by Debra Kristi
Phillip? Nah, I answer my own thought. He’s cute but clueless.
James and Jeanna? I sigh. Grab my book bag and head out the door to school. Arrive with only a few minutes to spare. Barely enough time to collect a hug from each of my coven members and make plans to meet at lunch.
Time passes at such a slow rate; I find myself constantly checking the clock to make sure it isn’t turning backwards. I want for lunch, not because I am hungry, but because of the time I’ll get with my friends. Then I want to bail.
Only, if I bail on the second half of my school day, what will I do with myself? What if Mom is still sleeping and I can’t get ahold of my brother? What if Luna isn’t ready to take my call?
I’ll end up curled in a ball on my bed in a complete state of misery, that’s what I would do. With the environment pressing heavily upon me, I decide the best option… for now… is to suffer through until the end of school.
At lunchtime, James, Jeanna, and I steal away for the far end of the campus. Find a spot where we are assured of privacy. The middle of the football field where there is nothing but dying grass around us. I pick at my food, tossing much of it to the grass in tiny pieces, and update them on everything. Absolutely everything. I tell them all about Luna, her dad’s death, her mom’s overprotective behavior, the men watching the house, the body being picked up, and services being paid for by parties unknown.
I assure them that Luna’s protection spell is in place, and partially powered with my brother’s energy. I also tell them I have no results yet to give regarding my own mom. With all that happened in Luna’s life last night, I didn’t get to talk to my mom, or even see her awake. I even inform them that the bokor, a.k.a. Chuks, called my house the other night… just in case I forgot to mention it earlier.
My head is so filled with stuff I honestly couldn’t remember.
“This is a scary and frustrating time.” Jeanna folds her hands together, weaving and unweaving her fingers over and over again.
“You can say that again.” I tear a piece of my sandwich free and stare at it. Chuck it at the birds that have begun to gather.
“Do you want me to try to talk to my brother about the bokor?” James leans forward and presses his arms into his thighs.
“How well do you trust your brother?” I ask, recalling Michael’s reaction to the inclusion of James’s brother John.
“He’s done some crap things, but I trust him.” He rolls back on his butt and drops forward, slapping his feet to the ground.
“Do you think he’d help us against the bokor—willingly—and be able to keep everything discussed a secret?” I toss several pieces of my sandwich and a small group of birds fight over the bounty.
“Fairly sure.”
“Only fairly?” I counter.
James is quiet for a moment. The fact that he requires time to consider his brother’s trustability doesn’t sit well with me.
“You know what?” I say, stepping in before James can deliver a response. “Let’s not involve John right now. He’s safer not knowing.”
“True that.” James nods his head, his upper body bouncing forward and back ever slightly.
The bell rings signaling the end of lunch. Five minutes to get to class.
“Welp.” Jeanna stands and brushes any clinging grass from her jeans. “I’m going to be late to class. There’s zero chance of me running.”
We all gather the remnants of our meals, toss them in the nearest trash can, and make our way to our respective classrooms to serve our terms till school day’s end.
When I get home from school, I can’t wait any longer. I punch Luna’s number into the kitchen phone.
“You just get home from school?” she asks.
“Just,” I answer. I couldn’t stand the waiting. “How are you holding up?”
“As best can be expected, I guess.” She heaves a breath. “The people from the place. The mortuary. Came to our house today.”
Since when do mortuaries make house calls like that? My gaze narrows. “And?” I ask.
“The burial will be tomorrow, first thing in the morning,” she says.
“So fast?” I balk.
“It’s so fast my extended family can’t even make it in time.” Her voice gives the hint of a whine. “My aunt and uncles on my mom’s side live out of state. They would need time to make arrangements. It’s impossible… and upsetting.”
“I’m so sorry, Luna.” I want to slip through the phone and give her a hug. Because the several I gave her last night aren’t enough.
