Devil's Punch

by Ann Aguirre

  Yet I found myself looking for him. Searching the crowd for him. Sure, I could call him, but what would I say? Hi. Missed you. Killed anybody amusing lately? You just didn’t trifle with someone who reported to archangels. So I remembered and I missed him and tried to put the pieces back together. Too bad they’d all been broken into jagged shapes that cut when I tried to connect the edges.

  “You all right?” Chance asked, coming up beside me.

  The mountains were beautiful, dark green and pointed like weapons against the darkening sky. Where I’d grown up, it was relatively flat and the countryside tended toward swampland. Until coming here, I’d never lived at high altitude. It changed everything from cooking to taking a walk. Everything felt like more of an achievement at seven thousand feet.

  Including moving day.

  I nodded. “Just tired. You fit a lot of boxes in the Mustang.”

  “I’m a good packer. We used to move around a lot.”

  “You and Min?”

  His silence felt like an affirmative. Then I wondered why I didn’t know more about him, why I’d permitted his reticence. A woman more confident of her self-worth wouldn’t; she’d insist on learning about her lover. And if he didn’t care to share, she’d move on, looking for someone who wanted to be a partner, not a manager. The mistakes in our rearview didn’t all belong to Chance.

  At length, he offered, “I think she was hiding from someone.”

  “Your father…or the Montoyas?”

  “Both? Min doesn’t talk about the past much.”

  “And you didn’t press her.”

  He shook his head. “I never wanted to disappoint her. She’d get this look, like I should know better than to ask. Like it was…impolite.”

  “Maybe it’s a cultural thing?”

  “What I’ve read suggests that it is. Which is weird—that I’m reading what it’s like to be Korean, but I’m American…and I’ve learned what I know about relating to people from my mom.”

  “Did she ever have a boyfriend when you were growing up?”

  Chance laughed. “Never. Not that they didn’t try. But she always seemed like she was waiting.”

  “For your dad to come back?”

  “I don’t know. I’m sorry if this is frustrating, but some of it I really don’t know. She tried to give me a normal American childhood, as much as she could, as much as we could afford.”

  “Well, at least you’re telling me straight out that you don’t have the answers,” I said, smiling. “That’s more than I got before.”

  “True.”

  “Let’s unpack a little more, and then I’ll get us something to eat.”

  The nice thing about the neighborhood, there were several tortillerias and taquerias within a couple of blocks, where I could buy rice and beans. The taco joints stayed open super-late, too, as they were a favorite of the college drinking crowd.

  “Will you sleep over?” he asked.

  I laughed. “You don’t even have a bed. But nice try.” In truth, he had little furniture. The Mustang carried his personal belongings, his books and clothes, but it couldn’t hold a sofa. “I’ll take you shopping tomorrow in the El Camino. I should be able to fit what you need, if we make multiple trips.”

  “Thank you, Corine.”

  I didn’t know what he was thanking me for—the offer of help or the second chance between us—but when he leaned down to kiss me, I forgot to wonder. His mouth tasted of tea and lemon with a hint of salt. It was a sweet nothing of a kiss, full of hope and expectation. Happiness swirled through me, despite everything I’d lost.

  I forced myself to sound brisk. “If you had your way, we’d make out on the floor all night. Get to work.”

  He grinned, shameless and beautiful, and my heart fluttered. The last of the light shone on his raven-dark hair, limning it blue. In profile, he was still the best thing I’d ever seen. I didn’t want to love him again; I feared it, but he had a siren’s call bound up in his tiger eyes and tawny skin. With Chance, I suspected—in the end—I would walk into the water, smiling, and let it close over my head.

  An hour later I finished putting away his kitchen things, so at least we’d have cups and plates. The previous tenant had left some rusty wrought-iron patio furniture on the balcony, so we’d eat there, watching the sunset. I let myself out while Chance hung clothing in the bedroom. I ran lightly down the stairs; the hundred pesos in my pocket would more than buy our dinner.

