San Francisco Covens: Crucible

by Manuel Tiger

  I spun around and shot out the door, hearing him calling my name but I didn’t stop. I ran to my car, tears fogging up my glasses as I unlocked the door and climbed inside. By the time I had started it he was running down the stairs still shouting my name, but I was already tearing off down the driveway and headed back to Heaven Falls.

  “Why is he standing outside?”

  I was at my desk working on an article that Belle Dawn had given me, focusing on it, not aware of the question that floated on the air, which drew others to look up from their computers and look out the front window of the office.

  When I had arrived back at the townhouse I had showered, dressed and with my old messenger bag starting to smell like a damp basement had simply transferred my items to a backpack. I had gone to a corner store and bought a pre-paid phone and was still trying to figure out how to work it.

  “That’s Mister Salvadori isn’t it?”

  At the mention of his last name I jerked my head up, my glasses sliding down my nose. “The hell,” I whispered.

  He was standing outside leaning against the hood of his car. He was dressed in a gray V-neck shirt, black jeans and boots, arms folded across his chest, muscles bulging. He looked like the poster boy for every mistake one could make in a lifetime.

  His hair was brushed back but being tossed about by the storm winds that were starting to kick up. I could hear the rumble of thunder overhead and ever so often lightning crackled across the sky.

  “He’s going to get wet if that storm breaks.”

  “I heard they’re already issuing warnings about tornadoes coming with this storm.”

  I ignored the words of the others around me though I could not ignore the look he was giving me through the window. I simply sighed and returned to typing, but the unnerving sensation of being watched kept growing till I looked up and he was still leaning against the hood of his car.

  “Just ignore him and he will go away,” I muttered typing away at the keyboard.

  “Mister Sullivan,” Belle Dawn said coming to stand beside my desk. “Do you know why Mister Salvadori is standing outside my office building?”

  “Nope,” I replied. ‘I’ll have a preview of this article on your desk in ten minutes.”

  She said nothing and when she walked away I looked up and saw her head out the front door. She approached him and he continued looking straight ahead. I saw his lips move but could not hear what was said as there came a sudden boom of thunder overhead and a flicker of the lights in the office. I watched as Belle Dawn nodded and came back inside and up to my desk.

  “It would seem he wants to speak with you, Mister Sullivan.”

  I looked at her frowning. “Why?”

  “He wouldn’t say.”

  “I’m busy.”

  She sighed and walked back outside. I watched as she must have repeated what I said and he only shrugged and did not change his stance. She came back inside and back to my desk. By now all eyes were bouncing from him outside to me at my desk.

  “You had better go out there and find out what he wants, Mister Sullivan. I’m not playing messenger boy for the two of you.”

  With that she promptly returned to her office, closing the door behind her.

  I sighed and stood up feeling his eyes on me as I made my way outside.

  I kept a lengthy bit of space between us.

  “Go home Mister Salvadori.”

  “Mister Salvadori now is it?”

  “I’m at work.”

  “So I’m watching.”

  “Just go home,” I repeated. “Last night was a mistake.”

  “That’s your opinion.”

  “A valid one.”

  “Why?”

  I stared at him aghast. “You can’t possibly tell me that you have feelings for me after one night of sex! That’s absurd!” I hissed keeping my voice low.

  “Do you find it hard to believe that an attraction could happen in a day and grow by the hours?”

  “Only in fanciful stories,” I replied. “Please, just go home.”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “For one, you’re not my parents so you can’t order me to do anything,” he said. “Two? I don’t like how you assumed it was pity sex I gave you. Why would you even think it was?”

  I sighed. “It’s a long story and not one there’s enough time to tell. Just please go home.”

  “I will make time.”

  “Why?” I said. “I’m not worth knowing Mister Salvadori! I’m not! I’m not worthy of anything more than a quick bang in a backseat or some No Tell Motel! Of being used! That’s all! Set your sights elsewhere!”

  “You are worth far more than you believe yourself to be, Henry,” he said growing angry. “You seem to think you’re a nobody, deserving of no affection or even kindness!”

  I brought my hand to my mouth and turned away from him, shaking my head.

  “Just go home, Mister Salvadori. There’s a storm coming. A bad one.”

  “Then I will sit out here in it till you agree to come with me on a date.”

  I spun back around. “What? On a date?”

  “Well, technically, our second date. I’m looking forward to our third, fourth, fifth, sixth, well, you get the picture.”

  “I’m not someone anyone dates!” I said. “I’m not!”

  “Difference of opinion, Henry.”

  “I don’t do relationships!”

  “Then let me be your first. I’ll think you’ll be marvelous at it.”

  “Just. Go. Home.”

  With that I spun around and came back inside to return to my desk and get back to work on the article. Overhead there came a loud boom of thunder followed by the heavy sound of rain.

  “He’s…he’s just sitting in the rain!” someone said as I paused in typing.

  I looked up and sure enough, he was. Not even changing his pose. He just continued to sit on the hood of his car while rain drenched him.

