I took a few deep breaths and looked around me for danger. I didn't see anything alarming, but that didn't mean I was safe. Eyes are always watching, as Zinnia liked to say. Plus there'd been the strange tapping on my thigh. I looked down at the bulge in my skirt pocket. There was nothing on my thigh except the weight of the bookwyrm dough in its plastic container.
The hipster girl at the counter had turned away from me. It had been her eyes that had sucked me in. Perhaps I hadn't gone anywhere, but her eyes had certainly caused a vision. Was she a witch? I'd need to be cautious of this girl, since either she was crazy or she had two other spirits plotting against her inside her own mind.
She was leaning on the counter, growing visibly impatient about having to wait for the hairdresser.
“Morganna, I'm sorry to bother you,” the hipster girl said. “I left something here yesterday.”
I remembered part of the conversation I'd overheard inside her mind. "My first order of business will be a haircut,” the mature female had said. "This one's face really needs bangs, don't you think? I got her to book a haircut appointment yesterday, but she lost her nerve and ran out in a panic.”
Whatever or whoever the voices inside this girl's head were, they had been making her do things. She had my full sympathy. If anyone could understand what she was going through, surely it was me.
The girl fidgeted at the counter. “Sorry I ran out like that,” she said to the older hairdresser. “I don't know what I was thinking. Getting bangs? I must have been crazy.”
Morganna, who'd tied her own voluminous mermaid locks back in a loose butterfly clip, barely glanced up from her work on Zoey's hair. “Bangs aren't crazy,” Morganna said. “You have a good face for bangs.” She looked back down at the red hair whipping around in her small, quick hands. “What can I do for you today?”
"I just need to get my phone. My memory has been weird lately, but I'm pretty sure I left it here yesterday.”
Morganna smiled. “Do you mean that little blue thing that makes the funny noises? I thought you left that squawk box here to drive me crazy.”
The hipster girl forced a laugh. “Yes. My phone's in a blue case.”
“I'm surprised you didn't come back for it last night,” Morganna said teasingly. “Aren't you young people addicted to your little squawk boxes? Don't you get the shakes when you're separated for more than ten minutes?”
The girl forced another laugh, this one less convincing. “My father needed my help with a project,” she said.
Morganna grabbed one of Zoey's hands and lifted it to her head. “Hold this piece here so I don't lose my place and have to start all over,” she told my daughter. Zoey did as she was asked, though I caught a glimpse in the mirror of her skepticism. It was a look I knew well, as she gave it to me often.
Morganna floated over to the reception desk. She dug around in some drawers on the other side before handing a phone in a blue case to the hipster girl.
“Here's your gadget,” Morganna said. “Will you tell Perry I send him my best? He needs to get out of the house more. I hardly ever see him anymore.”
At Morganna's mention of the name Perry, a jolt went through my body. It was similar to that shock of recognition you get when you hear your own name over the radio or a loudspeaker announcement.
I didn't know anyone named Perry, but apparently my ghost did. I kept my eyes down on my magazine but listened intently to the conversation going on in front of me.
“My father's been keeping busy,” the hipster girl said. “You know how he is when he's working on a new project.”
“And what is this new project of his?”
I listened with interest. The voices in her head had mentioned a project with an ominous name. Project Erasure. With a name like that, was there any doubt this girl's father's project had something to do with local books being erased?
The dark-haired girl was slow to respond and stumbled over her words. “Oh... Dad's just working on this and that. Did I say new project? I meant that he's dabbling on a bunch of random things.” She tucked the phone into her bag and took a few steps backward.
Morganna came out from behind the counter and took tentative steps toward the girl. “Josephine, are you sleeping well? You have dark circles under your eyes. They're darker than yesterday.”
“No, they're not any darker,” the girl—Josephine—said defensively.”
“Child, don't run away on me. Wait here. I'll give you a sea salt candle holder to help you sleep.”
“I'm fine, really,” Josephine said, sounding irritated.
