Toby loaded the last of the boxes in the truck and wiped his hands on his jeans. "All set!"
The older man who watched him shook his head and leaned on the porch rail. "You could just send 'em. That's why God made UPS."
"But this way it's an adventure!" He grinned and for a moment was surprised by his own smile.
"And you get away from that woman."
"I could never fool you, Dad." Toby climbed the porch steps two at a time and enveloped his adoptive father in a hug. With some gentle but manly thumping on the back, of course.
"She ain't that bad, Son. You gotta settle sometime. And once I get better, I'll go back to helping you with the business."
Now Toby's smile faltered. He and his mom had talked to the doctors that week, and he knew it didn't look good. They wouldn't tell Tom, but the tumor in his brain hadn't responded to the chemo and radiation like they'd hoped. But the old man kept his spirits up by not listening to them even though he complied with their instructions. Never mind that he was almost blind.
"Bunch o' fools," he muttered like he could tell what his son was thinking. "Now go. Those cookies ain't gonna last forever, and your mother'll have a fit if those linens she stitched for your cousin aren't there in time for the rehearsal dinner. You know she's already upset about missing her sister's only daughter's wedding."
"All right, all right, I'm off!" And with another gentle – but still very manly – pat on the back, he was.
---
Lydia shook her head. "There's no point in going into all of this again, Amber!"
Her friend put her hands on her hips. "Sarah Lydia Rockfort Smithson Webber!"
Tiffany raised her eyebrows. "That's a lot of last names!"
"And that's not even all of them." Lydia sat and put her head in her hands. "Look, can't we just drop it! It's going to be different this time."
Tiffany sat beside the bride and put a hand on her shoulder. She sensed the girl's hesitation. "What's going to make it different?"
"Why do you want to know?" This was no longer the girl who had gleefully chopped the end off her man-cake earlier. She narrowed her blue eyes and set her jaw, and Tiffany could see the determination and the grief the girl had endured. No, this was a young woman who had suffered more than she should have.
"She can help you, Lydia!" Now Amber pleaded. "Please, at least try!"
"There's no point. I'm cursed. We've only heard about happy marriages that make it through the first night."
"Tell me about the curse," Tiffany said, but she couldn't help a little smile that the rumor was doing its work. "Happy Brides go to the Bride's Best Friend for their bachelorette parties!" had been her slogan, and the part about her brides always having happy marriages? Well, she couldn't help it if good marketing, careful selection of her first clientele, and a little magic had all worked together.
"Something always happens to my husband on the wedding night," Lydia whispered.
Now Tiffany felt the chill return. "Like what?"
Amber came to stand behind Lydia. "It's always an accident," she said. "There's never anything suspicious, no hint of foul play."
Lydia bit her lip, tears running down her cheeks. She obviously couldn't continue, so Tiffany looked at Amber again.
"Freaky stuff, like a short in the television or a balcony on a honeymoon suite that's rusted. Things that people are only going to find out the worst way."
"I see." She couldn't see, really, but she could sense the shadow that hung over Lydia, and she thought about the spirit in the kitchen.
"But it's going to be different this time," Lydia said in a small voice. She looked up through her tears at Amber. "I know it is."
Amber put her hand on Lydia's shoulder. "You need to tell her that part, too."
Tiffany arched an eyebrow. "Which is…?"
"He picked the groom. He said if I married the right one, it would all be okay."
Tiffany stood and walked to the other side of the table. She felt like a magnet with the same pole toward Lydia's, the force pushing her backwards. "What did he offer you?"
Lydia shrugged. "A chance to finally be happy with a wonderful man."
Amber squeezed her friend's shoulder. "But you don't know that! You see, Tiffany," she said, and the party hostess heard the panic in the girl's voice, "this is why we need you! No one else believes in curses anymore!"
A clap of thunder shook the small building, and rain poured from the sky. Tiffany ran around the room and closed windows, which had been open to the surprisingly balmy weather. Now a chill wind whipped the empty branches outside.
"I think that you have no idea what you're getting into," she said and rubbed the goosebumps on her arms.
"I've already lost six husbands," said Lydia. "I almost didn't try again, but when Trent picked me up that night, I knew he'd be different. He'd be the one to break the curse!"
"Does he know about it?" Tiffany asked. She'd been ready to dismiss the girls' claim, but six husbands? Lydia couldn't be more than thirty! "And who picked him?"
"I don't know." Lydia blushed and looked away. "I only see him in my dreams. But yes, Trent knows about the curse. He laughed, especially when I told him he'd been chosen to break it."
The cuckoo clock on the wall chirped two, and Tiffany cursed under her breath. There would be a tea at four, and she needed time to clean the shop.
"We should go," said Amber.
Tiffany nodded. "Come back any time tomorrow. The wedding's next weekend, right?"
"It's Tuesday."
Tiffany almost dropped the plates she held. "That doesn't give us much time."
III. Strange Meetings
Tiffany made it through the tea at four o'clock, the dinner at six, and the martini dessert at nine with her mind half on her guests and half on Lydia's problem. Finally, at midnight, everyone had gone, and she and Lacey the cat had the place and a pile of dirty dishes to themselves. Tiffany shook her head and sat at the table instead, her ledger book in front of her, to record the day's charges and payments. If she was finishing up the pitcher of Cosmos she'd made for the last party, well, there was only the cat to scold her.
She had just entered the first invoice when she heard someone in the kitchen. The cat was with her, so that only left one possibility.
"Hello, Tizz."
"Good gravy, Mortal Slut!" The brownie stood with her hands on her hips and looked at the dirty dishes piled on every surface. "What in Celestina's panties have you been getting up to?" Her prominent dark eyes darted from plate to plate, no doubt noticing every bit of icing stuck to the porcelain, never mind the tray of martini glasses.
"What can I say? Business has been good. Your charm helped." She chose her words carefully so as not to accidentally use the "T" word – Thanks. Like most of the faery folk, brownies could be finicky and easily offended. This one had come with an antique dresser that now stood in the main room, the only thing left after a fire had destroyed the manor house it had come from in Ireland. Somehow Tizz had accompanied it, and Tiffany had inherited her when she bought it.
