by Dalya Moon
Julie claps her hands together and says, “Ooh, tea!”
I metaphorically put my tail between my legs and join the three of them inside Heidi's cottage, at the round, wooden table by her kitchen.
An expression pops into my head: You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.
I guess that means I should try being nice. It's easier for James and Julie, because the only time they met Heidi, she cast a forgetting spell on them. They remember her serving cucumber sandwiches, but not being evil and trying to suck out my powers while stabbing me with a ceremonial dagger. For the record, there were no cucumber sandwiches that day, despite what James and Julie believe.
The round table is already set up with a pot of hot tea and four dainty tea cups on saucers. I scowl at James and Julie, who don't seem to notice anything odd about Heidi apparently knowing we were coming.
Do they even believe me about her being a witch, or do they think she's a just a batty palm reader? The decor inside the house is not unusual—old pine cupboards in the kitchen and normal house stuff, like a pile of mismatched plastic containers on top of the refrigerator. I remember she had some stuffed crows before, some real creepy shit, but they're nowhere to be seen now. The calendar on the wall has nothing on it but Bridge Club, penned in three times for the month.
Heidi asks me, “How did it come to be that you're investigating the case?”
“Someone asked me to.” I study her face for signs of guilt, but she just looks tired to me.
“I'm glad someone's working hard for justice. You are a smart boy. You'll do a good job.”
James interrupts with, “We're helping too.”
“I'm sure you are,” Heidi says, giving me a wry look that almost makes me like her.
I have to nip these fuzzy feelings in the bud before we all get a little too comfortable and Heidi throws us in a big witch's pot to make stew with our juicy bones.
Julie asks Heidi, “How did you get your powers? Do you have to be born with them, or can you learn?”
“Both,” Heidi says.
“Would you teach me?” Julie asks.
Heidi frowns and her posture droops, as though she's caving in on herself. “No.”
“Why not?”
“The old ways should be left to the old,” Heidi says.
“Don't make this about you,” James says to Julie. “We're here on Zan business. Murder-investigation business.”
Julie opens her mouth, about to argue, but stops and folds her hands on her lap. Julie doesn't usually let things go, but she's quiet now, though scouring the place silently with her bright blue eyes.
“Exactly what do you know?” Heidi asks me in a friendly, conversational manner.
Don't trust her any further than you can throw her.
Bringing the heat, I give her a good, stern glare and say, “I figure you're the number one suspect. You and Newt were up to no good, doing some evil stuff, and you eliminated him as a witness.”
She calmly pours tea into all four cups. “Newt's bark was worse than his bite. At the end of the day, he was not a very good person, but he wasn't evil. He was like most of us, unfortunately. Selfish.”
Julie nods in agreement. “Men can be selfish.”
Heidi continues, “I tried to have a positive influence on my brother, but you can only do so much.”
“He was your brother?” Julie asks.
“Twin brother,” Heidi says.
Julie gasps.
Newt was Heidi's brother? Weird!
Julie begins to sob. “I don't know what I'd do if anything happened to James.”
Heidi hands Julie the handkerchief from her pocket, which I don't think is very hygienic, but I refrain from saying anything. I have to stick to my plan.
“Fine, you say you didn't harm him, but you can say anything with your mouth.” I take a deep breath and pull up my shirt a few inches. “I'm going to need you to stick your finger in my belly button. Then you'll be cleared as our prime suspect.”
Heidi knows all about my power, but she still seems surprised. I guess I'm being rather direct, but I don't always know how to gently ease females into poking me in the navel. I wish my power could be less kinky in appearance. Like a handshake. A handshake would be great.
“It'll just take a second.” I poke my own finger in and out quickly to demonstrate.
“You won't feel anything,” Julie says.
“Except lint,” James says. “Dude, you need to keep it neat in there.”
I flick away a little piece of fuzz that must have come from my sweatshirt. There's a trail of hair leading down from my navel, and being exposed like this is making me self-conscious. I drop my shirt down, as Heidi isn't exactly jumping at the opportunity to plug in.
The white-haired old woman uses some silver tongs to drop a cube of sugar in her tea before handing the tongs to me. The tips have three sharp points and are shaped like bird claws. I mix my tea to my liking, but wait for her to drink first, in case it's poisoned. James is already slurping at his. Julie blows over the surface of hers, her eyes still wet from imagining terrible things happening to her brother.
“Go ahead. It's only Tetley,” Heidi says in answer to my unspoken suspicion.
She's a devious one, more than a simple palm reader. I wouldn't be surprised if she had a crystal ball or something for seeing the future, as today was not the first time she knew of my plans ahead of time.
“Fine,” I say. “Let's have some tea first, before we get to the main event.”
Julie snuffles as she hugs her brother. He pats her messy black hair and assures her he's not going anywhere. When she pulls away from him, she says to Heidi, “I'm very sorry for your loss.”
James and I murmur the same, and Heidi's forlorn expression makes me doubt even being here. The woman's grieving, and I'm pushing her to prove she didn't murder her own brother. I don't know how cops can do their job if it's always like this.
