by Leanne Leeds
I didn’t notice the soft shimmer of light in the cat house corner as I left.
“That was a fantastic night!” My Dad danced around the lobby laughing moments after the last guest left. The evening had been an exceptional success, with adoption applications for over forty dogs and cats. Mom and I had “interviewed” all the prospective adoptive parents and made sure they were good people with good intentions, checking with the animals chosen to make sure it was a match both ways. Even Fang had been selected by a family with a little boy that had a permanent limp just like the German Shepherd, both obtained from a car accident that occurred when each was younger.
“It was wonderful, Alan. The dogs were wonderfully behaved, and we got a decent amount of donations this year,” my mother concurred as she began cleaning up the lobby. “I’ll take care of the lobby if you can get the dog kennels. I’m sure Charlotte can handle the cat house.”
“I got it!” I called as I hustled out the door. The night was long and reading so many people while doing the adoption applications had exhausted me. I couldn’t wait to get done with the party wrap up and get the heck into bed.
As I walked down the path to the cat house, a rainbow colored sparkling light shimmered from inside of the annex, but… that couldn’t be right. I didn’t remember my father putting any Halloween lights inside the building. The cats weren’t fond of weird lights or noises, and so the decorations within the place were minimal, and cat approved. There was no way the cats would have supported the addition of the blinding disco-glimmer I was seeing.
I opened the door to find a cat in the center of the room, sparkling. All the other feline inhabitants circled around the shimmering apparition as if they were getting a visit from grimalkin royalty.
“What the heck is going on in here?”
“Indeed. It took you long enough to come out here and check on the cats. Especially after you allowed us to gorge ourselves to an obscene degree on salmon treats. What if someone choked? What if someone ate themselves into a stupor?” the cat chastised as his audience turned their collective sullen stink-eyes toward me.
“Um. Did they?”
“Did they what?” the cat asked with some irritation as its glowing eyes narrowed.
“Choke or eat themselves into a stupor?”
“Well, no, but that’s hardly the point, now, is it?” the cat asked as he tilted his head.
“Wait, how can I hear you talk? I don’t have Dad’s ability.”
“You do at this moment in time,” the cat responded as it cleaned its whiskers.
“What point in time?”
“This one. This point. This is a point in time. My goodness, you cannot possibly be one of the heirs being considered as a potential holder of the ring. I know witches are daft, but you seem to have daftness as your talent.”
“Hey now! No need for insults, buddy,” The cat was so sparkling and dazzling that I could barely see him through the shimmer. I could sense emotion coming from him, so I knew he was real, and he was there, but he shined so brightly that it was difficult to look at him. “Who are you?”
“Samson.”
“Wait, you’re Uncle Phil’s cat?”
“Correction. I was your Uncle Phil’s cat. Now, I am no one’s cat. I am my own cat now that he is gone. For now and in this moment.”
I scooped up Sparkles McAttitude and ran toward the administration building while clutching him tightly to my chest. To my surprise, the cat with the attitude didn’t struggle against me, though I was hit with a wave of annoyance.
“Mom! Dad! We have a problem!” I burst into the lobby holding the disco ball cat and nearly ran into my mother. Mom dropped the cup she was holding as she stared at the cat in my arms. Pale, her eyes filled up with tears. “He says he’s not Uncle Phil’s cat anymore, and that Uncle Phil is gone. What does this mean? Mom?”
My father burst through the back door and stopped mid-stride as he glimpsed the glowing cat in my arms. “No,” he whispered. My mother walked over to my father and gathered him in her arms, murmuring words of comfort as she held him.
“You know why I am here, Alan, brother of Phil. Someone must bear the ring. I am here to find the next ringmaster. The only candidates are here.”
“Dad, why can I hear Samson talk?” I dropped the cat to the floor and walked over to my father, who was now pale and white as a sheet. “I can hear his words as plain as if he spoke them. I can’t do that.”
“You can at the moment,” my father choked out as he folded me in his arms. “Something’s happened to your Uncle Phil, honey. I’m so sorry. So very sorry.”
