Pooka in My Pantry

by R. L. Naquin

  I was aware of movement around me, the sounds of alarmed zoo staff, the worry and terror leaking in through my barriers. I paid no attention. I was having a personal moment with a polar bear. I rubbed her with both hands, and spoke to her in a low voice.

  “Doesn’t anybody around here rub your belly, sweetheart? You’re not so terrifying, are you? You’re just a big girl who needs lots of love, aren’t you?”

  She wiggled a little, showing me where the itches were, and rested a paw on my leg. I moved my hand between her front legs, stroking the fur on her chest. Her tongue dipped down and lapped at my arm.

  “What a sweet girl,” I said. “You didn’t want to cause any trouble, did you?”

  She chuffed again in response.

  I heard a click from nearby, and the bear flinched, tensed, then relaxed. A brightly colored dart stuck out of her flank. A minute later, her eyes turned glassy and her paws went limp. I stroked her face. “Sleep well, my sweet girl.” I reached higher and touched her ear with the tips of my fingers. It was probably the only chance I’d ever get to pet a polar bear, and I wanted to see if her ears were as downy-soft as I thought they would be. They were.

  Before I could throw away any remaining caution and bury my face in her fur, rough hands gripped both of my arms and pulled me to my feet.

  “Ma’am, are you okay?”

  “It’s okay, miss, we’ve got you.”

  I was yanked away from the tranquilized bear amid reassurances of my safety and the zoo’s extreme apologies. Khaki-suited zookeepers swarmed the animal. Riley was there, putting his arm around me and leading me away.

  “That was terrifying,” he said. “I couldn’t get to you. I yelled at you to drop and curl into a ball, but you didn’t move.”

  “I couldn’t hear you,” I said. Everything was a little fuzzy, the edges of the world coated in fur. “I don’t feel very well.”

  Riley settled me on a bench. My escort of zoo officials followed, still offering apologies and reassurances. Someone handed me a bottle of water. I sipped, wondering where it had come from. It was fall. The closest food kiosk was closed.

  “Hey, can you guys step back and give her a minute, please?” Riley herded the crowd, giving me room to breathe.

  “I’m fine,” I said. My voice sounded far away, as if coming from somewhere else. “Did you see me? Did you see her? How cool was that?”

  Riley smiled. “Very cool. But I think I need a change of pants.”

  I looked down at the leg of my jeans where the bear’s paw had rested. There was a dirty print, but she hadn’t ripped them. When I moved my head, I caught a whiff of fish from my hair where her tongue had made contact. I made a face.

  “I need a shower.” I took a long swallow of water and felt my head clearing. I looked around. “What happened to Art?”

  “He walked off in a huff right around when your friend presented her belly for scratching. I don’t think he’s happy with you.”

  I shrugged. “I bet my lack of dying was a huge disappointment to him. I’m such a tease.”

  “That one was really close,” he said. “I couldn’t do a thing to stop it.”

  “Apparently, today is not a good day to die.” I cringed. “For me, anyway. That guy by the tree didn’t make it, did he?”

  Riley shook his head. “He was gone before we reached him. I couldn’t try to resuscitate him with Art standing there.”

  Art was getting to be a real problem.

  We sat in the shade for a while, watching zookeepers bundle up the dead weight of the drugged polar bear—her name, I learned later, was Miranda—and move her from the area. At some point, a man in a suit rolled up in a golf cart, waving paperwork at me to sign. I had no intention of suing the zoo, so I skimmed the pages and signed without comment. In all fairness, a tree becoming a bridge after being struck by lightning was not something their safety inspectors should have planned for, and it was probably my bad luck curse that had caused it to happen.

  I wanted to ask about the security guard—about his family and his life—but I was afraid. There was a dull ache in the pit of my stomach telling me I’d been the cause of yet another death.

  But my assumption was based on circumstantial evidence. The guard had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Even if the lightning strike were related to my Aegis trial, I wasn’t the one who gave myself the bad luck. No, that was Art.

