by Geof Johnson
Evelyn checked her watch. “I suppose. Round everybody up and let’s go inside.” She turned to Jamie. “Are you going to eat with us? The kids would love that.”
He scratched his neck and pushed his mouth to one side. “I’d like to, but I need to go home and get ready for work. I’ll probably eat a sandwich later.”
“How about you, Miss Duffy? Did you bring your lunch today?”
“I forgot. I am used to having all my meals prepared for me at the Fuller’s house.”
“We can’t let you go hungry,” Evelyn said.
“I shall be fine.”
“You can have some of my peanut butter and jelly sandwich,” Sammi said with a big smile.
“We’ll all share,” Evelyn said. “We’ll have enough, I’m sure.”
Miss Duffy’s mouth tightened and she seemed to squeeze her arms around her chest even harder. “I...I can do without lunch. It will be good for me.”
“Nonsense. We can’t expect you to work on an empty stomach.”
“I can get you something at the market from one of the food carts,” Jamie said, shifting the leather-bound book under his arm while he dug his hand into the front pocket of his pants. “I didn’t spend all my money at Mr. Winston’s shop.” He pulled out a few coins and turned to Miss Duffy. “How about a sausage on a bun? Fred told me those are good.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
“Sure it is. So, sausage on a bun, yes or no?”
“Um...yes.”
“Get some fruit for the kids while you’re at it,” Rachel said. “You can get a honeydew melon from Leora’s mother if you can find her wagon. Do you have enough money?”
“Think so. Should I buy a knife to cut it with, or can I use my magic?” Jamie wagged one finger and grinned.
“We have a knife, Jamie,” Evelyn said, “so go already, before we all starve.”
“Back in a sec.”
He vanished without warning, and Miss Duffy flinched and sucked in her breath as she gaped at the space where’d he’d been standing.
“He loves to do that,” Rachel said. “He can be a big show off, sometimes.”
“I saw his performance at the Founders’ Festival. It was astounding. He is a most amazing wizard, he is.”
“But he’s a good boy,” Rachel said quickly. “He’s not at all like Renn, so you don’t have to be afraid of him.”
Jamie returned a few minutes later with Miss Duffy’s food, wrapped in brown paper, and a couple of golden melons. “Leora’s mom gave me a discount on the fruit ’cause I was buying it for the school. This should be enough for everybody, don’t you think? Kids and grownups, too?”
He handed the steaming sausage to Miss Duffy, whose stomach grumbled as she took it.
Rachel laughed. “So, you are hungry after all.”
“I suppose I am,” Miss Duffy said with a weak smile. “I had no breakfast today. I was too nervous to eat this morning before I came.”
“Well, I hope you’re not too nervous to eat, now,” Evelyn said and turned to the children who waited nearby. “Let’s go inside and eat.”
Jamie returned to the school in the late afternoon, hoping to talk to Miss Duffy again before she went home, but he was too late.
“She left about ten minutes ago,” Rachel said as she closed and latched the last window. “She waited ’till all of the kids were gone, and she helped clean up a little bit before we called it a day.”
“Hmph.” Jamie pulled at his chin for a moment. “So what do you think of her?”
“Hold on,” Evelyn said and turned to Sammi. “Do you want to turn off the lights?” Sammi ran to the switch near the front hall and Evelyn leaned close to Jamie and lowered her voice to a whisper. “Let’s talk about this when we get home.”
They locked the doors and Jamie made a portal back to the Callahan’s living room. As soon as they had all stepped through, Sammi rushed up the stairs to see Lisa and Larry before they left for their foster parenting class.
Once Sammi was out of earshot, Jamie said, “What’s the word on Miss Duffy?”
“Well....” Rachel glanced at Evelyn before answering. “She’s really good with the kids. They love her, and she’s a terrific artist. And this afternoon, Mom and I showed her some of our reading workbooks, and she seemed okay with them.”
“So,” Jamie said, “is she going to be able to cut it or not?”
