The Flower Bowl Spell (27 page)

I round a corner. Across the street is a
building the color of orange baby aspirin, washed out from wind,
rain, and sun. A housing project. Graffiti mars the walls, ugly
tags of gibberish with the most recognizable words being “Fuck
little bitches.” The windows are high up, barred, and offer the
residents no view. There’s one entryway, a broken gate with an
ineffectual chain and padlock. I squeeze through and turn to look
back. A stupid thing to do because it slows me down.

The man, who has paused on the corner to look
around, sees me. I dart away. I’m in an outdoor passage. On either
side are doors leading to apartments. My breath comes even more
unevenly as my feet carry me forward towards the other end, where
there’s more light. I hear the creak of the gate, some grunting.
Stinky is bigger than I am, and he’s having trouble slipping
through. I don’t look back this time. I know from his footfalls
when he’s made it.

The passage leads to a large courtyard. It’s
big enough for one basketball hoop, although the pavement is
cracked and uneven, patchily overgrown with weeds. A couple of
teenage boys are playing ball, and they stop to stare at me, a
strange duck in their soup. There’s a way out, another passageway
to the right, and I take it. The doors here are unmarked by
apartment numbers. Maybe utility closets. I hurry along and try my
charms again, but the choking is back. In fact, it’s worse.

I stumble against the wall, tripping over my
toes, falling so that I scrape and bruise my knees. I pull myself
up and keep going, and although my body is rebelling I have enough
sense to realize a different tack is called for. Saying the words
is the best way to get results, I’ve always known that, but
sometimes you just have to shut up. So I think the words, and I
don’t just think words that will protect me. I beg for help. In
some circles, this is called praying.

Help me, help, Jesus Christ help, well,
not him, and not Him, but—okay, I would take Him, and maybe even
him right now—I’d prefer Artemis or Isis or especially Minerva
because I’m feeling a bit like a warrior right now—or how about
Guan Yin? She’d do. If one of you would come along and help me
shake this guy, I would so appreciate it. I’m not doing so well at
the mo’, and the girls need me, so please, help them too, oh, sweet
Jesus—man, I did it again—please watch out for them, even if you
can’t help me, even if you can’t save
—

All at once, something covers my nose and
mouth and yanks my head back. It’s a hand, and it has encircled me
from behind and is doing a very good job of crushing my nostrils
shut and cutting my teeth against my lips. I wonder for a moment if
this is how it happened to Alice. How did I not hear him catch up?
His smell that I remember from the bus is, no shock, even more foul
this close. All of it, his breath, his skin, his clothes. But even
worse is the faint, masked odor of cologne—something expensive and
haughty underneath his hobo stew. I’m gagging again, and this time,
the small bit of salad, bread, and wine that I consumed at lunch
comes up my burning esophagus and even he is powerless as it bursts
from my mouth and through his fingers. He recoils and I don’t pause
to turn around, I keep going.

I keep going until there’s nowhere else to
go.

The passage leads to a locked door. I
backtrack and try every other one as the stinker, who seems to be
fastidious, stays put and wipes at the mess I made on him.

The third door is unlocked and I dart inside,
slamming it behind me. It’s a laundry room. I realize with dismay
that the door doesn’t lock. I lean my back against it and plunge my
hands into my bag, hoping to find some sort of weapon. I come up
with the silver rattle I took from Arsenic Playground’s dressing
room. I throw it across the room in frustration, its sweet tinkling
sound mocking me.

Before I can make another move, Stinky forces
the door open with his shoulder, throwing me off balance once
again. As I catch myself on a table, he shuts the door and blocks
it with his body. I look around quickly. It’s the only exit.

I fix him with my gaze. His eyes are black
now, blacker than they were on the bus. Not just the irises—his
entire eyes. He lunges at me, grabbing at my face. Pinning me
against the wall, he uses his weight and height, which strikes me
as so unfair, but what did I expect? My toes are barely touching
the floor. I can still breathe—he has left my throat free—but my
mouth is clamped shut by his grip, my teeth crunching painfully
against each other. He reaches for something in his coat pocket—a
dagger, a gun—and I strike out instinctively with my knee, a lucky
blow to his nards. He collapses a little but does not let go of my
jaw, and the slight let-up of pressure on my head against the wall
quickly worsens as he pushes it back even farther.

