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.The air in the room smelled like fermented mangoes.The older officer was lean, thin and wiry, with eyes set close together.I unwrapped a loaf of bread.The officer closed his eyes and breathed in deeply.“That is what it smells like in heaven.” His arms dropped from behind his head to his lap, and he slid his feet off the desk.He stood and swayed.“Who’s it for?”“Lizzy,” I whispered.“She your mom?” His eyes narrowed and he examined me intently.“No.She’s a friend.”I felt a little knot form in my stomach.She could have lived a normal life with Nathanael if she had been given the operation.The other police officer moved to stand behind the one at the desk.The two of them watched me, their faces difficult to read, their eyes glassy and unfocused.“You missed Lizzy by about forty minutes,” one of the officers said.His face was kinder, less hardened, still chubby in the cheeks.“Where did she go?” I asked.The younger officer shrugged.“Heaven,” he said.“Hell.Wherever people like that go when they die.”I felt a fluttering in my head, a beating of my heart somewhere in my ears.People like that.“It was the weirdest thing.I’d brought their lunch down—I gave her the food.She was standing, looking right at me, her eyes as clear and focused as I’ve ever seen them.I had to stop and look at her for a minute—she was kind of creepy, you know? With those eyes, messed-up face.She raised her arms to the side and then one of the lights, the one right behind me, popped.Shot out red, yellow and orange sparks.Made me jump out of my skin.I went upstairs to get another lightbulb, and when I came down again, she was gone.Dead.Lying on the floor of her cell, her mouth pulled into a snarl.” The young man’s hand reached up to his own face and touched his lips.“She was a witch, you know, making that lightbulb pop like that.She had powers, that woman.”My hands were damp against the paper bag.I hadn’t known Lizzy well, I hadn’t known what her life had been like, but I did know that she could have lived a life outside a jail cell.“Merry Christmas,” I said.I left the loaf of bread on the desk in front of the men and walked out the door.Maybe departing this world could be considered a gift in some cases.I walked through the cold streets, the colorless lanes, and passed only four people even though I looked around every corner.I did see one man lying on the ground, cardboard under him, cardboard over him.I didn’t know if he was still alive.Everyone else must have been gathered around warm fires, singing songs, stuffing themselves full of goose.Even the ladies with the high heels, bare skin and made-up faces were gone, taking the day off to celebrate in whatever way suited them best.Nathanael, Jeremia, Ranita and Eva would be stringing necklaces of holly berries for the tree and gathering pecans for the rice dressing.I could have been at Solomon’s, feeling warmth and kindness, if not inclusion.When I knocked on the door of Purgatory Palace, it was flung open by a tall man with a lopsided nose and a very black, swollen eye.I held my breath for a minute, wondering if Celso had taken over the entire building while I was gone, but the man laughed when he saw me.I had prepared myself for Ofelia, for her sneer, her condescension, her rancid breath, but her door was closed.“Well, if it isn’t Whisper,” he said.“Merry Christmas!”“Oscar…?”I remembered the veil and slipped it off my head and into the sack.Here, I was not different.Here, I could uncover my face.Oscar wore tan shorts over thin metal legs ending on split wooden ovals that clumped in a stuttering beat against the floor.He steadied himself with his hands and lurched from side to side as he led me down the hall.Residents of Purgatory Palace stood in the hallway, each with a paint roller in hand and a bucket of paint by their feet.Oscar weaved unsteadily past them, waving his arms in big swings, but he was so giddy with laughter that those in the hallway giggled too.“I’m almost six feet tall,” he said.“Whoa.”His legs leaned to the right while his body moved in the opposite direction, but Oscar didn’t fall.Instead, he placed both hands on the left wall and pushed himself back toward the legs
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