Residual Magic

by J J Andrews

  “I know of that. It’s one of the most expensive wines in the world. Recovered from a shipwreck and once destined for the czar of Russia. My father had an extensive wine cellar. Most of the time, I just wanted something I could sit back and enjoy. You know, a sweet red for Netflix and chill.”

  Cora purred. “I have Netflix. Look, I don’t have many girlfriends. And I know you and I have some history—with Tom and all that fuss on Hell Night—but let’s kick off our shoes, watch a movie, eat something yummy, and drink my bottle of $200,000 wine. I can’t think of another person I’d rather crack that seal with than you.”

  “No offense, but you are on the wrong side of the law…”

  “Really? All my permits are in order and one story below is the finest non-sexual dungeon in the state. If you’d like, we can Netflix and chill while trussed up like Thanksgiving turkeys. It’s really quite freeing. Once you quit struggling and submit to the bite of the rope and stinging in your hands and feet as they fall asleep from lack of blood flow…the all-encompassing sensation that you are truly—and perhaps for the first time—in total control, takes over.”

  “Thank you, no. I mean…I could use some girl time. But I don’t want to engage in rope play.”

  “The TV is in the den. A big comfy sofa and ‘50s-style TV trays. What would you like to eat? I’ll either have my cook whip something up or order in.”

  “Why are you being so nice?”

  “Always an officer of the law, hmm? Always on guard. Always wondering when the other shoe is going to drop. Trust me, Aliyah, nothing is going to happen that you don’t want. That includes choice of movie.”

  “What goes with shipwreck wine?” Ali asked. “A pirate movie?”

  “Sure. The food should match the vintage, don’t you think?”

  Ali laughed. “It shouldn’t be fast food served on silver, that’s for sure.”

  “I think I could go for wagyu beef sliders, medium rare on brioche buns, a Caesar salad with a little anchovy in the dressing, and a delicate dessert. Chocolate, of course.”

  “Can I take off my shoes?” Ali asked, slipping back onto the sofa.

  “Honey, in this place you can wear nothing, and no one would blink an eye. Let me get our food ordered.” Cora picked up her cell phone, and speaking perfect French, ordered her lunch.

  “You speak French?”

  “And about eight other languages. It helps in my profession to be multi-lingual.”

  A few moments later, a sommelier strolled into the den with the bottle of shipwrecked wine. “Madam,” he said, offering it to Corazon.

  “Thanks, Levi. Would you please open it? Do we have to let wine that sat on the bottom of the ocean breathe before drinking it?”

  The sommelier chuckled. “At over $200,000 per bottle, I would hate to waste the perfume. Drink it like it’s your last day on Earth.”

  “Oh, I like this guy,” Ali said.

  He opened the bottle and then poured two glasses. “Enjoy, ladies.”

  Corazon passed Ali a cut-crystal wineglass.

  “I can smell the black powder. And the graham crackers. It’s not bad at all.” Ali took a sip. “Oh, and I can taste the salt. This is the most orgasmic wine I’ve ever…this is better than sex.”

  Corazon laughed. “I don’t know about that. I know we’ve both been with Tommy and he has a lot to offer a woman.”

  “Yes, he does. But the relations I had with him were coerced by whatever gaseous aphrodisiac you released onto Old Town. I would have never slept with him otherwise. He’s my partner. It’s not done.”

  “But you’re not angry about it.” It was more of a comment than a question.

  “No.”

  Cora stretched her long arms out before her, then brought them in to hug herself. “When he is inside me, filling me, moving against me…I could come just sitting here thinking about it.”

  Ali chuckled. “Try being on top? It was the single-most startling act of intercourse I’ve ever experienced. Tom…is responsive.”

  “Let’s speak plainly, shall we? Officer Tom Wolfson has a thick cock. And he knows what to do with his tongue. Being with him is nearly a religious experience.” Cora took a sip of her wine.

  “I rather enjoyed it when we were mashing in my truck, uniforms on, duty belts slamming together as we deep kissed and tried to feel each other up over the top of Kevlar vests with steel plate.”

  “Police work at its best.”

