Witches in Wonderland

by J. D. Winters

  “So you’re babysitting for Gavin, right?”

  She nodded.

  “Where did Krissy go?”

  She hesitated. “I’m not sure. She said she had to run some errands and wouldn’t be back for about two hours.”

  “Ah.”

  I was pretty sure I knew where she’d gone. Her special friend—and Gavin’s father—was Ted Fremont, who wasn’t allowed in our haven town. She had to sneak off to meet with him, and usually she took Gavin with her. But tonight, it looked like she was going to have a few hours alone with the man she loved.

  Good for her, I said silently to myself.

  But there was the issue of Mandy. I was a bit wary of her at first, after that reaction I’d had to meeting her startling eyes. What was it about this young person that seemed to make the tips of my nerve endings quiver with warning? As though something was coming—something that I had to be careful of and watch for.

  But now that I had a chance to get to know her, that sense of danger seemed to fade away. Up close, she was much older than she had seemed—about in her mid-twenties I would say. Which made me curious about who she was and where she’d come from.

  “The first thing I need to know,” I told her as we worked, “is who that little fur ball is.”

  I’d noticed that Mandy had opened the pocket of her jacket as we’d begun to work and he’d jumped right in.

  “Did you bring him here?”

  She hesitated, then gave a quick, fleeting smile. “Yes. In fact, this is Shrimp. Come on out, Shrimp. Say ‘hello’ to Haley Greco. She owns this place.”

  A little face slowly emerged at the top of the pocket, little nose hooked over the hem. The shoe-button black eyes sparkled and I could have sworn the animal smiled at me.

  I laughed. I couldn’t help it. The urge to laugh just bubbled up in me. “You’re so cute,” I admitted, shaking my head. “What are you?”

  Mandy smiled. “He’s a woodland creature. Where I come from, we call them Snickers.”

  “After the candy bar?”

  She looked surprised and shook her head. “Not really,” she said. “Nothing to do with candy.”

  Feeling ignored, Toto barked at that moment, hoping to gather in a little attention for himself, and the little animal quickly sank back down into the pocket.

  “Is he yours?” I asked Mandy. “I mean, I thought I saw him earlier at my grandmother’s. Does he stay with you or….?”

  She got a wary look in her eyes, as though she didn’t want to reveal too much. “I don’t own him, if that’s what you mean. He can come and go as he pleases.”

  Yes, but that didn’t answer my question, did it? Still, that was her business. I wasn’t the one hiring her. So I shrugged it off.

  “I guess you can go on home,” I said casually as I swept up the last of the remnants of the battle. “I can take care of Gavin from here.”

  She gave me another of those wary looks. “Uh..actually, Krissy was going to talk to you about….about me staying here tonight. She thought maybe you wouldn’t mind if I slept on the couch in the back room.” She noted the surprised look I gave her and started to back away. “But if you’d rather, I can probably find somewhere else to sleep. Only…”

  Those prickles were back.

  “Do you know my grandmother?” I asked her abruptly.

  Her eyes widened. “Your grandmother? I don’t think so. What’s her name?”

  I smiled. Funny but it was a relief to know she wasn’t another of Gran Ana’s plots. “Never mind. If Krissy thinks you’re okay to stay here, I think so too.”

  She flushed. “Thanks,” she said a bit awkwardly. “I know it’s an imposition, but I got here so suddenly and I’m so unprepared for this…” Her voice faded away and I knew she had all kinds of secrets that I should be forcing out of her, but I just didn’t have the heart for it. Not tonight. I liked her and that was all that mattered to me right now.

  “Okay, you get Gavin into his pajamas and ready for bed and I’ll go out and get the flour for the morning rolls.”

  She nodded and I went out the back door, heading for the shed where the supplies were stockpiled. But two steps out, I realized there was someone hanging around on the front porch and I circled back to take a look.

  It was Derek, the one who’d tried to kiss me inappropriately. The man I’d tossed and Shane had given a warning to. (I still warmed thinking about that moment!) What on earth was he doing here?

