by Harper Lin
She wore jeans and a baggy shirt and carried a grocery bag. Gingerly, she stepped around the jars on her steps. Then she bent down and removed something from the threshold of her door. Rattling her keys, she unlocked the door, stepped inside, sprinkled something over the top step, replaced whatever had been in front of her door, then shut it quietly. From where we were, we heard several locks slip into place.
I wouldn’t be able to kick in the door to get my cat. Even if I wanted to, I was in no condition to do it. My stomach was rolling up and over itself, and as I took a step closer to see what she had put in front of the door, I almost lost my balance.
It’s a broom. A broom?
I noticed a gap in the curtain by the tiny window next to the door. I squinted and tried to see in, inching my way closer and closer to the front steps. I tried to see what was in the jars, too. A tiny light outside the door helped me to see.
Looking into the jars, I saw what appeared to be hair. It was repulsive. I knew I was too close and at any minute, I was sure I’d throw up, alerting not just the cat thief but the neighboring trailers as well. Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. With Marshmallow in my arms, I trudged back toward the trees. With every step, I started to feel better.
“Cath! Cath!” Marshmallow was screaming, clinging to my shirt. “Why won’t you answer me? I’m right here!”
“Marshmallow! I couldn’t hear you. Calm down. I can hear you now. Something was happening at that trailer.”
“Did you see him? She has him! That person has…”
“Treacle. Yes. I saw him.”
“Oh, how are we going to get him back?”
“I don’t know. There’s something going on at that place, but it wasn’t a spell. At least, it wasn’t any spell I’ve ever experienced. We’ve got to get Aunt Astrid and Bea. Maybe it’s just something that affects me, you know, because Treacle is my cat. Maybe that’s why I was getting sick. I don’t know. But we need reinforcements for sure.”
“Take me home. I don’t want to be out here anymore.” Marshmallow sounded pitiful. I snuggled her to me as we slowly made our way back to the used car lot and my car.
“You found Treacle, Marsh. I don’t know what you saw that was glowing, but you saw it. I’d still be roaming around in there lost if it weren’t for you. And Treacle is there.”
“We have to come back to get him.”
“Yes, we do.”
“But how?”
I shook my head. The lights over the Pizza Hut-looking building guided us back.
“I don’t know.” I lowered Marshmallow back into her travel box. Before I even started the car, the cat was asleep. I wish I could do that.
That night, I tossed and turned. How was I going to get my cat back if the spell around that trailer made me feel like I had eaten a pail of dirt?
Witches’ Vials
“Jars of liquid and hair? Oh, dear.” Aunt Astrid looked off in the distance.
Bea poured some of her strong Oolong tea into the tiny flowered cup setting in front of me.
I waved my hand. “Even after getting a couple hours sleep last night, I don’t think I can keep anything down. There is still a twinge of sour that I just don’t want to tempt.”
Aunt Astrid’s house was almost directly centered between my house and Bea’s house. Jake always worked odd hours, so he was pretty understanding that we were always together.
I wrapped my arms around my stomach and sat very still in my aunt’s straight-backed dining room chair, trying desperately not to look at the Dutch apple pie she had within arm’s reach.
“That poor girl,” Aunt Astrid mumbled.
I didn’t have to speak. Bea read my mind. “Poor girl? She stole Treacle. She killed her father and is the kind of ‘witch’”—Bea used air quotes to emphasize her disgust with our cat-napping nemesis—“that gives the rest of us a bad name. How can you say ‘poor girl’?”
Sitting down calmly, Aunt Astrid pushed her long locks behind her and looked sternly at her daughter. “Sit down, Bea.”
Taking a seat next to me, Bea looked at her mother curiously.
“What you saw, Cath, are what we call witches’ vials. This girl is not a witch, but she’s obviously very scared of one.” Aunt Astrid went on to explain that during the days when people would see witches around every corner sabotaging crops, causing diseases, and stealing children and husbands, the fearful would use witches’ vials. The person fearful of the witch would fill the jar with urine, nail clippings, hair, sometimes a scrap of clothing, sometimes drops of blood, small pieces of skin like a hangnail or a scab, then seal it tight. The jars were then set near all the entrances, preventing witches from crossing the thresholds.
