by Gary Jonas
“She stole that first. I just channeled your father.”
She shook her head and laughed. Her father was a kleptomaniac wizard who stole shit from everyone. For a few years when I was eleven and twelve, I wanted to be like him, and he taught me a few skills. My father was so pissed. I’ll never forget his admonishing finger waving in my face. “So you’ll apply yourself to thievery, but not to magic?”
But stealing shit was fun until you got caught, and I was never any good at the whole magic thing.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Lakesha met us at the hearse a few minutes later. She unlocked the vehicle and we piled inside with Sabrina in the center again.
“I trust everything went well with the cops?” I asked.
“I called them, but I didn’t stick around to see them.”
“You had to call them?”
Lakesha nodded as she wheeled around a curve to exit the shopping center parking lot. “Yeah,” she said. “I went back to the jewelry store, but it was closed. No cops. No crime scene tape or anything.”
“That’s weird,” I said. “But not as weird as the shit we dealt with.” I filled her in on the run-in with Abigail. We were on the highway headed home by the time I finished up and dangled the black onyx necklace in one hand, letting it swing back and forth like a pendulum.
“So you’re a thief as well as a slacker,” Lakesha said. “We should return the jewel. I’ll turn around at the next exit. If I can get over, that is.” She signaled to change lanes, but Houston traffic at rush hour is a parking lot, and with all the highways and byways swirling over and under one another, it’s a real pain in the ass to get where you want to go. The lane beside us was packed bumper to bumper. The guy in front of us hit the brakes, and Lakesha was still looking to see if she could get over.
“Brakes,” I said.
She hit the brakes hard enough to bark the tires. Fortunately, we weren’t going fast and managed to stop without a collision.
“You said the store was closed,” I said. “We’re never going to be able to get over, and we’re in the right lane to get back to forty-five. Let’s just hang on to the necklace for now. Besides, we may need it to deal with Abigail. She had to have stolen it for a reason.”
“Well, since the store is closed, and I don’t want to deal with rush hour traffic any longer than I have to, we’ll call it good for the day. But you need to promise to return it. I don’t want that old man to get fired.”
“I promise. Gene Gene the Dancing Machine will get to keep his shit job.”
“How do you know it’s a shit job?” Sabrina asked.
“Because it’s a job.”
She shrugged. “You have a point.”
“Not all jobs are bad,” Lakesha said.
“That’s true,” I said.
“You’ve never had a job,” Sabrina said.
“That’s not true. I had a blow job just last week.”
“Girl,” Lakesha said. “I can’t reach past you, so you need to slap him for me.”
So Sabrina slapped my left arm and shoulder multiple times. I suspect at least one of those was for Lakesha.
But I didn’t care. It was worth it.
When we got back to Galveston, I told Sabrina to head back to the house, told Lakesha I’d see her the next day after two, and hopped in my car without telling them where I was going.
I was tired, and I wanted to go home, but I felt I had a promise to make good on while there was still some light left.
Demetrius was in his room when I arrived at the haunted house. I knocked on the doorjamb to get his attention.
“Hi, Brat,” he said.
“Try that again, little man,” I said.
“Hi, Brett.”
“That’s better. It’s a bit dark in here. Come on out on the front porch.”
“What for?”
I held up the two comic books. “Blast from the past, buddy.”
His face lit up, and it was worth it to have comic geeks look down their noses at me. It’s not every day you can make a dead kid smile.
We went out on the porch, sat on the steps, and I read the comic books to him. He sat enraptured by the adventures of Brother Voodoo and a werewolf fighting some silly-assed bald dude in robes named Dr. Glitternight.
When I closed the second comic, he looked at me with a smile. “Thank you, Brett. That was so cool.”
It occurred to me that no one had done anything like that for Demetrius in more than thirty years.
“What did you do to your arm?” he asked.
“New tattoo,” I said. “I was supposed to take the bandage off already. Want to see how it turned out?”
“Yeah.”
I peeled off the bandage.
My tattoo didn’t look any different than it had the day before. Just a Chinese dragon on my upper arm with grass and flowers on my forearm. It still hurt.
“Hmm,” I said. “Let’s try something.”
I gave my arm a shake, thinking about what tomorrow might hold.
The grass flared out and a Tarot card appeared on my forearm.
Ten of Swords: Ruin.
A bunch of swords stabbing and splintering against one another, and into a heart. Yeah, not a lot of subtext there. I remembered the Rider-Waite deck with a dude lying on the ground with ten swords sticking out of his back, too.
I shook my arm again, but nothing happened. That’s right. One query per day. And now the damn card wouldn’t go away.
“Cool,” Demetrius said.
“Not so cool,” I said. “Maybe I should just stay in bed tomorrow.”
“Well, thanks for the comics.”
“You bet, little man. If I live through tomorrow, I’ll see about getting more.”
“That would be awesome!”
His excitement broke me out of my concern about the ruinous card displayed on my forearm. Maybe the ruin would be that the next comic book would have a tear on the cover. Somehow I didn’t think I’d be that lucky.
“And if you die, you can still come back here,” Demetrius said with just as much excitement.
