Open All Hours

by Eden Royce

  Pain slashed at Arthur as he tried to enter Vol’s mind. Damn. His cousin was enraged, but he’d been right: it was hurt and a sense of betrayal behind the anger. He pushed again, trying to gain entry without the large bear noticing. Thoughts and memories flooded Arthur as he circled, looking for an unguarded way in. He felt the wonder and kindness when Vol found the tiny black cat hiding behind the diner’s dumpsters. And the shock when he found the half-naked woman in his room who almost immediately shifted into the cat he’d so tenderly saved. An intimate moment between them flashed by and Arthur turned away to look elsewhere. Vol was entitled to his memories and secrets. He just needed a way in.

  Between his high school locker code and the recipe for hollandaise, Arthur saw his opening and slipped inside Vol’s consciousness. He felt the bear’s body jerk then stiffen.

  Fancy meeting you here.

  Get out of my head, Arthur.

  So you know it’s me, then. Good. Now what the hell’s going on?

  Vol reared up and shook his huge frame, ending with an ear-shattering roar. Arthur managed to hold on to his grasp of Vol despite the man’s efforts to dislodge him. The bear reared up again, crashing through the tender young trees surrounding the clearing and headed for the deeper forestry.

  Arthur held on. I’m asking you nicely here. Don’t force me.

  Vol ignored the warning and continued bounding toward the cover of the larger trees. Arthur didn’t know if he was going to try and scrape him off, but he knew Vol’s reasoning was at an all time low right now. Instead of looking at the memories in his cousin’s mind, Arthur looked up, through the bear’s eyes and saw Ellie. In focusing on keeping his foothold in Vol’s mind, he hadn’t noticed that the bear had made a circle.

  Good God.

  She’d let go of his hand and was pacing around a few feet away from where his body lay against a broad pine. She glanced up at the vibrations and her eyes widened as the huge grizzly headed toward her. Ellie glanced at his body and then back up at the massive creature.

  Shit.

  Don’t run, dove. Don’t run.

  Now he had no choice. Vol had to be shut down right now. Arthur shoved his mind fully into Vol’s, ending conversation and taking over his massive bulk. He forced his will into every muscle, every sinew, every cell of Vol’s body. He felt himself sink down, filling each space and pushing Vol out of the way. Arthur’s mind strained, pulling hard on Vol’s rogue conscience like a rider pulls a horse’s reins.

  Enough!

  The bear halted and lay down, less than ten feet away from Ellie, who rushed back over to Arthur’s body and embraced him. How he wanted to be there for that embrace. But first…

  Man, I’m sorry.

  Arthur tested his connection with his cousin and Vol now seemed to be in control of himself. Arthur pulled back, just a little. You okay?

  Yeah. I’m…okay. I would never hurt Ellie. I just got a little --

  I know. But I also need to know what’s going on.

  Okay, but let me shift back first. You in my head is skeeving me out. I don’t want you looking at my brain.

  Why not? Nothing much in here. Arthur laughed.

  Out!

  A few minutes later, Vol was back in human form, dressed in his jeans, the only clothing that was intact from his prior rampage. He sat next to Arthur, who was recovering from his journey into Vol’s head.

  “It just blindsided me and I got so -- I don’t know. When Leesa said she didn’t want to be an animal I lost it.” He roughly rubbed his palm over the growth of stubble on his cheeks. “But you brought me down. Not a lot of people can say that.” He paused. “Thanks.”

  “Had to be done.”

  “I know you hate the fact you can’t shift but --” When Arthur stiffened, Vol continued. “But what you can do is amazing. You’re probably stronger than any of us. Don’t let anyone tell you different.”

  “Yeah, well…” He trailed off with a shrug.

  “Yeah, well my ass. Believe it, cuz.”

  “Look, I --” Arthur began.

  Ellie interrupted. “Sorry guys, but I have to chime in here. Leesa is fully human like me and I know how I felt a year ago when I found out about shifters. I can understand her reaction.”

  Both men looked at her, torn between shock and horror.

  “Hear me out,” she continued. “To humans, shifters are something from mythology. Legends. To find out they’re real is huge. It opens up a new world that never existed before. Like if you told me you were from Mars.”