“But you're so tense.” Morganna grabbed her by the wrist. “And your pulse is racing.”
Josephine yanked her hand away and took a few more steps backward. She had to be aiming for the door, but misjudged the location and stepped onto my toes. She whirled to see what she'd tripped over, lost her balance, and fell backward, right onto my lap.
Again, I felt a surprising jolt of familiarity.
I also felt an elbow in my face. The elbow missed my nose but still hurt like the dickens.
The girl jumped off me, spewing apologies. “I'm so clumsy,” she said.
“And forgetful,” I said with surprising vehemence. My mouth moved with a mind of its own. “Little Jo, head in the clouds, leaving things behind everywhere she goes.”
She gave me a startled look. And for good reason. A complete stranger had just scolded her, seemingly with knowledge of her bad habits. It's not me, I wanted to say. This is a ghost who knows you, talking through my mouth.
But I couldn't say that. And I couldn't ask her about the voices I'd overheard inside her head. Not without revealing myself as a witch. But this girl was definitely jumpier than a two-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. And she did have the dark circles of anxiety and sleeplessness under her eyes. She knew something.
As we stared at each other, her shock shifted to irritation. “What are you looking at, lady? I apologized. What more do you want?”
“Just for you to finally learn from your mistakes,” I said with the heavy sigh of someone who knew her well. Which I did not. This was my ghost continuing to speak through my mouth, and I was as surprised by the words as this Josephine girl was.
“I'm honestly trying,” she said petulantly. She turned to Morganna, who was watching us quietly. “I'm trying to get my life together,” Josephine said to the hairdresser.
“Don't try too hard,” Morganna said, her voice tinkling like silver bells in the wind. “Forgetfulness is no sin. If anything, forgetfulness is the cure for our sorrows.” Her eyes wrinkled with truth and wisdom as she smiled.
Josephine edged toward the door, straightening her hipster hat with one hand. “I hate to disagree with you, Morganna, but I think money is the only cure for our sorrows.” She reached for the door handle and gave me a wary look. “Sorry, but do I know you?”
“No, but you could learn a lot from someone like Zara Riddle,” I said in a voice tinged with masculinity. “She—I mean I—have raised a fine daughter all on my own as a single mother. And I'm now a proud homeowner.” My cheeks burned from embarrassment. The nerve of me, blowing my own horn this way! It was still the ghost making me talk, but unlike the night he'd talked to Zoey, this time I was consciously present and not entirely pleased about it.
Josephine's eyes widened until I could see the whites all the way around her brown irises. “You work at the library,” she said. “That must be where I've talked to you before.”
I nodded, and he continued to speak through my mouth, just like a father scolding his daughter. “The library contains a wealth of knowledge, and all of it completely free. A savvy shopper does all of her book-browsing at the library.” My cheeks flushed even hotter. Now the ghost was making me sound like an infomercial.
“Sorry again for falling on you,” Josephine said.
She backed out of the door and was gone before I could embarrass myself further.
Morganna had also withdrawn from the
awkward conversation. She was back with Zoey, cooing over what a lovely job my daughter had done holding the lock of hair in the exact right place.
Zoey caught my eye in the mirror and silently mouthed the words what was that?
I cleared my throat tentatively. “Testing, testing,” I whispered. I was back in control of my mouth again. The ghost had either left or was taking a coffee break after all the excitement.
To Zoey, I mouthed the word ghost.
She nodded, looked concerned about my problems for all of three seconds, and then went back to chatting with Morganna about texturizing her hair to control the natural wave.
I sighed and looked down at the rumpled magazine Josephine had landed on atop my lap.
The pages of the magazine were entirely blank. White. I flipped through the magazine. More pages were partially or completely blank. A good twenty percent of the content was missing. I surreptitiously rolled up the magazine and slipped it into my bag for examining later. I picked up another magazine and flipped through the pages. It was normal. I picked up two more and riffled through. All the other magazines appeared to be intact. Project Erasure strikes again, I thought.
