Doug changed the subject. “So, we have to choose. Gary said we have until end of day today to make a decision.”
Mia sighed. After they had wrapped up their last investigative project, their boss at Channel 7 had given them a choice: do a story on the developing gang violence or the famous-but-illusive Motorcycle Man.
In Los Angeles, gang violence coverage wasn’t a prestigious assignment. It was just dangerous, the sort of thing everyone had to do in order to pay their dues. Media across the country, however, were beginning to tune into the rising wave of violence, which meant the two of them had a chance of winding up on national news.
On the other hand, there was Motorcycle Man. The story was beyond interesting, yet…
“Have you heard anything new?” Mia asked Doug.
He shook his head.
She blew out an annoyed breath. “Great. Me neither. A great story like that comes along, and of course, it’s the one time in modern history when no one is able to capture anything on their phone cameras.”
Doug rolled his tongue around his mouth as he thought. “Maybe that’s what we focus on for the angle. The sheer lack of info is in itself kinda interesting. Makes it more mysterious. A man in black on a motorcycle appears out of nowhere, saves everyone after a potentially deadly freeway crash, and then disappears back into the night before anyone knows what the hell happened. People are begging for a follow-up.”
“Yeah, and we don’t have the first fucking idea how to give it to them.” Mia shook her head. “This is a trap project. We have to be careful. Half the populace doesn’t trust journalists anymore, so if we embellish it too much, it’ll just seem ridiculous. Then again, how do you embellish a story in which a guy practically rips a car in half with his bare hands? A small guy, too. That’s what the eyewitnesses are saying, anyway.” She sighed. “But yeah. Vids would help.”
Doug looked out the window and chuckled softly to himself. “The most amazing part is that he stopped to begin with. Do you ever think about ceasing to drive while you’re on the goddamned 10?”
“Good point,” Mia laughed. “Pretty sure I’d have to, like, see someone walking on water before I even slowed down.”
“Right,” said her partner. “Because by that point, you know you’re dealing with miracles anyway, so it’ll all work out somehow.”
Mia bit her tongue. Doug’s cynicism tended to crack her up, and she was fairly certain it had rubbed off on her since they’d started working together.
They worked well together, too. Ironically, that was why they had this impossible choice. Since their last project had been well-received, their boss wanted to let them pick their next one. Mia supposed it wasn’t his fault that there weren’t any good options.
The waiter dropped off their check, and both of them leaned over to check their totals.
As she pulled bills out of her wallet, she muttered, “It’s rare, though, to the point of being nonsensical. A Good Samaritan appears out of the blue and makes no effort to get credit for his heroics, let alone a material reward. What is the world coming to?”
Doug signed the check. “It’s a shame, it truly is. A wasted opportunity. That guy squandered his big shot at fifteen seconds of fame. So, are we decided? We’re doing the Motorcycle Man story?”
“I don’t know,” Mia hedged. “I tend to prefer topics I can actually, you know, get information about. And what’s with this supposed new gang? The LA Witches or something?”
“Might just be kids playing Harry Potter,” Doug said, shrugging.
“I dunno.” Mia got to her feet and stretched as a cyclist went by, glaring at her for daring to stand near his sidewalk. She ignored him and went on. “I couldn’t tell if it was supposed to be ‘LA Witches’ or ‘LA Bitches,’ but definitely LA-something. Could be ‘Zilches’ for all we know, and who would really care?”
Her partner stood up too. “Maybe ‘Snitches,’ but that would be an incredibly stupid name for a gang. All the other ones would drop whatever they were doing to come beat the shit out of them and then shoot their dog for good measure. Anyway, if it’s ‘Witches,’ then it’s probably a girl gang.”
“I wouldn’t leap to that conclusion,” Mia commented, “but it’s likely, yeah. Wanna track them down and see if we can do another gang-exposé? I think the masses are starting to get tired of those, but...”
Doug made a sour face. “I don’t know. Maybe we should just tell him we’ll take both.”