“There are various ways witches’ vials can affect a witch. If Bea were to go there and try and get close, she might get lost and turned around. If I went there, it might make me forget who I am and what I was doing there in the first place. In your instance, it made you nauseated.”
“Seriously nauseated. I’m still feeling it.” I rubbed my belly. “I also couldn’t talk to Marshmallow or Treacle for that matter.”
“I believe it. It’s like mountains in the way of using a cell phone,” Aunt Astrid explained. “The signals you are used to get cut off. Nothing can pass. This little girl just put a big mountain in our way. She must have a very scary reason for doing so.”
“But what about the broom?” Bea asked. “Cath said she put a broom down in front of the door. What does that mean?”
“This girl is no dummy. She has obviously done her research.” Aunt Astrid started to slice herself a piece of pie, and I had to look away. I couldn’t handle the sight of food yet. “When people thought there was a witch in their village, some of them would put their broomsticks across their thresholds at nighttime. Because witches were supposed to use these things to fly around on if they came across one lying on the floor, they were forced to count each bristle. By the time they actually counted them all, it was believed the sun would be on the rise, and the witch would be unable to complete her evil deeds.”
“So, would that have happened to me? If I didn’t get all shades of queasy, would I have been forced to count the bristles? That sounds crazy.” I rubbed my head, feeling the sickness from my stomach traveling up the back of my neck. A headache was quickly approaching.
“I’m afraid so,” Aunt Astrid said, taking a big bite of pie.
“And I’d have had no control? How can that be? I mean, what if this girl decides to render us powerless by throwing brooms at us, and we’re compelled to count every bristle?” I was getting angry. First, the woman had my cat, which was bad enough. Then she put out witches’ vials and thousand-bristled broomsticks to compel us to count, and she is the poor girl? I was starting to wonder if someone had put a hex on Aunt Astrid.
“More importantly, how are we going to get to this girl?” Bea asked. “We obviously need to talk to her. A witch did that to Brit Clegg’s father, but Brit isn’t the witch. So who is?”
“Well, we can’t get to her at her place. We might have to bring in the reserves.” Aunt Astrid took another bite of pie. In four forkfuls, the dessert was almost gone. Where my aunt put it was anyone’s guess because she still had quite a cute, soft figure for a woman her age.
We both looked at Bea, who rolled her eyes. “How am I going to nonchalantly tell Jake that Brit Clegg, the daughter of the man who died of one hell of a heart attack, has weird and quite offensive witches’ vials all around her trailer home and also has Treacle?” She put her hands on her hips. “He’ll hit the roof if he knows that we’re sneaking up behind him on this case.”
“I think we need to handle this the way we’d handle Darla Castellan.” Aunt Astrid pushed herself up from her seat, reaching over to cut another piece of pie.
“You mean with a whip and a chair?” I asked as Aunt Astrid placed the plate in front of me. As soon as she did, my headache was gone, my neck relaxed, and my stomach grumbled with hunger. “How did you
know?”
“It is also pretty common that the effects of witches’ vials only last a couple of hours. Enough to keep us off our balance but not enough to keep us laid up for long. Besides, the color just came back into your cheeks.” She gave me a wink that made me feel special.
I ate the pie and listened to Aunt Astrid’s plan for getting Brit Clegg away from her home and someplace we could talk to her. “It’s so simple, it has to work.” I wiped my mouth after practically inhaling my dessert. I just needed a hamburger or something to wash it down.
“Bea, I think you should be the one to contact her. You have a natural way about you that sets people at ease,” Aunt Astrid said.
I furrowed my brows after hearing this. “Wait a second. I can put people at ease. I am quite a people pleaser when it comes down to it.”
Both women looked at me as if I were a baby babbling incoherent words into the middle of their adult discussion.
