Still, I couldn’t deny that serving other people was good for me. It kept me sober, and, strangely enough, it gave me a sense of peace. Not a good reason to get involved in charity, but it was undoubtedly a fringe benefit.
And as much as anything, I needed to feel like I was doing something good. Something more than carving my physique at a gym, learning to fight, or filling pint glasses for patrons.
“Reverend!” a man said as I walked through the door.
There were Cecil and Shanda, along with their daughter, Grace, standing between them. She was using a cane.
“Well, hello!” I said. “How nice to see you.”
I looked at Grace. “How are you doing?”
“I’m great!” Grace piped up.
Cecil smiled. “Her legs are weak. The cane helps her balance, but she’s managing. And I’m sure her strength will come in time.”
“Most definitely,” I said, grinning. “So, have you come for dinner?”
Cecil nodded. “Sloppy Joe night.”
“Grace’s favorite,” Shanda added. “We’d never miss it.”
“Well, enjoy your meal. And if those Sloppy Joes are as good as you say, I might just have to get one myself.”
“They’re the best!” Grace said, still smiling.
“Reverend,” Cecil said, pulling me aside while Shanda helped her daughter to her seat. “Thank you, again. She’s been smiling for two days straight, ever since you healed her. I know you were reluctant, but thank you.”
I extended my hand. Cecil grabbed it and gripped it tightly. “It was my pleasure, Cecil. Enjoy your meal.”
“What was that about?” a voice asked from behind me. I turned, and it was Evelyn, peering at me curiously. “Nice to see you, Caspar.”
“You too, Evelyn. That family, they came to our church on Sunday.”
Evelyn raised one eyebrow. “So you’re the minister they say healed her? I figured it must’ve been a Pentecostal church.”
I chuckled. “Not this time. I’m just grateful she’s doing well.”
“So, how’d you do it?” Evelyn asked.
“I can’t say for sure how it works. I visualized her getting better.”
“Not that,” Evelyn said. “The bigger miracle is, how did you convince your council to let you assist? I got your text. I was as surprised as anyone.”
I smiled. “Well, they are still reluctant, but they agreed we could handle the evenings you aren’t already serving.”
Evelyn nodded. “Well, I suppose that’s a start. I don’t see why they wouldn’t be willing to serve together on the same evenings.”
I rolled my eyes. “Stodgy bastards.”
Evelyn laughed out loud. “I like you, Cruciger.”
“But they can’t prevent me from helping out. Tell me what I can do,” I said. “Show me the ropes. If we’re going to start doing this on other evenings, I need to learn whatever I can.”
Evelyn extended one finger in the air. “One second. I’ll be right back.”
A minute later, Evelyn returned with a mauve apron.
“Don’t you have any other colors?” I asked. “Mauve isn’t my favorite.”
“When it’s covered in sloppy joe, you won’t even notice.” Evelyn handed it to me.
“Mauve it is,” I said. “That’s a pretty word. ‘Mauve.’”
Evelyn smirked. “I suppose it is. If you’d like, you can work the line. Just grab a ladle and scoop. Not much more to it than that.”
I nodded. “Will do. Thanks, Evelyn.”
I slipped my apron over my head and reached around my back to tie it, then stepped toward the buffet bar where the servers were dishing out the food.
And my foot caught on something.
I lost my balance and fell directly into the path of one of the volunteers carrying a tray of warm sloppy joe sauce.
It was it all in slow motion: my body hitting the floor, the look on the volunteer’s face turning to shock, the tray tumbling end over end and the sloppy joe sauce flying.
Thud!
I hit the ground.
Splat!
The tray flipped over and fell right on top of my head.
I sat up and wiped sloppy joe from my eyes.
Three kids were giggling in the distance.
I looked down.
My shoelaces were tied together.
Those kids?
I would have noticed.
Fairies! It had to be fairies!
I heard a snicker. I turned and looked up at Evelyn.
“You aren’t in mauve anymore. That’s something, at least.”
I licked my lips. “Well, it is delicious. I can see why the kids like this stuff.”
“Caspar, bathroom’s in the back. Let me see if I can find you another shirt from the donation pile. And another mauve apron.”
I nodded. “Thanks.”
It felt like a walk of shame. My face, hair, and torso were covered in sloppy joe.
“Bad day?” a random passerby asked.
I nodded. “You could say that.”
The bathroom wasn’t large. The soup kitchen was in an old, closed-down cafeteria, and the bathrooms hadn’t been updated since the seventies. They contained a small mirror and a sink big enough to splash water on my face and make myself nearly presentable.
The sink was too shallow to douse my head. I grabbed a paper towel and wiped away as much mess as I could.
I heard a high-pitched giggle.
No, it wasn’t a child. It was too squeaky to be a kid.
Then a bright green orb-shaped glow whizzed across the bathroom, flushing all the toilets before disappearing in thin air.
Must’ve been a fairy. Neither Layla nor Brag’mok had told me what they looked like, but what else could it be?
“Where are you?” I asked. “Come out, wherever you are!”
I heard tapping in one of the bathroom stalls.
“Someone in there?”
