Twelve Shades of Midnight:

by Liliana Hart

  “I’m just pointing out that I didn’t set people on fire when the temperatures hit one hundred and twenty in Idaho—in January,” she reminded.

  “Right. You’re just pointing out that I’m a bigger magic abuser than you. Got it. Now get in and hurry up. I’m not missing chocolate pudding for a week because you won’t lay off the preaching.”

  Winnie halted, alarm bells ringing distantly in her head. Wait one second. Think before you act, Foster. “Oh, I get it. This is a test, isn’t it? Like I get into this deathtrap when I know full well you shouldn’t be out running loose and bam—I’m punished for not using my common sense. Common sense tells me Baba Nah-Nah would never let you drive a vehicle or let you out of here without supervision.”

  Take that, Baba Daba Doo. You’re not fooling me—not this time. She wasn’t giving that woman a shred of a reason to slap her back in jail.

  She was feeling pretty proud of herself for being one step ahead of her jailor until Chi-Chi put the Datsun in park, popped the cassette tape out, and held up a Kotex-covered foot wrapped in duct tape.

  A glittering, purple ring surrounded her ankle. “See this? This is my house-arrest anklet. She dipped it in magic. If I get too far away from this dive, it goes off and Baba Yaga comes huntin’. Now get in this truck or I’m going back in there and telling those creepy cohorts of hers you won’t make nice.”

  She shuddered. No more creepy cohorts. Winnie yanked on the door handle, pulling it open to a creaky groan, and hopped in. She folded her hands in her lap and smiled at Chi-Chi. “Okay, so where are we going?”

  “The airport.”

  The airport? “Like airport-airport? Wings and vroom-vroom-in-the-sky airport?”

  “One and the same. Now be quiet and let me listen to my Boyz. It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to listen to anything but those dumb, mystical monk chants Baba Yaga claims are supposed to help our abusive urges.” She pushed the cassette tape back into the player and took off.

  Two hours later, they came to a screeching, grinding, death-defying halt—in yet another parking lot.

  Winnie let go of the passenger door handle with stiff fingers, fingers she was convinced had kept her from nailing Chi-Chi with a spell to improve her driving, and scanned their surroundings. “This isn’t drop-offs for departures.”

  Chi-Chi rolled her tongue along the inside of her cheek and yawned. “This is where Baba Yaga said to ditch you, Firestarter. So, this is where I ditch you. Get out.”

  Winnie turned to gaze at Chi-Chi. “I don’t get it.”

  “I don’t either. I don’t want to. I’m just doing what I was told to do. Baba Yaga said parking lot A, here we are. Parking lot A.” She lifted a slender finger to point to the sign. “Now get out. If I’m lucky, and I don’t hit any traffic, I can make it back ten minutes early.”

  Suddenly, Winnie felt very alone. She hated alone. Hated not having Zelda with her to cook up a plan for what to do next. She turned in the seat and opened her arms. “Can I at least get a hug goodbye?” They had been cellblock mates for nine months. That had to mean something…

  Chi-chi crossed her arms over her orange prison sweatshirt and shook her gorgeous head of dark curls. “No. No, you definitely can’t. There isn’t enough therapy in the world that’ll turn me into a hugger. I’ve tried to tell Baba Yaga that, but she refuses to listen. Stuck her damn fingers right in her ears and sang Flock of Seagulls when I tried to explain.”

  Defeated, she reached for the door handle then hesitated, turning back to find Chi-Chi’s eyes flashing with irritation. “I’ll make this quick. I know chocolate pudding’s at stake, but I don’t know what to do next, Chi-Chi. Where do I go from here?”

  “Not a clue.”

  “Why are you so mean? I did help you make slippers.”

  “No. Zelda helped me.”

  “But I taught her how to make them. It was my idea.” That had to count for something.

  “I don’t care.”

  “Didn’t you learn anything in Witches Helping Witches group?”

  “The warm, squishy one where I learn how to read your emotions and body language?”

  “Yeah. That’s the one. Are you reading that I’m a little freaked out right now and I could use some support?”

  “Nope because I skipped it and went to Witches Don’t Whine group instead. I learned a lot there. Like how to spot a whiner when they’re sitting across from you in a Datsun pickup truck that’s older than Baba Yaga.”

