was a woman on a motorcycle taking special note of Mack Street. The memories came flooding back, of that woman in black leather and a motorcycle helmet who stood there on the landing of the stairs in the hospital and urged him - no, made him want - to throw baby Mack down and end his life on the concrete at the bottom.
She wanted him dead, and now she's giving him rides on a very dangerous machine. Without a helmet.
If it's the same woman.
How could it be? That was seventeen years ago. Nobody would call her a young woman now, the way they were all talking about Yolanda White.
Lots of people ride motorcycles. Lots of women, for that matter.
That other woman, though, she knew Mr. Christmas or Bag Man or Puck or whatever his name is. Which means she's probably just like him. A fairy. An immortal. In which case she could look as young as ever, even after seventeen years. Could be the same woman. Might not be, but could be.
Which is why Ceese got up from the supper table, rinsed his dishes, put them in the dishwasher, added the soap, started it up, then strapped on his gun and headed out the door to walk up the street.
It occurred to him that this might be more convincing if he arrived in a patrol car.
Then it occurred to him that if this was an ordinary woman who just moved into a neighborhood that didn't appreciate her, there really wasn't much point to the visit. And if this Yolanda was actually a fairy like Puck, he was in serious danger of getting turned upside down or inside out or something without her lifting a finger.
Maybe she wasn't as powerful as he feared.
Still, he couldn't help but wish that this confrontation was happening in Fairyland, where he was very, very large, and fairies were very, very little.
Ceese walked up the hill, remembering seventeen years before when he walked up this same street with Raymo, carrying a skateboard under his arm and fake weed in his pocket. He had seen enough weed since then to know that they'd been scammed. Finding the baby probably saved him from smoking something poisonous or at least sickening. And it occurred to him right then: Did Raymo know it was fake? Was he setting Ceese up to be humiliated? Look what I got Ceese to smoke!
Well, it didn't work. Ceese was a cop now. And Raymo was... somewhere. Doing something.
His family moved out before he got out of high school. Moved north somewhere. Central Valley.
Raymo was probably the biggest hood in a small town. Well, that was all right. In LA, Raymo would have had plenty of really evil guys to imitate; in a more innocent town, he'd be limited by the evil he was able to think up for himself.
Trouble was, Raymo was kind of a creative guy.
And what if he didn't stay in Fresno or Milpitas or wherever the hell he was? After high school, why would he stay? What if he came back to LA and found himself a spot in South Central or Compton? Would there come a day when Ceese came face to face with Raymo again, only this time he's a cop with a gun and the law on his side, and Raymo is...
Not the same dumb malicious kid he was, that's for sure. Something more. Something worse.
If my life was touched by whatever power brought Mack and these fairies into our life, why wasn't Raymo touched? Or was he?
Ceese was standing in front of the Phelps house. Where Yolanda White lived. There were some lights on, but what did that mean? Garage door was closed so he couldn't tell if the bike was there or not.
Why was he afraid? He was a cop, but he was also a neighbor. He wished he hadn't strapped on his gun.
He passed through the low gate and walked to the front door and rang the doorbell. Still had the chimes that Mrs. Phelps liked so much. Longest door chiming in Baldwin Hills. And she'd never answer the door till they finished chiming.
Yolanda White apparently had no such qualms. The door was open less than halfway through the complicated melody. "Oh, good heavens," she said - not exactly the expletive he expected her to use. "A policeman at my door. What is it, the noise of the motorcycle or a charge that I was speeding? Or are you just here on a neighborly visit?"
"Miz