I felt my mother’s warm hand rub my back the way she used to do when I was a small child as my father squeezed me so tightly I thought my bones would bruise. “My brother has died. Samson has come so that one of us can be chosen as the next ringmaster. You and I are the only ones in the Astley family left, now.”
“Yes. So let’s go. I’d prefer not to explode, thank you very much,” Samson glowed brighter as he stared up at our family’s grief.
“Jeesh, Samson, we just found out Uncle Phil passed away—what kind of a heartless jerk are you?” I hissed at the cat.
“I’m a cat. What’s more, I am the Astley family cat. We all have a duty, and my duty is not to incinerate myself. You must fulfill yours. We need to go.”
“Samson’s right,” Dad sniffled and pulled away from me. His watery eyes stared into my eyes. “The Midway cannot go without an anchor for long. Samson can hold the Magical Midway’s power, but not for much longer. You and I need to go with Samson so the ancestors can decide which one of us will become the new anchor for the Midway.”
“Honey, you remember what I told you when you came home from vacation this summer? About the Midway needing a person to anchor through?” My mother grabbed my hand and took over for my distraught father. I nodded and squeezed her hand. “Well, Samson will take you and your father to the Midway so that your Uncle Phil can choose which one of you should take over.”
“We need to go. They are waiting.” Samson hacked and then threw up a pink-tinged hairball on the floor. Dumbstruck, I stared at it and then glared at the cat.
“You were here during Animal House? And you didn’t say anything?” I asked him accusingly.
“I needed a snack. Traveling long distances while carrying cosmic power can make a cat hungry,” Samson answered. I stared at him in shock.
“Honey, we have to go,” Dad said quietly. I nodded.
“Good luck, you two,” Mom whispered as Samson glowed even brighter and the rainbow sparkles whooshed around us. “I love you both, always, whatever you each choose and whoever is chosen.”
The wind whirled around me as I wondered what happens next.
It was dark when my father and I manifested in front of Uncle Phil’s yurt at the Magical Midway. The inhabitants of the circus whispered amongst themselves as we appeared. The Larry brothers stood guard at the four corners of the small clearing. Samson struggled to push away from me, and I gently placed him on the ground. He continued to glow with blinding brightness.
“Charlotte!” Fiona called as she raced toward me. Gallus Larry, the oldest of the Larry brothers, grabbed her startlingly fast by the arm and held her back.
“Stay,” the Roman told her. “No one may approach the bearer candidates or the familiar until it is done. No one.”
Fiona glared at him and shook her hand loose, stepping back to stand with the other kelpies. Faces lined with stress. The whole place seemed drained of the usual joy and excitement I knew from those that populated the circus. “Right, then. Get on with it, will ya?” Fiona snapped.
“The Midway is now in a time that is not a time, transported to a place that is not a place,” Samson droned. The city lights that had glowed off in the distance when we arrived blinked once and then disappeared from view. A warm wind blew over those gathered. “Anyone who does not wish to witness the choosing may return to their tent.”
“Can eve
ryone hear the cat?” I whispered to my father. He nodded yes without moving his eyes from the glowing feline and swallowed. I grabbed his hand and squeezed, unsure of what was about to happen. My heart still ached for my uncle, and I was desperately confused. Everyone in attendance, including my father, seemed to wait with anticipation as if they knew what was coming next.
I had no freaking clue.
A shimmering bubble glowed, anchored at four points by four of the Larry brothers. It expanded until we were cut off from all those waiting and watching. Bob, the youngest, patrolled outside the glowing sphere while smiling optimistically at the attendees.
A pinpoint of light slowly glowed into focus within the center of the circle. As it expanded, it took the form of a rotund man. Features and details slowly focused themselves, and I realized that it was a glowing apparition of my uncle. I gasped as he smiled at me. Much fainter and slightly out of focus, a line of men stood behind him.
