Down on the Charm

by E L Wilder

  “I thought you weren’t going to play mentor.”

  It hardly serves me if you go getting yourself killed. Speaking of, you should really dress better for the woods—long pants tucked into socks, and all that. You should probably do a tick check later. Lyme disease is a concern.

  She slumped onto the stone wall and set the imp on the mossy forest bed. Mustering as much sarcasm as she could, she said, “Thanks for the public service announcement. And how about black magic? Should I tuck my pants into my socks to protect myself from that, too?”

  Clancy grew still. Black magic is greedy, Hazel. Good magic is clean—in harmony with the caster and the world around her. But black magic is never in balance. It is hungry and it consumes. It will fuel itself however it needs to. Usually with the closest lifeforce—the things that put up the least resistance. Plants and wood and whatnot. Just beware the decay, Hazel.

  How was that helpful? She was pretty sure if this killer caught up with her, she would be the only thing decaying. “Compost piles decay, Clancy,” she said pointedly.

  But when she glanced up, Clancy was already gone.

  She grumbled. She thought she had left all of the complicated relationships behind when she’d fled LA, but between her mom, Charlie, Clancy, and Tyler, things were hardly looking up. Maybe there’s a common denominator here.

  “And you,” she said, lifting the imp and staring it in the face. “Something tells me we can never be friends.” The imp rattled off a string of nonsense that Hazel was certain were impish curse words. She set the creature on the ground in front of the Postern. “I’m going to let you out,” she said. “But if you pull any mischief, we’re going to have a problem.”

  She unwound the vine and the imp stretched its limbs, eyeing her suspiciously the whole time.

  “Now get,” she said. “If you come back, your greeting won’t be nearly as friendly.”

  The imp screeched at her and darted through the Postern. The air shimmered and seemed to stretch around him and hold him in place for a moment, like he had gotten caught up in another vine. But then, accompanied by a dull popping sound, he disappeared.

  She sighed and started back down the hill, wondering if she should pull a similar disappearing act. Wasn’t she just another interloper wreaking havoc on Bennett Farms?

  * * *

  Hazel returned to the South Way at last after fighting through one final patch of roadside brambles.

  This day had gone from bad from worse, and she wasn’t about to lose one of her few good pairs of shorts to a vicious-looking raspberry bush. She stopped in the road and checked her clothes for tears or snags—and any roving ticks. God, what did a tick even look like? When this was all said and done, she’d need to investigate a repellent spell.

  Suddenly, a pickup truck came barreling around a bend in the South Way and careened toward her. She only avoided being run over by throwing herself back into the brambles.

  The truck slid to a stop. Ronnie’s vehicle. The door slammed shut.

  She looked up, expecting a familiar face, but instead came face-to-face with the assistant caretaker that Juniper had hired—the devilishly handsome one with his dusky skin tone and the formfitting T-shirts. What had Ronnie said his name was? Alex?

  “Are you all right?” he asked. It was the first time she’d heard him speak, and she noted a thick accent, though of what variety she couldn’t say.

  “I’m fine,” she grumbled. “But I’m not so sure about you. Where’d you learn to drive?”

  “In a car, mostly.”

  “Har, har.” She tried to get up, but the brambles held her fast. “Mind giving a girl a hand?”

  “Of course—sorry!” He rushed forward and helped her disentangle from the branches. He pulled her to her feet, and for a moment they stood uncomfortably close.

  “Thanks,” she said, blushing and taking a step back.

  “You’re Hazel,” he said. “Juniper’s older sister.”

  “In the flesh.” Something about that seemed lascivious and she blushed despite herself. “You, uh, barn-bound?” she asked, if only to change the subject.

  He darkened suddenly, his mouth drawing into a thin line and his eyes sparking. “Basically. I gotta meet Ronnie in the North Meadow.” He looked back up the South Way. “I’ve got to talk to him about some dead roses.”

  Bring up his permacrabby boss on the fly, she thought. Great idea. The Hazel touch strikes again.

