The Romeo Catchers

by Arden, Alys

  “You seem uneasy, that’s all.”

  “Why would I be?” My pulse picked up as I realized how defensive I was being. I looked down at my hands again. It wasn’t just a nervous habit. I felt something. It was faint, but it was there: something supernatural. My eyes instantly searched for the nearest metal object.

  He smiled a pinched-lip smile. Not a sinister or creeper smile, just a regular happy one, which freaked me out even more.

  “Have you really never met another witch before?”

  “W-what?”

  And then I just stood there, looking at the leather cuffs on his wrists and the rings he wore on most of his fingers. This was all incredibly strange—too strange. Ren’s nonbelief in coincidences rang in my head, but then again, wasn’t it Ritha Borges who’d said, “Sometimes when things need to be found, they find you”?

  His smile spread wider. “My God. Have you really not? Am I your first? You do know your boyfriend is a witch, right?”

  “Isaac told you?” The words came out a loud yelp.

  “No! Oh, sorry, no. He hasn’t betrayed your confidence. We didn’t talk about you, or about anything, really. I just noticed his mark. I didn’t say anything, though, because I didn’t want to freak him out, like I’m doing to you right now. He’s quite muscly.”

  “Yes. He is.”

  His expression told me the message was received.

  “What do you mean you saw his mark?”

  “His Maleficium. Like yours. Whiiich, now I’m guessing you can’t see yet.”

  My blank stare must have answered for me.

  “Oh boy. Adele, the witch’s Maleficium is one of the most special parts of growing into witchhood.” His voice lowered. “Witchhood is a tradition of secrets, and the Maleficium helps you identify those truly of the magical community, which is why you can’t see the mark of others until you can see your own.”

  My eyes slowly wandered to my left arm—I pushed up my sleeve. Nothing. If Isaac hadn’t been going on and on for the last month about a triangle, I’d think this guy was totally full of shit. But if this is really a thing, why doesn’t Désirée know about it? She grew up a witch.

  He leaned over the counter, took my wrist, and turned my arm over. Just as his finger touched my skin, the tin shelf behind him tilted, sending another case of moon mugs crashing to their deaths.

  I looked at him suspiciously, and he looked at me with a similar expression, both of us pleading innocence.

  “Juuuuullllllliiiiiiieeeeee!” a voice bellowed from down the hall.

  Callis grabbed a broom from behind a tall cabinet. “I keep telling them the integrity of the bricks is compromised, but they keep drilling the shelf back in and blaming Julie.”

  “She gets the blame for everything around here,” I said. “At least she has been for as long as I can remember.”

  Ren would tout Julie as the French Quarter’s most famous ghost, but here among the Daures, she was treated like a daughter or a sister, depending on which family member you were talking to.

  Chatham came running out from the back. “Everyone okay?”

  “Everyone but the moon mugs,” I said.

  “Missy, aren’t you on the wrong side of the counter?” He unlatched the wooden middle section and lifted it up for me to walk through, and then he let out a little yelp as he squeezed my shoulders. “I think this is more exciting for me than you, so you’ll have to beg my pardon, but you’re just so grown up. It’s just like when each one of the boys had their first day.”

  I was glad Callis was sweeping mugs, so he couldn’t see how red my face was turning.

  And so for the next couple hours, the nostalgic psychic and the shiny new witch took turns showing me the ropes. Chatham showed me how to book appointments, and how to ring a sale on the antique cash register that made a satisfying zing when the cash drawer popped open. All the while, I wondered if I’d get another moment alone with Callis. I had a million questions about these witch-marks. I couldn’t wait to see Isaac to tell him.

  “This thing,” Chatham said, pointing to a tall piece of furniture with lots of narrow drawers like a library card catalogue, “is the customer database.” It took up a large portion of the back wall.

  I pulled out one of the drawers and ran my fingers over the cards. They were all filed alphabetically by last name.

