Damali covered her mouth and silently screamed behind her hands, eyes wide. "When I hear music in my head, creating my own, it's like elongated foreplay for him." She finally breathed out, closing her eyes. "When I sing, this brother is liquefied." She gulped and grabbed Marlene by both arms, shaking her. "Are you hearing me? He kissed me and I gasped, and I thought it was all gonna be over. He almost had a--you know what I'm saying, just from my voice--it was the sexiest shit I've ever seen in my life! The rapture was all over his face. The shit was so intense I lost my towel, dropped my freaking Isis blade--didn't care, girl! I just wanted to create."
Marlene's eyes were so wide that tears had formed in them. "All right, let's get rational--we need a plan."
Damali's head bobbed as she released Marlene and wrapped her arms around herself.
"First off, we have to get a bead on what shifted things in the universe to pierce the veil."
Damali nodded, hanging on Marlene's every word as though she was listening to a doctor explain cancer. "He said time stopped." She shook her head. "Sho' he right!"
Both women looked at each other and spoke in unison. "The tsunami."
Marlene closed her eyes. "The Earth wobbled on its axis, it happened in the east--the lands of deep cultural expansion and the earth's clock is off by milliseconds."
"He walked though an invisible fold in the air like a curtain had parted. Said I was alone, calling him with composition. And, when I think back on it, I did mentally say, 'Muse, baby, where are you?' as I was trying to figure out chords and melodies for a new song that was taking shape in my mind. But I thought a muse was a metaphorical thing, and female, okaaaay? Not some fine-ass, six- five entity or deity that would rock my daggone world!"
Marlene stared at Damali. "Bingo." She let out a quick breath. "Okay. Then, he's not likely to manifest unless you're alone... we hope."
"We hope," Damali concurred.
"So, until we get him tucked away and back in spirit form, you only compose during the day with somebody in the room, cool?"
"Challenging, but it makes sense." Damali ran her hand over her hair. "But here's a question. If he manifested, what if more of them are walking from spirit into flesh and back again through this rip? Like, what if all sorts of positive guides, beings, whatever, that are normally supportive, but detached, because they've left all earthly, flesh-created weaknesses behind to ascend, and are coming to their charges--as is their mission, but when they get to them, in the flesh form, they're bugging?"
The fact that Marlene just looked at her, stunned, pushed Damali dangerously close to hysterics. It was too crazy to totally comprehend. As the reality fully dawned on her, Damali pressed on, her quiet voice becoming shrill.
"Mar, think about it. Like, what if your guardian angel just happened to be some tall, dark, fine warrior that always had your back, but as he comes to you to help you out of a jam, accidentally becomes flesh, and then wigs--because all of a sudden, all of the stimuli and intense feelings of the earth plane slam that brother? Blow his mind. Make him remember what human life felt like? You understand where I'm going? Houston, we have a problem, 'cause all I know is, muses demand creation. Demand conception. Are jealous lovers. Must sire something. Have to connect with the artist, or the artist will practically die if they can't give birth to what the muse has planted within them. And you and I both know that there is nothing on the planet more... more... sensual, fulfilling, or completing than giving birth to a new muse-inspired thing... an inventor must invent, a painter must paint, a writer must write, a--"
"Girl, we gotta close that door."
Damali nodded. "Marlene, if he rolls up on Carlos . . ." "And Carlos kills music . . ."
"That's just it, Mar. I don't think Carlos can whup this brother's ass. You should have seen him."
Again, the two women just stared at each other.
"This Neteru is bad, Mar." Damali walked away. "I love my baby, and he ain't no slouch, but. . ."
"Damn," Marlene murmured with appreciation. "You think he could take Carlos?"
"Yeah, like I said," Damali whispered, just shaking her head. "You know how you knew in your heart that if Shabazz went up against Kamal it would be ugly."
Marlene closed her eyes and simply nodded. "Chile . . ."
"Uh-huh. Like that, Mar."
"Damn . . ."
"That's what I keep saying," Damali said, laughing as tears came to her eyes. "Now you see why I wigged?"
"You don't have to say another word," Marlene said, placing her hand over her heart.
"The worst part of it all is, Mar, right about through here, if. . ." Damali shivered and hugged herself and looked out the stained- glass window. "I've gotta get this song outta my head. He turned me on so bad that--"
Marlene held up her hand. "Been there." She sighed and looked at Damali. "Let me repeat. I know Carlos almost got with that were demon, but you now have intimate knowledge of the urge the brother was fighting from what was then his realm. The tables have obviously turned, and the Light is going through something we don't yet understand. But like I tried to tell you, it didn't have anything to do with how much Carlos loved you. It was something real crazy-primal, and for a few, she opened his nose. Now, the shoe, literally, is on the other foot. But you're not going to be able to throw his old dirty laundry up in his face to make a logical argument. This isn't about logic; it's pure emotion. He, as a man, is not going to process the situation with the same level of accepting grace that you, as a woman, did. And before you start arguing with me about what is fair, what's right, and the new millennium, and what have you--we both know, like you know in your soul, this will not go over well."
"So, keep it to myself and get it out of my system while we figure out how to close the rip." Damali let her breath out hard. Grace? Marlene just didn't know. Grace was the last word she'd choose to describe how she'd handled a recent scenario along those very lines. But Marlene was right, going tit for tat about Juanita or any of Carlos's other past misdeeds versus this entity would not go over well, if she slept with it--no matter what.
Marlene looked at her hard and smiled. "Take it to your grave. This is a solo mission." They both smiled.