flip-flops and with a white triangular hat on his head, sat in the row in front of us. Noah and I exchanged a look. The other attendees were more normally attired; a heavyset woman with short, curly blond hair in jean shorts fanned herself with a pamphlet. Two identical middle-aged men with mustaches sat in the far corner of the room, whispering to each other. They wore jeans.
Just then, the speaker walked up to the podium and introduced himself. I was surprised to see him wearing a crisp suit, given that he was supposed to be a priest. A priest of what, I did not know.
Mr. Lukumi arranged his papers before smiling broadly and scanning the few filled seats. Then our eyes met. His went wide with surprise.
I turned around, wondering if someone behind me had caught his attention, but no one was there. Mr. Lukumi cleared his throat, but when he spoke, his voice shook.
I was being paranoid. Paranoid paranoid paranoid. And stupid. I focused on the lecture and on Noah, as he took an exaggerated interest in what was being said. I’m not sure what I expected, but hearing Mr. Lukumi discuss the mystical properties of candles and bead necklaces wasn’t it.
Noah cracked me up as he pretended to actively listen; nodding and murmuring at the most inappropriate moments. We passed the Cuban sandwich he’d bought back and forth during the seminar and at one point, I struggled so hard not to laugh that I almost choked on it. If nothing else, I was having some badly needed, well deserved fun after the hellish week.
When the talk ended, Noah went to the front of the room to chat up Mr. Lukumi as the handful of other attendees filtered out. I went to explore.
There was only one small window in the room, and it was partially hidden by a shelf. An overflow of rain gurgled out of a storm drain, sounding like a muffled plug-in fountain through the glass barrier. My eyes scanned the labels of dozens of tiny bottles and jars of herbs and liquids in front of me; “mystic bath,” “recuperation of love life,” “luck,” “confusion.”
Confusion. I reached out to inspect the bottle just as something squawked behind me. I whipped around and, in the process, dislodged a poured candle from the shelf. It fell in slow motion then smashed against the tile, the glass casing splitting into a thousand little diamond shards. Noah and Mr. Lukumi both turned in my direction, just as a small silver cup with jingle bells on it tipped over.
Mr. Lukumi’s eyes flicked to the cup, then to me. “Get out,” he said, as he approached.
His tone stunned me. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”
Mr. Lukumi crouched and examined the broken glass, then raised his eyes to mine. “Just go,” he said, but his voice wasn’t angry. It was urgent.
“Wait a minute,” Noah said, growing annoyed. “There’s no call to be rude. I’ll pay for it.”
Mr. Lukumi rose from his crouch and reached for my arm. But at the last second, he didn’t take it. His tall figure loomed over mine. Intimidating.
“There is nothing for you here,” he said slowly. “Please leave.”
Noah appeared at my side. “Back up,” he said to Mr. Lukumi, his voice low. Dangerous. The priest did so without pause, but his eyes never left mine.
I was beyond confused, and speechless. The three of us stood still a few feet from the doorway. One of the children giggled in the other room. I tried to orient myself, to figure out what I’d done that was so insulting and examined Mr. Lukumi’s face in the process. His eyes met mine, and something flashed behind them. Something I didn’t expect.
Recognition.
“You know something,” I said to him quietly, not sure how I knew. I registered Noah’s surprise in my peripheral vision as I stared Mr. Lukumi down. “You know what’s happening to me.” The words felt true.
But I was crazy. Medicated. In therapy. And believing that was what had led me here to a hole in the wall with a medicine man made more sense than the impossible idea that there was something very, very wrong with me. Something worse than crazy. Mr. Lukumi dropped his gaze and my conviction began to slip away. He was acting like he knew. But what did he know? How did he know? And then I realized that it didn’t matter. Whatever insight he had, I was desperate for it.
“Please,” I said. “I’m—” I remembered the tiny bottle clenched in my sweaty fist. “I’m confused. I need help.”
Mr. Lukumi looked at my fist. “That won’t help you,” he said, but his tone was softer.
Noah’s expression was still wary, but his voice was calm. “We’ll pay,” he said, digging into his pocket. He had no idea what was going on, but he was going along with it. With me. Reckless Noah, game for anything. I loved him.
I loved him.
Before I could even dwell on the thought, Mr. Lukumi shook his head and motioned us toward the door again, but Noah withdrew a fat wad of bills from his pocket. As he counted them out, my eyes went wide.
“Five thousand to help us,” he said, and pressed them into Mr. Lukumi’s hand.
I wasn’t the only one shocked by the money. The priest hesitated for a moment before his fingers curled over the cash. His eyes appraised Noah.
“You do need help,” he said to him, shaking his head before closing the door behind us. Then his eyes found mine. “Wait here.” Mr. Lukumi headed to a back door I hadn’t even noticed. How deep did this place go?
He finally disappeared, and the sound of squawking and clucking met my ears.
“Chickens?” I asked. “What are those—”
A nonhuman scream cut off my question.
“Did he just—” My hands curled into fists. No. No way.
Noah tilted his head. “What are you getting so upset about?”
“Are you joking?”
“The medianoche we just ate had pork in it.”
But that’s different. “I didn’t have to hear it,” I said out loud.
“No one likes a hypocrite, Mara,” he said, a sad shadow of a smile turning up one corner of his mouth.
“And anyway, you’re running this show. I’m just the financier.”
I tried not to think about what might or might not be happening in the back room as the sandwich turned sour in my stomach. “Speaking of finances,” I said, swallowing carefully before I continued, “what the hell were you doing with five thousand dollars on you?”
“Eight, actually. I had grand plans for today. Hookers and blow aren’t cheap, but I suppose animal sacrifice will have to do. Happy birthday.”
“Thanks,” I deadpanned. I was starting to feel more normal. Relaxed, even. “But seriously, why the money?”
Noah’s eyes were focused on the back door. “I thought we’d stop in the art district to meet a painter I know. I was going to buy something from him.”
“With that much money? In cash?”
“He has cash vices, shall we say.”
“And you’d enable them?”
Noah shrugged a shoulder. “He’s supremely talented,”
I looked at him with disapproval.
“What?” Noah asked. “Nobody’s perfect.”
Since Noah’s money was now being used to support animal sacrifice as opposed to someone’s cocaine habit, I dropped the subject. My eyes roamed the room.
“What’s the deal with all the random stuff here?” I asked. “The rusty horseshoes? The honey?”
“It’s for Santeria offerings,” Noah said. “It’s a popular religion here. Mr. Lukumi is one of the high priests.”
Just then, the back door opened and the high priest himself appeared, carrying a small glass in his hands. With a picture of a rooster on it. Terrible.
He pointed at the ugly brown and yellow flowered armchair in the corner of the room. “Sit,” he said as he ushered me toward it. His voice was dispassionate. I obeyed.
He handed me the glass. It was warm. “Drink this,” he said.
My bizarre day—my bizarre life—was getting weirder and weirder. “What’s in it?” I asked, eyeing the
