Deegie sat alone at the ornate iron table. Her hands basked in the warmth of the extra-large, extravagantly priced cup of coffee she held, but the dainty iron chair was freezing so she stood up and glanced up and down the sidewalk, trying to look as casual as possible. She always felt edgy at the end of the month; the delivery man was so damn creepy. He wore a navy blue beanie, no matter what the season, and had piggy little eyes that squinted and blinked spastically.
And he always found her, no matter where she was.
She heard him before she saw him; he wore hobnail boots which made a singular clickety-clack on the chilly Washington sidewalk. He rounded the corner of the donut shop, a squinting mole of a man bundled in a too large overcoat. To herself, Deegie called him Moley, but his real name was Mr. Hack, which reminded her of phlegm.
“Miss Tibbs,” Moley dipped forward at the waist in a brief bow and handed her a thick manila envelope which she folded over and tucked into her purse.
The ritual had been the same for the past eleven years, beginning the night she lost her parents.
“You are in a different place now, a different city,” Moley said, showing a scattering of teeth. “Still with the same man?”
“Yes. And no, he doesn’t know, don’t worry.” Deegie answered his next question before he could ask it. Moley never seemed to trust her; he had the same set of questions every time. She would never tell Spencer, her boyfriend, that she received an envelope stuffed full of cash every month from a shady little man who looked like a garden pest. Spencer hardly paid her any attention anyway. He didn’t even know she was a natural-born witch, not that she’d tell him that either.
“There are those who would harm you if they knew. No one must know.” He glowered at her suspiciously between blinks.
“Yes, Mr. Hack, I know. I’ll be careful. See you next time.”
“No matter where you are.” Moley offered his standard parting quote, then clickety-clacked back down the sidewalk. The ritual was complete; her monthly inheritance payment was delivered.
Deegie slid her hand inside her purse and felt the envelope. It was thicker than usual, which sometimes happened, and she smiled to herself. Her secret stash was building up. She hurried back to her vehicle and sat inside, sipping coffee and counting the thick stack of hundreds in the envelope. Combined with her savings, she had more than enough money for her own place. Today might just be the day. The money felt strangely warm, as it always did. Deegie had long suspected that Moley came from somewhere far south of here. Her father had been a dark witch, after all; he was bound to have had Underworld connections at some point in his life. Perhaps that’s where he is now, she thought.
Thanks, Mom and Dad. Love you. In her mind, she colored the thought form a golden pink, added sparkles and red and pink hearts, then sent it bursting out into the Universe. She knew it would reach them.
It was funny how things worked out for Deegie.
She drove back to the A-frame house she shared with Spencer Pratt, her on-and-off boyfriend of three years. His car was in the driveway, the first sign that something was wrong. After making sure that her bulging purse was securely zipped, she hurried, frowning, to the front door. Spencer never came home early, never stayed home sick. Trying to stifle the alarm bells going off in her head, she went into the house. It was dim inside; not a light was on. She heard music coming from behind their closed bedroom door, and she hurried in that direction.
“Spencer?”
The music stopped abruptly, and she heard a shuffle, a thump, and hushed, frantic voices. She opened the door, and her heart plunged all the way down to the floor.
“Oh. I see. You son of a bitch!”
Spencer stood poised on one leg, fighting for balance as he struggled into his boxers, and the peroxide blonde from next door cowered in the bed and covered her silicone breasts.
“Deegie! I didn’t know you were—I mean, I thought you worked—”
“Nope.” Deegie’s lips tightened into a grim line, and she slammed her purse down on the dresser. “And you told me you were working today. Looks like you got your days mixed up.”
The blonde reached for her clothes that lay scattered across the carpet, but Deegie toed them out of the way. “Oh no. You stay right there,” she said. “I have a little surprise for you two love birds.”
She backed away and stood blocking the doorway, arms across her chest. Yep, today was definitely the day. The extra money had been a sign. She balled her hands into tight, vibrating fists, let the outrage and hurt rise and boil, and then released it in the most effective way she knew.
***
Across from the tidy little A-frame on High Street, an old man woke up in the tool shed of a vacant rental home. Loud voices had disturbed his nap, and his head still pounded from all the two-for-one gin and tonics he’d had to drink last night. Damn young couple must be fightin’ again, he thought with a grimace. He opened the door to the tool shed, poked his head out and took a cautious look around, then stepped out into autumn chill and golden sunlight. Guess I’ll find my truck and head on home. He wasn’t quite sure how he’d wound up all the way over here on High Street, but this certainly wasn’t the first time this had happened.
