The Boy Who Couldn't Fly Straight (The Broom Closet Stories)

by Jeff Jacobson

  “This one’s mine,” Beverly said, pulling out a broom made of a light-colored wood. “Birch. Fast and supple. But a bit tricky to maneuver when starting out.”

  She removed another broom from the closet and held it out to Charlie, sizing up how they looked together.

  “This ought to do. It’s mahogany. A very hard, solid wood. It should give you a feeling of stability.”

  The broomstick was a dark reddish-brown, and a lot bulkier-looking than Beverly’s. But it wasn’t as thick as the training brooms they’d used in the field near Malcolm’s cabin.

  “If you like it, we can call it yours. But I want you to be able to test it out first, okay?”

  He nodded. The idea of having his own broomstick was so exciting that he was suddenly afraid if he talked out loud, it would be taken away from him. He knew he was being silly, but he kept his mouth closed anyway.

  Beverly locked up her workroom. Together they walked into the garage and out the door that led to the backyard.

  “You’ll have to get used to flying in the rain if you ever want to ride around in Seattle. But for tonight, you’re lucky. Mostly a clear sky.”

  They walked past the hedges framing the sides of the yard and stopped where the grass ended. There was about a foot of soil beyond, with small rose bushes and hydrangeas acting as a natural barrier. Then, a steep decline that led down to blackberry bushes about twenty feet beneath his feet. He peeked over the edge and could see the rooftops, far below, of the homes that extended from the end of their property straight out to the Sound.

  Moonlight softened the edges of everything in the yard that was sharp and bright during the day, turning the grass a metallic gray, silvering the leaves of the trees. The twin lights of a large ferry, crossing over to Vashon Island, shone over the dark water. A slight wind was the only sound he could hear.

  “How are we going to…?” Charlie whispered, for the night was quiet and it seemed like the right thing to do. “What if someone sees us?”

  “Don’t worry about that. I’ll whip up a little concealment for us. It won’t turn us invisible. It’ll just help us blend into things.”

  Charlie’s heart started to pound. The drop-off in front of him wasn’t a sheer cliff face, but it might has well have been. If he fell from this height, he would definitely hurt himself.

  “You scared?” whispered Beverly.

  “Yeah, a little.”

  “Good. You should be. I want you to gain a healthy respect for broom flight. You’ll grow to love it. I just know you will. But don’t ever forget that it’s just a small piece of wood holding you up, hundreds of feet in the air. There are no seat belts. If you keep that in mind and stay smart, you’ll do fine.

  “And don’t forget - I’ll be right here with you. Now, go ahead and set your broom down. Do you remember the Words?”

  “I think so.”

  He placed his broom down on the wet grass, held his hand over it, closed his eyes, and let the Words find him. The cold air helped to clear his mind. He parted his lips, and could feel a tingling sensation gather around him as the Words began to flow from his mouth.

  The broom didn’t smack into his palm the way it did at Malcolm’s. It rose gently up into his hand. He held it in his grip and looked at Beverly.

  “Smarty! You’re such a natural.”

  She lifted her leg over her own broom before nodding at him to do the same.

  “Ready?”

  “I think so.”

  “Good.”

  And with that, they pushed off the ground together and floated out over the black expanse of night awaiting just beyond the edge of the backyard.

  Chapter 60

  Charlie looked down and saw the blackberry bushes far below the broom handle. He dropped several feet, causing his stomach to lurch.

  “Whoa!” he shouted, his voice echoing off the hills.

  “That’s okay,” he heard his aunt say from somewhere above him. “You just hit an air pocket. Come back up a bit.”

  He leaned back, stopping his descent.

  The tip of his aunt’s broom come up on his left side, and soon they flew side by side, soaring forward, the wind cold on his face.

  “Keep breathing,” his aunt yelled.

  ‘God, why did he always hold his breath?’ he wondered, exhaling.

  He relaxed, convinced at the moment that he wasn’t going to plummet to his death, or at least to a painful encounter with the blackberry bushes beneath them.