  “Sounds like a good time,” she said. “Mind if I hitch a ride?”

  He considered her for a second and then nodded. “Get in.”

  She hesitated. Maybe she should invent an excuse and walk back to the barn. She didn’t really know this guy, and he seemed a little moody. Then again, so was she—as she was constantly being reminded. But why not? This day couldn’t get any worse. She hopped into the passenger’s seat.

  He climbed into the cab and stared at her too long, so she chuckled nervously and said, “Giddy up.”

  He threw the truck into gear and tore off down the road. The speedometer quickly climbed and soon they were zipping along, nearly fishtailing around all the blind corners. Maybe he was hoping to fill up the truck with more distressed damsels.

  “You should really be more careful,” he said.

  She should be more careful? How about not driving across the farm like Mario Andretti? “Yeah, I guess I wasn’t aware that Juniper had renamed it the South Racetrack.”

  “There’s still a killer on the loose,” he said, carefully.

  She looked at him, but he kept his eyes on the road, gritting his teeth.

  “You think Juniper is innocent?” she asked, hopeful.

  He shifted and the truck lurched forward.

  She continued. “You seem to know an awful lot about this.”

  “People in the audience are always paying attention,” he said, side-eyeing her. “When you’re always on the stage, you lose a little perspective.”

  Well that was certainly pointed. She was starting to get a serious creeper vibe from this guy.

  “Where did you say you were from?” she asked.

  “I didn’t.”

  “Could you? . . .”

  He just smiled humorlessly and kept driving.

  The truck shot out of the Tanglewood and came into sight of the East Barn. He swung around to the front side and skidded to a halt just before the courtyard arch.

  She opened the door and jumped out immediately. “Try to take it easy . . . and slow,” she advised as she took a few cautionary steps back. “Kids live around here.”

  “Noted.”

  The truck spun its tires and took off, bouncing down the dirt road toward the North Meadow. She wanted to rush in and tell Charlie—they had a new suspect. But she realized she had elected to go this alone.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  “Someone was in a hurry.”

  Tyler stood in the courtyard archway. Hazel just nodded dumbly.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  She shrugged. “Fine. If you ignore that I’ve ruined most everything I’ve touched since I’ve been home.”

  Tyler looked at her pityingly. “Stop stealing my shtick.”

  She chuckled, despite herself.

  “You want to go for a ride?” he asked. “I thought we could finally get you that cup of coffee you’ve been craving.”

  “Yeah, I could stand to get out of here for a bit,” she said. “You sure you’re not going to get into trouble for this?”

  “Yeah, ’bout that. I just got myself fired,” he said. “Thought it might be a good time to go talk to my buddy again about fixing up that carriage. See if I can’t land myself some part-time work in the process.”

  She followed him to the north side of the barn where a sad, rusted Toyota pickup waited for them.

  “Wait a minute,” she said, eyeing the tailgate, where the T and O were missing. “Is this Yota?!”

  “The one and only.”

  “How is he still running?�
�

  “A lot of TLC,” Tyler said proudly, patting the roof. “Want to drive him?”

  “Oh my god,” she said. “You would let me touch Yota?”

  He opened the door for her and dramatically waved her in.

  She slid onto the duct-taped seat and managed to shut the door on the third try. At least the seatbelt still worked.

  “Can you drive stick?” he asked, jumping into the passenger’s side.

  “Barely. Juniper would be your gal for that. While she was learning to drive trucks and tractors, I was memorizing my lines for school plays.”

  “Perfect,” he said. “Because the clutch is impossible, the power steering is shot, and the suspension is a distant memory.”

  “Are we safe in this thing?”

  “Are any of us safe anywhere?”

  “Morbid,” she said, thinking back to the last truck she had been in. “But point taken.”

  She pushed the clutch, turned the key, and started the truck. It sounded like she had awoken an undead monster beneath the hood.

  “Is it supposed to sound like that?” she asked.

  “No, but that’s Yota for you.”

