Black Catz

Chapter Fourteen - "Refugee Season"

That thin, flamboyant body I knew—and only met at the Catz bar—is running towards me. The Santo hugs me. Then the Santo takes off his mask. But behind him are more luchadores.

"Divine! How are you?" Noe repeats.

Is Noe el Santo; Or are the Catz part of the Santo's plans; or are all the luchadores part of the Catz?

Don't reference me verbatim.

Do they work here as we thought?

Luchadores over plain white, with a delta background, then blood as the main decorator, decorating and redesigning as much as possible, as much as it could reach wherever it was distilled from—view this picture with me.

Not all of them are Santos. Noe is the only Santo.

But there is Pamela!

Then there's Fernando!

They are both under luchador masks.

Is my prediction of the Catz also being the fighters right?

The jodhpurs on a few of them—the ones I notice—meant we are not going anywhere where vehicles may travel. No, it is to the mountains they take us, like they did back in my grandmother's day when they would steal the women from their houses, in horseback.

It is a horse that carries the men from the times before, but it is us, the horses, that carry the men with times before, before any time could give us a horse to give a man a ride through time, so indeed the bullet in the hands of the Gods comes and the Catz purr, as we take a dive into this purr-gatory we're riding into.

"Your mom is giving this rule to the Catz under Zushka power. Whether she likes it or not," says Zero.

The wrinkles on my grandmother seem to hang a bit lower every time I do look at them.

"The war, my darling," they say. "The war is always chasing us."

"Divine where have you been?" Noe then asks like everything is supposed to be fine and like I've only been at a carnival grabbing toys for a fair, or like I've only been out picking strawberries for a great fucking breakfast or one of his fucking cocktails. Is he el Santo? Will he prepare me a Santo cocktail? Maybe one that would shoot me straight up into heaven like the shot it is meant to give to the heart (I could use a cocktail now)? That is what a Saint would do, after all.

A purple mask is what I see next. Luviel puts it over her face and sticks her tongue out of the hole that rests over her mouth—because this mask was privileged enough to have a mouth-hole.

"Come on, divine! Join the family!" she slurred out, tongue out. "Join the family..."

...she said this in repeat, skipping, rewinding like a fucked up a cassette or vinyl or record not wanting to play, skipping with every turn forward; this was said as if the repetition would somehow change my mind.

Then, all of a sudden, there is new hair on Luviel—there is purple hair; there is bright, light purple hair which she switches from the hair I was used to, in which, in turn of the swap, would reveal the bald head she had been sporting and maneuvering this whole time, this whole time under that fake, real-looking hair.

Zero, I assume, is with her on her beliefs: in the ones where I'm supposed to "join the family"—whatever fucking family this is, sis.

"Okay—this new stream is brought to you by Gecko—reminding you that you can save and not be like these fuck ups by choosing Gecko to ensure your life, for your family," says one of the youths, reading a giant note card with giant blank ink being held by a youth with Catz colors. Noe and Pamela and Fernando help hold up the que cards being read before the "family meeting".