Dion shook his head as he walked into his room, and I turned to Cassandra and lowered my voice. “Could that be what someone was looking for?”
“I was thinking that,” she said. “But if they knew the 8 Ball was something special, wouldn’t they have taken it? Instead of just destroying it and leaving the pieces here?”
“Where’s your dad’s journal?” I asked her.
“It’s in my locker at school.”
“What?” I was stunned. I had never even seen Cassandra go to her locker. In fact, I wasn’t even sure she knew where it was.
“It’s the perfect hiding place,” she said. “No one ever keeps anything important in their lockers, just like homework and books and stuff.”
“Sure,” I said. Her reasoning was not totally unsound. Then something hit me. “Your mom?” I ventured.
We also knew, or at least suspected, that Cassandra’s mom, Circe, was out there somewhere, and probably not all that far away. She and my mom had been Sitters together, and friends, but Circe had disappeared right around the time Erebus was banished and my mom got cursed. For a long time, everyone had thought Circe was dead, but we’d seen her, or at least someone that we really thought was her, at the Summit, but she’d disappeared again before we could really talk to her.
Cassandra started to nod, then shook her head definitively. “If she was looking for something,” she said, “she wouldn’t have trashed the place to do it. She loved this house, I know it, and that’s why she left it to us.”
“I know,” I agreed.
Cassandra looked around, muttered a bad word, then said, “Well, let’s clean it up.”
Fortunately, one of the first spells that Cassandra and I had learned when we’d first discovered our powers was a cleaning spell, so she took the kitchen and I took the living room, and we both got to work. I held out my hands and uttered the spell, and cushions fused themselves together and books and board games returned to the shelves. Soil rose off the floor and molded itself around plant roots, which went back into their pots and stood upright. I put shoes back in pairs and piled them by the front door, sat chairs upright, and rehung jackets on the chair backs. A silver chain flew through the air and, not knowing what it was, I caught it in my hand. At first, I thought it was a dog collar, but when I got a closer look, it made me laugh.
“Hey,” I called to Cassandra, “when did Dion get a wallet chain?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she called back. I wound it into a loop and set it on the table. I’d also found a can of something called Axe body spray for men. I pulled the top off, gave it a sniff, and gagged. It smelled like gas station incense. I couldn’t believe I’d ever thought Dion was cute.
After that, all that was left was a bunch of papers. Opened and unopened mail, some stuff from school, coupons, catalogs, and notebook pages covered with Dion’s scrawl and sketches. I wasn’t sure where it all went, so I just stacked them into a pile and set them on the table next to the wallet chain, sure that neither Cass nor Dion would ever go through them.
As I turned to survey my work, a flyer for a band called Jacking Lanterns caught my eye—though, solely because the flyer, and the band itself, looked absolutely horrible. It was all male—of course—and their look was total hair gel, black eyeliner, and slightly-too-small T-shirts. It seemed like maybe it was a joke? Like maybe Jacking Lanterns was some sort of early 2000s butt-rock tribute band, but they were playing a show in Spring River on Tuesday night.
“Nice job in here,” Cassandra said, coming up behind me. “It looks better than before.”
“Thanks,” I said, turning and holding out the flyer. “Where did this even come from? It’s, like, the best worst thing I’ve ever seen.” I was always grabbing things because they seemed hilariously bad, but Cassandra had no flair for irony, and also only listened to rap, so it was odd to me that she would have picked the flyer up.
“That’s not mine,” she said with a shrug. “It must be Dion’s.”
“What is mine?” Dion asked, appearing from the kitchen.
“This flyer,” I said, waving it at him. “Where’d you get it?”
He crossed the room, took the flyer from me, looked at it for a second, and then handed it back.
“I’ve never seen that before in my life,” he said, his face serious.
He sounded genuine, but out of curiosity, I pointed to the body spray and wallet chain.
“What about those?” I asked. He didn’t say anything, just shook his head, his forehead wrinkling in confusion.