  My eyes narrowed, and I glanced around again. I spotted him in the distance, on the other side of the grassy area, glaring at me. His hatred was a light drizzle coming from so far away. But I felt it.

  Art or not, Aegis trial or not, the security guard’s death might still be partly my fault. The gargoyle stone didn’t just protect me from the curse. It protected everyone in my vicinity. I’d made the decision to give it to Sara so she’d be safe. And I took a selfish, unprotected day off for a date. I should have stayed home, knowing I was a walking bad luck bomb. No one would’ve been hurt. At least, I thought so.

  The last of the adrenaline wore off, and I was exhausted. “Any chance we could call it a day and head home?”

  Riley waved at Art, then helped me to my feet. “Home it is. We’ve had a long day.”

  “I think this is the most successful date we’ve had so far,” I said.

  “You think?”

  “You’re taking me home. We never get that far into the date together.”

  He put his arm around me and cradled me against his side as we walked. “You’re right. You didn’t leave in a huff, and I didn’t lose track of you in shark-infested waters. This is a huge improvement.”

  “Next time, maybe we try for nobody dies and I’m not in danger?”

  He thought about it. “That’s a lot to ask. Maybe the first step is going somewhere with no people around?”

  We came around to the entrance and found Art waiting for us.

  “No other people,” I said, smiling through my teeth. “Excellent idea.”

  Oddly, Art said nothing, and continued that way until we approached my driveway over an hour later. He had been so quiet I started to worry—he’d even silenced his pen.

  The silent treatment gnawed at me. His hatred had dulled into a solid stream of dislike, and I wanted badly to ask him why he felt that way. Sure, I’d egged him on a bit, but his negative feelings preceded my teasing. I wouldn’t have messed with him if he hadn’t displayed such an irrational revulsion to me.

  I finally couldn’t squelch my discomfort and curiosity. When we came to a stop, I unbuckled my seat belt and flipped around to face him.

  He jerked, as if eye contact with me were a physical blow. His face shrunk into itself, drawn and tight.

  “What,” I said. “Just tell me.”

  His voice was guarded and sharp. “Tell you what, Miss Donovan? We have nothing to discuss.”

  “Oh, I think we do.”

  He looked away, out the window. “No, I don’t think we do.”

  He was infuriating. “What did I do to make you hate me so much?”

  His eyes moved slowly from the window to mine in a cool look. “I don’t like rule breakers.”

  “Zoey, why don’t we just go inside?” Riley had a hand on my hip, trying to pull me away. I ignored him.

  “You’re angry because I lived when I should have died?”

  He sniffed and turned his head away. “You break every rule in the book.”

  “What book? Nobody ever gave me a damn book. I keep getting heaped with crap and I have to dig myself out, blind. If you’ve got a book to share, I sure as hell would love to see it.”

  “I’m confident the Board will be happy to comply when this horrible week is over.” His words were laced with sarcasm.

  “So, you’re admitting you think I’m an Aegis?”

 
He looked pained, as if I’d hit a nerve. “I still think you’re a very lucky woman who gets away with whatever she pleases.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean? I’m not exactly living a leisurely life, what with all the sharks and flat tires you’ve brought me.”

  “A little hardship will do you good. You’re a spoiled brat with no idea what to do with your gifts. You’re not fit for the office you’re getting.”

  “Office?”

  “Do you know how rare it is for an Aegis to appear? You should have been identified and trained years ago, yet the Board didn’t know of your existence until after the incident with the incubus. You are an anomaly. Your very existence is offensive. You break rules every time you take a breath.” His lips curled in disgust, and spittle flecked his chin.

  His hatred turned up to a red-hot level, spattering me like butter in a frying pan.

  “So, to be clear,” I said, “it’s nothing I’ve done that makes you hate me, other than breathing?”

  He squinted his eyes at me. “You still don’t understand, do you? It’s everything you do. Everything you say. Every move you make.”

  “Is this where I ask you to excuse me for living?”

