Clasping the note, she sped back into the bedroom, grabbed the beret, and tiptoed as fast as she could downstairs. Finding it deserted, she checked their car. Still there. She tossed Salome’s beret in the backseat.
She spotted a guard and asked, “Moses?”
“Think they’re all at the music studio.”
She steeled herself. Be strong for Moses, no matter what the—
An echoing crack.
She took off down the path.
A piercing cry.
Legs churning now faster and faster, until Moses, splashed with blood, bowed over Laluna, who cradled Alchemy’s half skull in her hands, pleading, moaning, “Oh, my God, oh, my God, please, oh, God, don’t die, you can’t, I didn’t, I won’t, couldn’t …” Mindswallow was pinning the thrashing Salome to the ground.
Jay crumbled. Moses went to her and raised her up.
“Take Persephone to your apartment. Get her to bed. No TV, phone, or computer tonight. Don’t call anyone but me.” She yearned to hold him so tightly that they would spin back to a time before he ever met Alchemy. Trembling, she murmured, “Oh, Moses.”
He embraced her. His blood-drenched body staining hers. He gently pushed her away, held her by her arms. “Jay, someday, maybe in a few months, maybe next week, maybe, who knows, after I’m gone — Perse must know everything. No more lies.”
And so it was promised.
96 MEMOIRS OF A USELESS GOOD-FOR-NUTHIN’
Rashomonstrosity, 2018
For seconds after the shot, it’s like time stops. I hear nothing and I’m standing there paralyzed. Then I yell at myself, You ain’t been hit. Fucking do something! I empty the damn gun so, what the fuck, ya know.
Salome is muttering manically in her private lingo and swinging her limbs every which way. For the only time in my life, I hit a lady. The first slap does nothing. She spits at me. I knock her out. Mrs. Mose swoops in and out in an instant. Laluna is hysterical.
Mose says to me, “This was an accident. Salome flipped …” I finish for him, “… because she is Salome.”
“Can you?” He stretches out his arms. Together we lift Salome up, and he holds her in his arms. “Call nine one one. It was an accident,” he says again, but in such a way that I wonder if he seen what I think maybe I seen … who pulled the fucking trigger.
97 THE MOSES CHRONICLES (2018)
Cries and Whispers
Persephone gripped the staircase banister. Shivering. “Auntie Jay, I had a bad dream. Daddy didn’t kiss me good night, he kissed me goodbye.”
“Oh, honey, it was just a dream. You’re awake now. I’m here.”
She whisked Perse back into her room. The nanny, in her robe, stumbled up the stairs. “Please throw some clothes into Persephone’s backpack. Fast.” Jay bundled Persephone in her blanket.
“Where are we going? Where’s my mommy and daddy?”
“They’re together. They’ll be busy for a little while. Your daddy asked me to take you to our house tonight.” Jay enveloped Persephone in her arms and chest, trying to empty the fear coursing through both their bodies.
Holding the backpack in one arm and Persephone in the other, she dashed to her car and buckled Persephone into the backseat. Persephone reached for the red hat beside her. “Granmamma’s.”
“Yes, it was a present from her to … Uncle Mose. He wants you to have it.” Jay shut the door and hopped into the car. She started the engine, took two heavy breaths — in and out — then pressed on the gas pedal and carefully drove down the private road. She turned onto Topanga Canyon Boulevard, cautiously taking the tight curves, until she’d made it a quarter mile down the road. Then she pulled to the side and waited as police cars and ambulances roared past her and up the mountain.
His mother felt weightless in his arms. Moses felt weightless, too, as if her body had evaporated into the ether and transported them to the cottage. Moses gently laid his mother in her bed. She opened her eyes, blinked. Her lips moved. No sound. Her eyes shut again. He waited.
Nothing. Nothing more from her to him. His heart aching, forever broken, Moses began to weep.
OUTRO
Can you take me back where I came from?
Brother, can you take me back?
— The Beatles
98 MEMOIRS OF A USELESS GOOD-FOR-NUTHIN’
That’s All, Folks
The medics drug Laluna, who can’t stop crying and screaming. I give my story to the cops.
They send Salome back to Collier Layne. I ain’t seen her since.
The funeral is back in Long Island. I don’t remember much, and sorry, I don’t want to. Me and Lux do the eulogies. Fuckin’ brutalest thing I ever done in my life.
Mose, he steps up big time. Him and Mrs. Mose kinda babysit for Perse and Laluna ’til the cops officially declare it an accident. Laluna can’t take no more bullshit, so she and Perse disappear to Hungary or Romania. No idea when she is coming back. Andrew and Sue, everyone turns up the heat on the SpeedFeed bullshit. They ain’t no better than the paparazzi. It was Mose, goin’ on TV just one time, acting all classy and calm, that got SpeedFeed to do a complete retraction and apology. Still, I learned a long time ago, people will believe what they wanna believe.
Mose officially shuts down the Nightingale Party, but some followers are keeping it alive on the Net and with meetings. He keeps the foundation going. I seen him at Kasbah working with the Sheiks on money stuff, and he looks not so good. None of us ever speak about that night. Don’t goddamn matter what I seen or even think I seen, ’cause Alchemy is dead and nuthin’ gonna change that.
It ain’t no fun, but I gotta admit I spent a lotta time hearing Absurda’s voice from that Christmas Eve when she came up to Alchy’s Topanga place. “I waited and waited for you to realize it was your loss. You didn’t. I did what I had to and moved on.” And blaming Alchemy for what I said and done. You know by now that I do what I do and move on with no grousing allowed. Only I’m gonna be living with this shit for a long, long time. Maybe forever.
That’s it. What I’ve told you, every damn word is the truth as I seen and lived it. In the end, all I can say is the Savants, they was one magnificently biddy-bip-bip clan. I loved them, and damn, I miss them, even crazy Salome, and Alchemy most of all.
99 THE SONGS OF SALOME
Almost No Memory
Babydeath. Bodydeath.
Breaking apart.
Into the dark matter.
Goodbye, my sons,
goodbye.
I sing my songs no more.
100 THE MOSES CHRONICLES
Infinite Rest
The future that died that night is reborn each day in Alchemy’s eternal music — the man becoming the myth and the myth becoming the vision, singing through time.
Moses will travel to Orient Point. Alone.
He will pass the house where he was born but will not enter. He will walk along the shore where he was conceived. By the grave site of his brother and what was once his, and one day will be again.