  “Aliens don’t exist,” Vol growled.

  “Exactly what I thought about shape shifters. But thankfully, I had some powerful stuff to take the edge off my concerns.” Ellie blushed and Arthur grinned.

  “Aw come on, you two.”

  Ellie cleared her throat. “All I’m saying is, Vol, don’t be too hard on her. She found out about witches, curses, and shifters -- by becoming one, I might add -- in one twenty-four hour period. I think she deserves credit for not going insane.” She picked up a twig and broke it into pieces. “Her fear got the better of her and she said something she regrets. But she nearly killed herself coming to get us to help you.”

  “Help me? Or was she just making sure I didn’t destroy the forest?”

  Arthur pressed his palms to his temples. “Oh yeah, that’s it. She’s not only a cat shifter; she also changes into a forest ranger. Don’t be dim.”

  “He’s right, you know. Everyone deserves a right to explain and a second chance.” Ellie patted Vol’s hand and helped Arthur to his feet. “Just think about what I said. Let’s go to the diner. Having my life in danger makes me want fries.”

  * * *

  Leesa looked up as the trio walked carefully into the diner. The lunch rush was over and she and Tip had commandeered the largest table in the place. It sat along the back wall of the diner and was partially cut off from the rest of the building by a huge column of brick that used to be a working fireplace. Arthur looked tired, Ellie worried as she held his arm, and Vol… Vol looked… Leesa wasn’t sure.

  There was fatigue and determination on his face, along with something else she couldn’t identify. And he was wearing a new white T-shirt that proclaimed, “Now, this is called a Show!” written in bronze glitter on the front. Obviously one Ellie thought to grab from the back of the carnival truck before they left. The trio came to the booth in the back of the diner and pressed in along the seats, Ellie and Arthur next to Leesa and Tip. Vol pulled a chair from another table and sat at the end.

  “We’re back,” Ellie said, needlessly, but Leesa appreciated her attempt to add some normalcy to the day.

  “How are you?” Leesa asked, to no one in particular, but hoping Vol would say something about his forest-rending outburst.

  “Good, we’re all good,” Arthur said, adjusting his vest and casting an eye at Vol. A server came over and took their orders, then scurried away. Silence ruled the table until their orders arrived and Vol asked the server to make sure they had privacy.

  Arthur took a sip of his latte. “Now might not be the time to mention this, but I think it’s best we’re upfront with you, Leesa.”

  Leesa nodded. “Yes, please. I…I need that right now.”

  “We don’t have any new information for you. I’ve spoken to everyone with any sort of magical, mystical background at the Show and we don’t know any more than we did a few days ago.” He stole one of Ellie’s fries and she glared at him. “What we need is a witch with the knowledge of shifting and control of appearance. There’s no one like that around here.”

  “Then where?” Vol asked. “We can travel to wherever there’s someone who can help. Cars, plane, whatever it takes.”

  Leesa was stunned. Even after her outburst, he was willing to help her find a way to reverse the spell. And she hadn’t even apologized to him… yet. But she would and she’d show him that she wasn’t ungrateful for his help. “You’re still willing to…” She trailed off, not sure how to finish h
er question. Cure me? Fix me? They both sounded wrong, like she still felt she had a sickness inside of her.

  “I’ve been willing to help you this whole time, Leesa. That hasn’t changed. I -- I’m only sorry I blew up. That’s not like me.” He took a deep breath. “I’ll be making that up to you, be sure of it.”

  “No, I’m the one who’s sorry. I was totally out of line with what I said and I never mean to hurt you, just --”

  “Crikey,” Tip said. She’d been unusually quiet up until now, absorbing all of the information she could, but now she was ready to make her opinions known. “Enough of the Dr. Phil earbash, yeah? You two can do your horizontal twerking later.”

  Leesa almost choked on her coffee. Vol’s eyes widened until they looked like jar lids.

  “So Leesa has told me…everything,” Tip continued. “Sort of. She fiddled around in something that wasn’t her business -- Sorry, luv,” she added in a less than comforting tone.