We drink our tea while Heidi asks us questions about school. What follows is a normal-sounding conversation. She asks about our new teacher, Ms. Mikado, as well as any new students at the school this year.
I turn the topic back to the matter at hand, asking if she knows of anyone who was enemies with her brother.
“Enemies,” she says. Her tea cup rattles against the plate when she sets it down with a shaking hand. “He dealt with some unsavory types, due to the nature of his business. Junkies and thieves, plus people down on their luck, but they respected him. He was fair in his dealings and had a positive reputation. He did the best he could.”
“Can't you use your visions or whatever to find out who shot him?”
She turns to look out the window. “I cannot penetrate the secrecy. A veil has been drawn across the event.”
Julie says, “So his death had to be something to do with magic, right?”
Heidi nods, so I ask, “Why don't you give me the names of everyone Newt was friends with, who also did magic?”
“I couldn't, even if I wanted to,” she says.
“Aw, come on,” James says.
“I've already said too much,” Heidi says, turning to stare into me with her cold eyes. An icy, numbing sensation crawls up my spine. I open my mouth to speak, but no words come out. The room is silent, except for the music of songbirds and wind in the trees outside.
Finally, Heidi rubs her hands together to warm them, and points at my belly button. She breathes on her fingers to warm them up, which is really thoughtful.
Despite my awe and fear of her, I find myself not hating the woman.
As her finger goes into my belly button, I say, “Thanks for warming your hands, that's very considera—” I lose the rest of the word as the room rises up and yanks me under.
Chapter Seven
Dirt is piling on me, getting in my mouth. I spit. Dimly, I'm aware of James and Julie and the table full of chipped cups of tea, as that whole world fills with colorless, flavorless gel. My visions always take over like this, s
uffocating and making me panic, but this time it's worse.
Outside my physical body is Slow World, moving at a snail's pace, and I'm entering Heidi's personal Secret Town, her psyche, or her spirit, or whatever it is. This is Heidi's secret life, though I don't know if I'm in the past or the future.
All I know is I can't breathe. The dirt is caked in my mouth, sticking to my tongue like ash, and everything is dark.
Death.
I focus on the idea of rewinding, of backing up, going left instead of right. I can't see anyone, but I know people all around me are crying, and I don't want to be here, wherever and whenever here is.
I pull back, thinking about my intention to move back in time, while I also seek Heidi in this darkness. Why is it so black?
A patch of blue sky opens, and someone falls from above, landing on top of me. The pain. It's over.
Heidi, take me to Halloween. I talk to her from inside my mind, assuming she can hear me, though I've rarely tried direct questions within the visions before. Where were you on Halloween?
I feel something like recognition, a familiarity, a sense of having done all this before.
I've only been able to control my visions as much as the regular dreams I have at night, which is to say damn little, but I'm stronger today. I know I can access the time line at any point, if only I put my will to it.
Halloween, I command. Halloween. Take us there.
The vision is still dark, but it's not from dirt and death. Now it's as though all the lights are off from a power outage. I see Heidi now, and I'm with her. We're at a grocery store, a big chain one, buying bags of miniature candy. I squint and will the vision to brighten, but my efforts only make my head ache.
The cashier doesn't seem bothered by the dark, so I guess it's just me, and not a power failure. Perhaps we have a bad connection due to Heidi being so old—I've mainly tried my power on girls my age.
I move myself as close as possible, until I'm practically overlapping with Heidi, and only then can I dimly make out what's in front of her on the counter. She's not buying candy after all, but miniature packs of raisins, to give to trick-or-treaters. The woman is SO evil.
I push for the vision to move a little faster, and I follow her in the dark, as she goes to a friend's house, a woman about the same age. They drink tea and hand out candy to the little ghosts, Spidermans, and princesses coming to the door.
My head hurts from trying to see. The vision is falling apart, with entire blotches completely black and missing.
The vision feels true and accurate, but like an underexposed piece of film that reveals no information, even when you artificially brighten the image or enhance the contrast. There's nothing here in this murky blackness. Nothing but her alibi for the day of the murder—proof of Heidi's innocence.
* * *
I come back out of the vision and get up from my chair. My head feels light, my mouth waters, and the whole world shrinks to a tiny dot.
* * *
When I come to, James and Julie are looming over me. Julie is crying again. “I don't know what I'd do if anything happened to Zan,” she sobs.
“I'm fine.” I prop myself up on my elbows. “Level with me, guys, did I just faint?”
“Like a girl,” James says.
Julie wallops him on the arm. “Sexist.”
“The sighted are very sensitive,” Heidi says, looming over me from where I'm lying on the floor. “There are side effects to the visions, and the seer is not always just a watcher, but participant.”
From where he's squatting next to me, James turns to Heidi and asks what she means.
She answers by gazing into my eyes, prompting me with a chill.
“I felt the vision that time,” I say. “More than usual. But I couldn't see a damn thing. It was all dark.”
Heidi frowns. “All dark? Curious. Has this ever happened before?”
“I don't think so.”
“What did you see, exactly?”
