Gemma

Gemma first appeared in an unpublished short story, “Wings”, then in OGW 9/24/09 and 10/29/09.  Gemma’s mother abandoned her when she was a child.  Mom was addicted to smoking faery dust, and now that Gem’s an adolescent she has what all the daughters of dusters got – wings.  Horrified and outcast, Gemma left home for NYC to find her mother, and herself. 

Gemma:  Fear wrapped around my neck like Samantha, Ian’s pet python, gone wild.  Tightening, then loosening so I could almost taste air again… and then tight again, choking me.

Gemma, get a hold of yourself, the reasonable, somehow calm me said inside.

Aaaaaaaa cough cough gasp Aaaaaaa… (sound fading out to nothing) said the real me, the anxiety-driven, wings-fluttering, freaked-out me.

“Are you gonna knock?” said Iris.

“She’s chicken,” said Lola.

“Just knock,” said Ian.

“I’m here for you no matter what,” said Luke.

“Knock!” everyone shouted at once.

I did.  I thrust my arm out and rapped hard on the door twice, paused, and then a third time.  All the voices in my head were quiet.  I was alone in the hall outside the fifth floor walk-up.  My knock seemed to linger in the empty air.  When the air stilled, I knocked again, more gently, calmly this time because I was sure no one was home.

“Who is it?  Who’s out there?”  said a gruff voice, and I jumped back.  “Who are you?” said the voice.  Old woman?  Old man?  I couldn’t tell, but I imagined a milky eyeball pressed against the peep hole.

“Gemma,” I said.  “Um, it’s me, Gemma?  I’m looking for my mother?”

“I ain’t her.  Go away!”

“I’m here for you,” Luke said in my head before I could run. 

“Oh. Um.  Do you know um Belle um Green?  Or, I mean maybe she calls herself Belle LaGuin?  I was told, well, I mean, I heard she lives here?”  I pulled my jacket closer, forgetting for a moment that Luke and I had cut out a hole for my wings and they were out there for anyone to see now. 

I am looking for my mother, and that’s nothing to be ashamed of! I thought, and with that, my wings beat, and I rose up off the floor.  Gemma, me, adolescent faery.  On my own in New York, and doing fine.  I pounded on the door this time.

The door opened a crack.  “All right, all right.  Just come down from there.  I’ll tell you what I know.”  A gnarled hand appeared around the edge of the open door, and a long finger with a sharp, yellowed nail beckoned.  “Come on, quit your lollygagging and get in before someone sees you.  This is a nice neighborhood.”