Six Times a Charm

by Deanna Chase

  Another sigh, even deeper. Entire wind farms could be fueled if he went on like this. “Hello.”

  This wasn’t going to be easy. Melissa tried, though. “You should have seen Jane in yoga class! She mastered the inverted poses.”

  He gave me a wan smile that might have broken my heart if I’d thought for a second that he was truly suffering. “Wonderful.”

  We moved down the sidewalk, avoiding the early revelers who were starting their big nights out in Georgetown’s trendy restaurants and bars. Amateurs, Melissa called them. People who wanted to see and be seen.

  Passing by the plate glass windows of Sephora, I was amazed by the number of women buying cosmetics on a Saturday evening. Hard to believe, but I’d never been inside the place. I knew that it was a high end cosmetics emporium; I’d seen the ads and walked by the classy black-and-white storefront. But when I was with Scott, it seemed silly to spend all that time and effort making myself beautiful for my own fiancé. And since he’d dumped me, I hadn’t had any reason to splurge.

  I shrugged and said. “Can you imagine spending hours shopping for makeup?”

  Neko sighed. “Roger could spend hours shopping for makeup.” He made life as a spendthrift sound downright noble.

  Melissa started to retort—I knew that she would say that she had never spent more than five minutes at the drugstore selecting a lipstick. And I suspected that Neko would bite back with something unkind. I was desperate to avoid sniping between the two of them, so I said, “Well, I want to see what they’ve got.”

  I grabbed both Neko and Melissa by their hands and plunged inside, only to be stopped by the first display. TARTE, said large letters. I picked up their “Clean Slate” and read the ingredients. “Here, Melissa. This should sound familiar—avocado oil, rosemary, hibiscus oil.”

  “I wouldn’t know whether to cook with it or put it on my face.”

  “Roger uses hibiscus oil.” Wistfully, Neko picked up the makeup base and read the rest of the label, barely summoning the strength to return it to the counter.

  “But Roger isn’t here now,” I said, deciding to take a firm hand with my lovelorn familiar. I wasn’t totally heartless, though. I knew that I’d have to do something to distract him. “I’m going to have to rely on you to help me.”

  “Me?” Neko perked up at that, but then he remembered that he was supposed to be drowning in the slough of despond.

  “You.”

  “What are you looking for?” Melissa sounded incredulous, and I tried to flash her a warning look over Neko’s bowed head.

  “A new image. A new me. I’ve got fingernails for the first time in my adult life. I remembered to put on Pick Me Up Pink lipstick every morning last week. I have to do something to brighten up my colonial wardrobe. And there’s certainly a lot to choose from here.”

  When I’d started cranking out my explanation, I had no idea what I would say. I didn’t even know what half the things were in the store; I’d certainly never applied them to my body before. But the more I thought about it, the more I wondered why I shouldn’t go on a shopping spree. After all, my brilliant foundation idea looked like it was going to be a bust. I wasn’t likely to shed my Martha Washington look anytime soon. I might as well do all I could to freshen up my appearance. Especially if I ever hoped to regain Jason’s attention, after the Great Indoor Barbecue fiasco.

  “Come on, Neko,” I said. “What would you suggest?”

  “Mojitos. Extra rum.”

  “I’m serious!”

  “So am I,” he said mournfully.

  “We’ll make the mojitos,” I promised. “But first you have to help me choose some makeup.”

  Nothing. I was having flashbacks to the babysitting I had done when I was twelve, to my desperate attempts to get an overtired five-year-old to pay attention to dinner and get ready for bed.

  Melissa wasn’t helping. She had wandered down the counter, studying the rest of the Tarte line. I watched her pick up a palette of eye-shadow and flip it over so that she could read the price tag. It must have been pretty steep; she practically slammed it back into its Lucite holder.

  Well, fine then. I wasn’t going to waste the rest of my evening trying to orchestrate fun for the whole gang. “Okay,” I said. “I’m just going to buy this eye-liner, and then we can go.” I chose the purple one. Purple has always been one of my favorite colors—that must go back to my Barbie dream-girl days.