Funny, but that didn’t improve my outlook.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Twenty minutes later, I stumbled into the house. As I climbed the stairs, ready to crash, I heard the thunk thunk thunk of a bed frame against a wall, along with grunts and moans of pleasure.
Michael was laying undead pipe in my cousin.
I hung the necklace on my doorknob, tossed Abigail’s wallet on my dresser then collapsed on my bed. I tried to go to sleep, but the noise kept me awake.
One thing I’ll say for the vampire, he sure had stamina. As I hugged my pillow, I kept thinking about Abigail. I knew it wasn’t a natural thing. Maybe I’d absorbed too much of her perfume into my system, but all I could think about was holding her. When I found myself kissing the pillow, I knew I had a problem.
I gave up on sleep and went downstairs to get a beer. Before I finished it, Michael came downstairs in a pink terrycloth robe. His long, dark hair flowed over his shoulders. When he spotted me, I raised my bottle.
“What’s up, stud muffin?” I said.
He gave me a sly smile. “Your cousin is … energetic.”
Michael was the only guy I knew who could rock a pink robe. He got himself a glass of water. Vampires could eat and drink like the rest of us, but they had to occasionally have some blood. Fortunately, wizard blood was bad for the undead.
“What do you know about witches?” I asked.
“I’ve been with a few,” he said.
“How do their love spells work?”
“Color me clueless,” he said. “I’ve never fallen for a witch.”
I frowned.
“Something wrong, Brett?” he asked.
I finished my beer and set the empty bottle on the counter. Sabrina wouldn’t like that, but she’d get over it. After all, we had a maid service coming in now. She didn’t have to clean up after me.
“Not sure anything’s actually wrong,�
�� I said. “Oh, who am I kidding? I’m in a bad way, dude.”
Sabrina came downstairs, so I stopped talking. “Hey, Brett,” she said.
“Cuz,” I said giving her a nod.
She embraced Michael and kissed his neck. “You look hot in pink,” she said. “You coming back to bed?”
“I’ll be up in a few,” he said and kissed her.
“Okay,” she said. She pointed at the beer bottle. “Don’t leave that on the counter, Brett. Trash can is under the sink.”
“Feel free to pitch it,” I said.
She flipped me the bird, got a glass of water, kissed Michael once more, then went back upstairs.
“What’s the problem?” Michael asked.
I shook my head. “Don’t worry about it. You should go sleep with your food.”
He raised an eyebrow. “That’s not the way I eat her,” he said.
“TMI,” I said.
He drank his water, put the glass in the dishwasher and looked at me again. “You want to talk, I’m here for you.”
“Sabrina needs you more than I do. I’ve got this.”
“Your call,” he said and went back upstairs.
I wanted to go get my phone and call Abigail, but I didn’t know what I’d say to her. After all, she didn’t like me. Her damn spell just jacked me up, and I needed to get it out of my system.
If I worked out, or went for a run, that might help, but that was too much like exercise. The headboard started bumping the wall upstairs again, and built up to a steady rhythm, so I didn’t want to go back to my room. I stretched out on the couch. My usual method for handling things was to sleep it off. That should work for this too.
When I closed my eyes, I saw Abigail. I remembered the taste of her lips. The feeling of her kissing me back. The sound of her voice. The aroma of her perfume.
I sat up.
“Son of a bitch,” I said.
For the first time in as long as I could remember, I could not go to sleep.
This was unacceptable.
Napping was my goddamn superpower. How could a witch take that away from me? I never felt like I had to be with anyone. I liked thinking only of myself. It sure made life easier. There’s a certain freedom in not giving a shit what anyone thinks.
Now I wondered what she was doing. What was she thinking? Was she thinking of me?
I got up, went upstairs, ignoring the sounds of Michael and Sabrina damaging the drywall, and put on my shoes. I considered taking my phone, but it was charging, and I’d be too tempted to call her. Then I went downstairs, out the front door, and headed toward the beach.
The scent of salty air on the breeze coming off the Gulf invigorated me. A couple weeks back, I’d met a girl on the beach. Wouldn’t it be amazing if Abigail was out for a walk, too? That would be awesome. We could walk along the beach, waves crashing around our ankles as we talked and held hands. Then she could try to kill me again and all would be wrong with the world.
I broke into a jog.
My feet pounded on the sand as I trotted down the beach toward Pleasure Pier. It was summer, so the rides stayed lit all night, even though the amusement park closed at eleven. But maybe Abigail was there anyway.
Jesus. Clearly, the spell was messing with my head.
It needed to stop, and it needed to stop now.
I turned and ran back the way I’d come, then turned toward the seawall, and took the stairs to street level two at a time. I had to wait for traffic to clear out, then I jogged across the street at the light, and cruised toward Broadway.
A few more blocks and I was home.
I took a few minutes to catch my breath, then went inside. It was time to try and sleep again. Engage my superpower. I went up to my room, checked the time on my phone—almost eleven—and saw I had a new message.
It was from Abigail.
I’d missed her call. Damn. I should have taken the phone with me. She hadn’t left a message. Double damn with peanut butter.
And I don’t even like peanut butter.
