Destruction: The December People, Book One

by Sharon Bayliss

  Xavier stared into the pantry and then turned around with a box of Wheat Thins in hand. He started when he saw David.

  “I’m sorry. I thought you knew I was in here,” David said.

  Xavier shrugged one shoulder.

  “If it’s okay, I wanted to talk to you for a second.”

  Xavier said nothing.

  “I’m really sorry about what happened this morning with the coffee pot. I shouldn’t have lost my temper over something so small. I am very sorry.”

  Xavier stacked his crackers into a star shape that defied gravity. He might not want to speak, but the bold display of magic seemed to speak for itself.

  “That is… very cool,” David said.

  Xavier removed one of the crackers and popped it into his mouth, causing the structure to fall.

  “Even if you did break the coffee pot, it’s not a huge deal,” David continued. “If things upset you about living here or about anything, I just wish you would tell me instead of breaking things. If you tell me, then maybe I can change it, or at least we could talk about it so you could understand why things have to be a certain way. But you have to tell me. I don’t know what you’re telling me with a broken coffee pot. It’s frustrating… because I want to understand, and all I can do is guess.”

  Xavier rearranged his crackers into a standing stick figure.

  “What do you think about what I said?” David asked. “Can you please say something?”

  “I’m good at magic. I don’t just destroy things like you said.”

  “I know. I can see that.”

  “But you don’t care about the magic I can do,” Xavier said. “You pretend it’s not even real. That we’re crazy or something.”

  A surge of anger bubbled up in David’s chest, but at Amanda, not Xavier. Choosing not to practice seemed bad enough, but David must have looked like a complete asshole pretending magic didn’t even exist.

  “I’m sorry about that,” David said. “I guess I forgot some things.”

  Xavier narrowed his eyes but didn’t ask for clarification.

  “I care about the magic you can do,” David said. “I want to know about the stuff you like and the stuff you’re good at. I really do.”

  Xavier raised one eyebrow skeptically. “Magic is forbidden.”

  “Just describe it to me. What spell are you best at?”

  “Best at?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, I can… leave.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can leave my body. I mean… I don’t actually go anywhere. It’s more like closing the curtains in a house. I don’t know what’s going on outside. I turn my senses off.”

  Like a turtle in a shell.

  “Sounds peaceful.”

  “I guess.”

  “Do you do this often?”

  “Not that often.” He flicked off his cracker man’s arms, then his legs and head. “I got a little too good. I do it on accident sometimes.”

  “It’s cool you can do that,” David said. “But I would like it if you stayed here as much as you can. I like it when you’re here.”

  “I try. I have to stay. To protect Eve.”

  David nodded. He wanted to say she didn’t need protection anymore. Not here. Even so, Xavier didn’t protect her alone anymore. David had that job now. But he doubted Xavier felt that way.

  “And try to stay present during class, okay? Even if it’s something terrible like a grammar lesson.”

  Another tiny smile. “All right.”

  avid spent his first Thanksgiving with Amanda’s parents in 1995, the year he gained a wife and lost a childhood. He had spent Thanksgiving and Christmas with them every year since. His in-laws, Erastus and Eloise Oppenheimer, lived in Ezra, Texas, a town tucked so deep in the woods of East Texas that time, civil rights, and wireless Internet couldn’t find it. On the drive in 1995, Amanda seemed quieter than usual. She peppered him with random questions about his family. What does your father do for a living? Where did the Vandergraffs come from? Have you always lived in Austin? What are your parents doing for the holidays? Where does your brother go to school?

  He answered all the questions pretty much the same way. “Amanda, you know that. Why are you asking me?”

  “I just want to see what your answers are. In case my parents ask.”

  “Why? Are they really that judgmental? Are you afraid the Vandergraffs are secretly black and your parents are going to run me out of town?”

  “That’s not nice, David. They wouldn’t care if you were black.”

  “I’m sure. But do they need to know exactly which town my grandfather lived in before he immigrated? Are they really going to ask me that?”

