Summerwind Magick: Making Witches of Salem

by Rick Bettencourt

  Carolyn kicked him under the table. While she’d confessed about her crush on him, she didn’t want it known.

  “That his looks were quite striking,” Michael finished.

  Carolyn grinned. So much for subtlety. “Oh, Michael, you shouldn’t share my proclivities.” She dug a heel into his toe.

  Michael flinched.

  Jay, in a gray San Jose T-shirt over a long-sleeved off-white thermal, leaned back. “Oh, Carolyn. You’re quite beautiful yourself.” He put a sinewy forearm on Michael’s chair.

  “Why, thank you, Jay. I bet you say that to all the girls.”

  “And boys,” Michael said.

  Jay chuckled. “I haven’t said it to many men. But why pass up the chance?”

  Michael turned to him. “Well?”

  “Well, what? Oh…you’re very beautiful, too.”

  Michael shrugged a shoulder. “I prefer handsome, but I’ll take what I can get.”

  Carolyn placed her napkin on the table. “Well, boys, I’m exhausted. Perhaps you two can continue this little chitchat.”

  Jay turned to Michael. “Would you be interested in seeing my log?”

  Michael choked on his water.

  Carolyn shook her head. “Michael, a log is not what you think.” She bit back a laugh. “He means his location log. It’s a book of photos the scouts take for places to film.”

  “Oh.” Michael wiped his mouth. “Oh, sure. I’d love to see…your log.”

  The lit hearth sent crackles throughout the tavern, and Michael moved to his favorite spot in front of it, sipped his after-dinner drink, and waited for Jay. Finally, cooler weather warranted the use of the fireplace. Drinking again, he thought, recalling the classic song. He’d never had so much alcohol in his life, except in high school when he and Carolyn were bullied by Seth Stevenson and crew. He wiped the image from his mind. No wonder Carolyn never wants to talk about it.

  When Jay returned with the log under his arm, Michael tried to keep faithful thoughts of Terrence in mind and avoid glancing below Jay’s beltline, but his efforts proved futile.

  Jay took a seat beside him on the leather couch and ordered a round of drinks. He lay the book, unopened, on the trunk in front of them and talked about his involvement with various studios.

  With cocktails underway, they sipped, and conversations veered off work and into relationships.

  “Well, we’re practically married,” Michael said.

  “Good for you. I can’t keep a girl past Tuesday.”

  “Sounds like me, with men, before I settled down.”

  Jay ordered another Scotch. “Well, I’m not gay, if that’s what you’re getting at.”

  “I never meant to imply—”

  “But,” Jay looked over his shoulder, then turned to Michael, and lowered his voice, “if Brad Pitt wanted me to…” He put his hands up. “Well, yeah, I wouldn’t throw him out of bed.”

  “Now that would be hot!” Michael sat back. “How about Martha Stewart?”

  Jay put his head down and shook it. “I’m sorry. While she’s a good-looking older woman, I draw the line at doing Martha.” He looked up and smiled at Michael. “All right, now let me ask you some questions.”

  Michael took a pull from his B&B. “You mean you’d mess around with Brad Pitt over Martha?”

  Jay sat back and laughed. “Be quiet.” He looked over Michael’s shoulder.

  Michael turned. “No one’s paying attention.” He looked back at Jay.

  Jay put his hand on Michael’s knee. “You’re going to get me in trouble.”

  “Me?” Michael looked down at Jay’s hand, sans ring.

  Jay leaned forward.

  For a moment, Michael thought Jay might kiss him, and he closed his eyes.

  “So, who would you do?” Jay asked.

  “Umm, like meaning…?”

  “For a woman.”

  “Oh, I don’t—”

  “C’mon. How about Lorna Toomey from The Alabasters?”

  “She’s gorgeous.”

  “You’d do her?”

  Michael shrugged. “I guess.”

  “What about Carolyn Sohier?”

  Michael grew cold. “No.”

  “Just ask—”

  “We’re like brother and sister.”

  “Sorry. Say…look here.” Jay elbowed him.

  Michael cleared his throat and put his drink on the trunk.

