Not that it did me any freaking good.
The scene back near the bar wasn’t any less hectic than when we left. The fire was still smoldering, an eerie orange glow illuminated the building. The brick seemed to pulsate beneath the force of the water pressure, like the walls were breathing a sigh of relief. We just stood there for a moment, mesmerized, and I still had that feeling that I was forgetting something.
“Damn shame,” I heard behind me. I turned to see Mr. Huckleberry puffing away on a stogie.
Mr. Huckleberry was a longtime family friend. He used to play poker with Cin’s dad and he sold Cinnamon the bar when he retired a few years ago.
“Hi Mr. Huckleberry,” I said.
“Hey Huck,” said Cinnamon.
He nodded towards us. “Girls. You okay?” He looked like Santa Claus with his white beard and protruding belly.
“Hm-hm,” we said.
“Huck,” said Cin, “I’m so sorry this happened. I know how much you love the place.”
“Sweetheart, these things happen.” He puffed the cigar, the burning tobacco mirroring the flame from the fire. “Old buildings with old wiring plus a bunch of numb nuts that don’t know their ass from a hole in the ground inspecting them. Bound to be trouble sooner or later.” He patted Cin on the back. “You take care, sweetheart.”
Mr. Huckleberry ambled away and Gus Dorsey came up to us then. Gus had a Basset hound face and floppy ears that were too big for his frame. I was sure he had yet to shop in the men’s department.
“Hey, Stacy. Hi Cinnamon. You okay? Can I get you something? You cold? You thirsty or something?” This was all directed at Cinnamon, whom Gus has been in love with forever. He hadn’t quite grasped the fact that she was back with her ex-husband and even if she weren’t, he was a used Volvo kind of guy where Cinnamon was a muscle car woman.
“Gus, get Stacy a blanket, would you?” Cin said.
“Sure, sure. Oh, I almost forgot. Stacy, the chief wants to talk to you right away,” Gus said and scampered off.
“I feel another lecture coming on,” I mumbled. I returned Cin’s coat and rubbed my arms.
Derek was talking to a fireman and snapping photos a few yards away. He and Iris were jotting down notes. I guess Parker didn’t send anyone else to the scene. Odd.
I turned to Cin to tell her I was going to find Leo and that I’d meet up with her later, but before I could say a word, a meaty hand smacked her upside the head.
“Ow, Mama!” Cin cried. Aunt Angelica. Famous for her cannolis and right hook.
Thor ducked behind my legs.
“This is what I get, hah? I have to hear ‘bout a fire on the radio? Not from my daughter. My flesh and blood. I raised you better!” She lifted her other hand and realized she was still holding a spatula. She calculated if that would border on abuse, then tried to swing it anyway before Tony caught the interception.
“Mama, Angelica, please. Cinnamon has been through enough,” he said. He wasn’t as tall as her, but what he lacked in height, he made up for in charm and personality.
Angelica flashed Tony a look of betrayal, then softened. “Oh my baby!” She pulled Cinnamon to her huge chest and sobbed. Cin flailed her arms.
“Mama, stop.”
“Hi, Auntie,” I said, hoping to deflect some of the heat from Cin.
Angelica faced me, still wearing her bakery apron smeared with frosting and sprinkles, her dark hair streaked with flour. Thor snaked around and stole a lick from the spatula Tony was holding. I said a little prayer for her not to notice.
“Oh, Stacy, my beautiful niece.” She pulled me in for a bear hug, then stood back and said, “What’s wrong with you, hah? That one,” she pointed to Cin, “that one I know is trouble. But you a good girl. You should call when things happen, hah?”
I nodded. “But the bakery is only a block away.”
Angelica leaned forward and waved her finger. “You getting smart?”
I shook my head. “No.”
“You come for dinner tomorrow, hah?” she said.
“I will.”
In the distance, I spotted three women who seemed to claim the street as their own, walking in tandem. Confidence radiated from them like the brilliant colors of the bright capes they wore. One red, one yellow, one green. The Geraghty Girls.
Shit.
I whirled around to Cinnamon. “What are they doing here dressed like that?”
“Don’t you remember what day it is?” Cin whispered.
I flipped through my mental calendar and drew a blank. “Thursday.”
Cin rolled her eyes at me. “Imbolc.”
Double shit. I slapped my forehead. In all the excitement, the holiday slipped away from me.