  “Of all the jackass stupid…” I grabbed my raincoat and hurried back outside, draping it over my head as I stepped into the rain. “Daman! Please! Go home!”

  “I said I would remain in the rain till you agreed to go on our second date with me.”

  “You’re being stupid!”

  “Maybe I am, but some people are worth being stupid for.”

  “I’m not the relationship type, Daman!” I said approaching him and latching a hand onto his arm as I tried to keep my jacket over my head with my other hand. “Please, just get in your car and go home! You’re going to get sick!”

  It was like trying to move a mountain.

  “That’s your opinion, Henry,” he said refusing to budge. “Let me be your first relationship. Let me be your first and last everything.”

  I stopped jerking on his arm and stared at him.

  “We may not have first met under the best circumstances Henry, and for that I will regret. But the moment I saw you?” he held my gaze. “I wanted to know you, to be with you and last night was sure as hell no pity sex as you seem to be under the impression of.”

  “I’m not worthy of you,” I whispered. “I’m not worthy to be with anyone, Daman.”

  “Let me show that you are, that I’m the one unworthy of you for last night? Last night was the first time I have truly enjoyed myself in a very long time. A very long time. And I want those moments again with you and even now? Even you behaving this way? I want you back in my arms.”

  This wasn’t happening! It couldn’t be happening! I had to change his mind, I had to!

  “I’m fucked up Daman! Immensely so! You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into!”

  “No one’s perfect,” he said pushing off from the hood of the car and came to stand before me. “Let me make you see you are worthy of love, of kindness and affection. Let me be the one and only the one to show you that.”

  I stared at him as the rain came down harder and the wind began to howl down the street. I shook my head as tears c
oursed their way down my cheeks.

  “I’m not worthy of anything…,” I whispered, but he was taking me into his embrace, cupping my cheek and kissing me, sweeping me back to last night, to how he had made me feel before my demons, shame and guilt took hold of me with the birth of a new day.

  “I didn’t lie to you last night,” he whispered against my lips as the rain fell upon us, drenching me now. “You are mine and will be mine, Henry Sullivan. You can’t change my mind on what I want. And what I want? Is you.”

  I closed my eyes, the tears coming freely now along with so many emotions welling up in me.

  Was this even real, even happening? Was I in some dream that was teasing me ruthlessly? How many times had I wished someone would say those words to me, would make me feel…whole instead of fractured? Could he be the one to do that? I was so fucking scared now.

  You have to be scared, you have to be fearful when taking chances, Henry. That is experiencing life, a lot of fear, some doubt, but taking a chance and hoping that it will all turn out alright in the end. You can’t live your life in fear or doubt forever. For you will always wonder what could have been. Just take that leap and see where you land.

  Aunt Jemma’s words came back to me, her voice whispering in my head. She said it to me when I was scared of going to college, when I was scared of doing anything.

  I was scared to open my eyes, that when I did he wouldn’t be there, that this was all some dream, some nightmare cruelly tormenting me.

  But I did so.

  I opened my eyes.

  He was still standing in front of me, still looking at me with the most intense heat in his eyes that I had never seen before.

  “Daman,” I said sniffling, swallowing the lump in my throat.

  “Yes?”

  Somehow I could hear his voice above the howling wind, the thunderous downpour of rain and the cannon fire of thunder that raged all around us.

  “Will you get out of the rain now?” I asked half smiling as he laughed and held me closer.

  “Second time you got me slick,” he whispered kissing me again, keeping me pressed to his body and I found myself pressing into it, wrapping my arms around him tightly and vowing to never let go.

  I didn’t know how this would turn out, of even if it would last more than a week or a month. But I wanted this, I wanted to see if I was worthy of love, of affection.

  This would be my chance I took, my leap.

  Our second date was directly after work, wet clothes and all, at a restaurant by the river followed by a return to his home and slow lovemaking that lasted all night as if to assure me that he meant every word he had said there on the sidewalk in the pouring rain.

  Our third date? He surprised me with a weekend trip to Virginia Beach where we stayed in a rental cottage by the ocean. By day we explored the area, swam in the ocean, and visited little shops tucked out of sight from the typical tourist traps. And by night? We made love to the sound of the waves crashing on the beach and beneath pale moonlight coming through the bedroom window.

  Our fourth date? He surprised me again by getting tickets to a play that was showing in Richmond that I had mentioned once seeing when I was younger with Aunt Jemma.

  And the days and the weeks in between those dates? We spent in each other’s company. He was always there after work to pick me up, to return with me back to the townhouse even if it was for me to pack an overnight bag or to spend the night with me.

  Some part of me kept expecting him to announce that he had changed his mind about us, about me, but it never came. Once we made it a week, then a second and that of reaching a month I began to let this fear lessen.

  It was during the fourth week of being with Daman that I called Anna. I had figured enough time had passed to make that evening in which I told her what had happened to me less of a topic, or I hoped that enough time had passed that it wouldn’t be a topic.

  I did have another reason behind my call other than reaching out to her and to establish what I hoped to be a friend in Heaven Falls since I was short on those.