I grab at his hand, his fingers, trying to
pull them off, but it’s like we’re magnetized. My ears are
beginning to thump. I think,
That’s odd, shouldn’t they be
ringing?
But it’s a distinct thumping, rapid but light, like a
wind-up toy helicopter or airplane.

Stinky has succeeded in retrieving whatever
he’s been looking for from his pockets. It’s a vial holding some
sort of powder and I wonder if his grand plan is to get me high. He
puts the cap between his much-too-white, too-straight teeth and
begins to twist it off.

I let go of his hand and his grip slips,
giving me a pocket of hope before he tightens it again. My hands
frantically pat at my own coat pockets, and I feel a lump through
the material. It’s the saltshaker from the hotel breakfast room in
Santa Barbara. It’s small, made of plastic. I pull it out and swing
it at his face. Salt flies through the air and some gets in his
crazy alien eyes. Another lucky shot. He releases me, his fists
flying up to his sockets.

I use the moment to swing my messenger bag
over my head—I can feel the weight of my almost full water bottle,
Tucker’s book of magick, and my wallet overstuffed with receipts,
not to mention my toiletry kit, notebook, and day planner. And, of
course, my laptop. I bring it all down on his skull, and he
crumples to his knees. I do it again. This blow is sloppier and
lands on his neck, but he falls forward, his face hitting the hard
concrete floor. One more time for good measure, and now his body is
shuddering from head to toe.

My breath is coming out hard and ragged, but
it’s coming. Once more, I raise the bag halfway, but abruptly it
feels too heavy, and I drop it to the floor. Gradually, he begins
to still. I kneel beside him and feel his wrist for a pulse, which
I find no problemo. The vial is still in his hand, and I take it.
The saltshaker is by my foot. I pick it up and begin to pour it
around him, like police outline tape. The helicopter in my head
hasn’t let up.

“Bind him,” I whisper experimentally.
“
Bind him
.” I’m choke-free. “Bind him in life, bind him in
sleep, bind him in the afterworld, bind him so that he can do no
harm to himself or others. Especially me.” It’s like the charm I
put on my dog pack when I walk them, but at a higher octane. I keep
walking around Stinky, saying the words over and over, my voice
getting stronger.

On my third go-round, I notice the helicopter
sound has stopped and there’s a scratching coming from the ceiling.
A vent pops open and Xien flies out brandishing his adorable, shiny
little sword. His wings are beating rapidly, and I realize the
sound I heard was him trying to get through to us. He takes in the
scene and circles the room before landing on a washing machine.

“Where the hell were you?” I ask.

He points to a corner of the room where the
rattle lies. I pick it up.

“That calls you?”

He nods.

“Cool.” I toss it in my bag. “I’ll remember
that. I’ve got to get out of here.”

Xien holds up his hand.
Wait
. He
points to the vial.

“I don’t know. I think he was going to use it
on me.” I look at the man on the ground. Whatever hold he had over
me—and I’m guessing a smothering curse, with a twist of bitter dark
side—it’s not there, for now at least. I rummage through his
pockets. No wallet, but I come up with a leather pouch full of
small bones, a cell phone, a knife, and a pair of sunglasses that
look very much like Tyson’s. No.
Exactly
like Tyson’s.

He also sports a tattoo that coils around his
neck. I don’t want to turn him over and disturb my binding spell,
so I lift him up just a little. The tattoo has a snout with teeth,
flopping ears, and a long body, with legs and a fishtail with
horns. Nothing I’ve ever seen before. It’s crudely rendered and
reminds me of a Hindu makara—part crocodile, part elephant, part
fish. I lie him back down softly. Xien flutters over my shoulder
and sheathes his sword. I see he also has a quiver of arrows and a
delicate little bow I could probably snap in two with ease. I think
how Cleo would love to check out all of the fairy gear.

Shit. Cleo. The girls. “I have to get home
right now
.”

I run out of the room, Xien right behind me,
and slam the door shut. Quickly, I whisper a lockdown charm. Sorry,
residents of this scary housing project, but you’ll have to wait a
while to launder your togs. I think about calling the police, but
what will they do? Most likely arrest me for assault and
kidnapping. I think about calling a cab too, but I doubt one would
come out here to get me.