“Femina ad rana!” a woman’s voice shouted from across the street, and a garish burst of colored lights, green, red, and brilliant gold, lit up the windows of the A-frame.
The old drunk’s hands flew to his face to cover his still-bleary eyes. “What the Sam Hill is that?”
A flock of birds, spooked by the flash of light and the old man’s strangled cry, flew in a squawking, flapping cloud to the next lot. The drunk peered through his stubby fingers and wondered if his hangover was worse than he’d thought. The stale alcohol in his belly burbled and rose sluggishly, and he wondered if he was going to vomit. Maybe this was that alcoholic hallucin-whatsis the doctor was always going on about, or the delirium tremens, or something.
“Imgens vir uber!” the woman cried, and a series of loud pops followed, each accompanied by its own impossibly bright color.
“Yup, yup, I’m a sick one today, I’m a sick one.” The old drunk turned around and headed back to the tool shed, mumbling to himself and swiping at his filmy eyes. “Just a bit more shut-eye. Yup, that’ll fix things.” He wrenched the aluminum door shut and found the piece of tarp he’d wrapped around himself last night.
“Amittere memoria!”
The woman’s angry scream was muffled by the flimsy metal shed, and the old drunk was glad he couldn’t see the flashes of light this time. “No more gin,” he muttered with his hands over his ears. “No more gin. That’s what did it, yup. From here on out, it’s nothin’ but beer.”
***
Deegie Tibbs tucked her house key into her officially dumped boyfriend’s loosely curled hand and hauled the strap of her tightly packed duffle bag over her shoulder. “Well, I guess that’s it then,” she said with honest regret. She got no reply and wasn’t expecting one. Spencer was still snared in her Chill Out Spell, and he wouldn’t be saying much for another couple of hours. He sprawled languidly on his seventies-era couch and watched her with glazed and dreamy eyes. His fingers twitched as he tried to fold them around the key, and Deegie smirked at the goofy look on his face. “You’ll come around in a few hours, asshole,” she said.
Spencer was so damn sensitive; he’d be bawling like a kindergartner if it weren’t for the Chill Out Spell. Although he was the one who had cheated and ultimately destroyed their relationship, she didn’t want to risk causing him a panic attack while she left his sorry ass. Besides, he would have enough to deal with when he came out of his blissful state. She glanced at his chest with a wicked grin and resisted the urge to press a glossy red lip print onto his cheek.
She went to the roll top desk in the corner where a tiny purple frog splashed and flailed in a water-filled mayonnaise jar. “As for you, Danielle, you’re going to have to get used to your new body.” Deegie picked up the jar and peered at the little creature inside. Its dainty white throat pulsed with a frantic beat, and its froggy eyes bulged comically. The rims of its eyes still bore traces of bright green eye shadow and black liner. Soon that would fade, along with the bright purple of what was once a spandex yoga outfit, and the erstwhile Danielle Coltyn, yoga instructor, next-door neighbor, and boyfriend stealer would be an ordinary little yard frog trapped in a jar. Deegie tapped a black-lacquered nail against the jar; Danielle uttered a strangled croak and churned her webbed feet in the water.
“By the way, it’s true,” Deegie said, and she narrowed her striking blue eyes. “Witches really can turn people into frogs, have you noticed?” She tossed the jar into the air, giggled as it missed the ceiling by inches, then caught it and returned it to the desk. “You’ll be amphibious and craving flies for oh, say three or four days. Then you’ll return to your usual slutty, overly made-up self. You might want to be careful when that jar breaks, though. Wouldn’t want to get a nasty cut, would we?” She blew a kiss to the unfortunate creature in its glass prison. “Oh, there’s just one more thing, D. Better hope Spencer doesn’t find you before you change back into a hooker. He hates to see innocent creatures trapped in jars. He might decide to set you free in Orchard Park, and, well ... let’s just say there are a lot of hungry ducks waddling around out there.”
She tipped a wave to the drooling mess lolling all over the couch. “Bye, Spence. Thanks for the memories, and enjoy your new breasts.”
Spencer’s t-shirt strained over his DDD chest, and he managed to roll his head in Deegie’s direction. “Nughh ...” he said.