Rachel glanced at her mother again and squeezed her mouth into a line. “Depends on your definition of cut it.”
“What’s the problem?”
“She’s really hard to talk to,” Evelyn said. “I wouldn’t say she’s evasive, but she’s hesitant to talk about herself...in the extreme.”
“Do you think she’s hiding something?” Jamie asked.
“I don’t know,” Rachel said. “Maybe she’s just not good with adults. But that could be a problem down the line, because we need the staff to get along well, or the school might be a dysfunctional mess.”
“Maybe she needs time to get to know us,” Jamie said.
“I hope so, because she certainly has the knack for connecting with the kids.”
“I’d like to talk to her again, if I can. Maybe tomorrow, if dad and I get the refrigerator installed at the stone house early enough.”
* * *
Carl was reading in bed that night with Rachel so that Jamie and Fred could be alone in the family room. Rachel didn’t seem to be reading much, though. Her book was laid across her lap and she sighed so often that Carl finally put down his novel and said, “Something bothering you, honey?”
“I don’t know,” she said with another deep sigh that meant yes, something important is on my mind.
Carl had been married long enough to know that he should listen to how she sighed, not to what she said. “Come on, tell me.”
“I was just thinking about things.”
“Anything in particular?”
“Well....” She rolled onto her side and faced him. “Do you ever wonder what it would be like if Jamie was just a normal teenager instead of an incredibly powerful sorcerer with two hundred years’ worth of someone else’s memories?”
Carl took a deep breath and started to say not really, but changed his mind. “Um, sometimes. But there’s nothing I can do about it, so I accept it. Why do you ask? Does it bother you now, after all this time?”
“Not exactly. But I’ve been thinking about how many peoples’ lives have been changed because he’s not normal. And I mean, changed drastically. Not just ours, but Fred’s family and Rollie’s...Bryce and Melanie are caught up in this craziness, too.” She nodded. “And Mrs. Tully and Aiven.”
“You should probably add Sammi and Nova to the list.”
Rachel turned onto her back and stared at the ceiling. “Things are really changing now that we’ve started the school. Not just for the kids in Rivershire, but especially for Miss Duffy and Mr. Winston. It’s a major commitment for them to work for us. Mr. Winston can always go back to his shop if we decide not to keep him, or if the school folds, but Miss Duffy could be out of a job.”
“Do you really think the school might fold?”
“Probably not. But you know how I like to worry about everything.” She rolled back to face him again and took his hand. “It’s just so...so scary, and amazing, too, sometimes. It’s like...it’s like we’ve hitched out train cars to a locomotive, and it’s picking up speed and going really, really fast, and we’re not even sure where it’s headed, but we’re going along anyway.”
“Is Jamie the locomotive?”
“I guess, though he thinks he’s a pawn in this game, too.”
“You’re mixing your metaphors.”
“You know what I mean.”
Carl stared at the book in his lap and took a deep breath. “Sometimes I try to imagine what it was like for Fred and Rollie, back when they were eight years old, when they saw Jamie floating off the ground in the backyard, and they found out that he’s a wizard.”
�
�I think that was the big turning point for everybody,” Rachel said. “All of this insanity started right then.”
“No, it started when we decided to buy a house from an older gentleman named Mr. Edwards, who was really Eddan the Sorcerer.”
“What would you have done if you knew then what we know now? Would you change anything?”
“Not if it meant that we never would’ve had Jamie.”
“Or didn’t have the Callahans and the Wilkins as our best friends.”
“Or didn’t know John Paul,” Carl said, “or Mrs. Tully and Aiven and Sammi, for that matter. Even Bryce and Melanie.”
Rachel squeezed his hand and smiled gently at him. “Our lives are so rich. Kinda makes me feel bad for normal families.”
Chapter 17
Fred’s living room was crowded on Tuesday morning with people waiting for Jamie to take them to Rivershire — Rachel, Evelyn, Aunt Connie, Sammi, and now Granddaddy Pete.
