by Etta Faire
Feldman coughed on the smoke. “It’s not my birthday.”
“What are you talking about? That’s why we’re all over here, celebrating, or at least that’s the story I told Pamela.” He winked. “You’re turning the big 4-0. Congratulations, for the second time.”
“So you and Pamela were the ones who sent me that weird horse bank over there?” He motioned toward the back of the bar.
And I finally got to see it. The horse bank. It was about the size of a small loaf of bread, a brown race horse with the number 3 on its green blanket, and what looked like a red blanket around its neck. Its painted metal eyes were the spookiest part, like they could see right through you in a blank, dead kind of way.
“Oh. That is a beauty.” Doc whistled and picked it up. I tried to pay attention to every angle, not just the horse, but the way the doctor was looking at it too. “We didn’t send this. Pamela would rather have died than send something so tacky. We sent the cheese basket with fruit from Hank’s grocery.”
Feldman thanked his friend for the cheese. “If you didn’t send the bank, I can’t figure out who did. It’s not my birthday. And there was no return address on the package when it came last week. No card. Nothing. Drew said it was probably a metaphor. Somebody’s trying to tell me they’re going to make bank this weekend.”
“An expensive metaphor,” Doc said. “Or, it’s someone trying to tell you we should save our pennies and go to the Kentucky Derby again. Why’d we stop going there, anyway? It must be… seven or eight years.”
“We all got old. We have wives, girlfriends, and businesses now…”
“Some of us have all three.” Doc set the bank back on the bar and toasted his glass to his own comment. “I thought your friend from New York was coming. The writer. Jeremy.”
“He couldn’t make it.”
“Writers are busy now, huh?”
“More like writers are poor now, in particular that guy,” Feldman replied. “I guess Golden Promises wasn’t the hit he needed it to be.”
Flo danced over to the bar at that moment, sweat glistening around her face, making her look even more beautiful. Sweat never did that to me.
“I read that book,” she said, chest heaving as she caught her breath from dancing. She turned to Doc. “Pour me a drink, will ya? Gin and tonic, easy on the tonic.”
Doc puffed harder on his pipe as he brought down a glass.
She continued. “Jeremy Somebody-or-rather. He certainly hates rich people and women. A bit of a hack, I’d say, especially that last book.”
Feldman shrugged. “A talented hack who told me he made a nice chunk of change.”
She nodded to Doc when he handed her the drink then chugged it. “I’ll never know why. His poems are all right, but the women in his stories are all fools.”
Doc chuckled. “Well, my fool of a wife loved it.”
Flo didn’t seem to hear him. She was still talking about the book. “It made me feel sorry for them, how they were constantly concerned with whether or not they seemed clever to their men. Which because the stories were always written from the male perspective, they never did. Try as they might. Poor fools.”
“Do us all a favor and go heavier on the tonic,” Feldman said, through clenched teeth.
“I’m sorry. Wasn’t that comment clever enough for you, darling?”
She took another gulp then left to dance with his brother again.
Doc leaned into Feldman. “I tell you, I like her. She speaks her mind.”
“Yeah, ain’t nothing better than that,” Feldman said. “Except maybe tuberculosis.”
Doc went on. “But I have to agree about that book, for different reasons, though. It put a bunch of useless ideas into Pamela’s head. I swear it was right after reading Golden Promises that the woman started talking nonsense, about how we needed to support each other’s dreams like they did in the books.” He sighed. “I told her the only dream I had was winning at horses and getting a divorce. And she was more than welcome to support me on both of those.”
Feldman downed his beer and watched his brother on the dance floor. Terry kissed Flo on the cheek then broke for the bar. “Two shots of the finest, Felds,” he said to his brother. “And Flo’s thirsty too. Gin and tonic for her, easy on the tonic.”
Doc shot him a look while Feldman started on the drinks.