“I only wear Irish Spring,” he said. “And is that a dog collar?” A small part of me was relieved.
Cassandra was next to me in an instant, yanking the flyer out of my hand. She studied it for a moment, then looked up at me, her eyes even more electric than usual.
“I think,” she said with a smirk, “this is what you call a clue.”
Dion gave me a ride home, while Cassandra stayed behind, clearly worried about leaving the house empty. I normally hated Dion’s guts for what he’d put Cassandra and me through the previous fall, but lately, that hatred had been shifting more toward a feeling of genuine sympathy. Cass and Dion had been on their own for most of their lives, and that couldn’t have been easy. I totally understood why Cassandra wanted to share stuff with him, even after his earlier betrayal, but I still made sure I was careful around him. I didn’t want to tell him anything that he didn’t already know.
“So, do you think this break-in had something to do with you and Cassandra?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe.”
“Where did that band flyer come from? Do you think the person who dropped it was planning to go to that show?”
“I don’t know,” I said again. “Maybe.”
“Do you think you and Cass will find out who did it?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe.”
“What is a wallet chain, anyway?”
That one, at least, I could answer.
“It’s a chain that hooks your wallet to your pants,” I explained.
“Why would anyone want that?” he asked, his eyes fixed on the road ahead. “Just don’t lose your wallet.”
I laughed. “I guess some people think it looks cool,” I said.
When Dion pulled up in front of my house to drop me off, I felt a genuine desire to try to make him feel better. “Thanks for the ride,” I said. “And sorry about your house. We’ll figure it out.”
“Yeah,” he said. “I hope so.”
Dion waited until I had opened the door and was inside the house before he drove away. Our house was dark, and when I pulled the front door shut behind me, I felt the momentary rush of expectant joy, followed by the harsh realization that it was misplaced. There was no dog coming to greet me, and I’d be the only one snoring in my bedroom tonight.
Dad was asleep on the couch, which was where he slept these days, and as I walked by the bedroom, I could see that the TV was still on. Mom was sitting up straight against a stack of pillows, the blue light flickering on her face. When I looked closer, though, I could see that she was asleep too, just still sitting up, so I went in and turned off the TV and tucked the blankets around her waist.
I brushed my teeth and did my skin care routine, and when I got into bed, all I could think about was the flyer, now magnetized to the middle of Cassandra and Dion’s fridge. I couldn’t help but think, or maybe hope, that it was a clue to something bigger than the break-in.
* * *
—
I slept late into the morning and woke up to a bright sun and clear blue sky that seemed sneaky, since my widget said that it was only twenty-eight degrees outside. Janis and I had a Sunday-morning ritual that we followed religiously: Coffee. Doughnuts. Thrifting. We had big plans to take Amirah and Ji-A when they were in town the
next weekend, and I hoped we hadn’t oversold it, especially since they were both used to shopping at the kind of places where you had to make an appointment.
But what Spring River lacked in almost every other area, it made up for in thrifting, and Janis and I were like the empress and high priestess of the fantastical find. That is, we crushed it, and we had a battle uniform. I pulled on my hunter-green leggings, chartreuse socks, checkerboard slip-ons, lipstick-red bralette, an oversized men’s tank top that fit almost like a minidress, and a red plaid Pendleton wool flannel that was a hand-me-down from Dad. This look didn’t have a name, but it was highly functional and the best outfit for thrifting, since the shoes came off easily, and you could try on anything over a tank top and leggings, which was especially good, considering the thrift stores didn’t have dressing rooms. Correction: the thrift stores didn’t have dressing rooms that were anything more than a corner delineated by a shower curtain, and they were always damp, even when it hadn’t rained in weeks.
I went downstairs to find Mom and Dad sitting at the kitchen table.
“Cosmo surname,” he said when I walked in. “Six letters, first one K.”
I looked over his shoulder at his crossword. “Kramer,” I said, and he wrote it in.