What could I do to find out more about Josephine and her father's secret projects? I had a number of options, ranging from illegal and unethical to simply unsavory. But I wasn't getting paid to investigate supernatural shenanigans, let alone getting paid enough to break into people's houses or dig through their garbage.
I looked down at my purse, bulging with the rolled-up magazine. Once I was somewhere private, I could test the bookwyrm dough on the magazine's blank sections. But even if it restored the pages, the dough wouldn't tell me how the ink had been erased, or why. It was a shame the voices in Josephine's head hadn't named their secret project something more informative, such as Project Erasure of Voting Ballots, or Project Erasure of Valuable Picasso Paintings. Then I'd have a motive, at least.
If I could erase anything in the world, where would I start? Maybe the comments section under YouTube videos. Then billboards and outdoor advertising. Would it work on freckles?
My thoughts were eventually disrupted by the hairdresser calling out, “Next!”
Morganna had finished trimming Zoey's hair and was calling me to her chair.
I walked over and climbed into the green seat.
Morganna wrapped a protective plastic cape around me and paused, staring down at her hand. I watched her as she walked over to the sink, washed her hands, and continued to stare at her right hand, lifting it up and down slowly, tracking it with her eyes.
I glanced over at Zoey. She hadn't noticed the hairdresser's strange behavior because she was using her phone to take photos of her new haircut.
I asked the diminutive, elderly hairdresser, “Is everything okay? If you need a break, I can come back next week. There's really no rush.”
She kept staring at her hand.
“My split ends can wait another seven days,” I said. “In fact, they'd probably appreciate the stay of execution.”
Morganna shook her head and came out of her daze. “It is a blessed and surprising morning,” she said. “You stay right where you are, and we'll have you beach-ready in no time.”
She combed my hair and sprayed on water to dampen it for cutting. As she worked, she kept glancing at the top of her right hand and letting her gaze linger.
Finally, I had to ask, “Is there something wrong with your hand?”
She laughed. “Do you know how people say they'd know something like the back of their hand? I was just thinking about what an odd expression that is.”
“Most idioms are a bit odd,” I agreed.
“And maybe we don't know the backs of our hands that well. Once upon a time, I got a little fairy tattooed onto the back of my hand.” She dropped her hand in front of my face to show me.
I didn't see a fairy, or any other tattoo on her hand. “Are you sure it wasn't your left hand?”
She raised her left hand to show me it was blank as well.
“It must have faded,” I said. “I hear tattoos can fade over the years.”
“That must be what happened,” Morganna said. “It must have been fading for years, and I didn't even notice until just now. Isn't that the strangest thing?”
“It is strange,” I said.
She shrugged. “Now I'll just have to get a new tattoo,” she said.
“And you'll have to keep an eye on it this time.”
She whipped her tiny hands up into my hair and began massaging my scalp. “Maybe I'll have to keep an eye on you, Zara Riddle.” She let out a high-pitched laugh that sounded like wind chimes being shaken in a storm. “You were the one nearest me when my tattoo ran away.”
I fixed my expression into a good-natured grin. “You got me. I'm secretly a collector of other people's tattoos.”
She laughed again and continued to massage my scalp.
Morganna Faire had surprisingly strong hands for a tiny lady in her seventies.
Chapter 12
“I love my new beach hair,” Zoey cooed as we left the Beach Hair Shack.
“If I were to tell you that was a half-price bargain haircut, would you love it more or less?”
“Even more,” she said.
“Me, too.”
She looked over at me and tilted her head. “Yours looks more like bed head. You should have let her put in more styling mud.” She twirled one of her tiny braids, which Morganna had fastened with a butterfly elastic. “And a few mermaid braids.”
“Bohemian doesn't suit me,” I said. “My look is more classic.”
“Classic what?”
She had me stumped, but not for long. I fluffed out my voluminous skirts and kicked up my laced boots. “Classic Anne of Green Gables,” I said.