  The taqueria was two blocks down the hill. After passing the gate, I jogged them easily; thanks to my time in the jungle with Kel, passing Escobar’s test, I was fitter than I had been in years.

  Because the food was good, there were a few people waiting outside. The man at the counter took my order and then I joined the queue. I got tacos al pastor, rice, and beans. Takeaway came in simple containers and wrapped in paper. I cradled the bag against my chest and retraced my steps. The security guy recognized me and didn’t demand my ID this time. He opened the gate just wide enough for me to slip through and then I headed for Chance’s flat. He met me at the door and relieved me of our repast, carrying it out to the balcony without being asked.

  I guessed he realized there was nowhere else to eat. But in my absence, he’d fixed up the area with a couple of potted plants, cushions Min had embroidered, and candles. With the sun setting over the mountains, it was breathtaking.

  “You approve?”

  “Absolutely. I can’t believe you managed all this so fast.”

  He winked. “Not a problem. I just unpacked the box labeled ‘Seduction.’”

  “And you were doing so well too.” But I was smiling as I laid out the meal on dishes I remembered picking out with Chance.

  Oh, goddess. When I agreed to a second try, I didn’t realize how hard it would be to keep from falling into his arms, without being sure we’d changed old patterns.

  To my relief, he accepted the implicit request to back off. “So, what are you doing tomorrow?”

  “In the morning I’m meeting with the project foreman to go over progress they’ve made on the reconstruction. Then I’ll practice my spells with Tia.”

  “She’s a slave driver.”

  “I have to master the magick.” It wasn’t open to debate.

  “Are you free in the afternoon? Shopping?” he reminded me.

  “Yeah, absolutely. I’ll pick you up at three?” There were a number of furniture stores in the area, and some had cash-and-carry availability. “Let’s see if we can get a mattress first, and then a sofa and a table.”

  “Sounds good.”

  After dinner he spread some bigger pillows on the balcony and we curled up together. He’d truly given up everything for me. Started over. The night passed in sweet conversation and tentative plans. There was kissing too, of course, but I backed off before it got too intense. That didn’t seem fair to either of us when I would return to Tia’s place at the end of the night. At eleven, Chance walked me to her door, kissed me again, and I went inside.

  My mentor had left a lamp on for me, but she’d gone to sleep an hour before; she rarely stayed up past ten. The woman followed the light, working during the day, reading a little at night. We had no television, but I didn’t miss it. Chance would want one, I thought as I put my purse on the bed. I hadn’t put my mark on this space—a simple room decorated in colonial style—because I wouldn’t be here long, if the weather held and the work crew remained reliable. I’d hired an excellent foreman named Armando who was opposed to physical labor on his own behalf but excelled at making others buckle down.

  Butch trotted to meet me, his nails clicking on the tile floor. He’d gotten a little pudgy since our return. He preferred staying with Tia while I worked at Chance’s place, as she had a nice courtyard where he could nap in the sun or chase birds. Usually it was the former—hence the Chihuahua spare tire.

  “Anything exciting happen?” I asked, kneeling to scoop him into my arms.

  He snuggled in with two quiet, negative
yaps. It might not be normal for me to talk to my dog and get an answer, but it had been going on long enough that it didn’t seem odd to me anymore. I’d considered asking why he could understand me, but I’d decided some mysteries were better left alone.

  “Did you keep Tia company?”

  An affirmative bark.

  I stroked his head, then scratched behind his ears, just as he liked. “Good boy. Did she remember to feed you?”

  Yap. Yes. But Butch stared up at me with sad eyes, despite the fact that everything seemed to be okay in his world. I thought I knew what it was. “You miss Shannon, huh?”

  Me too.

  Shannon had been my best friend ever since I rescued her in Kilmer. She’d become my roommate and my closest confidante. Before the shit went down in Laredo, we’d discussed opening a consignment store in the new building, becoming true partners. The girl had been the closest I had to a sister.