  “Hey, I was doing my job. It’s --”

  “Right,” Tip cut her off. “So this woman said it wasn’t a curse, and it could be undone. But you need a powerful caster to reverse this spell.”

  Ellie ran a fry through a puddle of Dijon mustard on her plate. “Yeah, so?”

  Tip rolled the silver ring in her lip. Her black lipstick had faded, but she made no move to retouch it. “Yeah, so…I’m volunteering.”

  Ellie sputtered while Arthur and Vol exchanged glances. “What?” came from all of them in unison.

  Leesa nodded. “Tip is a w -- uh… the person for the job.”

  “If I’d known this was what you guys have been scurrying around to find, I could have helped sooner.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me? I mean, why didn’t I know about…this earlier?” Ellie asked.

  Tip’s face softened. “I hadn’t told anyone, luv.” Leesa noticed that “luv” sounded more sincere when Tip addressed her best friend. “I’m sorry, but I have my reasons.” She looked away.

  “So why help now? You could have hidden it and we’d never know,” Vol said, a frown creasing his brow.

  “Shape changing should be done because you want to or because it is in one’s nature. It shouldn’t be forced upon someone by magic. Tonight, I’m just doing my customer service at the magic returns department. But if any of you so much as breathes that I’ve done this, you’ll be a leopard slug in two minutes flat.” She took a slurp of her cookie-dough milkshake. “And you don’t want that. Those things have penises coming out of their heads.”

  Both men cringed.

  Ellie laughed. “That’s my girl. What do you need? We’ll all be there to support you, won’t we, guys? Isn’t that helpful to spells, the mental strength of friends and believers?”

  “Yeah, if this was Dungeons and Dragons,” Tip said. “Just kidding. It would be great to have you all there.” She took a napkin from the metal dispenser on the table and scribbled on it, then shoved the note at Ellie. “Here. I need these things.”

  * 3 white roses

  * 1 live moth

  * 4 pieces of lead

  * cube of antimony

  * kilogram of salt

  * a cedar tree branch

  Ellie pushed the list to Arthur, who slid it to Vol. “Why have I got to get these things?” he asked, squinting at the list. “Shouldn’t we split the list?”

  “I’ve got to get back to the Show. I have to get things back on track after the code blue,” Arthur said. “That’ll take most of my day and early evening.”

  “And I’m helping with that, then going home to finish up a report for work.” Ellie pushed her plate away.

  Vol looked at Tip. “And I have a uterus,” she said. “Just get them. I need to rest up for tonight.” She raised a thin, pencil-black eyebrow at Arthur. “I assume I get the night off? With pay?”

  “If you can do this, you’ve got a place in the Show, if you want it,” he said.

  “Nope. Although a raise wouldn’t go amiss.”

  “We’ll see,” Arthur replied. Tip was pushing it a bit, because he did pay her well. “When and where?”

  “Soon as Gentle Ben gets the stuff. Where? Someplace quiet, but not too quiet. Large but not too large…”

  “We get it, we get it. How about here at the diner?” Vol asked.

  “Hate to say it, but we have to be prepared that the woman from earlier will show up. Too many humans here at the diner. If anything goes down, we risk exposing the shifters.” Ellie was the voice of reason.

  After a pause, Arthur offered up the carnival. “If anyone gets suspicious, we can say it’s part of a new act. That will at least buy us some time to cover and give us a few other shifters to stand guard.”

  Leesa took this new information surprisingly well. “There are more shifters working at the carnival?”

  “Most of them are, actually,” Arthur replied. “It can be hard to find acceptance as a shifter and the Show has been a safe haven for a lot of runaways and changelings with no family.”

  “So tonight, then?” Vol asked. “At midnight?”

  “I’d say just before. Get set up and all. The moon isn’t full tonight but it’s waxing, so that’s in our favor. We can’t wait another two weeks until it’s full again. Let’s go.”

  Leesa stayed in the booth as everyone else began to leave. Tip patted the back of her hand. “Don’t look so worried. Most of the time reversal spells are painless.”

  “Most of the time?” Leesa asked, eyes wide. But Tip had slipped away, presumably to rest up for the night.