“Well, I seem to have relinquished the job earlier than I had hoped, my girl,” Uncle Phil’s shimmering image laughed as he acknowledged me. “Alan, nice of you to show up. Too bad it took my being murdered for you to actually visit the Midway.”
“Murdered!” my father shouted. I saw all those outside of the bubble chatter amongst themselves frantically at my father’s exclamation. Howls of anger and fury echoed within the bubble from every direction.
“Samson, turn the volume down on our soiree, will you? We won’t get anything done with the peanut gallery rabble-rousing out there,” Uncle Phil asked his cat. A deep silence descended within the bubble, and the protests of audience were shut out in an instant. “There. Goodness me, they can get themselves worked up into a tizzy, can’t they?”
“Well, of course they’re in a tizzy, Uncle! You just said you were murdered! Frankly, I’m surprised you don’t seem that concerned!” I told Uncle Phil as my father choked out a sob. Uncle Phil frowned at him.
“Actually, your father just said I was murdered, dear girl. Only you and your father and Samson can see or hear me. Now, Alan, don’t get all emotional. We have things to decide and plans to make. I’ll be concerned about my murder later. Right now, we have to get moving on this.” My father smiled through his tears and nodded.
“Who is it going to be?”
“Well, clearly not you, Alan. You haven’t been on this fairground in twenty years. Why would we choose you?”
“Charlotte has never even been formally trained as a witch, Phil! You can’t make her one of the two most powerful witches in the world with a snap of your fingers.”
My uncle cast his eyes at me for a moment as I tried to absorb the news. Uncle Phil was dead, and he was about to hand the Magical Midway over to me. Tears filled my eyes as I took in both the death of Uncle Phil and the circumstances of my life that were about to dramatically change. It seemed like I should be panicking.
For some reason I didn’t understand, I wasn’t. Some part of me seemed to always know this would happen. I felt a strange sense of relief now that it was here.
I nodded, and my uncle nodded back and winked. Turning back to my father, I watched the two brothers engage in one last argument that didn’t matter anymore.
“Well, I can, and frankly, who’s fault is it that she will be woefully unprepared? It’s not mine. You decided to pretend you were mortal and limit what she knew about the paranormal world. I warned you, repeatedly. How did you think this would work out when you decided that?”
“I thought you’d settle down like a grown up, get a wife, and have children so this wouldn’t involve my family, you immature child!” My father’s hands balled into fists, and his grief morphed into anger. He stepped up and stared Uncle Phil in the eye, furious at the fat ghost’s amusement. The two men stared each other down, one angry and one bemused.
As moments passed and they continued to list each others faults and poor decisions, my father’s anger seemed to suddenly drain from him. He sighed. “I suppose none of that matters anymore.”
“No, Alan, it doesn’t. I didn’t get myself murdered just to be able to tell you that I told you so. Though I have to admit it’s an amusing afterlife reward. Because I did tell you so. Repeatedly.”
“I’m more qualified than Charlotte. I was at least trained at the Academy. Choose me. Give me time to prepare her for the role.”
“No. Our decision has been made,” Uncle Phil told him without pause as the ancestors that stood behind him nodded. “You had your chance, and you knew this could happen.”
“How on earth would I know this would happen? You have so many levels of protection around you that almost no one on the planet could possibly hurt you! Why would I think this was a possibility?”
“What do you mean, Dad?” My father shook his head and turned away from me, choked up again. I flicked my eyes to the shimmering visage of Uncle Phil. “Well? What does he mean?”
“He means that I really shouldn’t have been able to be murdered,” Uncle Phil told me. “As the ringmaster, I’m darn near indestructible. My health should stand for at least a hundred years or more, and no violent act should be able to make a dent in me. I’m only sixty-five! Far too young for a ringmaster to die. The only person that can really hurt me is… well, me. And I didn’t do it. I had a date with Jeannie Goldberg tomorrow to see that Broadway show everyone is talking about. I’ve been waiting two years to see that damn show.”
“But then how are you dead?”
