Carrie was droning on and on about “being concerned for my well-being” and “provided her support,” but my mind was drifting. I remembered coming into the lunch room one day and seeing a few other teachers staring at something under the table.
“What are you guys looking at?” I asked.
“It’s Kate. We found her in this fetal position,” Julie, one of the teachers, answered. “I’m not sure if she’s dead or alive. Maybe she’s both. It looks like fifteen years of sixth graders entering puberty and another new math method have finally taken her down.”
Another teacher, Gina, a dyed in the wool science geek, added her thoughts. “She’s alive, but if we wake her up, I’d say there’s about a 50/50 chance she’s going to be permanently insane.” She poked Kate. “Or she could be just fine.” Gina suddenly erupted from some strange fuzzy brained science related thought, typical of her kind. “Jesus! It’s like Schrödinger's Cat in teacher form.”
I had to learn about the hypothetical experiments of people like Einstein and Schrödinger in college. It sailed right over my head. I had no idea what it meant. Schrödinger's Cat? What the hell, Gina? I thought. All I could say to Gina was, “Yeah, I never thought of it like that. Excellent observation, Gina.” Gina nodded approvingly to my supposedly sharp grasp of quantum mechanics.
“Julie, get the cork,” I directed. We keep a reasonably fresh cork from a bottle of wine in the cupboard. It is first aid intended especially for cases like Kate’s. You place it under the victim’s nose like you would with smelling salts—works wonders.
“Leigh? Leigh? Are you even listening to me?” Carrie the Perky snapped me out of my thoughts.
“Oh, yes. Just taking in all of your advice. Or whatever that was.” Since she had been eavesdropping on my conversation with Hunter, I thought it would be fun to just be honest and see if I could make her tightly stretched skin blush. “But you’ve got this all wrong. I was just talking to my fiancé, doing a little roleplaying. If you know what I’m saying.” I winked and nudged her with my elbow. “I’m going to see if the big bad cop can cuff and stuff a naughty girl like me.”
Carrie’s eyes popped open so suddenly it reminded me of when I open a can of those refrigerated biscuits—they always catch me by surprise. It made me flinch. “Leigh! You should never play into the harassment of a misogynistic police officer. You are just encouraging his rake-like behavior. And that just makes all of us other women his targets.”
If I was Luna, my fur would have puffed out and I would have hissed at her. Or perhaps scratched her eyes out. “Relax! Lighten up a little before you end up like…like that cat…Schrödinger's Cat.” I’m not even sure what that meant. Carrie stared at me with big bug eyes. I took another deep breath and calmly started over. “You don’t get what I’m saying. We live together. We have a healthy relationship and a damn good sexual one, too. I was playing around with him.” I paused to see if anything I said registered with her. It didn’t. “You’re single, right? But do you have a special someone? You know, a lover?”
“Well…no.”
“All right, at some point you will. You’ll want to have a little fun once in a while. Not just flirting but going the extra mile, so to speak. Tease each other. Get a little naughty. Do you know what I’m saying?”
“It seems like you have a very vulgar and twisted sexual fantasy. You want to be cuffed and…and stuffed? By a bad cop?” Carrie followed up by making a clucking sound that made me want to pull her tongue out by the roots.
“You think that’s twisted? Ha! That’s nothing. Let me tell you…” Then I heard it—a purposeful cough. The kind of cough someone makes when they are trying to interrupt a conversation. I suddenly realized that we were no longer alone. I turned around and saw that the principal had just walked in with a few other teachers. I have no idea what they heard, but my attempt to get Carrie to lighten up and blush had completely backfired. Instead, it was my face that became as red as a baboon’s ass. I didn’t want to explain a thing. I had no stomach to face additional embarrassment. I walked right out and stayed in my classroom for the rest of the day. If I ever wanted to win a verbal fencing match with Carrie, I really needed to get better at that sort of thing. Mondays always suck.