  He looked down, and found that the distance to the ground didn’t seem as frightening as it had been, back at the edge of the yard. He watched as the pointed roofs of the homes passed beneath the length of his broomstick.

  A minivan drove through the winding streets that ran through the neighborhood below. It was a strange vantage point to have: to watch the roof of the van, from a good three or four stories above, and the yellow light spilling out onto the street in front of it, illuminating garage doors, recycling bins, and juniper bushes as the van drove past house after house.

  The taste of salt in the air grew stronger as they passed the last of the houses and flew low, out over the water. He relaxed even more, knowing that he could survive a ten-foot drop into the water much better than a fall hundreds of feet above blackberry brambles, chimneyed rooftops, and TV antennas.

  He wondered how fast they were going. It was difficult to tell. It felt faster than riding a bike downhill, but slower than being in a car on the freeway. And unlike a car or a bike, flying on a broom was smoother. The air pockets created dips and rises, but none of the bouncing or shaking you got when wheels spun over pavement.

  He liked how his broom felt. It was solid, like Beverly said it would be, but glided through the air much better than the one he had used at Malcolm’s, which, compared to this, felt like it had training wheels on it. He wondered if Malcolm’s brooms had some sort of spell on them to make them go slowly.

  He felt a tapping on his shoulder. He turned to see Beverly pointing down to the surface of the dark water and smiling, her teeth white against the night’s background.

  Charlie looked down and saw the silhouettes of two figures flying on broomsticks. Their shadows rippled and reformed as they passed wave after silver-crested wave, the moonlight pulling their dark shapes along the way a child pulls a toy on a string.

  It was a breathtaking view, quiet and wonderful. The colors of moonlight, silver and gray blending in with the shadowy dark, created a soft, textured sheen over the surface of the water. It was cold, but the lighting made everything seem gentle.

  Charlie remembered a children’s book that his mother used to read to him when he was young. In it, a family of bears drove their station wagon down a tree-lined, country road at night. A large yellow moon rose in front of the car.

  The sky in the storybook was covered with a black, synthetic material made to resemble velvet, and Charlie used to rub it between his fingers while his mother read to him about the bears and their adventures.

  The quality of the light around them, the weightless journey, the silver on the water, their shadows, all of it had the same velvety feel to him. Charlie wanted to extend his hand and rub the night between his fingers, convinced that it would feel as soft, and as smooth. He resisted, deciding that it would be better to keep a firm grip on his broom handle.

  A thought arose in his mind, surprising him. ‘Maybe I am home now.’

  ––––—

  “We’re going to land over there on Blake,” Beverly yelled. Several strands of her hair had slipped out from beneath her knitted cap and were whipping past her head as she pulled up in front of him and looked back over her shoulder.

  She was pointing to the small, uninhabited island to the north of Vashon. All Charlie could see were trees and rocks as they flew closer. His vision was better than when they’d first stepped out in the backyard, but it was still hard to distinguish shapes in the dark. How was he going to land on ground that wasn’t covered with rocks? What if he
fell into the water? As they flew closer to the landmass, Charlie strained to see a clear landing spot.

  Beverly shot ahead, and slipped both legs over to one side of her broom. It reminded him of a documentary he had seen about the bicycle culture of the Netherlands. He remembered how people there tended to dismount, swinging both legs in front of them and to the side of the bike and then stepping down onto the ground. This was quite different from how he and his friends got off their bikes, by stopping first, straddling the bike with both feet on either side, and then lifting one leg up and over the seat.

  As the island loomed closer, Charlie saw a long stretch of beach that was free of boulders. Beverly angled her broom so that it ran parallel to the open, sandy patch. She sank toward the ground, slowed down, and then simply slid off the broom, standing up gracefully.

  He flew toward her, not exactly sure how to slow his broom down. He decided not to flip his legs over the side the way she had; he worried that such a movement would toss him headfirst into the water.

  “Slow it down, slow it down,” he heard Beverly cautioning him.

