Chapter 1
“Alright. Just sit here and relax. This won’t take but 10 minutes or so.” My patient tentatively leaned back against the chair and closed her eyes. I placed my hands on her shoulders, closed my own eyes, and let the magic flow through me, searching for the pain and exhaustion within her so that I could pull it into myself.
Mrs. Dozier, a tiny seventy year old, with her white hair neatly permed, was facing her second bout with breast cancer in five years and had come to me for help with her treatment. Some people call me a mystic, some call me a witch, and others call me a fraud, but whatever I’m called, I do make a living by taking the symptoms of diseases away from the ill.
“All done,” I told Mrs. Dozier. I straightened up slowly, hiding the pain that I now felt. I showed her out of the drawing room, into the foyer where her husband waited. He looked at me expectantly, wanting to know how the treatment had gone, but Mrs. Dozier showed him the results better than I ever could have. Instead of the woman who had barely been able to walk from the car into my home stood a woman looking twenty years younger. She nearly ran to her husband to wrap her arms around him.
“I’ve never felt so good!” she exclaimed as she kissed him. I smiled, then hid the cough I felt suddenly as I cleared my throat.
“I don’t mean to rush you, but I do have another appointment coming. That will be three hundred dollars.”
“Oh yes. Here’s your check,” Mr. Dozier said as he handed me the slip of paper. I gave him a receipt I had made out earlier and told Mrs. Dozier to schedule an appointment with me when she knew her next Chemotherapy session. Mr. Dozier took his wife by the arm and the two of them left.
I didn’t really have another appointment that afternoon, it was just my excuse to get my patients out of the house before I collapsed as a result of their symptoms now coursing through my body. I walked into my second drawing room, a room that is the complete opposite of the one I use for the treatment of patients. While that one is bright, with the windows uncovered, bringing the outdoors in, my second, private one is dark, with heavy curtains drawn over the windows. Instead of the pair of old fashioned wing backed chairs, I lay on the most expensive piece of furniture in my home, a bed with a fantastic mattress. While I sleep on just the basic mattress in my bedroom, when recovering from a healing, I lay on a sophisticated piece of engineering that feels like I’m lying on a cloud. It’s the only real change I’ve made in this house’s furnishings since I took over after my mother’s death.
I lay on the bed and tried to will away the nausea so that I could sleep off the rest of the symptoms.
I woke up a few hours later feeling again like myself. And I was hungry, always a good sign with illness. I got up and put a slice of the lasagna I’d made the day before into the microwave. I’d left the Dozier’s check on the table in the foyer, so I picked it and the rest of that week’s payments up and took them back to the kitchen with my ledger. I filled out the deposit slip and recorded that week’s income in the ledger while I ate the lasagna. After I finished, I checked the time. It was only 7:00. I looked at my appointment book. My next patient wasn’t until the following Tuesday. I had an entire weekend to myself, the first in a long time. That is the problem when the majority of your patients are cancer patients. Chemotherapy treatments tend to be regularly scheduled and in my case, the majority of my patients had their treatment at the same time. I’d spent the past three weeks with barely one day without the nausea and body aches and the cycle would start again in a week or so. I hoped that my next group of cancer patients would be more spread out. It might seem callous, but so long as cancer exists, my descendents and I will continue to be in business.
This business had spread purely by word of mouth since my “too many greats to remember” grandmother helped her neighbor during childbirth and I didn’t realize how wide it had spread until a woman with a French accent had rung my doorbell asking for relief from an ulcer. She’d heard about me from a pen pal and made a special stop during her vacation in the United States. I had a suspicion that the doctors at the local hospital were doing a lot to help my business, but I had never asked my patients how they had come to hear about me. Few people will admit to seeing a witch for treatment and most only around the closest friends. A lot of my patients use a fake name and pay with cash for fear that I will use their name to control them or some other such nonsense. Not to say that I can’t control someone using their name, but to think that I would bother is silly. I spend a good deal of my time feeling sick and in whatever free time I can find I enjoy reading and hiking and doing stuff that just can’t be done with a headache and/or nausea.
I went into my treatment drawing room and picked up Fahrenheit 451. It had been such a busy week that I hadn’t gotten much read of the book. I was just settling into my chair when the doorbell rang. I sighed as I set my book aside and went to the door.
Chapter 2
I opened it to find a tall police officer standing on my stoop.
