Calliope: Guilty By Imani Wagner (Short Thirteen)

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“I’ve been dreaming of my grandmother,” I said between sips of my latte.

"Good or bad dreams," Azrael asked. He had come over for a late breakfast with coffee and bagel sandwiches from Cafe 53 around the corner.

"They're mostly memories of some not-so-great moments between us and many times when my mom did nothing about it. I veer someplace between the anger I have from what I had to endure and trying to understand them as people who are also lost and traumatized." A sharp taste filled my mouth. After I began working for Gina, I moved out and did not look back.

“Do you remember the day we met in the park? It was the first time you ran away," he said, looking off somewhere to revisit that day. When I looked at him, he was no longer Azrael, the cop; he had returned to Azrael, the clumsy boy who could make even the unhappiest person laugh. I was about seven years old and had just left my grandma's house, where my mother and I lived with her. Neither of them had even noticed. I walked six blocks to the nearest park, where Azrael was with his dad and two younger siblings. 

I heard their laughter first. When I finally saw them, all I could do was watch them. Their father's eyes, how he looked at his children with total love and fascination, revealed what was missing in my little family. Azrael's baby brother was being pushed on the swing, and the little boy's joy could not be contained. Instead, it was out in the open, swirling in the air for anyone to witness. 

The little girl ran up to him and pounced, but he caught her in his arms just in time. He flipped her around, and as he held her, he encouraged her to give the baby another push in the swing. The little boy's nose scrunched with amusement, and the three happily continued their game. The rusted swing squeaked back and forth. It was like a pendulum made to help people discover joy. I then saw Azrael for the first time. He scampered over to his father for his own turn at pushing the baby in the swing. I remembered wondering what that felt like. What would it be to know that the person who helped usher you into the world understood the depths of unconditional love every time they laid eyes on you?

Azrael's phone rang. I watched as he spoke to the whispers on the other end in a neutral tone. "They've picked up another suspect in the Mad Scientist case. The interrogation for two suspects begins at noon," he said, still looking at the phone. I wasn't conscious of how it may have affected him until then. I knew he was seeing so much more than I imagined was healthy for any person. Any person, except me. Over and over, the ghosts that found me had little hesitation in showing me every detail of their last moments. 

What was so different about my mind that a single nerve wiggled its way out of my ear and opened me up to the world lying just beneath the surface of our own? And how special are both worlds, which come together intertwined and unable to exist without their counterparts? 

"I have to head over to the station. I can come back later to fill you in," Azrael said, rushing out of the door. 

Not even seconds later, Jabari, Rick, and Jim were standing in front of my kitchen counter. "We've gotta get into that interrogation room," Jabari said as he crossed the room to Henrietta who was sitting in her favorite chair.

"That's actually not a terrible idea. It would be easy enough," Jim chimed in. It was a perfect plan. I'd be able to travel, too, just as I did when we found the basement. I had Dr. Delvaux’s help then, but it was time for me to go at it alone. 

Henrietta leaped onto the couch and into my lap. I shut my eyes as she curled into a perfect loaf. With each stroke of her velvety fur, I slipped deeper into the darkness of the spirit realm. The hum of Henri's purring kept me in touch with my body. The next time I opened my eyes, I was standing in the middle of the darkness. Jim, Rick, and Jabari surrounded me. Rick and Jim looked as though they were waiting on me for our next steps, but Jabari was looking upward at something. I followed his gaze to a million tiny lights above us. They sparkled and twinkled before I realized that they were stars. I had never gotten the idea to look up that high before.

"Do you know where you are, Calliope?" A voice I recognized sounded as though it was coming from all directions. 

"Do you hear that," I asked the men. They turned to each other, and before I could even ask again, I heard a familiar chime of ringing metals. They jingled together so harmoniously that it was like a thousand crystal bells. It was sweet and soft, and it was powerful. 

Mnemosyne came out from behind Rick and Jim as though she had always been there. They stumbled out of her way, almost frightened by her tall stature and her bold blueish-black color. She was just as dark as the night of this realm, yet she glowed still. Her gold and copper bangles lit up her arms and ankles as she came closer to kneel before me. "Can you see now? Do you know where you are, Calliope," she asked again. 

