I leap out of bed and immediately do thirty push-ups, which is ten more than I've ever done. I'm not even cheating like we do in karate class, but doing full dips, straight down, nose to the ground. I stand and stretch, my fingertips brushing against the plaster and the glow-in-the-dark stars affixed to my ceiling.
Whipping off my shirt, I examine my new muscles with admiration, then drop and do another twenty push-ups before hitting the shower.
As I'm adjusting the hot water, the pattern of the tiles around the tub catch my attention. The tiles are actually circles, penny tiles as Gran calls them, and even dry as they are now, they appear to float like dewdrops against the grout. When I was little I misunderstood what she meant and thought the tiles were actual pennies, covered in white paint. One of the tiles is still scratched from where I tried to saw into it with a steak knife, to see the penny. When my failed experiment was discovered, Gran was a little annoyed, but my grandfather thought my childish misunderstanding was hysterical.
Circles don't have sides, but penny tiles fool your eye into thinking they're six-sided tiles, hexagons. Out of the corner of your eye, they're honeycomb-shaped, until you look directly at them. How can a circle seem to have sides, just from being next to other circles? One of life's great mysteries, I suppose.
My arms are pumping with energy today, and the shower curtain bar begs me to grab hold and do chin-ups, but I must resist. Gran would not be pleased if I destroyed the bathroom drywall, so I get down on the bath mat and do some crunches while the shower gets nice and steamy.
I can do anything, I think as I co-wash my hair—a technique Julie suggested, where I skip the shampoo and use my honey-scented conditioner, since even conditioners contain some cleaning agents. This leaves my hair softer and—I like to think—irresistible to the ladies.
Proving me correct, when I come out for breakfast, Gran gives me an admiring pet me on the head. I pet Mibs on his head, completing the chain of love.
Rudy is here, having slept over last night, and I don't even care. He keeps some clothes here and today he's wearing an even bigger belt buckle than usual. “Is that a guy throwing a rope around a cow?” I ask, examining the shiny brass surface.
“The cowboy is lassoing a steer,” Rudy says.
For some reason, this gives me the giggles, and sets him off laughing as well.
As we eat breakfast, Rudy keeps refilling my glass with this new multi-citrus juice he's been bringing over. “These vitamins are restoring your vim!” he says. “You can help me prune some of the bushes in the back yard.”
“I'd love to,” I lie, “but I'm going to the lake with my friends today.”
“Weather's a bit cool for swimming,” Gran says.
“Yes,” Rudy says. “What reason do you have to make that long drive?”
I'm certainly not going to tell them about my planned stopover to question the witch, Heidi. “We can still barbecue and have a bonfire. It's still fun without swimming.”
“Sure could use some help with the hedge clippers,” Rudy says.
Gran swats Rudy playfully. “Let him have his weekend. Kids need their own time and space to figure out who they are.” She pulls the picnic basket down from over the fridge. “I'll pack you kids something healthy so you don't get scurvy.”
“I think scurvy takes longer to develop than one night,” I say.
She begins stuffing the picnic basket, asking who else is going. It's just me, James and Julie, as usual.
Gran pins her hair up so she doesn't get stray hairs in the sandwiches she's making with our gluten-free bread. When she leaves her hair down, her fluffy 'fro is impressive, though she claims to look like the Bride of Frankenstein because of the white streaks flaming from her temples.
“Why isn't your lovely girlfriend going?” she asks.
“She's got physio or something.”
Gran gives Rudy a knowing look. For months they've been dropping little hints about why things won't work out with me and Austin.
My volume rising with irritation, I say, “This is not about the age gap.”
Gran holds one of her graceful hands over her heart. “Zan, I didn't say it was. She's a lovely girl. When you get older, the age gap won't matter nearly so much.” She and Rudy exchange a sickly sweet look. I think they're about two years apart, same as us, but at their age a couple years probably seems like nothing.
Rudy pours some more pink-orange juice into my glass. “Enjoy your puppy love while it lasts. Don't get her pregnant.”
Gran nods.
I can't believe we're having this conversation. I grab the picnic basket and go out the front door to wait on the porch. Mibs winds his brown tabby body around my feet as I put on my shoes, biting my shoelaces. “I'd take you with me, but you hate car rides,” I tell him.
Did that conversation in my kitchen actually happen? Did Rudy really advise me about the perils of teen pregnancy? Little does he know, you have to actually be in the same room with your girlfriend before there's any danger of impregnation. I know all about the birds and the bees, and Austin and I have been very safe. Safe to the point of not very much fun at all.
* * *
I sit on the step for about ten minutes before James and Julie drive up in the blue Jeep they share. Julie's finally got her driver's license, so she's at the wheel. As I get in the back seat, I glance over at Crystal's house, across the street. That's odd. There's yesterday's newspaper on her front porch, as though she's out of town, but she ordinarily tells us if she's going away so Gran can keep an eye on her house.