“You sure you need two?” Doc asked the tall strawberry-blonde man in front of him. “And Flo just ordered that same drink not more than one minute ago.”
Terry’s lip curled. “You our dad all the sudden, Doc? This is my brother’s place. That means we have my family to thank for this weekend. Show a little respect, huh?” He downed one of the shots while staring right in Doc’s eyes like he was daring the older man to say something. Then he drank the other shot. “Leave the bottle on the counter, Felds. It’s too much work for you to pour it for me.”
Feldman looked at Doc, who was already shaking his head, before shrugging and leaving the bottle on the bar.
Terry went back to the dance floor carrying the drink for Flo.
“I’m adding water to that bottle when he’s not looking,” Doc said when Terry was out of earshot.
“Your place now,” Feldman replied. “Your call.”
Feldman went back to talking to me in his head. “My brother was by far the biggest reason I sold the Bear Bird. Sometimes in life you hit a certain point where, if success hasn’t come, you think it never will. And you give up. He was giving up, drinking himself crazy. I could see that. I was buying him an art studio. Nice, huh? He used to paint some amazing stuff back in the day.”
Richie and Boyd left the tour and went over to the bar, watching the dance floor where things were heating up as the dancers got drunk. Flo ran her hands over Terrance’s chest and down his back to the beat of the jazz song playing. She spilled a little drink on the back of Terry’s shirt and laughed as they twirled.
“Drew is a great tour guide,” Richie said to Feldman. He sat down in one of the stools along the bar. Richie’s thin, sunken cheeks seemed to cave in at unnatural angles. Feldman quickly grabbed a glass and poured him a beer. “But we ducked out early because I got thirsty.”
Boyd pointed to the display on the dance floor. “Plus, this is a lot more interesting than looking at Feldman’s office or the finest sheets you two got all the way from China. I thought your girlfriend said darkest corners.”
It was the first time I’d really heard the man who looked like Bobby speak. He sounded just like Bobby too. Bored and upset about most everything in life.
Doc slid the drinks over to the men.
“That pansy you brought better really be a pigeon, Doc,” Richie said. “You bringing a stranger in on a reunion poker weekend isn’t sitting too well with me. I’m surprised you okayed it, Feld.”
Feldman shrugged.
Doc rolled his eyes at him. “When Chance expressed to me that he’d never played poker before, I said ‘Perfect. Neither have we. Bring fifty bucks and we’ll figure it out together.’”
“His name’s Chance. C’mon, Doc. Who’s conning who?”
Doc puffed on his pipe. “His last name’s Chance. I think his first name’s Michael, maybe. I don’t know. Pamela hired him. He’s doing work around the house for her.”
“I bet he is,” Richie said, raising his eyebrows and his glass. “Tell Pam I do good work too.”
Doc stared at the man like he wanted to rip his guts out.
Feldman talked to me. “They never liked each other.”
“I can tell,” I said.
Feldman reached across the bar and grabbed the bank, sliding it over in front of the guys. “Okay, ‘fess up. Which one of you jokers gave me this ugly thing?”
They both laughed when they saw it and shook their heads no. “I wish I could take credit for finding something straight out of hell like this, but you know me, I don’t shop, and I don’t buy,” Richie said. “If I spend any money, it’s here at the bar.”
Feldman spoke to me again. “He never spent money here. He made money here. He drank on the house and he got paid off. Richie was another guy who was none too happy to hear I sold the bar. Especially not to Doc. He knew there was no way Doc was gonna pay Richie even one thin dime for protection on this place. Doc already told me he wasn’t. He said he had enough on that crooked cop to already put him away and that’s what he’d do if he was pressured.”
“Interesting,” I said, over the sound of an alarm beeping in the background. It barely registered and kind of morphed into the man’s words. My shoulders shook and my eyesight went dark then light again.
The two men in front of me who were holding the bank and laughing flickered in and out with my own living room wallpaper.