  “You’re not going to buy the plum!” Neko could not have sounded more scandalized if I had suggested stripping bare and performing a bump and grind under the chic store’s pinlights. A dozen heads swiveled in our direction.

  “Um, no,” I said, blushing a color only a shade lighter than the offending eye-liner. “I just meant that I would buy this brand.”

  Neko took the pencil from my hand and eased it back into its container. “Step away from the plum. It would bring out all the red in your face. You need something green. But not too green. You don’t want to lean toward sallow. Green-blue. Like Roger’s eyes….”

  And for a moment there, I’d thought we were making progress. Melissa rolled her own eyes. “Look,” she said. “I’m heading down to the bakery. I’ll make the mojitos. Come down when you’re finished here.”

  I nodded, not quite ready to give up on revivifying Neko. I was certain that we’d be fine for the rest of the weekend if I could just make him forget his vacationing love for five straight minutes. Consecutive minutes. Whatever. “Go on,” I said to Melissa. “Just don’t forget to—”

  “Add extra lime. I know.”

  I gave her a finger wave as she ducked out the door. She actually shook her head when she got out to the street, as if she were clearing away a physical residue of frou-frou girliness. I thought of a Labrador retriever puppy shaking off raindrops.

  “Green-blue,” I prompted Neko. “Help me find something.”

  “It doesn’t really matter.”

  “All right then.” I strode over to the Cargo display. “I’ll go with this Casablanca palette. Mmmm. Caramel lip gloss.”

  “Caramel?” Neko’s shriek actually stopped a transaction at the cash register. He swept over to me and covered my hand with his own. “If you get the caramel, you will absolutely look like a corpse. It will bleach every hint of color that you have in your cheeks.”

  I bit back a smile as Neko led me down the row. “Here,” he said. You need something more pink. A little sheer. No glitter.”

  His hands moved as if he were dealing blackjack. Before I knew it, I was holding foundation and blush, pressed powder and loose. He passed me a pair of eye-liners and a tube of mascara. Seven lipsticks—they were all just too luscious to pass up he assured me—and three different bottles of nail polish.

  With each category of cosmetic, Neko became more of the man I knew and—well, not quite loved, but expected. He offered bitter criticisms of some products. “Can you imagine who buys that? She’d have to have the skin of an elephant and the coloring of a three-hundred-year-old witch. Oh. Present company excepted.” I bit my tongue and kept from pointing out that I had a few years left before I hit the three-century mark.

  He was on a roll. “Orange? Who needs orange lipstick? There isn’t a woman alive who would look good in orange lipstick.” My favorite was when he checked out the sample of glittery body powder. He shook the powder puff against its ornate cardboard box with an expert flick of his wrists before he highlighted his collar bones with the faintest hint of gold sparkles. “Stunning!” he pronounced himself.

  “Enough!” I said, figuring that we had done sufficient retail therapy. “I can’t buy all this stuff.”

  “Why not?”

  “Fifty dollars is my limit. I’m just a working librarian, remember?” The Peabridge might be paying my rent, but I didn’t have a stash of hundred-dollar bills for all Neko’s treasures.

  “There are ways,” he countered, waggling his eyebrows in a manner that suggested something utterly unethical. Or at least immo
ral.

  I was afraid to ask if he meant shoplifting or peddling my own pitiful body to pay for the wares. “David Montrose would have you turned back into a cat statue faster than you can blink if he even heard you make that suggestion.”

  I watched him contemplate retorts. One even bubbled to his lips. But he thought better of his words and settled for a shrug. “Well, you have to get the eye-liner. And the nail polish. The stuff you have on is working wonders; you really need it to remind yourself not to gnaw.”

  He made me sound like a rabbit, but I decided not to take offense. Instead, I said, “And we’ll add the blush. I’ll get lipstick another day—stay with Pick Me Up Pink for a bit longer.”

  He gazed wistfully at the products we were abandoning. “Can’t we just add the foundation?”

  “Nope.”

