by Harper Lin
“Uh, yeah. Well, it could be.” I couldn’t tell them that it was more than likely not even Topher talking, but some really annoyed, really nasty demon with a yearning for a strong, young, previously deceased body to dress up in and roam the streets looking for more lives to ruin.
“I’ll get you Treacle. He moseyed in this morning looking a little worn. I think he got into a fight.” Cody slowly walked to the back door with the word CATS in thick black block letters with a silhouette of a cat underneath it.
He emerged carrying my big black cat, and I instantly saw the small clip out of his right ear.
“Oh, Treacle, what have you been getting into?” I said, scooping the cat into my arms and holding him tightly. He had been scared, and so had I. His motor started to run, and the purring felt comforting as he nuzzled into my neck. “If you could put this on my running tab?” I joked. It seemed as if I was always paying the shelter a fee for my cat. “Are you two going to be all right? Do you want me to send Chief Talbot over, you know, just for the heck of it?”
Cody and Naomi shook their heads.
“I’m going to see my grandpa again tonight. I’ll ask him what he thinks we should do,” Cody said.
“Good idea,” I said.
All we needed was a few more hours, and we might be able to help Topher without police intervention. I hoped. But now I still had to get to the Parks. If just the mention of the Park name sent Topher off like that, only heaven knew what he would do if he actually got his hands on one of them.
Park House
Stepping foot into Min’s parents’ house was not only like stepping back in time to my teenage years but to an exotic and mysterious place. Beautiful Korean paintings graced the walls. The furniture was sparse but elegantly arranged. Lush green plants grew from baskets and pots placed all over the house, giving the atmosphere a natural, organic feel. Family photos of Min growing up were scattered around in abundance.
At the front door was a row of shoes, including a pair of size nine black ballet flats that were mine. It was customary in Asian homes to take off your shoes even before closing the door. The home was a sanctuary. It was a peaceful place for contemplation and meditation. Usually. But not today.
Mrs. Park seemed civil, while Mr. Park was cold and standoffish as usual. I tried not to take it personally. I told them why I’d come. It seemed they knew exactly what I was talking about when I said I’d come to warn them about Topher’s behavior while pretending I knew nothing about why he might be acting that way. I thought I’d pulled it off fairly convincingly, but the Parks still seemed to assume I knew something.
It wasn’t long before they started arguing. As I looked at them, Mr. Park particularly, I thought about Tommy. He hadn’t looked much like Mr. Park, except for the black hair and tan skin. He must’ve taken after his mother. I supposed if anyone were to look closely, he could have seemed a bit Asian, but mostly, he seemed Hispanic.
“What are you trying to say?” Mrs. Park yelled at her husband, who stood straight and defiantly in their living room.
I had shrunk back into the chair I was sitting in in the kitchen, trying to figure out how to get to the front door and slip out unnoticed.
“You heard the girl,” Mr. Park said in a low voice through clenched teeth. “This trouble has come back to us and now—”
“To us? This was not my trouble. You brought this with you, and now we have to explain to the whole world—”
They went on arguing for several more minutes.
“I really just think he’s chosen you guys to fixate on.” I’d explained how he had exploded at the theater and at the mere mention of Min’s name. “I hate to say it, but you guys have a nice business in town, and everyone knows you. You know how Topher is. If we didn’t grow up with him around, we’d think he was just a string of dynamite short of being the Unabomber, living up there alone in the woods and keeping so much to himself. Yeah, it’s just one of those things.” I tried to act naïve, but when Mrs. Park’s eyes filled with tears, I knew they knew what this was about. I was pretty sure they knew I knew.
“You know what this is about, don’t you?” she’d asked her husband.
“No,” was all Mr. Park had said at first. But he couldn’t look at his wife. Instead, he held his head up high and looked past her out the window.
That must have been something he had done before, because Mrs. Park pounced. “Yes, you do. A problem of the past has finally risen to the surface. There will be no rest until you face this shame.”
