Taking a late lunch at the Cannabus Cafe, Magenta removed her wire-rim amber shades so that she could study the menu. On the wall behind her was a painting of the Virgin Mary standing in a field of tall marijuana plants. Mary looked stoned.
Items on the menu: hemp pasta, hemp tortillas, hemp salad dressing.
"What'll ya have?"
"I'll try the quesadillas, eh."
"Sure thing."
She saw people openly smoking spliffs. White people with Jamaican dreadlocks and ganja. Cool.
Her dub had been rolled with grass grown locally in a hydroponic basement. Its THC content was at least twenty-five percent. Oobie-doobie.
A few tokes later, Magenta began seeing things in the mural. Crazy things. New variations. She told herself this was Vancouver 1994, not Guadalupe 1551.
Mary had appeared to Juan Diego, an Indian peasant. She ordered him to fill his cloak with flowers and take them to Juan de Zumarraga, Mexico's first bishop. The humble patron of Mary gained the bishop's audience, but when his cloak fell open the flowers were gone, vanished. In their place was an image of the Mother of Jesus. A miracle.
The mural was a miracle. Alive. With a new story to tell.
Magenta put the dope away.
When the meal came she was ravenous. She ate like a lobo wolf. Then she opened her bag from Duthie Books. She had just bought "Death On The Installment Plan" by Celine.
"You dig Celine?"
"Don't know yet." Replying to a young man with a shaved head and a goatee. "The title grabbed me."
"Celine is popular with you Goths."
"I am not a Goth."
"You wear black. Have a ring in your nose. And a tattoo on your wazoo."
"Hush!"
Oz sat down with his drumsticks and began tapping out an annoying rhythm on the tabletop. "So, Ling, whassup?"
Ling could barely tolerate Oz. Ever since she had met him in an anthropology class at the University of British Columbia a year ago (his "designated" seat seemed to be next to hers) rarely a day could go by without him alighting near her like a fly. He was such a pest! Often she told him to shoo, but lacked the nerve to swat him.
She blamed herself for his infatuation and persistance.
Early on, they went on a date to the Museum of Anthropology. And over coffee at the B&O Expresso
they discovered they both had read Ruth Benedict's classic study of the Kwakiutles of Vancouver Island. They chatted with manic enthusiasm amid a sullen crowd of intellectual poseurs (the ennui was palpable) and more than once received the hairy eyeball.
*
People in the Cannabis Cafe noticed Oz's tickety-tickety tapping. Ling hissed: "Quit that!"
Oz leaned close. "Come up to my loft. We can do potlatch."
"No thanks. Been there, done that."
"You wanna chase a film crew? Outer Limits. X-Files."
Ling poked his hand with a fork. "Get this, eh. A man came into the office today and said he was looking for a person to watch after his daughter. Domestic job. No medical experience necessary. When the inevitable happens, someone calls the doctor, or coroner. I can do this. The pay is OK. But that is beside the point. I'm going to act on this before it gets posted."
"You'd leave the employment office?"
"In a heartbeat." Then she added in a low voice, "There is something you should know."
"What?"
"She has AIDS."
"Oh, Christ, you don't want that job."
"Yes, I do. I have strong feelings for these people. I was about to do volunteer work at the Caring Center. Maybe work the hotline."
Oz shook his head in disbelief. "I never would have guessed you were one."
"One what?"
Oz rolled his eyes.
Ling tugged her magenta hair and began to rhapsodize. "The place is way out on the big island. Dirt road through the woods. Real remote. Cabin down by the water. Real scenic. The man wants his daughter to enjoy life up to the final moment. Beautiful."
"You're a sap."
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