A Fistful Of Sky

by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

  His eyes narrowed. “Perception is a factor. What you believe, you can achieve, whether your belief is based on fact or false speculation. What you don’t perceive, what you don’t believe—those things are much harder to work with. You believed you were normal. I think that makes it possible for you to go there. What did you discover?”

  “I hate normal! Not only that, it makes me sick.”

  Great-Uncle Tobias smiled at me. His eyes twinkled. “Welcome home, Gyp.”

  I turned back to my pot and stirred some more. Hating normal! That was not a noble sentiment, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to celebrate it. I had a lot vested in being noble. It had been all I had for a long time. “Normal’s not so bad.”

  “Normal’s not so bad when it’s your only option,” he said. “Time to recognize you’ve left normal behind.”

  My pineapple filling thickened up, and I took it off the flame, poured it into a bowl and put it in the freezer. I got cookie dough out of the fridge, kneaded it a little bit, then floured the butcher block table and rolled the dough out thin. I got all the cookie cutters out of the back of a drawer and set to work cutting out shapes, two of each.

  “Do you want to go back? Gyp, seriously now. You’ve had time to try your wings. Do you know what you want?”

  “What if I wanted to turn back into my old self?”

  “There might be a way.”

  I wiped my forehead, felt flour stick to my face. “You tell me that now? Not before?”

  “I found some new information yesterday. Now I see a path you could take away from your power. I wanted to check with you, but it seems to me that you’re doing fine.”

  I set cookies on a greased baking sheet: stars, bells, hearts, angels, trees, rabbits sneaking over from Easter, scotty dogs. I got the pineapple filling out of the freezer and set a spoonful of it in the center of each cutout cookie, then pressed their top layers over the filling and tamped down the edges with fork tines. “I don’t know about doing fine. I’m doing something, anyway. I know enough to know I don’t want to go back.”

  “Good.”

  I put the cookies in to bake and started another sheet. I had cut out half a sheet’s worth of cookies when I noticed red light gloving my right hand.

  Tobias saw it, too. “Now what?”

  “Time to curse something,” I said.

  “You have a visible tell?”

  “If I don’t act on it soon enough, yeah.”

  “You might want to train it not to do that.”

  I set my cookie cutters aside, put the filling and the unused dough back in the refrigerator, and clenched my hands into fists.

  “Do you have anything in mind?” Tobias asked.

  “I didn’t mean to curse the guys. I better go outside and figure out something. Will you watch this for me? Take those cookies out in a couple minutes? They should be a little brown; dark brown is burnt.”

  “I will take care of them.”

  “Thanks. Or I could stay here, watch the cookies myself, and curse you.”

  “You could. You could try.”

  I looked for his shield, but didn’t see it. “Back in a few,” I said.

  At that moment, the kitchen door opened, and Mama walked in, completely naked. In her left hand she held a bunch of red bananas, and in her right hand she held a single one, half-eaten. She smiled at us.

  “Anise?” said Tobias. He stood.

  She strolled to him, her hips swaying, and held out the bunch. “Have you tried these, Uncle? Amazing.”

  He opened his mouth, held out his hand. I could smell them from where I was, and, oh, I wanted one, too. “Shield yourself,” I said to Tobias. “I made those.”

  His fingers flickered. A shield, almost invisible except for glints, formed around him.

  Mama frowned. She set the bananas on the table, reached out and jerked the shield off Tobias. “Don’t be rude.” She handed him the half-banana in her hand as I grabbed the others.

  I was suddenly hungry, and they smelled delicious, promised me every taste I could ever crave.

  I opened the oven and stuffed them in on top of the baking sheets of cookies.

  Tobias fought his hand. It brought the banana toward his mouth, then, with effort, pulled it away again. I clenched my fist, formed an image of my intention, pointed toward the banana, and said, “Damn.” The fruit cindered into nothing.

  “Gyp.” Mama’s eyes glowed.

  “Mama, why did you eat those? Didn’t you see my note?”

