by Kater Cheek
“Not that I’m saying she deserved it, but you start dating drug dealers you’re kind of asking for it.”
“The guy’s name is Jojo? That sounds like movie candy.”
He laughed and fished some pepperoncinis out of a jar. “I think his name is Jason or John or something. Don’t know what his brother’s name is.”
And then it clicked. Madame R. told her boyfriend Jojo and his brother to ransack my apartment when she realized she had a fake bindi. They did, and when they came back, sans jewel, for payment, the three of them got in a fight, landing Madame R. in the hospital.
I had no way of proving it, but if true there was one less person on the ‘who wants to kill me’ list who had the opportunity. My face broke into a smile. Never had I been happier to know that someone was in the hospital.
“You want this for here or to go?”
“To go. I was thinking about going to sit in the plaza for a while.”
“It’s a nice day for it. It’s almost sunny,” he agreed. “You want chips or a drink?”
My wallet had only a few bills in it, and had to be shaken thoroughly to relinquish its quarters. “No, thanks. How much do I owe you?”
He gave it to me for a dollar lower than the lowest priced sandwich on the menu and explained with a wink, “Cause I can hear your stomach growling from here, and you’ve been staring at the food like you want to climb inside the case and make friends with it.”
“Thanks.” My stomach growled in anticipation. “Thanks a lot.”
***
The Cineplex plaza was the destination of choice for students, tourists, and shoppers tired from walking around downtown. Overpriced bistros surrounding the cobblestone square faced the central fountain, which in October had been drained of all but the most corroded coins, but whose blue-tinted waters bathed the fingers of a thousand curious children each summer.
The sandwich rested happily in my belly. Then, a familiar voice caused the food, caterpillar-like, to suddenly become butterflies.
“Dude, what’s up?”
Judging by the number of bags hanging from Rob’s fingers, Rob and Julie had been out shopping, and Julie had money to spend. She was wearing a tight blue top that ended just high enough above her jeans to show two inches of smooth, flat tummy. A tiny purse dangled from her shoulder, with a cell phone peeking out of the side pocket. Her golden hair had been pulled back in a ponytail, and not a single lock strayed from the velvet scrunchie crowning her head.
As for Rob, he gazed at her with all the adoration such a perfect goddess of the feminine deserved. He was a sweatshirt and jean clad acolyte, and he had laid a gold and diamond ring at her altar.
“So, what’s up? Shopping?”
“No, just went to see someone and get some lunch.” Let him go, Kit. Let him go.
“Hey, how come you haven’t been to the dojo? Did you get the flu or something?”
The two of them sat down next to me, ignoring the painful axe of ‘you can’t have him’ that just about cut me in two.
“No, my van broke down,” I lied. Rob wouldn’t understand “out of gas and didn’t have money for more until I got paid” because his parents always gave him money. “And I’ve had a lot of work to do. So, it’s been hard to find time to get away.”
“Fenwick thinks it’s ‘cause you’re mad at him. He said you got in a fight about something.”
“Yeah, we did.” I leaned forward and James’ amulet dangled out from under my jacket. Protection from curses, right? How about the curse of losing your two best friends?
“I hear you two are hooking up now,” Rob added. Was this for Julie’s benefit? Was he trying to prove that I wasn’t a dangerous partner-less woman?
“Who told you that?”
“Dude, everyone knows. ‘Bout time.”
I fished in my pocket for a cigarette and lit it, not asking if Rob and Julie minded or not. If he was rude enough to talk to me like this, I was rude enough to give them lung cancer.
Everyone knows?
I hadn’t told anyone but James, and yet somehow everyone knows? Fenwick must have told him. King of the double standard. I’m not allowed to tell anyone, because it might keep him from picking up girls, but if he tells Rob, that’s just fine.
I took another deep drag of the cigarette. Anger and smoke burned its way down my lungs.
“Dude, are you still pissed off at me?”