“I do not need the council of a woman!” Mr. Park had barked. He got angrier and angrier by the minute. “The past cannot be changed!”
“That’s true, but you can make amends. You never did that with me or with Min. You let Min think he wasn’t good enough when it was you who had the indiscretion.”
My whole body had heated up with embarrassment. What was I doing, sitting there with a tiny cup of tea that Mrs. Park had poured for me over fifteen minutes earlier? Had they forgotten I was sitting there? Didn’t they want to know what to do next?
Apparently not, because they’d continued their argument, and I learned a little bit more about the whole situation than I really cared to know.
“What can I do now? The mother is dead,” Mr. Park growled.
“Her name was Alice. You are not so cruel you have forgotten the name of the mother of your first son? Your first son, Thomas, who is also dead, not knowing his real father.” Her voice was loud, and if no one in the town knew about this, there was a good chance a couple of them might know now. “You never talk to me about this. You say it happened like it was nothing. Like I was to accept it and just move on. Forgive and forget. But all this time, you never make things right. So how can I make it right? How can I clean up your mess? And when you see his name in the paper, you say nothing? You shed no tears. You don’t go to the funeral? You don’t mourn him?”
Those words made Mr. Park lower his head and close his eyes. “I do mourn him. You don’t know this burden I have carried.”
His voice was low, and I thought for a moment I would cry myself.
Mrs. Park walked up to her husband and stood directly in front of him, forcing him to make eye contact with her. For a second, I thought she was going to crack him across the face. But she didn’t. She stood there strong and straight.
“How can you say that when I have carried it with you?” she asked.
“A woman’s burden is not the same as a man’s. There is more to this than you can possibly understand.”
Mrs. Park folded her arms across her chest. “Then maybe you need to talk to Topher. Man to man. And you both can mourn and finally lay to rest this mess that you caused.”
“I wouldn’t suggest doing that,” I said, putting my hands up and instantly regretting opening my mouth. They glared at me like I was some kind of interloper, which, at that moment, I was. “I’m not trying to get into your business. Really, I’m not. But going to talk to Topher right now may just be, well, too dangerous. You may end up doing more harm than good.”
“You are not part of this family,” Mr. Park said calmly but with bitterness. “I don’t need advice from you.”
Mrs. Park seemed to agree with her husband and looked at me with anger and hurt in her eyes. All I could think of was what Min would think of all this. What would he think of me bringing this into his family’s home?
I nodded and stood, hearing the bones in my knees crack with relief. I had been sitting so stone still, they had locked up a little. “I’m sorry. But please don’t go talk to Topher. He’s not well. Give it a couple of days, or weeks even.”
I could tell by their faces they were getting angrier by the second, and their silence was making me nervous. Images of Mrs. Park physically tossing me out of her home to land square on my keister flashed through my mind, so I made my way quickly to the front door.
They resumed their argument in Korean. I felt bad for them and for myself. Had I done the right thing by warning
them? Yes. Yes, I had. They had to know that Topher wasn’t stable right now.
But no matter how much I tried to comfort myself, I still felt as though I’d done way more harm than good. I wanted to call Min right away and maybe give him a heads-up about everything that had gone on, but I could only imagine what Mr. and Mrs. Park would say if I told Min about the relationship between his father and Alice Thompson.
I decided to try something new and kept my mouth shut.
I made my way back to Aunt Astrid’s house. When I got there, Bea had left for the Brew-Ha-Ha and Aunt Astrid was searching around for a couple of books we needed to study to prepare for the full moon in two days.
“There is nothing you can do now, Cath. What’s done is done,” she said, searching through her library, which was spread throughout almost every room in her home.
“You sound like you aren’t happy I went to them.”
“Your intentions were good. I know they were. But this is a sticky topic. It might have been better if you’d gone over your plan with Bea and me.”