Chapter Five
A “Do Yourself” Romance
“Isn’t there someone, anyone? Another shop you might recommend? It’s only November and it’s colder than a snowman’s ass in here. Seriously, you could hang sides of beef in here,” I pleaded with the fourth furnace repair service I called.
“Listen, I’ll tell you something. The reason you haven’t been able to get someone into that Schlitt house of yours is because it’s haunted. Every repair shop in Cook County knows it!” The woman’s raspy voice was honest but gruff.
“No it isn’t. Well, it used to be. You could say the Schlitt house is formerly haunted. We haven’t seen a ghost since we had the séances and my fiancé’s exorcism last month.” I heard some mumbling and then nothing. “Hello? Hello?” The bastards hung up on me!
“Why are all of these furnace people so damn rude?” I muttered to Luna.
“Meow.” Luna’s nonchalance seemed as if it was something I should have expected from self-described heating professionals.
“It’s a bunch of bullshit. That’s what it is. Ghosts. I wonder if I could get Millie to write a letter of certification for these jackasses. It could say ‘This house is clean’ or something.” I arranged two of our new electric space heaters so they would give me a semicircle of warmth around my desk. I went through the mail I grabbed when I got home. “Bill. Bill. Election bullshit. Bill.” Luna pounced on one remaining piece of mail. “What’s this?” A business envelope with a New York City return address told me immediately this was the long awaited response to the two manuscripts I submitted, Four Bitten Fangtasy and Bangin’ the Billion-were.
I had also sent them a pitch for my ideas on my yet to be written, second and third books in my Billion-were series. Book two was to be called Fangin’ the Billion-were. In that story, my billionaire werewolf’s lover would reveal herself to be a vampire. Book Three, Gangin’ the Billion-were was to be a ménage story that entailed my hot, hung hero getting involved in a hedonistic club run by a coven of hot witches. It was inspired by the purported trysts of Esmeralda and Kelly. I’d have to sit down and get the tantalizing details from Kelly on how things worked out. I didn’t have any desire to actually get involved in their games, and I have never had any experiences involving extra players, so to speak. Unless of course you count Luna’s annoying interaction any time Hunter and I would get together.
My eyes squinted as I looked at her. “Okay, Luna. Now that I am fully aware of the fact that somewhere under all that fur you’re some reincarnated chick from the past, you have to realize it’s no longer acceptable for you to jump in bed when Hunter and I are having sex. It takes on a whole new dimension of weird. Having a threesome with a cat is where I draw the line. Got it?”
“Meeoow.”
“No. Seriously, you need to go find something else to do.” I held the envelope up and felt the paper. “Luna, in here could be a chance for my imagination and my writing to really pay off.” My fingers trembled as I ran them across the seal. “This is so exciting. I wish Hunter could be home already.” I ripped open the envelope and read the letter.
Dear Ms. Epstein,
We are pleased to accept your manuscript, Bangin’ the Billion-were for publication. Enclosed is the contract for our proposal. Upon the return of the signed contract, you will receive a royalty advance of $2,000.00 in accordance with the terms specified in the agreement. This contract is for exclusive publishing rights to the following titles: Bangin’ the Billion-were, Fangin’ the Billion-were, and Gangin’ the Billion-were. These will need to be submitted by the deadlines listed on the contract. Unfortunately, we are not interested in Four Bitten Fangtasy at this time. We are especially interested in any paranormal romance stories involving witches, witchcraft, or o
ther occult themed romance stories as they are very popular among our readers right now. Please consider submitting any manuscripts as soon as possible.
Sincerely,
Ann Putnam
KD Publishing
“Woo hoo! Fuck yeah!” All I had to do was hold my arms out and Luna jumped up on me. We danced around in front of my desk and I continued to shout with joy. “They liked my story! Can you believe it? I can’t wait to tell Hunter.” In the meantime, I grabbed my phone to share the good news.