“No, it’s, forget it.” I stubbed out the barely-started cigarette. “I gotta go home. I have a lot of work to do. Nice seeing you two.”
“Bye, Kit,” they chorused.
Rob threw an arm around Julie casually, and a beam of sunlight broke through the clouds and illuminated her hair. As he leaned forward to kiss her, I turned away, not looking back even to wave.
It took most of the bus ride home before the ache subsided. By the time I trudged up the street, most of my anger had faded to a nebulous resentment.
Work. Work would clear out all this emotional stuff. Work would help me. I’d only finished a few of the boughs that Silvara had asked for, and time was passing. Better get cracking.
Making the boughs required a little creativity, a lot of patience, and an unending tolerance for hot glue burns. It was relaxing, not as enjoyable as tree-making but more profitable by far. I put on the radio and let my thoughts wander while I twisted wires, sorted Styrofoam fruit by size, and separated snarled bundles of raffia. The hours flew by as the rope of autumnal foliage grew by feet and yards.
By the time night settled in for good, I had done about as much bough-making as my fingers would allow, and was too tired for anything but watching television. At least I was two boughs closer to my goal. They were pretty, too, a rainbow of reds and golds and subtle textures. The corn husk supply was almost gone, which was a shame because they hid the green wire of the light strings so well.
There were plenty of foam pomegranates, though most of them were too small to work well with the gourds. And what about the acorns? They were real, and the nut tended to fall out of the cap when they dried.
Maybe I could pull the nut out, then dab in some hot glue and stuff them back in. It was a lot of work, but there was a whole box of them, it would be a shame not to use them. Or spray-paint them gold? That might be pretty.
A loud knocking on the door just about gave me a heart attack.
Someone had followed me here. Who knew I lived here? Elaina’s mother and whoever she told. Who else?
“Kit? Are you there? I saw your van out front. Let me in, we need to talk.”
Fenwick. On one hand, I was relieved that it wasn’t someone trying to kill me. On the other hand, I didn’t want to talk to that jerk. He knocked again, louder, as though he was willing to break the door down to make his point.
“Go away. I have nothing to say to you.”
“Kit, please. Open the door.” Fenwick pounded harder. The windows and doors still showed the pale violet aetheric placenta that Elaina had put in place when she left on her date with Ulrich. Fenwick didn’t heed the magical keep-out sign. “I’m not angry at you anymore. We need to talk. Please?”
He wasn’t angry at me anymore? I opened my mouth to shout at him, but shut it again. What good would it do to have a shouting match through the door? It wouldn’t change the horrible things he said to me. It wouldn’t repair the tornado damage he had done to my self-esteem. It wouldn’t make me attractive to him.
I stormed into my bedroom and slammed the door loud enough for him to hear. He kept knocking, but I put a pillow over my head and held it there for so long I fell asleep.
***
I woke up to the sound of someone walking around the side of the house. It was dark, with only a pale glimmer of moonlight shining through the weed-choked casement windows of my bedroom. I paused, but only the faint slither of the wind and the distant barks of a dog disturbed the night.
How safe was I here? Would our deadbolt and tiny windows keep out someone who really wanted to kill me? What if
Monica realized the bindi she had was a fake and decided to track me down? What if she thought she had the real one and decided to kill me to make it work? What if it was someone I hadn’t even met yet?
At times like these, it’s best to have a weapon. My sais were in a case underneath the futon frame. The three-pronged weapons were made to break swords, not deflect bullets, but eighteen inches of steel would make me feel better.
I pushed down the covers and curled over the end of the futon to reach for the vinyl case. The amulet James had made for me dangled off the edge of the frame. It glowed with hot pink fire, and thrummed like an overheating engine.
Someone was casting a curse against me. I clutched the amulet and the sais to my chest like monster-warding teddy bears and climbed back under the covers.
Chapter Nineteen
“You’re still working on those things?” Elaina came down the stairs, still wearing her work clothes and carrying a Styrofoam box in one hand. “Have you even left the house today?”