No response. More tapping.
I pressed on the door.
A fountain of water sprayed out of the toilet directly into my face.
I gagged.
Just the thought! It was toilet water.
I quickly went back to the sink and splashed my face with clean water.
I heard a squeak, and the warm water was turned off.
“Stop it!” I shouted, not seeing how the fairy or whatever it was had pulled it off.
I reached into the water again, then yanked my hand out of it. This time, it was scalding hot.
I sighed, grabbed a paper towel, and quickly ran it under the water before the heat could get to me. A warm paper towel; I’d have to settle for that.
I looked in the mirror and sighed again.
Presentable enough.
I walked out of the bathroom.
Someone tugged on my arm.
It was a boy, and not one I recognized.
“Sir,” he said. “Your fly is down.”
I shook my head.
Fucking fairies.
Chapter Sixteen
So much for making progress with the soup kitchen.
Why was a fairy messing with me?
Was it because of the whole ordeal at the gym? Maybe it was an accumulation of things. Healing folks. Flying around like a superhero. Wielding more magic than any other human had in centuries, as far as I knew. If the fairies deemed themselves the Earth’s magic police, I suppose my emergence had given them something to do, if nothing else.
I was waiting for the next prank.
I guarded every step as if I was walking across eggshells. I looked all around as I made my way back to the Metro for a ride home, expecting a ball to fly toward my head, a car to swerve over the sidewalk, or a manhole cover missing in the middle of the sidewalk. Anything unexpected. That was the problem. It was hard to keep an eye out for pranks or fairy tricksters when there was no telling what they’d do.
It seemed like none of this stuff had happened until after Layla left. Was th
at a coincidence? Maybe, maybe not.
And what did the fairies want? Layla had said they acted up as a warning. To show the person that there were consequences to using magic. That magic had a price, one that was exacted by their antics.
I made it home safely, but I was still uneasy.
My stomach was churning from anxiety.
I unlocked the door to my apartment. Agnus was snoozing on the couch. Everything appeared to be in order.
I took a deep breath and exhaled. It seemed like the fairies hadn’t messed with the apartment.
But my stomach was still unsettled.
I made my way to the bathroom, undid my trousers, and sat on the toilet seat.
And something cold squirted me in the ass.
“What the…”
I stood up. It looked like…was that ketchup on my ass?
I lifted the lid, and two ketchup packets fell from the rim into the toilet bowl.
“Dammit!” I shouted. Ketchup is good on a lot of things. A butt cheek isn’t one of them.
I grabbed some toilet paper and cleaned myself up.
At least this one had been moderately humorous and painless.
But it had also spoiled the illusion of sanctuary I thought my apartment represented.
I finished my business without incident.
It could have been worse. They could have cellophaned the toilet bowl—an old college dorm prank. I wasn’t about to mention that one out loud.
Didn’t want to give them any ideas.
There was a knock on my front door.
I quickly tidied myself the rest of the way.
Who in the world was stopping by at this time in the evening?
I opened the door.
As the door swung inward, a giant trash barrel fell toward me, and water flooded the entryway of my apartment.
“How the hell!?!?” I shouted. “They’re so small. How the hell did they lift a trash barrel full of water?”
Agnus was awake now, and he was staring at me, his head cocked to one side. “You going to clean that up?”
I narrowed my eyes and glared back at my cat. “What choice do I have?”
It took every towel I had in my closet. Thankfully, I didn’t have carpet in the entryway. The only part of my apartment with carpet was the bedroom. This prank had been a much bigger pain than the ketchup under the toilet seat, but it was still relatively harmless—nothing I couldn’t handle.
But what would be next?
That was the point, I imagined. To keep me worried about the next shoe to drop. To convince me to stop using magic.
Or at least to be more careful about how I was using it.
I tossed my towels into the washer, added detergent, and turned it on. They weren’t all that filthy, but I didn’t know where the water had come from. For all I knew, it was fairy piss. Or sewer water.
It didn’t smell bad, but that didn’t mean anything.
I needed a shower, then I was going to bed. How much more could go wrong?
I checked the shower. Butter hadn’t been spread on the floor. I turned on the water and checked the temperature. It was normal.
So far, so good.
I stripped down and got in the shower. I washed my body. I shampooed my hair.
I rinsed off and sighed in relief as I turned off the water and grabbed my towel.
I examined it carefully—no scorpions in the towel. No snakes. I was good.
I dried my hair first. Why the hell were there chunks of hair in my towel? I pulled at my hair. More chunks, falling out.
I looked in the garbage can and shook my head. A bottle of Nair hair removal cream.
The damn fairies had put it in my shampoo.
I stepped back into the shower. More hair came out, circling the drain.
I didn’t have any extra towels because I’d used them to clean up the water.
I shook out my towel as best I could, then dried off.
I looked at myself in the mirror. My hair was now patchy.
There was only one solution to this problem.
I had a beard trimmer under the sink. I hadn’t had a beard for a while, but I used to have a goatee and had used the trimmer to maintain it.
I plugged it in and switched it on, half-expecting that it wouldn’t work.
But it did, so I shaved off the rest of my hair.
