“What he said.” Jeanna jabs her thumb toward James.
“Thanks.” My chest warms with the blessings of friendships. True-to-the-core bonds I know I can count on, lean on. The rest of our time spent together falls into light discussions bouncing between school, and future spells we wish to explore. We help each other with our homework and I head home before seven o’clock.
The house is oddly dark when I return home. Every light within is turned off, and zero moonlight shines in through the windows. In the front room, Mom sits on the sofa, unmoving, staring at a blackscreened television.
“Mom? What are you doing sitting in the dark?” I close the front door and turn on the overhead light.
Her head snaps up, her eyes narrowed.
“No!” She jolts upright and rushes at me.
Chapter Two
“Mom!” I jolt back and throw my arms up, grabbing her before she’s able to tackle me. Her hands claw at me, and her hissed accusations pin me as Miri.
“Your fault,” she says. “Your fault, Miri.”
“Calm,” I whisper my programmed spell at her ear, and her body falls slack.
This is not the first time Mom has snapped and gone off on Miri. Her wild personality swings have been a problem ever since the fire at Caleb’s. And they are probably the reason I haven’t been able to find a magickal cure for her depression… because it isn’t depression Mom is suffering, but something else. Something I have yet to figure out and understand.
Mom now stands in front of me like a nonresponsive zombie. “Come on, Mom. Let’s get you to bed.” Wrapping my arm around hers, I turn her toward the hallway and lead her to the bedroom. I help her undress and slip into her night clothes. Lay her back on the bed and pull the covers up over her, tuck her in. “Goodnight, Mom.” I kiss her forehead.
Tomorrow is a workday for her, so she’ll likely be back to normal… normal for her, anyway. Oddly enough, how her personality swings usually only happen on her off days. When she has to check in at the casino for a shift, she almost always has her stuff together and moves through the day with a perky attitude.
I need to get to the root of her problem.
The phone rings, pulling my attention from Mom. I glance at the phone set on her nightstand and decide to take the call down the hall.
“See you in the morning,” I say and leave the room, head to the kitchen and grab the receiver from the phone on the wall. My nerves are tense, like a stretched rubber band. Mom’s condition has a way of doing that to me.
I place the receiver to my ear. “Hello?” A sense of wariness slithers through my blood.
“Hey Belle, it’s James.”
My muscles relax and my heart slows. I move across the room and take a seat at the table, stretching the curly cord across the distance.
“Hey James. What’s up?” I lean into my chair, stretching my legs long.
“I was thinking about the stuff you told us, and I think I might know someone who can help,” he says.
“Really?” I perk up. “That’s great!”
“Don’t get too excited just yet,” he says. “We haven’t been on the best of terms this last year.”
“Who is it?” I ask, leaning into the table.
“My brother,” he replies.
“Oh.” My shoulders straighten. James’s mother kicked his older brother out of the house shortly after I moved here. I’ve only met him a handful of times. “I’m sorry you and your brother are having problems.”
“Yeah, well. He can be a real dick sometimes.” The edge of James’s tone hardens.
“Is it because of the stuff that got him kicked out, or… you know…” I hesitate and wave my hand, as if the action will help my words flow. “He found out you’re gay?”
Telling one’s family can sometimes be a difficult task. Too many harbor hardened thoughts on the topic of love choice. I don’t know how my brother or mother will react when I eventually tell them about me, but at least Miri seems to be cool with it and doesn’t treat me any differently. She seems to understand that we are all physically made the same and none of us can control what we feel. We simply feel what we do. We can follow our emotions or pretend to be something we aren’t. I’d prefer to follow my heart and be happy. I’d also prefer to be able to share that part of myself with my family without fear of backlash.
“No.” James’s response is firm. “I don’t think he cares much about that. It’s my choice of magick practice that bothers him.”
“Seriously?” My head jerks back a smidgen. Prejudice over magickal practices? I’m not sure how I would handle that. “What’s wrong with kitchen magick?”
“My point exactly. I like the warmth and sense of wholeness it brings me, but he’s all about bigger, stronger magick,” James says. “Anyway, I think we have a better chance of getting him to help us if we show up at his door.”
My eyes widen. “Um, alright.”
“Can you meet me after school tomorrow? We’ll ambush him at his place of work.”
“Do you think that’s a good idea?” I ask.
“Less chance of him throwing a scene if we are someplace public,” he answers.
“You would know best.” I rub the underside of my chin. “So, let’s do it. Tomorrow works for me.”
“Okay, then. See you after school. We’ll be taking the ferry to the Quarter, by the way.” He hangs up.
I pull the receiver away from my ear and stare at it. Tomorrow should be interesting. I haven’t spent much time in the Quarter since we moved here. If I find myself there, I’m usually passing through on the way to Grandma’s house.
The next day, after school, James and I take the ferry to the French Quarter. The sky is grey, heavy with clouds, and the wind