  With Butch in my arms, I curled up on the bed and remembered.

  Witchy Business

  Laredo. A summoning spell had gone wrong due to my ignorance and lack of training, and Shannon was injured. The memory and regret swallowed me.

  I had to stop putting her at risk. Maybe I should put her on a bus, even if she didn’t want to go. Before it was too late. “Look, Shan, I really think—”

  “No.” She slammed the first door open and stomped to the apartment. “If you want to get rid of me, I’ll go. But you’re not sending me to my dad. I’m not a little kid.…I can get a job. Maybe I’ll try Cali. I hear it’s pretty there.” She glared, as if daring me to object. “You did fine on your own.”

  “Not really,” I said softly. I’d never told anyone this. I didn’t like thinking about it. “I landed well at first. I found a job in a used-book store, and I had a room in a boardinghouse. But when the store went under, I couldn’t find anything else. Pretty soon I had no money and I had no place to stay. I don’t make friends easily, so I had nobody to turn to. I moved on with only enough money in my pocket to get to the next town. I found myself sleeping in the bus station. I did things I’m not proud of.”

  I’d taken insane risks, and it was lucky I wasn’t diseased or dead. It would break my heart if I drove Shannon to that with my good intentions.

  “Like what?”

  She wouldn’t be satisfied unless I told her. I wouldn’t reveal my past to anyone else, for any other reason—only to keep Shan from repeating my mistakes. I was over it, mostly. I’d learned to deal. But she needed to know how much I trusted her.

  So while I wrapped an ice pack, fixed a glass of water, and set out two pills, I revealed the whole story. Nobody knew this much about me—I’d picked up men for food and shelter, using serial monogamy as a means of survival. Those relationships never lasted long, because I chose men who wouldn’t reject me, ones who’d take me home and were lonely enough not to complain if I stayed. But I always moved on, feeling worse each time, because I lived with them out of desperation, not desire.

  My past left me with such low self-esteem that I didn’t demand to be an equal partner with Chance when he came along. I didn’t feel worthy of him, and I did anything to please him; I spurned my old identity because it was awful and tawdry, and I wanted to forget that woman, the sad, desperate Corine. It would kill me if Shan ever thought she wasn’t equal to any man who wanted her.

  I went on. “By the time I met Chance, I had gotten myself together. I had a place of my own and a job at a dry cleaner’s. But you know how hard it is to get work if you don’t have an address? How hard it is to keep clean in public restrooms so people’s eyes don’t slide away from you? It’s easier if you’re young. But if you’re old and homeless, it’s the next thing to an invisibility spell. I knew people who died on the street, people who froze to death and nobody noticed. Nobody cared. The city just removed the bodies like they were leaves in the street.” I bit my lip against the burn of tears and the throbbing in my head. “So if you think I’m letting you leave with nothing, you’re out of your mind. I want better than that for you.”

  And that was part of the reason I couldn’t turn down Escobar’s money. I wanted her to have a future brighter than I could provide alone. Having a place of our own mattered desperately, and now maybe she’d understand why. If Chance knew, he might get why my pawnshop had meant everything to me, and with it blown to shit, why I felt as if someone I loved had died. I needed a home, damn it.

  “I had no idea,” she whispered.

  “Nobody does.” I exhaled shakily and got my own Aleve and agua.

  Her expression said she understood; we didn’t need to speak of this again. Thank God. Though I’d come to terms with my mistakes, I didn’t enjoy reliving them, even for Shan’s benefit.

  But she had her own point to make as well. “Look, I’ll stop threatening to leave if you stop talking about sending me away. I know it’s dangerous. I’m not an idiot. But for the first time I feel like I belong and I’m not giving that up. Okay?”

  I downed my water like it was a shot of something stronger. “Fair enough.”

  Now, she didn’t remember me. Part of me—the selfish part—wanted desperately to cast something to negate what I’d done, but with my lack of control, I couldn’t risk making Shan and Jesse worse or hurting them again. So I lived with the consequences and missed my best friend. I’d do pretty much anything to have her back in my life, but my options were limited.