  “Here goes,” she said. She popped the truck into gear and eased the accelerator. Yota lurched a few times before shooting forward fast enough to whip their heads into their headrests.

  He laughed. “The force is strong with this one.”

  “You know he spells his name Yoda, with a D.”

  “Those are the same lettahs ’round these parts,” he said, slipping into a syrupy-thick Vermont accent, a Ronnie impression so flawless she laughed out loud. He dropped it quickly though, adding, “You might want to open your window. Otherwise we’ll likely die of carbon monoxide poisoning.”

  She complied, cranking the window all the way down before she eased the truck and guided it toward the farm’s entrance. When she passed the North Meadow, she glanced toward the old sheep barn. Dilapidated barns were a staple on most old Vermont farms, and the sheep barn was Bennett Farm’s entry into the genre—a clapboard barn sagging beneath a rusted tin roof. An old metal windmill that could no longer stand on its own leaned heavily into the barn’s side.

  The truck Alex had been driving was now parked beside the barn. Both Ronnie and Alex stood outside. As best she could tell, Ronnie was giving his assistant a tongue-lashing for the ages.

  “Better him than me,” Tyler said. “Who is that guy?”

  “One of Juni’s new hires. An assistant caretaker to help Ronnie keep up with the labor-intensive parts of the job. He’s a bit . . . off.”

  “Why doesn’t she just replace Ronnie?” he asked. “I mean hire somebody to take over his duties full-time?”

  “No way. Ronnie is as much a part of Bennett Farms as the East Barn—and maybe just as old. Juni will let him live out his life here. It’s only right to take care of him after his years of service. Not that he’ll ever retire. He’ll go down with a hammer in his hand, that one.”

  She pulled Yota onto Old Farm Road and headed toward the center of Larkhaven.

  “I saw the article in the Scryer.”

  “Ah,” he said. “That.”

  “How do I know you didn’t invite me to town just to try to get the scoop? It’s a classic move to try to get a headlining article above the fold.”

  “It would be a helluva story if somebody were to realize the accused was Helena Rose’s sister,” he said, then whistled, “they could go national—international—with that one.”

  Her jaw dropped. She had guarded personal details about her and her family fiercely, even having her publicist push false stories to muddy the waters. She had repeated some of those lies in interviews and in casual conversation. When she had created Helena Rose, she had created a completely different identity. From top to bottom.

  “You wouldn’t.”

  “No. I wouldn’t,” he conceded. “I’m not interested in advancing my career at any cost.”

  Hazel winced, but Tyler took no notice. He went on. “You have nothing to fear from me. This is the biggest story to hit Larkhaven since Linda installed a creemee machine at the Genny. Boman always saves the juicy bits for himself. This week I’m covering the epic tale of the faulty culvert pipe running under Meade Road.”

  “A timeless tale if ever there was one.”

  They rode on in silence. Fortunately, the drive was short.

  If Bennett Farms had been decaying over the years, Larkhaven had been frozen in time. It was a simple Vermont village with a quaint town green edged by brick and clapboard colonials, a peeled-paint town hall, and idyllic old Congregational Church, and the Larkhaven General Store.

  She quietly marveled at all of the landmarks, each a waypoint in her own history. She’d had her first kiss—with Tyler—in the gazebo on the green. She’d performed her first role in a non-school play in the town hall theater. And, of course, the general store, she’d had her first job serving creemees the summer after her freshman year.

  And where there were childhood memories, there were bound to be townies lurking. And, considering the headlines, they were bound to pepper her with questions she didn’t really want to answer.

  She thought about fishing her sunglasses out of her satchel and asking Tyler for his hat, but what good would it do to hide? She’d come home so she could be herself for the first time in years. If she had to hide behind a façade here, too, where could she ever go that she wasn’t Helena Rose?

  “Ready for that killer coffee?” asked Tyler.

  She glanced at him questioningly and he pointed to the general store.

  “The Genny?” she asked, more than a little disappointed.