  “Gypsum.” Her voice was full of freeze. “How dare you?” She pumped her hands open and shut, and blue flame gathered above her palms, so bright it seared my vision. She flicked her fingers. The power shot toward me.

  I screamed and shielded myself with my arms. Red light flooded from me, clashed with Mama’s blue light. There was a strange stillness around us as our fires devoured each other and disappeared.

  “Anise,” said Tobias. He gripped Mama’s shoulders, stared into her eyes, and said something in a low, chilling voice.

  Mama straightened, blinked, peered at Tobias. “What?” She glanced down at herself, paled, then flushed. “What happened?”

  “Sit down. Both of you.”

  My heart raced. My arms were trembling. I couldn’t get myself to move at first. I shuffled across the floor to a chair and collapsed.

  Mama sank down beside me.

  Tobias reached into the air and grabbed a bathrobe from somewhere else, handed it to Mama. She blushed again and wrapped up in it.

  An enticing smell was filling the kitchen. I bit my lip, got up and went to the oven. I patted my chest. I didn’t think I had any fire left, but I opened the oven door and damned everything inside it, and a faint flash of red answered my call. All anything smelled like afterward was burnt.

  “What was the curse, Gyp?” Tobias asked after I sat again.

  I told them about planting the banana and summoning a tree. “I didn’t know what it would do. I just thought if it was someplace away from the house—”

  “I was lying on the chaise after my morning laps,” said Mama, “and I smelled this wonderful smell.”

  “I put a note about avoiding the orchard on the porch doors.”

  “I didn’t go out that way.”

  Sometimes, when she was sure no one was looking, she drifted down from the widow’s walk to the backyard. I had forgotten.

  “Do you remember what you just did, Anise?” Tobias asked.

  “Not really. Last thing I remember was that taste on my tongue, so luscious. It made me feel good all over.”

  “You tried to kill me,” I whispered.

  “Oh, no. No. I couldn’t possibly have—” Mama gazed at Tobias with anxious eyes.

  He cupped his chin in his hand and studied her. “I believe it was more that you didn’t care what consequences your action had.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “You ate fruit of a cursed tree. It affected your world-view. You were irritated with Gyp, and you cast all the fire you had at her.”

  Mama’s wide violet eyes fixed their gaze on me. Tears ran out of them. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Oh, lord, Gyp, I—”

  I swallowed. “It’s my fault. I made those bananas.” I looked away from Mama. She ate my curse, and it bounced back on me. I didn’t think I had ever seen anything more terrifying than my mother’s cold eyes as she threw potential death at me.

  She wept and hugged me. I sank down inside myself, away from her. I thought of Great-Aunt Meta. I understood her better now.

  “Those bananas,” I said. I pushed out of Mama’s hug. “What if someone else eats them?”

  We ran out back, down the new staircase and over to the old vegetable garden.

  The tree looked as though it had been carved from obsidian, except for the three heavy flower spikes, with their blood-red hands of fruit and deep maroon petals with creamy insides. A raccoon was eating bananas at the tree’s base. It turned and snarled at us, but didn’t leave.
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br />   The smell was light and seductive. Mama gripped my arm. I glanced at her face. The tip of her tongue traveled slowly along her top lip.

  Tobias spoke something that clunked from his mouth as though each word were a brick. The air around the tree glistened. A shield formed around it, cutting off the scent. “Time of creation?” he asked me.

  “Nine-fifteen.”

  He spoke some other words, and the shield turned opaque, rendering the small black tree invisible. The raccoon, still snarling, came out through the shield, then turned back to glare at it before trundling off. “Should hold for eight hours or so,” Tobias said.

  “Thanks,” I said. “Can I change my mind about going back to the way I was?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Tobias,” Mama said. “What is this?”