It wasn’t until Deegie got behind the wheel of her vintage Volkswagen Bus that she allowed herself the luxury of a few tears. She was, after all, human, albeit with extraordinary abilities. Thank all the gods you didn’t marry him, she reminded herself as she started the Volkswagen’s engine. The elderly vehicle shuddered as it came to life. A familiar pain wrapped itself around the back of Deegie’s head and neck. She’d overextended herself again, and that pain was a warning that she’d better find a place to lie down before a full-blown migraine paid her a visit. She beeped the horn at Spencer’s house just for the hell of it and drove to the spotless alleyway behind the magical supply shop she owned, The Silent Cat. Once securely parked, she fished around in her purse for her bottle of pain relievers, then went to the cot in the back of the Bus to lie down. The little spells she’d performed hadn’t been big ones by any means, but for Deegie every spell came with a painful price.
A low bass rumbling rose from under the cot, and the cramped quarters filled with the scents of damp earth and the sun-warmed pelt of a large animal. Deegie’s hand swept the empty space in front of her until her fingers sunk deep into coarse, familiar fur. “Tiger Spirit ...” She smiled despite her distress, and opened her eyes. There was nothing to see but an angular slice of sunlight peering through a gap in the window curtain, but the young witch knew her guardian was there just the same. She felt his oily coat, heard his soothing rumble, and was ever so grateful for the comfort he brought.
“I’m okay,” she said to the unseen feline spirit. “Just a little tired. It’s not too bad this time, but thank you.
“Oh, and just in case you were watching me back there, I was only kidding about the ducks. There are no ducks in Orchard Park. I only said that to scare Danielle.” Deegie felt her distress trickle away as she buried her face in Tiger Spirit’s ethereal neck, and she managed a soft chuckle. “I can’t say Spencer won’t take pity on that little frog in a jar, though. He’ll probably set her free in the backyard.” She laughed now, despite the weakness in her limbs and the dull throbbing behind her eyes. “If he can stop screaming over his boobs long enough, that is.”
Tiger rumbled, louder now, and she had a feeling he was scolding her. After all, it was against the Witch’s Creed to alter another human’s appearance. But the spells Deegie had used were basically harmless pranks, taught to her in secret by her father many years ago. Her mother would have been appalled, but her father, for all his faults, had had a wonderful sense of humor.
“They will both be fine in a few days, I promise. I was just mad, that’s all. And yes, I remembered to use the Forget Me Spell, so they won’t remember me.” (The spell’s real title was long and difficult to pronounce; Deegie had made her own adjustments.)
A soft growl, trailing up at the end in a rough-edged musical note.
“And yes, I’m sorry. I overreacted.”
It wasn’t that she actually understood the guardian spirit’s grunts and rumbles. Since she was a little girl, she’d always made up the things that Tiger might tell her on his visits. She’d spent many long hours playing in her room having long conversations with the voice she provided for Tiger, pouring him make-believe tea from a pink plastic teapot. Later, when she became a teenager, Deegie would snuggle close to Tiger’s huge, spirit form body and whisper to him of all matters that a teen girl found important: prom dates, and secret crushes, and whether she should try out for cheerleading. Although he never spoke, Tiger always listened.
The hot draft of clammy feline breath washed over her cheeks again and she felt the whack of a long tail against her leg, then the fading rumble of her guardian as he returned to the spirit world.
Deegie stayed where she was, parked in the alleyway behind The Silent Cat, and just before nightfall, when the sky slipped on its robes of purple and black, she felt well enough to unlock the back door of her shop and brew a pot of herbal tea on the hotplate behind the counter. Having lived in the Bus before on two other occasions, she wasn’t particularly worried about not having an actual home—at least not for a few days. The Bus was older than she was, but the engine ran like a champ, and she’d turned the back part into a tiny, but fully livable, camper. It was early fall, and the weather was still warm, and she liked the idea of being close to The Silent Cat; she’d be fine here until she found a place of her own.
It will be an adventure, she thought as she inhaled fragrant steam. A brand new page in a brand new chapter and all that jazz. And who the hell needs men anyway?
While the tea brewed, Deegie filled a one-ounce bottle of amber glass with drops of essential oils: rose oil blend, for stress and grief; lavender oil, for her headache; and clary sage, for depression and insomnia. She swirled the mixture clockwise and inhaled the magical scent as she envisioned her unhappy heart surrounded by a warm pink cloud that sparkled with flecks of gold. She filled the rest of the bottle with jojoba oil and added an eyedropper cap. This would be her daily fragrance until she got over the cheating asshat she’d once called her boyfriend.