“Kelly! You won’t believe it!”
“Okay, what did you do this time? More shifters? Ghosts?”
“No! I just got a letter from a publisher. They’ve offered me a contract for my Billion-were series. It’s un-fucking-believable! I am so excited!”
Kelly seemed as excited as I was. “Way to go, Leigh! That’s awesome. I am so happy for you! This calls for a little celebration. Remember, Friday night is our first meeting of Spell Club. We’ll be sure to make it a bit of a party for you.”
“Sounds great. See you here on Friday.”
Spell Club was an idea that Lindsey came up with. We would have a monthly get-together to discuss and maybe practice our witchcraft powers. The way we envisioned it working was that each of us would pick something related to witchcraft and gather any information we could. Once we discussed the topics, we planned to prepare a handy guide containing any spells we found or “lessons learned the hard way.” We could be assured that there were plenty of those unfortunate examples already compiled. I had completely forgotten about Spell Club and I hadn’t done a bit of the research that I had volunteered for.
“You know something, Luna? I’m really being a wimp about this witchcrafty stuff. Do you really think Marie or Esmeralda would sit here without heat? No way in hell. They’d snap their fingers or wave a wand. Before long, it would be nice and warm.” My nose was starting to feel like an ice cube, so I sat back down and let the heaters do their thing.
“Meow.”
“I was just thinking the same thing. I’m sitting here with all the power I need at my fingertips. To hell with those repair people.” I’ve been saying all along that my desk often pulls me in and compels me to write at it. This was one of those times. I started by writing a romance story about two people deeply in love and hell bent on restoring the historic Schlitt house. Of course I had to use the name of the Schlitt house in order for the magic to work. It should go without saying that I had to choose very unfamiliar names for the couple. For the man I chose Cosmos and for the woman I chose Sybil. My plan was to encompass the furnace issue as well as any future home repair items that might come along in times of desperation. In any case, I needed heat. I typed out a rather poorly written start, just to get the ball rolling.
Restoring The Old Schlitt House- A ‘Do Yourself’ Romance.
The icy hands of winter had tightened their frosty grip on the old Schlitt house. Inside a chilly dark room upstairs were the last remnants of heat. Two hearts in love, beating as one. “Sybil, I know that our love will keep us warm enough to survive the coldest winter. As long as you sate my lustful desires, repeatedly, with your deliciously hot body.”
“Cosmos, I will always. As long as you continue to do that thing you do with your tongue that makes me scream your name. And the other thing, the way you pull my legs up around your back and hold me so close while you fill me so completely with your huge hard piece of man meat and you kiss me with our tongues entangled. That is, as long as you’ve washed your face after having it between my legs, from when you were doing that thing you do with your tongue.”
“Meeoow.”
“I know, right? I’m getting myself turned on by writing porn. Okay, now let me see if I can get some actual heat for these two.”
“Yes, Sybil. Always.”
“But Cosmos, at some point we have to leave our cozy warm nest of love in order to eat, or use the bathroom. For the love of God, we really need a working furnace. Would you please just listen to me for once? And call someone to repair our furnace?”
The very next day, Cosmos had a day off and he finally succeeded in getting a very reasonably priced repair person to stop by that afternoon and restore warmth to the house. When Sybil returned from a fun filled day at work, the house was nice and toasty warm.”
“Ta da! Done. A little cheesy, but I think this will work. When Hunter is home tomorrow, he just needs to call another repair place and we should have it fixed. And at a reasonable price, too.”
“Meow.”
“I am pretty sure it will work. See, I used the actual name for our house. The characters names are different, but it’s not like anyone else is living here. Surely, the magic will apply to our house, but without the side effect of causing us to do anything stupid.”
“Meow, mow, mow, meow.”
