Free The Liminal People by Ayize Jama-everett

healer with you everywhere these days?” Her voice broke the night sky above the tarmac, and small bits of fire jumped from her lips.
    â€œI bring him as a courtesy to you, should I lose my temper and break off a part of you that even I can’t fix,” he replied with a honeyed voice. “Keep your sparks to yourself woman and guide me to our master.” In an old cargo container, on an ancient rusting freighter, the two powers made ablutions for each other and walked into a darkness that no light would penetrate. Even the sparks from the old woman’s tongue didn’t emanate outward. I waited for twenty-four hours in a car on the dock wondering what power in the world existed that could cow my boss so. At the beginning of that second night, Nordeen emerged alone. He seemed revitalized physically, standing taller, his cane for ornamentation alone. His eyes shone brightly. And when he spoke, small sparks of fire came from his mouth.
    â€œNever forget, little healer. There are powers stronger than ours in this world. And they do not always favor us.”
    Those words are on my mind as I think about how to hunt down this girl, this Tamara. The really powerful ones of our type attract others. Those others are so far above us they make us seem like the normals. If one of those others is involved in this, I’m screwed. But if not, I can do this.
    The moderately powerful ones like us alienate our families. As my brother did. As I did. But the most powerful of us are always alone. So she can’t be that powerful. Plus, she had to make a choice to read her teacher’s mind. That means she either doesn’t have the power to do it casually or she has that much control. Doesn’t matter. Point is she’s living a normal life. A normal life means normal boundaries, normal friends, normal schooling. And our kind of power among the norms always leaves trails.
    I leave Yasmine and hit a hospital. Scrubs are easy enough to find, and I need the right costume for what I’m about to try. I change clothes in the attending doctor’s bathroom. Then I change physically.
    It’s difficult, but when I focus I can change the melanin count in my skin. It’s the hardest transformation for me. Nordeen says it’s because my self-image is rooted in being black. I say it’s because melanin is a hard substance to transmute. But I need to be less black to pull this off, so I focus until I can tell that I probably look mulatto. I close off my hair follicles and pull the thick mats that I have out and flush them down the toilet. Then I focus on slick black hair, coated in oil. I let it grow until I can fix a small rubber band at the base of my neck. Since I’m at a toilet I vomit up sixty-five pounds, making sure to check my discharge for too much stomach acids. I just need to lose the pounds, not my voice. When I step out I look like a sexy young intern that works too hard. I look at my watch. It’s eleven. Almost time for lunch.

Chapter Eight

    Catholic schoolgirl uniforms had to be designed by pedophiles. It’s the only thing that makes sense. And that’s the only partially normal thought in my head as I exit the tube and head for Atkins Road. This is Tamara’s school. An all-girl’s school. An all-girl’s Catholic school where they’re made to wear the pedophiles dream-uniform. Half a block away and I already smell the adolescent hormones. I try to respond in kind.
    I did a lot of things on instinct during my cross-Africa trek that I later had to learn the specifics of. Keeping the animals from attacking me, for instance. In my delusional state, I thought it was simply because I was different. Over time I realized it had more to do with the manipulation of my scent. I call it stank. I sent out non-fear hormones. This confused the animals enough to make them leave me alone. Humans react to stank as well. It’s obvious to me, but of course most people are