The pagan calendar consists of eight major celebrations. Imbolc occurs between the Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox. It’s one of the three Celtic feasts of fire and in Ireland it is known as Brighid’s Day.
In Amethyst, that translates to Birdie’s Day.
“What, they figured there’s already a fire, so let’s have the ceremony here?”
“Hey, you try telling them what they can and cannot do,” said Cinnamon.
The crowd was thinning out, giving Birdie and the aunts space.
“Stacy, I have to go find my insurance papers and give my agent a call. I’m sure he’ll want to assess the damage right away. Maybe it isn’t so bad,” she said, but her face showed that she thought it was bad. “I’ll call you when I’m done, okay?” She kissed me on the cheek and she, Tony, and aunt Angelica headed in the opposite direction, towards the bakery.
“Okay,” I said. But what I meant was, thanks for feeding me to the wolves.
As I watched the Geraghty Girls approach, Gus draped a blanket over me and said, “Hey, Stacy, no kidding, you need to come with me.”
“Not now, Gus,” I hissed.
They drifted closer. Streetlamps shined on each strand of red hair that poked through their hoods, the smoke creating a billowy backdrop. I felt like I was about to become the first victim in a Wes Craven film.
“Cripes, Stacy, please. He gets real mad when I don’t follow orders. Cinnamon already gave her account.” He said that like it would prompt me to follow suit.
“Gus, I have no idea what happened. I was behind the bar one minute, setting up for Cin, and the next thing I knew, smoke filtered up through the back stairs and the beams were on fire. That’s all I got. Type it up.”
I watched as Birdie paused to whisper into a fireman’s ear. He was taking a load off on the side of the truck. He bounced up immediately and started to roll the hose that lay across their path. Another fireman paused to whistle at my great aunt, Fiona. She winked back.
Gus followed my gaze, perked up and said, “Hey, it’s your granny.” Gus and Birdie have a strange friendship that developed through her occasional bouts with the law.
“Anastasia,” my grandmother said and clasped my hands. She refused to call me by the name on my birth certificate, which is simply, Stacy. Something about bad luck naming a female child after her father.
“Hey, Birdie,” piped Gus, “how about another round of Dungeons and Dragons?”
Her eyes slid towards him and she smiled as if he were a child asking for a lollipop. Then she tilted her head and raised her manicured eyebrows.
“Oh, sure, you want to catch up. Maybe later,” Gus said and darted off.
And then there was me.
I waited for my grandmother to say something. Why her eyes were fierce, I didn’t know. I glanced at my great aunt Lolly, who despite being a few letters short of a full alphabet, always dressed like it was Oscar night. This occasion proved no different. Her purple silk ball gown was fluffed out by a hoop skirt and her face looked like a paint-by-numbers. Her eyebrows were shaved smooth, then penciled in. With an actual #2 pencil, it appeared. Lolly grinned and waved. She had pink lipstick all over her teeth.
Fiona, the youngest of the three, smiled softly at me. She was one of those women you just know was a pinup girl and probably still could be.
“Birdie, what the hell are you doing walking around town like this?” I finally asked when no one else spoke.
Their beliefs weren’t a secret, but I mean, come on.
Birdie straightened. “Like, what dear?”
“Stacy, honey, we didn’t mean to embarrass you,” Fiona chimed in. “But we were preparing for the Imbolc when we heard about the fire. And then it happened.”
Well, sure, that about cleared it up.
“You mean you were preparing for the Imbolc when the fire happened.”
“No, dear. Something else,” said Birdie.
“Something else? You have got to be kidding me. Your granddaughters nearly die in a fire and there was something more important than that? Weren’t you worried about me? About Cin?”
Birdie didn’t even bother to look surprised. “Cinnamon can care for herself and you were wearing the amethyst when you left,” said Birdie.
“Plus your familiar was with you,” said Fiona, patting Thor on the head. He licked her hand in return. Fiona is loved by all four-legged creatures—and two-legged ones for that matter.
“What do you mean my familiar?” I asked.
Birdie sighed and looked at her watch. “Your witch’s familiar.”
“I’m not even familiar with being a witch and stop calling me that!” I said.
“A familiar is an animal totem, dear, who protects you,” said Fiona.
Lolly barked.
“Protects me? But he...” I glanced at Thor. “I mean, I...oh forget it.” It was true. Thor was my guardian angel of sorts.