We retrace my steps. The basketball-playing
boys are gone. I run out of the project and into the street. Xien,
still with me, points. There’s a bus coming. I wave it down. The
only other passengers are little old ladies dressed in coats and
hats as if on their way to church, and I love them as I would my
own grandmothers.

****

My tongue runs over my teeth. There’s a
jagged place on one of my molars, a new chip from the grinding
Stinky gave me.

The bus, like just about every other Muni
vehicle (except the last one I was on), is about as swift as a
sloth. The little old ladies with their canes could hobble down the
sidewalk faster than this motor coach. But it gives me time to go
through Stinky’s stuff. First, the sunglasses. I hold them
carefully. They zip and zing, humming with an energy that causes a
little dropsy in my stomach, like carsickness, from which I’ve
always suffered unless I’m the driver or asleep. I’m sure they are
enchanted, like Tyson’s. I’ll have to ask someone about the bones.
Maybe Mr. Worth, my old AP biology teacher. Of course, he’s a
friend of Cooper’s, so nowadays I’m supposed to call him Henry.

I have a feeling the bones aren’t leftovers
from KFC. The powder I’ll save too. The cell phone is easier. I
click through the address book. Nothing I recognize, until I do.
And my heart sinks.

Cheryl L.

Cheryl LeBrun. Cheradon Badler.

And there’s another number I recognize.
Tyson’s.

I scroll through the names again, more
quickly this time, and another one lights up in my brain, like an
exit sign: Dex. I close my eyes and try a little self-hypnosis with
some breathing exercises thrown in. Dex. Dexter. Dexter Berdin.
D.B.! Cheradon’s manager. Somehow, this makes sense, although I
have yet to figure out why.

I have to transfer buses at the next corner.
I get lucky—my connection is coming. This one is more crowded, with
four-o’clock commuters on the way home, and I have to stand. The
man seated in front of me is getting a call on his phone. He
studies the caller ID, his lips pressed together in inner debate.
The phone stops its jingling. I watch him cuss under his breath and
hit redial.

“Hey,” he says to whoever has picked up.
“Yeah, sorry. We were going through a tunnel.”

We actually were not.

He hangs up, and I try to figure out what
Stinky’s attack was all about. Who does he work for? Is it
Cheradon? Is she after the girls? Or Viveka? I think about the
Flower Bowl Spell, and why I think I know Stinky. It’s not only
from that first day I saw Xien in the subway tunnel. There’s
something else. I look at the bus window in front of me at my own
reflection, and am reminded of a face through a window. A face I’ve
only half-seen.

Bright Vixen’s murderer.

But what does Cheryl—Cheradon—have to do with
it all? Maybe she’s the one putting together the Flower Bowl Spell.
Perhaps she’s looking for an ingredient.

My thoughts jump around. Maybe she’s ramping
up the gross-out factor as well as the power of the spell by adding
something other than a fetus to it. The idea is almost too much to
bear, and I start fretting anew over the girls. Could she do such a
horrible thing, especially to children, to children who are her
cousins?

By the time we’re almost to my stop, I’m so
jumpy I hop off three blocks early and run. As I reach the flat, I
see that the living room lights are illuminating the curtains.
Rosario’s car is still parked on the street, blocking our driveway.
Cooper was supposed to pay her and send her home after he got back
from work, which should have already happened.

I take the stairs two at a time, dropping my
keys on the landing my hands are so shaky. Finally, I get the door
open and run to the living room, afraid of what I’ll find.

What I do find is the girls and Rosario
steeped in an intense game of Candyland. Romola and Cleo turn and
give me big smiles, which I love even more than the old ladies on
the bus. Rosario’s look, however, is one of exasperation.

“Miss Memphis, I must to go.”

“Rosario, I’m so sorry. Didn’t my—didn’t
Cooper come home?”

“No, no husband. I must to go and cook dinner
for my family. My sister, her childrens…”

I apologize profusely as I rummage in my bag
for my wallet. Not a lot of cash. I run to my room where Viveka’s
envelope is still in my luggage and pull out four fifties. Rosario
takes it but balks.