by D V Wolfe
“Uh, great,” Noah said.
“Yeah,” Gabe said. “Great.”
“Fine,” Stacks said, looking down at his phone in his lap. “I mean, once I got used to the mice scurrying…” He looked up and visibly swallowed as the hard smile on Rosetta’s face began to slip into a scowl. “I mean, great.”
“It wasn’t mice scurrying,” I muttered, glancing at the cellar door. With the Hellgate under the house, the scurrying could have been any number of things. Rosetta’s gaze swung to me, but I ignored it. “Where’s Tags?” I asked Rosetta. Her expression softened and I saw a hint of embarrassment flare in her cheeks before she spun away from me and headed back to the waffle maker. “He’ll be down in a minute.”
I grinned at the other three. “How did Tags sleep?”
Rosetta paused, her back still to us. “How would I know? Ask him yourself when he gets down here if you’re so interested, Bane.”
“And you?” I asked, not ready to put the squeaky toy of Rosetta and Tags’ relationship down. “How did you sleep, Rosetta?”
“Or did you sleep?” Stacks asked, keeping his voice low and grinning at me. Rosetta spun on her heel and glared at Stacks who suddenly looked like he’d swallowed his tongue. “I mean, you were up so early. We...I could hear you down here...banging...cooking us this amazing breakfast...brunch.” He paused in his babbling and I could almost see cartoon-sized drops of sweat pouring off of his brow as Rosetta surveyed him like someone deciding his fate. She seemed to have decided to let him live because she turned away from him and went back to the stove, just as we heard the stairs squeak and looked up to see Tags coming down, dressed for the day in his usual ratty jeans and t-shirt. His few strands of hair were neatly combed and he was carrying his ratty baseball hat.
“Morning all,” Tags said when he reached the bottom of the stairs. We all turned to smile at him. He gave us all an insecure half-smile and his eyes slid to Rosetta’s back before he looked back at us. “How...how’d everyone sleep?”
Gabe was sitting next to me and I leaned close enough so he was the only one who would be able to hear me. “Now the question makes sense. They’re polling us to see if any of us heard him and Rosetta knocking boots.”
Tags gaze narrowed on me. “Something you want to share, Bane?”
“Yeah,” I said, straightening up. “I slept ok, but I was awoken by this...rhythmic banging overhead.”
Rosetta slammed a plate of ham, sausage, and bacon onto the table next to me. “Probably the sound of your brain, trying to break out of that thick skull of yours.” She glared at me and I closed my mouth. I decided not to push my luck for three reasons. First, because Rosetta still had Lucy’s keys and I needed to get on the road and do some hunting. Second, because the look Rosetta was giving me had just made all the hairs stand up on the back of my neck and third, because her twelve-gauge, Big Joe, was sitting on the counter next to the sink.
“Well,” Rosetta said, dropping the last platter of food onto the table and seating herself. “Now that we’re all present and accounted for. I’m going to lay out the day’s activities.”
This wasn’t going to be good.
“First,” Rosetta said. “I’ve got chores that I need all of you to help with. Bane, you and I are going to start with checking hex bags and smudgings around the house, and then we’re going to move onto other chores inside the house. Stacks, I know you have several projects you’re researching, but while you’re doing that, I also need you to sort through a couple of boxes of receipts that I’ve been saving to help me get organized for tax season. Gabe and Taggert,” Rosetta continued, steamrollering right over Stacks inhale and attempt at objecting. “I need you two to gear up and take a look at my root cellar. I think the foundation is starting to give on the northwest corner because of the hellions picking at it down there.” She turned to Noah. “And Noah, you can pick whichever one of us you would like to assist.”
Noah looked around the table and I could see in his face that he was contemplating which group would be the least painful and was least likely to annoy Rosetta if he chose it. “Stacks?” Noah asked, glancing over at him.
“Good,” Stacks muttered. “You can sort through the year’s worth of gun range and Bible revival receipts.” He glanced up and met Rosetta’s death glare. He quickly returned his attention to the plate in front of him and started cutting up his waffle.
“I love playing house as much as the next captive,” I said to Rosetta. “But, I’m going to have to take a raincheck on this one. I need to get on the road and get some numbers under my belt.” Of course, the knot forming in my gut reminded me that even if I got some hunting done, I wouldn’t know what those numbers were without Festus. After a minute of no answer to my statement, I looked over at Rosetta who was eating as if I hadn’t said anything. “Rosetta.”
“Eat up,” she said.
“Rosetta,” I repeated.
“Noah, pass me the waffles, please,” Rosetta said.
I gave up. Better to just wait for her afternoon nap and snatch the keys back. I’d go along with her plan and then slip out as soon as she laid down. I knew what she was trying to do. And it wasn’t that I didn’t appreciate her caring. But it didn’t change anything. It didn’t change what I had to do, or how much time I had to do it in. Festus, or no Festus. A hand tightened around my heart and I remembered him showing up, beaten bloody. I remembered the vulnerable look on his face when I asked him if another demon had ‘drank’ him, sucked all the humanity out of him. If it had, it hadn’t done a very good job, because despite what Festus would say otherwise, he cared. He said it was because he was a ‘corporate climber’, but I was pretty sure that was just a face he wore around the office. He saw the system and he wasn’t going quietly along with it.