“She’s a smart one, Theresa,” he said, looking up at Mom. “Thankfully, she got your brains and not mine. You want coffee, kid? There’s still some left.”
“Janis is on her way,” I said, knowing she’d be there, like she was every week, to pick me up at eleven a.m. on the dot. I heard a car turn into the driveway almost as soon as the words were out of my mouth. I gave Dad and Mom both a kiss on the head, and then headed toward the door. Just before I opened it, I heard Dad asking Mom’s advice on the next part of the puzzle that he couldn’t solve.
It made me smile, but also made me want to choke back tears. I had sometimes wondered if Dad’s devotion was something the Sitters had implanted in his brain, like all the false memories of his friendship with Brian. But no, it was real. Even before we’d known that Mom was cursed, even when we’d thought she was just destined to be like this for the rest of our lives, Dad had still been all in.
I pulled on my North Face puffer (Depop, thirty-five dollars) and headed out the door, all twenty-eight degrees slapping me in the face as I stepped onto the porch. I hurried to Janis’s car and climbed inside, where she had both the heat and Ashanti blasting. Janis was dressed in basically the same outfit as me, though as per usual, hers was better: iridescent silver leggings, way oversized zip-up black hoodie, and a pair of Margiela slip-ons, inherited, of course, from Amirah.
“I forget,” I said as I buckled my seat belt and she pulled out of the driveway. “Why did we decide that we were going to store all of Amirah’s clothes at your house again?”
“Because, silly,” Janis said, not meeting my eyes, “I have more closet space, remember?”
“Hmm,” I said. “I don’t. Did we do measurements or something? You’re sure I was there?” Janis turned the music up, but a text from Cassandra distracted me anyway.
What are you doing?
Thrifting
Gross. Meet me after.
Will text when we’re done. Meet us at the Perk.
“Who was that?” Janis asked.
“Cassandra,” I said, and then filled her in on everything that had happened the night before.
“Jeez,” Janis said as she pulled into the Donut Temple drive-through. “That sounds scary.” Then the speaker crackled, and Janis said into it, “Can I get two strawberry cake doughnuts with sprinkles, one bear claw, a caramel Long John, a large hot coffee, and I know it’s freezing out here, but a large iced coffee. Just dump ice into the drip if you have to. She doesn’t mind.”
I rolled my eyes. When it was winter, Janis always ordered my drink like she was asking for a can of chilled clam chowder with a straw. I handed her a five, and two minutes later she was handing me back my change and my breakfast.
By the time we pulled into the Goodwill parking lot, we were riding high on a wave of sugar sprinkles and caffeine and nineties R&B, yelling along to “The Boy Is Mine.” It’s such a funny song, because it’s so obvious they should just ditch the dude and be best friends.
We waited until the song ended, and then ran across the parking lot and hit the door. Once inside, we each grabbed a shopping cart, and split. Janis went left, toward blazers and evening wear, while I went right, starting with men’s button-downs before I moved on to women’s pants and children’s T-shirts. We shopped for each other, as that saved time, and now that Janis had her Depop store, we also shopped with an eye for what would be easy to style and sell. Forty-five minutes later, we met in the middle to survey our findings and determine what was treasure and what was trash. If we hadn’t been so busy chasing demons and trying to save the world, we could have filmed one heck of a YouTube haul series.
Today’s trash: a crocheted cardigan with an unfortunate mustard stain that no amount of bleach would remove, vintage Levi’s that were an implausible twenty-one-inch waist, and—much debated but eventually unanimous—an Ed Hardy bowling shirt. (“ ‘Retro douchebag’ is still douchebag,” Janis reasoned.)
Today’s treasure: a pair of Dickies engineer-stripe overalls; a magenta silk kimono with voluminous, purple-feather-edged sleeves; a Rugrats T-shirt; a near-perfect pair of high-waisted burgundy velvet leggings; and a nineties rayon floral baby-doll dress. Janis could easily make close to fifty dollars off the Rugrats T-shirt and the kimono alone. Provided she got around to shipping them out, of course. Between the two of us, our grand total came to $12.75, and Janis and I left the store feeling like queens.
