That got through. Mother let go of the pilot. He slowly shook his head, trying to reorient himself. Relief shot through Sarah.
This is the last time I flew with them.
The realization came sudden and she tried to look down, to see herself as the memory returned, but she couldn’t move. She recalled this day like a memory even as she sat there. This was the day she’d begun to wonder if dark matter really wanted the energy or essence it demanded. Did it actually consume a decade or two of a man’s life, or a woman’s youth? Or did it want to detach a witch’s soul by forcing her to make such offers? Maybe it was both. Lily and her mother had gone from hurting animals to people in the bat of an eye.
Somehow the plane landed. Somehow Sarah now sat inside the little terminal of the private airport, still without a body. Aunt Lily and Mother sat beside her, watching her with guilty eyes and apologizing.
“It’s so hard to tell anymore.”
“Sometimes we lose ourselves.”
“That’s why we need you to remind us.”
They waited for an answer. Sarah couldn’t reply. They were gone and she was at home with her body again. It worked fine.
SARAH APPLIED FINISHING touches to her face; a bit of eyeliner made ice-blue eyes pop against black lashes. She ignored the doorbell echoing up the stairs. Someone must have come early. Tonight the entire coven would gather. The autumnal equinox was a big deal for some. The Archers weren’t particularly devoted, or into ceremony. Or company much, anymore.
Sarah hoped no one would comment on Aunt Lily’s looks.
She grabbed a tissue and wiped the makeup off.
No reason to upset her. Besides, who cares?
From downstairs came the cackle of mother’s laughter and Sarah glanced at the clock. She slipped into her heels and hurried downstairs.
Gray rushed past, her arms loaded with linens for the dining room. Sarah barely glanced at the ghost of a woman. Gray cleaned the house and cooked, and rarely said a word. Like the rest of her family, Sarah often forgot she was there.
Sarah headed for the kitchen to see if any food was ready. Before she got to the archway, Gray stepped in front of her and Sarah nearly plowed into her. Their eyes met, and for a moment Sarah wondered if she’d ever looked at Gray’s face before. She had ruddy, windburn cheeks and droopy brown eyes. The woman swallowed and nervously chewed her lip.
“What’s wrong?” Sarah asked.
Frightened eyes stared meaningfully back at her before glancing in the direction of the doorway. Sarah could hear a faint childish giggle, her mother murmuring, and the rustling of Aunt Lily’s silk skirts. Slinky dresses and bare midriffs had given way to old-fashioned gowns and occasional cloaks. They hid the cost of a lifetime of casting.
“Is that your Halloween costume?” a little girl’s voice asked. “I’m going to be Batman. Daddy thinks I should be Catwoman, but I’m going to be Batman anyway.”
Sarah moved past Gray and the large bureau near the entryway and stopped. Mother knelt beside a little girl, a scrawny arm around her shoulders as if hugging her. An expression of wicked glee made her look almost as bad as Aunt Lily. Lily stood blocking the open door, a fake smile plastered on her skeletal face. Thick makeup and perfect hair did nothing to hide the monster inside. She moved forward until her gown touched the child, and reached a bony hand toward her. Blood-red fingernails glistened.
“Do you want to fly, little one? Like Batman?”
“Batman doesn’t fly!” said the girl. “But if I sell five hundred dollars in candy and wrapping paper, I can get his mask!”
“I can make you fly!” said Aunt Lily, clearly not listening to the child.
Sarah saw dark matter oozing from her mother’s arm and Aunt Lily’s hand, drifting over the little girl. Perspiration beaded across the child’s unwrinkled forehead and her fine skin grew paler by the second. The trusting smile didn’t waver.
“What’s going on?” asked Sarah, stepping into view. “Are you selling something for Batman?”
The smile grew wider, and the girl waved a form with one hand and a thin glossy brochure with the other. “No, silly! For school! But I can win a real Batman mask if I sell enough!”
“We’ll take it all,” said Aunt Lily, running chicken bone fingers through dark waves of thick hair. “Everything!”
The little girl stiffened and her eyes widened. “For reals? Goody!” she squealed, and jumped up and down, fading right before Sarah’s eyes.