I picked at my thumbnail. I didn’t think anyone could make me feel worse than the Parks had, but I was wrong. Aunt Astrid was right. I should have talked it out a little more, especially after I’d seen the shape Topher was in at the animal shelter. That reminded me of something I was reluctant to talk to anyone about. When I mentioned it to Aunt Astrid, she looked at me with a frightened expression.
“He mentioned monsters under your bed?” she said, her hand to her chest and her voice quieter.
I nodded.
She quickly turned back to her books and pulled an old-looking gray tome off the shelf. When she blew on it, a few specks of dust flew off, and she hustled to another shelf across the room. She ran her index finger along the spines until an “a-ha” let me know she’d found the book she was looking for.
“Sit down,” she said to me without emotion.
I sat in the corner of her soft, flower-patterned couch and looked at her. Aunt Astrid’s eyes scanned around deliberately, as if she was pushing her gaze through the various dimensions that only she could see. She opened the gray book and read aloud.
When Aunt Astrid read a spell, it sounded like a song. The words were like a poem and brought a slight swirl to the air, like a gentle breeze. I felt calm settle over me. Then her voice became quieter and the words indistinguishable as she muttered them. Her hand rested gently on my head, and I felt the tingly sensation of magic float over and through me. The whole ritual took less than a minute, but I immediately felt different.
“What was that for?” I asked.
“It’s just a little protection spell. That Unfamiliar looked at you. He saw your face, even if it was just through the frosted glass of that door. Today he got a good look at you. Not just your face but inside your soul. He knows more than he should. I don’t know how that can be.”
I didn’t like how her face looked and how she wouldn’t meet my gaze.
“So this spell will protect me?” I asked.
“It will make it a little hard for him to read your thoughts, but it isn’t permanent nor is it foolproof. And for a short time, you may not be able to talk to the cats.”
My eyes filled with tears, but I nodded my understanding.
“I’m sorry, honey, but it’s the only way,” Aunt Astrid said.
I knew she felt bad, but I also got the feeling I was being punished just a little bit.
Protection Spell
The next two days were spent preparing for the full moon as if we were all cramming for finals. This was difficult as we’d reopened the Brew-Ha-Ha already. The whole town had missed us, and we were busier than ever. We took on more staff to handle the customers. We would’ve rejoiced in our grand reopening if it weren’t for all of this Unfamiliar trouble.
Every night after closing down the Brew-Ha-Ha, we gathered in the cellar, and while sipping herb tea, we dog-eared pages, underlined passages, made notes into the wee hours of the morning.
“Well, from everything we’ve read, it’s pretty obvious the Parks will be the next target. They’re the only family Topher has left, even if they don’t acknowledge each other as such,” Bea said. “Everything in these books regarding raising the dead confirms a familial tie is the strongest way raise the dead. No wonder it’s never practiced. How morbid.”
“Is anyone hungry?” I asked a little sheepishly.
“Really? You’re thinking of food now?” Bea looked at me while Aunt Astrid chuckled in the corner.
“Come on. We have to open the Brew-Ha-Ha in what?” I looked at my watch. “Holy moly. Forty-five minutes. I don’t know about you two, but I want something a little stronger than tea to drink and something with sugar to eat.”
“I think Cath is right,” Astrid said. “We’ll need our strength tonight. We need to eat and get some rest.”
We made our way up from the cellar. The bright morning light cascaded in through the big front windows, and coffee was quickly brewed. Every morning, Daisy’s Garden, the local flower shop, left a fresh delivery of flowers by the front door. I scooped them up and deeply inhaled the wonderful smell of rosebuds with sprigs of baby’s breath. After breaking up the bouquet, I filled the tiny bud vases that graced the counter and the couple of mismatched tables we’d acquired during the last village-wide garage sale.
A bit of movement out of my peripheral vision caught my attention. It was Treacle. He slinked in, setting off the tinkling bells over the door. He looked at me. I looked at him. I couldn’t hear a thing.