  “Every customer who’s ever had a reading—since readings were legalized, that is—has a handwritten card on file.”

  I pulled a few out, learning the system: color-coded dot stickers indicated preferences like tarot or palm, and notes were taken on the back, like whether they wanted a female psychic or someone who specialized in near-death experiences, their birthdates and star signs, and who their reading had been with. Most had one name listed, maybe two, and others, who were not picky about who saw their future, had a list of readers. Some had names scratched off.

  “The more you get to know your psychic, the more enriching the reading becomes,” Chatham told us.

  Most of the cards were single, but some people had ten. I held up a stack bound together by a rubber band.

  “Mary Jo’s been coming here for decades. We’re her first stop after Mass.”

  “Wow, I didn’t know people did both of those things,” I said.

  “There’s more than one way to talk to God, honey, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.”

  I looked to the clock on the wall and back to Callis, who was at the other end of the counter cleaning crystal wands until they sparkled.

  Chatham took me on a lap of the shop, pointing out which items were made locally. We paused at a bookcase near the front window where shelves of metaphysical books were displayed. I ran my fingers along the spines: Beginner’s Guide to Stargazing, Encyclopedia of Crystals, Hauntings and the Haunted. Some were as vintage as Mr. Mauer’s collection, and others were new and glossy. Three on the end caught my eye. The Art of Dreaming, Deciphering Your Dreams, and Dreamology.

  My fingers lingered on the last one.

  “Dreams,” Chatham said, peeking over my shoulder, “one of our most underestimated tools.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Dreams are the time our mind doesn’t dictate what we think and see and imagine, what we remember, what we fantasize about. They are arguably the most important key into your own soul.” He tugged Dreamology’s green spine and handed it to me.

  “Merci,” I said. I pictured my stack of research books back at the brothel. “But just to warn you, my to-be-read stack is huge.”

  “At your leisure, sweetheart. I just think you might find it interesting . . . Call it a hunch.”

  There was something about a Chatham Daure hunch that made me wonder if I should move the book to the top of the stack.

  The door opened, and Theis walked in—his walk said he was on a mission. He saw me and waved, but the serious expression never left his face.

  “Excuse me.” Chatham hurried over and gently steered Theis’s studded leather-jacket-clad elbow to his booth in the back.

  I drifted back to the counter before realizing I didn’t know what to say to Callis. How to just go back to witchtalk? So then I was just silently standing in front of him like a weirdo.

  “Yes?” he asked, looking up.

  “Question . . . About these mal-ef-a—marks.”

  “Maleficiums.”

  “Oui. You said you can see mine. Where is it? What does it look like? Is it just the alchemical symbol for Fire?”

  “Whoa.” He started laughing. “I don’t want to spoil it for you—seeing your Maleficium for the first time is a special experience.”

  “Especially if you saw it for the first time in the middle of the night in a graveyard, right after a séance?”

  He laughed again. “Well, that would certainly be one hell of a first time.”

  “When will I be able to see it?”

  “No easy answer to that, love. Whenever the universe decides you’re worthy of it.”

&nbs
p; My mind spun. What the hell does that mean? Who is this guy? More importantly, who else in this town has seen my mark unbeknownst to me?

  “One more question,” I asked, my fingers threading my chain. “What if . . . it never comes?”

  “Is your mother a witch?”

  “No. She’s, er, not really in my life.”

  “Your father?”

  I shook my head.

  “What does he do?”

  “He’s a metalsmith.”

  “Well, maybe you’ll be a metalsmith instead.”

  “Instead of what?”

  “Instead of a witch.”

  “Huh . . .” I tried not to sound horrified by the idea of not being a witch. “It’s probably just the alchemical symbol for Fire,” I mumbled.

  He let a smile slip, but that was all I got.