  “I’ve been researching matters of power to see if Gypsum might have some options, or at least some help. I found a seventeenth-century grimoire in my collection yesterday. It had some interesting spells in it. There might be a way for her to give up her power without dying. Gyp, I don’t think you’re ready to decide yet. While it’s true that Anise could have killed you, it’s also true that you saved yourself.”

  “Did she?” Mama asked. “I just assumed—”

  “That I took care of it?” he asked when the pause stretched. “I hadn’t time to take care of it.”

  Mama looked at me, and I stared back. Her lower lip trembled. Then she straightened and smiled. “You can defend yourself against me now? Good.”

  Heat curled over my breastbone. I had cast all my power out to protect myself, but more was coming.

  Mama glanced at the black bell jar Tobias had placed over my curse tree. “Now I just have to learn to defend myself from you.”

  Twenty

  “WHAT are you doing?”

  I looked up from my curse journal. Opal stood in my doorway, her arms crossed over her chest and her feet crossed at the ankles as she leaned against the doorjamb.

  “Hey, Opal. Welcome home.”

  “Hey, kid. Thanks.”

  “You talk to anybody else yet?”

  She leaned back and looked out at the sitting room, checked around for other signs of life. Shook her head. “Snuck up the back way. Wanted to get a feel for the place before I ran into Mama.”

  It had been almost a year since I had seen my older sister. She worked on one movie project after another; once people saw what she could do with special effects makeup, word went around, and she was hired solid.

  It made Mama mad that Opal had so many jobs and didn’t make time to come home for more frequent visits. Opal’s jobs were on location: Mexico City, Seattle, Florida, Toronto. After one of these jobs when Mama didn’t know where Opal was, Mama laid down the law: I know you’re working sixteen-hour days and you don’t have time to talk to your mother, but you will leave me a phone number where I can contact you, or I’ll do something disruptive and you’ll regret it. If Mama was desperate to find you, she could reach right down your bloodline and pull you home whether you wanted to go or not. So Opal let us know where she was. She usually didn’t tell us what she was doing, though.

  My sister looked worn-out, painfully thin and tired.

  “I’ve got some cookies to get back to.” I’d begged Tobias’s help in cleaning out the oven, then left him in charge of the kitchen before I came upstairs to write the latest curse news. “You want some?”

  “You made the snickerdoodles yet?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh, boy. I’ll come with you, Sis.” She glanced around my room. “How come it smells like magic in here?”

  I pushed past her and shut the door. “Okay, that’s kind of a long story, but the short version is, last weekend? When I was too sick to go to L.A. and meet Gerry? Transition.”

  She grabbed my arm and pulled me to a stop. “No lie, Gyp? Holy shit. Holy shit!” She hugged me tight.

  I relaxed into it. When I was little and Mama was busy, Opal took care of me. Mama was always busy. Opal took care of all of us. She cared about us even when Jasper and I got old enough to tease her for being who she was. When she moved away, I was so upset. How could Opal leave us? And she really left. She didn’t keep in touch with us, not till Mama forced her to. Seemed like she was glad to get away.

  “Okay, okay,” I said, and pushed back. “And the other news is I got the power of curses instead of regular power.”

  “What?” She gripped my shoulders and stared into my face.

  “Stuff I do comes out twisted and mean.”

  “Oh, Gyp.” She hugged me again. I closed my eyes. She smelled faintly of her favorite essential oil, October Rain, a scent she almost always wore. I pretended that she could take care of me again, make everything all right. I gave it about twenty seconds, then sighed and let go of her.

  “Are you doing all right with this?” she asked.

  I shrugged. “Working on it.” Opal didn’t live here anymore. I was technically almost grown up. It was my problem.

  I wished I was a little kid again, before any of us had transitioned.

  “If there’s anything I can do to help, tell me, okay?”

  “I will.”

  We studied each other. Finally exchanged smiles.

  “Is Mama home?” Opal asked.

  “She was about twenty minutes ago.”

  Opal looked at nothing for a few seconds, then shrugged. “Might as well see her.”

  We went downstairs.