Mia led the way down the sidewalk toward the lot where they’d parked the car. “For once, I think you’re right,” she quipped. “Oh, and by the way? Next time, I’m choosing where we eat. Something healthy.”
“If you insist,” Doug sighed. “Just make sure they have something good on the menu, and I want to be clear. ‘Good’ means fried.”
“Kale chips, coming right up.” Mia gave him a thumbs-up. “Oh, you think I’m joking? I’m not. That’s a thing.”
Chapter Two
Her walk to the Kims’ grocery store was brisk but pleasant. Kera normally preferred to take her motorcycle, but she was beginning to worry that someone might notice Zee. She knew she’d been noteworthy before—almost everyone turned to watch when a motorcycle went past—but now there was a certain fascination with people on bikes. One of them, after all, was the mysterious rider who had saved three people from a burning car wreck.
Kera wasn’t yet ready for the world to know that was her, and she didn’t like the idea of people watching her, even if she could conceivably just lie.
After she pushed her way into the store, she waved to Sam, who was watching the counter. He was, if Kera recalled, only sixteen, but she imagined that child labor laws were a bit more lax than usual when it came to part-time work at the family business.
Mr. Kim was in the back, loading bags of chips onto a shelf.
“Hi, Mr. Kim,” Kera said.
“Kera! Hello.” He stood up and brushed off his hands before holding one out to shake hers warmly. Sam’s father was a trim man of about her height, with graying hair and a lined, worn face. Despite the aches and pains that came with his age, he was usually smiling, and he was always polite. “How are you?”
“Good, thank you. And thank you for the latest shipment of food.” Kera looked at Sam, who had delivered it. “Thank you, too, Sam!”
Sam, firmly in the middle of an awkward teenage stage, flushed bright red and gave a shrug and a nod. The Kims had been sending him with Mrs. Kim’s homemade Korean food, something that had made the task of eating far more enjoyable.
“You’re welcome,” Mr. Kim said. “I would caution you that it is difficult to keep a healthy waistline when eating my wife’s cooking, but you seem to be one of the few people who is not troubled by that.” His eyes twinkled knowingly.
Kera put her hands in her pockets and tried not to wince when her stomach gave a loud growl.
“You still have a date soon?”
“Oh. Uh, yes, I do.”
Mr. Kim nodded seriously. “Are you two still coming to dinner?”
Now that he had brought it up, she realized she hadn’t yet floated the idea of going to the Kims’ place for dinner to Christian. She’d asked him out and he’d said yes, but she was certain that wasn’t what he’d had in mind.
Besides, her nerves had her questioning if Christian was actually looking forward to the date. Talking to him about this part was not something she was excited about.
She couldn’t say it was precisely the same set of emotions she would feel if she were bringing someone home to her parents, though she’d rather bring someone to meet the Kims than her mother, but there was still a sense of embarrassment. Would Christian like the Kims? Would he think it was weird that she was bringing him to meet them? After all, what kind of first date was that?
And what if they didn’t like him?
“Um,” she said, “I, uh…well, as long as Chris is okay with it. Yes.”
Dammit, she could kick the ass of guys with guns and ga
ng backup, and here she was, too worried about being rude to draw a line in the sand.
She hoped the gangs never figured out that her weakness was Korean food and politeness.
Mr. Kim’s knowing smile said he could see some of what was going through her head since he had once been her age. It also said that he wasn’t prepared to offer her an out. “You are like a daughter,” he reminded her. “Your parents would want someone to check him out.”
“Do you know my mom?” Kera inquired, raising an eyebrow. For a second, she could nearly believe her mother had surreptitiously recruited the locals to keep an eye on her.
Kim’s smile widened a little. “No, I just know parents. They are the same everywhere; they all worry. Also…” He beckoned her over to the counter with him.
Curiously, she watched as he went behind it and rummaged around. Even Sam seemed curious to see what his father had hidden.
After a moment, Mr. Kim stood up with a stack of notebooks and some stick-on page markers. “These are for you.”
