by Lily Webb
“What in tarnation do you think you’re doin’? You’d better answer that, it could be the call you been waitin’ for!”
“Oh, come on, Gram. No respectable paper is gonna call me from a blocked number.”
“You don’t know that! Ain’t all you journalists worried about privacy and whatnot? Maybe they’ve just got a block on their number or somethin’.”
She had a point, as much as I didn’t want to admit it, so I slid my finger across the screen to accept the call.
“Hello, this is Zoe.”
“Yeah, hello. This Zoe Clarke?” a gruff male voice barked on the other end of the line. My skin tingled and itched at the sound.
“It is. Who’s calling?”
“Mitch Harris, editor-in-chief at the Moon Grove Messenger.” I racked my brain trying to match his name with any of the dozens I’d seen on job applications. Nothing rang a bell. Come to think of it, I couldn’t recall ever hearing about a town named Moon Grove, nor a paper called the Moon Grove Messenger. Maybe he had the wrong number?
“Who is it?” Grandma hissed, but I waved her away.
“Hi, Mr. Harris, thanks for the call. I’m so happy to hear from you,” I said and deflated. It was the lamest response in the world, but what else was I supposed to say?
“Yeah, sure thing. Hey, listen, the Messenger’s in desperate need of a beat reporter. I looked over your resume, and you seem like a good fit. Job’s yours if you want it.”
I held the phone away from my ear to stare at it in disbelief. Was he really offering me a job without even interviewing me? Talk about professional.
“No offense, Mr. Harris—”
“Please don’t call me that. It’s Mitch.”
Well, alrighty then.
“Okay. Look, no offense, Mitch, but I need more details to go on here. What exactly are you offering me?”
“Didn’t you read the job description and compensation when you applied?”
Ouch. Touché.
“I did, but the description wasn’t very, well, descriptive,” I said, hoping it was true. I couldn’t remember a single detail about the job — but then again, I couldn’t remember applying to work there.
“It’ll be more than enough to make a living. You’ll be covering the town and government beat.”
Okay, it didn’t sound like the most exciting offer in the world, but it was an offer regardless — and the only one I’d gotten in three months of searching.
“I think I can handle that.” At my last job, I’d started at the same level, but my editor had moved me up the chain quickly. Hopefully, this new gig would follow a similar path.
“I think so too. Can you be here tomorrow?” Mitch asked.
“Tomorrow?” What was I supposed to do about an apartment and, well, everything else? It sounded crazy. Now I understood why he’d called from a blocked number.
“Like I said, The Messenger’s desperate, and what better day to start than a Monday? If you can’t make it, I understand, I’m sure we’ll find someone else.”
My heart leaped into my throat and lodged there. Half my brain told me I should hang up before things went any further, but the other half screamed at me to take the job — because I might not get another offer.
I looked at Grandma, who nodded at me enthusiastically like she’d heard everything — and she probably had. Despite her age, she had an uncanny sense of hearing, for better or worse.
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Okay, yeah, I-I’ll take it. I’ll be there.”
Mitch let out a long, ragged exhale. “Great, you won’t be sorry. But I guess I should warn you that things are pretty active around here, so you’re gonna hit the ground running.”
A beat of silence passed. “Oh, and, uh, Moon Grove might be a bit, well, jarring for you at first coming from the big city, but I’m sure you’ll adjust.”
I didn’t know what to make of that comment, so I let it slide. “I’m sure I will too.”
“Okay. See you tomorrow then.”
“Mitch, wait!”
“Yeah?”
“Sorry, uh… I don’t know where Moon Grove is,” I said, my face burning. At least he couldn’t see it.
“Most people don’t. You know where Roanoke Island is?”
“Roughly, yeah.”
“It’s not too far from there. You’re in Charlotte, right?”
“Not quite. I live in Lumberton with my grandmother.”
“Hm, never heard of it. Does Lumberton have a bus station?”
“Yeah. The only one in town isn’t far from where I live.”
“Good. Be there by 6 AM and keep your eyes open for a big silver bus. Trust me, you’ll know it when you see it.”
“Uh, yeah, sure, okay.” I wiped my sweaty palms on my shorts as headlines of travelers murdered on cross-country bus drives flashed through my brain.
“Don’t worry, it’s not too bad. But just in case, I’ll have one of my staff meet you when you get here, and I’ll email you my contact info too.”
“Great, thanks.”
“One last thing, Zoe: don’t oversleep. The bus won’t wait. Neither will I.”