  “Just forget it.”

  “I’m not trying to fight with you. You’re just being weird.”

  “I’m nervous.”

  “It’s going to be fine, babe. And it’s not like we’ve never met. I spent lots of quality time with your parents when they came down for the wedding. I remember it vividly.”

  “That’s good,” she said. “But you don’t remember which town your grandfather was from?”

  “No,” he said. “Who knows things like that?”

  “You do,” she said quietly.

  It all made more sense now. She had tested her handiwork. She didn’t want her parents to find gaps or suspicious answers and guess she had used magic. She did have one thing going in her favor: her parents never discussed magic, so they wouldn’t say anything to prick David’s bubble and disturb his newly remodeled mind.

  Amanda had recently explained that her parents didn’t practice magic either. They believed only God should have the power to make miracles, and any magic from humans came from the Devil. So, as David suspected, Amanda’s parents didn’t approve of his family heritage, but not because of the color of their skin or their nation of origin. They were practicing wizards—the worst type of family she could have possibly married into.

  When David walked into the Oppenheimers’ home, he could tell right away they loved their children, Jesus, and slaughtering animals, hopefully in that order. David could hardly spot a piece of yellowed paisley wallpaper not covered by a family photo, wooden cross, stitched Bible verse, or hunting trophy. Their house smelled of bacon grease, bug spray, and a mild whiff of taxidermy chemicals. In time, this potpourri became a welcoming fragrance. This house would later become Me Maw and Papa’s house, a place his kids loved visiting as much as Six Flags.

  Eventually, it would also feel like David’s own ‘coming home’ because his own family would become less and less a part of his life, especially after he had kids. He imagined Amanda had faced a serious challenge over the years, keeping David and their kids away from David’s parents without having any obvious reason. Fortunately, David never argued this. He wondered if part of him knew, on an instinctive level, to keep his kids away from his father. Or, perhaps from the memories Amanda left him, he could at least piece together the fact that the Oppenheimers easily beat out the Vandergraffs as the better holiday visiting family and the better grandparents. Not a tough decision, since the Vandergraffs ignored Christmas.

  After dinner, which had consisted entirely of four whole barbequed chickens, sausage links, dinner rolls, and a pitcher of sweet tea, David didn’t think he’d ever get the grease or smoky smell off his hands. David sat next to Amanda and her brother Carson on the couch, and Mr. Oppenheimer stared David down with his gray eyes from his armchair. Erastus Oppenheimer was a massive building of a man, with an untamed appearance, as if he lived in the wild… which he pretty much did. His blond hair had turned gray early, or stayed so dirty it looked gray, and he cut it himself at home with a hunting knife. The same blondish-gray fur covered his whole body. He shaved only once every few days at most and always had a thick gray scruff on his face. Something about the gray beard made David picture Mr. Oppenheimer as a backwoods version of Zeus.

  Mr. Oppenheimer said, “Eloise, bring it on out now.”r />
  “Bring it on out yourself,” she said from the kitchen.

  David thought Mrs. Oppenheimer had a wispy, ghost-like quality. Everything about her, from her clothes to her pale eyes and hair, looked faded. Although she was quiet and demure most of the time, no one except her would talk back to Erastus Oppenheimer.

  “Jesus, woman,” he said. “I just sat down.” Mr. Oppenheimer grunted and stood back up. He returned a few minutes later and approached David with the last thing he wanted to see his new father-in-law holding: a rifle.

  “There you are,” he said, handing the rifle to David.

  David held it in his lap and stared at it.

  “Oh, sweet,” Carson said. He took the rifle out of David’s hands and looked through the sight as if prepared to assassinate the porcelain angel on the mantel.

  “That’s a fine piece,” he said and handed it back to David.

  David had hoped Carson would hang on to it but held it awkwardly in both hands, afraid to touch anything and accidentally shoot someone.

  Amanda elbowed him in the ribs. “It’s a gift.”

  “Oh. Thank you. Thank you very much. It’s really nice.”