Kera’s stomach fluttered, and she struggled not to panic. Since she had begun practicing magic, she had been taking an insane quantity of notes. One of the first spells she had tried, a memory-erasing spell she had also used on her boss and a gang member, got stronger the more often it was practiced and the more often the user practiced magic.
Therefore, taking notes was essential. She had started with hundreds of post-it notes and had now started buying notebooks by the dozen.
She hadn’t realized anyone had noticed. Even knowing that Mr. Kim was aware of her abilities, she was still worried by the fact that he was seeing parts of it.
He doesn’t know why you’ve been buying them, her mind insisted, but she still felt hunted. If he could see things, people with intentions that were not as good might also see them.
Mr. Kim noticed the discomfort on her face and asked Sam to go get something from the back. When the boy was gone, the older man leaned forward and tapped on the counter to get Kera’s attention.
His voice and face were grave yet kind. “Do not worry. I know why you have been buying them, more or less. Every person who seeks truth, who practices Gatha, will eventually have such problems. It is the one absolute trait you find in new students.”
“Oh.” That didn’t set her mind at ease. If many people knew that was a sign of a new practitioner of magic…
How many people had she tipped off without realizing it?
Then another thought caught up with her. “Why do they teach that spell so early? It’s a menace.”
He laughed, the first belly-laugh she had ever heard from him. He was always polite and kind, but she now saw that he had a genuine appreciation for life.
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I remember thinking the same thing, though.” When his chuckles died, he gave her a serious look. “Do you want to talk about it? I can have Sam take the counter.”
Kera hesitated. She was deeply interested in his admission and wondered if he had also practiced magic at some point. Still…
“I’m not sure I’m ready,” she admitted in a small voice.
Mr. Kim nodded and held up a hand to stave off her apology. “There is no rush. It’s okay. Besides, I called you here about something related, but not quite the same thing. I’m here because of your weight, which is still hard to maintain, yes?”
Frowning, the girl conceded he was right.
“I thought so,” Kim went on. “It has to do with your new abilities. You must make sure that you—how do I say this—switch it off when you are not using it, like a faucet when you don’t need water anymore. Do not forget, or you will continue to waste away. Sooner or later, parts of your body will shut down.”
Kera’s skin crawled at the thought of her power slowly eating her from the inside. She had never thought about turning her power off, but it made sense. She nodded.
“Please, understand how grateful I am,” the older man said. “You saved my Ye-Jin.”
“I didn’t cure her,” Kera said, suddenly desperate for him not to think she had done more than she really had. The last thing she wanted was for them to believe the cancer was gone. “I only—”
“You bought her time, yes.” Mr. Kim nodded, then hesitated. “Do not take this as criticism. It is just…what you accomplished should not have occurred. Something as powerful as that always comes with dangers. Like chemotherapy, yes? Good, but dangerous. How you summoned so much power, I do not know, but it will take a toll on you, and I worry that people will take notice of it. Take care of yourself, and be safe.”
Kera nodded mutely.
Mr. Kim slowly moved toward the door. Halfway there, he stopped. “Oh, one last thing. Ye-Jin wants to talk to you. Not now since she is asleep, but sometime soon.” He put the notebooks into a bag and handed them to her, his eyes twinkling again.
Kera let herself out of the store with another wave and a thank you, but she couldn’t keep from grumbling, “Way to leave that bombshell for the end of the conversation,” as she strode away.
The sun poked out briefly on the walk back but disappeared much too quickly. When she was inside and had put the notebooks on the table, she was tempted to start taking notes and using the colored page markers, but she knew she should do her workout now.
She definitely wasn’t going to feel like doing so after work.
“All right,” she told herself a few minutes later. “You’re going to go hard. You’re going to get strong. You have a super-embarrassing workout playlist, but who doesn’t? Let’s do this.”
About thirty minutes later, she was strongly regretting her choices.