“You look different,” Julie says, glancing back at me as she pulls the vehicle out onto the road.
“Eyes in front,” James says.
“How do I look?”
She adjusts the rear view mirror to make eye contact with me. “Your eyes are really bright. And you look bigger.”
“Stop flirting with Zan,” James says to his sister, turning to bat his dark eyelashes and blue eyes at me. “Oh, you're so dreamy! You look delicious.”
“You need a girlfriend,” I say, crossing my arms over my chest. “Stop undressing me with your eyes. You need to see some lady tatas and bobos.”
“He does look bigger,” James says to Julie. “All the better for interrogating this witch.” He smacks his fist into his open palm.
“James, you almost looked tough there for a minute,” I say.
“Tougher than you,” he says.
“You guys, we don't have to stop at that woman's place if you're not up to it. I don't feel right dragging you both into my weird shenanigans.”
“I love shenanigans,” Julie says.
“I'm hoping to upgrade from shenanigans to a full-scale fiasco,” James says. “You'd think Newt's ghost could have told you who shot him. I mean, he was there when it happened, right? He saw who shot him, unless it was from behind.”
I'm not a complete idiot, so I had considered that already. “The person must have been wearing a mask,” I say. “It was Halloween, so a masked person wouldn't have even seemed odd to anyone.”
“The killer could have been in a gorilla suit,” Julie says.
“I think we're looking for a clown,” James says. “One of those evil birthday clowns that kidnaps children. Did you find anything online?”
“Sadly, no,” I say. “Newt Steadfast has zero online presence. He was a ghost even before he was a ghost. Besides, if it was that obvious, the cops would have solved it already. I think he asked me because I have to use my power.”
“I don't like it when you use your power,” Julie says. “A person isn't supposed to know someone else's secrets. If it's not mutual, or fair. You're taking advantage!”
“Easy, Julie. I don't do it without permission.”
She's getting awfully agitated, and I don't know why. Her voice rises as she yells, “You might ask for permission, but the girls have no idea what they're getting into!”
“Calm your road rage,” James says. “Keep it between the lines or I'll ha
ve to take over driving.”
Her voice tiny now, Julie says she'll be fine if we can leave her alone for a few minutes. James gives me a confused look, as if to say he has no idea what's going on. Julie turns on the stereo, loud.
* * *
The building where we first met Heidi is near the lake, right at the border where cell phone reception cuts out. At the front of the place is an Orange Crush sign and a fairly nondescript little gas station—the dusty type you find in the countryside anywhere in America.
The three of us walk around the side of the building together. At the back, hidden away from the road, is a cottage straight out of a fairytale, with shutters on the windows and garden gnomes in green jackets and red caps stationed around the yard with shovels and petunia-filled wheelbarrows.
James says he's not scared at all, but he pulls out his cell phone and dials 9 and 1 just to be cautious.
I knock on the door, brave enough with my backup here. My clever plan is to tell Heidi I'm working as a consultant to Detective Wrong on the case, and if anything should happen to me, the whole police department will be on her scrawny, evil butt in a heartbeat.
A sweet little old lady opens the door. “I remember you three,” she says.
James and Julie greet her warmly, sticking out their hands for shaking. The woman, who has rosy, round apple cheeks and smooth pale skin, smiles graciously. Her shoulder-length white hair falls in gentle waves, and she has the aura of someone who captures spiders and flies with a cup and a sheet of paper, in order to free them outside. This woman isn't Heidi, and yet, she is. She says she's Heidi.
Mutely, I shake her hand.
“Well, look at that,” she says, taking out a handkerchief, then wetting it on her tongue and rubbing at the corner of my mouth. Her evil spit is touching my skin and I'm too horrified to push her away. Rubbing saliva on my face? Yup, it's Heidi.
“Explain yourself!” I say sternly. “The last time I saw you was when you kidnapped me and attempted to murder me!”
“Don't be silly,” she says lightly. “You asked us to help with your memory, and that was all we were doing. Nobody murdered you. Clearly. Here you are.”
She gestures to me with her hands, and James and Julie both laugh, all three of them making me feel ridiculous.
She and Newt did try to kill me, though, didn't they? Why else would they have tied me up?
I announce, with what I hope is the air of authority, “Never mind that. We're here to investigate the mysterious death of one Mr. Newt Steadfast.”
“Oh, dear. You heard about that? Did it make the papers? I'm still not sure exactly what happened.”
“You know DAMN WELL what happened!”
Heidi blinks and takes a step back.
“Zan!” Julie yells at me.
“Dude!” James says. “Manners much? Be a psycho psychic on your own time, but you're with me now, so you gotta be chill, okay?”
Despite my verbal attack, Heidi invites us in for tea.
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.
Witches and Ghosts Supernatural Mysteries Page 130