Thor plopped on my feet and belched.
I wagged my head to shake out the loose screws and continued. “Okay so what else happened, then?”
Lolly yanked the blanket off me and worked a winter-white velvet cape around my shoulders. I tried to slap her hand away.
“The bat, dear,” said Fiona.
Birdie folded her arms and pursed her lips.
“Big bat,” said Lolly who finished strapping me in the cape from behind.
Fiona’s eyes grew wide and she nodded.
A bat in February? I was speechless.
They stood patiently waiting for me to come by some sort of epiphany.
I had nothing.
Fiona tilted her head towards Birdie and said quietly, “She hasn’t been practicing that long since she returned. She needs more time.”
“Nonsense,” Birdie said. “The child learned everything she ever needed to know by the time she was thirteen.”
It was true that Birdie had molded me from birth to practice under her wing. A point my mother fought her on constantly. But after my father died—after the dream showed me he would die and my warning didn’t save him as I had hoped, but instead put him in the path of a tractor-trailer—I had no more use for magic.
“But, she blocked it out after,” said Fiona.
After. She meant after my father died, after my mother left with no forwarding address. My whole life could be divided in ‘before’ and ‘after’. Before I killed my father. After my mother disappeared.
“She was born with more talent than we could ever teach her,” said Birdie.
“Yes, but she still has so much to learn,” Fiona pointed out.
“Would you two quit talking about me like I’m not here!”
Wait, what happened to the other one?
“Where’s Lolly?” I asked.
We all scanned the street and I spotted Thor hitched to a lamppost while Lolly tied a cape around his neck. He had the look of a man whose wife just sent him out to buy tampons.
“Lolly!” I hissed.
“I’ll handle it, dear.” Fiona patted my arm and rushed off. I winced from the sting.
Birdie’s forehead creased and she lifted my cape. Her eyes locked with mine after she examined the burn.
“We have work to do,” she said.
CHAPTER 3
There are moments in my life I am not proud of. Like the Christmas Eve I replaced the Virgin Mary with the Goddess Diana on our neighbor’s lawn because she refused Aunt Lolly’s cookies. Or the time I inhaled a little too much wine and flashed a tour bus; and, well, this one.
We were standing in the back parking lot of the Black Opal where Fiona had applied a mixture of lavender oil, comfrey, and chamomile to my arm. Thor sat near the dumpster, on the lookout. A tiger’s eye dangled from the tassels of his cape and he kept trying to eat it.
“Birdie, I am begging you to take this somewhere else. You cannot have an Imbolc ceremony here right now,” I said.
“And why not? What better way to honor the Great Goddess than at the scene of a fire?”
I felt a migraine coming on.
“Because for one thing, they don’t need any more uncontrolled blazes.” I nodded towards Lolly who liked to play fast and loose with the matches. She was chugging the ceremonial wine and I was thankful because for some reason alcohol sharpened her senses.
“Don’t be ridiculous. We’re not going to light a bonfire,” Birdie said.
Whew. That was a relief. Then I heard the distinct sound of a lighter flicking.
Lolly was snapping a lighter beneath what appeared to be a homemade cigar.
“Lolly, stop that,” I said with a wave of my good arm. Fiona was still patching me up.
“You just said no fires,” I said to my grandmother, louder than I should have.
Birdie paused and lifted her shoulders. “A smudge stick of sage, dear, for cleansing. Lolly, let’s get on with it.”
Lolly fumbled around inside her cape and produced a bottle of milk, a poppy seed cake, and a bouquet of heather and myrrh. She set everything at the back entrance.
My mouth fell open. She was like Batman, except female, much older and less lucid.
“We always come prepared, dear,” Lolly said.
“But how...”
“Fiona, is she ready?” Birdie interrupted, her voice authoritative.
No I was not.
“Yes, all better,” sang Fiona.
“Lolly, the cross,” said Birdie. Lolly hung what I recognized as Brighid’s cross on the doorknob.
“Now, the stones.”
She opened her cape again and I tried to peek in, but I didn’t see any pockets or purses. She pulled out four gemstones; an amethyst for protection, a bloodstone to banish evil, hematite to purify smoke, and a fire opal to release the demons of the past. She placed the stones on the threshold.
This was nothing like the Imbolc ceremonies of my childhood.
Birdie waved the sage cigar all around the doorway and chanted. Then she removed the caution tape and stepped inside.
