She tore the bag up. Sweat poured off her body. Her head felt clear, and she saw everything in vivid color.
Oh, no—
The anger was coming back. A natural reaction; you can’t box with a smile on your face.
Her skin glowed blue. She heard a chorus of strange music coming from all around her.
“Control it, Maria,” she said. “Control it, or you’re going to let everyone in this place know you’re not normal.”
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes.
“Hello,” a strange voice said.
Maria jumped and swung out with her right fist. The air whistled.
“Can’t really hit a poltergeist,” the voice said.
“Oh,” Maria said, getting control of herself. God, if anyone looked into the aerobic room, they would’ve seen Maria miss the bag by a solid three feet. Talk about crazy.
Moving closer and closer to Gramps’s level of kookiness each day, she thought.
The dead boy, Duke, stood in front of the boxing bag. Maria walked over to the stereo and turned the music down, then turned to Duke and said, “Well, you’re here again, so I guess you aren’t here with good news.”
Duke frowned slightly. The blood on his face, which dribbled perpetually from the corners of his mouth, was still there. He looked as dead as he had the previous night.
“Do you have the music box?”
Maria nodded. She went over to her gym bag and pulled the box out.
Duke began to smile.
“You okay? I’ve never seen you smile before,” Maria said.
Duke’s arm reached out like he was going to brush the intricate carvings on the wood. As he did, his hand passed through it instead, and his smile disappeared.
“Ah, so many grand memories of that box,” he said.
Maria felt a sudden sadness overtake her; one that could only be fixed by beating the crap out of the boxing bags.
“Do you want me to play the music?”
Duke smiled again. He looked longingly at the box, and words played on his lips. Maria thought he meant to say ‘Yes,’ but he shook his head.
“No, we have business to attend to.” The ghostly figure stood straight up. He was a soldier through and through, even in death.
“Okay, hit me,” Maria said.
“The villagers await you, Maria.”
“Yes, I know. I’m trying. And, yeah, I’m boxing right now instead of figuring this out, but that’s a necessity.”
“I understand. You don’t want to go into battle unprepared,” Duke said. “But time is short. Malakai comes for you.”
“Yeah, I saw the marks he left on the door last night,” Maria said.
Duke cocked his head. “It was him? You’re sure of it?”
“I think so,” Maria answered.
“Then our time is even shorter. He’s more powerful than I originally thought.”
Maria paced. “What do you mean?”
“If he’s made a move, he knows for sure. But how he knows, I don’t—”
Realization hit Maria as hard as she had been hitting the punching bags.
“The lights,” Maria said, looking around at the dimness of the room. Something was happening.
“Lights?” Duke said before a cloud of darkness overtook Duke, like a swirling thunderstorm. From it, eight bulbous eyes blinked into existence. The gym disappeared around Maria. In her hands, she held the music box; the very weight of it gave her courage. She stood straight up, her shoulders square, ready to take on whatever came at her.
From the darkness, long, spindly legs reached for the box. Maria snapped it away. “Uh uh, asshole,” she said. “Over my dead body.”
“That’s the idea,” said a deep, thrumming voice. It was the voice of evil, of all things unholy. “Surrender it. Surrender the box. Give it up, and maybe there’s a chance that you and your loved ones will walk away unscathed.”
“Yeah, sure, buddy,” Maria said.
The putrid stink of death wheezed out from the hole, which seemed to be torn in the very fabric of existence.
Maria’s knees went weak. She wanted nothing more than to run. Run back to her grandfather, to Sherlock, to hide in the safety of her bedroom.
But the village, the village your mom died protecting, the village your grandfather swore an oath to. That’s your village, too, Maria. Those are your people. And even if they weren’t, you wouldn’t roll over and let evil win. Ignatius Apple didn’t raise you like that.
“Malakai comes, and he will not let you go without pain, Maria Apple. Know that. Know that if you fight, you die. You waste all of our time,” the dark figure said.
“Good luck,” Maria said. She closed her eyes.