“Smartass. And yes, Do Yourself sounds a lot better than Do it Yourself. I mean seriously, what are they saying when they use a phrase like that? It’s rude. As in, ‘go do it your damn self.’ ”
Luna jumped off my desk and made a dash for the front door. “Hey, Luna! Hi, Leigh!” Hunter called out.
I was right behind Luna. “Hi, baby. I’m so glad you’re home.” My arms wrapped around him. “Hey. You’re out of character. You were supposed to be in uniform.”
“Sorry. It was a rough ending for the day. I pulled over some guy and gave him a sobriety check. When I asked him if he had anything to drink, he responded by throwing up on me. It smelled like beer and looked like cottage cheese.”
My stomach churned at the thought of it. “Nice! Thanks for killing my appetite.”
Hunter seemed rather upbeat for someone that had just been showered with vomit. “I was just thinking how this job isn’t as exciting as I hoped, then when I got back to the station I got some great news.”
“Really? Me too! I received a reply from that publisher. They accepted my Billion-were series. Can you believe it? I am so thrilled. What’s your good news?”
“Seriously? That’s great, baby. Wow! You’re going to be a published author. Maybe you’ll be famous someday. My news isn’t that great, but it’s good. The detective division requested me to come and help out on some undercover work this coming Saturday. For a rookie like me, it’s a big deal. I’m sure they just need someone new that nobody will recognize as a police officer. Still, if I do a good job, I might be able to get a foot in the door. You know, to become a detective someday.”
I was immediately afraid. I’ve seen way too many movies and read too many stories about the dangerous life of an undercover cop. “Baby, that’s…wonderful.” My voice was quiet and faltering.
“Oh I know. You’re worried, right? Don’t be. They assured me that this is not a violent crime issue. I think it might be corruption or vice. Hey! Maybe it’s a sting operation! Anyway, they said I’ll find out all the details on Friday.”
My spirits lifted. “Oh thank God. I really worry about you out there. How about you get a shower, I’ll warm up some food, and meet you in our cozy nest of warm love. Tomorrow you can call one more furnace repair shop. But for tonight, just do that thing you do and keep me warm.”
“Cozy nest of warm love?”
“No, I meant to say nest of warm cozy…never mind. See you in bed, hottie.”
Late that night, wrapped in the warm feeling of having made love with Hunter, my mind started to wander.
Nothing makes you appreciate the basic needs of life more than their absence. For me, it happened to be heat, but I guess that’s why people go off on those extreme trips into the wilderness. It must make them appreciate what it means to have food, water, shelter, companionship, and warmth. Not to mention a bathroom. I thought about the kids in the city, and I knew there were more than a few that didn’t always feel as if any, or all, of those needs were guaranteed. An idea popped into my head.
I rolled on top of Hunter and looked him in the eyes as they popped open. He made a grunting sound.
“Hunter? Hunt
er? Are you still awake?”
“Um. No. But I can be.”
“Okay good. I want to make a difference. There are so many people that have it worse than us. Especially the kids in the city. I’d like to start collecting donations. We could split up the money and provide funding for homeless shelters and domestic abuse shelters. For heating, winter coats, things like that to make the winter a little more bearable. What do you think?”
“Sure. You could start the fund by donating the last remaining piece of the Schlitt jewelry collection.”
“Really? Are you sure?” Part of me wanted to say “Sorry. That sucker is paying for my…I mean our wedding and a real honeymoon.” But I didn’t want to suddenly turn into a Grinch.
“Aren’t you the one that keeps saying that the Thankshanukkamas holiday is all about giving, not receiving? We’ll be fine without that piece of jewelry, but it could really make a difference for someone else. Besides, I’d like to keep karma on our side for a change. She’s been beating the living hell out of me this year.” He rubbed the still visible lump on his forehead from when I knocked the ghost out of him at Halloween. “You’ve got a heart of gold, Leigh. Another reason why I love you.”
The last thing I remember saying was, “I love you, too, Hunter.” I’m pretty sure that was the only time I’ve fallen asleep before him.
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