The Park Perk was just a few minutes’ drive from the Goodwill, and it was Spring River’s anti-Starbucks. It was completely inefficient, probably hadn’t made a profit since 2003, and had a sign at the register that said NO APPLE PAY AND BTW, CORPORATIONS ARE EVIL. Janis had an ongoing beef with the Perk because it smelled like ham, even though there wasn’t a single pork product on the menu, but other than that, it was perfect. Even if you ordered nothing, you could camp out for hours with no risk of being kicked out.
It was always packed on the weekends, with college students doing homework, Ren Faire refugees wearing capes and playing D&D, and grizzled, black-leather-clad bikers who drank mochas with extra whipped cream. The Perk also always had live music on the weekends, which was most unfortunate. When Janis and I walked in, Cassandra had already nabbed us a booth, which happened to be right next to the stage, which was really just a carpet and a wooden stool. Cass was wearing her work polo and had an appalled look on her face that she made zero effort to hide. “Do you think he’s going to do this all afternoon?” she asked loudly as a guy with an acoustic guitar finished up a song.
“Sadly, no,” I said, gesturing at a guy in the corner, breaking out a flute.
“I’ll go order,” Janis said as we dropped our bags onto the booth bench. “Esme, I know you want your Antarctica special. Cassandra, what do you want?”
At this, Cass smiled. “I invented a new drink,” she said. “It’s hot water with whipped cream on top. I call it creamy water. I can come up if they need me to tell them how to make it.”
Janis grimaced. “I’m sure they can figure it out,” she said.
As per usual, the Perk took forever to make our drinks, and flute man was already on his second song when Janis came back. She handed me my iced coffee, and Cassandra her whipped cream and water. “It already melted,” Janis said. “It kind of looks disgusting.”
Cassandra just shrugged. “It’s actually better this way.”
Janis sat down and took a sip of her cappuccino. “I’m sorry to hear about your house, but let’s see this flyer.”
Cassandra pulled the flyer from her pocket and slid it across the table. As she seemed to do with almost everything, she had sealed it in
a ziplock bag.
“Jacking Lanterns,” Janis said, picking the baggie up and looking at it closely, before flipping it over to see the back side. “Interesting name choice. Seems a few months late, but okay.” Cassandra and I were the magic muscle, but Janis was the brains in our three-person operation, and so we anxiously awaited her opinion on what the flyer could possibly mean.
“So, there are a few different scenarios here,” she finally said. “One, whoever broke into your house is in this band. Two, whoever broke into your house is a fan of this band and will be at this show, or three, whoever broke into your house was chewing gum and was going to need something to put it in when they were done. My money’s on one, or three, because judging by the looks of this flyer, I can’t imagine that this band has many fans.”
“Which one do you think it is?” I asked.
“There’s only one way to find out,” Janis said. “And you know what that is?”
“We go to this show,” Cassandra said, a smile spreading across her face.
“Ding, ding, ding, ding,” Janis said. “Right answer.” Cassandra was now beaming, and Janis’s smile matched hers. I leaned forward and got a closer look at the flyer.
“But it’s at a bar,” I pointed out. “How are we going to get in?”
Cassandra looked at me like I was as dense as a garden gnome. “The door,” she said. “Duh.”
“But we’re underage?” I reminded her.
“Pshaw,” Janis said, waving away my concern as though it were a fly. Now they had both leaned back in the booth and crossed their arms over their chests. The thing about a trio is that someone is usually outnumbered, and in our trio, that someone was usually me. I was getting used to it, but that didn’t mean I liked it.
The flute guy at the Perk wasn’t the worst musician I’d ever heard in my life, but he was far from the best. Cassandra drained the last of her creamy water, and we left right as he was asking the crowd if they liked hip-hop. Janis put her earmuffs on before we got to the door.
Spells Like Teen Spirit Page 4