“She reminds me of you!” said Mother, squeezing the girl closer, making motions like air kisses with her lips.
Sarah knew she was consuming her, and her stomach dropped. She barely heard Aunt Lily’s murmurs of agreement.
Sarah tried to keep her voice calm. “Mother, go get your pocketbook. You’re going to need it if you’re going to buy enough for her to win a Batman mask! Aunt Lily, will you nab mine, too, when you go upstairs to get yours?” Sarah needed only seconds alone to send the kid safely packing.
They saw right through her. Both the women frowned as the girl looked up at them expectantly.
“Grab my checkbook, Sarah,” Mother said. “It’s in the desk right there.”
Lily beamed at her sister.
“My tummy hurts,” said the little girl.
“No, it doesn’t,” said Aunt Lily.
“No, it doesn’t,” echoed the girl, but her papers fluttered to the floor as she hunched over and clutched at her stomach.
“She’s a neighbor!” said Sarah. “Where are her parents?”
Both women leered. Lily answered, “Our clever girl snuck out.”
“Gonna. Surprise. Daddy,” the child whimpered, her pallor turning quickly from white to grey. Mother supported her as her legs gave out.
“No,” said Sarah. “Stop it. You’re really hurting her!”
The little girl’s eyes went wide, locking on Sarah’s with the first trace of fear in them.
“You stop it, Daughter!” said Mother. Her lips reached the girl’s cheek like a kiss to whisper, “We’re not hurting you. We’re your friends.”
The child smiled faintly, a hand grasping Aunt Lily’s gown. “Um, kay.” Her head rolled loosely on her neck, dropping forward.
“I said no!” Sarah stepped forward and wrapped her arms around the limp girl, wresting her from them. She backed away, holding the girl to her.
Both women turned on Sarah, shoving her and the little girl against the wall with a flick of their wrists. “Who do you think you are? Who do you think provides for your needs? We do! We always have! Why do you think we need so much?” said Mother.
Aunt Lily growled, reaching for the girl. “Let go of her!”
“Gray! Call the police!”
Both women laughed. Sarah held the limp child tightly, trying to protect her from their reaching hands. For a moment they grappled; Lily attempting to pry Sarah’s hands loose and mother tugging on the girl. Something changed though, and they both stopped fighting Sarah at the same instant. For a second Sarah thought her mother had regained some sense. Her lips pressed against Sarah’s cheek as though to offer a token of gratitude. Then she noticed Lily’s mortified expression.
“Sissy, no,” said Aunt Lily. “She’s your daughter.”
Mother turned her head to respond, her fingers now running down Sarah’s cheek. “Dark matter flows through her. It’s intoxicating. Taste.”
Lily licked her lips.
Despair ripped through Sarah’s heart, taking her breath, and she squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t want to see what they’d become, and her strangled words came out with angry sobs. “Go ahead then, both of you, if this is what you’ve become! If you’re going to kill children, you might as well have your own too! I won’t fight! You don’t have to waste a cast on me!”
“Open your eyes,” said a man’s voice. “Sarah, I know you can hear me. Open your eyes. Kathleen is going to be okay, don’t cry. Do you hear me, Sarah? It’s Paul.”
Sarah’s body disappeared a
gain, along with her mother, Aunt Lily and the little girl.
It took time for Sarah to know anything. It took time to really feel the pain, to feel dark matter again gnawing on her blackened bones as she floated in lava. Between those times she disappeared without a conscious thought. Nothing was the bearable part. Everything else tried to kill her, searing heat through her bones and icy sharp pain into her stomach. The memory of Paul’s disappointed dark eyes scorched her. Henry’s didn’t, but they were focused on someone else. Somehow that was worse. Sarah didn’t struggle as she vanished again.
Dark matter roosted inside Sarah, so much she thought the bed would collapse from the sheer weight of it. Where am I? She tried to remember what had happened. Memories came with a wave of remorse. She’d cast against Kathleen. Big time.
Big time? You tried to kill her.
No, she argued with herself. I never meant to kill her. Not for a second.
