Part VII: Breakfast in LA
Brilliant rays of sunlight were filtering through the shutters when Jade awoke for the second time. She checked the clock: eleven, and stretched out the kinks in her back and body that had accumulated from sleeping in such an awkward curled-up position. Yawning, she shivered involuntarily at the memory of her dream, and let her gaze wander over to where John and Chas were both still fast asleep. John was sprawled across the bed, one arm flung above his head and the other clutching a shiny golden gun-looking object. Chas was snoring openly; his blankets were kicked everywhere and his head was only half on his pillow. Jade watched as John turned over and mumbled something like, "Constantine, asshole," in his sleep, and Jade couldn't help but give a small smile at how unthreatening and innocent both seemed in their sleep…Chas more than John, of course, but that was the natural order of things, after all.
Jade crept quietly to the bathroom, shutting the door behind her. She pulled her hair from where it was still tied in a messy bun down until it cascaded chaotically across her shoulders. Grabbing her brush from the simple vanity kit she'd laid beside the sink earlier, she proceeded to detangle her mass of thick, dark hair in under fifteen minutes. She brushed her teeth and then washed her face quickly, drying it on one of the towels she'd hung up earlier—John's place was most definitely a well-lived in bachelor pad—and studied herself in the mirror. Deep brown eyes stared back at her from under long, dark lashes. Her skin was olive-colored, smooth, and clear, but the dark patches under her eyes made her look both tired and past her seventeen years. She stared at herself as she brought her right hand up to the neckline of her tank top, where a small protrusion gave away the existence of the pendant she never took off. She slowly drew the pendant out, letting it fall against the black of her shirt as she fingered it thoughtfully. Despite the fact that they were only nightmares, she couldn't help but believe that it was this pendant that had always been her source, her connection to her world that helped to draw her out…out of the dream world. Out of the nightmarish hell. It was silver, and a series of intertwining curves that made up what the Celts knew as the symbol for the holy Trinity. A small circle of purple shot through the loops, interconnecting with them to make up the rest of the pendant. It hung from her neck on a short silver chain. She held it to her chest and whispered softly to herself, "Deo gratias. Annuit coeptis—"
She was cut off as someone knocked on the door. Quickly tucking the pendant below her shirt, she grabbed her vanity kit and opened the door, only to be faced with a bleary-eyed Chas Kramer. He nodded at her sleepily, and stumbled past her into the bathroom, grunting what she figured was something along the lines of 'good morning'. She nodded in response.
John was still asleep, and since he didn't look like the kind of person who slept much, at all, Jade was careful to be quiet. She opened the refrigerator in search of a decent breakfast food, and muttered to herself as she took the contents out, one-by-one, and placed them on the counter, "Butter. Milk. He drinks milk?" She shot a dubious glance toward her still-dozing brother and weighed the milk container in one hand. Still nearly full, no wonder. She opened a cupboard, and then another, until she found a small saucer. "Isis," she called softly, pouring the milk into the saucer, "C'mon, baby." The black cat leapt deftly onto the counter and gave her a curious cat-stare before lapping at the milk.
"Olives." Jade set the jar on the counter, and looked back in the refrigerator, "Hershey's chocolate bars."
That was it for the fridge. She opened the freezer, "Three TV dinners. Ice." She glanced at John again—still asleep—how does this guy live? She thought to herself. No sign of anything remotely breakfast-y to be found, "Guess I'll have to go shopping," she muttered. Jade remembered seeing an open-air market on her way to the café the night before, so she walked over to the table by the door, where John had a change-plate, and scooped out several dollars and a handful of quarters and dimes. She glanced outside and decided that, while it didn't look frighteningly chilly outside, she was only wearing a midriff-bearing tank top and red-silk Capri pajama pants—and she was in a neighborhood she wasn't quite familiar with yet. She glanced around and saw an old grey hoodie lying half over the armrest of a chair. She grabbed it and pulled it on. It came to about mid-thigh, and she figured it had to be Chas's. Didn't seem like the type of thing John would wear, but it wasn't like she was an expert on John, or his personal choice in clothing. But it smelled like what she thought Chas might smell like, not John—pine air-freshener mixed with the faint scent of chocolate-chips, not expensive cologne and raw danger. She checked to see that John was still sleeping and pulled the hood up over her hair when a sharp whisper stopped her.