  Leesa stirred her cold coffee, lost in thought until she heard a cough. Vol stood at the head of the table, list in hand. “You okay?” he asked.

  “Yeah…I think so. This is just so surreal. I can’t process it.”

  He shifted from foot to foot. “Ellie said you might feel that way. I’m sorry I had no right…I just never thought of it from your perspective. As a full human. It must be scary to suddenly have all of this shoved in your lap.”

  “It is, but I’m managing. Look,” she said, turning to him and touching his arm. The touch sent a shock of awareness up through her fingertips and into her body at the heat he radiated. “I’m sorry too. I never should have said those things. You have been great.” Her voice lowered to a whisper. “You’re an amazing man and I never thought I’d meet anyone like you. When I did and I found out about your bear, it freaked me out. But I…no matter what happens tonight --”

  “No, don’t think the worst. It will work out.” He laced his fingers through hers. “C’mon. Let’s go and attack this list. That’ll keep your mind off tonight.”

  Tone came over to wipe down their table.

  “Can I see what we need?” Leesa asked.

  “Sure.”

  Leesa looked over the list. “Where do you get some of this stuff? What’s antimony?”

  “No idea,” he said. “Guess we’re going to Google it.”

  Tone had the answer. “Metal alloy. Used in making your own bullets and such. Gun store should have some.”

  “How do you…” Leesa looked surprised that the little man had such knowledge of not only guns, but of bullet making?

  “I wasn’t always a short-order cook, you know.” He smirked and Leesa thought she could see a hint of that sharp fox nose slyly peeking out. “Go get what you need. I can hold down the fort.”

  “I don’t know what I’d do without you, old man,” Vol said, slapping the smaller man on the back.

  “I do,” he replied. “Be broke.” Then he grabbed the empty coffee cups and headed back into the kitchen.

  After a stunned moment, Vol’s laughter joined Leesa’s. “He’s right, you know,” he admitted as he tugged at her hand. “Ready to attack this list?”

  She took a deep breath. “I may as well be.”

  “Great, but first, let me change this shirt. I love Arthur, but I’m not wearing sparkly bronze out in public.” He grinned, and pulled at the T-shirt.

  His humor was infectious and L
eesa returned it, smiling up at him. She was still nervous… terrified, actually… but she wasn’t in this alone. She wasn’t the frightened lost kitten she was a week ago. She had friends, and support, and whatever this thing with Vol was now. Later, she’d find that out, but for now, they had a job to do.

  Chapter Six

  Three hours later, Vol and Leesa returned to the diner worn and rushed, having purchased each item on the list. Except one. The roses and the salt had been easy; the local supermarket carried those in abundance. The lead and antimony as expected were harder, but they’d managed it. The gun shop owner, a portly pockmarked man, had been less than cooperative. He had a semi-automatic holstered at his hip. and Leesa thought he was going to ask them to leave, but once Vol mentioned Tone’s name as the person who’d referred him, the man’s demeanor changed to one that was almost welcoming. They’d left with the lead, antimony, and his business card: it seemed he offered shooting and gun-handling lessons, group or private. Leesa pocketed the card. That might come in handy some day.

  The only thing missing from the list was a live moth. None of the pet stores had them, as moths weren’t a common food for their lizards and chameleons. “We’ll have to wait until the sun sets,” Leesa said. “Surely, there will be a few outside near those woods.”

  “I’m sure. We’ve got everything else.” Vol looked at her, searching her face. “Are you okay?”

  She was not okay. Leesa was about to participate in a strange ritual -- ritual was the only word she could think of -- that might or might not work. If it didn’t, she’d be stuck as a hybrid, part human and part animal. But at least she’d have someone to fall back on. The shifters she’d met so far, Vol included, had been kind and helpful. The thing that was eating at her and what she couldn’t confide in anyone else was what would happen if the spell worked?

  Returned to her regular self, would she then return to her job? Her family wasn’t too much of a concern: a telephone call to her mother weekly and one to her sister once a month was hardly a hardship. She could forget all about this experience if she wanted to. But was that what she wanted? Sure, being cursed was something she could do with forgetting, but this was the most at home she’d felt in… possibly ever.