I looked around me, and in every direction, there were stars. Some were bigger or smaller than others. Mnemosyne reached out into the distance, and with her finger, she pointed toward a star as if to tap on it. When she brought her hand back in front of me, the star followed, floating just above the palm of her hand, and I could see that it was a perfectly round sphere of fire. "Are we in space?" I looked up at Mnemosyne before marveling at the fiery star in front of me.

"...And time. With that, you don't need to be afraid. You can trust in your ability to travel to any place that calls you. You can be confident that you will be safe in unwelcoming places." Her voice echoed. It was both loud and softly spoken. It felt as though it was coming from inside of me, though I watched her lips say the words from where she stood in front of me.

She dropped her hand to her side, and the star disappeared. She gracefully lifted that same hand as if to draw power into her palm from the surface below us before nudging the space between my brows. A warmness found my eyes and lips, and then my shoulders. It traveled through each vertebra of my spine and into the soles of my feet. At that exact moment, there was no one except Jim, Rick, Jabari, and I.

"What the hell was that," Jabari emphasized.

Jim laughed with awe and disbelief, "Who was that?"

"I don't fully understand who she is either, but I think in some way, she is me," I reply. "Or, at the very least, we were meant to cross paths." Mnemosyne felt like love to me. She felt like something familiar and constant as if she had always been a part of my life. When she touched me, she showed me that her life and mine were not separate from one another, at least not in the most essential way. She reminded me of an image she showed me one of the first times we met. 

She had placed her hands on either side of her face. She inhaled deeply. She exhaled. Her hands moved in circular motions, always hovering over her ears. Slowly, a thread-like structure began to twirl out of both of her ears. This time, I realized that the thread was made of light and glowed just as spirits sometimes did. It was just as bright as the cord that kept Ellie attached to our world before releasing her back to wherever we all come from. Again, Mnemosyne showed me the first time I had consciously experienced my own spiritual abilities. The thread that had come out of my ears that day was tangible on this human plane. It was evidence that Mnemosyne and I were connected. Maybe it was less about her being a part of me and more about us being an extension of each other. 

Nonetheless, her revelation was that I can access any ability she possesses, including astral projection. So I sat, crossed-leg in the middle of what I now understood to be space and time. The men sat around me, unsure of what was happening but ready and waiting for directions. I placed a hand on either side of my face and began to move them in a ring shape around my ears, just as Mnemosyne had shown me. 

Something was tugging at me from an unfamiliar space in my brain, and eventually, it moved from behind my eyes, through my ear canal, and out into the palms of my hands. I focused my breathing and thought about the air that moved in and out of my lungs. In my mind, I imagined that my astral spirit separated itself from my soul. I considered how I might find the Chicago Police Department and where they'd hold interrogations in the building. I didn't have a clue. My astral spirit and my soul snapped back together, breaking my focus at the first sign of confusion.

I tried again, moving my hands, pulling the threads out from my head and into my fingertips. The thin little cords strained at first, but eventually, they flowed, and my astral spirit departed from my soul once more. This time, I pictured Azrael in my mind. Within an instant, my spirit found him, and I was standing in the interrogation room across from the Mad Scientist. Azrael sat next to another detective, and they were reviewing evidence together. 

The detective slid a photograph across the table to the man. "Timothy, this is Mavis Geralds. He's 18 years old. He has a sister, who practically raised him. She's not much older than he is. His parents were out of town when his body was found in your basement."

"Was it," he questioned snarkily. Jabari, Rick, and Jim all popped into the interrogation room. They stood behind The Mad Man, and each of them took turns trying to grab at him. None of them were successful, except Rick. He placed his hands around Timothy's neck, but nothing happened. He snapped his shoulders forward, and a force moved from his center into his hands. 

The man gasped for air and began to choke. He strained to clear his throat and grabbed for his water. Jabari motioned toward the cup, which slid just an inch on the table. Finally, the man reached for the clear plastic cup and took a sip.

Azrael tried again, "You killed this kid. Why?"

"He had something we needed. I didn't have a choice," The man said.

Azrael's large shoulders tensed up. He was trying hard to control every breath. The detective noticed, "You didn't have a choice in killing an innocent young man, who was barely at the beginning of his life? I would think the best alternative option is to not kill anyone."