  Jay pulled the location log closer and riffled through it. “These are the pictures I took for Witches, or, as I called it back then, The Witchcraft of Show Biz, knowing all the hoopla Cantor can create. It didn’t have a name at the time.” He pulled an envelope out from the back of the book. “Oh, and these are from Summerwind.”

  “Huh?”

  “The place in Maine that I got back from…with that crazy loon, Rebecca.”

  “She’s…crazy?” The drink had gone to Michael’s head, and he felt a little tipsy.

  “She made me get them developed to see if I captured a ghost or something.”

  “In the pictures?”

  “Yeah. She said she saw some bat-winged man on the shore when I was taking pictures. She was scared shitless the whole trip. Even asked the lady, Viola, who owns the inn and had been walking her dog on the beach if she’d seen it.”

  Michael put a hand to his chest and leaned back. “Did it photograph?”

  “Of course not.” Jay tapped a finger to his head. “She’s looney tunes. There was no bat-winged man. Here, let’s look at the Salem pics. I’ll add the Maine ones later.” He returned the envelope to the back of the book and turned a page. “Here’s Pickering Wharf.”

  “Oh, yeah. I recognize it.” Michael leaned in toward him. The smell of Jay’s cologne, a sweet sandalwood scent, chased away thoughts of the place he and Carolyn frequented as teens.

  Jay flipped another page. “Here’s a restaurant over by the bridge. I don’t know…I thought it might be kind of cool as part of the film’s underground. You never know what some of the directors are looking for, so it’s better to take more than less.”

  In Michael’s drunken haze, the room wobbled. He looked at the pictures Jay pointed to, and as a waitress passed, he asked her for some water.

  Jay pulled at Michael’s sleeve. “Look here. Here’s a great sunset I took over by the college…Marblehead, I think.” He perused the book some more. “Oh, and this is Peabody, or as I was told to pronounce it, Pea-bidy.”

  Michael watched the waitress get his water. “Huh?” He looked down at the book. “Did you say Peabody, really?”

  “No, you have to say it like Pea-bidy!” Jay laughed.

  “That’s where Carolyn and I grew up…well, at least, spent our high school years.”

  “Really? Well, look here, then. Maybe you’ll recognize this.” Jay put the book on his lap and paged through some more.

  Michael glimpsed pictures of downtown Peabody, the mall, and Brooksby Farms.

  “These are from the high school,” Jay said.

  Michael took the water from the waitress. “Wait a minute.” He put the glass down. “Let me see.”

  “I thought it might be a good location for another picture I’m working on…for Zach Littlefield.” Jay grabbed his Scotch. “That is, if the Massachusetts Film Office continues their tax break.”

  “Wait! Go back.” Michael leafed the page back, one that Jay had skimmed past.

  “Oh, that?” Jay took a sip of his Scotch. “I came upon it in the woods behind the high school.” He leaned in toward Michael. “I had to piss really bad. And while there, I stumbled—literally, nearly tore a ligament—across this.” He pointed to a picture of a dirt area and a broken bottle of Canadian Club half-buried in the ground.

  Michael jumped back. “What?” He stood up and looked at Jay. “Who are you?”

  Jay looked around. “What are you talking about?”

  Michael pointed to the book, still opened at the picture. “How did you know?”

  “Dude.”
Jay put the book back on the table. “I think maybe you’ve had too much…” He grabbed Michael’s arm. “It’s just a spot where some of the kids probably hung out, smoked, and drank.” He looked down at the book. “Reminded me of this script I read—”

  “That’s not a coincidence.” Michael backed up.

  “You been there?” Jay asked.

  “When did you take that?”

  “Last spring. Why?”

  “I got to go!” Michael turned and left. He knew he wouldn’t make it upstairs to the room, so he ran across the lobby to the men’s room, pushed open the door, rushed into a stall, and vomited in the toilet.

  As he clung to the bowl, his mind flashed back to high school. A bottle of whisky forced in his mouth and a slam to his head. Carolyn!

  He pressed his cheek against the cool toilet as the memory of an Aerosmith song played in his head like it had that night.

  Maine or Bust

  The more that time passed since seeing the photograph of that whisky bottle behind the high school, the better Michael felt. With the memories it invoked, he understood why Carolyn chose to bury the pain. And he did the same.