“No.” I winced as she flicked the overhead light on. It had grown dark outside without my noticing. “What time is it?” I started to pick glue and acetate ribbon scraps off my hands.
“Almost six.” She set the box on the counter and turned the kitchen light on. “I stopped by your brother’s coffee house this morning. James is worried about you. He hasn’t seen you for almost two weeks.”
“I’ve been busy.” I picked up the end of the bough and began to coil it gently in one of the empty boxes.
“I see. How many is that?”
“Fourteen.” I had to finish them all soon. My bank account was getting down to the double digits. “Is that food I smell? Can I have some?”
“Maybe. Are you going to leave?” She held the box up over my head like a dog trainer.
“Why, is Ulrich coming over?” My stomach growled, and my joints ached from crouching down on the floor all afternoon.
“Yes, he is, and I’d like at least three hours of privacy.”
And I still had tons of work to do. I folded my arms. “You know if I go to Ishmael’s, James will make me serve coffee and bus tables.”
She lifted the lid to reveal an enormous serving of potato skins with a slice of pizza rolled up on the side. There were even hot wings tucked under the crust. They could have been leftovers picked off someone’s plate and she still would have won the argument. Nothing’s better than greasy bar food when you’ve been working hard.
“You win. I won’t come home until late.” I pulled the food away from her and began devouring it.
“There was a guy at Ishmael’s asking about you, by the way.”
Fenwick.
“If he comes by here, don’t let him in. I’m pissed off at him.” The food disappeared at an alarming rate. By the time Elaina finished taking her smelly shoes off, I had finished the pizza and half the skins. The wings disappeared moments later. “Flip you for the shower.”
Stinky Feet was hypocritical enough to wrinkle her nose at my odor. “You can go first. Just be quick.”
The nights had turned damp and chilly, making me think of my mom’s remonstrations against going outside with wet hair. At least the heater in my van still worked. I shivered in my jean jacket and hurried over the cement bridge.
Rosa and Phillip’s porch light didn’t quite touch the murky water underneath. Had Elaina fed the kappa this week? She better have. I reached the van and almost stuck my key in the door before remembering that the van was out of gas. Crap.
And then a flicker caught my eye. There was something under the dash, a small bundle with spiral runes on it. It glowed faintly. Or maybe it was a reflection from the streetlight? No, it definitely glowed.
“Is aught amiss with your vehicle?”
“Jesus!” I jumped back into a fighting stance, hands reflexively pulled into a guard position.
“No, not he.” Ulrich replied with a wry tone, appearing suddenly from the empty sidewalk beside me. His spiral tattoos were swirling with mirth, and his hands were tucked into his own jacket’s pockets. He had combed his scruffy red hair back, displaying the pointed ears that Elaina loved.
“Ulrich, you scared the shit out of me.”
“’Twas not my intention. I wish but to practice my stealthy skills, ere they vanish in a puff of mortality. But you saw aught in your vehicle, did you not?” He peeked through the driver’s side window, cupping his four fingered hands against the reflection.
“Yeah. There’s something in there, on the dash. It’s glowing like a spell.”
“Aye, Kit. You have crossed a fell mage indeed. Touch it not,” he said.
“Okay.” I pulled my hand away from the door. “You think it’s dangerous? James gave me an amulet to help against curses.”
“Though I love my friend, I must admit his skill is not enough to guard you from foul magics that rest and wait. I see that sigil. It is a mark meant for naught but ill. Pray touch it not till the old year has faded.”
“Till New Year’s?” I wailed. “But I need my van! I can’t leave it there until January!”
“Nay, nay,” he reassured me. “The old year ends on the night of All Hallows. By the dawn thereafter, many trappings of the past will have fallen into dust.”
“That sounds like obscure prophecy. Can you explain it to me in English?”
Elaina approached, and gave Ulrich a flirtatious hug. “Spells fade over time, and since Samhain is a big turning point, most spells will either die or become weaker. Is there something in your van?” She peered in the window. “Oooh. That looks nasty. Who did this?”