“My grandparents will be there, and my uncle on my dad’s side. So at least there’s that.” She sniffles. “Mom says the time frame is because of the money. We don’t have the money for a proper burial, so corners are being cut. Primarily those that have to do with the embalming process.”
“Oh.” My body jerks back, and my eyes blink wide. That’s something I hadn’t heard of before, but I guess it makes sense. Not that I’m any expert in the field. “What can I do?” I ask, searching for some way to ease her through this painful time.
“Showing our respect for our departed loved ones is important to my family. Seriously important.” She sighs. “My mom is planning some sort of service a month or so from now so that my whole family can attend. But tomorrow, what family is able to make it will gather at eight in the morning to say goodbye to my dad. Can you come? Hold my hand and lend me your strength?”
“Of course. At your side is the only place I want to be tomorrow morning.”
“What did you do to me?” My mom slaps the phone from my hand.
Chapter Thirteen
With a shiver and a start, I jump back and ogle my mom.
“Mom, what are you…” I blurt.
She lurches forward. Grabs my arm and shakes. “What did you do to me? I want to know.” Her face is dark and shadowed and cut with endless lines of emotion. Most of them red.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I shake my head.
“Don’t play dumb with me, child.” Her eyes tighten on me. “Ever since I first met you, I saw the trouble you and your siblings would bring. But the power… the power made it worth the minor miseries.”
“Mom?” My eyes widen, and my gut drops to the floor.
She torques her head, and her eyes dilate with crazy. “Sorry. She can’t come to the conversation right now.”
Bat dung. Bat dung. Bat dung.
“If you’re not my mom, who are you?”
“Oh, come on Mirabelle. You should know me. We used to share a home,” she sneers. Only, she isn’t really a she. Only in body. But the current inhabiting soul is nothing sweet or gentle.
“Caleb?” I whisper. Mom’s old boyfriend? The guy who tried to kill us all in a house fire?
“There you go. Turns out, there is a brain in there after all.” Mom’s finger taps the top of my skull.
I yank back, try to pull away, and stumble on the phone cord. The receiver spins at my feet, and repetitions of my name bellow from the line. The call with Luna is still connected.
My mom, powered with the strength of Caleb, yanks and pushes my arms. I crash into the wall, sending my rack of spices crashing to the floor. Bottles break. Spices and broken slivers of glass spray outward, covering the vinyl floor.
I lurch forward, grab a shard of glass. It bites my skin, and the warmth of blood begins to trickle along my arm.
“What are you going to do with that?” Caleb asks. “You willing to cut your mother’s pretty face?” Her finger traces the side of her cheek.
I inhale and breathe deep. Remind myself that the person in front of me looks like my mom, but really isn’t. Not currently.
“If I have to,” I say. “But I doubt it will come to that.”
She laughs, her body jolting back with the action. “And what is it you propose will happen? Huh? I’m twice your size. You’re unschooled in the craft. Not to mention, your siblings got the true power.” She stands straight and gazes down at
me, her lips pulling into a smug smile. “How does it make you feel, being the least magickal in the family?”
“I’m plenty magical to whoop your ass.” I raise my hand through the air and then shove it toward him. Twist my arm upward.
The spices swirl up and around my mom’s body. The glass shards rise, create a splintered outer barrier.
“What is this?” Caleb asks. He reaches forward, touches the glass. “Ouch,” Mom’s voice sounds.
I will not be fooled.
With a forward flip of my hands at the side of my head, lids pop free from the remaining jars that still cling to the precariously hung rack. Spices swim through the air and join those already swirling around my foe.
“With spice of earth, I bind to thee. The elements shall now make you sleep.”
The cyclone of herbs and spices drop to the floor and with them, my mom. I stare at her resting face. Breathing, breathing, to catch my breath. I wipe my brow.
My name slips through the air, soft and tiny.
I spin on the floor and recover the phone. “Luna,” I say into the receiver and pull myself to a stand. “I’m sorry. I’m okay, but I have to go.” I press the reset button and dial the number for my brother’s school.
Please, please, please be there. For the love of all that is magickal, be sitting near the phone.