  “Hey,” I said, careful not to sound friendly.

  He whipped around and took a deep breath as he saw me standing there.

  “Hey,” he said back.

  “Go away,” I told him. “It’s late and we’re not accepting visitors.”

  He came closer and looked very earnest. “Actually, I came over to apologize.”

  “Really?” I was unmoved.

  “Yeah. I’m sorry for the way I acted. I know it was a stupid thing to do. I’d had a little too much wine, and…” He shrugged as though he was nothing but a helpless lamb, lost in the wild, wild woods. “You know how it is. Right?”

  I shook my head slowly, deliberately. “No, as a matter of fact, I don’t.”

  He frowned at me as though he wasn’t used to being contradicted. “Sure you do. I’ll bet you have your share of frustrations about the ghosts and all. Don’t you? I mean, they’re a hot mess to pin down in the best of times, but when they’re against you, Katy bar the door. The buggers are hard to control, you know what I mean? They can tear your life apart.”

  Just what was his game, anyway? I didn’t know and I refused to get chummy with this man.

  “Ghosts?” I said coolly. I knew that was what the docu-whatever-reality show was all about, but he mentioned them as though they were real. Really real. Not just gimmicks for a phony TV show.

  “Yes, ghosts,” he said. “Those wavy, wiggly images that saunter through the room and make spooky sounds and try to scare you into doing something for them. Ghosts. You know all about them. I’ve heard about you. I’m sure you know a few quite well.”

  I decided to ignore his personal attempts to goad me into agreeing with him here. Instead, I went with the original narrative.

  “So are you trying to tell me that you can see ghosts? You can talk to them?”

  He nodded. “That’s the way it is. From what I’ve heard, you’ve got the same natural born talents yourself. But if you tell anyone else I’ve got them, I’ll deny it until I’m blue in the face. I don’t need the grief.”

  Now he was puzzling me. “But…”

  “Hey, you know how it is. You’ve got that sensitivity too. I know that.”

  I bit my lip and looked away. “How do you know?”

  “Your aunt told me. She told me all about you.”

  I turned back and stared at him. “What aunt?”

  He leaned closer, grinning at me mockingly. “The ghost one. I think her name is Tina, isn’t it?”

  I blinked, not about to give anything away. “What did she say?”

  “She told me all about how you were a rebel in high school. How you had to fight to go to a college as far as you could get away from Moonhaven and all the people here.”

  I made a dismissive face. “That’s garbage.”

  “Really?” He was laughing at me. “Well, she told me about how you fought with your parents. They wanted you to stay in town and go to the junior college. But you left anyway. And that’s true, isn’t it?”

  When I didn’t answer, he went on. “Hey, I can relate. I was a rebel too. I spent a couple of wasted years trying to be an actor. I was pretty good at it, but the competition was insane. Going to auditions—humiliating.” He gave a short bark of a laugh. “Almost as humiliating as working with Kenny.”

  I stared at him, wondering what all this was leading to. I didn’t want to be friends with this man. Why was he trying so hard to connect?

  He came a little closer and his voice lowered almost to a whisper. “She told me your grandmother is
a sorceress. True or false?”

  I swallowed, hard. “Hey, there’s no such thing as sorceresses.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah.” I took a deep breath. “First you tell me you believe ghosts can talk to you, now you’re telling me you believe in sorceresses. And witches, I suppose. And demons.”

  He grinned at me. “Sure. Also vampires, like your friend Bentley.”

  That gave me a start. If he had plans to do anything to hurt Bentley in any shape or form, I was definitely going to be standing in his way.

  “Come on, babe, don’t try to con me,” he said in his casual, joking manner. “I’m not a stranger to these things. I grew up in a haven town, and I’ve been there, done that. A thousand times.”

  Somehow, I doubted that. Most regular humans didn’t really get the supernatural quirks and habits of their less human neighbors in haven towns. Every now and then, something might puzzle them. But there were spells for that, ways to clear those things from the mind. And once cleared, minds went happily on with their normal activities. Otherwise, how could haven towns survive and thrive?