After brunch, I kept up my own appearance of going along with Rosetta’s regime. I helped Rosetta and Gabe clear up after the meal and do the dishes. Everyone dispersed to do the chores Rosetta had set for them and I waited until we were through checking hex bags and smudging and had moved onto polishing Rosetta’s silver before I finally spoke. “So is the plan now?” I asked, swiping at the polish I’d smeared on the handle of one of Rosetta’s silver daggers. “You're going to keep us all here for the next five months so I won’t die? Because I kind of see a flaw in that plan.”
Rosetta sighed. “You’re always so dramatic, Bane. No. Walter said his vision showed the full moon. That’s Friday. I’m keeping you here for your own good until after the full moon. I’m doing it so that you don’t go off half-cocked to your death because of some misguided vendetta you have about the death of a demon.”
“Festus?” I asked. She nodded and I could feel hot jabs of anger in my throat. “Is that how you think of him? Just another demon?”
“Well, that’s what he was,” Rosetta said. She paused. “Look, Bane, I know you’re under a lot of pressure right now, and I know your time is running out and normally I’d let you blow in the wind, say a prayer and hope that you’d make it back here in good enough shape for me to stitch you up so you could go at it again, but Walter’s vision…”
“Could be a mistake,” I said. “Or maybe he was seeing my death in five months and it just got meshed together with the cannibal tribe and this full moon.”
Rosetta shook her head. “Until we hear otherwise, Walter’s word is what we’re going with and until the full moon passes, you’re staying put. And that’s all I have to say about that.”
I took some slow breaths, trying to get my heart rate back under control and the growling rage out of my tone before I said, “Ok, well, can we at least turn the radio on? Just to see if there are any updates?”
Rosetta hesitated, toying with a silver throwing star in her fingers while she thought it over. Finally, she nodded. I got up and went back into the living room. I dug through my duffle bag, pulled out the small, portable radio, and switched it on.
An hour later, I regretted this decision. Walter had been coming on the air
after every fourth song, announcing hunts that were available across the country. Of course, Rosetta flatly refused to let me call Walter for details on any of them.
‘Why not?” I finally roared at her as we were putting new drawer-liner paper into her kitchen drawers. “I can go get some hunting done and just come back here before the full moon.”
“No,” Rosetta growled. “Because I know you. Even if you go for a hunt, make it out alive and are heading back this way, if you hear about another hunt on the radio, you’ll take on that one too. Then before you know it, it’s Friday night, the moon is full and the cannibals have captured you.”
“You do realize how far-fetched that last part sounds, right?” I asked.
“Normally, yes,” Rosetta said. “But this is you that we’re talking about so it’s right on par. Just turn the damn radio off.”
“No,” I said. “What if he gives an all-clear on the tribe?”
“What? Like they all decided to become vegetarians and move to the Florida keys to open a bar together?”
Because brunch had been so late, we didn’t stop for lunch and instead, Rosetta kept us busy in the house until it was time to make dinner. Tags offered to do it and he shooed Rosetta and me out the back door, into the yard.
“Why don’t you two relax and do some gardening and I’ll rustle up the grub.”
This was by design I was sure so that I wouldn’t have the chance to leave Rosetta’s side and go searching for my keys. As if she’d known what I’d been planning on doing, out of nowhere she’d announced that she was skipping her afternoon nap. This was bad for two reasons. First, it put me in a bad mood because she’d foiled my plan, and second, without her afternoon nap, Rosetta’s bad mood matched mine, with interest. Rosetta sent me to mow the backyard and she started weeding. I was just finishing up when I saw Rosetta heading up the back porch stairs. She opened the backdoor and screamed. I let off the mower and ran for the back porch.
“What?” I yelled at Rosetta.
“My kitchen!”
I stood behind Rosetta looking over her head at the mess in front of us. There was rock salt scattered all over the floor and crunching under Tags’ feet as he moved between the sink and the stove. He had open tin cans all over the countertops and something was about to boil over in a soup pot on the stove. Stacks was sitting at the table, beakers, and herbs spread out in front of him. I recognized a lot of the ingredients for the god’s tears elixir. He was a sloppy brewer though and there were severed pieces of roots and spilled liquids coating the surface of the table. At the other end was my shell loader and a box of plastic shells waiting to be filled. There were three filled shells lined up on the table and a second box held split, bent, and otherwise trashed shell casings. Noah was sitting next to the loader, trying to scoop spilled rock salt into a new shell. He looked up and gave Rosetta and me a nervous smile.
“Well I see you all found a way to pass the time until dinner,” I said.