“Hello.” Someone, not Michael, answers the phone.
“Is Mike Roussard there?” I ask.
“Maybe. Think so.”
“Could you get him?” I press, my blood warming. Rising.
“Probably.” The guy sounds unmotivated and lit. Flying a magickally induced high.
My skin is burning. Every inch of my upper body, fuming. What if Mom—slash—Caleb wakes up? “Get him!” I yell. “Get Mike now.”
The guy drops the phone, and I begin to pace. What if it ends up like last time, and no one ever comes back to the phone? What will I do?
“Hello?” Michael’s voice is pinched with tension. Likely warned that an angry caller was on the line.
“Oh. Michael. Michael, I need you now. Can you come? Please?” I plead.
“Belle? What’s happened?”
“It’s Mom.”
I hardly have to finish my first sentence. Michael hangs up the phone after promising he’ll come straight here. I wait impatiently, cowered in the corner of the kitchen, unwilling to take my eyes off the sleeping body on the kitchen floor. Outside, the weather turns from dreary to stormy, sending the rain and wind to bang against the sides of the house.
Five minutes feels like thirty, and then, an hour. The drive time between our house and where Michael currently lives is twenty to thirty minutes depending on traffic. The change of weather, likely slowing his commute. The rumble of his car pulls up to the front of the house, and it’s clear, he came straight away like he’d promised.
He knocks at the front door, and I’m afraid to move out of sight of my mom, in case she wakes up. But if I don’t move, Michael can’t get in, and I’ll be stuck here, alone, until she regains consciousness.
At the count of three, I dash to the front door, unbolt the lock, and dash back. Mom’s body hasn’t moved. Behind me, the front door opens. Closes. Bolts.
“What happened?” Michael looks over my shoulder.
“I spiced him,” I say of Caleb.
Michael rubs his chin. “Appears we have much more than a mind-control or programming spell here.”
“It would appear.” I bite my lip and consider my mom. Never has she acted this insane. Has she been fighting his control all this time and whatever we did broke down her barriers? Or worse, encaged her? “What do we do?”
“This is beyond me.” He leans against the counter. “I might guess this is a possession, except, as far as I know, Caleb isn’t dead. He’s serving his time.”
“We should make sure,” I say. “I’ll ask Phillip to look into Caleb’s current situation.”
“Good idea. If anyone can get answers, it will be him.” He straightens and rubs his hands together. “Okay. Help me with her.”
“Where are we taking her?” I ask.
“To my car.”
I jerk. Spin toward him. A clear what-the-broomstick look on my face.
“Would you rather we tie her to the bed, and you become her daily caregiver? Spritzing her with holy water, cleaning up her messes, and enduring her nasty slurs?”
“No.” The mere thought of that scenario awakens a roll of bile in my gut.
“Okay then. To Grandma’s we go.” He grabs masking tape from the catchall drawer. Spins the roll on his index finger.
“Mom said Grandma’s house causes her pain,” I drop my gaze to Mom. She may have a serious… like deeply serious… issue right now, but I don’t want to cause her any more pain than necessary.
“Good,” Michael retorts. “Probably because the house’s protections attack whatever hold Caleb has on her. Maybe, just being there will help banish his influences.”
My back straightens. That’s something I hadn’t thought of. He could be right. I hope he’s right.
He kneels beside Mom and starts binding her wrists with the tape.
“What are you doing?” I stomp forward.
“I for one, don’t want to die in a fiery crash because she woke up in the back of the car during the drive there,” he says.
“Oh.” I relax. Another good point.
“Pack a bag,” he says. “With Mom in this condition, I don’t think you should be staying here alone. Prepare to spend the night, or the next couple of nights at Grandma’s.”
“And we’re just going to show up on her doorstep, unannounced? Like, surprise! We brought our demon-possessed Mom over for a visit.” My hands fly out and up in a chaotic theatrical performance.