“I barely saw you buying Halloween treats and having tea with another lady. But the other part of the vision was … abstract.” Talking about the dirt and the death sensation is the type of thing people might freak out about, so I am keeping that to myself. Despite my vagueness, Heidi gives me a resigned nod.
She knows.
Her time in this world is nearly up.
“I'm afraid Zan's aware of my secret now,” she says to James and Julie. “I should have warned him.”
James and Julie turn to me.
“She's dying,” I say.
Julie starts to bawl, hugging small, fragile Heidi to her. James seems to be having trouble keeping his own eyes dry, as am I.
“But she didn't kill her brother, Newt,” I say. “So, she's officially cleared as a suspect.”
The twins are still crouched around me, and I shift to get myself off the floor. Heidi offers her hands to help me to my feet, and when I place my palms on hers, I get a zap, like electricity.
Something's happening.
I'm not in the kitchen.
I'm in a vision, in a domed room made of glass, and the outside is covered in vines and plants. This vision isn't dark, and I like this place, which is humid and comforting, and feels rich in oxygen. My lungs are doing the opposite of suffocating, which is such a relief for a vision. Embedded in the glass walls of the dome are two doors. One is unmarked and a dull yellow, and the other is dark blue, bearing a sign that reads Bridge Club, no entry except to members.
No entry? The skull symbol below the lettering on the sign is taunting me to try.
I reach for the door handle, but it pulls away as the round, glass atrium expands in size. I run to the door as fast as I can without a body, which is barely faster than the door's moving away from me. I leap, soaring through the air, my fingers just grazing the surface of the doorknob—
And I'm flat on my stomach.
In Heidi's kitchen.
Her hands are in the pockets of her apron, and she's saying, “Oh dear, oh dear.”
James and Julie are both frowning at me, looking equally confused and annoyed.
“I'm sorry,” I say, though I don't know about what. I get up—this time without fainting—and back away to the door. I think when my palms touched Heidi's, I was taken into her power, seeing something she's been trying to hide. Was her attempt to hide some secret the reason my own vision was so dark?
These are all things I'd like to think about at my own leisure, far away from Heidi's cottage. By now the tea is cold and I have the sense we should have left ages ago.
We thank her for the tea and cluster by the door. I offer to give her my phone number, in case she thinks of anything else that might be a clue, but she says she doesn't use telephones.
“Figures,” I say, and everyone laughs with fake-sounding, forced merriment. The woman's brother has been murdered and she's dying soon. No part of this is funny, yet it feels better to laugh than cry.
The three of us are quiet as we leave and walk around to the front of the gas station.
As we near the Jeep, Julie says she's too emotional to get behind the wheel, and asks James to drive. I call shotgun and hop in the front seat.
As we pull out onto the highway, Julie comments from the back seat about how nice Heidi seemed and how lovely the cucumber sandwiches were.
“There were no cucumber sandwiches!” I yell.
James shakes his head. “You're so funny sometimes. Just because you didn't eat any doesn't mean there were none.”
* * *
The gritty taste of dirt lingers on my tongue.
Time is short.
The idea of loss overwhelms me when I check my phone and confirm we're out of cell phone range. Austin hasn't sent me many text messages so far today, but now I'm guaranteed not to hear from her until tomorrow. It's been over a week since I've even seen her, and I still have the beautiful necklace I bought her for our four month anniversary.
We talked on the phone last night, and I tried getting her
to cancel her physio appointment and come along with us to the lake, but she insisted I have a nice weekend with fun people. I then made the joke of, “I don't want fun people, I want you!” and she didn't even laugh.
Julie thinks Austin is a Manic Pixie Dream Girl, a one-person performance, and the only jokes she gets are the ones she makes herself. I want to say Julie's wrong.
I turn around and look at Julie, sitting cross-legged in the back seat. “Hey Julie, poke your finger in my belly button. I want to make sure my power is working.”
“No.” She picks up a magazine and starts reading.
“For science,” I say.
She gives me the middle finger. “No way.”
“I guess I'll have to get some random girl at the lake to poke me.” I sigh dramatically.
James yells, “INCONCEIVABLE!”
Julie says, “Translation: he's excited about hooking up with new lake skanks.”
James honks the horn and jumps up and down in his seat. “Lake skanks!”
I yell, “James, no honking in non-emergency situations!”
“Sorry,” he mutters.
I turn to Julie. “Come on Julie, old buddy, old pal, it'll just take a second. I already know you were born with a little tail. What else is there?”
She flips a page and picks at her teeth.
“Don't be a tease,” James says to Julie.
She smacks him across the back of the head with a rolled-up magazine.
“Finger tease,” he says.
“Why don't you put on a skirt and do it yourself,” she says to James.
“It doesn't work that way,” I say. “It only works with females. I can't fool myself.”
“What about a transgendered person?” Julie asks.
“I don't know. We should definitely do more testing. Come on, Julie, just a quickie.”
She holds her magazine up between us.
James asks, “What did you mean back there about feeling the vision?”
Dirt in my mouth. I reach forward and turn on the heat, pointing the vents at myself.
“Fine, don't talk about it,” James says.
A few minutes later, he starts singing a made-up song about lake skanks. “I love to go, a lake-skanking ...”