“No,” was all Aunt Astrid said.
I shrugged, giving Bea a wink. The truth was I knew she was much more diplomatic and, well, just kinder than I ever was. I remembered my parents being good, loving people, but I didn’t remember if either of them had a temper or what their limits were. I always had the feeling I developed my pattern of harsh, scratchy behavior after realizing how fate had cheated me.
808
After another slice of pie, some strong coffee, a bagel with cream cheese, and some leftover veggie chili, I was feeling much more like my regular self. Yet I couldn’t shake the weird cottony feeling still in my head. It was as if a small corner existed in my mind in which the light couldn’t penetrate. No matter how hard I reached and stretched inside my head, I couldn’t get to that corner, but something was telling me I needed to see what was there.
I left Bea and Aunt Astrid alone to devise a plan in which Brit Clegg would bring me my cat. I couldn’t help because my idea was to stomp over there, nauseated or not, and pound the door down. If she believed witches were so bad, I was more than happy to prove her right. She would be called some very nasty names and told to stay away from my cat and me. I’d also slam the door, if given the chance, and stomp away with a scowl on my face that she wouldn’t soon forget. Yup! That would teach her.
Still, Treacle hadn’t looked hurt or in pain. The worst thing for him was probably staying cooped up all day and night. If I knew my cat, he’d probably already introduced his claws to her upholstery and curtains. Serves her right. But if she didn’t like witches, I hoped she wasn’t going to take it out on Treacle. He couldn’t help it that he was an exceptional black cat.
My eyes filled with tears. Treacle didn’t see me last night, and I couldn’t call to him. He hadn’t even known I was there. What really bothered me was thinking that Treacle might think I wasn’t looking for him. That thought broke my heart the most.
I made my way down Bryn Mawr Avenue and took a left onto First Street. There were dozens of little shops and restaurants to look into. The pedestrian traffic was bustling. I looked into the windows of the shops, thinking of nothing and everything at the same time. When I came to Standee’s twenty-four-hour diner, I peeked in and saw two faces I knew.
I went inside and walked up to Jake and Blake, who sat at the counter sipping coffee. “Are you guys off duty? I promise I won’t tell Bea and Aunt Astrid you’re getting coffee and lunch at a place that’s not the Brew-Ha-Ha.”
“Hey, Cath. Want to join us? We’re technically getting dinner then heading home. Had a wild morning.” Jake was a handsome guy. Bea was very lucky because as pretty as he was on the outside, he was even more so on the inside. He was the big brother I never had.
“You know, I just ate at Aunt Astrid’s.” I patted my stomach. “So what kind of excitement did you guys have?”
“An 808 at the Walona Motel,” Blake said after he took a sip of water. He was always so stiff.
“Okay, what is an 808, and what is the Walona Motel?”
“Disturbing the peace. The Walona Motel is over in the industrial part of town. It’s on a side street just before you get on the expressway.”
“The Walona Motel? I’ve never heard of it, but it sounds like a respite station for kings. What happened?”
“Apparently, two occupants of two separate rooms decided they didn’t care to share the same air space with each other,” Jake said as the waitress behind the counter served up big cheeseburgers in front of him and Blake. “A loud shouting match between a woman who was there by herself and another woman who was there with her husband. Nobody was drunk. No one had any priors. It just got loud. The woman and her husband said they’d be leaving, so there was no need for us to do anything.”
“Well, that doesn’t sound so bad,” I said. “With the way the world is, it could have been a lot worse.”
“Well, it was over and done with for me, but Blake here had a little more on his hands than just an ornery woman.” Jake chuckled and nudged Blake with his elbow just before he took a big bite out of his burger.
“Really, was she looking for a stone ornament for her yard?” I asked, completely serious.
Blake looked at me then shook his head. “Some people in the world are just a little lonely. That’s all.”
“Or desperate,” I mumbled. “Well, I gotta run. I’ll tell Bea you’re on your way home.”
“Well, if you wait, I’ll drop you wherever you’re headed,” Jake offered.