  CHAPTER 23

  His and Her Marks

  The water kicks my feet from under me and sweeps me away. It feels like I’m flying. Weightless. Only there aren’t any clouds or peaceful horizons, and there isn’t any serenity as we’re carried into the current along with everything else on the street. I knock away a detached car bumper, and its sharp metal edge slices my arm. A stop sign smacks the back of my head, and I want to blink out. I want my mom to save me, like Pop did that time a wave caught me while he was teaching me to surf at the Rockaways. I wasn’t under for long before he pulled me out, but I remember hearing my mom screaming from the beach. Screaming my name over and over again as she ran into the water to meet my pop as he carried me out.

  Like they’re screaming my name now, over and over and over. The sound gurgles as water pushes into their mouths.

  “Isaac!”

  “Isaac!”

  But the girls don’t know my name.

  They called me Mister.

  My phone vibrated underneath me, jabbing into my side. I wasn’t drowning. A chemical smell pierced the air. Not the ammonia used to clean the stainless steel rooms, but . . . silver polish. My eyes pelted open.

  I sat up and swung my legs down to the floor, the disorientation melting away. I was in Mac’s studio. He was at the workbench polishing jewelry.

  I walked over to the table, feeling oddly exposed, as if he’d seen everything running through my subconscious while I was asleep. Mac was the last person I wanted to know about the nightmare—other than Adele. He needed to know that she was safe with me, not think I was incapable of keeping people out of danger.

  Adele’s pile of chainmaille rings was noticeably larger than it had been earlier.

  “You just missed her,” he said. “She’s really excited about that new job.”

  Or more coven members.

  “I’m glad she’s getting out of the café,” I said, having to force my voice to work. “That place haunts her.”

  He nodded, still focusing on polishing the bracelet. “Her mom loved that tearoom. It’s unbelievable how alike she and Brigitte are. Sometimes I wonder if she got any of my genes at all.”

  Mac had never mentioned his wife—ex-wife?—around me. I liked that he did, but it also felt weird since Adele never talked about her mother, like I might be invading her privacy in a roundabout way. Adele so rarely mentioned her, it was almost like her mother was dead—and just one more thing we had in common. I looked around the room at all the tools, the sculptures, the sheets of brass and rods of silver and gold yet to be touched. So much metal. “I think she definitely got some of your genes.”

  He looked up at me. “So who’s Jade?”

  My breath halted. I knew I shouldn’t have gone to sleep here. What were you thinking?

  “Who?” I asked, trying to play it off like my pulse wasn’t racing.

  “You screamed her name a couple times.”

  My eyes dropped to the pile of metal rings.

  “Adele wasn’t here,” he said, putting down the rag. “Don’t worry.”

  For a second I felt like I could breathe again.

  “How long have you been having the nightmares?”

  “I—I don’t know. A few months, I guess.” I couldn’t look at him, but it was the closest I’d ever come to talking about it.

  “I have a friend who’s a trauma couns—”

  “I’m fine,” I snapped. Don’t get defensive, Isaac. “There are thousands of people out there who deserve help before me. Real victims.”

  “PTSD is a real thing, son.”

  “I don’t have PTSD. Just lack of sleep. I start work really early—not that I’m complaining—and I stayed up too late last night, that’s all.” Because I had to make up for saying some really stupid shit to your daughter, who has the most vivid blue eyes I’ve ever seen and who I still can’t believe forgave me.

  “I know you’re not complaining, son. But please, if you ever change your mind . . . or if you ever need to catch up on z’s, the couch is there.”

  I nodded.

  “The couch, just to be clear. Not Adele’s bed.”

  I looked him in the eye and nodded again, using all of my mental strength not to imagine Adele last night, the moonlight pouring through that perfectly thin T-shirt, which was now officially my favorite piece of clothing in the world.

  My pen glided around the page in swirling curves, forming delicate tendrils of hair. Tiny bubbles trailed from the blonde’s plump lips up to the water’s surface. Bubbles were supposed to be fun, light, and weightless, but here they carried her last breath back out to the world. If you listened closely, you could almost hear the gurgle as her pensive eyes watched the bubbles carry it away.