"It's bigger than me. I don't make the decisions; I just do what I'm told."

"Timothy, stop talking. My client will not be answering any more questions until his trial.”

Azrael crossed his fingers on top of the table between him and the lawyer, "Well, it doesn't matter what he says or doesn't say because he's going to prison. That's guaranteed."

The detective intervened, "However, if you comply and turn in the rest of the people involved, maybe we can convince the judge to reduce your sentence.” I just couldn’t see a way in which they’d ever allow something like that. With a case this big, he could be sentenced to death. The only other offer they’d make is life in prison, but is that any different? 

“I couldn’t possibly list everyone in our organization. There are many of us, some I've never met. 

"Okay, then let's start again with Mavis' case. What happened that night?" The detective waited for an answer. He looked down at the file in front of him. There was a photo of Mavis' body lying on the cold embalming mortuary table. It was a wide shot so that his entire body and the table were in view. He slid the photo across the desk to Timothy. "How'd Mavis end up in a secret room found in your basement?"

Without hesitation, he said, "I got a phone call that afternoon from an unknown number. They said there'd be a boy on East 54th Place and then hung up. When I got home from surgery that evening, an envelope had been delivered inside the hidden room. It lay there neatly on that same table. They weren't just handing me my next job; they were warning me that even the most unsuspected places were reachable to them. It wasn't the first time, but they never missed a chance to remind us."

"Are we supposed to feel sorry for you?" Azrael said.

"No. I made a shit ton of money." The man's eyes went dark and crazed. He smirked slyly, and I could feel a chill run through my body, even as I was now apart from it. "What else is there in life anyway? Sacrifice a few for something bigger and greater than us all."

"And where did that get you?" Jabari asked only those of us that could hear.

"It was the largest gamble I'd made yet. I got into some trouble at the casino and then boxing. Somehow I gambled off $550,000 I didn't have. I reached out to a group a colleague told me about. But they weren't just going to give me that amount of money. I would have a new debt to pay off, and the thing I'd have to gamble was my life and career. Didn't seem like a big deal, I'd have no life without any money to fund it anyway."

"Timothy, we're done here."

"Shut up, Jerry! I'm done, none of it matters anyway! They've already found the room." Timothy shut down his lawyer angrily. Who would ever talk this much against their lawyer's advice? It didn't make any sense, except he was right. They had found that room and all that evidence. Mavis' body wasn't the only one they had discovered either. "Eventually and surprisingly, I did pay off my debt, but this group began to appeal to the very addiction I had just paid for. I don't know, this seemed like the better deal," he continued.

"And what was it you had to do?" The detective dug deeper, his eyes never leaving Timothy. He formulated each question so gently. It seemed effortlessly strategic. He only took notes after Timothy had finished his answer. Azrael watched everyone, the lawyer, the detective, and the suspect.

"They called me a collector. I had a quota based on what was being asked for. While I could use whatever supplies I could get my hands on, I had to find my own specimens. Occasionally, they would give me the name of someone they wanted."

"You mean you had to murder innocent people, like Mavis," Azrael said.

"Sure," Timothy declared.

“This dude is delusional,” Jabari exclaimed. 

Jim stepped closer to the suspect and got down on his level. His face was just inches apart as if he was trying to dissect the man’s behavior just by staring deeply into his skull, ”He’s caught, I don’t understand why he’s trying to talk in riddles. He’s not good at it.”

"We found seventy-eight folders in your house. Is that all of the people you've collected," The detective asked. Timothy didn't answer. He stared at the wall behind the detective's head blankly. Azrael and the detective continued to question Timothy. Sometimes, he replied, but mostly, he continued in silence, looking at everything or nothing.

Eventually, I was distracted by movement behind the reflection of the interrogation glass. I could see someone behind the glass, but I was more concerned by what appeared to be inside the glass's reflection. I could barely see a face. I looked down at my ghostly feet and then my hands. Nothing was different about the form I had taken in this astral travel.

I looked again at the glass, and in a quick flash, I saw it. I saw her. My grandmother's face came forward, and when it looked like she was about to walk right through the wall toward me, she disappeared as quickly as I had seen her.