I turned to Fiona. “What’s going on?”
“What do you mean, dear?” She had taken her place to face the north wind. Lolly picked up the cue and found her place to the east and grabbed my hand. They both bowed their heads.
“Okay, if we’re doing a spell to heal the business from the harm of the blaze, shouldn’t Cinnamon be here?”
“This isn’t for the business, Anastasia.” Birdie returned behind me, prompting me to jump out of my skin. She was excellent at undetected entrances. This is why I rarely misbehaved as a kid under her roof. She took her place to the south and grabbed my hand too.
Holding hands in a dark alley with my grown relatives while my dog took a leak on the sidewalk, I could actually hear my credibility as a reporter crack.
“Alright, that’s enough.” I dropped their hands and removed my hood. “What’s this about?”
“I thought reporters were good listeners,” said Birdie.
Geez, if she was trying to drive me insane she was working it well.
“Give me a hint,” I said.
Lolly flapped her arms and said, “Bat, bat, bat, bat.”
“Right, the bat. Okay, what about it? It was dead in the woods? It flew from behind a shutter? What?” I asked.
Fiona and Lolly shook their heads and Birdie turned to face me. “We were preparing for the ceremony and it flew through the hearth. Then it circled the kitchen three times before Fiona opened the back door to release it.”
I was nodding to show her I was listening and to keep from screaming.
Fiona said, “A bat in February is a bad sign, Stacy. It means betrayal.”
“But a bat that circles the house exactly three times is worse,” said Birdie. She narrowed her eyes.
“Why? What does that mean?” I asked.
“Death has paid a visit.”
Fiona once told me that Birdie made no mistakes. This time, however, I suspected her circuit breaker had blown a fuse.
Who in my family would betray another? And if death had paid a visit then the joke was on him because we all escaped that fire unscathed.
I voiced this to Birdie who put her forehead to mine and whispered, “Not everything is as black and white as the newspaper your words are printed on, my darling granddaughter. Sometimes you have to read between the lines. The message will be clear when the time is right.” She popped me on the rear.
A short while later, we finished the spell and Lolly was packing up. I don’t know where she put everything because she wouldn’t let me look. Maybe she had a tool belt beneath her cape.
Fiona came to me, kissed me on the cheek and said, “Don’t worry. If anyone can overcome, it’s you.” She tied her hood and followed Birdie.
I resisted the urge to ask “overcome what?”
Then I remembered it was cold, I wasn’t about to wear this cloak around town, and I had no ride.
“Wait, can you drive me and Thor home?”
Lolly smiled at me, waved and said, “It’s Cinnamon.”
I scanned the street. “Where?” I asked just as my phone started belting out a Stevie Nicks tune.
I flipped it open.
“Stacy?” It was Cinnamon.
How did she do that?
“Hang on,” I told her. I lifted my head to tell Birdie and the aunts that Cin could pick me up but they were gone.
I sighed. “Hey, cousin.”
“You have to come and get me. Mama is driving me batty and Mario is on his fourth grappa.”
I thought that was an interesting word choice. “Mario’s there?”
Mario is Angelica’s brother from the old country who visits now and then to the delight of no one. He bathes in Old Spice, sells junk from a shoebox, and has a problem holding his neck up whenever he talks to a woman. Any woman.
“Yes, and he’s getting sleazier by the minute. Get me out of here. We’re still at the bakery. Mama won’t fight me if you’re here.”
“Cin, I need clean clothes, a coat, and a shower. I was just about to ask you to come get me.”
“Tony went by your place and picked up a few things already. I’ve got all that and he fed Moonlight.”
Moonlight is my cat, who has learned to love Thor. The three of us live in a small cottage behind the Geraghty Girls’ House. It was decorated by Aunt Fiona, so it looks more like a honeymoon suite at a Poconos resort than a Thomas Kinkade painting.
“Okay. I’ll meet you at the back door.”
“Thanks,” she said and hung up.
I looked at Thor.
“Come on, we have to go get Cinnamon.”
Thor made a disgusted noise and sat down.
“Thor, up. We have to go.” I tugged at his collar, which was futile. The dog was solid as a truck. Sometimes he could be incredibly stubborn, usually when I least wanted him to be. This might have gone smoother if I had a leash but it was still behind the bar.
“Thor, let’s go. NOW,” I said as sternly as I could.