  The Genny had been a Larkhaven staple for generations—not nearly as long as Bennett Farms, but close. As long as Hazel could remember, the Genny had been serving up deli meats, off-brand canned goods, fresh produce, and a strange medley of clothing, toys, and sundry home goods. There weren’t many places one could buy both a few pounds of fresh tomatoes, a plastic robot claw, a Hawaiian shirt, and a breakfast sandwich all under the same roof. And, of course, coffee. At least a dozen urns of Green Mountain Beans no doubt at least half a day old by now.

  She pulled into one of the empty spots in front of the store and cut the ignition. Yota died with a spasmodic cough as she and Tyler climbed out.

  “The one and only Genny,” Tyler said. “You didn’t think I was taking you somewhere nice, did you?”

  She was about to dig in when she saw something across the green, in front of the town hall. Two people stood there talking, and there was something about one of them that seemed all too familiar and completely out of place. The man was too toned, too tanned, and too trendy for a small town like Larkhaven.

  “It couldn’t be. . .” she whispered. She definitely should have gone with the disguise.

  “What?” asked Tyler.

  She grabbed his hand and practically tore it from his arm as she yanked him inside the Genny. She slammed the door shut so hard it bounced back open. She shut it firmly and then peered through the glass, craning to find the proper voyeuristic angle.

  “What’s the deal?” asked Tyler

  “Easy does it, lovebirds!” shouted a harsh but familiar voice from the back of the Genny. The voice made most people cringe, but to Hazel it was part of the soundtrack of her childhood. “It’s a door, not your headboard!”

  Hazel realized she was still holding Tyler’s hand and immediately dropped it. She could feel the heat rushing to her cheeks.

  “No,” said Tyler. “We’re not. Oh, this—she just—”

  “Easy, before you hurt yourself, Tyler,” said the woman. Partially obscured by giant jars of rock candy and licorice, stood Linda Wilkins, a pillar of a woman and of the community. Her hair aggressively permed, her cat-eye glasses chained around her head, she was every inch the tough, no-nonsense Vermont matron. She held up a finger, indicating for Hazel and Tyler to hold on, and she put a phone receiver back up to her ear. “Well, I’m go
ing to have a lunch crowd in here in about an hour that’ll be clamoring for some BLTs. So how about you get some fresh L and the T down here so I don’t have to kick you directly in the Bs.” She hung the phone up so hard it made the bell inside ring.

  “Hazel Bennett!” she crowed. “Are you too important to hug a bag of bones and gristle?” She ambled out from behind the counter and made her way over.

  “Never,” said Hazel, as Linda pulled her into a rib-crushing embrace.

  “It’s a crying shame what’s happening to your sister,” said Linda. “Ain’t nobody in this town as hard-working and honest as her.”

  “Thanks, Linda,” said Hazel. “That means a lot.”

  “Truth will prevail.”

  “I hope so . . .”

  “This thing will turn out okay in the end,” Linda said. “She has the support of most everyone in this town. And for everybody else, I’ve got a swift boot to the rear.” She tapped her heavy boots on the wooden floor. “I tell you, if your sister could get that farm of hers back into operation, I’d gladly look for a new supplier of fresh produce.” She jacked her thumb back toward the phone. “That guy doesn’t know his baby corn from his cornhole.”

  “He might after your boot connects with him,” said Tyler.

  Hazel laughed.

  “Listen,” Linda continued. “Speaking of incompetent suppliers, I have to call about a bum bok choy shipment. Stay as long as you want. I’m serving up lunch soon.”

  “We just stopped in for a cup of coffee,” said Tyler.

  “On the house,” responded Linda. “Even for you, you bum.”

  “We’ll pay, Linda,” said Tyler, a touch defensively. “We insist.”

  “You can insist all you want,” she said. “For all the good it’ll do ya. Just try not to tear the door off its hinges on the way out.”

  Hazel moved over to the coffee station and squirted some dark roast into a cup, mixed in a splash of milk and maple syrup, and headed for the door. She scanned the green cautiously before committing to stepping outside. Whoever she had seen before was gone now.