  During this time—bouncing between watching Carolyn on the set and kicking back at the Hawthorne with the cast, crew, and hotel staff—it occurred to him that Carolyn spent her days either in fear of the director’s wrath or ignoring him completely, trusting her instinct. He wished she’d let her intuition rule, for her talent shined when she did. Yet after all these years—perhaps she could blame high school and Seth Stevenson—she still questioned her impulses. Her quandary ensued.

  On an early fall day, the executive producer of Witches of Salem, Jack Cantor, arrived and showered Carolyn with accolades for her contribution to the film, yet concluded filming needed to return to California. “Thank you, Carolyn,” he said. “Thus far, you’ve made a masterpiece out of mere rubbish.” His Capote-like voice whispered within earshot of Jonathan Dodger. “Hopefully, going forward, you’ll get better direction, and we’ll be able to channel the brilliance the writer intended.”

  The compliment, according to Michael, had Carolyn at odds with Dodger, and he avoided her for the remainder of the day. Production returned to wrap the Salem scenes. The news of being Hollywood-bound took its time to reach the crew.

  Over the next few days, production wound down.

  “I’ve got a flight out this afternoon,” Jay said to Michael, who sat on the edge of the bed in Jay’s room at the Hawthorne. Jay squirted shave cream in his hand and spread it around his jawline. “Two-day itch. Can’t stand it.”

  “You asked me up here to watch you shave?” Michael asked, studying Jay’s naked torso and firm buttocks cupped in a pair of tan corduroy jeans.

  “No, but I don’t mind.” Jay’s buckle, from the undone belt around his waist, tapped the edge of the sink. He drew an upward shave through the lather on his neck.

  “Julia told me to come up.” Michael tried not to stare at Jay’s biceps and the soft patch of hair that traced his abs. “She said you wanted”—he swallowed—“to see me.”

  “I did.” In little time, Jay completed shaving the fuzz from his face and neck, and, with a towel, wiped away the rest of the shave cream. “I told her if she saw you, to have you come up. She and I have been busy with the new location.”

  Michael leaned back with his hands on the bed. The look Jay gave—with his glimmering blue eyes and a flash of pearly whites—unnerved Michael. “What?” Michael straightened.

  Jay grabbed a comb and slicked back a strand of wet hair. “I wanted you to be the first to know.”

  “Okay? What?”

  “The film’s moving to Maine.”

  “It is?” Michael scratched his head. “Why are you telling me? Why me first?” Michael didn’t trust Jay’s intentions. “I’m just a schmuck along for the ride.”

  Jay threw the comb onto the vanity and sauntered into the main room. He had an animal quality to his gait, like a lion on the prowl.

  Michael took in Jay’s bare feet. They hardly made a sound against the floor. Michael, never one to find the tootsies of another man all that appealing, found something in this lion’s appendages that made him sweat. “You sure I didn’t catch you at a bad time?”

  Jay leaned against the chest of drawers and folded his arms across his sculpted chest. “No. I just got out of the shower.”

  “You were saying…Maine?”

  “Oh, yeah.” A devilish grin grew on Jay’s face. “Dodger’s going to start filming on this little island called Summerwind, just outside of Bar Harbor.”

  Michael raised an eyebrow, remembering the photographs Jay had shown him that night in the tavern. “Rumor has it Cantor wanted everyone back in LA, back to his ‘production bubble,’ as he called it.”

  Jay put his hands in his pockets, which nudged his pants down a bit. Michael looked to the floor to avoid seeing more than he should and kicked at the carpet.

  “Jonathan Dodger and I were able to persuade Cantor otherwise.” A drawer closed with a soft thud.

  “Oh?”

  Jay walked over to Michael, took his hands out of his pockets, and sat next to him on the bed. “Michael.”

  “Yeah.” Michael took in Jay’s freshly showered scent and swallowed.

  Jay leaned in. “I know how to make a man happy…just as much as I do a woman.” He put a hand on Michael’s knee.

  Michael shot up. “Jay! I-I-I’m a married man!” He moved to the bureau. “Well…practically.” He turned around but flinched when he found himself face-to-face with Jay.

  Jay pulled him closer.

  Michael froze.

  Jay grabbed Michael’s butt, moaned, and their lips touched.