“Carly… Carly.” It was my annoying ex-husband. I focused on his voice even though I didn’t want to, allowing it to lead me back.
His face was translucent, his color weak. I knew it took a lot out of him to move things in the physical world. He stopped shaking my shoulders as soon as my eyes opened fully. The alarm on my phone beeped annoyingly.
“I think it’s been going off for a while,” he said. “I’m not sure why I didn’t notice.”
And when I thought about it, it did seem like more than a half an hour had passed.
Chapter 12
Breaks With Reality
It was becoming harder and harder to return to reality after a channeling. Living in someone else’s mind was invigorating and intoxicating; I couldn’t even lie about it to myself. A different time. A different person. A different way of breathing and smelling and thinking.
I needed to do it again, and that was the part that was scaring me the most, probably because I wasn’t sure if I was starting to lose myself.
I wrote down everything into my notes about the channeling so far, even the part where it had seemed to be longer than a half an hour. I checked the clock on my phone. 10:30. Unfortunately, I had no idea what time I’d started channeling.
Feldman was nowhere to be found. Ghosts always needed time to rest after a channeling, so I couldn’t go over the case with him. And Jackson wasn’t interested.
“You’re on your own, Carly doll,” he said.
I stared at my notes while I downed the water by my side. “Feldman’s death must have had something to do with selling the bar,” I said to myself. “Sending a horse bank and then writing a note inside it was pretty planned out. Personal. Not a crime of passion.”
At least I had a lot to look up at the library the next morning. I guzzled the rest of my water then got up for more. Sometimes, water hits the spot so well it tastes better than ice cream. This time, it was like a hot fudge sundae with whip cream, chocolate sprinkles, and a little cherry on top.
“When are you planning your next channeling,” my ex asked, hovering beside me as I turned on the faucet and hiked myself along the side of the sink so I could drink straight from the water stream. He raised an eyebrow at me.
I climbed down and shrugged. “Maybe tomorrow. Why?”
“I think you should take a break,” he said.
I shook my head so hard, water drizzled down my chin. “Why? I’m fine.” I coughed on my own drool.
“You seem fine, for someone trapped in a clothes dryer.”
I wiped the drips from my chin, but didn’t answer him.
Light from my window woke me up the next morning, and I checked the time. It was almost 9:30. I hadn’t heard my alarm again. My eyes were heavy. My body ached. I was nowhere near ready to get up, but the library was already open. I had to get going before work.
I set my phone alarm for the following minute just to make sure everything was working properly then shuffled downstairs.
There was a message on my machine. It was Rosalie.
“Get over to my house quick. The package came. I repeat the package came. We can figure out what Feldman is now. See if it’s safe to do a channeling. Hurry. We need to open the Purple Pony at eleven.
I gulped. I knew she was talking about the ingredients for the sapientia formula. I almost didn’t want to find out what I’d channeled with now.
I looked around for my water bottle, my mouth dry and chalky, as my alarm went off. My phone had been working just fine.
Chapter 13
The Sapientia Formula
I parked my car in front of Rosalie’s cottage, which was tucked in the part of Potter Grove not too many people lived in anymore. I always guessed this division must’ve been built by a guy who thought cars were a passing phase. Narrow streets and no sidewalks. But it was why she could live off of nothing.
A wind picked up as soon as I stepped out of the car causing the loose shutter hanging crooked on her modest two-story to bang along the paneling like it was going to fall into her lawn, a term I was using lightly because it basically consisted of overgrown bushes, colorful empty pots, and a large sculpture of a unicorn drinking from a fountain. She sure loved her unicorns in life.
Rosalie rarely invited anyone over. I’d only been to her place one other time, and the only thing I remembered about it, aside from the fact it was full of books stacked everywhere, was that it was dark. Probably why she spent most of her time at the Purple Pony.