You cast poison. You wanted to annihilate her.
No. Not really. How often do people say drop dead without really meaning it? I meant it like that.
Lie to yourself if it helps.
Sarah tried to move but couldn’t. She couldn’t feel her body, yet the mass of the planet seemed to weigh her down. Her eyes wouldn’t open. She wasn’t certain how they functioned anymore.
“No change?” an unfamiliar voice asked.
Sarah tried to locate her mouth to answer. All lines were down.
“None.” Paul’s voice sounded close by.
“Hmph,” said the other one. An older woman with a wicked South Boston accent, all misplaced R’s and jumbled words. “Yanno yaneed to take care of ya-self too, Mr. Longfella. Go home, get some sleep. Maybe take a shower.” She pronounced it sh-ow-wah.
“I will, after she wakes up.”
“Sometimes it takes a while. Have pity on the nursing staff, or at least me. If ya don’t care that we have to smell ya, consider that it’s entirely possible that Ms. Archa can smell ya.” Possible came out par-sable.
“Do you think so, Doctor Shaw?” Paul sounded hopeful. If Sarah could have rolled her eyes, she would have.
“It’s absolutely par-sable.”
The doctor was lying. At least Sarah thought so. She couldn’t smell a thing. She couldn’t figure out where her nose was or how she was breathing. A rhythmic hissing and beeping in the background offered a horrible clue that she chose to ignore.
“Is it true that the longer she’s in the coma, the more unlikely it is that she’ll come out of it?”
“You’re not getting on the Google, are you? Stay off the Google. Ms. Archa will do what Ms. Archa does. I see some amazing grace in my practice. We’re going to get some of that for your friend here.”
“Two weeks is a long time though, isn’t it?”
“Depends on what you’re talking about. I can tell ya that two weeks is too long to go without a shower. You’re in a hospital. We keep things sanitary. Your underthings must have disintegrated by now.”
Sarah could hear Paul shift uncomfortably in his chair. She would have smiled if she could have found her mouth controls. The doctor was embarrassing him.
The squeak and rattle of a metal tray table with wheels scraping across the floor followed the shuffling of many feet. More people must have entered the room.
“We need to swap out some of these tubes. Are you staying again?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe I’ll have you do it then. We could leave this stuff here and go take care of another patient who has visitors that bathe regularly.”
There was a clacking sound as the bedrails dropped and a low wup-wup as blankets were spread. Someone hummed low in their throat, a tune Sarah recognized from church. Dark matter writhed inside her, clawing in protest, and Sarah dropped into a fiery inferno again.
“THERE ONCE WAS a dude from Pawtucket who caught some kelp in a bucket. It tasted like crap, so he threw it all back, and ordered some pizza saying fuck it. That, in a nutshell, is why I’m overweight, Sarah. Just in case you were wondering.”
Mindy Millerton!
“I would have brought flowers, but you let the last bunch die. Like you couldn’t get your lazy ass up and water them? That’s inconsiderate. I spent almost ten dollars on those. Well, not quite ten. I took up a collection at work so technically I made close to a hundred dollars profit. Maybe I will send you some more. At least as long as people keep falling for it—I mean, contributing. You’re boring the fuck out of me. Not as much as when you talk, but close. Give me that remote.”
A moment later the television clicked on. Sarah listened to an entire episode of Survivor before it abruptly shut off.
“I thought you were going to keep her company!” Paul sounded angry. “You said you’d talk to her the whole time I was gone!”
“I did, but then she wanted to watch some TV.”
“She said something?!”
“I could sense it,” Mindy said. “You do know she’s faking. I could see her eyes moving under her eyelids.”
“Even when she’s herself, Sarah doesn’t watch TV,” Paul said, his impatience obvious.
“She could have said.”
“You’re not funny, please go. I’ll find someone else to stay with her next time I have to leave.”
“Avery Gross would do it. He’d probably feel her up though, if you left him alone. He’s a total perv I heard. Hey, are you the one he punched in the face?”
“No. That was my brother.”
“He’s still bragging about it at work, like every day. Says you were attacking Sarah in her car and he rescued her and kicked your ass.”