“I have no idea, dear girl,” Uncle Phil said as his sparkling face grew more serious. “But I know that I am, and so we must get on with what we need to do. There’s no help for all these regrets that your father has now.”
As I stood in the glowing circle with my father, my uncle, and Samson the reality that my uncle was dead slipped more profoundly within me. My father seemed defeated by the turn of events while my uncle stood resigned but peaceful. I smiled at him again, and he smiled back. It was hard to mourn someone standing in front of you, even if that someone was glowing like a pink and blue disco ball.
“Dad, I’m okay with this. Really. You love the shelter, and you and Mom never wanted to live this paranormal nomadic life, anyway. I don’t mind so much. I’m almost thirty, you know?” Walking over to my struggling father, I placed my arms around him. “Maybe it’s time I moved out of the house.”
“Charlie, are you sure?” Dad brushed the hair from my eyes as he called me by my girlish childhood nickname. “I feel like I have failed you. You know so little about the power you’re about to get.”
“She’ll be able to contact me through Samson, Alan,” Uncle Phil told my father reassuringly. “No ringmaster is ever truly alone. I’ll take care of her, little brother. I promise.”
“Oh, Phil,” my father sighed. “I thought we would have so much more time, you and I.” Dad walked toward Uncle Phil and stood in front of the older brother he never got along with but always loved. Dad nodded.
As I tried to ask what my uncle meant by never being alone (because that didn’t sound so fabulous), Samson jumped on my thigh and wrapped his paws around me. The cat’s long needle-like claws dug deeply into my flesh as lightning flashed in escalating rapidity from my uncle to the cat to me.
With a flash of blinding brightness, I heard a roar fill my ears as I collapsed on the ground.
3
My head thrummed as the pulse in my skull beat a staccato inside my brain. Peeking out from beneath my eyelids I glimpsed the candles flickering all around the tent I recognized as Uncle Phil’s.
“’Bout time you woke up,” Fiona snapped as she pulled the covers off of me. “We’ve been stuck in the middle of nowhere for two days now. You have a bunch of right ticked paranormals waiting for your highness to drag your royal arse out of that bed and take us out of here.”
Fiona handed me a Wake-Up coffee and grabbed my wrist to pull me into an upright position. “Not kidding, Charlotte, you have to get us somewhere that we can get supplies and sunshine. People are freaking out at
being stuck in this pitch-black ringmaster no man’s land. Not a good start to your reign.”
Samson walked across the room and hopped up on the bed next to me. The black cat purred and rubbed his forehead against my thigh as Fiona waved frantically at me to drink my coffee faster. I sipped and squinted up at her while she glared at me. “What do you mean? Where are we?”
“Oh my herds, you must be kidding me. Don’t you just know?”
“Um. I don’t know. Should I just know?”
“I have no idea, but we’re in this suspended no time no place thing. We have to get out. If you don’t know how to get us back, you better ask the cat.”
Think “next town,” Samson’s bored voice echoed in my head. Phil always programmed in the next three or four locations into the magic so it would be easy to move.
As soon as I finished thinking next town, sunlight poured through the entrance to my uncle’s yurt and an approving cheer went up through the grounds. Amongst the clapping and celebration, I heard several shouted epithets complaining about the time it had taken for “the blond wench” to have returned the Midway to its proper time and place.
“Well, that was rude,” I complained.
My father ran into the yurt and exhaled when he saw me sitting up and drinking my coffee. “Charlotte, I am so glad that you’re awake,” he said as he crossed the living space and sat down on the bed next to me. “Is your uncle here?”
“Um. No. Uncle Phil is dead, Dad,” I told my father slowly wondering if the time travel had rattled his brain.
“No, Charlotte, I mean is his spirit here. Or his ghost. I’m not exactly sure how this works, but I know that you should be able to call on him and talk to him. You need to start learning how some of this works, sweetie.” My father appeared like he hadn’t slept in several days. His shirt was wrinkled, and his face was stubbled. As I peered into his eyes I noticed they were swollen red with deep bags underneath them.