Chapter Seventeen
Brag’mok tilted his head as I approached him in the park for our day’s training. “What did you do?”
I sighed. “I think I pissed off a fairy.”
My giant friend grunted. “I was talking about your hair. But since you mentioned a fairy, I’m sure that had something to do with it.”
I snorted. “You could say that.”
“What did you do, magic-wise, to anger a fairy?” Brag’mok asked.
I bit my lip. “Nothing. Just used a little magic to push through my gym routine.”
“Why would you do that?” Brag’mok snorted. “You need to get the most out of your training.”
I sighed. “Because Layla hired a trainer for me, and he’s a douche bag. I was just fucking with him.”
Brag’mok shook his head. “Then that’s why. You didn’t use magic for good, although also not for evil. You used it to pull a joke, a prank, on someone. Now, you’re getting your just desserts.”
“Sweet justice? How is that justice? I pulled one prank. Since yesterday, this fairy has been going after me non-stop. How do I convince him to quit?”
Brag’mok shrugged. “Karma’s a bitch.”
I rolled my eyes. “If this is karma, you’d think one prank would suffice. That’s all I did, just one.”
Brag’mok shook his head. “And he’ll keep going at it until he’s convinced you’ve changed. Until you’ve balanced things out.”
I sighed. “I healed a girl on Sunday. You’d think I’d earned enough good karma with that to counter-balance one prank. Enough that one joke wouldn’t elicit fairy wrath.”
Brag’mok shook his head. “It doesn’t work that way. That’s like saying because you did a lot of good in your life, you have a free pass to commit crimes.”
“Not a free pass,” I said. “But even in cases like that, the judge will usually consider character witnesses and such. Give you a lesser sentence if the crime was an isolated out-of-character act.”
“Fairies don’t see it that way,” Brag’mok assured me.
“Obviously.” I huffed. “So what sort of good do I have to do?”
Brag’mok shrugged. “It’s not just about doing good as much as it is about demonstrating you’re sorry. Achieving balance through contrition, not charity. After all, fairies don’t care about your love for your fellow man. They just want to know you won’t use magic recklessly again.”
“How would I do that?” I asked.
“Humiliate yourself, so the fairy doesn’t have to.” Brag’mok stared at me intently.
“Like, go streaking through the park?” I asked.
“If you don’t mind getting arrested,” Brag’mok said. “That might do it.”
“Fair point,” I said. “Not to mention a streaking minister would almost definitely make the front page of the Post-Dispatch. Well, maybe not the main article. They’d need a picture for that.”
“What is the one thing that would embarrass you more than anything else?” Brag’mok asked.
I sighed. “I don’t know. I mean, after years of drinking, I’ve pretty much had my share of embarrassment.”
“You can’t think of anything you could do to embarrass yourself?” Brag’mok asked.
“Well, there’s that show where those friends go around and have an earpiece in and have to do or say whatever their other friends say. That’s pretty embarrassing.”
Brag’mok grinned. “We can work with that.”
“We don’t have an earpiece,” I said.
Brag’mok shook his head. “Not exactly true. I have one. It’s how I could hear you when you were in the
car. Also, how I communicate with my contacts back on New Albion. I have another one.”
“Convenient,” I said, rolling my eyes. Brag’mok reached into his bag and pulled out a small crystal. I took it. “What do I do with this?”
“Just stick it in your ear,” Brag’mok said. “You should be able to hear whatever I say.”
I sighed and stuck the little device in my ear. Not as comfortable as earbuds and not contoured to the human ear, but it stuck.
“Now,” Brag’mok said. “See that jogger?”
I nodded. “The lady in the yoga pants?”
“Go up to her,” Brag’mok said. “I’ll tell you what to say when you get there.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Just go easy on me, all right.”
“That would defeat the purpose, human. Hurry up before she gets too far away.”
I sighed. “All right, here goes nothing.”
I darted across the grass, angling my trajectory so I’d catch up with the woman. I waved my hands to get her attention. “Excuse me, miss?”
The woman stopped, cocked her head, and removed her headphones as I approached her, nearly out of breath. “Can I help you?”
Brag’mok gave me instructions in my ear. I bit my lip. I didn’t want to say what he wanted me to say. Everything in me said not to do it. But that was the point, right?
“Ma’am, I don’t mean to be rude or anything. But I noticed your pants are a bit too tight. I wondered if you’d like to get into mine?”
The woman busted out laughing. “I have to say, that’s maybe the best pick-up line I’ve heard in a while. But I’m married. Happily. So, no, thank you.”
“It wasn’t a pick-up line,” I said.
The woman rolled her eyes, and put her headphones back on. “Try someone else.”
“Did she turn you down?” Brag’mok asked, cackling through the earpiece.
“Of course she did,” I said as the woman jogged away. “I can’t believe I just asked a random woman that.”
“Let’s try another one,” Brag’mok said. “For good measure?”
I sighed. “Might as well.”
“There, at two o’clock,” Brag’mok said. “She’s pretty, don’t you think?”
Old Dogma New Tricks (The Elven Prophecy Book 2) Page 10