"Where are you going?" Chas's voice was sharp with an edge of sleepiness still attached to it, "That's my sweatshirt."
"Yeah," Jade agreed—I knew it! She thought to herself—"I, ah, was just going to get some breakfast."
Chas looked confused, "Like, food?"
Jade nodded slowly, "Yes…like food."
"Oh." A pause, "Why are you wearing my sweatshirt?"
Jade shrugged, "I'm hardly wearing anything underneath, figured the neighborhood probably wasn't very safe."
Chas snorted, "No kidding," he glanced back at where John had turned over and let out a string of Latin, but was still sleeping, "You know what, I'll come with you."
Jade shrugged again, "Alright. I saw a market down the street, so…"
Chas nodded, "Yeah, let me just leave a note."
He scribbled something quickly on a pad of paper by the change-plate—from what Jade could read of it, all it informed John of was that she and Chas were 'still alive, don't worry', but Chas seemed to think that was enough for John to not wake up and think they'd been kidnapped or killed, so he tore off the piece of paper and threw it on the counter, and pushed the door open, waiting patiently for Jade to step through. She gave him a wary glance, but stepped through ahead of him, wondering confusedly why someone as paranoid as John seemed didn't have any bolts on his door. But Chas fell into step beside her and started talking about everything he wanted to eat, and she forgot about the bolts for laughing at Chas's excitement.
Jade and Chas walked down the cracked sidewalk in fairly comfortable silence, until the reached the market. Big Jim's Supermarket, the faded sign read across the door of the shambled building. Carts of fresh fruits and vegetables were piled up outside, and Chas took an immediate interest in all the real food, "I'm going to grab some stuff inside, alright," Jade confirmed with Chas before turning and walking through the dusty glass doors. Chas returned his attention to the apples; it had been a long time since he'd had an apple.
A bell jangled as Jade pushed through the double doors, and a balding man reading a newspaper behind the counter of the small market barely glanced up. Jade browsed the shelves, grabbing a carton of eggs and a half-loaf of bread. She brought the items to the counter, and set them down, reaching into the pocket of the sweatshirt where she had put the money. She paused as she was taking out the money and picked up a box of Silk Cuts, dropping them on the counter.
"I'm gonna need to see your ID for those, miss," The man continued to read his paper. Jade gave an annoyed groan, and patted herself conspicuously.
"I just moved in, down the street, needed to grab some breakfast," she gestured to the eggs and bread sitting next to the cigarettes, "I'm still in my pj's, don't have any ID with me at the moment…"
The man glanced up slightly, taking in her face, and she tried her best to look annoyed and not scared of being caught, "Alright," he shrugged and rang up the items, "Six fifty-five."
"Thanks," she said, pulling out a five dollar bill and reaching in for more. The bell jangled as she pulled out a handful of quarters and began to count them into the money tray.
"This girl's seventeen." Jade looked up to see Chas dropping a pack of Chiclets on the counter while swooping her Silks back into the tray under the counter. The man narrowed his eyes at her, and Jade shrugged. Chas placed a bag of apples, a bunch of bananas, and a package of strawberries on the counter next to the bread, eggs, and gum. He shot her a look, and Jade glared.
"Fifteen ninety-six," the man amended, and Chas pulled out some money of his own. The man bagged their purchases, and Chas scooped them both up. Jade gazed longingly at her cigarettes as Chas pushed her out the door, waving good-bye to the clerk.
"Gum?"
"Fuck you."
"Trust me, it's better to quit while you're ahead."
Jade glowered, but reluctantly took a piece of gum from him. She needed something to get her through the day, and Chas had pretty much nixed her chances of ever buying cigarettes from that store, ever again. Well, she amended, until she turned eighteen…but that was six months away and she didn't plan on being around, anyway. She pulled off her sweatshirt, not caring how little she was wearing—the sun was high, and it was LA—and looked up at Chas, who was swinging the bags in one hand and staring over her head across the street, a curious look in his eyes. Jade turned to face what he was staring at and saw a group of boys, not much older than she, talking amongst themselves and staring right back at her and Chas. One boy, the presumable 'leader', slowly let his gaze drag up and down her body, and winked. She stuck up her middle finger, and he laughed to his friends. Though, he wasn't necessarily abhorrent, she noted, tall and semi-built, with tanned skin and messy black hair. He was taking a long drag from a cigarette, she noticed appreciatively, and leaning casually against the hottest bike she'd ever seen. But just because he was hot didn't mean he couldn't be an asshole, she decided, and focused ahead of her on the sidewalk.