  “Since you deal with ghosts so well, why aren’t you back at the Haunted House, helping Kenny Sands make his show?”

  “Are you kidding?” He grimaced. “He’s making a mess of everything. I try to stay out of the way. We haven’t been getting on so well lately.”

  “Isn’t he your partner?”

  “Partner?” He managed to make a shrug look sarcastic and his tone turned bitter. “What we’ve got is more like indentured servitude than a partnership. I’m tied to the guy but the friendship we once had is long gone. He owes me so much money—I’ll never get it back unless I hang around to make sure he gets his work done. Generating some positive income would be nice. Something that helps pay the rent. You know what I mean?”

  He was sounding so hopeless and sort of hurt, I was almost feeling sorry for him. I could well imagine that Kenny was a maddening person to work with. “So you don’t think this docudrama or whatever it is will make it to the top of the filmmaking food chain?”

  “Seriously? Odds are against us.”

  “But then, they always are, aren’t they?”

  I felt kind of mean saying something like that, especially after the look he gave me. I sighed. “Sorry,” I muttered. “But I’ve got to get some dough started for the morning bake.”

  “Cool.” He jammed his hands into his pockets and looked kind of lost.

  “What are you going to do?” I asked him, then bit my tongue. Why was I delaying his departure this way?

  “Oh, I don’t know.” He looked up at me from under his dark hair which was sweeping down over his forehead. “I could hang around downtown, looking for some action. Or maybe I’ll just go back to the Haunted House and make plans for murder.”

  “Murder!”

  “I’m kidding, I’m kidding.” He gave me a sad smile. “I just wanted to make you feel bad for casting me out.”

  “I’m not casting you out. I’m just….” What was I doing?

  “Giving me good-bye signals. I know.” He sighed, then his face brightened. “Hey, maybe I’ll come by in the morning. What do you usually serve for breakfast?”

  “Cinnamon rolls. Doughnuts. Breakfast burrito.” I turned toward the supply shed. “I’ll see you then.”

  “Yeah, sure.” He hesitated, then started back to where I assumed he’d left his car, whistling a jaunty tune, trying to look happy.

  I stopped myself from calling after him and inviting him in. I have to catch myself now and then. You may think I’m kinda’ tough, kinda’ uncompromising? Actually, my nurturing instincts are another Achilles’ heel. I’m just brimming with them. Lost kittens, bewildered puppies, melancholy young men—they all seem to tug on my heartstrings. If I’m not careful, I’ll end up running a half-way house for lost souls of all species. Haley’s Animal Kingdom.

  When I went back inside, I found that Mandy had put Gavin to bed and he was already sound asleep. She pitched right in and helped me prepare the dough for the morning bake. While we worked, we talked.

  I asked the usual questions. How did you get here? Don’t you have a car? Where did you come from? Where did you grow up? What drew you to Moonhaven?

  She answered them all, but somehow the answers never hung together and formed any real information. It worked for me at the time, but later, I couldn’t put any rhyme or reason to it. She talked, but she told me nothing. Her words evaporated like snowflakes hitting a warm windshield. What seemed like a plausible narrative at first fell apart in the long run. There was nothing there.

  The funny thing was, it didn’t annoy me the way it should have. Somehow, I still trusted and liked her. For no good reason, but there you go. Something in her appealed to me greatly. I wanted to be friends.

  Suddenly I realized that was a real ache deep inside. I had Rennie and I had Shane—but neither were the kind of friend I felt I needed—another woman to talk things over with. Even Krissy couldn’t quite fill that bill. The two of us had once been friends, but a lot had happened since then and we still hadn’t reached a place where we really trusted each other. So, yeah. A good friend would be welcome. If only I could find one.

  That night I had another boring dream. Yes, I heard your groan. Sorry, but the way things are shaking out, I sort of have to tell you about these dreams. They seem to be significant. If only I could figure out what they keep coming back for. There’s got to be a reason.