“That’s what I’d like to know. Is it ‘make me itch’ kind of nasty, or ‘send out a cloud of purple dye’ kind of nasty?” Not that it mattered either way, because I wouldn’t have money to fill my tank until after Halloween.
She peered again. “That looks like a death shroud, don’t you think, Ulrich?”
“I ken but little earthy mage-craft,” he answered. “But in truth this stinks of magics foul and black.”
“Yeah,” Elaina agreed. “You don’t want to mess with that. I’ve heard about death shrouds.”
“Let me guess, they kill you.” Sarcasm was a good cure for hysteria, wasn’t it?
Elaina had already started to fondle Ulrich, but she broke off a kiss to explain. Apparently, my near death was more interesting than making out with a grogoch. “No, they make you sleepy, and sometimes they make you hallucinate, if they’re strong enough. A death shroud and driving is a bad combination.
“I’ll get my mom and some of her coven members to check it out after Halloween. They’ll cast a binding on the mage who did this. You sure you don’t know who it is?”
“If I knew, I’d be at her house right now, kicking the shit out of her.” The fog was rising, making me aware of how cold and damp this sidewalk had become. On the other side of the easement, drainage water gurgled in the ditch. “How come the kappa didn’t do anything about this?”
“The kappa only guards the bridge,” she replied primly, taking Ulrich’s arm to walk with him back to the apartment. “We’re safe when we’re at home.”
Which would have been fine if my roommate hadn’t kicked me out. With one last look at the relative safety of the kappa-guarded basement, I buttoned my jacket and headed for the bus stop. What else was there to do but go to Ishmael’s, and see if James needed some help?
The bus to Ishmael’s took forever. Taking the bus when you’re used to driving sucks. If I had a real job, I could afford to get a vehicle that wasn’t a gas guzzler. Temp jobs sucked too though, and it wasn’t like I had a stellar resume. Too bad I didn’t have a rich uncle to inherit from. Heh.
The coffee house was hopping with customers, which meant I couldn’t claim my favorite red easy chair and while away the evening with a newspaper and a cup of chai. Jolene, Barnabus, and another part-timer worked alongside James, which meant they didn’t need my help. A wasted trip. I pushed open the door anyway and nodded hello.
&n
bsp; “That guy came here again,” Jolene told me, not looking up from her script.
“Jolene, you’re supposed to be helping the customers,” James snapped. What was going on? He had never snapped at her for laziness before. Telling Jolene to work harder was like telling a cat to fetch.
“What guy?” I asked her.
“That old guy. He left you a note.” She leaned forward, snatched a piece of paper from between the pages of her script, and handed it to me despite James’ protest. Barnabus and the part-timer wisely kept their mouths shut and found busywork.
Miss Melbourne,
I’ve had the devil of a time trying to reach you. Your brother claims that you have no phone. I’ve found some potential buyers for that jewel you inherited. Some have offered as much as six figures. Please do call me at your earliest convenience.
Mr. Thorn
“That’s like the third time he came by,” Jolene said. She glanced at James, oblivious to his irritation. “What? He did, you know. You were here.”
“Put that script down. I don’t pay you to read,” James said.
He glared at me, and I glared right back. Yeah, so I had promised not to sell it, but he had also promised to give me any messages that came for me. And six figures? Who turns down that kind of money?
There was a phone number on the bottom of the note. I walked over to the pay phone next to the bulletin board and dialed it. Mr. Thorn’s scratchy answering machine announcement gave me ample time to pointedly ignore James while I planned my message.
“Hey, Mr. Thorn, this is Kit Melbourne. I finally got your note. I’ll come by on Wednesday and we can talk about it, okay?”
James was standing next to me, with folded arms and a rare expression of fury on his face. “Kit, I’d like to speak with you upstairs please.”
I slammed the phone back onto the cradle. The coins jingled to the bottom. “What is this, James? The guy came by three times and you didn’t even tell me?”