Tizz shook her head. "You're a strange one, helping women to get their marriages off to a good start considering you don't have even the beginnings of a decent home yourself."
Tiffany hid her smile. This was an old conversation. Tizz didn't approve of her background as a stripper and club dancer. She hadn't appeared until Tiffany had moved and set up her new life, and she showed up when she wanted, usually when Tiffany was overwhelmed.
"So, got any sense of what else happened here today?" Tiffany never knew where Tizz hid herself between manifestations.
Tizz waved her hand in front of her face and wrinkled her snub nose. "Phew, yeah, something stinks! I felt something come into my territory, but it wasn't here that long."
"It was a ghost. It spoiled the whipped cream for the punch bowl cake."
"That's not all."
With those words, Tiffany's hair stood on end. "What do you mean?"
"There was something nasty hanging around. That's why I'm here – you need to stay away from that business."
"Really?" Tiffany raised her eyebrows and perched on a counter while Tizz grabbed the pile of dishes closest to the sink with expert movements and started piling them in the dishwasher. "You're using that?"
Tizz paused. "You see? You've got me so worked up, I was going to use that infernal machine that only chips your plates. Yeah, really. There's more to that situation than rotten luck. And you've got some good things coming your way, honey, so just step back."
"I'll think about it."
"Which means you'll humor me now and do it anyway later." Tizz shook her head. "I know your type. Stubborn."
Tiffany laughed. "You're right, as always."
"Fine, then. I'll leave you a book you may find helpful. Now get out of my way. You did a good job messing up my kitchen."
"Yes, ma'am!" Tiffany saluted and went back into the main room. Soon her skin tingled, and she sensed that Tizz worked her magic in the kitchen to the music of clinking glasses and clanging dishes. When all was quiet, Tiffany went back into the kitchen and found everything clean and put away. A book waited on the wooden table that she used for prep, and her hair really stood on end when she saw the title engraved on the cracked leather cover: "Demons for Dummies."
----
Toby wiped his hands on the back of his jeans again. Like that would help figure out why the battery, which should've been good for another year, had pooped out. The cold rain stung the back of his neck, and he blinked water out of his eyes.
"Need a jump?"
Toby squinted into the darkness. A black Camaro idled on the shoulder behind him, and he wondered how he hadn't heard or seen it pull up. Not that the rain let him pay attention to much except the trail of cold water down his spine. The Camaro's driver, a slight man with black hair, moustache, and goatee, stood a few feet away, his eyebrows raised in a helpful expression.
"I need somethin'." He grinned. "If you've got some good cables, that'd be great. Mine are under the boxes in the backseat. He nodded to the extended cab, where his mother's precious linens rode inside.
"They're extra long, so they'll be just what you need. Give me a minute."
In less than a minute, the jumpers had been hooked up, and the truck's engine brought back to life. Toby let it idle while they disconnected and stowed the cables.
"There's a place on the next exit, Gabriel's truck stop," said the stranger. "Tell 'em Raphe sent you, and they'll take good care of you. I know they keep extra batteries and a tester on hand in case of emergencies like this."
"I'm Toby. Let me get dinner for you. It's the least I can do. There's no telling how long I'd've been stuck out here."
Raphe's smile showed even white teeth. "I haven't eaten in a while. See you there."
With that, he got into his Camaro and sped away. Toby eased his truck on to the shoulder and followed him into the darkness.
IV. The Super Scrubber Fiance
Tiffany had looked worse than this, but it had been a while. Like when she was in college doing the walk of shame from the Kappa Something Prick house. But this time she hadn't even gotten to party or hook up with hot, preppy guys!
First, her favorite – and only – hairbrush had broken. On top of that, the cats just wouldn't settle down. Every time she had been just about to drift off, one of them had moved, meowed, kneaded, or stomped over her. Now she stood, dark bags under her eyes, while Lacey and her black twin sister Lexie curled up on the bed, a fuzzy yin-yang of softly snoring comfort.
"Damn cats," she said, but she couldn't blame them. Neither cat would go near the book the brownie had given her.
Tiffany pulled her hair back and smoothed the bumps as best she could, then headed downstairs to finish cleaning the shop. Tizz had washed the dishes, dusted, and mopped, but she didn't use disinfectant products or vacuum. Tiffany placed incense in burners around the room, opened the windows to the brisk morning air, and got to work.
The sound of a truck pulling into the parking spot by the door made her look up from scrubbing the sink. She ran to the front of the shop to peek through the peephole and saw Lydia standing there. Tizz's warning replayed in her brain, but Lydia looked so miserable she couldn't resist opening it.
"Idiot!" The brownie's word hissed in her ear, and Tiffany whirled around, but Tizz was nowhere in sight. She turned back toward the door and nearly swallowed her tongue. Lydia stood beside a truly gorgeous guy: tall, wavy dark blond hair, full lips, and cobalt blue eyes that peered quizzically at her over his tilted Ray-Bans. He wore a black t-shirt with a knight slaying a dragon and the line, "Real Men Slay Demons" underneath.
"Are you okay?" asked Lydia with a frown. "Who were you looking for?"
"Just a slight manifestation of the spirit world." Tiffany held the door open so the others could step inside. "Come in."
"This is Trent," Lydia said. "My fiance."
Trent took his sunglasses off and wrinkled his nose. "Smells like Brownie," he said.
"I was baking yesterday," Tiffany told him.
He shook his head. "No, no, Brownie, like the fairy creature. I can get rid of it for you. They try to be helpful, but their phobia of modern appliances and cleaning methods only make them a nuisance. It's easy, all you have to do is thank them."
Tiffany closed her mouth and clenched her back teeth to keep the first thing that came to mind from escaping. "I like her," she said instead, loudly enough for Tizz to hear. "She's very helpful, and I have no desire to 'get rid of her.'"
Trent shrugged. "Your choice. Besides, I don't usually bother with small game." He walked around and sniffed the air. "Yep, Lydia, your demon was here. He's got that smell. Phew! And one of your past husbands, too." He headed toward the kitchen.
"Hey!" Tiffany called after him. "Who do you think you are, Mister… Supernatural Janitor?" She blushed. Damnit, she'd think of the perfect name for him after they left!