  “I shouldn’t even be telling you this. I don’t like to think about it. There’s this thing Tom and I have discussed. Partners are supposed to have your back, not have you on your back.”

  “He broke it off with me,” Cora said. “I may pout for days.”

  “Yeah. He got a promotion. And he’s being watched pretty closely. Even though everyone from the FBI admits there’s no known cause for Hell Night, a few of the brass think he’s nuts.”

  “I had no idea it would all go so far. I am sorry for much of it. I lost my best friend. She kind of held things together for me so I didn’t go too far off the map. All I have left is a bone fragment and some twisted metal.”

  “Not much to see of your old place. The building was razed. And no offence to her memory, but Mary was kind of a bitch, Cora. At least to me.”

  “You are the descendant of the hangman who put the noose around her neck. She stayed alive for over four hundred years to exact her vengeance. Did she get it?”

  “And then some.”

  “More wine?” Cora asked.

  Ali held out her glass. Her phone chirped. She looked at it and sighed. “It’s Tom.”

  “Well, answer him. It’s all right.”

  Getting out in a.m.

  Ali punched the squirrel icon and hit send. It was the A-OK symbol they used. “He’s being released in the morning.”

  “Oh, good news. Let’s toast to his recovery, shall we?”

  They drank.

  They drank the bottle in its entirety, then opened another rare and expensive one. The food arrived and was served by an apron-wearing matronly type.

  “I’m too fucking drunk,” Ali said. She wiped her chin after biting into a slider. “Christ, this is good.”

  “Yep. Only the best. Should I start the movie now or are we just going to get completely inebriated?”

  “Too late, Cora. Too late. I’m surprised I’m letting my guard down at all. Did you put a spell on me?”

  Corazon laughed. “Maybe a little one.”

  “What do you want from me? I’m drunk enough to divulge secrets, or even kiss you.”

  Corazon leaned to her right and topped Ali. She pressed her lips to hers. Ali didn’t fight it. She tasted the wine and sweet bun and rich meat on Corazon’s tongue. She didn’t shy away when Corazon pulled her in tighter, straddling her.

  Ali broke away for a moment. “Are we going to make out?”

  “Yeah. Let’s.”

  “Are we going to fuck?” Ali asked.

  “That’s up to you.” Cora buried her kisses along Ali’s throat and yanked back the simple T-shirt Ali wore to kiss her breastbone and shoulder.

  Ali raised her hips and tugged on her yoga pants. Cora helped her remove them.

  Chapter Eight

  Ali snapped out of the shipwreck wine haze behind the wheel. She had already crossed the bridge into Old Town. The station house was just ahead. She pulled over and put her truck into Park. What the fuck just happened? She tapped her cell phone to check the time. An entire day had passed. I lost time. Just like an alien abductee. I drove into the city. I went to McPherson’s place. Told her about Tom. And I have no idea why I did that. I drank, I ate, and dear God, I had sex with her. I wonder if she could tell it was my first female experience. It doesn’t matter, really. I should not have succumbed to her charms. I’m just putting this out there, universe. Was the wine cursed? I mean it did come from a shipwreck. Am I victim to her wily powers again? She rested her head against the steering wheel. What have I done?


  A text jarred her from her remorse.

  Just discharged. Do I call Uber or are you coming? I texted you last night when you didn’t return with my milkshake. Meet up with a hot date?

  She returned Tom’s text. On my way.

  It’s Thursday. It’s Thursday. I have Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday off. I drove to the city around noon on Wednesday, and it’s almost noon on Thursday. I am missing the hours between kissing Corazon and now. What happened? She shook her head. I know what happened. Do I tell Tommy?

  Tom had been wheeled to the front of the hospital, where he appeared to be enjoying the sun.

  “Hey, you. Want a ride?” She left her truck idling and helped Tom in. “Do you need me to buckle you in or anything?”

  “Actually, yes. I am sore as fuck.”

  Ali pulled the seatbelt around him and leaned over to fasten it.

  “Up to a week off, depending upon how I feel. Then back to the glory of patrol.”

  “Smith has been fine—but I miss working with you, Tom. It will be nice to have you by my side again.”

