* * *
Brice gives me a plastic bag with a necklace inside. We are backstage again. He’s in his King Duncan costume. I haven’t put on my Hecate costume yet. “What is this?”
“Go out into the wings where you can see the play and put it on,” he says.
“But what is it?”
“It’s the charm I told you about,” he says. “Go try it.”
No way am I putting one of these things on. I’m not going to tempt fate. It’s still possible I got infected with Brice’s berserker virus. I’m not putting on a charm and getting the virus from it too. “Sorry, Brice, but I’m not getting the berserker virus.”
He shakes his head. He looks excited, and his eyes are doing the twinkly thing they do. “I didn’t make it like that.”
I’m confused. “What do you mean?”
“The jettatori tie magic to regular objects using the virus, but I don’t. It’s perfectly safe.”
I raise my eyebrows.
“I’ll show you,” he says. He takes my hand. I’m wearing a watch, and he runs his fingers over it lightly. He closes his eyes. I feel a jolt. Little sparks, like tiny bolts of lightning flow from Brice’s hand to my watch. He pulls his fingers back. “Now go out in the wings and check it out.”
I’m stunned. How did Brice just do that? I’ve never seen anything like it. I struggle to say something, but Brice propels me out to the stage area. He stops right at the edge of one of the leg curtains, so that I can see the action of the play, but the audience can’t see me. The best way to determine this is to make sure you can’t see the audience. If you can see them, they can see you.
“I have to go get killed,” Brice whispers. “Enjoy.”
I look out on stage. It’s the beginning of Act Two. Almost at once, I feel as if I’ve been swirled up into another world. It’s not the stage I’m looking at, but the stone walls of a castle. And I am Macbeth, standing alone, staring into the night. I don’t see an audience. I’m not an actor. But when I begin to speak, I feel the agony of the decision placed upon me. My wife thinks it’s a good idea to do it. The witches told me I’d become the king. And yet, I’m not sure if it’s the right thing to do. Still, when I hear the bell, I mutter, “Hear it not, Duncan, for it is a knell that summons thee to Heaven or to Hell.” And I know I’m committed to doing it. To killing my sovereign.
By the time Brice yanks the watch off my wrist, I’m a mess. I’ve been washing the blood off my hands. I’ve stabbed Duncan to death, and I can hardly handle it.
Even seeing the world as it is normally hardly helps. I’m too much reminded of Joey. “I’m afraid to think of what I have done,” I whisper. “Look on’t again I dare not.”
Brice shakes me, laughing. “Snap out of it, Olivia. It’s just a play.”
Right. Just a play. And Joey is not Duncan, the king. Joey wasn’t innocent. And I didn’t kill for ambition. I killed for justice. But if I hadn’t killed Joey, would I still have the place I have in the family? Wasn’t it somehow the way I proved myself to them? Am I like Macbeth? Is this just the beginning of the awful things I will do?
“So it’s cool?” Brice asks me.
“It’s very intense,” I say. “It feels so real.”
“Yes! I’m glad it works. People will pay for it, don’t you think?”
I nod slowly. It’s quite an experience. People will pay for it. Brice has done something very well. He’s good at this. “Yeah, I think people will.” I pull Brice away from the stage. “How did you do that, anyway? When we make charms, we have to use herbs and incantations. We don’t have lightning coming out of our hands.”
“I told you, I have a little talent.”
“A little? I’ve never seen anything like that in my life. I mean, I’ve heard that some of the benedette are powerful enough to cast spells without speaking, but they have to have training for that. Did you have training?”
“No. I’m a guy.”
The benedette don’t train men. No one thinks men have very much talent for magic anyway. Even the jettatori acknowledge that most of what they can do isn’t much more than parlor tricks. What Brice can do is amazing. And a little scary. “So how do you do it?”
He shrugs, looking self-conscious. “I’ve just always been able to do things like that. I’m not supposed to. My mom caught me once and told me to hide it. But I wanted to help you. This will help, won’t it?”
It will definitely help. “How many of those charm things can you make by Wednesday?” That’s our next performance date.
“Lots,” says Brice.
“It doesn’t make you tired or something?”
“Does magic make you tired?”
“No. But it seemed like the power was coming out of you. I thought you could get depleted or something maybe.”
He shakes his head, smiling again. “Not at all. Bring me charms, Olivia. I’ll make them magical.”