“Pete, how come Darla isn’t going with you this time?” Evelyn asked. “I thought she loved shopping in Rivershire.”
“She loves shopping anywhere, but I don’t have time to dillydally with her at every little store in the market. I got too much to do today.” He was carrying a brown leather briefcase in one hand and wore a light blue, long-sleeved dress shirt and dark slacks, immaculately pressed.
Rachel eyed his attire critically. “You’re going to get hot wearing that.”
“I’ll roll up my sleeves when it warms up. But I have business to attend to, and I need to look nice. I almost wore a suit, but Darla convinced me that this outfit was better.”
“Who are you going to see today, Mr. Pete?” Sammi asked.
“Lots of people, Sammi. I’m going to the inn, first, and Bann is going to meet me there so we can talk about the bathroom additions. Then I’m going to the stables to work out a deal with the owner so that our tourists will have access to a carriage while they’re in Rivershire. I’ll probably stop by the bank to work out a way for exchanging money for local currency. I imagine most of my friends’ wives are going to want to shop while they’re in town, and they can’t use credit cards, like they’re used to. I have a couple of other things I might see to, if I have time.”
Jamie shook his head. “Are you sure about this tourism scheme? It sounds really complicated to me.”
He grinned and patted Jamie on the shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. I’ve got it all covered. All you gotta do is help install the septic tank at the inn. You and Carl can do that, can’t you?”
“Yeah, I guess, if I use my magic.”
“Pete, you enjoy doing this, don’t you?” Evelyn said.
He winked at her and shrugged one shoulder. “I like challenges. Jamie’s got bigger plans for the school, and that takes more money, so I’m looking for ways to raise it. I could always try to play the stock market with the cash we got from Jamie’s gold, but that would be risky.”
“We can’t lose that money,” Jamie said. “Not now, especially. We just hired two teachers.”
“That’s good, right? That means things are going well at the school.” Pete nodded. “But I think this little tourism deal is going to bring in big money, fast, with almost no risk on our part. Just a little for the construction materials for the bathrooms and whatever Bann charges to do the remodeling.”
“Do you think we should install solar panels for electric lights at the inn?” Jamie asked.
“Just enough for lights in the bathrooms. Darla thinks we should leave the rest of the inn as quaint as possible. She thinks that’s going to be a big selling point.”
“I agree,” Aunt Connie said. “You don’t want to turn the inn into another Radisson or Hilton. You can stay in one of those here on Earth.”
Rachel frowned. “Does this mean we’re going to have strangers coming and going from our house? Jamie will have to make portals for them, and he won’t be here in the fall to do that once college starts. Plus, that’s going to mean more trucks will be delivering stuff, and my neighbors will get suspicious.”
“I already got a plan for that,” Pete said. “You know I still have my warehouse from my days in the medical supply business, and the last tenant just moved out. We can use that. Nobody will think twice about people and trucks going there.”
“Somebody’s going to have to be at the warehouse to receive the shipments,” Jamie said. “Are we going to have to hire somebody and get them to do the oath?”
“Nah. I’ll be there. I still have an office there, so it’ll be perfect. And if you make a permanent doorway for me, I can easily go to Rivershire whenever I need to take care of business.”
Jamie’s opened his mouth and stared at his grandfather. “You’ve really thought a lot about this, haven’t you?”
“You bet. You wanna do big things, you gotta think big. Look at what all you want to do.” He counted off on his fingers while he spoke. “You want to buy a couple of vans or a small bus for the school, right?”
Jamie nodded and Pete continued counting on his fingers. “And you want to build an all-purpose building, and maybe a cafeteria, too. That won’t be cheap.”
“We’re thinking about adding a library.”
“Yeah. So you have all this stuff you want to buy and build, but you only want to spend the money you’re making off the interest from the gold you got from the stone house. Now, we could eventually do all the things we just talked about, but it might take a few years, and I don’t think you want to wait.”
“I want to do everything right now.”