The smell of over-cooked pine needles took over my senses as soon as she opened the door, which was only just enough to let me in. “Come on,” she said, waving a plastic yellow-gloved hand at me. “We’ve got to hurry.” She closed and locked the door as soon as I squeezed inside like she was suddenly wanted by the FBI or something.
In addition to the gloves, she had on a plastic poncho and goggles with a cloth mask dangling from her neck. She handed me the same get-up. “We need to get this formula made, cooled, and tested while we still have adequate lighting, which I guess means while we still have daylight.”
“I think we’ll be fine. It’s barely ten o’clock.” I squinted into the darkness that was her living room. We were not going to get adequate lighting here.
There were even more books than I remembered. No wonder it was so dark. They were stacked from floor to ceiling and the stacks covered most the windows.
I quickly put my outfit on and slipped into the kitchen where I noticed the same recipe book from the other day out and opened on the counter. Three other equally large and maybe even older books were also opened in various parts of her kitchen: One along the stove, one propped against the microwave and another balanced along an empty pot.
“There are discrepancies in the recipes of the sapientia formulas from one book to the next. Can you believe it? I guess we just pick one and go with it. I’m boiling down the goat fingernails, half the charcoal, and frankincense now because all the recipes call for that. But maybe look through the books to see which recipe is best.”
“Now how would I know that?” I asked, coughing through what I now knew was goat fingernail fumes. I put the cloth mask back over my face and picked up the large gray book on the pot, scanning the entry for the formula.
“There’s going to be plenty here. Enough for me and Mr. Peters,” I said, checking her reaction out of the corner of my eye. I didn’t mention the part that I wasn’t even sure I wanted the spray anymore because then I would have to admit that I already channeled with Feldman.
Rosalie barely looked up from the bottom cupboard she was searching through. After clanging through pots and pans, she emerged with a blender.
“I’m only doing this for you,” she said, her voice muffled through her mask. “Because it’s important. If this entity is a poltergeist, a demon, or a curse, you cannot channel with it.”
I stared blankly at her. Now was the perfect time to mention that I’d already done a channeling, but then I couldn’t. She would feel like she was doing all this goat-fingernail-boiling for nothing.
She went on. “So don’t talk to me about Louis Peters. I don’t care about Louis Peters.”
“What happened with you two, anyway? What’s your full story?” I asked, noting the side ef
fects in the gray book included possible infertility. I tossed it aside and moved onto the purplish black book propped along the microwave.
“Classic Barbie and Ken story. He was captain of the football team and I was the cutest cheerleader.” She chuckled through the dust mask while she stirred the pot simmering on the stove that was about to boil over.
“You never confirmed yesterday. Is he the boyfriend from the unicorn vision?”
She didn’t say anything, so I knew he was. It was hard for me to picture balding, pudgy Mr. Peters as the hippie who broke Rosalie’s heart.
“This was the late 70s when we met, mind you. Louis was so straight-laced back then. Hair down to his knees, but he was already manager of the bookstore in Landover Mall. So responsible. I went in for a book. I wasn’t even planning on applying for a sales job. But I was instantly intrigued by this hippie in a suit. If I remember right, he told me to come back with shoes and he’d give me a job…”
I continued reading while she talked. The worst side effect in the purplish black book, aside from bleeding gums and the possibility of opening doors to the hosts of evil, was constipation. The recipe was still in the running.
She pulled her mask down so I could hear her better. “Long story short, we dated, fell in love or so I thought, and I got scared. He started talking commitments, long-term junk that hippies didn’t talk about back then. He wanted to get married, of all things. I was nineteen and he was talking forever-stuff to me. Got down on his knee with a ring and everything.”
Her pot began smoking, blackening the wall behind it with burning frankincense while a foul smell circulated through the kitchen. She waved a towel over the smoke and turned down the flame. “I think we’re ready for step two. This is where the recipes differ. Which one are we going with?”
I pointed to the dark green book she showed me a few days ago when I first learned about the recipe. “I guess we should stick with the original.”