"Just what you said. A Scrubber." He picked up one of her rose quartz statuettes, this one an intricately carved flower. "Your little witchy tricks will only work so far with the real nasty critters. Besides, Azzie likes your type."
"Azzie probably has good taste, whoever that is." She crossed her arms and tried to look stern. "Now tell me what makes you so confident you can handle it. From what I can tell, you don’t even have any magical talent!"
"Don't need it." He grinned, and his perfect teeth irked her. She wanted one flaw to show, just one! "I've been called by a higher power. And Azzie is Asmodeous, Demon of Lust. Somehow he got attached to Lydia."
"And Trent is going to slay him on our wedding night," said Lydia. Trent puffed out his chest in a superhero pose. Or maybe he always did that. Prick.
"Uh, sorry, but you can't slay demons," Tiffany said, and Lydia whipped her head around to look at Trent. "You can only bind them."
Trent's confidence didn't waver. "I know that, but it sounds better to say, "slay them." Either way, I'll make sure he doesn't bother her again. But I just wanted to come by and let you know not to worry about her. I've got it under control."
"Obviously Amber doesn't think so." The words came out of Tiffany's mouth before she could stop them. "And if there's one thing you can't discount, it's how your best friend feels about your marital situation. That's something I know from experience."
"Oh, Amber." Trent waved his hand. "She's just overly anxious. But thanks for your help, anyway."
Tiffany looked at Lydia. "And what do you think?"
Lydia shrugged and looked down. "I trust him."
Her body language said otherwise, Tiffany thought. There was something else, but she couldn't figure it out.
"Where is the wedding?"
"At St. George's church on the square," Lydia said before Trent could stop her. "It's at three on Tuesday."
"I'll be there. I don't have a tea that day. Let me bring some cookies or something."
Lydia smiled. "My cousin from Seattle is bringing Italian wedding cookies, but I'd love some of your chocolate cupcakes. Those were fantastic!"
"Done." Tiffany shook Lydia's hand. "I'll see you then."
After they left, Tiffany looked up Scrubbers. Yep, a New-Age order of Demon Slayers with questionable effectiveness. Tiffany put everything away – she needed to do a dream ritual to figure out who had promised Lydia that she'd be safe with Trent. What was his motive for helping Lydia? Something didn't smell right about this situation, and it was more than ghost- and demon-stench.
V. Catfishy
Toby followed Raphe's low-slung black Camaro for what felt like miles. The rain had softened to mist and then fog, and he couldn't even see the headlights on the other side of the highway. If there were any. His headlights worked, and that was all that mattered. So did Raphe's taillights, two glowing red orbs about twenty feet ahead.
He felt himself going up an incline and saw that they were on the exit. How had he not noticed? Had he been so entranced with the dance of headlight and taillight that he had gone into a fog of his own? He followed the Camaro to a glowing spot in the fog, which ended up being Gabriel's Truck Stop, brightly lit but empty.
"Are they open?" Toby asked after pulling into a parking spot by the front window.
"He is." Raphael stretched, and water beaded off his black leather jacket. In spite of having been out in the cold and rain like Toby, the waves in his short hair hadn't moved.
"He?" Toby followed Raphe to the door, which swung inward with a tinkle of the jingle bells on a string tied to the handle. The place didn't look open – set up like a diner, the room they had entered was lit by the bright light coming from the kithcen.
"Gabriel. He runs this place. Keeps it word of mouth only. That's why you didn't see any advertising on the highway."
"Yep, you never know what's running around out there." Gabriel, a big guy with curly light brown hair and a dimple in his chin, appeared from the kitchen, wiping his hands on a towel. He flipped a switch, and Toby had to squint against the sudden light.
"Gabe, this is Toby. Found him just after the last exit with a dead battery." Raphe inclined his head.
Gabriel's eyebrows crawled up his forehead. "Did you, now?" He shook Toby's hand. "Rough night to have car trouble. Or was that truck trouble?"
"Truck," said Toby. "My dad's."
"Where ya headed?" Gabriel motioned for them to take stools at the counter and pushed laminated menus at them. "Special's bearded catfish. Just swam in today."
"Going to Georgia. My cousin's getting married. Mom's sending cookies."
Gabriel raised his eyebrows. "Couldn't you have mailed them?"
Toby felt the back of his neck grow hot. "Yeah. So tell me about the catfish."
Gabe grinned. "I guarantee they're like nothin' you've ever seen. Big, meaty, but with extra whiskers. Some say it helps them be extra perceptive, but it didn't help these guys. I've got 'em in a tank in the back. Wanna see?"
"Sure." If it would keep them off the subject of why he was escorting cookies across the country instead of mailing them, Toby would look at Gabriel's Aunt Edna's knee warts. He followed Gabriel into the spotless kitchen to the back, where a large fish tank stood against the back wall. Only one fish swam in it.
"Where are the rest of them?"
Gabriel shrugged. "Specials run out. This one seemed to be smarter than the rest. I'll leave you for a minute, get started on Raphe's usual, and let you think about it."
Toby bent over and looked through the thick glass at the fish that swam around inside. Sure enough, in addition to its feelers, it had whiskers running along the bottom of its chin and a little way down its ventral side, almost like a thick beard and chest hair.
"A fish with chest hair," Toby muttered to himself. He hoped Gabriel made strong coffee – he'd need it.
"More manly than you'll ever be," a voice said. Toby looked around.
"Who was that?"
"Yeah, yeah, you heard me." Toby looked at the tank, where the voice seemed to be coming from. The fish hovered in the water. Toby bent again so he was eye level with it.
"Okay, Raphe," he said. "Joke time is over."
The fish rolled over and gave Toby a "stupid human" look.
"It's a joke, right?" Toby's voice cracked, but he didn't care. This evening had now reached its pinnacle of weirdness, and he was ready to go. He straightened up and turned away from the tank.
"Aw, man, you're not gonna eat me, are you?" It was the voice again, behind him.
Toby turned back around. "I am not talking to a fish."
The catfish's mouth seemed to move more frequently than its gills, and for a second, Toby was dizzy. "Looks to me like you are, buddy."
