Cherokee Bat and the Goat Guys by Francesca Lia Block Read Free Book Online Page B

nails, opened the flaps and removed the brown packing paper. Inside was another box. And inside that were the hooves.
    They were boots, really. But the toes were curved, with clefts running down the front, and the platform heels were sharp wedges chiseled into the shape of animal hooves. They were made of something fibrous and tough. They looked almost too real.
    “Now Cherokee will look like a Goat Guy too!” Angel Juan said.
    “Totally cool!” Raphael picked up one of the boots. “I wish I had some like this!”
    Cherokee sniffed. The hooves smelled like an animal. They bristled with tiny hairs.
    “Put them on!”
    She took off her moccasins and slid her feet into the boots. They made her tall; her legs were long like the legs of lean, muscled models who came to see The Coat Guys play. She walked around the room, balancing on the hooves.
    “They are hot!” Raphael said, watching her.
    They were fire. She was fire. She was thunderbird. Red hawk. Yellow dandelion. Storming the stage on long legs, on the feet of a horse child, wild deer, goat girl …
    “Cherokee! Cherokee!”
    They were calling her but she wasn’t really listening. She was dancing, thrusting. Her voice was bells. Her tambourine sent off sparks. The Vamp audience reached for her, there at the bottom of the stage, there, beneath her hooves.
    She spun and spun. She had imagined she was the color of red flame but she was whiter than ever, like the hottest part of the firebefore it burns itself out.
    Later, someone was reaching down her shirt. She called for Raphael but he was not there. Witch Baby came and pulled her away. Feathers were flying in a whirlwind. Her feet were blistering inside the hoof hoots.
    Then they were back at the house. Raphael had invited Lulu over and he. Lulu and Angel Juan were on the couch sharing a joint. Candles were burning. Raphael touched Lulu’s smooth, dark cheek with the back of his hand. Or had Cherokee imagined that? Her feet hurt so much and in the candlelight she could have been mistaken.
    “Help me take these off,” she said to Witch Baby. “Please. They hurt.”
    Witch Baby pulled at one boot. Every part of her body strained, even the tendons in her neck. Finally she fell backward and Cherokee’s foot was free, throbbing with pain. Witch Baby pulled on the other boot until it came off too.
    “It cut me! Nasty thing!”
    “What?”
    “Your boot cut me.” There was blood onWitch Baby’s hand.
    “Let’s wash it off.”
    They went into the bathroom and Cherokee held on to the claw-footed tub for balance- She felt as if she were going to be sick and took a deep breath. Then she helped clean the cut that ran across Witch Baby’s palm like a red lifeline.
    “I want to stop. Witch Baby,” she whispered.
    Witch Baby stood at the sink, her wings drooping with sweat and filth, her eyes glazed, blood from her hand dripping into the basin. “Tell that to our boyfriends out there on the couch,” she said. “Tell that to Angel Juan’s horns.”
    But what did Angel Juan’s horns tell Angel Juan?
    The next night The Goat Guys smoked and drank tequila before the show. Onstage they were all in a frenzy. Cherokee, burning with tequila, could not stop whirling, although her toes were screaming, smashed into the hooves. Witch Baby was playing so hard that the wings seemed to be flapping by themselves, ready to fly away with her. Raphael leapedup and down as if the fur pants were scalding him. Finally, he leaped into the audience and the people held him up, grabbing at matted fur, at his long dreadlocks, at his skin slippery with sweat.
    While Raphael was thrashing around in the audience trying not to lose hold of his microphone. Angel Juan pumped his bass, charging forward with his whole body like a bull in a ring. He swung his head back and forth as if it were very heavy, crammed full of pain and sound. He slid to his knees. Something flashed in his hand. Cherokee thought she could hear the audience salivating as