He let out a wail like a tornado warning and put on the brakes. That was his hunger call. “Thor I am not going in there just to get your four cans of Meaty Dog. Stop acting so spoiled. I’ll get you a doughnut at the bakery.”
Thor tossed his head back and bayed.
“Fine, a dozen.”
He plopped down and turned his head away from me.
I squatted behind Thor and pushed to no avail. It was either leave him there or take a trip to the basement of the Opal and get his dinner.
Not sure I made the right choice.
I tipped through the back door of the Black Opal, stepping over the caution tape that Birdie had ripped down.
Sage still permeated the air as I scanned the room. Paintings clung to loose hooks, tables wobbled on their sides. The damage didn’t seem too bad, save for the foamy mess from the firefighters putting out the blaze.
I gingerly approached the stairs that led to the basement where Thor’s food was stashed, careful to avoid the front windows.
The beam that separated the back room from the front of the place had crumbled into the floor. Cin always hated those beams. She was saving up to tear them down. She wanted to give the bar a facelift.
Doubt this was what she had in mind.
I peered down the cement stairwell but I couldn’t see much, so I fired up my cell phone for some light.
At the bottom, the stone wall on the left seemed untouched by the fire. The metal shelves were still standing, stacked with napkins, glassware, liquor, and Thor’s Meaty Dog food.
I took another step forward and aimed the light to the right wall.
That side of the room was half stone and half red brick, now black and swollen. Loose wires dripped from an opening in the ceiling near a broken window. Bottles of booze had exploded and glass blanketed the floor.
I crept to the shelves and scooped up several cans of dog food. When I turned back around, something near the corner, behind the stairwell, glimmered.
I set the cans down and crouched in for a closer look. Wedged between layers of sticky dirt and brick was a bit of gold. I decided to use the bottle opener in my back pocket to uncover the source of the sparkle. It was a nifty little tool equipped also with a corkscrew, a pocket knife, and a nail file.
The file latched onto just enough chain to extract a long gold necklace. Dangling from the chain was a cross shaped like nails, onyx topping each head. Onyx is great for severing a bad relationship.
Unfortunately, I knew that from experience.
“You shouldn’t be poking around down here.”
I screamed and dropped the bottle opener, nearly wetting myself.
First he mows me down, then he scares the piss out of me. Was this guy trying to give me a heart attack?
“Don’t ever do that again,” I said to Derek.
“Sorry. I heard you come down the steps, but I thought it was your boyfriend so I hid. Didn’t think it’d be too cool if he caught me.”
I didn’t even ask how he knew who my boyfriend was. That was the casualty of life in a small town. People scoop into your business then hand out cones to anyone who asks for a lick.
“What are you doing here?” I asked him.
“Taking some shots,” He lifted up one of his umpteen cameras. “They’ll look hot next to your article.”
I ignored the bad pun.
Wait, my article?
“I told you to tell Parker to get someone else.”
“I did. But I thought that’s why you’re here.”
“Oh. No, just picking up dog food.” I pointed to the cans.
“They don’t have grocery stores around here?”
I blew a strand of hair from my face. “It’s a long story.”
“What’s with the cape?”
“That’s a longer story.”
“Well, you can tell me on the way out. Ready to hit it?”
Something was pulling me to that corner. Something strong. I stilled myself, then hinged forward for a closer view. My cape was strangling me at that angle so I unclipped the top hook.
“Derek, do you have a flashlight?”
Derek grunted. “What do I look like, Handy Andy?”
“No, you look like a one-hour photo lab.” I squatted down to get another look, but it was too dark.
“Just point your camera over there and snap a shot, will you? Maybe the illumination will highlight the area and I could get a better look. “
“Or maybe you’ll just get a clear picture? I hear they last longer.”
Okay, that was stupid of me but it had been a long-ass day.
“Just do it.”
Derek aimed the camera, twisted a few knobs and punched a button. The flash revealed nothing more than the charred brick wall, with a few bricks missing.
“We done here?”
I sighed. “I guess.” I bent to pick up the bar tool and the necklace, the cross hot in my hand.
“Shh.” Derek put his finger to his lips.
I heard it too. Footsteps.
“Go,” I said. Derek took the stairs two at a time.
I shoved the opener and the necklace in my jeans pocket, gathered the cans, and sprinted up after him.
It might have gone well, too, if that damn cape hadn’t clung to a nail and yanked me back.