Okay, it was the fish. Why was that so hard to believe?
"Because it's a freaking talking fish!" Toby balled his hands into fists. "Do not lose control, do not lose control."
"You okay back there?" asked Gabriel. He peered around a set of wire shelves that held large cans of tomatoes, bags of flour, and huge bottles of olive oil.
"I… I think so." The room spun for a moment, and he stumbled. He reached out to grab for support, and his fingers met the cool, slick surface of the tank. He jerked away and tumbled on to the floor.
"Looks to me like you need somethin' to eat." Gabriel helped him up. "Give me two shakes, and I'll get that fish fried up for you."
"No!" Toby caught his breath. "No, that's okay, I'd rather have a burger."
"Suit yourself." Gabriel helped Toby out to the stool, where Raphe and a cup of coffee waited for him. His head didn't stop spinning until he'd finished his burger and fries.
"You look tired," Gabriel said. "Maybe you should stay the night. I've got rooms in the back for the truckers."
Toby nodded. He'd been talking to a fish, after all. "I think I'd better do that." Gabriel gave him a key and room number. Toby didn't see the look that the other two men exchanged after he walked out to his truck to get the duffel bag with his change of clothes.
VI. To Sleep…
Tiffany shuffled the deck of cards, their edges soft and worn from decades of use. She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. If she concentrated hard enough, the feel of them and the faint smell of lavender incense brought back wisps of memory. A shop with red beaded curtains, their clinking threaded with an old woman's belly laugh. The way the sound from outside would fade as soon as she stepped through and closed the worn wooden door. But try as she may, she couldn't remember the face of her mentor, or even her name.
"There will come a time," she remembered the husky voice, slightly accented, saying. "You will remember everything, but there are things beyond even my knowledge moving closer, and they will try to snare you in a trap. It is for both our protection that you will not remember clearly. Now sleep."
She had woken in her apartment, then, with nothing but this deck of Tarot cards in her hand, and the F.B.I. knocking at her door.
Tears tried to come to her eyes, and Tiffany shook her head. That was a different life, a different time, and although the familiar ache stretched from her diaphragm to her throat, she couldn't go back there, not yet. It had been more than the cards this time. It had been Lydia's words, "My cousin from Seattle is bringing wedding cookies."
"Seattle," she whispered.
"Never liked it much," a soft voice said, and Tiffany opened her eyes with a jerk. She hadn't heard anyone come into the shop, much less the kitchen, where she sat at the work table and shuffled the cards. Amber, Lydia's friend, stood on the other side of the table and watched Tiffany with one eyebrow raised.
"How did you get in?" asked Tiffany. She struggled to speak around the anxious lump in her throat. The door was locked! She'd placed magical wards around the room!
"The door was open." Amber looked around. "It feels safe in here. Not like with Lydia. And Trent doesn’t help."
"Idiot!" Tiffany heard the brownie's hissed insult and hoped Amber didn't. She guessed who had unlocked the door and engineered the disturbance.
"Sit down," she told Amber. "Do you know what these are?"
The girl looked at the cards. Her emerald green eyes sparkled as she flipped through the deck. "I haven't seen anything like this since I was a kid. My grandmother…" She wiped a tear off her cheek with the back of her wrist.
"She had Tarot cards?" asked Tiffany. She remembered her first impression of Amber, that she had the Blood, at least a few drops.
"She had many strange things." Amber pushed the deck back to Tiffany, who flipped the top card over and looked. The Moon: obfuscator of clarity and bringer of repressed memory.
"Why are you here?" Tiffany asked. "I've got work to do."
"Lydia said that she and Trent came to see you." Amber bit her lip.
"They did." Tiffany shuffled the cards again.
"She said that Trent told you to bug off."
"Pretty much."
The girl reached across the table and put her hand over Tiffany's. "Please don't. I… I don't care what it takes. Lydia needs to be happy, and I don't think that Trent is going to do it for her, even if he does survive their wedding night."
Tiffany nodded. "I feel the same way. Do you know who or what it is that matched them up?"
Amber shook her head. "It's something that she dreamed. I don't know who it could be, though."
"Me, neither, but I aim to find out." Tiffany shuffled again. "It's late, and I should be getting to work."
"Let me help?" asked Amber. "I don't have any formal training, but I feel like I should be here, assisting you."
Tiffany bit back the reply she wanted to make, which was, "Bugger off, newbie." If Amber felt drawn to be here, and she knew Lydia well, it could only help her. "Grab those candles on the counter," she said, "and follow me. We're going to cast a circle, and then you're going to watch over me in my trance while I do some spying."
"That's all I get to do? Watch?" Amber stuck her lower lip out in a pout.
"For now. But whatever you do, don't say my name." She grabbed a box of incense sticks from the drawer and led the way into the main room, where she had unfolded a circular rug on the middle of the floor. She placed candles at the cardinal points and lit them in a clockwise pattern, then sat in the middle. She placed the incense in a holder and lit it as well.
"Here we go," she said. "If something seems off, even though everything looks okay, blow out the candle between us."
Amber sat just outside the circle and watched her. "Like what?"
Tiffany smiled and echoed the words of her mentor, "You'll know. Trust the gift your grandmother gave you. Now focus on Lydia." She pulled a card from the deck – The Lovers. Perfect. With a few deep breaths, she focused on getting her brainwaves to move into alpha waves and into her trance.
---
Toby stretched out on the narrow bed and tried to block the events of the evening from his mind.
"I didn't talk with a fish," he told himself, and saying the silly words out loud made him feel better. He closed his eyes and focused on his breathing, the rise and fall of his belly as he inhaled deeply and then let it go.
"Let it go," he thought. He would focus on the rest of his journey to his cousin Lydia's wedding in Georgia. Before he could plan his next move, exhaustion overtook him, and he surrendered to the darkness.
The first thing he became aware of in his dream was the smell of lavender…
VII. To Dream...
Dream sequences were way more interesting in the movies. Having to stay out of Lydia's awareness already put distance between Tiffany and the action, but the dreams in earlier stages of sleep – an image here, a sound there – never were exciting. But it didn't hurt to look at them. Something had made an impression on Lydia's dreams to the point that she would marry that prick Trent.