  Michael wanted to pull away, but the feel of Jay’s mouth caressing his, ever so slightly, felt nice. The man’s breath warm and minty. A tad more pressure to the kiss befell. It had been so long since he and Terrence had been together—and years, before his partner, by someone other. Shame on…oh, but this is—

  Jay kissed him hard, and his lips moved to Michael’s neck.

  Michael closed his eyes. No! A shiver shot down his spine.

  Jay undid the top button of Michael’s shirt. “I got so revved up,” Jay said, “with Jonathan and Cantor—”

  Michael pulled away. “What?”

  Jay stood there with a lump showing in his pants and his belt flapping. “Oh…I…Jonathan and I…You see. We play this game in front of Cantor—our way of entertaining the boss.”

  Michael went slack-jawed.

  Jay pulled his belt off with the sound of a whip. “But I didn’t get to…finish.”

  “I’m sorry,” Michael said and stepped backward with his hands up.

  “What’s the matter?” Jay asked. “I know you want me.”

  Michael started for the exit. “You can play your little—” Michael’s foot hit the bottom of the door as it opened and the frame jounced. “Go do your casting-couch things with Cantor and Dodger—”

  “Wait!” Jay put his hand on Michael’s shoulder. “That’s not what I meant.”

  Michael turned. “I’m all set, Jay. I don’t need to play sex games with you.” He exited the room.

  Alan, the waiter, stopped in the hall. “Oh…hey.” His eyes darted between the men and lingered a bit longer on Jay’s half-opened pants.

  “It’s not what you think,” Michael offered.

  Alan shrugged. “What happens in Salem…” He left.

  Jay grabbed the door. “I won’t be going.”

  Michael turned to face him. “Huh?”

  “To Maine.” Jay buttoned the top of his pants. “My job was to find the place. No need for me to go there. I thought you and I…before I head back to Calif—”

  “You thought wrong,” Michael said and walked out into the hall. “Best of luck back in California.”

  Death Becomes Her

  In contrast to the spate of recent cool temperatures, filming labored its final days on location in the
heat of Salem Willows Park. A fake green maple tree, overnighted from LA, moved past Carolyn to stand in for the dying one behind her.

  “Approaching ninety degrees in the fall,” Carolyn said, fanning her black cape to produce some semblance of a breeze. “I’m melting like the Wicked Witch of the West.”

  Rebecca took Carolyn’s conical hat and waved it in front of the actress. “You’re not melting. Not on my watch.”

  Berniece drew a bottle of water across her forehead. “No, but I am.”

  “Go home, Cantor! Go home, Cantor!” chanted the crowd cordoned off in the parking lot. Despite news traveling to the public that the movie would soon leave the town to film elsewhere, members of the Wiccan community continued to protest.

  Berniece trudged off to watch the fence—still attending to her duties as a security guard. “Lord, have mercy.” She took a megaphone from a table near the director’s trailer and left.

  Carolyn had grown to like the witches more and more. Berniece’s way with the crowd, while not always appeasing them, usually garnered enough time to work in a few scenes, and Rebecca’s kind demeanor spoke nothing to her of the mischief that Julia and Jonathan Dodger seemed to find in the girl.

  Berniece’s voice boomed in the distance, “Did you hear the one about the witch and warlock?” She paused. “They’re favorite subject in school be spellin’!” Her scratchy laugh followed.

  The protesters groaned.

  The day meandered on. After three takes of a newly written scene, Carolyn felt confident she’d captured the essence of Marigold’s moment and aired a sigh of relief. “Done.” She removed her hat as Rebecca carted her chair into the shade, and the actress sat down. “Thanks, Becky,” Carolyn said to her. “But you don’t have to do that. That’s what the PAs are for.”

  “No worries,” said the witch, picking at a fingernail. “I like to keep myself busy.” She gnawed a cuticle.

  Carolyn shrugged as Dodger sat by her side. They watched a replay of the scene in a small monitor, as Michael hung in the background.

  “Okay. Okay.” Dodger’s face remained stoic.

  Carolyn preferred to take in the director’s reactions rather than view her performance on the tiny screen. Her last take satisfied her. She felt the character and that was all the recognition she needed.