The sound of thousands of lost souls screamed out to her. She thought she felt the bristles of a spider leg brush her face, but she didn’t waver. She stood her ground, just like her grandfather had taught her.
When she opened her eyes, the darkness was gone, and she was back in the aerobic room, Metallica played softly from the stereo. Nothing had changed; meatheads lifted weights, meatheads flexed.
“Duke?” Maria probed.
But Duke was gone.
It was just Maria and the music box now, and she thought that was how it would have to be.
She gathered up her stuff, putting the music box in her gym bag, and rushed out, not stopping to say bye to Gus or any of the other regulars.
She’d had her first encounter with the Widow and, though it hadn’t yet, it would leave her scarred.
Her workout didn’t stop when she left the gym. She ran home. She got there in about five minutes—record time.
“Gramps?” she said as she opened the door. “Gramps, I think whatever’s happening to me is more urgent than we really thought.”
From upstairs, she heard the clanking and clacking of objects.
He was back from Salem’s.
“Oh, no,” she groaned. Whenever Gramps was upstairs, that usually meant trouble. His oddness had been explained to Maria with the arrival of her magical capabilities, but that didn’t mean the things that Ignatius Apple built were any less dangerous.
Wouldn’t go up there if I were you, Sherlock warned. He lay at the foot of the stairs, his large, furry belly rising and falling with his ragged breath. Maria thought he might’ve put on an extra few pounds in a matter of hours. No more cookies and cake for him, she thought.
“What’s he doing?”
You know what he’s doing.
“Oh, God, not another lava experiment.”
Worse.
Maria’s heart fluttered.
“Gramps!”
“Dangnabit!” floated down from upstairs. “Where the golan are they!?”
“He’s looking for something?”
Travel gear, Sherlock said. Then he lifted his head up from the carpet and nodded, floppy cheeks dripping drool with the motion.
“Where could he be going? Only place he goes is that damn ice cream shop—Oh, GOD!”
She bounced up the stairs, vaulting over Sherlock and taking the steps two and three at a time. She reached the top and saw the upstairs hallway was littered with junk. Gramps had cleared out closets and desks and dresser drawers.
He was currently in the guest bedroom. The comforter, paisley-patterned, was strewn over him, making him look like a flamboyant ghost. Everything in the closet had been pulled out and thrown on the floor. Maria had to walk gingerly over extra piles of sheets and clothes hangers and grandpa’s old shoes.
“Gramps?” Maria said.
“Oh, hullo, Maria!”
“What are you looking for?”
Gramps flipped the comforter off of him. He wore checkered pants and a shirt with no suspenders. To Maria, he looked thinner, like he hadn’t actually been eating any ice cream down at the ice cream shop. Stress, she thought, that’s what’s doing it. Stress makes Sherlock gain an extra five pounds, and Gramps shed a few.
An odd look passed across his face. It
was a look of guilt. Maria could tell he was about to lie to her. She didn’t know how or why—maybe it was the magic—but she could.
“Well, I seem to have misplaced my good pair of underpants. You know, the pair with the Christmas trees on them? They’re my favorite pair. Perfectly comfortable.” He moved awkwardly and adjusted the waist of his pants. “These, they’re too…snug.”
“Grandpa,” Maria said, crossing her arms.
“Okay, fine! I’m looking for my damn galoshes. My rainboots!”
Maria glanced out the window, noted the yellow sunshine and pale blue, cloudless skies. “Doesn’t look like rain, today, Gramps.” In fact, she’d seen the forecast that morning in the paper. The week ahead was looking to be beautiful. “Or any rain for awhile. What are you really doing?”
He threw his arms up in exasperation. “That’s it! I give up! Come, Maria, you must accompany me to Walmart.”
“Walmart? Gramps, you know what happened the last time you went to a Walmart. They have your picture in every single one within a fifty-mile radius; they’re pretty serious about keeping you out. And you’re lucky that’s all they did.”
“Oh, phooey!” Gramps said.
Maria smiled. ‘Phooey’ was one of her grandfather’s many catchphrases, and it never ceased to make her smile whenever he said it; along with ‘cripes,’ ‘golan,’ and a few others.