  “That’s not even a group, and you know it, Chi-Chi.”

  “Um yeah. And I don’t care. Now get out.”

  Winnie popped the door open and slid to the ground, her Kotex slippers latching onto the loose gravel of the pavement.

  She made her eyes round and sad like the cat in Shrek when she turned back and said over her shoulder, “Well, take care, Chi-Chi. I hope the pudding is worth leaving me here all alone to fend for myself—”

  The rumbling gunning of the Datsun’s engine mixed with the vestiges of Boyz II Men’s End Of The Road rang through the air.

  Excellent. Alone. Again.

  Naturally.

  Stumbling to the curb, Winnie used her hand as a visor and assessed the parking lot with a shiver.

  Now what?

  The wind picked up then, bringing with it the scent of old lady crouch and a vague hint of Love’s Baby Soft perfume.

  “Now I give you the rest of your task,” Baba Yaga said, appearing out of thin air. She put her hands on her slender hips, the row of multi-colored bangle bracelets on her arm sliding down to her wrist. Today must be Pretty in Pink day if the dress made from her office curtains was any indication.

  Winnie breathed a sigh of relief. She’d never admit it, but she was currently happier to see Baba Yaga than she was when she saw the exit sign for the mall. So happy, she almost wet herself. “I’m ready.”

  Baba Yaga tightened her neon-pink scrunchie around the straggly length of her mullet and shook her head. “No, you’re not.”

  This was a test. This was only a test. If she kept reminding herself everything was a test, a means to an end, she’d manage to make it through this with her immortality intact.

  She rolled up the sleeves of the thermal shirt she wore beneath her orange jumpsuit, indicating she was ready to pay for her sins by getting her hands dirty. “But I am. I really am, Baba Yahoo. Where am I going and what do I have to do to prove I’m worthy of using my magic again? Lay it on me.”

  “You’re going to Paris.”

  Winnie kept her expression placid, but her stomach pirouetted like a ballerina. Shut the front door. Her task was in Paris?

  Act like it’s no big deal. You’ve been to Paris before. Okay, you got there by zapping your own private plane into being and making a mess of international airspace, if you listened to air traffic control carry on about it, but it all turned out okay.

  But holy shopping! Paris? Had Zelda gotten as lucky as she had?

  Baba Yaga held up a set of shiny keys, glinting under the fading sun. “Take these.”

  Winnie cocked her head. “Keys?” Did planes use keys to start them?

  “What are stupid questions for one hundred, Alex? Yes. Keys, Winnifred. Take them,” she snapped, holding them out to Winnie and jiggling them under her nose.

  She was all about being tested. In fact, she welcomed it if it meant she could get on with her life, but even Baba Yaga couldn’t expect her to drive to Paris without using her magic. “Do you need keys to start a plane?” she asked tentatively.

  “Nope, but you need them to drive.”

  Winnie laughed out loud, slapping her thighs. “You can’t drive to Paris, Baba Yaga. You’ve been around for centuries—did you miss that history lesson?”

  Baba Yaga’s eyes narrowed, glittery and angry.

  Ohhh. Bad Winnie. Hush before you end up in cellblock X.

  “I didn’t miss a thing, Winnifred. Literally or figuratively. The keys are for your car. See that rusty pink bub
ble with the Summer’s Eve advertisement on it?” She pointed all the way to the far end of the parking lot.

  Winnie squinted into the setting sun, her stomach sinking. Indeed, there was a pink Pacer, professionally wrapped with a picture of an enormous feminine product on the side of it. “Yeah…”

  “That’s your chariot, cookie. There’s a GPS system in there with the coordinates for Paris.”

  She was obviously missing the boat here. You couldn’t drive to Paris, for seven hells’ sakes. Not even in a car with a big douche on the side of it.

  Baba Yaga lobbed the keys at her with an evil grin slathered over her ageless lips. “Oh, and in case you’re wondering. That’s Paris, Texas. Not Eiffel-Tower, Champs-Élysées Paris,” she seemed to take great pleasure in sharing before she was gone in a puff of pink curtains and matching scrunchie.