  Tobias was studying my cookie book on the cookbook stand, where clear plastic shielded the page from random ingredients. He had rolled out more dough, and was cutting out pairs of shapes with the cookie cutters.

  “Hey, Uncle! Domestic streak?” Opal asked.

  Tobias smiled at her. “It occurred to me I hadn’t tried anything new in a while. This is interesting. How nice to see you, Opal. Welcome home.”

  “Thanks.” She kissed his cheek.

  I got a cookie tin down from the top shelf and opened it, held it out to her. She selected some snickerdoodles and headed for the coffeepot.

  “Thanks for taking care of things, Uncle.” I put away the tin, grabbed the spatula, and transferred the finished cookies he had taken out of the oven from the baking sheet to the cooling racks.

  “You didn’t mention that detail.”

  “It’s a small one,” I said. “You’re doing great.”

  Flint came in, carrying index cards and a Magic Marker. He dropped everything when he saw Opal, and went to hug her.

  “Hey, little brother. How are you?”

  He smiled and smiled. Then he went back and picked up his cards, sorted through them. Held one up. “Cursed,” it said.

  I hid behind my hands.

  “You cursed Flint?” Opal asked.

  “I didn’t mean to,” I said through my fingers. “It just popped out. They were eating the cookies without asking.”

  “So he can’t talk? That doesn’t make sense.”

  “I think he can’t open his mouth.”

  Flint nodded.

  “For how long?”

  I lowered my hands and checked the kitchen clock. “I cursed them around ten-thirty. Now it’s two hours later? So another four, five hours?”

  “Harsh!” said Opal.

  “It’s awful. Uncle, how can I take off a curse?”

  Flint found a blank index card and wrote on it, held it up. “Never mind. We won’t starve. Steak for dinner?”

  I went to the money drawer and checked the grocery envelope. Mama and Dad put money in it every week, and I spent most of it for dinner stuff and the day-to-day things that everybody ate; I checked out the cupboards and the refrigerator often enough that it was easy for me to keep track of what we were running out of. There was a shopping list magneted to the refrigerator, along with a pencil, and people wrote new things on it, and I bought them. I left money in the envelope for people to buy meals on the nights when I didn’t cook; usually they bought pizza or Chinese takeout or so
meone picked up something at the supermarket deli on their way home.

  We didn’t have any steaks on hand, but there was enough money left from the week’s cache that I could buy a big family pack of steaks. Plus, I owed Flint, and steaks were his favorite. I didn’t make them very often, because they were expensive and didn’t make good leftovers (not that there was ever anything left over after a steak night). “Sure.”

  He held up another card, this one already written out. “Gyp, will you help me?”

  “How?”

  He turned the card over for another prepared message. “Mama says I should make the lights again this year.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  Next card. “I screwed up so much last year. But if we worked together, maybe I could get it right.”

  I felt my own smile. “Oh, yeah! That would be great!” Another curse I wouldn’t have to worry about casting, and something Flint really needed.

  He grinned. He wrote a card. “When?”

  I checked the clock again. “A couple hours? I just used up my energy, but I should be recharged in a couple hours. Can we do this if you can’t talk, though? How about we wait until your curse wears off and then do it?”

  He held up a prepared card. “OK.”

  I smiled at him. One of this evening’s curses was spoken for. I was totally happy about that.

  “What’s that about? How can you help Flint?” Opal asked.

  I explained that to her. I could filter power through Flint, and through Altria, and it came out clean. At first I thought it was just Flint. But since it worked with Altria, too, and, come to that, my UFS self, maybe it would work with anybody? I needed to do some more experiments.

  “Have you tried setting time limits on your curses?” Tobias asked.

  “How do you mean?”

  “If you built a time limit in instead of letting them run their course—which, I should warn you, may be more variable than you’re giving them credit for; it depends on how much energy you put into it. More oomph, longer curse—if you specify a limit, that might help. Say you were mad at Flint and Jasper for eating the cookies, but you just shut their mouths for an hour.”