Last Canto of the Dead (Volume 2) by Daniel José Older

Author:Daniel José Older [Older, Daniel José]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Disney Book Group
Published: 2023-05-16T00:00:00+00:00

“WHAT ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO WITH ANY OF THIS?” Tolo growls, pouring himself some more coffee.

It’s been a few hours since the no-show misa, and this is about the sum of things: no one knows anything. That wouldn’t bother me so much if I had a better idea of what’s going on with Chela. But, of course, it’s all connected, and right now it just feels like an impossibly tangled spiderweb that we’re all caught up in.

We’re in the Hidalgos’ kitchen. Tolo and Tams sit at the table, nursing coffees. I’m standing at the window, gazing uselessly into the darkness of the cemetery, thinking useless thoughts.

Chela was the one doing upkeep on this little graveyard. She set up solar lights and turned the whole place into a cozy, Gothic little nook, tucked away from the rest of the city. It’s already looking forlorn and forgotten, as if the graves themselves know their caretaker is gone.

Shut up, Mateo.

It all keeps blipping back to me—the way she offered her cheek instead of her lips, her hand on my chest. What the hell happened to us? How did it fall apart so quickly?

“Mateo?” Tams is beside me, her hand on my shoulder. “Hey.”

I shake my head. She wants to know if I’m okay, and I don’t have an answer for her. It’s almost midnight, and I’m not sure if I should go disappear into the skies or just leave Chela alone. I don’t know anything.

“Mateo? Tolo!” Aviva calls urgently from the front room. “Come quickly!”

We’re all up and racing through the house, pulses pounding. Tams reaches the portico first and lets out a startled yelp. Maza stands in the doorway, barely holding themself up on Aviva’s shoulder; blood pours down their chin and stains their designer clothes.

“What happened?” Tolo grunts, lifting them up and clambering into the house. “Lock the doors. Where’s Tío?”

“He went out to see one of our congregants,” Aviva says.

“I’m okay,” Maza whispers, sounding anything but. “I’m…I’m sorry. I didn’t know where else to go.”

“It’s fine,” Tams insists. “Don’t apologize. Mateo?”

I’m already there, my hands ready as Tolo gently deposits Maza on the living room couch and stands back.

My eyes close; the song within Maza rises, a sultry bolero. I let that spiraling melody wrap around me, guide me as the world becomes color and sound and nothing else.

There.

The wounded flesh slips back into shape under my fingers, but a deeper hurt remains: Maza’s pride is wounded, their heart on the brink of broken.

When I stand, they look up, face wide open. “Thank you, I…”

Tams sits on the couch, cradling them. “Please don’t apologize again.”

“Just tell us what happened,” Tolo says with more gentleness than I’ve ever heard from him. “We’re not mad at you.”

“It was a gathering to try to sort out our differences. Just a small student thing…We thought…Maybelline thought we could start small and see if there was some common ground. I wasn’t so sure, but I went along with it, and it was going okay…but then they came.

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