  Paris, Texas.

  Yippee-ky-yay, motherfluffers.

  Chapter Three

  Yanking open the door of the Pacer, and ignoring the strange glances she was garnering from a stuffy-looking guy in a business suit, she climbed in and assessed her sweet, sweet ride.

  Fuzzy green dice hung from the rearview mirror, swishing in the cold breeze while she used all her strength to pull the door shut. The interior was littered with crushed Schlitz Malt Liquor cans and smelled vaguely of Cool Ranch Doritos.

  Determined to get on with this, Winnie settled into the seat, a hard spring poking her in the ass as she looked at the GPS mounted on the dashboard. Pressing on, she sat back and waited for her directions.

  “Bonjour, Weenie! Please make yourself comfortable then turn right out of ze parking lot!” a French-accented, way-too-cheerful voice encouraged.

  Funny. So funny. Not only wasn’t she going to the real Paris, she had a constant, painful reminder of Baba Yaga’s idea of a joke.

  Winnie jammed the key into the ignition and turned it, listening to the clunky engine cough, sputter then finally turn over.

  “Turn right out of ze parking lot, Weenie,” the GPS intrusively demanded again.

  She glared at the navigations system, flicking it with her fingers. “I heard you the first time.”

  “Tsk-Tsk, Weenie. Don’t be so crankeyyy!” the GPS chided.

  “I get it, for Pete’s sake. Give me a minute to get situated, oui?”

  “You don’t have a lot of minutes to spare, Winnie the Pooh,” a new voice said—definitely not a French one.

  Her eyes went wide with fright and she froze momentarily. Voices. She was hearing them. No one had called her Winnie the Pooh in forever. Not since her mother had died…

  It was stress. She was tired and worried about finding her way to Paris, Texas, in a pink Pacer with a product for douching plastered on the side. Her mother had been dead since she was four. She was just hearing things.

  “Turn right out of ze parking lot, Weenie! Do eet now!”

  “Winnie, listen to the man. Turn right out of the fucking parking lot or Jacques is gonna shit a croissant here,” a dry voice laced with sarcasm said.

  She turned her head toward the sound of the voice—then cringed, trying to make herself small against the car door. She closed her eyes, scrunching them shut, blocking out what she’d just seen.

  “Winnie?”

  Pushing a fist in her mouth, Winnie fought a scream of hysteria.

  “Oh, c’mon, Pooh Bear. It’s just me. You know, Icabod.”

  Her breathing grew shallow as she fought off a wave of panic. “You’re not real.” You’renotrealyou’renotreal!

  “I am, Weenie. Open your eyes and see.”

  Gripping the steering wheel, her eyes grazed the passenger seat then slammed shut again. She gulped back her sheer terror. “What are you?”

  “I’m your Cabbage Patch doll, Win. Don’t you remember me? Your mother gave me to you when you were four…”

  Oh, she remembered. She fucking remembered all too well. But her mother hadn’t given her Icabod. This doll was the reason her mother had never come home again. Because she’d gone out in a blinding snowstorm to pick up her daughter’s Christmas gift, swerved on some ice into oncoming traffic and T-boned a tractor-trailer.

  She’d overheard her father, Amos, tell her nana about the details of the accident, and even at the tender age of five, she’d understood. Her mother had found the doll Winnie had begged her for months to buy at a department store—she’d had a friend who’d worked there and had managed to get her hands on the elusive doll, tucking it away.

  It was a Christmas present, and she’d told Amos there was no way, after all the hunting she’d done, that she was going to disappoint her Pooh Bear come Christmas morning. Winnie would have the doll to open if it killed her.

  And it had—at least in Winnie’s small mind.

  And when her mother was gone, all Winnie’s rage, all her sorrow, was directed at Icabod, the name her father had later given the doll as a joke.

  If she were to pinpoint it, that was probably when she could first remember experiencing the emotion anger. When she’d first struggled with her impulse to act out, knowing she’d be punished and not caring.

  Sure, tears came, too, after a while; long nights of gulping sobs. But when she’d first heard her mother was never coming home again, and her father had given her the doll that sad Christmas morning, she’d been pissed off—so filled with rage—she’d blown up her Easy Bake Oven by snapping her fingers.