I shook my head. “No. I don’t know if Bea told you, but Treacle hasn’t come home for a few days.” Technically, it was true, but I couldn’t tell him any more than that, nor could I tell him anything about the mystery rolling around in my head like a silver pinball.
“That’s the big black cat I see at the Brew-Ha-Ha, right?” Blake asked, looking at me oddly.
“Yeah, that’s him. He’s a prowler. He has all his claws, and he never likes being indoors for very long. But usually he’s come back by now. I’m just strolling around, hoping maybe I’ll see him.” It wasn’t a total lie but more like a lie of omission.
“Well, I usually take a ten-mile run at the end of the day to get centered,” Blake said. “I’ll keep an eye out on the south side of town for you.” His eyes were serious, and there wasn’t any of the cold hardness that was usually there.
“I’d appreciate that, Blake. Thank you.”
“I lost a pet once. When I was a kid, we had an English bulldog named Buddy. We think someone stole him.”
My heart just broke at the simple tragedy. He said it quickly, but I could tell it held a certain amount of weight in his heart. When I looked him in the eyes, he didn’t look away. I saw the shadow of a memory there, then just as quickly, it was gone. He was back to Detective Blake Samberg and just the facts.
“How terrible.” I put my hand over my heart.
For a moment, we looked at each other. He looked at me as if he were surprised I would say something so kind. I felt bad about that and wondered if he’d become a cop, and then detective, in order to help other people find their lost Buddies.
“Nothing worse.” The right side of his mouth curled up in a sad grin.
“Right.” I nodded. “Well, I better let you guys finish your lunches.” I smiled at Jake and couldn’t help feel my eyes drawn to Blake’s. He was still looking at me a little more intently than usual. I don’t know what was going on behind his eyes, but they were deeper than I had noticed before.
Brit
A couple of days had passed since Aunt Astrid and Bea put their plan into motion. It was a very simple idea, but we’d have no way of knowing if it worked until Brit Clegg showed up at the café.
“Did you offer her a free lunch, too?” I’d asked when they first told me they had sent her a letter.
“No,” Bea said. “We told her the truth.”
“What?” I hissed over the counter at the Brew-Ha-Ha.
As I looked to see if anyone had noticed my outburst, Bea took my hand. “I told her we were sorry what happened to her father. We were sorr
y she was afraid, but that we knew what she was afraid of and wanted to help.”
“What about Treacle?”
“Of course. We told her we knew she had a cat that didn’t belong to her, and unless she wanted the authorities involved, she’d bring the cat with her.”
“And when is she supposed to arrive here?”
“Today. We told her we’re open from seven in the morning until eight o’clock at night. We said we understand people have to work and that she probably had many details to tend to. We said we didn’t want to inconvenience her, yet at the same time, we had to talk to her.”
I took a deep breath. “Well, that sounds like you were real nice. I think she might come.”
Bea shrugged and widened her eyes. It was a crap shoot, but what other choice did we have?
All day long, every time the bells over the door jingled their happy little tune, Aunt Astrid, Bea and I looked up to see if it was a woman carrying a cat box. Every time, we were disappointed.
It wasn’t until we were serving our last evening customers at ten minutes before eight that the door opened and the frantic “meow, meow, meow” that had been so familiar to me snapped my head toward the door.
“Treacle!” I cried out loud. “Treacle, are you all right?” I called to him inside my head. “Are you hurt at all? I missed you so much!”
“Cath!” he meowed loudly. “You won’t believe what is happening! I was afraid I might never see you again!”
“Hi. Hi. You must be Brit,” I said quickly. As much as I wanted to be mad at this girl, looking in her eyes, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. Her expression was a mixture of sadness, fear, and strength. No matter what had happened with her father, something else was going on that had her on edge and ready to fight.
She nodded and handed me the cardboard cat carrier. From the little air holes, a black paw kept sticking out, reaching and scratching for me. All anyone else could hear were wild and continual meows. I heard the relief and happiness coming from my beloved companion.