Tags had just gotten the pot on the stove under control before he threw a red-stained rag over his shoulder and turned to look at us with a grin. “Thought I’d make chili for dinner.” Rosetta was almost vibrating in the doorway in front of me. I needed to get her out of there before she hit critical mass.
“It smells excellent,” I said. “Rosetta has a headache from fighting with me and weeding, so I’m going to take her upstairs for a bit.” I half-walked, half-carried Rosetta up the stairs and into her room where I got her to sit on the edge of the bed. She was still beet red and not yet able to form words. “I’ll clean up the floor and get the shell loader and trimmings put away. I’ll help Stacks finish up brewing and then I’ll make sure he cleans it up. I’ll get Noah to help Tags finish with dinner and then Gabe, wherever the hell he is, will clean the kitchen after dinner.” I reached for her nightstand drawer and pulled it open. I looked around inside. No keys. I held in the little sigh that had been threatening to escape and instead I pulled out her Bible, the .45 she kept at her bedside, a bottle of aspirin, and the current romance novel she was reading. I set the items on the nightstand. I paused and took the .45 out of the mix. “I want you to pick your poison and just lay down and relax until dinner, ok?” I thought about limiting her to only a few aspirin but Rosetta barely took one when she needed it. I thought the chances of her rage-overdosing were fairly slim. She always leaned more towards homicidal than self-harm. I stood and put the .45 at the small of my back.
“Where are you taking my gun?” Rosetta finally hissed.
“You’ll get it back when your heart rate returns to normal and I’ve gotten everything downstairs back to how you like it,” I said. I crossed to the door. “Happy resting!” And then I closed the door. I wished there was a way for me to lock her in so that I’d have more time to look for my keys, but no such luck. I heard a crash in the kitchen and then Tags and Stacks yelling at each other. I thought for a moment about joining Rosetta in her room for some aspirin and a nap, but I knew that wouldn’t get the kitchen clean, find my keys, or keep the boys alive. I took a deep breath and headed back down the stairs.
After dinner, Tags, Stacks, and Noah volunteered to clean up. Tags had had to kick Stacks to get him to agree, but he’d done it, one hand under the table, rubbing his sore shin. After dinner, the three of them ushered us out of the kitchen. Rosetta said she was going to bed early and I saw her patting her dress pocket on her way up the stairs. She’d had my keys on her all day. If I had been fast enough, I probably could have…
“Hey,” Gabe said. I looked up and saw he was offering me a beer from the fridge. “Let’s go out back.”
I led the way and slumped down on the edge of the porch, my bare feet skimming the perfectly trimmed grass. “How was the cellar?” I asked, taking the beer from Gabe and twisting the cap off.
“Oh, the house is screwed,” Gabe said, dropping down beside me. He took a long pull and sighed. “If there wasn’t a Hellgate down there, the house would have collapsed in on itself ages ago. I think it’s the supernatural energy that’s holding it up at this point.”
I snorted. “Kind of like all of us.”
I felt his gaze on me, but I didn’t turn to look at him. I took a drink and shook my head. “If we didn’t hunt, what would be keeping us going? Rosetta would just have church, Tags would just have his tire shop, Stacks would just be a computer repair IT guy, and Noah, me….” I pointed my beer bottle at Gabe. “You’d be fine. You’ve got your family thing. That’s like hunting. Hunting is kind of an extracurricular for you.”
Gabe shook his head. “If that wasn’t your first beer of the night, I’d say you’ve had too much to drink. Your day with Rosetta must have been pretty rough.”
I finally turned to look at Gabe. “Walter was on, announcing hunts all day long and I couldn’t go. I couldn’t just take off and hunt like I know I need to. Do you know that kind of torture? To have something that you need as much as oxygen to be ok, dangled in front of you, and not be able to do anything about getting it?”
Gabe held my gaze for a minute and then looked down at the beer in his hands. “Yeah, I think I know what you mean.”
I chugged half my beer. “And I’m pissed,” I said with a burp.
“Yeah, why’s that?” Gabe asked, and I could hear the smile in his voice.
“Because, I just fucking figured out where Rosetta was keeping my fucking keys, all fucking day long and if I’d been careful, there were about a dozen times today when I could have snagged them if I’d figured out they were in her fucking dress pocket all along.” I chugged the rest of the beer.
Gabe was chuckling.
“What?” I spat, narrowing my eyes at him.
He shook his head. “It’s just, you and Rosetta remind me of how my sister and my mom used to get along.”
I set the empty bottle down between Gabe and me and leaned forward, my elbows on my knees. I gazed up at the stars overhead. “Do you miss them?”
“All the time,” Gabe said. “But, seeing y
ou and Rosetta, is sometimes like seeing them again.”
We were quiet for a moment. “Gabe, I gotta get out of here,” I said quietly. “I have to hunt. I have to find the tribe. I can’t just pretend that Festus didn’t matter, or that that finger-sucking dickbag doesn’t deserve for someone to rip his throat out for killing him.”