“I want a new girl
Who can show me how to have a good time
And get closer to my life's design
In the darkness
Candle light across my face
I feel myself fall into grace…”
          --Third Eye Blind, “New Girl”

So here I am, driving up to this house on Mulholland. Maybe I should start with what the house looked like. Big, and shiny, and newish, but as if it belonged there. With a bright porch light and a half dozen cars all parked in front, the noise from more than a few “kids” inside.

I parked, and just sat in my car staring at it for a second. Supposedly Deke and Dara lived in this beautiful monstrosity of a house. And here I was, coming to this party as if I belonged in this group of kids.

I recognized Bethany’s pink Jetta parked on one end of the lawn, and I couldn’t help but laugh to myself. I’d known she was going to be there, even if she denied it to herself. So I walked up to the front door, which was open, and then inside. Still laughing. And looking for Bethany.

Instead I was accosted by Dashiel. Who’d obviously had something to drink already. He smiled. “So, you came. I wasn’t sure she’d get you to show… Usually you’re all so wary…” I wondered what he meant, but I didn’t have time to think about it as he dragged me towards group after group of kids. Introducing me to them, even the ones who I would never see again.

I suppose that’s why I eventually escaped out the back door. Watched the ones who were in the pool, hanging out on the back deck, whatever.

It was then that I guess I finally noticed her for the first time. Her skin was this perfect, luminous shade of pale that seemed to almost glow in the light on the deck. All except for a single slightly tan line that ran down her breastbone, to end just above her navel. Sitting next to her, his head leaned back against her thigh was Deke.

“Zach, glad you could make it,” he seemed far more relaxed than he had at the dance, and I smiled, plopping down next to the two of them, on the pavement.

Deke ran a finger along her leg, and pulled a rolled up piece of paper from his shirt pocket, putting it to the line and inhaling. I marveled that he would do so openly in front of me.

But I shrugged, and let it go. She smiled at me, and I felt the urge to stay, sit, look at her. Talk to them both.

Bethany passed by us a couple of times, one of them stopping to talk to Deke, but he kind of cut her off. Turned back to me and kept listening to the random crap I was spewing about life, about how I was hating senior year, about how nothing could go right.

Before I knew it, Deke was pressing the rolled up paper into my hand. He’d pulled a small plastic bag out of his shirt pocket, and laid out another line on her chest. She smiled at him, and closed her eyes as he pulled a razor from a different pocket and cut the line ever so carefully.

I barely noticed that she was actually bleeding slightly, and that the blood had mixed with the powder. When he finished I put the makeshift straw to the line and inhaled quickly. I was kind of scared, I’ll admit.

After I inhaled it all I had the urge to lick her skin, so I did, getting the last traces of powder and blood, which had a strange faintly coppery sharp taste.

Closing my eyes I breathed deep. For a second it felt as if my lungs would explode.

And then it was as if I could see for the first time.

I don’t know how to explain this except to say it was like the clouds parted.
I looked at Deke, and then at the house. It was in such sharp focus. I could see things I’d never noticed before. Like the steely glint to Deke’s hair, the shine on the windows. I could almost see things in the glares, omens if you will, or road maps.

And then I looked at her. Or rather, I realized I couldn’t stop looking at her. Her skin wasn’t just pale, it glowed in the moonlight. There was a faint shimmer to it, as if she had diamond dust just under her skin. Which, I might add, was stretched taut over a combination of muscle and bone that was breathtaking. I wanted to grab her, in so many ways I wanted right then to break her.

But I met her gaze, feeling almost shameful and found myself in her eyes, as if I’d been lost there my whole life. A deep dark blue, they were almost indigo, and with her look I felt as if she knew every secret I had ever kept from anyone. Perfectly arched black eyebrows framed them.

That was the first night I ever kissed anyone whose name I didn’t know. Right then, on the deck that smelled of wisteria and night blooming jasmine, in a fit of impulsiveness I tangled my hands in her too black hair and pulled her towards me. She didn’t resist. It was almost as if she flowed, all of her muscles moving together in harmony to give the illusion that none of them moved at all.

And I kissed her. A kiss full of ragged desperation. I hard someone gasp behind me, even as my senses seemed focused on her, and I would later find out that Bethany had been coming to apologize to me when she saw us kissing. But then I didn’t care. For the first time ever I felt still inside, and the only thing I could find wrong with the world was that I wanted to look at other things, and she seemed intent on the kissing.

So I pulled away a little, and took in the view from the deck. Millions of lights, as far as the eye could see. I almost had vertigo just from looking down on my city. And why shouldn’t I? It was beautiful.

Not as beautiful as her though. Nothing could have been. I felt as if my heart were breaking looking at her, and when I couldn’t take it any more I looked away. Saw Deke, his arm around Bethany, comforting her it seemed. Her shoulders were heaving, and some detached part of me knew she was sobbing. I couldn’t however, be brought to care.

Dara stood framed in the doorway that opened onto the deck. Her sleek blonde hair pulled up into a ponytail that skimmed her shoulders. What seemed strange was that even at this distance I could see the pink sheen of lip-gloss that she had recently applied.

I had to close my eyes, looking at everything hurt too much. Breathing deeply, I smelled vanilla, the sweet scent of wisteria, somewhere the slightly spicy baked pumpkin smell of a jack-o-lantern. I barely realized that my hands had been balled into fists.

And just as suddenly as it had come, the tension eased from my muscles, and I found myself needing to sit down. I was still afraid to open my eyes, afraid that I would see everything still in the strange highs and lows, sharp contrasts and deep relief.

Someone whose hands I couldn't see helped me to sit on the chaise, and I leaned back into it, enjoying the give of the pillow on it. I smelled the sweet vanilla scent again, and realized that some girl's head was very close to my face. Turning my head to the side, I buried my nose in her hair, inhaling deeply again, wondering why it was that I was becoming so intoxicated by that particular smell.

Then time passed. I have no concept of how much, I was still busy rediscovering every muscle and bone in my body, re-learning how my joints worked, wondering if I would be able to walk again. I lay there, eyes in various states of openness trying to discover just how much light I could stand to have in my face. I hummed to myself and heard my own voice as if a long way off through a tunnel.

The disconnection was beautiful. I can't explain it any better than that. It was like I could finally let go of all the things which were worrying me, which were stressful... All the things which I didn't want to acknowledge as real no longer had to be. I could let them fade, and just drift on the current which had caught my body, and was carrying me as far away from myself as I would ever want to be.

I know that eventually the girl whose hair I had smelled came back. She kissed my forehead, although I had my eyes closed so I couldn't place who she was. Then the voice in my ear, strangely compelling, soft, bu firm. Like silk covered bone. "Open your eyes now. Open your eyes and truly see."

How could I disobey such a command?

Blinking against the backlight, I looked up. And arrayed before me were Deke, Dara, Dashiel, and her... The one whose name I still didn't know. But they were different. Radiant. Glowing with some light beyond the reflection of LA in the hills at night. I couldn't focus on them, on their faces. I couldn't see anything for the longest time, or so it seemed.

And then they came into focus. It was as if someone found the tracking button on my life and adjusted everything. I could see that they were different. That Deke and Dara, that Dashiel, and that she who I could not name, that they all wore their identities like masks. That they were not who we thought they were. That they couldn't even be human.

From somewhere in the back of my mind the thought came unbidden that they were angels. Or worse, demons. I had never been religious, and I gave it up for good when my mother died, but something about this experience made me question. And question I did.

The only thing I could ask as I looked up was who they were.