  Riley tugged at my arm. “Come on, Zoey. This isn’t getting you anywhere. Let’s go inside.”

  I brushed him away.

  Art leaned forward, his face inches from mine. “You’re so much like your mother, it makes me ill.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Art puffed up with pride at the shock his words invoked. I sat back, resting on my heels in the front seat of the car.

  “My mother,” I said. My voice was shaky and quiet. “You knew my mother.”

  He blanched and drew back. “I may have made her acquaintance a time or two.”

  Quick as a viper, I darted forward and grabbed him by the front of his properly starched white shirt. He winced. I’d managed to grab his shirt, undershirt, and a good handful of chest hair. I didn’t let up.

  All the questions I couldn’t get answers for glittered in his beady pig eyes. He’d known her before she left. And deep in my gut, I was sure he knew exactly where she’d gone and why.

  “You tell me where she is, right now, or I’ll toss you out of this car and let Iris tear your limbs off, you little shit.”

  His head swiveled, searching for Iris, and found the skunk-ape standing against the tree at the end of the drive, cracking his knuckles. For once, Iris was not grinning. Art swallowed.

  “I...I have n-n-n-o idea where she is,” he stuttered. His fear poured through my filters like sewage water. I hated how good it felt to make him afraid. I didn’t hate it enough to stop. “No one does. She fell off the grid about two years ago.”

  I shook him. “What the hell does that mean? You had her, and then you lost her?”

  Riley leaned forward and pried my fingers loose with gentle hands. “Zoey, let go of him. You don’t want to hurt anybody.”

  “I do want to hurt him,” I said, snapping over my shoulder. “He took my mother, and he’s going to give her back.”

  I reached for Art again, but he dodged me to huddle on the other side of the car.

  “If you want to blame someone, blame her. She’s the one who stomped all over the rules, interfering with my pick-ups and abusing her powers.”

  “Abusing her powers? My mother was a healer. If she interfered, your pick-ups weren’t dead yet.”

  He snorted and came out of his crouch. “She’s not a healer. She’s a necrofoil. Every time I got a call, she was there first, bringing my target back from the edge of death. Pushing me out of the way with that same Aegis thing you did when your friend’s pet should have died. She kept me from doing my job, and when I reported her for it, the Board cancelled my promotion. I should have been the head of the Human/Hidden Interaction Division by now.”

  I felt Riley stiffen next to me, and I turned to look at him. He shook his head and didn’t say anything. I’d have to ask him about it later. Sometime when my blood pressure wasn’t so high that my head was about to burst open like an overcooked egg in boiling water.

  “You’re blaming my mother—and now me—for your crappy career choices? Art, have you ever considered not being a dick? That might have more to do with it.”

  His face turned purple. “At least your mother didn’t fight me every step of the way. Maybe if I’d left her here with her brat, you might have grown up with some manners and respect for your betters.”

  I narrowed my eyes. If I could have shot death rays out of my eyeballs, the back of his head would have been spattered across the window. “You took her. It was you personally.”

  He smiled at me, that cheery salesman smile from when we first met—the one that never came near his eyes. “I’m the one who recommended she be relocated so the Board could control her better. Since then, my recommendation has become ratified procedure. Removal and relocation are now how we handle every Aegis. And that’s how we’ll handle you.”

  I slumped in my seat. My mother really was an Aegis. She didn’t leave me, she didn’t leave our family. The Board took her away. And then they lost her.

  And it was all Art’s doing.

  My protective walls crumbled. I didn’t have the energy to maintain or repair my emotional isolation chamber. Art’s hatred blasted me so hard I could taste it, oily and slick on my tongue. Riley, whose emotions I usually tried to guard against, was filled with a soft concern and a sharp-edged anger. Iris pelted me with excitement and worry, like hard little bits of sleet. My head felt heavy, and pain shot between my eyes to the back of my head. The migraine was coming fast.