Finally, the images became more clear and sequenced. Lydia taking her wedding dress out of a trunk, trying it on, and crying in an attic-like room. Lydia talking to a woman who looked like an older version of her, but stern and sadder, who crossed her arms and turned away from Lydia's pleading. Her mother, maybe? Lydia and Trent arguing, back in the attic. Tiffany could hear snatches of the conversation and knew it revolved around whether she should still be invited to come to the wedding. She tried to insert herself into the dream. An invisible but elastic layer separated her and the dream actors, like they were in a bubble. Tiffany could see, hear, and feel everything in the dream through the material – sadness and frustration predominated – but she couldn't get in. And that meant Lydia couldn't get out.
But where had the barrier come from? Who had made it? Was it Lydia, trapped by her curse? Or something else? Tiffany retreated and watched.
The dream-Trent disappeared, and Lydia was left alone in the attic. She closed and sat on the trunk and picked at the wedding dress, which came apart like tissue paper that floated to the floor and disappeared.
"I can't go through with this," Lydia said.
Tiffany jumped – was the girl talking to her?
The shadows gathered in the corner, built on themselves, and coalesced into the silhouette of a man. He stepped out of the shadow cocoon, tall, square-jawed with black shoulder-length hair and sparkling ebony eyes. He wore a tuxedo and white evening gloves, and he trailed a long finger along the battered dresser behind Lydia. The bubble that surrounded the scene shimmered and pulsed with power, and Tiffany felt every hair on her body stand.
"But you must. Or the curse will not be broken."
Lydia straightened and turned. The man ran a finger along her cheek and cupped her chin in his hand, tilting her head to look up at him.
"But I'm scared! What if Trent's not the one? He could die! I won't survive another funeral."
"Ah, but he is the demon-slayer. Or demon-binder." The man laughed. "You found a smart little witch."
"Amber found her. I didn't want to go."
The man's fingers tightened on Lydia's chin, and she sucked air through her teeth.
"Yet she will be coming to the wedding."
"I'm sorry! I can uninvite her."
The man let go, and Lydia fell backward, barely catching herself before tumbling off the trunk. She rubbed her jaw.
"No," he said. "She knows too much. In fact…" He pointed toward Tiffany, and she was sucked through the bubble into the dream like a cherry through a giant straw. "Here she is right now."
"It's just a dream," said Lydia.
"Or is it?" The man held Tiffany's arm just above her elbow. She tried to wriggle free, but each movement only tightened his fingers until they bit into her flesh like icy picks.
"Let me go," Tiffany hissed. She tried saying a release spell to escape back to her reality, but she couldn't. If her dream projection had one, her heart would be beating in her throat. As it was, she felt dizzy, like he eroded her tether to the waking world.
"Oh, I'll let you go, little witch." And he did, but she still couldn't get back. "Right to the afterlife."
"Lydia!" Tiffany pleaded. "Tell him to release me."
"What's the point?" asked Lydia. "You're not real. I'm not real. None of this is real. I'll wake up Wednesday morning, a widow again. No one will love me."
Before Tiffany could say anything, the man's fingers gripped her neck.
"Say goodbye, witch!" he said. She struggled to breathe.
Something large and hard knocked her out of the man's grasp, and she landed hard on the wooden floor. Tiffany gasped for air and saw a young man with sandy brown hair, striking blue eyes, and flannel shirt grappling with the tuxedo guy. Even stranger, a catfish floated in the air by him and gave instructions.
"That's it, Toby! Even demons have groins! Put a burning in his balls he'll never forget!"
The tuxedoed man disappeared, and Toby sat on the floor, panting. Tiffany staggered to his side and held out a hand.
"Thank you," she said.
"You're welcome, I think." He stood without her help, then shook her hand.
"Toby!" Lydia stood, happy surprise on her face.
"Lydia! I hear you're getting married."
The cousins hugged, and Tiffany started to say something, but the image disappeared in a poof! of candle smoke. She blinked at Amber, who waved a hand in front of Tiffany's face.
"Oh! Oh, good! You're okay! You are okay, aren't you?"
"I'm fine," Tiffany said. She nearly knocked Amber out of the way to get to the table, where she'd set a pad of paper and a pen. She wrote down everything she could remember. When she finished, she looked up at the other girl, who still stared at her. "What?"
"Your neck."
Tiffany walked to the dresser that Tizz was attached to and looked in the mirror. Sure enough, a handprint with clearly defined finger marks was bruised into her throat, another on her left arm.
"Told you to stay out of it," the Brownie mumbled from somewhere Tiffany couldn't see.
"Yeah. This has gotten bigger than I can handle," Tiffany agreed. She blew out the candles and lavender incense burner. "Much bigger. The demon set up Lydia and Trent."
VIII. No Rest for the Good
Toby woke just after he shook hands with Lydia. Too bad – he wondered where the hot blond, the one who'd been assaulted by the guy in the tuxedo, went.
He tried to roll to his back, but something blocked him. Ditto when he stretched his legs out. He opened his eyes and found himself curled up in the back seat of his extended cab truck. The boxes that had been back there, the ones with the linens his mother had made for Lydia, were piled high in the driver's and passenger seats and wells.
"What the hell…?" He looked out the window and saw a squat brick building, vending machines, and lots of empty parking spaces around grassy islands. One of them had a brown sign, "Pet Walk – Watch Your Step." There was no sign of the diner, the small bedroom he'd been tucked into, or Raphe. His shoes were on the floor in front of his head, and in the other backseat well, a large brown grocery bag, the top folded over. It moved, and Toby hit his head scrambling away from it.
The bag shook, and wet stains appeared on the side. Toby was trapped. He couldn't get out of the backseat without moving the boxes that were in the passenger seat, but then he'd have to get closer to the thing in the bag.
"You fought a demon in a tux last night," he told himself, although he wasn't sure how he knew it was a demon. "Surely you can handle a thing in a bag."
"Who are you calling a thing in a bag?" Its voice sounded familiar.
"You." Maybe he was still dreaming. "You're the thing in the bag." He almost giggled to release the bubble of tension in his chest.