I wanted to call her right then and there, but the trip to and from the beach had served me well, and my standards finally started to click into place. I say started because I had to actually think about it. I’d gotten Abigail’s number that very day. You have to turn in your man card if you call a girl before at least three days have passed. In fact, it’s best to wait a week so the girl thinks you’ve forgotten her. I could violate the rule because I was a musician, but that rarely happened. Normally the girl called me.
And Abigail had called.
Didn’t that mean I should call her back?
I checked the voicemail message.
Dead air.
Dammit.
I weighed my options. Call her or get some sleep?
Sorry, Abigail, sleep will win that battle every time unless I’m guaranteed to get lucky.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
When I rolled out of bed at a quarter past one in the afternoon, I had to piss like a Russian racehorse. I staggered into the restroom, let loose, and the ghost of Demetrius stepped through the wall. I jerked away and pissed on the wall for a second before adjusting the stream back to the toilet.
“Jesus, kid! What are you doing here?”
“The lady who helped take my Auntie Regina is at my house, and I’m scared. What if she wants to abduct me too?”
Abigail was at his house? “Just her or does she have helpers?”
“Just her, but she went right into my bedroom.”
I tucked the Beast away, then flushed the toilet. I looked at the wet wall. Would the maid service clean that? Would they even think to do so? I mean, how many people pee on their walls? Maybe I could leave them a note. Not saying I peed on the wall, but just saying to wash the walls. Would that seem weird? Did I care if it seemed weird? I could kick in an extra bill and they wouldn’t complain much.
That meant I’d have to remember to leave a note.
Demetrius stared at me and at the wet spot on the wall. “That might stain,” he said. “My momma would whoop my butt if I took a leak on the wall. Back when I could take a leak.”
It seemed like he missed it. “My mother told me it wards off piss demons,” I said.
“There are piss demons?”
“Not here,” I said. “They can’t get past the piss wards.”
“You’re making that up.”
“Yes, I am. Go wait in the other room. I’m going to take a shower.”
He walked through the wall into my bedroom. Before I’d even turned on the water, he poked his head back through the wall.
“Doesn’t your mama make you clean your room?”
“She gave up on that when I was your age, little man.”
“But I’m older than you. Auntie Lakesha told me I’ve been dead for more than thirty years, and I was nine when my daddy killed me, so…”
I shooed him back through the wall. “Whatever, kid. Move it.”
After a shower, shave, and a good tooth brushing, I felt almost human. I wrapped a towel around my waist and went into my bedroom to get dressed for the day’s adventure.
Demetrius sat on my bed and watched me choose clothes.
“You mind turning around?” I asked. “I want to get dressed.”
He turned around. “Hurry up,” he said. “I want my house back.”
I got dressed, and Demetrius followed me downstairs. Sabrina was kicked back on the sofa watching TV. She reached over to the table and pressed a button on her phone to check the time.
“You’re late to your meeting with Lakesha,” she said. “Who’s the ghost kid?”
“Demetrius, this is Sabrina.”
“Hi, Demetrius,” she said. “You can call me Bri.”
“Call her Cheese Whiz,” I said.
He looked up at me. “Why would I do that?” He waved to her. “Hi, are you Brat’s wife?”
She looked aghast. “Good God no,” she said. “You think I’d have to settle for a stoner slack-off like him?
Sadly, he’s my cousin so I have to put up with him.”
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Me too,” she said.
“Don’t go siding with her, Demetrius. I’m the one who can get you more comic books.”
He looked up at me, then looked over at Sabrina. “Sorry, Cheese Whiz,” he said. “I want more comics. Brat got me some cool comics.”
She laughed. “I can buy comic books for you, Demetrius. In fact, I can take you to the comic store so you can choose your own comics.”
“That would be awesome!”
“Don’t go one-upping me,” I said and walked through to the kitchen. “Do we have anything to eat?”
“I don’t know. Have you been to the store?”
“No.”
“Then I doubt you’ll find anything edible in there.”
I checked the refrigerator anyway. Condiments filled the door, but the shelves were bare except for a takeout box. I didn’t remember bringing home a takeout box. My stomach growled, so I took the box out and opened it. The contents looked like they could get up and walk away on their own. I leaned away from it in case it attacked. When I felt safe, I closed the box and put it back in the fridge.
“Hey, Cheese Puff,” I said, moving back into the living room. “Want to come with us to face that witch from yesterday?”
“Shouldn’t you take a witch to face a witch?” Sabrina asked.
“Did I misread the manual again? I could have sworn it said to take a bitch to face a witch.”
“Don’t get cute,” she said. “You’ve never opened a manual.”
“That’s not true,” I said. “I opened one to use as a fan to get better air flow once. Are you going to come along for the ride or are you going to stay here and watch Family Feud all afternoon?”
She sighed. “I’m supposed to start your magic lessons today, but you slept in.”
“As you knew I would.”
She turned off the TV and tossed the remote on the table. “Your dad is going to want progress or I won’t get a raise next month.”
“He’s paying you to teach me?”
She nodded. “Of course.”
“And you get to stay here?”
She nodded. “He pays me extra to stay here because you’re living here too. He called it hazard pay.”