  As he glided past the water and over the sand, he turned his broom parallel the way his aunt had. He also pulled back on the broom handle to slow his flight. It was too much at once. The broom nearly stopped in mid-air. He spun off the side like he’d done in the field at Malcolm’s. This time, however, he remembered to release his legs instead of clinging to the broom like a chimp hugging a tree branch. He hung from his hands about a foot above the sand, then let go of the broom and dropped to the ground.

  “Oomph!” he grunted.

  “An excellent, if unusual landing,” Beverly said. “A high score for creativity.”

  “Thank you very much,” he said, his legs wobbling as he stood up straight and took a bow.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something?” she asked, pointing to the air above him.

  He looked up and saw his broom hovering over his head.

  He reached up and touched it with his fingertips. He closed his eyes, letting the quiet Words escape his mouth, and then felt a dull thud as the broom dropped on his head.

  He laughed. “I think that might disqualify me from the match.”

  –––

  Beverly unzipped the backpack she had been wearing and pulled out a small tarpaulin that she lay over a log. They sat down together. Then she removed some dried apricots, a package of almonds, a bar of dark chocolate, and a thermos of hot Spring Spice tea, with two small porcelain cups.

  “No need to starve to death out here. We can still be civilized,” she added in a bad British accent.

  The tea was spicy and delicious. So were the nuts, which his aunt had dusted with her own blend of wasabi-salt.

  The beach wasn’t as sandy as it had appeared when he’d come in for his landing. It was actually made up of millions of small rocks, almost like gravel. When the surf broke over them, then rushed back away from the shore, the pebbles made clicking noises against each other. It sounded like dried beans being poured into a glass bowl. He found it mesmerizing.

  “When I first learned to ride a broomstick,” said Beverly, “I was just about your age. I wasn’t very good at it. I told my parents it was stupid, and made up excuses about wanting to be more modern. ‘Clearly witches who ride broomsticks are too old-fashioned,’ I used to say, forgetting that my parents both rode brooms themselves.

  “But then one night a family friend came over, and suggested then and there that he take me out for a nighttime ride. Just the two of us. I think my mom put him up to it. At first I didn’t want to, but he persisted, so I just went along with it.

  “It was a night a bit like this. The stars were out, and it was cold. Autumn was definitely in the air. We rode out over Puget Sound. It was so quiet, and I liked how I could feel the sea spray on my face. The man gave me some pointers, but he also encouraged me a lot. What I remember most about that night was the sea spray, and being with a nice older man who didn’t drive me so hard, like Dad always did.”

  She stopped talking, then looked off into the distance. Charlie wondered about his grandfather. So far the stories he’d heard about the man didn’t paint a very nice picture.

  “Whatever happened to him? And to my grandmother? How did they die?”

  “Your grandfather died of brain cancer, and Mom of a heart attack. His was a long, drawn-out thing, and hers, well, she went peacefully in the night.”

  “Brain cancer? How can…? Can’t you, you know, do…?”

  “…something about it?” Beverly finished the question. “It’s the darndest thing. No matter how powerful and amazing we witches think we are, we succumb to illness just like everyone else. We do know ways to promote health. But there aren’t any spells that cure cancer, unfortunately. You’d think we could do that, wouldn’t you? But we’ve never been able to. And I doubt we ever will. When it comes down to it, we’re human just like the rest of the population on this planet. I think that’s a good thing. It keeps us humble, and levels the playing field.”

  Charlie remembered what Malcolm had said to him in the living room before he had been popped, about how witches couldn’t read minds, and how that made it more fair to normal human beings. Witches couldn’t read minds, they couldn’t cure cancer, they died like regular people did. Maybe Charlie should be disappointed that witches weren’t immortal superheroes. Instead, he was more than a little relieved. Being a mind-reading creature immune to disease might make him feel like a monster.

  They sipped their tea in silence and listened to the gravel-rush of the waves washing over the shore. Beverly offered Charlie more of the dried apricots, which he chewed slowly, enjoying their tart-sweet flavor.