  And then she’d turned that misplaced rage on the symbol of her mother’s death. Icabod became the reason she’d never have another tea party in her mother’s lavish gardens. So she’d torn her beloved Cabbage Patch doll’s head off.

  Well, almost. Her father had caught her before she’d clawed the doll’s head off all the way, and she’d been rightfully punished for treating her toys like some budding serial killer, but she remembered how good it had felt to release that hurt.

  How easy it was to take the pain and fear of losing her mother out on a token that represented their relationship and was a painful reminder of how much she missed her.

  She’d stuffed the doll away when her dad had given it back to her, only to have him find it again when she was seventeen and packing for college.

  He’d jokingly dubbed him Icabod, after the headless horseman, and told her to take it with her to school as a way to remember her mother and just how much she’d loved her. How proud she’d be that Winnie was fulfilling the dream her mother had always wished for her.

  Amos had handed her that doll as though he were handing her the last memory of her mother, his age-lined eyes watery, and she didn’t have the heart to refuse.

  So she’d thrown it in the attic just before she’d left and never looked back.

  And now it was here. In the passenger seat of this stupid, stupid fucking car, his head hanging crookedly to the left side, his single tuft of black, looped-yarn hair on top of his otherwise bald head tattered and ratty.

  Talking to her.

  Aw, hell no.

  She reached over, now that she was past the horror of a talking doll from her past, and pushed his head up on his neck, leaving it only slightly sagging. Because it looked sad and reminded her of how out of control she’d once been.

  His blue eyes stared blankly up at her, unblinking. “So, road trip, Weenie?”

  She pressed her fingers to Icabod’s plastic mouth. “Say another word and it’s lights out for you. Not a single one or I’ll boot your semi-headless self outta here so fast, you’ll have blacktop in your plastic ass for decades. Now, buckle up, Trilogy of Terror.”

  Seven hours later—seven long hours of compressing her lips together to keep from asking Icabod how he’d come to be—and Jacques spoke up, breaking the silence between she and creepy doll. “Weenie! Make ze left off the Interstate!”

  She turned her signal on and continued to ponder what waiting for her in Paris, and what she’d have to do to get the hell out.

  And she thought about Baba Yaga’s nephew Benjamin while stabbing pains
of longing pierced her heart.

  The son of a bitch.

  Dark and gruff, he was the epitome of hard, chiseled edgy-hot. Six-foot-four, two hundred and forty pounds of solid, dusky muscle with a dimple in his chin, and from the moment she’d met him at some witch mixer Zelda had put together, she’d wanted him with a sharp ache.

  And she’d gotten him, but not before she’d fallen deeply, madly in love with him. She’d done things the right way for the first time with Ben. No hijinks, no love potions, no games—complete honesty. Ben was responsible, hardworking and never used his magic for ill-gotten gains. Meaning, his successful business had been earned through elbow grease, and after hanging around a crowd of people who used their abilities to conjure cars and luxury trips, Winnie found him even more attractive.

  It was the first time she’d wanted something more than endless parties and hiding from the Council, so they wouldn’t catch her turning abandoned buildings into luxury condos or buying a Jag with money she’d snapped into existence with her fingers.

  In her attempts to impress Mr. Straight and Narrow, she’d set out to live a clean life, only using her magic for good, just like all White Witches were taught from birth.

  She’d even gotten a job as a receptionist at a gynecologist’s office so she’d look like a real grownup with real responsibilities. She’d seen plenty of erroneous vagina on accident in her quest to impress Ben-effin’-Yaga.

  They’d dated for three months before they’d done the hokey-pokey. Three long, excruciating, lust-filled months, and the result had been magical. The most magical night of her life, bar none. Hot, passionate, long overdue. They’d made love until she’d seen fireworks behind her eyelids.

  And then it was over. He’d ended that incredible night with a tender kiss on her lips and the promise to call her the next day so they could set up a time to have lunch together.

  But Ben never called.

  In fact, he didn’t call and couldn’t be reached for almost three solid days. Wherein, she’d fretted and cried on Zelda’s shoulder until she couldn’t take it anymore.