She'd won the bet on the third ball, and he gave her a twenty anyway.
She repaid Darien with a tender hug and gently kissed him on the cheek.
"Sweet boy like you is always tops in my book, though," she cooed.
"Yeah, I know," he said.
He was sweet. To a fault. Probably the one thing that kept her from giving up on him. Sweeter than coconut milk.
She suddenly remembered Rapunzel and leaned back against the machine, tying her hair into a ponytail again.
"Lita Kaehler," she said.
The girl beamed bright as the sun and bounced on her toes. "Serena Babbit."
"Nice to meet ya, ‘Punzel."
"I saw you in the play."
"Oh, yeah? Right on! Good cast in that show."
"You were so good. I cried so hard when your daughter died. You audition a lot?"
"I do when I can. Dear Darry keeps me posted on the local theater scene."
"My friend says you do ice skating, too! Is that true?"
"Aw, god…Yeah, I've been in a couple competitions. None o' them fruity ice ballets, though."
"You could do it," Darien said. "You got the skill. I sure can't keep up with you."
"Yeah, right, I'll blow everyone away with my ladylike grace. Just wait."
Darien rolled his eyes and muttered something under his breath. He pointed at Lita and said to Rapunzel, "This chick has the lowest self-esteem you've ever heard of. Swear to God. Doesn't matter how many talents she's got."
"Are you doing the martial arts thing professionally at all?" Rapunzel asked.
Lita lifted one eyebrow. "You mean like a teacher?"
"Yeah. Like private self-defense courses."
"Are you lookin' for an instructor now? After that purse-snatcher incident, I don't blame ya."
"Would you consider it, though? My friend and I wanted to learn the kinda stuff you do. I mean, schools for that are too expensive, and you're the real deal, and lately things have gotten kinda hairy around the neighborhood for us."
"What I do is a lot of hard work. And I started when I was six. Training won't be as effective starting at your age. And you'd have to be pretty serious about it."
"We are," Rapunzel said, fidgeting with her purse. "I mean, I dunno how I could pay you for it…but I'm really serious. If you can't, that's okay, but it'd mean a lot to me."
Lita thought for several moments, looking Rapunzel up and down and reflecting on her own training. Darien was covering his face; she'd told him stories of her childhood learning under Sensei, and the thought of what Rapunzel was asking to be subjected to seemed to put him in physical pain. Lita looked at him and giggled.
"Well," she said, finally, scratching her head, "I don't have much else goin' for me anymore."
Nobody else would hire her anymore. Not with the record that followed her from city to city. And there was Darien always joking about her self-esteem issues.
"‘Bout time I got going," Lita said, wishing she had a watch. "See if my van's gonna live or not. Tell ya what, 'Punzel: I'ma be at Sunny Valley Park Monday afternoon 'til about five. Come pay me a visit and I'll see what I can do. Cool?"
Rapunzel's eyes somehow got even bigger at this. "Yeah, that'd rock."
"Alright," she said, then smiled at Darien. "TGIFridays?"
"TGIFridays," he replied with a nod. "Three hours. No less."
"See ya in three hours."
She was on her way to the arcade doors when Rapunzel squealed. She stopped and looked back to make sure she wasn't being attacked again or anything.
"That tattoo’s awesome!" she said.
Lita felt another tremor inside her chest. As a tiny smile crept over her lips she lifted her shirt to reveal the angelic fresco on her lower back inked in all the colors of the sky. The winged creature was distinctly male, draped in satin robes and rainbow sashes, and in its arms a tiny infant slept.
"Three hours plus," Lita said. "Hurt like hell for a week."
"What's the significance?" the girl asked.
Lita's Tibetan beads found themselves at the mercy of her right thumb again. As she walked out the door she threw over her shoulder, "Means I’m a little piece o’ heaven."
She didn't look back when she left. The swelling in her breast was subsiding, and making eye contact probably would have made it worse. She never cried in front of anybody. Bad energy to trade with people. If misery was your burden, you didn't ask others to help carry it. Daddy always said it was okay to cry in front of people if something was worth crying over, bless his soul. She never saw the point either way.
He was the only man she was allowed to love, probably. Might have been why her situation with boys never changed. Maybe she didn't have enough of her heart left for anybody else.
Twenty-one dollars and forty-seven cents. Might be able to make it last the rest of the week.
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