  “You ever shoot a gun like that?” Mr. Oppenheimer asked.

  “No. I’ve never shot any gun.”

  David remembered Carson had glanced at Amanda, and she nodded. At the time, he assumed his brother-in-law was appalled to learn his sister had chosen such a pathetic, non-gun-shooting man for a husband and she had nodded to mean, ‘yes, he really is that lame’. Now, he knew what it had meant. Amanda had told only one person about her memory spell: Carson. Carson wanted to know if David had answered the question correctly.

  “Why?” Mr. Oppenheimer asked. “You’re not some kind of vegetarian, are you?”

  David chuckled. “I wasn’t one at dinner, remember?”

  Mr. Oppenheimer narrowed his bushy gray eyebrows in confusion. David guessed Mr. Oppenheimer didn’t understand the meaning of the word ‘vegetarian’ and had meant it as a general definition for non-animal killing people with whom he would never see eye-to-eye.

  “Go easy on him,” Mrs. Oppenheimer said from the kitchen. “He’s from Austin,” she added kindly, as if he had some sort of disability they should be sensitive about.

  Mr. Oppenheimer laughed. He didn’t laugh often, but when he did, he had a hearty, joyful laugh, like the Ghost of Christmas Present.

  “Well, this sweet little flower made her first kill when she was six.” He tousled Amanda’s hair as if she was still six. “Maybe I shouldn’t teach you a thing,” he said to David. “That way, she’s always got the upper hand. You know if you do her wrong, she won’t hesitate.”

  He mimed shooting David and laughed again.

  “Yeah,” Carson agreed. “You don’t want to cross her. A six-year-old girl who can kill Bambi’s mom without batting an eye?”

  “Shut up,” Amanda said. “You made your first kill when you were four.”

  “You.” Mr. Oppenheimer pointed at David. “Tomorrow morning. 6:00 a.m.”

  After Mr. Oppenheimer had disappeared into his shed to do God only knew what someone might do in a shed after dark, David said, “So, he’s going to make me kill something, isn’t he?”

  “Yes,” Amanda said.

  “I suppose it’s not optional,” David said.

  “Oh, come on, David,” Amanda said. “It’s obviously a big deal to him. Just do it. It’s not hard.”

  “Are you coming, too?” David asked Carson.

  “Hell, yes,” he said. “I have got to see this.”

  “So, in your Dad’s head, I have to perform some kind of ritual of animal sacrifice to be part of the family?”

  He had meant it as a joke, but Amanda and Carson’s faces grew funeral serious.

  “No,” Amanda said. “It’s not like that. It’s nothing like that. Plenty of people hunt, David. It’s a completely normal thing to do.”

  “It’s not animal sacrifice,” Carson added. “Hunting game is a well-known, established sport. It’s not weird.”

  “God, relax,” David said. “I know. I was joking. What’s the matter with you guys?”

  Amanda gave a forced laugh. She patted him on the leg. “We know you’re joking.”

  “Message received,” David said. “I won’t joke about hunting.”

  David might not spend his holidays with the Oppenheimers ever again. At least, not this year. Instead of an evening discussing football, and only football, with Erastus and Carson Oppenheimer while the girls made the house smell like happiness, David would spend this Thanksgiving avoiding an assassination attempt. David had caught parts of several over-the-phone arguments between Amanda and various family members about Thanksgiving arrangements. Yes, they wanted to see Amanda and the kids—the original kids—but they had not invited David and his other kids to Thanksgiving, or anything else, and they considered simply allowing David to live a gracious act of kindness. In the end, the Vandergraffs and the Oppenheimers decided to have Thanksgiving separately.

  However, on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Grandma and Grandpa Oppenheimer wanted to spend the evening with their grandchildren. So Amanda took Jude, Emmy, and Patrick to Carson and Jess’s house to spend the night with their grandparents and cousins.