  So just by making that statement, I’ve revealed myself as a logical but open-minded sort of person, haven’t I? I believe in patterns and reasons. If I lose that belief, I’ll surely go mad. Because there have been too many strange things in my life. And I don’t trust them, but I’m sure I will be able to link them together and analyze why some day. If I didn’t have that to hold on to, I’d jump off a cliff.

  Overstating it a bit? Yeah, probably. I’m not the suicidal type, no matter what you’ve heard!

  Hah. That’s a joke. Not a very good joke, but I might warm up and get better later. In the meantime, the dream.

  It started in the usual way. The sun was shining brightly and the air was warm and sweet. I was in a car with a group of friends whose faces I could never quite see and we were cruising the highway, singing along with a song on the radio, feeling wonderful, wild and free, as though we’d just escaped from something, as though we’d just set off on an adventure and were heading toward the rest of our lives.

  And then came the squeal of the tires and the feeling of losing balance and flying off into nothing and the screams and pain and the water in my mouth….

  That’s where it usually ended. But this time there was more. The car came back out of the water, shooting out and heading for land and a huge man in a torn shirt and ragged jeans, with hair hanging over his eyes was holding us up—the whole car--with one hand and yelling, “No! No! No!”

  But then that turned out to be my cell phone ringing right next to my head beside the pillow rather than the shout of the man. I stared at it for a moment, then answered it, struggling to clear my brain.

  “Rennie, is that you?”

  I could hear her teeth chattering, right there on the phone.

  “Haley, you’ve got to come quick. Something happened. Get over here.”

  I blinked away the sleep in my eyes. “Where is ‘here’, Rennie? Where are you?”

  “At your house, of course. The Haunted House. Oh no! Gotta go.”

  She hung up and I stared at the phone in my hand. I knew she must mean the house I grew up in, but what was she doing there at the crack of dawn? Whatever it was, she’d sounded scared to death.

  I rolled out of bed and slipped into jeans and a sweatshirt and headed out the door, wishing I knew a spell for quick transportation as I yanked open my car’s cranky door and dropped into the driver’s seat. A few seconds later I was out on the empty streets of Moonhaven, heading for that Victorian I’d just left a few hours before, the one behind the
wrought-iron fence. The one that was full of memories of my life that I couldn’t quite connect to. The one that had scared me from the beginning. My heart was keeping up a quick beat and adrenalin was surging in my veins. What was I walking into?

  Chapter 7

  Rennie came running at me as I parked, arms waving, looking like a big awkward bird trying to take off in flight through the darkness between patches of fog. “You’re finally here! What are we going to do?”

  “Hold it,” I ordered her sternly as I came closer, hoping to calm those flapping arms. “Stop right there and tell me what you think is going on and why.”

  She blinked at me and I noticed tears were streaming down her face. That certainly put a new level of seriousness into the mix.

  She drew in a sobbing breath and then said, “Murder,” clearly and distinctly. “There’s been a murder. I think he’s dead.”

  That chilled me to the bone. What Derek had said the night before flashed through my mind and I wanted to start chanting, “Oh no, oh no,” but I forced myself to keep control. Somebody had to. “Who’s dead, Rennie?”

  “Kenny Sands. The one who was sort of in charge of everything. He’s on the floor and there’s blood ….” She hid her face in her hands and sobbed.

  “Whoa,” I said, repelled by her words, but she was crying too hard to hear me. “Rennie!” I shook her a little. “Hold on. Don’t go getting crazy here.”

  “I’m not.” She sniffed loudly, then seemed to clear up. “I’m okay. Come in and see for yourself.” She turned to lead the way.

  “Wait.” I grabbed her arm and held her back. “Have you called the Sheriff Station? Who have you told?”

  “I called the station,” she said, her eyes almost wild. “That new Deputy answered. I didn’t trust her. I hung up.”

  “Oh no.”

  “Then I called you.”

  “Right.” I sighed. I had to hold it together. “Okay, take me in and show me. Then I’ll call Shane.”