“I won’t, I promise.”
“Good,” Mitch said and hung up without a goodbye.
I sat staring at my phone screen, dumbfounded. Seconds later, it vibrated with an email from Mitch. I tapped to open the message and, sure enough, his phone number was inside — but it was in a weird six-digit format I hadn’t seen before. Maybe he had a foreign account or something?
Grandma’s twinkling eyes caught mine. “Magic works in mysterious ways, don’t it?”
I laughed and shrugged. “I dunno if I’d call this opportunity magical, but I guess beggars can’t be choosers.”
“Where did he say it was again? Moon somethin’ or other?”
“Moon Grove,” I said as I tapped to open the maps app on my phone and look the place up. It took forever to load but eventually came back with no results. Mitch implied Moon Grove was a small town, but it couldn’t possibly have been so little that it wouldn’t come up on a GPS search. Weird.
“I’ve lived in North Carolina my whole life but I ain’t never heard of a place like that,” Grandma said. “You sure you heard him right, and all that wax in your ears didn’t get in the way?”
“Hilarious. Yes, I’m sure. Mitch definitely said Moon Grove.” I zoomed in on the map near Roanoke Island, but I didn’t see any place named Moon Grove or any stretch of land nearby that could’ve been it. “It’s not coming up on the map either. I hope this bus knows where it’s going.”
“He didn’t give you an address or nothin’?”
“No, nothing other than a weird phone number.”
“He sure sounds like one strange fella, but as long as he signs your paychecks, I guess it don’t matter, right?”
“Right.” I switched to the phone’s browser to search for the paper’s name online. Their website was the first result, but when I tapped on it, the page came back with an error. “Hm, they have a site, but it doesn’t look like it’s working.”
“Well, cell service ain’t the greatest out here.”
Somehow, I didn’t think it was the service, but I didn’t have any other explanation. The more I dug, the weirder things got, but it was a job — or at least the hope of one — so I’d just have to take the bus out to the coast in the morning and see what happened. It wasn’t like I had anything better to do.
As if on cue, the black cat with haunting blue eyes Grandma had given me on my sixteenth birthday wandered out the front door and meowed up at me. I scooped her up into my arms.
“Hey, Luna. I was wondering where you were.” She purred and tucked her head under my chin like she always did when I held her. “It looks like we’ve got some packing to do.”
“Meow,” Luna croaked, her eyes still heavy with sleep.
“You need help?” Grandma asked.
“I don’t think so. It isn’t like I have much to load. I guess that
’s one perk of being broke.”
Grandma chuckled. “You’ve always landed on your feet, just like that cat.”
“Well, here’s hoping I’ve got nine lives like her too because where I’m going I think I’m gonna need them.” I stood with Luna held against my chest and scratched her under the chin. Her purring intensified like she agreed.
“If you ain’t got nine lives, then I dunno who does. You know, what with that black cat and them fiery curls of yours, you look like a regular witch standin’ there.”
I swished my free hand through the air in front of me. “Abra Kadabra, teleport me to Moon Grove, Alakazam!” I said and froze for dramatic effect. When nothing happened, I shrugged. “No witches here. I guess I’m as painfully normal as they come.”
Grandma shooed me away. “There ain’t nothin’ normal bout you, Sugar. Never was. Now go get packed. You got a big day comin’ tomorrow and you gotta get some amount of sleep in the meantime. There ain’t no time for dilly dallyin’.”
Luna meowed her agreement.
I took one last long look out at our family farm, framed by the darkness creeping down from the sky, and smiled at the full moon taking shape above it.
It could only be a good sign.
Want more Zoe and Moon Grove?
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The Magic & Mystery Series
1. Broomsticks and Burials
2. Spellbooks and Stakings
3. Alchemy and Arson
4. Heists and Homicides
5. Covens and Coffins
6. Vampires and Vanishings
7. Shifters and Sabotage
8. Crystals and Criminals
9. Witches and Witnesses
10. Bloodmages and Blackmail
The Visions & Victims Series
1. Dead and Breakfast
2. Dead Man Walking
3. Dead on Arrival
4. Dead and Dusted
5. Dead on Target
6. Dead Over Heels
About the Author
Lily Webb lives in the desert southwest with her two cats, Hilda and Zelda, where she spends her time reading and writing all things paranormal. As an aspiring witch herself, nothing has fascinated Lily more than the magical powers of the written word.
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