  “In the meantime, there’s life to live. Who knows when our number is up? I think death is a great reminder to live life the way we want to, to enjoy it and do what we can do to leave some good on this planet,” she said. She reached down and picked up a rock, then threw it out over the water. He watched it skip several times before it sank, and at each place it skipped, tiny splashes of light exploded.

  “Did you make it do that? Get so bright?” Charlie asked.

  “No, that was phosphorous. It’s little tiny particles that make light when something stirs the water. There is plenty of magic in nature that has nothing to do with witchcraft, Charlie.”

  ––—

  They mounted their brooms and soared high above the water, flying side by side. Charlie looked over his shoulder and watched Blake Island as it gradually shrank in the distance. Beverly pointed out the skyline of downtown Seattle, Lake Washington, and its much smaller counterpart, Lake Union. The lights of the Fauntleroy Ferry dock shone in the clear night air.

  As they approached the shoreline, Charlie spotted their house. Looking closely, he could make out Amos standing at the edge of the garden, wagging his tail. He had no idea how the dog knew they were returning, but was glad to see him.

  “Woof!” Amos barked one time as they came in for a landing. The lawn was much bigger than the small beach on Blake Island. Charlie came in low to the ground, slowed down, then landed with his feet solidly on the grass, his legs straddling either side of the broomstick. It was easy, with no stumbling, flipping, or tripping this time.

  Together they walked toward the house, Amos running back and forth between them. Beverly said, “Feel free to take your broom upstairs with you if you’d like. Play with it. See what it’s like to float around in an enclosed space. That can be trickier than riding in a wide open area. Just no solo flights out your window, okay? Promise me?”

  “I promise.”

  They stepped inside the basement and began removing their hats and gloves, their heavy coats.

  “Thanks, Beverly. That was a really great ride.”

  “You are welcome, Charlie. My pleasure.”

  Chapter 61

  Diego touched and stroked everything above the belt as the two boys lay next to each other on Charlie’s bed. Their kissing deepened, and he could f
eel the boy’s breath blow stronger on his neck and face. Charlie was more relaxed, knowing that they weren’t going to do anything he wasn’t ready to do. Therefore, he found himself exploring and touching his friend with a hunger he hadn’t let himself express before.

  Diego had such a beautiful face. Charlie marveled at the cinnamon brown skin, the long lashes that softened the intensity of his large eyes, the strong nose. And his mouth, his amazing mouth, with its white teeth and thick tongue, the full lips always pulling at him, receiving him.

  He pressed his hips against Diego, who responded in kind. This quickened their kissing and their breathing. Charlie felt light-headed, and decided that while the hip part was amazing, it sped things up too fast. He pulled his mouth away and took a breath.

  Sitting up straight, he leaned back against the headboard and exhaled.

  “What’s the matter?” Diego asked, his lips puffy and his eyes half-closed.

  Charlie smiled and ran his hand over Diego’s black hair.

  “Nothing. Just out of breath is all,” he said.

  “Yeah, I know what you mean.”

  Diego lay his head down on Charlie’s stomach.

  “Do you think this is a good idea?”

  “Do I think what is a good idea?” Charlie asked.

  “This. Us. Kissing. Doing this together. Hanging out.”

  Fear stabbed at Charlie’s chest. Was Diego regretting their friendship? Or whatever they were calling it?

  “No, why? Do you? Is it not, um, good?”

  “Charlie, how can you ask me that? It’s amazing. I really like you a lot. And I love spending time together. It’s just that I don’t want to pressure you. I can’t tell what you’re thinking half the time, and if you’re not into it, well…”

  “But I am. Can’t you tell by how much I, you know, like doing this?”

  “Yeah. I can tell that. But I don’t know. I’ve been out for a long time. You aren’t even sure if you’re gay. Maybe you’re bi. I don’t want to force anything. Ms. Boyd says that it’s really someone’s own choice when and how, even if, they come out. She says that those organizations that force people to come out are doing everyone a disservice. She says it’s better to let people do it when they’re ready.”