  “The Tarte Clean Slate?”

  “You are incorrigible! It would cost half my budget. No.”

  He pouted. “I can’t be held responsible for the damage if you don’t take my advice.”

  “No one is holding you responsible for anything. And there won’t be any damage. Besides, if I spend all my money here, I won’t be able to get my hair cut.”

  “You’re getting your hair cut?” I might have told him I was giving him a pony for his birthday. He clasped his hands and held them close to his chest. “You’re having Roger cut it, aren’t you! Tell me that you are! Tell me that you’ll let him do it! Please, please, please!”

  “Yes!” I said, laughing.

  “Then I forgive you for getting my hopes up here.” He fondled the mascara and bid it farewell with one last sigh.

  We paid a small fortune for my three new cosmetics, and I let the salesgirl put my loot into a cute bag. Neko prattled on about the choices that we’d made, debating the considerable merits of blue-green over green-blue. At least he’d recovered from his heartbreak.

  Melissa greeted us at the back door to Cake Walk. She already had the drinks made, and she was sipping from her own well-iced glass. We followed her upstairs to the Snuggery, her name for the cozy one-room apartment on the townhouse’s second floor. She raised her eyebrows at Neko’s streaming commentary about her throw pillows, her coffee table, her breakfast nook, and the color of her walls. I shrugged when she gave me a questioning look, but we both knew that it was better to ignore his transition from moping and lovesick to hyper and designer-obsessed.

  “So,” she said, when we were gathered on her couch and matching loveseat. “When am I going to see you work some of your magic, Jane?”

  I wriggled deeper into the pillows and sipped from the mojito she had just passed me. “Not tonight. I promised David I wouldn’t combine alcohol and magic.”

  “You’ve had one sip.”

  I looked at Neko. He shrugged elaborately. “My lips are sealed,” he said, taking great care to lock them with an invisible key.

  “Well, I don’t know. I mean, I don’t have a lot of skills yet. If you want to fall in love with me at first sight, then great, I’ve got that covered. Or if you want to set your kitchen on fire—I know how to handle that.”

  “It doesn’t have to be anything big.”

  “Neko?” I asked, uncertain of what I should try.

  “How about that candle?” He gestured to the three-wick monster that Melissa had centered on her coffee table. I knew that she lit it for a few minutes each night, using it to calm her thoughts before she went to bed.

  “I don’t know the spell for lighting it.” I tried to hide the exasperation in my voice.

  “Well, I do, silly. That’s my job, remember?”

  I stuck my tongue out at him. Of course I knew that was his job, but I wasn’t exactly sure how all this worked. He grinned and moved closer to me, pressing his leg up against mine in a comforting way. When he spoke again, his voice was soft, quiet enough that Melissa would not be able to make out his words. “I’ll tell you the spell. You just repeat after me. This is a fire spell, in the same family as the one you did on Thursday. Do you remember how to start it?”

  I nodded, glancing at Melissa to see if she thought I was nuts. She was staring in rapt fascination, but she didn’t seem ready to call the men in white coats. Yet. “Four deep breaths,” I said to Neko. “Then I touch my head, my throat, and my heart.”

  “Perfect,” he said, and he settled even closer to me as I went through the routine. I felt the same thrum that had risen earlier in the week, the tingling energy that had released itself into water and air and earth. “Now point to the first wick,” he said. I did. “And say after me:

  Candle light, candle bright

  Wick kindle, bring sight.”

  Well, that was simple enough. I repeated the words, but I couldn’t keep from gasping when the first wick blossomed with golden light. The vibrating power inside me ratcheted down a notch.

  Neko nodded. “Go ahead, then. You can do the other two.”

  And he was right. I could. I repeated the little rhyme, pointing at each wick. Obediently, they also bloomed with little tongues of fire.

  I felt calm inside when I had finished. I knew that I had spent some energy, but I was not at all exhausted. In fact, I felt a little as if I had successfully completed a supported headstand, the same rush of pleased success. “Salamba Sirsasana,” I whispered, wondering how I had remembered that phrase.