"And you're the dumb thing staring at it. Now get me out of here! It smells like wet paper sack!"
"I'm still dreaming, that's all." Saying the words out loud made them believable. Toby opened the bag and found a large plastic food container, holes punched in the lid, and inside, a pissed-off bearded catfish. When he saw the fish, Toby almost dropped the whole thing.
"You!" he said.
The fish swam the tight radius he was allowed. "Yeah, yeah, it's me. The bearded catfish. The one you didn't want for dinner."
"I don't eat things that talk to me."
"That's a good policy." The fish stared at him with big eyes, its irises the color of mud. "You're no great catch, either."
"I'm being insulted by takeout," Toby said. He put the fish's container back in the well and managed to move enough boxes to wriggle into the passenger seat, from where he rearranged everything else, including the fish, which got strapped into the seat with the seatbelt so he wouldn't tip over. The catfish, meanwhile, sulked.
"Okay, I'm going to get some coffee. Maybe then I'll wake up." He put his shoes on.
"You're not dreaming, kid."
Toby paused mid-lacing. "What?"
"You're not dreaming. This is all real."
"No it's not." Toby shut the door, pressed the "Lock" button on his remote, and walked into the squat brick building. He rubbed at the stubble on his chin and hoped he didn't look too bedraggled in case any other blonde damsels needed rescuing.
"Welcome to Alabama," said the gray-haired woman behind the counter. Her nametag said "Ruby" and had red rhinestones glued to it.
"Is that where I am?" Toby asked. He saw displays with brochures for attractions from the U.S.S. Alabama to Desoto Caverns to Little River Gorge.
"How long were you on the road yesterday, honey?" She handed him a cup of coffee. It felt warm and solid in his hand, and he started to doubt that he dreamed. His were never this vivid.
"I'm not sure." He took a sip and nearly burned his tongue on the hot, bitter liquid. "Do you have any cream and sugar?"
She handed him two packets, one of each, and shook her head. "You know, taking meth before a long trip is only going to mess with your head later on, dear. You should really be more careful. What would your mother think?"
"I'm not a meth-head," he said and shook the powdered creamer and sugar into his coffee.
"Right, dear. Now why don't you go into the bathroom and make yourself presentable? You don't want the cops pulling you over. They're very strict here."
Toby could only shake his head, but at least the coffee was drinkable now. And his stomach growled. If Michael was going to send him with a bag of stuff, why not biscuits?
The longer he spent in the Welcome Center, which he found out from Ruby was on the Western side of Alabama, the more he believed that he had driven there, parked, and slept in his truck the night before. The talking fish had to have been a hallucination. Ditto the diner. It was just a trick his mind had played on him after he'd watched the lines on the road for hours the past few days. He'd probably get back in the truck and find the container was full of his mother's cookies or something.
But still, he hesitated getting back in the truck even after Ruby had shooed him out when a young couple came in looking for the bathrooms. She had cheerfully offered them some condoms.
"More road trips than rock concerts have bred babies, you know," she told the blushing girl.
Toby didn't even look in the passenger seat when he got in. He put his new "Heart of Dixie" travel mug in the cup holder and started the engine.
"It's about time you got back! I'm starving!"
He jumped. Yes, the fish was still there, and it looked at him through the plastic with its mud-colored eyes.
"By the way, if we're gonna road trip together, my name is Bert. I hear that Alabama has great chicken biscuits!"
IX. Collision Course
The bruises from the demon's death-grip had faded by Monday morning, but Tiffany still felt them every time she moved her head or left arm.
She had let Amber stay the night, deeming it safer to keep the girl near her since the demon was angry at the bride's best friend for seeking professional magickal help. Like Tiffany, the black-haired girl had been scared by the events of the night before, but unlike the witch, she was okay with admitting it. Over and over. In a breathless "Omigod, I can't believe it's this bad!" way, which only made Tiffany feel more out of control of the situation. Finally, she turned from the sink to where Amber polished rose quartz crystals at the table.
"What do you think this is?" Tiffany asked. "Some sort of game?"
"No," Amber said. "It just doesn't seem real. Everything's been happening in everyone else's dreams, remember?" She placed the pink sphere she'd been polishing on its clear plastic base and stood. "But if you don't think I'm taking it seriously enough, I can leave."
The girl's reply brought a memory back to Tiffany, of her own teacher, who had told her, "One of the hardest things to do as a teacher is find the student's balance between overconfidence and utter lack of it. The most difficult for the teacher is to be patient."
"No, don’t leave," said Tiffany. "I just remembered something important. And you saved my life last night, even if you didn't realize it at the time." Had she been overconfident? she wondered. Or not confident enough? She tried to remember more of that conversation, but as usual, when she struggled against the spell that had hidden her memories, a little dervish of pain swirled through her head.
"Are you okay?" asked Amber.
"I'm fine, just tired from trying to figure this out. Why did the demon set Lydia up with Trent? It makes no sense! Do you remember how they met?"
"Online, I think. She's a web designer for small businesses, and he wanted her to do his site."
"What kind of work does he do?"
Amber thought for a moment and bit her lip.
"Well?" Tiffany twisted the dish towel into a knot so she wouldn't throw it at the girl. "C'mon, Amber, it could be important. Why are you laughing?"
"Because he's an exterminator!"
Tiffany closed her eyes and slumped against the counter. Why did she bother? But the irony wiggled into her brain, and she couldn't help but smile, then chuckle. She wondered if he went after demons with the insecticide.
"That makes sense. I bet he's a good one."
"Oh, yes, no insect survives the assault of Master Trent, Demon-Slayer and bug killer!" Amber mimed a thrust with an invisible sword. "And he'd be a fine husband for someone else, but Lydia doesn't love him."
"I could tell." Tiffany returned to drying the breakfast dishes and then paused. "He's particularly juicy prey for the demon with all the energy from the animals he's killed. I bet he hasn't shed it, which explains the ego."
"What do you mean?" asked Amber. "What energy?"
"Well, you know how some cultures revere the animals they hunt and have elaborate rituals around it? They're the smart ones. Any time you kill something, you release its energy, and if you're not careful, it can mark you and change you."