  The streets outside the café were so silent, devoid of people and cars, you could hear Ren’s voice from two blocks away as he went on about someone named Alessandro, which meant they’d be here shortly.

  I finished filling her eyes with ink, then set the pen down and emptied the carafe of coffee into the sink. Ren and his tour group would likely be the only customers for the rest of the shift, so they might as well get a fresh pot.

  I ground the beans, looked at the chicory, and then ignored it, because it was disgusting. I couldn’t understand for the life of me why people would ruin perfectly good coffee by adding it. Adele said I wasn’t able to get the full effect until we were able to get milk, but again, why would you make something so gross that it was only drinkable cut with equal parts milk. Baffling. I flipped the switch on the machine to brew.

  Even though I’d covered shifts at the café a few times for Adele, it still felt odd being on this side of the counter. Most of the time I just sat in my usual spot in the window, which I think actually attracted customers—nothing to do with me personally, but just seeing a live human as proof that the café was open. But today, despite the nap, I was still exhausted, and I felt better tucked away behind the counter, hiding behind the empty pastry cases and espresso machines. I almost hoped no one would come in.

  Plus, it was easier to think about dead girls and cold touches and the whispers in the wind when I was sitting away from the sharp line of afternoon sun cast through the window.

  I closed the sketch pad.

  Ren rounded the gallery on the corner with the same perfectly timed joke about blue dogs that he told every day, and the group came into view and crossed the street to the shop.

  “This is the best cup of coffee and chicory you’ll find in NOLA,” he said coming through the door. Oops. “And I’m not just saying that because it’s the only one you’ll find around these parts. And this is Isaac, the second-best barista downtown.” He winked at me, and everyone laughed.

  The group was made up of two couples, one older and the other midtwenties, and another four women who looked like they were together and who all appeared to be taken by Ren, just like the women always seemed to be. It made me chuckle . . . if they only knew.

  I pulled down nine cups and began filling them with coffee. There’s wasn’t really a point in taking orders, because we didn’t have much else. The group sat at a table along the red wall. One of the women, who had a mid
western accent, seemed extra enamored.

  “And how are you this fine day?” Ren asked, leaning on the counter. I got a giant whiff of something sweet.

  “Good God, Ren. Overdo it much on the cologne?”

  “What ever do you mean?”

  “You smell like you took a shower in orange juice or something.”

  “Not orange juice,” the midwesterner giggled, reaching around him for a cup. “Grapefruit.”

  “I think it’s lemon,” said another.

  “Dolce al limone!” he said with maximum Ren-level drama.

  “I love it when he speaks Italian,” the third girl whispered.

  Italian? Since when was Italian part of Ren’s act?

  He turned back to the table, grabbed one of the girls, and twirled her around straight into a dip. For a second I thought he was actually going to kiss her. I think everyone in the room did.

  It reminded me of another time in the café, when Nicco’s brother had been twirling Adele around, and I kinda wanted to retch.

  As the girl swooned and fell to her seat, Ren stepped back to the counter for his coffee, seeming a little dazed. He pulled his flask from the inside of his velvet jacket, took a swig, and started to screw the lid back on but then stopped and glugged the rest of it into his coffee cup.

  “You okay, there, buddy?” I asked.

  He tucked away the flask and took a sip from the cup. “Never better!”

  Then as if to prove it, he ran to the front of the room and leaped up to a chair, making me cringe as it rocked on two legs, but he actually managed to stabilize it and land the move. We both breathed a sigh of relief.

  He went straight into the story about a girl who died on the roof of Bottom of the Cup, back before it was a psychic tearoom. I thought about Adele and her first day, surrounded by psychics and ghosts, fingers threading her chain and telling bad jokes as she got more nervous. I picked up my phone to see if there were any progress updates.

  Just a message from Dee:

  Dee 14:12 I’m dying. I want to go over there.

  I tapped out a response.

  Isaac 14:37 Chill.