  “Take the scenic route home, huh? Oh, and can I stay at your place for a few days? I’m not entirely steady yet.”

  “I work Saturday.”

  “That means we have today and tomorrow. Just give me a blanket and the sofa—and the remote.” Tom chuckled. “I should be right as rain in a couple of days. Really.”

  “All right. What do you want to see? The shores of the Bez? The latest burned-out building? Oh, I know…the new meth house.”

  “Anywhere but the church.”

  “Killer demon pig statues,” Ali replied.

  “They are the stuff from which bad dreams hail.”

  She wasn’t sure why she chose the path out of the parking lot that took her past the berm hiding the hospital waste—and tunnel entrance. She made something up. “I just want to make sure the detectives locked the gate.”

  “Yeah, like they’re so fucking reckless. Come on, Ali. What’s your gut telling you?”

  “My gut is the last of my worries right now.” I’m not going to tell him.

  “Corazon gave me a call last night.”

  He knows. “Oh?”

  “She says you two had a girl’s night. Expensive wine, food, a movie. What did you watch?”

  “A pirate movie.”

  “I wasn’t aware that you two are on social terms. Last time you were together she was in hex-mode and had you literally under her spell.”

  Ali swallowed hard. “I don’t know why I went. I drove across the bridge and just ended up there.”

  “That’s usually what happens to me. It’s almost like she’s ice cream on a hot day. I rush to get to her, then deal with the belly ache later.”

  Idling to allow for cross traffic, Ali came clean. “I drank wine obtained from a shipwreck with her. It was 200k per bottle. We ate some food that probably cost more than I make in a week. Then she kissed me.”

  “I would have enjoyed watching that.”

  Ali didn’t reply.

  Tom touched her leg. “Ali. What happened?”

  “I’m pretty sure I slept with her.”

  “She has a way of making folks do that. I have driven up to her door dozens of time just to break it off, and we ended up having sex. She’s an aphrodisiac unto herself.”

  “I’ve never been bi-curious.”

  “She’s up to something. She was angry at me when last I darkened her doorstep. Then I became ill. Ill and off the job. She knows the job is important to me.”

  “We spoke a little about Hell Night. I don’t recall everything.”

  “The memories will return.”

  “Why do I feel like it might be happening again, Tom?” Ali pulled the car in a sharp right and headed toward the berm. “It’s like we haven’t yet awakened. Like we’re still bespelled. Mind-controlling gas, my ass. It’s her.” Ali clutched her steering wheel hard.

  “We can fight her, together. I’m not going back there. My sergeant’s stripes depend upon it.”

  Ali squeezed his hand. “I do recall one thing, Tommy.”

  “What’s that?”

  “She said you are a real-life boy.”

  Tom laughed. “Oh, really? I have always considered myself real, though, and I say this completely suspending disbelief, I am born of a powerful spell to be a human prison for Loki.”

  “No. You were real. From the get-go. She took a cop and hexed him to punish Loki. Are your memories returning? She said they would.”

  * * * *

  Ali retrieved a few things from Tom’s apartment to make him more comfortable in hers, then like a good nurse, made him lunch. “Don’t get used to this. I don’t like houseguests, nor do I like cooking for others.” She picked up his hospital bag. “Your personal effects save for your badge and gun. Those are locked up.” She paused, picking out a tattered paperback from the plastic drawstring bag. “I thought you got rid of this.” She held up a dogeared copy of the serialization of the movie Beneath the Planet of the Apes.

  “That’s odd,” Tom replied.

  Ali thumbed through the book. “Its pages are torn and stained. Looks like someone chewed the corners off.”

  “I could have picked it up anywhere.”

  “Yeah, but I took your uniform and belt with me when you were admitted. You don’t recall the significance of this book?”

  “I do not.”

  “Until Hell Night you had it with you all the time. In your war bag or side pants pocket. Always. It was strange.”

  “I reveal my inmost self unto my god. Yes, I’m teasing. I picked the book up in the visitor’s lounge at the hospital. I think it was Loki’s way of trying to get me to recognize his presence the first time ‘round. I did a great job ignoring him too. Until I couldn’t.”