"So Trent's covered in bug energy? That's disgusting!"
"And spider and mouse and whatever else he's killed." Tiffany thought. "But why not go after him directly? Why go through Lydia?"
She smelled it again, the rotten egg, whipped cream-spoiling odor of the unhappy ghost. A column of noxious brown smoke materialized in the middle of the kitchen between Tiffany and Amber. The smoke swirled and tightened until it took on the shape of a man, about six feet tall with medium build.
"Back, spirit!" Tiffany yelled and held a wooden spoon like a wand. Not as good as her crystal-tipped one, but it would have to do.
"I mean no harm, Witch," it said in a nasal voice. "I come to warn you!"
Tiffany crossed her arms, but before she could say anything, Amber spoke.
"Danny?" she asked. Tears came to her eyes. "Danny, is that you?"
The apparition nodded.
"You know this guy?" asked Tiffany.
"Yes." Amber tried to take a deep breath, but the spirit's smell made her cough. She finally choked out, "He was Lydia's first husband. A chef."
"So why did you ruin her dessert?" asked Tiffany. So much for professional courtesy!
"An accident."
"You said you had a warning," Amber said, and Tiffany mentally applauded her focus.
"The demon is greedy," the ghost told them. "He wants more than the spirit of another man. He will enslave all the souls he can reach. Only one can stop him, and time grows short."
"Who?" asked Tiffany.
"Not you. Listen to your Brownie, Witch! Stay away from the courthouse square tomorrow!" With that, he vanished, and a cold breeze swept his smell out of the kitchen.
"Well, at least he cleaned up after himself this time," Tiffany said. She tapped the flat of the spoon against her palm and pondered the ghost's warning.
"What are you going to do?" Amber asked.
"What else? I'm going to bake brownies for the wedding tomorrow. Whoever is coming is going to need my help."
"Idiot!" Tizz hissed from the outer room. "Can't you leave well enough alone?"
Amber jumped. "What was that?"
"That was Tizz, the Brownie the ghost was talking about. She's a sort of fairy."
"Shouldn't you listen to her?"
Tiffany sighed. "Probably, but I've had enough of being warned away from things I need to finish. I'm going to see this one through."
"Then let me help!"
"Great! I'll show you where the Magic Mint is so you can wash it and start chopping it. We're baking it into the brownies."
"Are we going to get high?"
Tiffany sighed. Patience…
X. Brownies Take Him Higher
It was late afternoon when Toby pulled into Thicket, the small Georgia town where his cousin Lydia lived. The trip had taken him a couple of extra hours because he'd driven the speed limit. It wouldn't be good to get pulled over with a mouthy bottom-feeder in the passenger seat, and his out-of-state license plate made him juicy game for troopers. His cell phone had rung at one point, but he didn't answer it.
"Who's calling?" Bert asked.
"Probably my mom."
"The caller I.D. screen says Marie."
Toby turned the phone over.
"Fine, I get it that you don't want to talk! Is that why you're driving the linens and cookies across the flipping country instead of using Uncle Sam's Pony Express?"
"The Pony Express stopped running a long time ago."
"You know what I mean." The fish sloshed in his container. "And I'm hungry!"
"Fine." Stopping by a Chick-Fil-A to get chicken biscuits had managed to shut Bert up for a few hours.
"Are we there yet?" The fish swam the tight radius of his plastic to-go container when the truck slowed to town speed.
"Yes," Toby said. "This is Thicket."
"What the hell kind of name is Thicket? Why didn't they just call it Redneck?"
"You watch it," Toby said. "Or these rednecks will have you filleted, breaded, and fried before you can say fish hook."
"Go hook yourself."
"Oh, look, there's a diner! Maybe they need a special."
A heavenly chocolate-mint smell caught Toby's attention and caused him to miss the fish's response. He slowly drove around the square, trying to figure out where it was coming from. It seemed strongest on the west side, so he turned down a side street and found himself outside a two-story brick house with a row of parking spaces in front and a sign that said, "Bride's Best Friend" on the door.
---
"Those smell wonderful!" Amber said.
"It's the mint. I grow it myself. It attracts positive energy and people, or at least it's supposed to." Tiffany pulled the brownies out of the oven and put the pan on a wire rack to cool. "Baking helps me think."
"So, what did you do in Seattle?" Amber leaned back in the chair and crossed her ankles. "I moved from there when I was a kid."
Before Tiffany could make up something "acceptable" like accountant or tax attorney, she heard a knock at the door. "I'll be right back."
"Who could that be?" she wondered. Maybe the postman had a box for her. The little town was safe, but she had requested that all deliveries be made to her personally, especially if they were magickal supplies.
Opening the door gave her little time to think, even less to stifle her reaction, so she stood and stared, open-mouthed like the fish in the plastic takeout container he held under his arm. The "he" in question was the guy from Lydia's dream, the one who had knocked the demon down before it could kill her.
They may have stood looking at each other forever had the fish not sung, "Bow chicka bow bow!"
"Hush, Bert," the guy said.
Tiffany shook her head to clear it, not sure which was more improbable, that this particular guy was standing on her stoop, that the fish had just talked, or that he had responded to it.
"Would you like to come in?" she finally asked.
She held the door open and stood back. He entered with a little smile on his face.
"What smells so good?" he asked. "It's like chocolate mint ice cream." He walked toward the kitchen.
"Brownies, dimwit," said the fish. "You have to pardon him," it said to Tiffany, turning to face her. "He's had a really long day and not much sleep."
"That's okay," she told it. "I haven't, either." First a ghost in her kitchen, and now a talking fish?
"Is everything all right?" Amber came through the bead curtain and almost bumped into Toby. "Oh! Hi!"
"Hi," he said and turned back to Tiffany. "Right. Brownies. I can have one?"
"They're cooling in the kitchen," Tiffany said and motioned for Amber to get out of the way.
"Yeah, witch-lady, you better give him one. He's not gonna come out of the spell otherwise."
Amber's eyes widened when she realized who was speaking.
"Hey, hey, hey!" The fish swam in circles. "A blonde and a brunette! Where's the redhead, ladies? This could be a good time for all."