  I went to bed that night and dreamt of old mistakes. In the morning I had some fruit for breakfast, showered, and dressed. Tia was cleaning this morning, so the house was empty when I left. I left her a note saying what time I’d be home and headed to my meeting, where I argued with Armando, the foreman, about his projected date of completion.

  “If you don’t step it up,” I said in Spanish, “rainy season will set in, and there won’t be time to finish.”

  “We’re doing the best we can, señorita. There have been delays. Materials—”

  “Let me make this simple. You will have the building finished by”—I named a date—“or I will hire someone else to take your place. Understood?”

  “Sí, claro. I’ll get the work done.”

  Tia was waiting when I got back. She greeted me by demanding I cast a blindness spell.

  I protested, “What if I blind you permanently?”

  She cackled. “I’m mostly blind already, nena. So get to work!”

  Under her supervision, I spent four hours drilling the five spells she insisted would be most useful: Blind, Trip, Steam, Freeze, and Open. I’d mastered Blind by the time we knocked off for the day. Trip and Steam, I executed successfully 75 percent of the time. I had less luck with Freeze and Open. Those were more complicated, requiring complete focus. I had perfected Light weeks ago and no longer needed practice. At the end of the day, she added a new spell, Truth-sense. That one wasn’t complicated, but it required a fair amount of focus. I failed it the first couple of times, but then, once I fell into the correct pattern, I understood it instinctively.

  “A good day’s work,” Tia said. “Soon you’ll be casting like a proper witch.”

  “Gracias.” I kissed her cheek and grabbed my purse. “I’m going shopping, Butch. Interested?”

  He shot me an as-if look, but followed me as far as the courtyard. I refilled his water dish at the outside spigot and then went out to the El Camino. Fortunately it wasn’t market day, so traffic on the narrow road wasn’t heavy. I drove down and hung a left, then a right, and then another right. Roads were weird, with odd roundabouts called glorietas, but I didn’t mind because the medians were always so green, full of trees and flowers and beautifully landscaped. I turned around and went back down the mountain a few blocks to the gated community where Chance lived. The guard greeted me with a raised hand and let me in. This was a small complex with one- and two-bedroom flats, up the hill from an expensive private school, no more than twelve buildings, two units each, but there was ample parking. I didn’t wait long for Chance, who bounde
d down the stairs to meet me.

  He swung into the car and kissed my cheek as I backed out. “I thought we’d go to Soriana first.”

  “That’s nearby, right?” Chance still didn’t know where everything was, even in this neighborhood, but that wasn’t so bad. I’d lived here for two years before I could find the nearest mall on my own.

  Now I could find five different ones—without GPS.

  “Yep.”

  “I went grocery shopping today. I’ll cook dinner when we’re done tonight.”

  That was an interesting offer. The Chance from my memory preferred takeout menus to working the stove. In his new place, he had a nice kitchen with pretty white ceramic tile and pristine counters, so it was good he intended to make use of the space.

  “What’re we having?” I asked as I nudged out into traffic. Between the bodyguards blocking the right lane, waiting to pick up the ambassadors’ kids, and the delivery trucks that didn’t want to let me in on the left, the merge took longer than it should have.

  “Chapchae noodles. Or as close as I can get, anyway. I doubt there’s a Korean grocery around here.”

  “Superama has a small Asian foods section, but it’s eclectic.” I glanced over at him. “It’s been a big adjustment, huh?”

  “I like the energy. And it’s…different.”

  No arguing that.

  I didn’t say more until I parked at Plaza Jardines, a small shopping center with one anchor store—Soriana—a couple of midsize places, like DormiMundo, where you could buy mattresses, and Altimus, which had furniture. But those places both took a week or more for delivery. I didn’t want Chance sleeping on the floor that long. Soriana would let you carry anything out that you could buy and fit into your vehicle.