“My brother and Sarah were making out in her car. Avery jumped inside uninvited and sucker punched Henry in the face. Once, I think.”
“I can’t believe you let him get even one punch in. He’s kind of a pussy.”
“He punched my brother, not me!” Paul said in exasperation.
“Why were you attacking Sarah in her car anyway? I’m pretty sure she puts out fairly easy.”
“Mindy, I thought you were her friend.”
“She wants more, but I’m really not into her like that. I mean look at her. She just lays there. That doesn’t do it for me. I’m guessing it does for you though.”
“Maybe you should go,” Paul said without humor.
Mindy heaved to her feet. Sarah heard something creak like she’d grabbed onto the bed to pull herself to stand. “Yeah, I’ve got to get up early tomorrow anyway. Hey, can you think of anything that rhymes with Crapstone?”
“What?”
“Crapstone. It’s a town in England. I’m working on a poem for Sarah, but all I can come up with is twat-bone. Not only does that not really rhyme, I don’t even know if a twat-bone is a thing. I think I invented it. In my head, I mean. I don’t know. Maybe we could ask one of the doctors about it. Hey, whoa, whoa, mister-mister.”
Sarah had a distinct impression Paul had taken hold of Mindy to drag her out of the room.
“Let’s not get all handsy,” Mindy insisted. “I hardly know you. Is this why Avery punched you? You’re making me highly uncomfortable. I could get into it though, now that you smell better.”
“Mindy, I can’t tell if you’re joking around or if you’re being serious.”
“That’s probably why Sarah’s dating your brother.”
“Goodnight, Mindy.”
“Hey, you’re going to throw me out now that we’re getting to second base? You should see me slide into home.”
Sarah heard the door shut, and thought Paul stood there for a moment holding it closed. She assumed Mindy had left when he chuckled and crossed the floor. Although she couldn’t feel it, Sarah heard Paul lean over her and adjust blankets.
“You know she claims to be your best friend. I don’t know whether to believe her hands-down, or call security when she shows up.”
Believe her. The thought warmed Sarah. Dark matter didn’t like it. As the feeling waned, searing heat blasted her away from c
onsciousness once more.
“MOM, THIS IS awk-weird. Are you sure she’s alive?”
Sarah didn’t recognize the young voice.
“Of course I’m sure.”
That voice she did recognize. Jackie Hamilton from Human Resources. What on earth is she doing here?
The flush of a toilet sounded from nearby, followed by the scrape of a door opening.
“Hello!” Paul sounded surprised.
“Hello, I’m Jackie Hamilton from Mass Power and Light.” Sarah could almost see them shaking hands, extra firm and brief, the way Jackie rolled. “This is my daughter Mary Elizabeth. We just stopped by for a moment to pay our—visit.”
“It’s good of you to come. I’m Paul Revere Longfellow.”
Mary Elizabeth snickered and Sarah wondered not for the first time why Paul didn’t drop his middle name when introducing himself. Who does that?
“Yes, I recognize you,” said Jackie.
“From the parking lot? No. That was my brother, Henry. We’re twins.”
“What’s his middle name?” Mary Elizabeth asked.
“You probably guessed it,” Paul said, a smile evident in his voice. “Wadsworth.”
“Does Henry Wadsworth Longfellow write poetry?” giggled the girl.
“Mary Elizabeth,” Jackie admonished her. “You and your brother don’t talk like you’re from here.”
“We’re not, although we both went to college up here.”
“You did? Where?” asked Jackie, incredulous northern superiority in every syllable.
“Henry went to Harvard, and I went to Bowdoin up in—”
“Really,” interrupted Jackie, “your brother went to Harvard? Maybe it’s not so tough to get into with your last name.”
Sarah just knew Jackie winked as she said that.
“My mom wants me to go to Harvard,” explained Mary Elizabeth. “But it’s not looking good.”
“How’s our patient?” asked Jackie, changing the subject.
For a moment Paul didn’t answer. When he did, his voice sounded determined. “Fine. Sarah will be fine. She only needs time.”
Bitch Witch Page 15