"Patience," Tiffany muttered. She followed the guy into the kitchen, cut a square from the pan, and put it on a small plate. "It's still hot, so be careful."
He put the fish down on the counter and took the plate as well as the fork she offered him. He shook his head after the first bite.
"A little hot, like you said, and –" He would've dropped the plate if Tiffany hadn't taken it. The fork clattered to the floor. "Where am I?"
Tiffany put the brownie on the counter and scooted to the other side of the island in case he got aggressive. The spell had never worked this well before!
"This is my place of business," she said. "The Bride's Best Friend, a bachelorette party venue."
"How did I get here?" He looked around. "The last thing I remember is driving into town and arguing with…" He glanced at the fish, who was sloshing the water in his container with his efforts to scoot it closer to the brownie.
"They're Magic Mint Brownies!" Amber said. "They attract positive energy and people." She looked the young man over. "I think they worked."
"What's your name?" asked Tiffany. He looked at her for the first time as though seeing her clearly.
"I'm Toby. Hey, I know you!"
She realized too late that this was the cousin from Seattle.
"You're Lacey Chenille, the exotic dancer! I went to a bachelor party, and you were the main attraction!"
XI. Revelations
"You were a what?" Amber asked.
"An exotic dancer." The air in the room felt thick, the same feeling from when she woke that morning after her teacher had left her with nothing but a warning and a wiped memory.
"You were in the dream last night." Toby brought her back to the present. He held the brownie. "Bert, is this safe to eat?"
"No! You need to put it all in here."
He pinched off a corner and dropped it into the container. "No one likes mint-flavored fish."
"You remember the dream?" Tiffany asked. "And how did you end up with a talking catfish?"
"Is she safe to talk to?" he asked the fish.
"The answer will cost you another piece of brownie." Bert picked the crumb off the surface of the water. "She's a good witch. You saved her life, so as far as I'm concerned, the rest of the brownies are mine, I mean ours."
Toby told them about the mysterious strangers and the truck stop that had vanished in the night, leaving him with nothing but a crick in his neck and a smart-mouthed fish.
"I've heard of this," Tiffany said. She bent down to look at the fish. "He's a guardian spirit."
"Just my luck," Toby said and rolled his eyes.
"So now what?" Amber asked. "We still have a big problem – the wedding!"
"Why?" Toby asked.
"Don't you know? It's her seventh one!"
"Her what?" Toby leaned back against the counter – hard.
Shock's a bitch, Tiffany thought.
"I thought it was her first!"
"Where have you been?" asked Amber.
"In the missionary field. With my parents. We've just been in the States since my dad got sick."
"You're a missionary?" Tiffany took a deep breath so she wouldn't scream in frustration. First, he blew her cover, and now he'd have her burned at the stake!
"My parents were. I went along for the adventures." He shrugged and half-smiled. "If you call parasites adventuresome. They're both elderly, so maybe my Aunt Theresa – Lydia's mom – didn't want to upset them. Her seventh?"
Amber filled him in, and Tiffany watched the girl. It was a story she'd told many times, but there was something about how she said it… Tiffany remembered Amber's tears when the ghost appeared in the kitchen earlier that day.
"Amber, who was Danny? Besides Lydia's first husband?"
Amber picked up one of the pieces of rose quartz that she had been polishing, a heart, and ran her fingers over the smooth curves. "A guy she met in college."
"And what was he to you?"
The black-haired girl's hands shook, and she dropped the heart. It fell to the tile floor and cracked exactly in half. Tiffany picked up the pink teardrops and, for a moment, saw Danny as he had been: tall, green-eyed, and dark-haired. A male version of Amber.
"He was your brother."
Amber ran from the room, and Tiffany started after her. But she paused when she remembered her other guests, and she heard the front door slam.
"Took you long enough to figure that out," Tizz the Brownie muttered from the other room. Tiffany hoped that Toby hadn't heard her. But Bert had.
"Good gravy, witch, how many supernatural critters do you have in this dump? A ghost and now a Brownie?"
"I should go," Toby said. "Or I guess we should. It was nice meeting you, I guess."
"Likewise." She smiled. "Sorry I bespelled you. It was an accident." She led him to the front door, but he didn't leave.
"What are you going to do to help my cousin?" he asked.
Tiffany looked at the pieces of rose quartz heart in her hand. "Eye of newt, wing of bat, something witchy like that."
"Let me know if I can help. We used to play together when we were little."
"I will, although I'm probably going to stay up all night doing useless research and then show up and wing it."
He laughed, and the sound un-knotted the tension in Tiffany's chest. She looked at him again and noticed the little lines at the corners of his eyes. He laughed a lot, or had, she deduced. But something had kept him from it lately.
"Can I ask you something? Since I'm today's queen of awkward revelations, after all."
"Sure."
"What are you running from?"
The expression on his face changed from amused to angry to sad in rapid succession.
"My problems. What else?"
She nodded. "Well, maybe after the wedding, you and I can talk about them."
"I'll think about it."
"And that means no." She watched him drive away.
---
Toby's problems were still on Tiffany's mind the next day. She was so lost in thought that she almost bumped into a guy wearing black shirt and pants as well as a Roman collar.
"Oh! Excuse me, Reverend."
"I'm not a real preacher, I just play one on t.v." The balding man winked at Tiffany. She backed away.
"I think I'm at the wrong wedding."
The town council had decided to encourage people to come out and celebrate the start of spring with a "Love Is in the Air" festival. Tiffany knew about it and had a booth at the main event on Saturday, but she'd missed the part about the mass wedding. She wandered from group to group looking for her bride. She spotted Trent first.
She set the platter of cupcakes and mint brownies on the card table that had a sign on it: "Lydia and Trent's goodies." She couldn't help but look for hottie cousin Toby. Those yummy-looking powdered-sugar covered cookies must have come with him.
"Places, everyone!" A harried young man with a megaphone jogged around the square. The brides and grooms moved toward the middle. The minister who had winked at Tiffany moved to the front of the crowd, shadowed by a cameraman and sound guy with a microphone.
"Not quite what I had imagined."
Tiffany looked up and saw that Toby stood beside her.
For the final part, click here.