Need to get stronger, Kera urged herself, throwing a straight, rifled punch from the hip into the punching bag. Need your form back. Speed, grace, power, and the ability to think on your feet. Magic or no, it’s hard to be a hero if you’re slow, weak, and clumsy.
She had been in Shotokan karate for two and a half years in high school. She’d left as a purple belt. She was by no means a master, but she had a respectable foundation in the martial arts. She was rusty, but she remembered most of what she’d learned, and it was providing a valuable basis for her training now.
Her arms, legs, pecs, and glutes were all burning from her free weight training before this, and her breath was coming in little gasps. She had known she wasn’t in the best shape of her life after college, but she’d thought she was in better shape than this.
Of course, she hadn’t expected to get into brawls with gang members on the streets of LA.
There was the humorous aspect that her mother’s worst nightmares were coming true, but Kera would be more amused if she had enough breath to laugh.
Her phone rang, and she went to grab it.
To her surprise, it was Christian.
“Hi,” she said cautiously when she picked up.
“Hey, it’s Christian.” He sounded just as uncertain as she did. “You pointed out that we had each other’s numbers, so I thought I’d call.”
Suddenly, the warmth in her chest wasn’t all from the workout.
“I’m glad you did,” she said honestly. “Uh, look, about Saturday.”
There was a sudden silence from the other end of the phone. “Yes?” Christian asked. “Is there a problem?”
“Um. That depends. Maybe…a wrinkle?” She winced and plunged on. “There’s this old Korean couple I know who owns the grocery place near my apartment, and they really want to have us over to dinner. Is that okay? They invited me, I said I had a date, and they said I should bring you. It was kinda hard to say no.”
“Oh.” Christian said nothing for a moment. When he spoke again, she could hear the relief in his voice. “Yeah, that’s fine. I like Korean food.”
“Okay.” That had been so much easier than she expected that it was almost disorienting. “Uh, great. Remind me to text you the address.”
“Sounds good.” He cleared his throat. “Ah, I didn’t really have anything to check in about.”
&n
bsp; “That’s fine. Unless you need to get off the phone?”
“Nope.”
Kera wondered briefly what an objective bystander would think of this conversation. Probably, that humans trying to figure out dating were stupid.
She could hardly argue.
“So, how are you?” Christian asked to fill the awkward silence.
“Good. Good.” She dropped onto the edge of the bed. “It’s been a weird couple of weeks.”
“Oh?” He sounded genuinely interested. “Anything you want to talk about?”
Inspiration hit her in a bolt. “Actually, kinda, yeah. If you don’t mind.”
“I don’t.”
“Okay.” Now, how to say this without mentioning magic? “Basically, uh…” Think of something! Anything! “When you were a kid, did you ever feel like it would be easy to figure out how to make a difference in the world?”
It was a strange sentiment to express spontaneously, but Christian laughed immediately and said, “Yes. Absolutely. Now I’m in a cubicle, trying to make my CEO richer and skate past regulations, and, uh…I don’t even know where I want to be, but I don’t feel great about where I am.”
“Me, neither,” Kera said honestly. “My mom keeps getting on my case about getting an office job, and I don’t think it’s where I want to be.”
“If I were where you were,” Christian told her, “I don’t see why I’d want to go get an office job. We don’t get paid much more, there’s all this useless crap to put up with, and yeah, it’s not like I’m doing anything useful in the world.” There was a pause. “Huh.”
“Sorry, this is kind of a bummer discussion, isn’t it?” Kera winced. “I just…it’s nice to know I’m not the only one.”
“Definitely not the only one,” Christian replied.
“Cool. Look, I gotta get ready for work, but I’ll see you soon. And I’ll text you about Saturday.”
“Sounds good.” He sounded like he was smiling. “Good to talk to you.”
Kera was still smiling as she went to clean up. Sure, she hadn’t finished her workout, but talking to Chris might have helped her more. After the past few days, she’d been wondering if she was doing the right thing. Should she take the fight to LA’s gangs instead of focusing on healing people and rescuing them from car crashes and so on?
How To Be A Badass Witch: Book Two Page 2