“Of course not.” He shakes his head. “I’ll call and give her a heads up before we leave. Now hurry up. I want to get there before whatever it is you did to her wears off.”
“Right.” I rush to my room, grab a large gym bag and stuff several days of clothing into it, making sure to include one special all-black outfit for tomorrow’s service. Sure hope I’m able to get away long enough to attend.
I flip the light off and pause. Turn the light back on. Grab the new apron Luna made me from the hook on the back of the door. I slip it over my head and tie it into place.
When I return to the kitchen, Michael is hanging up the phone. Mom lies motionless at his feet, her wrists and ankles bound… for everyone’s protection. “Grandma is expecting us. She’s preparing a place for both of you. Separate rooms, of course.”
I’d hope so. I don’t want to sleep anywhere near someone who might start spouting horrors from Caleb at any moment.
“You ready?” he asks.
“One moment and I will be.” Michael’s brow pinches, but I ignore his unasked question. I wave my hands in toward me, calling my magick home. “Come. Come back to me,” I whisper.
The scattered mix of spices covering the kitchen floor rises and separates into swirling herbal highways. Each individual type of spice finds its own pocket on my new Luna-made apron.
“Impressive,” Michael says, and I thank him. “You ready now?”
“Think so,” I reply.
“I’ll pick her up and you get the door.” He lifts Mom up and over his shoulder. She slumps like wet fabric. With my bag in hand, I rush forward and open the front door, let him pass, lock the door.
“Hurry,” Michael calls.
I spin to find him waiting on me to open the car door. Dashing past him, I pull the door open and step aside. He lowers Mom into the back, laying her out across the seat. I toss my bag on the floor of the front passenger seat.
“Can I bring my bike?” I ask.
“Hurry up.” He swings his arm in a wide come-here arc. I quickly retrieve my bike from the back, and he stows it in the trunk. Since the trunk lid won’t close with the bike in the way, he ties the lid in place so that it won’t bounce the entire drive.
&nbs
p; With the house locked and dark, we pull away from the curb and head for the garden district and the family’s magickally protected house. Thunder and lightning keep us company during the drive.
Grandma and Miri are waiting on the porch when we arrive. Miri’s shoulders and neck are tense, and she holds her hands firmly to her belly, but Grandma is as calm as a nonexistent breeze. Bastian sits patiently at Miri’s feet.
The car rolls to a stop, and Michael kills the engine. Miri covers the distance before I am able to extract myself from the seat. She doesn’t bother with an umbrella, allowing herself to get soaked. She hugs me. Doesn’t let me go.
“All that you have been through,” she whispers at my ear. “You shouldn’t have to go through such trial alone.”
I squeeze her tight and release, step back. “I haven’t been alone,” I say. “I’ve had my coven and Michael. They’ve all been rather extraordinary.”
“I don’t doubt that. You bring out the extraordinary in people.” She hugs me to her side and leads me toward the house.
“Wow. Thanks, sis.” We climb the front steps to where Grandma and Bastian wait. The cat stands, meows, and walks a tight circle returning to the position where he originally sat. He does so again.
“Welcome back, sweet girl.” Grandma rubs my cheek. “I wish it were under better circumstances.”
“So do I.” I glance back at Michael. He has Mom balanced over his shoulder. He kicks the door closed and approaches.
“Shall we?” Grandma motions for us to move into the house. Miri opens the door and holds it open, allowing all the family members to pass through with ease. Bastian slips through between me and Grandma, hugging the walls, then zipping out in front of our feet.
Michael steps into the house, and mom’s body jerks.
“Great,” Michael mumbles. “Best get her to her destination quick, or things are going to get real ugly.”
“Upstairs,” Grandma says.
“Where upstairs?” Michael asks.
“My old room.” Miri points to the staircase.
Without another word, Michael races up the stairs. Mom’s body jerks, and jerks again. Jumps every few seconds. I drop my bag in the entry and race up to the second level, following close at my brother’s heels. He drops Mom to the surface of the bed and she screams.