Chas was still giving the boys a curious stare, though it was rapidly turning hostile. He wasn't sure if it was, perhaps the early afternoon heat, but he could almost swear that the boy who'd winked at Jade was shimmering slightly. The boy gave him a nod, and a devilish smile, and then turned back to his friends. Chas blinked, and there was nothing—no shimmering, nothing—so he turned back to Jade, who was staring at the ground in front of her. They walked the rest of the way home in silence.
John woke to the smell of something burning. He opened his eyes to assess what was on fire, and where it was coming from. Chas was standing over him, with a spatula—where'd he get that? John wondered—in his right hand, shaking it at him.
"When was the last time you got that toaster checked out, John?" Chas asked angrily, his spatula bouncing up and down, "it's not only ancient, but I think we blew out a fuse."
John sat up in bed and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes, "Do I have a toaster?"
"…That's what I thought." Chas turned and left, and John sat on the side of the bed, bracing himself on the floor. He checked the clock—12:13 pm. It wasn't like him to sleep in like that, but Jade's middle-of-the-night terror probably had something to do with it, he mused. He walked around the bed, barely glancing at the fiasco happening in the kitchen as he stumbled into the bathroom. Fifteen minutes later, he stumbled out, a towel wrapped around his slender waist, and back into his bedroom-area, sliding a large wooden partition between that area and the rest of the apartment to give himself some semblance of privacy. A couple of minutes later, he walked out wearing black slacks, black socks, and a half-buttoned white shirt.
Jade and Chas were sitting at the table, Chas with his nose in a book as he chomped down on an apple, and Jade pushing scrambled eggs around a plate with her fork. At the sound of his footsteps, Jade glanced up, and Chas turned a page.
Jade gave him a slight smirk, "Hungry?"
John stared at her, "Uh…" he wasn't entirely sure what to say, but he certainly wasn't used to people invading his space and cooking edible, and dare he say, appetizing food, "Yeah. Sure." Jade pushed a plate of eggs toward him and he picked up a fork, poising it above the plate thoughtfully.
Jade made an eating motion with her right hand, and John glared. Then, placing the fork beside the plate, he quickly bowed his head and mumbled a few strings of Latin. Jade stared. Chas stopped reading and eating and stared. John looked up, to find both of them staring, "What?" he asked defensively, and started to eat.
"Did you just…pray?" Chas asked incredulously, "To…God?"
"What if I did," John muttered, "And who else would I pray to."
Chas nodded dumbly, and glanced at Jade, who was still staring. John looked distinctly uncomfortable and defensive, so they decided to drop the subject. Who would've ever thought…Chas mused silently, perhaps John really had learned something with his double-death experience.
Chas returned to his book, and Jade finished the last bite of eggs, and picked up her plate to put it in the sink. Suddenly, the biting shrill of the phone sliced through the air. John was eating, and Chas was reading, so Jade dropped her plate on the counter and reached over to pick up the black receiver, "Hello?"
"Is this the number of John Constantine?"
"Yes, would you like to speak to him?"
"Yes, it's very urgent, I—" Jade held the phone slightly away from her ear as the speaker's voice turned into a gurgling sound, "I—need him—722—Grayson Avenue…please…fast…rakshasasss—"
Jade stared at the receiver as the line went abruptly dead, and John nodded to her, "Who was it?"
She gave him a confused look, "Someone said they needed you…722 Grayson Avenue…something about…rakshasas? John—" She had barely finished her sentence as she watched John run out the door while throwing on his coat, and Chas rushing after him, "John! Chas!" She called, and Chas turned to her quickly.
"Stay." He muttered, before following John out the door. She glared, "I'm not a do—" But her words were lost as he had already slammed the door behind him.