“Me too.” Pete patted him on the shoulder again.
“Can we go soon?” Sammi said, her face drawn down into a petulant frown. “This is boring.”
Jamie outlined a glowing doorway to the front of the school, and they all stepped through.
The sun was shining in Rivershire and the morning air was still cool. Pete looked around and inhaled deeply through his nose. “Ahhhh. Don’t you just love this place? It always smells so good and the scenery is beautiful.” He gestured with one hand at the farms in the distance.
“You don’t have to sell me on it,” Evelyn said. “I spend a lot of time here.”
He nodded approvingly, glanced around one more time and said, “Well, I’m off. Got places to go and people to see.” He strode away toward the town gates with his briefcase in his left hand, and he began to whistle.
Jamie called after him, “What are you doing about lunch? Do you have any of the local money?”
Pete glanced over his shoulder and patted one of his pants pockets. “Still got some of your coins from last time.”
“Okay. Come back to the school when you’re done, and you can walk with Mom and everybody to the stone house. I’ll be there with Dad working on the refrigerator.”
Pete held up one thumb and walked away, resuming his whistling. It sounded vaguely like a Sousa march.
“He sure looks happy,” Sammi said.
“He is,” Rachel said. “I don’t think he likes being retired.”
“Darla told me that Pete regrets selling his medical supply business,” Aunt Connie said. “He misses the challenge of being a businessman.”
“A lot of people are defined by their careers,” Evelyn said. “It becomes what they are, as a person. So when they retire, they feel like there’s a big hole in their lives, especially men.”
“It’s a good thing he’s doing all of this. I don’t think we could pull all this off without him.” Jamie nodded and sighed. “Well, I gotta go to work. I’ll see you at the stone house later.” He made a doorway, stepped through it, and it winked out.
“Why are we walking to the stone house after school?” Sammie said. “Why can’t we ride in the carriage with Aiven?”
“It’s not that far, and there are too many of us,” Evelyn said. “We won’t all fit.”
Rachel pulled the key to the lock from her pocket and said, “Besides, Aiven is giving Brinna a ride. She wants to see Fred and Melanie while they�
�re here today, so she’s closing her shop a little early and Aiven is going to pick her up.
“Nova’s gonna be there, too,” Sammi said.
“Yes, and I’m sure you can’t wait to see her.” Rachel pulled the door open and said, “Now, let’s go inside and get this place ready.”
* * *
Duane Gundy held the letter from the power company closer so that he could read it in the dim light. Though the sun was still shining, it was dark inside his house with the electricity turned off. Damn. It does say they’d disconnect it today. They must’ve done it while I was off buying cigarettes.
He crumpled the notice into a ball and hurled it across the room, put his hands on his hips and scowled. Brenda’s gonna have a fit when she finds out.
As if on cue, a car door slammed outside, and he looked through the front window to see his wife walking toward the house. Damn damn damn! He steeled himself for the onslaught of nagging that he knew was coming.
Brenda opened the door and stepped inside. “Why’s it so dark in here?” She flipped the switch on the wall beside her, repeatedly. “What’s wrong with the light, Duane? Is the bulb burned out?”
“No.”
“Is the lamp broken?”
“No.”
“Then what’s wrong with it?”
He hesitated for a moment before answering, trying to think of a clever lie, but realized he had to tell her the truth. “Power’s cut off.”
“Huh? Why?”
He gritted his teeth and took a deep breath through his nose.
“Duane?”
“’Cause I didn’t pay the bill, that’s why.”
Her voice rose nearly an octave, sharp and aggravating. “Why not?”
He grunted to himself and closed his eyes for a moment. Ihate it when she does that. “’Cause I didn’t have enough money. I made the car payments and other stuff, but I ran out before I got to the electric bill. I thought we had a few more days ’fore they’d cut it off.”
“Why didn’t we have enough money? We usually do.”
“I ran low this month. I tried to put it on our credit card, but it’s maxed out.”
She set her purse on the coffee table. “How can that be?”