  “What?” Melissa asked, finally pulling her eyes away from the candle.

  “Nothing,” I said. “I was just remembering something else.”

  “That is amazing,” Melissa said, clearly not listening to my answer. Instead, she was craning her neck, checking her candle as if she thought I might have worked some sleight of hand with smoke and mirrors. When she looked up at me, there was a hint of awe in her face. “What happens now?”

  I glanced at Neko.

  “Now, you feed us something,” he said. “Do you have any tuna?”

  Before Melissa could think about searching her kitchen, I gave her the real answer to her question. “Now, we wait for David Montrose to appear. He’ll read me the riot act and tell me what I’ve done wrong.”

  But I was mistaken. David did not arrive. And, when I finally gave up waiting for him and drank the rest of my mojito, I realized that I was just a little bit disappointed. Not as disappointed as Neko, though, when he found out that Melissa’s cupboards were bereft of canned fish products.

  I poured a second drink and reminded myself that I did not want to see my warder when I was working new spells during cocktail hour. And for a few minutes, I even believed myself.

  Chapter 18

  On Monday morning, Evelyn was waiting for me beside my desk the instant I arrived at the library. “Just a second,” I said. “I’ll turn on the latte machine.”

  “This is more important.”

  More important than the precious aroma of Colombian Roast filling the lobby? Evelyn had always insisted that I prepare our coffee service first thing; we could lure early morning researchers that way. Besides, if we were ready to serve them right when the doors opened, we were more likely to get their repeat business before they finished their library work.

  I locked my purse into my desk drawer and straightened to look at her. Deep lines cut beside her lips, making her face look even more jowly than usual. I was sure that Neko would know some cosmetic fix, but I didn’t have the courage to suggest such a thing. “Is everything OK?” I asked, apprehension twisting my stomach.

  “Come into my office.”

  Gulp. This was serious.

  I followed Evelyn into her glassed-in office, shutting her door as she took her seat. She was wearing a brown and green tweed suit, with a large, loose weave. The colors weren’t terrible on her, but the cut was far too boxy. More advice that I’d absorbed from Neko. More advice that I wouldn’t share.

  Evelyn nodded her head toward one of the guest chairs. I sat down, but I did not lean back. Something told me not to get too comfortable. “What?” I finally asked.

  “Satur
day night, something came to my attention, and I spent all day yesterday trying to figure out the best way to discuss it with you.”

  Saturday night. She had been strolling by Cake Walk, and she had looked up to see me light the candle in Melissa’s apartment, without benefit of match or Zippo. Or she had watched Neko and me frolicking in Sephora. Could she have stopped by the cottage while I wasn’t home? Oh my God—had she stumbled on the collection of books?

  That must be it. She had discovered the trove of witch books. She had found the valuable leather and parchment, noted its complete and utter disarray. Even if she weren’t furious with me for keeping the collection a secret, she must be angry that I had done nothing to preserve the rare tomes.

  Every fiber of my being wanted to explain. I wanted to tell her all about my witchcraft experiences, let her know that I completely understood the responsibility that had fallen into my lap. I wanted to say that I would never harm the books, and that I would get them into some semblance of order, and that I was only using my powers for good and not for evil.

  I mean, putting out the fire in my kitchen had been good, hadn’t it?

  The fire in my kitchen. Oh no. Was that what she was upset about? Had she heard that I’d invited Jason over for dinner? Had he complained to my boss?

  “Evelyn, I can explain.”

  He’d been my Imaginary Boyfriend for almost a year, I would tell her. I’d watched him, every day that he’d come in. I knew his study habits. I knew his writing style. I knew everything about him, and I knew that he and I would be perfect together. Once he got around to recognizing the same. Once he thought to ask me out.

  “I can’t tell you how embarrassed I was,” Evelyn said, shaking her head. She really should think about getting her hair cut. That length was just so unflattering, the way the ends of her hair curled under right beside her jaw. Of course, if she colored it, instead of leaving it that mousy grey….