She clapped her hands to her cheeks and gasped. “You're right! How did I never see this before? You could move to Prince Edward Island and become a celebrity Anne performer. You already have the wardrobe.”
I laughed. “You want to move again? We're barely unpacked.”
“No,” she said hesitantly. “Wisteria is great. But...” She trailed off.
“But what?”
“Nothing.” She looked around, whipping her fluffy beach hair and bohemian braids. “What street are we on?”
We stopped for a minute to read the street signs and figure out which way to turn for the high school. We resumed walking. Zoey continued to fluff her hair and whip her head to make it fly out. She didn't care that it was a half-price hairdo.
After a few minutes, she asked, “What was going on back there, anyway?” She lowered her voice. “Did you get a visit from a ghost?”
The sun slipped behind a cloud. My skin cooled as I recalled the vision of the voices in the darkness. Before I'd overheard the conversation, I'd seen things wriggling around in the darkness. Living things that were not quite animal, not exactly insects, and not entirely machine, but a combination of all three. I blinked away the memory and forced a smile for my daughter.
“Nothing for you to worry about,” I said lightly. “Let me deal with the ghosts, and you keep on getting those stellar grades at school.”
She made a strangled noise.
“Zoey?” I turned to look at her. She studied the neatly trimmed hedge at her side, avoiding my eyes.
I gently pressed for more information. “Anything you want to talk about?”
“Nothing for you to worry about,” she said, mimicking my tone.
I slung my arm around her shoulders. “You don't have to get straight A's in everything, kiddo. I'll still love you even if you get a B.”
She gave me a dirty look.
“Not as much as I'd love an A-student,” I said.
She groaned and sped up, pulling away from my arm. She continued to trot, getting ahead of me on the sidewalk.
“Hey,” I called after her. “I didn't get up early to go jogging.”
She turned and walked backward, facing me. “The library's that
way.” She pointed to a side street. “I can make it to school on my own.” She turned and picked up the pace, the sound of her boots on the sidewalk ringing through the quiet neighborhood.
As she rounded the corner, I caught a glimpse of the ten-year-old version of her, insisting she could walk the last few blocks to school on her own. She'd always been so independent. I would agree, and then follow at a distance, just to make sure she was safe.
Even now, at sixteen, I felt the urge to follow, to keep her in my sight. I waved goodbye as my heart did that mother thing and broke just a little. My baby appreciated me, but she didn't need me.
One day, when I was gone, how would Zoey remember today? Would it be the beautiful sunny day she got beach hair at a kooky lady's wooden shack, or the day her mother wasn't a good mother because she was distracted, busy talking to ghosts and getting ominous visions?
* * *
By the time I got to work, I'd forgotten about my hair. A new hairstyle paled in comparison to worrying about whether or not I was a good mother and fretting over finding not just work-life balance but work-life-witch balance.
I went straight to the staff lounge and made the day's first pot of coffee.
Frank came in, took one look at me, and made an unrepeatable comment about the sort of activities one might engage in to rumple up one's hair.
I finger-combed some of the backcombing from my thick red locks. “The stylist backcombed it for a beach-tousled look.”
“Beach-tousled? More like bed-wrestled.”
Snorting, I said, “Some people with one-track minds see what they want to see.”
Frank poured a coffee and squinted at me with one eye. He had a tough time keeping both eyes open before his first cup of coffee. “And your beau saw a whole lot of what he wanted to see. Now here you are, yawning over your coffee because that burly neighbor man didn't let you get any sleep last night.”
I caught myself mid-yawn and shut my mouth with considerable effort. “I had to get up early, so I could take advantage of Morganna Faire's half-price Wednesday morning special.”
Frank shook his head. “Only half-price? But her rates are already so reasonable. I'm afraid my beauty sleep is worth a bit more.”
3-Book Series Bundle: Wisteria Witches, Wicked Wisteria, Wisteria Wonders - Cozy Witch Mysteries Page 33