  Ali sat on the sofa next to Tom. “Don’t make me crazy, Tom. I’m already fighting a migraine. It just shouldn’t be this crazy all the time.”

  “We are policing dead center of a powerful magical vortex.” He rubbed his index finger against his thumb and made sparks. “Crazy is our thing.”

  Ali rubbed hers together and touched her sparking fingertips to Tom’s. The sparks arched. “We live in a weird place, man.”

  He wrapped his fingers around hers. “Corazon notwithstanding, it’s all you and me. We are magically fucked-up cops, walking a beat in Krazy Town, and we need to stick together. Moreover, both of us need to stay away from dens of iniquity in the city.”

  Ali nodded. “We’re not magic. I mean, not really. Fucked up, maybe. That sticky magic—it was done to us—it’s not inherently in us.” She squeezed Tom’s hand. Like electricity leaping between poles, the residual magic in their palms hummed. I have a connection with you that goes beyond partners. Beyond friends. Beyond the relations of men and women. We are like the current flowing between our palms. Alive with the promise of power. If harnessed. “I just want to do my job. With you as my partner. Right now, I am flummoxed by the potentiality that we have a serial killer in Old Town.”

  “And until then…it’s you and me. No strings attached.”

  Ali nodded. “I’d like that.”

  * * * *

  She slept in Thursday to all of six in the morning. The sun hadn’t risen yet. Tom snored softly on the sofa. She pulled her hair back and went for a run. Very little traffic filled the streets of Krazy Town as she jogged. The crisp air acted like coffee on her system as the moon waded through the clouds. She wanted to concentrate on foot to pavement. On her heartbeat. On anything but the man sleeping on her sofa. Or his ex-girlfriend. Or Hell Night. But that was what filled her mind with each footfall. Maybe it was her cop’s instinct, but she turned down an alley in which she’d made good arrests—ones that stuck. Every arrest began with a mental encyclopedia of code. Which section of the Washington Administrative Code applied? Which city code? How deep was the level of asshole and asshattery? Was it worth the paperwork? Tom was rubbing off on her. When she was a rookie, she’d been by-the
-book. Now, she’d be just as likely to push a baggie or weed into the sewer and give a warning instead of a citation. That was Tom’s thing. He didn’t like busting folks for stupid shit. He even let working girls off the hook sometimes. He said he knew the ones who were just trying to make milk money and the ones who were hooking for drugs.

  The alley had a faint sickly sweet odor. Somewhere, several stories up in the tenement, folks were cooking meth. She hadn’t remembered her cell phone. I’ll call it in from the cafe. Hopefully, they won’t blow up the building before then. She reached the end of the alley and doubled back. The sun had finally risen, and a single stream of light kissed the asphalt. In its glow, a very suspect black oil slick rested in her path. She stopped. All stop. Dead stop. Hell Night had made her jaded to anything even remotely sinister-looking. She half expected a malevolent beast to rise from the depths of hell and attack her.

  After a few moments, she made a judgement call. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. It is just an oil slick and PTSD is making me irrational. The beam of sun had moved atop it. The myriad of colors that made black black gleamed. She approached it and stood next to it. She passed her hand between it and the sunlight. A perfect shadow of her hand appeared atop the slick.

  As if she were high or hallucinating, the outline of her hand took on a far more malignant form. A silhouette she recalled in her nightmares. One she thought was long gone, burned to ashes in flames hotter than the blue ones of a chemical reaction. Flames hot enough to turn steel girders to ash. Unable to pull in her hand, she whispered, “Mary.” The image released her hand and dissipated in the sunlight.

  Ali ran to the café a few blocks away. “Hey, Diane…can I use your phone? I left my cell at home.”

  The waitress glanced at the old-style princess phone on the wall behind the calendar. Ali lifted the hinged counter and dialed 9-1-1. “This is Officer Najarah, badge number 540. I was jogging along Filmore and turned into the alley between the Savoy and the old Times building on my 72 off. I smelled a meth cook. Probably several stories up in the Savoy. I counted nine floors until a window was open.”