  Around eleven, David heard the front door open, followed by voices he recognized. Amanda, Jess, and Carson had dressed up for an evening out. So, they must have left the kids with their grandparents. Their slightly raised voices implied some measure of wine or cocktails had been involved in their evening. David stood at the bottom of the stairs, wearing flannel pajama pants, and waited to get his ass kicked by his brother-in-law and former best friend, Carson Oppenheimer. He had known it would come eventually, and hoped the fact Carson had come escorted by his wife and sister might mean David would at least avoid getting shot.

  Aside from also loving Jesus, family, and hunting, Carson and Jess Oppenheimer could hardly be less similar to the elder Oppenheimers. As some of David’s favorite people, he had chosen them as the guardians of his children if he and Amanda died. Despite appearances needed for networking, David had never felt as if he fit in with anyone other than his brother and sister-in-law. This had turned out to be far truer than he had ever imagined. According to Amanda, wizards made up a minute fraction of the population. Perhaps .001%. David didn’t know how many non-practicing dark wizard Christian businessmen resided in the Houston area, but he had the feeling he now looked at the only other one.

  Carson loved yelling at football players on the television screen, doing anything outdoors, and more than anything else, he loved his wife and kids. He looked like a ruddier and balder version of Jude. Amanda had told David that Jess was a witch. David hadn’t asked if she was a dark witch, but he didn’t need to. She was too warm, the human equivalent of apple cider with cinnamon. Her hair was the color of cherry wood, and she usually painted her lips a matching color. She had lightly freckled skin, eyes the color of Saint Arnold Brown Ale, and an over-sized Julia Roberts-type smile. A physical therapist by trade, she had recently returned to the profession after spending ten years as a full-time mom. She also taught yoga classes on the side. David wondered if she truly excelled at yoga or if she used whatever physics-breaking trick Xavier used to stack crackers to stack her body.

  “Hello,” David said. “I thought you were going to stay over,” he said to Amanda.

  “We wanted to talk to you,” Jess said. The women had drawn eyes and mouths in straight lines. Carson had his arms crossed and his face turned away from David. They had moved beyond mad and had gone straight to showing the sad faces they had prepared for his funeral.

  “Where are they?” Amanda asked, and David knew she meant Xavier and Evangeline.

  “They went to bed.”

  “Maybe the dining room,” Amanda said to Jess.

  The three removed their jackets, then Amanda grabbed David’s arm and pulled him. He could tell by the way she walked that Amanda had the
most to drink. The other two looked more composed.

  “What’s going on?” David asked.

  “Should I open a bottle of wine?” Jess asked.

  “Yes,” Amanda said.

  “Can I put on pants?” David asked.

  They ignored the request. Jess came back with four glasses and a bottle. She poured wine into only two of the glasses.

  “None for us yet,” Jess said to David, then handed glasses to Amanda and Carson. “I need you sharp. Have you had anything to drink tonight?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Amanda had already nearly emptied the glass she had just been poured.

  “Just do it,” Carson said. “Don’t give him time to prepare.”

  David took a few steps back.

  “I have to tell him what I’m going to do,” Jess said. “It works much better that way. As soon as you tell someone you’re trying to find their secrets, their secrets float to the top of their mind and are much easier to find. With wizards, I have to tell them, they’re too good at keeping secrets.”

  “If wizards are good at anything, it’s keeping secrets, right, David?” Carson said.

  “Amanda?” David asked.

  “Carson and Jess came to an agreement,” Amanda said. “Carson has agreed not to kill you if Jess does a spell to scan your mind and look for secrets. She’s really good at it. I’ve always told her she should have been a cop or something.”

  “It’s a fairly useful trick for a wife and mother, as well,” Jess said.

  “I don’t keep secrets,” Carson said. “I’m an honest man.”

  Jess put her hand on Carson’s arm. “Calm down, honey. I was making a joke.”

  “I thought you didn’t practice,” David said.

  “We don’t,” Jess said. “We don’t do this every day. We just thought it would be the best way to decide if we could trust you.”

  “Amanda, you can’t let them. What about your secret? You want her to know that?”