Nearly bursting into tears, I scooped him up in my arms, stroking his black fur. “I’m sorry, buddy. I can’t talk right now. Not until this whole mess is over with.”
I rubbed his head and felt his purring motor. I don’t know if he understood me since we usually communicated telepathically. I hoped he did. I inspected his scratches from the other night. They appeared to be getting better, and for that, I was thankful. I set him on the counter, where he batted the baby’s breath for a second then looked at me.
Aunt Astrid came up to the counter and skirted around it to sit at the nearest table. “Well, look who came to visit.” She ran her hand over Treacle’s back, making him arch his body happily.
“I can’t hear him. I don’t think there has ever been a time I didn’t hear him talk to me.”
Tilting her head to the left, Aunt Astrid smiled. “It won’t last too much longer, honey. I promise. But it’s better safe than sorry. You can explain to Treacle once this whole mess is over.”
I nodded, my eyes still stinging as I tried to keep from crying like a baby. Then someone set off the bells over the door with a fierce push. It was Jake and Blake. Wiping my eyes, I straightened up and squared my shoulders.
“Good morning, boys. Coffee?” I said, sniffling as I smiled.
Blake looked at me as if I had turned green. He stepped a little closer and was about to say something when Jake made his announcement.
“No, Cath. We’ve got a problem.”
Bea came up front from the kitchen. “Hi, honey.” She leaned over the counter to greet Jake, who met her halfway for a kiss. “Something wrong?”
“Topher’s gone missing. Have you seen him?”
Bea, Aunt Astrid, and I looked at each other, and even Treacle stood up and nudged me with his head.
“No. We haven’t.” I said. “Are you sure? He’s been known to roam around the woods and sometimes stake out a place to sit and think or meditate or whatever it is that he does by himself.”
“No, he’s missing. Cody has been taking care of him since Old Murray is recovering, and he said he never came back after their altercation and he hasn’t touched his blood pressure today or yesterday.”
“Oh no. Poor Topher,” Aunt Astrid said.
“That’s not the only problem,” Jake added. “Have any of you seen Mr. Lei Park recently?”
My heart sank down to my stomach. “I saw him the day before yesterday.”
Blake gave me a once-o
ver. The look he gave me made me think he might be worried that I had been crying about something related to his case, but that quickly went away as he shifted into facts-just-the-facts mode. He pulled out his little notebook and pen.
“Where did you see him?” he asked, his voice hard and all business.
“I… was… at their house.”
“What time was that?”
I rolled my eyes. “It was in the morning.”
“What did you go there for? Did you have something to do with the argument he had with his wife?”
My heart that had sunk to my stomach tightened up and pounded in my ears. I knew I looked guilty of something. “Why?”
“Mrs. Park said you were there when they were having a fight. Do you know what it was about?”
I knew Blake was studying my body language, my eye movement, my tone, but I couldn’t tell him the truth. I couldn’t tell him about Alice Thompson. Not only would the Parks never forgive me, but I’d never forgive myself. “I did kind of arrive as something was heating up, but I was looking for Min. I only stayed for about fifteen minutes, maybe half an hour tops, then I left.” It wasn’t a complete lie. It was just maybe half the truth.
Blake nodded as he scribbled his notes. Then he looked at Jake as if to say he didn’t think I was telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God.
When the two detectives left, they didn’t have much more than they had started with. Jake gave Bea a wink as if to let her know he might pick her brain a little later when no one else was around. The truth was none of us knew where Topher or Mr. Park could be. Even Treacle was on edge as he nudged me and forced his head underneath my hand. He must have sensed something was wrong and wanted a little extra attention.
“Where do you think they could be?” Bea asked, looking from me to Aunt Astrid.
I shrugged, but Aunt Astrid had a very calm expression. Her chin was raised, and she looked off as if she were staring out the windows.