Chapter 3: Voice of an Angel

The next day Maia accompanied him to the wrecking yard and found the truck stripped of its body panels, roll bar, engine hood, and windshield frame. Even the two passenger tires were missing as well as both doors.

“It looks...,” she scrunched her face trying to think of a term.

“Bare?” he suggested as he helped her off the bike.

“Yeah,” she walked around it with a troubled expression.

“What’s the matter Maia?” he asked. He heard the office door and turned to see his uncle approaching.

“I feel the loss of life here and it troubles me,” she turned to him and then smiled brightly at the older man coming up behind him. “Hello Mr. Latoure,” she greeted sweetly.

Frank smiled back at her and then frowned at her bare feet. “Young lady it’s too dangerous for you to be around her with no shoes,” he admonished. He pointed to the oil spill and several piles of broken glass, “You’ll shred your feet like that.”

She placed her hands behind her back and did a pirouette before dancing around the shop floor, spinning like Tinkerbelle. To his astonishment, she purposefully trod over multiple shards of glass as well as puddles of oil, ATF, and mud before spinning into Jesse’s arms and holding up her toes to reveal soles that were completely unblemished. He stared at them astonished before glancing back at the two of them questioningly.

“I appreciate your caring Mr. Latoure,” she said smiling at his disarmingly. “I promise I will be especially careful.”

He shook his head before frowning at Jesse. “Well, all that gypsy fire dancing stuff is one thing, but what about you on that motorcycle without a helmet, son?”

Jesse gulped guiltily. “Uh ... yeah, I let her wear mine until I can get her one of her own.”

“Hmph,” his uncle grunted as he turned back towards the office. “we’ve got a few around here. Come with me Maia,” he ordered, “we’ll see if any of them fit ya.”

She smiled brightly at Jesse still keeping her hands behind her back as she curtsied to him and bounced after the older man.

She returned several minutes later wearing a shiny white open-face helmet with gold metallic glitter. “How do I look, baby?” she posed for him as he lifted the driver’s seat from the Bronco.

He grinned. “You make anything look fabulous babe!”

“Ah. You say the sweetest things.” She moved in for a kiss and smacked him in the mouth with her helmet instead. “Oh, Goddess I’m so sorry!”

He held his lip and laughed. “It’s okay. Try again.”

When he went to remove the passenger’s seat, he noticed the dark puddle that pooled under the driver’s side.

“Oh man,” he muttered suddenly feeling ill.

“What is it babe?” she looked and her face filled with sadness, “Oh.”

“I’ll go get some shop rags and detergent,” He walked over to one of the other steel buildings.

As he gathered the cleaning supplies, he heard a sweet high-pitched note ring out. He felt an incredible sense of ease and it seemed as if any sorrow within him was released. He turned back amazed and saw Maia standing on the Bronco’s rear seats, with her hands at her sides. Her eyes were closed, and her face was raised in song as she produced the most incredible notes he had ever heard. Not even the opera could compare with this, he was certain.

He stood staring with his eyes wide and his mouth agape as she sang. The words were unknown to him, but he was certain that she beseeched the very spirits with her ringing voice. He was oblivious to everything else, so he didn’t notice Frank, Juan, and Xavier all standing outside the office staring at her enraptured.

Tears gathered in his eyes as he listened and felt her words, compelling the departed to go forth with joy and happiness. The shop radiated with vibrations only the spirit felt, and a powerful sense of righteous ambivalence emanated from the dismantled vehicle.

Then her voice faded and she grew quiet. Her body was frozen in the pose he first noticed.

Shaking himself from his daze he walked over to the Bronco and regarded her as she turned to smile at him. He dropped his rags and cleaner and reached up to help her down. As he set her feet on the ground, he heard the other three men approach.

“Santa Madrè de Dios!” Juan exclaimed, “That was the most beautiful thing I have ever heard.”

“What were you just singing?” Xav asked with a subdued voice, “I’ve never heard the like.”

“You have the voice of an angel,” Frank whispered.

She sniffed as she wiped a tear from her eye. “I sang to the spirit of the man who lost his life in that Bronco,” she said quietly, “I had to cleanse the vessel of the sorrow from his passing.” She smiled up at Jesse. “It is pure now.”

He nodded and proceeded to wipe up and clean the old blood stain on the floorboard.

Later, back at home, he relaxed out in front of the shop as Maia went around the backyard humming contentedly to herself. She carried one of the bags of dirt that she had brought with her and sprinkled it by the handfuls in the soil around the trees, shrubs, and bushes. She paused before the old plum tree and looked up at it.

“You need a lot of work buddy,” she said to it as she sifted two handfuls of the dirt around its base.

Jesse smiled at her adoringly and headed for the back door. “I need to use the computer to research some stuff on the Bronco.”

She smiled sweetly at him and waved him off.

Teetee was sprawled on the floor watching her favorite idol—Jojo Siwa, on the flatscreen. He snorted and shook his head as he sat in front of the desktop and began googling.

When he was done, he went out back and heard her singing once more. It was a different, happy song that he still couldn’t understand, but it lifted his spirits all the same. He looked around but could not see her. Then he noticed a large branch fall from the plum tree and join a large pile of others at its base. He looked up and saw...

“Maia!” he cried out in alarm as he spotted her standing high up in the branches of the tree, with a set of clippers and a saw. She was perched on an impossibly small branch that was sure to collapse under her weight.

Her singing stopped and she beamed down at him. “What’s up, baby?”

“You are!” he yelled, “way too far up. Come down before you fall!”

She laughed gayly and turned back to the branch she was pruning. “Don’t be silly. I’m almost done anyways.”

“We have ladders you know,” he retorted.

“I need to feel the tree babe,” she said down to him. “He is very old and out of shape. So, he’s getting a spa treatment.”

“How do you know it’s a he?” he asked with a smirk.

She gazed back down at him with a cool expression.

He looked away nervously. “Oh yeah ... of course.”

He turned towards the shop, and she resumed singing.

Almost immediately an irate voice sounded from the other side of the fence, on the east side of the yard; opposite his apartment/shop.

“Would you stop that damn awful singing?” it yelled. It was an older man’s voice and full of anger.

Maia stopped and looked across the fence at the old neighbor standing on his back deck. “Excuse me?” she asked innocently.

Jesse rolled his eyes and walked back towards the tree. “That would be Mr. Sinclair, our lovely neighbor,” he told her sarcastically.