“Gramps, I need to talk to you.”
“Talk on the way,” Gramps answered. “Bring Sherlock. He’ll be able to smell any spiders a mile away.”
Gramps walked past her, out into the hallway, kicking away the piled clothes and shoes and books that he’d pulled out in his haste to find his…galoshes.
“Come, come!”
Maria needed to talk to him, so she had no choice but to follow.
He went down the steps and out to the garage, where under a sheet was the 1968 Pontiac Firebird her grandfather never drove but kept in case of emergencies. As Maria stepped over Sherlock, he said, Told you!
“C’mon, fatty,” Maria said.
Hey, I’m getting prepared for winter! It’s gonna be a cold one, Sherlock said.
“Yeah, you’re about three months too soon, buddy.”
The two of them went out to the garage.
Gramps stood in front of the Firebird, admiring its beauty. It was beautiful; the type of car you’d see on the front of ‘Classic Muscle Cars Magazine’ (if such a magazine existed). Maria, too, appreciated the beauty of such a fine piece of craftsmanship. She’d always wanted to drive it, but she knew Gramps would never let her. That’s okay. I can appreciate its beauty from the passenger’s seat.
Gramps pulled the keys free from his pocket. He’d done the right thing and put a shirt on. Maria was glad.
“Ready?” he asked.
Sherlock barked. He loved the Bird, too. Loved sticking his head out the window, and letting the wind blow his flappy cheeks every which way, which usually meant a rather large backdraft of drool for whomever joined him in the backseat.
“Heads up,” Gramps said. He tossed something to Maria. With her new magical abilities came a quicker reaction time, and the keys her grandfather tossed through the air seemed to move in slow motion.
Maria snagged them. “What?” she said, breathless.
“I think you’re old enough now,” Gramps said.
“B-But you never let anyone drive the Bird but you.”
Gramps shrugged, smiling. “First time for everything.”
“Seems like there are a lot of firsts since I turned nineteen.”
“It’ll only get weirder!” Gramps said, then he threw his head back and cackled. “That’s not a bad thing, by the way, Maria. You know what I say… ‘The weirder, the—”
“…Better,” Maria finished.
“Good girl. Now let’s get out of this smelly garage and out on the open road. It’s a beautiful day, and we have much to discuss.”
As much as Maria wanted to put the pedal to the metal, she couldn’t. Ignatius had fixed it to where the Firebird somehow wouldn’t go over thirty miles per hour, no matter how hard Maria pressed the gas pedal.
Magic, she thought. Whenever I don’t understand anything, I’ll just blame magic. Kennedy assassination? Magic. Aliens? Bigfoot? Abominable Snowman? Magic. Simple as that. I like it.
So Maria drove up the road with people riding her rear bumper, some of them honking and flashing their lights. She did her best to ignore them, but she caught her skin glowing blue again, threatening to unleash an uncontrollable burst of magic.
“Now we talk,” Gramps said.
Sherlock, who usually stuck his head out of the passenger’s side window, was leaning over Maria and drooling out the driver’s side.
“If this is payback for me calling you a fatty, then touché,” Maria said softly into his ear. He ignored her. She turned to glance at Gramps, to ask him the question that had been on her mind.
His eyes bugged out and he looked at the street. “Eyes on the road! Eyes on the road!”
Maria snapped her eyes back in that direction.
“Good, good. There is no tomfoolery while driving Sheila.”
“Sheila?” Maria asked.
“That’s what I named her. Fine, fine name, don’t you think?”
Maria chuckled. “Yeah, I guess; if there’s no tomfoolery, or whatever the heck you called it, I think you better tell Sherlock to stop stepping all over me.”
“You’re the one who can communicate with him!”
“He won’t listen to me,” Maria said.
Gramps frowned. “Sherlock? Get in the backseat.”
Sherlock listened, reluctantly, making sure he put his butt in Maria’s face on the way to the back.
“Bleh!” Maria said, turning her head away.
“Eyes on the road!” Gramps shouted again.