  I closed my eyes and rubbed at the space between my eyebrows. “We’re not done,” I said to Art as I opened the car door. “When this is over, you’re taking me to see your Board, and we’re going to talk.”

  “They won’t see you,” he said.

  “Oh, I think they will.”

  Riley came around the car and helped me up the steps to the house. “You okay?”

  I nodded. “I need some of Andrew’s tea. I’ll be fine.”

  “No, I mean about what Art said.” He opened the door for me.

  “I’m more than okay on that count. I finally know where to go to get some answers.”

  He glanced back at the car. “Let me walk you in and get you settled.”

  “I’d rather you didn’t.” I turned toward him, loosening his hold on my arm. “It would be better if you just get Art out of here. I’ll be fine. Promise.”

  Riley’s kiss was chaste and on the cheek, which made me a little sorry for acting so crazy. But he was being sweet, and I had to admit, the pain in my head had gone supernova, so making out probably wouldn’t have been too enjoyable. Though it would have been fun to piss off Art. I meant what I’d said to him. I wasn’t done with him. Nowhere near done. I walked into the kitchen to find Sara and Maurice playing cards at the table.

  Sara looked up from her hand. “How’d the date go?” She frowned. “Migraine.”

  “Yeah.” I nodded slowly, afraid my head would fall off if I moved it too fast.

  “I’m on it,” Maurice said, dropping his cards face down. “I fold anyway.” He scooted his chair and went to work brewing the special tea Andrew made me for when my walls broke down and the inevitable migraine showed up.

  “How can you fold?” Sara asked. “We’re playing gin.”

  Maurice grinned. “No wonder I keep losing.”

  The tea washed over my tongue in a cacophony of flavors. Most were pleasant. When I got to the aftertaste, I made a face. Andrew once told me the taste of sweat socks is how you know it’s working.

  Within a few minutes, the migraine unclenched its fist and eased off. I could never do enough for Andrew to repay him for this tea.

  When my h
ead cleared, I relaxed enough to examine my housemates. Sara looked more comfortable with Maurice than I ever would have thought possible. And Maurice, well, something was different about him. It took me a minute.

  “Hey,” I said, my brow furrowed in suspicion. “You look really nice.”

  Maurice sat up straighter and posed. “Sara picked out my shirt.”

  Normally, Maurice dressed himself in a hellish mixture of plaids, stripes and paisleys, all in various shades of Modern Clown. Today, he wore a crisp pair of khakis and a soft blue polo shirt. His hair, which consisted of a small, wispy patch, usually bobbed up and down while he talked or gestured. It was now trimmed and spiked in an artistic display of monster couture. In comparison to the Maurice I was used to, he was a freaking fashion model.

  I sipped my tea and gave Sara a wary eye. “You’re not giving me a makeover, so don’t try it.”

  “Honey, I gave up on you years ago. At least Maurice recognizes talent.” Her nostrils twitched and she leaned toward me. “You smell like smoked fish. I thought you were going to the zoo.”

  I told them about the freak lightning strike and the polar bear. And the goats. I couldn’t forget the goats. Their bugged-out eyes and demonic pupils would probably haunt me in my sleep.

  Maurice was up and baking in seconds. I was beginning to understand it was his way of coping with stress.

  Sara reacted by grabbing the gargoyle rock off the kitchen counter and putting it in my hand. “I kept leaving this behind all day, and nothing happened to me. I think whatever the leprechauns did to me was a one-off. You, on the other hand, are a walking disaster.”

  I tucked it in my pocket. “There’s more.” I took a swallow of tea. It was growing cold and the sweat-sock taste was now its most prominent feature. “Art knew my mom. I think the Board of Hidden Affairs took her away and somehow erased my memories.”

  Sara frowned. “They’re the reason she’s been missing all these years?” She held up her hand and counted off on her fingers. “So, they cursed you with bad luck, which probably brought the leprechauns here. That means they’re partly to blame for the car that crashed through my house, nearly got you killed you multiple times, and they kidnapped your mom. I’m really beginning to hate these guys.”