  My reason was to inquire of information about Daman since I couldn’t help recalling what she had told me that night at Rowdy’s, the warning that she had given me when I had asked about him coupled with Belle Dawn having issued several warnings about him herself.

  I had tried to ignore what each woman had said to me, for so far things were sailing smoothly in these four weeks.

  I knew that was being naïve given that our relationship was still in the early stages. But it wasn’t like he hadn’t been forthcoming with information about himself, far from it.

  I knew he came from old money that he had invested wisely and owned a major antique store in Richmond that we had begun visiting. He also had expressed interest in purchasing a condo in Richmond for us that we could stay at during weekends.

  This he wanted to do because of me, for us.

  So why was I trying to find dirt on him?

  One part of me did rebel against asking Anna any information on Daman, for in these four weeks he had shown me more affection and tenderness than I had ever been exposed to, used to. And maybe that was the reason, that I felt undeserving of such for that blackbird of unhappiness in the far corner of my mind was cawing that this could very well be a passing fancy for him that could end as quickly as it had begun.

  I warred with myself for several days, yet the reporter in me, that investigator, sought to know, to find out things that he may not tell me or to be at least armed with information in case he did bring up something shocking so I would not overreact to it too dramatically.

  There was the fear that somehow this would get back to him and anger him if he was to find out I had went behind his back instead of asking him directly anything that I wished to know.

  For the first half of the week I debated making the call to Anna until that Wednesday I finally called her on my lunchbreak.

  “Henry! I wondered when you would call me,” she greeted me with after picking up on the first ring.

  “You knew it was me calling?”

  “Magic.”

  “Magic?”

  “Well, magic in the form of technology that the caller ID on my phone told me it was you.”

  “Oh!” I said laughing softly as I sat down on a bench. I had decided to take my lunchbreak in the park which bordered the office and for the fact that doing so would give me privacy from the listening ears of my co-workers. Ever since Daman and I had begun dating some had tried to pry information out of me about him to which I gave vague responses in hopes they would get the idea I wasn’t sharing anything with them.

  I settled back into the bench, watching as a mother pushed her infant in a stroller beneath the pecan and willow trees that lined the walking path.

  “Yeah or did you think I was one of the witches that live in Heaven Falls?” Anna said drawing me back.

  This certainly drew me back. I arched a brow. “There’s…there are witches that live here?”

  “Shit, hold on a check Hen,” she said as I heard her yelling at someone about unboxing the beer and placing it in the fridge. She returned with an exasperated sigh. “Newbies! I swear they walk around half the time with their head struck up in their ass! Only reason I’m here this early today is the boss requested me to show the ropes to some new girls he hired. But just between you and me? I think he hired them for the size of their chest and not for their brains.” I heard a door open and close. “Much better! So where were we?”

  “You said that witches live in Heaven Falls.”

  “That’s the story,” she replied as I heard her light up followed by her exhaling. “Some escapees from the Salem Witch Trials, so the rumors go. And then you supposedly have wolf men that hunt the marshes near the town.”

  “Wolf men?”

  “Didn’t know that Heaven Falls had quite the colorful history huh?”

  “Still settling in, so no,” I replied with a laugh. “And really haven’t had much time to explor
e the town.”

  “I imagine that you haven’t for I heard that you and Mister Salvadori were seen making out on the sidewalk in front of the Gazette a few weeks back.”

  “Word seems to get around fast.”

  “It’s been a few weeks, but still shocking a few Blue Hairs. Besides, gossip is the lifeblood of southern towns, Hen.”

  “So it would seem.”

  “But I don’t think you called me for me to tell you what is setting the tongues to wagging in town did you?”

  “Uh, no, actually –”

  “He’s safe Henry. He can be an asshole at times. But then, what man isn’t?” she said before I could ask my question. “The only reason he rubs people the wrong way in town is because he tends to shock them by well, being himself. He tends to make them clutch their pearls and heart meds at the same time.” I laughed at this and could hear her grinning over the phone.

  “How did you know I was going to ask you about Daman?”

  “Maybe I’m secretly a witch?”

  I laughed. “But yes, that was one of the reasons I was calling you,” I admitted. “It was just after what you told me that night we first met at Rowdy’s, I just…” I sighed. “For once in my life I’m actually feeling good and enjoying my life and now looking for the tarnish for some part of the old me is looking for that tarnish.”

  “The only tarnish to be found Hen is the sour faces on the bitches that he used to pay attention to. You’re not well-liked at the moment by them, FYI, but some new stud will move into town and they will latch onto him like vampires.”

  “Now you’re going to tell me that there are vampires in this town?”

  “Quite possibly,” she said. “You just have to look around and see if you spot any.”

  “Maybe I will have to do that.”

  “Careful if you do Hen.”

  “Oh? Why is that?”

  She was silent for a moment before speaking again.

  “I will give you one word of warning Hen, or advice. Heaven Falls can be exclusive to new arrivals. Newcomers are often viewed as the plague. People in this town tend to guard their secrets closely and anyone that goes snooping around where they shouldn’t are viewed as possible threats or a threat.