She was beginning to think that driving was actually not all that it was chalked up to be.
“Why were you looking for galoshes, Gramps?” Maria asked him with a slight edge to her voice. “Especially on such a beautiful day as this.” She took one hand off the wheel and swept it across the windshield as if showcasing a beautiful new house on Home Makeover.
“Hands on the wheel! Hands on the wheel!” Gramps shrieked.
She growled, sounding like Sherlock, and put her other hand back on the wheel.
“Galoshes, Gramps! Why? Tell me.”
Gramps sighed.
Maria turned off of East Avenue into the area’s strip mall. Down the way, across from a plaza full with Petsmart, Target, Starbucks, and Shoe Depot was the Walmart.
“I will tell you, Maria, as long as you promise not to get upset.”
Can’t get anymore weirder, I suppose, she thought, and flipped on her left blinker at the stop sign that led into Walmart’s parking lot. She almost raised her right hand, too, and said something like ‘Right hand to God,’ but quickly remembered how touchy Gramps was about keeping both hands on the wheel.
She settled for “I promise” instead.
A lady was walking her dog. Sherlock sniffed the air and turned to look at her. The dog outside started barking.
How dare he say something so vulgar about my mother! Sherlock said. Maria, stop the car. Stop the car and let me at him. I’ll tear his face off!
“Or you’ll sniff his butt and ask him to go get a Dairy Queen Blizzard with you,” Maria said.
“Pardon?” Gramps asked.
“Oh, nothing. Anyway, I promise,” Maria said again.
“Well, Maria; Salem, Agnes, the Muffler twins, and I thought it would be best if you sit this one out. I will need you here to guard the portal.” All that actually meant was that Gramps thought it was best. The others seemed mostly on her side.
She pulled into a parking space, shifted the gear stick to ‘P,’ then turned to her grandfather. “What the heck does that mean? You’re making it sound like this is a recreational softball league or something.”
Gramps cringed. “I kn
ew you’d be mad.”
“I’m not sitting this one out. Duke came to me! It’s up to me to save the villagers from the world in between, and it’s up to me to stop whatever the giant spider-men are planning on doing.”
Gramps leaned forward. He put one bony, liver-spotted hand on Maria’s, and sighed again. His face lost all of the humor that was usually there.
Maria moved her hand out from under his. She felt betrayed. She felt like a kid again, not allowed to do the grownup things because she was too young and stupid.
“That’s why you let me drive the Firebird! Oh, my God! You were trying to butter me up before you let me down, weren’t you? Gramps, I’m disappointed.” It was nice being on the other end of the dreaded, ‘I’m not mad, just disappointed’ statement.
Gramps just shook his head.
“So I’m old and wise enough to drive Sheila, but I’m too inexperienced to go save my family, right?”
Maybe if you wouldn’t have called me a fatty…Sherlock said.
“Can it!” Maria shouted, her voice rattling the windows.
Sherlock slunk into the backseat.
“You must understand that I’m only doing this because I love you, Maria. Your service to the village will not go unnoticed. You will be lauded as a hero—”
“I don’t care about being called a hero!” Maria clarified, cutting him off. “I care about the well-being of those people. I care about doing the right thing.”
Her grandfather smiled. There was a twinkle in his eyes.
“You are your mother’s daughter, that much is true.” He pointed to Maria’s face. “When she was angry, her nostrils would flare just like that.”
Maria pulled away.
“Don’t try to be sweet to me, old man!”
Her skin glowed; she could see the muted blue beneath her jeans. Wouldn’t be good to go all magical fireball inside Gramps’s sacred Pontiac…or would it?
There was a pause, a moment of silence in which Maria and Ignatius stared. Who will blink first?
Gramps did. He looked toward the stickshift.
“Okay, Maria,” he said finally. “I give up. Like your mother, you are hardheaded.” He knocked on his forehead twice. It made a deep thunk. “And like your mother, you are tenacious. That is a good trait, Maria, but it can get you killed. You must be careful.”
Midwest Magic Chronicles Boxed Set Page 13