Chapter Four
To make this work, I need to practically redesign the way that the family operates. We generally work with established clients—people who call us when they need more product. We move a small amount of highly priced product to a small amount of people. Doing it this way, selling Brice’s charms, means moving a lower priced product to a higher volume of people. I’ve been given half of the family’s resources, which means half of the guys. Not all of the guys are Calabrese. Some of them are kids from the neighborhood that we hire. They usually do menial errand running tasks, or things like packaging and distributing. I’m putting them all on the streets before our performance, selling directly to the audience.
They are excited about it. They’ve never done any direct selling. It’s a step up for them. But they’re also rough around the edges. I make them dress in suits, because they are selling to a theater-going crowd. I have to teach them not to use swear words or to speak in slang when they are talking to the potential customers. It’s a lot of work.
It takes up most of my Monday and Tuesday. Between training the guys and getting Brice charms, I am a little overwhelmed. Vincent wanders through at one point and openly makes fun of me for doing things differently. I ignore him. He’ll see how well my idea works when I deliver more money next week. At least I hope this idea works. I really do. I’m putting a lot on the line just so I can stay in the play.
Also on Monday, I go to Tressa’s funeral. I follow the hearse out to the cemetery and watch them lower her casket into the ground. Around me, everyone is crying. I kind of wish that I could too. But I haven’t cried since my mother’s funeral. I remember that day, sobbing my eyes out, and being all alone, because my father had been taken into custody and was awaiting trial. I had known then that I was all alone and that I had to rely on myself. I didn’t think crying was going to help me fix anything. I decided right then not to do it anymore. And I haven’t.
Still, sometimes it looks like it’s making people feel better.
After the funeral, my cousin Antonia, Tressa’s younger sister, comes over to me. Antonia and I were close when we were younger. We’re about the same age. We used to play together when we were little girls. As we got older, though, we went our separate ways. Antonia is into dresses and makeup and fingernail polish. I’m not. We don’t have a lot to talk about anymore.
Antonia’s face is red and puffy. She is wiping her nose with a crumpled tissue. Other than that, she looks flawless, her dark hair is in a perfect French twist on the back of her head. I even think she must be wearing waterproof mascara or something, because her eye makeup doesn’t look smeary. “I heard it was you,” she says.
I don’t know what she’s talking about. I wish I would have listened to Nonna’s advice and worn a dress to the funeral. Nonna isn’t here because she won’t attend Calabrese family events. She is very sorry about what happened to Tressa, though. I feel underdressed in my dark slacks and button up shirt, even though it’s what all the guys are wearing. I touch my unfancy ponytail self-consciously. “What was me?”
<
br /> Antonia swallows. “I heard it was you that got Joey.”
Oh. This is strange. Jettatori business usually doesn’t get shared with the women in the family. What should I do? Should I admit it? No. I shouldn’t. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Antonia hugs me. “Okay, you don’t have to admit it.” She pulls back, fresh tears spilling out of her eyes. “You are so brave, Olivia. I wish I could be like you. I wish I could be tough and deadly. I wanted to kill that son of a bitch so much.” She dabs at her eyes. “Thank you. I’m glad it was a woman that did it, you know?”
I look at the ground, embarrassed. Why would Antonia want to be like me? I’m a freak of nature. But what she said only affirms my feelings that Joey got what he deserved.
Antonia grabs my hand. “Hey, I know we aren’t as close as we used to be.”
I look up at her. “Well, we were kids back then.”
“Yeah,” she says. “But you’re my cousin, and I love you. And I’m grateful for what you did. So I want you to be the maid of honor in my wedding.”
I snatch my hand back. “You’re getting married?”
“You didn’t know?”
“I...” Did I know? Maybe I just didn’t pay attention. I have a big family, and I’ve been distracted. “Well, congratulations, anyway. Are you marrying Seth?” Seth is the guy she’s been dating for a few years.
“Of course,” she says. “Maddie was my maid of honor, but she said I should have you do it after what you did for Tressa, and I agree.”
This is sweet, really, and I get that Antonia is trying to do something nice for me, but I don’t want to be the maid of honor in a wedding. “You should give it back to Maddie. I’m not, like, maid of honor material. And, you know, that should be your closest girl friend. And we’ve grown apart.”
“No arguments, Olivia. You’re my maid of honor, and that’s all there is to it.”
“Look, Antonia, I appreciate it, but you really don’t have to do this.” I will die if I have to be a maid of honor. Just die. The thought of some awful dress and being stuck in pantyhose in front of a whole bunch of people. No. Please no.
“Yes I do,” she says. “Of course I do. And I want to. Plus, you’re going to love the dress.”
I really doubt it.
The Toil and Trouble Trilogy, Book One Page 8