“Ms. Scarlet Hawthorne?” he asked.
I cringed as I always did at my mother’s idea of a joke. She'd been so excited when she met my father, Steven Hawthorne, since that meant she could name me after her favorite book: The Scarlet Letter. “Yes, that’s me. How can I help you?”
“I’m Nathan Whitworth. I’m investigating a claim that you have charging for services under false pretenses. There has been a report that you say that you heal the sick and take money for this service, but you don’t heal the person and instead make them come back for more ‘treatments’. What do you have to say about this?”
I stared at him a bit dumbfounded. “Come in. There has been a serious misunderstanding, not that I’m surprised.”
I showed Officer Whitworth into the bright drawing room and gestured for him to sit. I took my place in the second wing backed chair.
“Okay. What is...wait,” I stood up, went to the desk in the corner and found the form that I needed. “This is the disclosure form that all patients must read, understand, and sign before I do any treatment,” I said as I handed it to him and sat down again. “I’ll tell you what I tell all my patients. I do not claim to heal anyone and that page in front of you says that explicitly. All I claim to do is to relieve people of the symptoms caused by underlying disease; I do not remove the disease itself. For example, if you look at the form, there is a blank where we write in the disease that the person is suffering from as diagnosed by their doctor and you’ll see that it says that this is merely for reference when researching the associated symptoms. In the next blank we write any treatment the patient is receiving from their doctor and any side effects associated with that. And in the third blank we write what symptoms and side effects the patient wishes to have removed. Then there’s the customary paragraph of various disclaimers that my lawyer said should be included in the litigation ruled world we live in. Now, if you’d tell me who made such a claim about me, I can find my copy of this form for that person and we can talk about what they said I was supposed to do and what I actually did. There’s another form that patients fill out after their treatment has been completed that lets me know of their satisfaction, though that one is not required.”
Officer Whitworth spent two minutes reading the form that I’d handed him. He looked at me, looked at the page, leaned back and seemed to think about what I’d told him. He scratched his chin as he leaned forward to look at me closer. “What you’ve told me seems to clear your name, so I guess I need to see the form of Ms. Jacqueline Cox so that I can look into this further.”
I groaned audibly and Officer Whitworth’s eyes widened at the sound. “Ms. Cox is not one of my patients. She’s a member of the Reverend Brown’s group of, for lack of a better word, cronies that has been trying to get my family thrown out of this town since before 1692.” I heard my voice rising so I took a deep breath. I hadn’t been able to vent my frustration on this subject for years and things were just getting worse. “Look, I’m sorry that you had to come all the way out here, but Ms. Cox has no experience with my abilities and so any claims she’s making about me are fake. I have a feeling that I could turn the tables and press charges on her for making such claims,” Officer Whitworth nodded, “but I’m not. I’d rather just forget about it.” I stood up. “If there’s nothing else, I’ll show you to the door.”
Officer Whitworth stood, too. “I’m sorry to have bothered you. I guess I should have called and asked if Ms. Cox was a client before coming out here and annoying you. I’ll go now.” We walked to the door. “It was nice to meet you, though,” he said a bit awkwardly.
“Yeah, it was nice to meet you, too, I guess. Maybe under different circumstances things would be better." I think I was being rude, but it was hard to be polite when all I wanted to do was punch a wall in frustration. "Well, Goodbye.” I shut the door as he walked away, and leaned against it, thinking.
I went into my bedroom and pulled the large, ancient leather bound book from inside my bedside table. I went across the hall into the upstairs office where I did most of my studying and crafting.
I pushed some scrap fabric and lacewings to the side of the table and set the book gently on it. The book is over four hundred years old and is essentially my bible. It is everything that my ancestors have compiled about our talent with hints and instructions for everything they could think of that a person in my position would need to know. There were also places where they vented their own frustrations with neighbors that felt that “our kind” didn’t belong in this town. My ancestor, Mary Pickworth, was here during the Witch Trials of 1692, and gave a very detailed account of the massacre. She was never charged, which, given our history, is astonishing in my opinion. I suspect that her relationship with the mother of Simon Bradstreet, one of the Massachusetts Bay Colony leaders, had something to do with it. Mary kept a list of the women and children she treated, I assume as insurance should she find herself charged with witchcraft, and Mrs. Bradstreet was listed as suffering from a very painful bowel ailment. I flipped the pages carefully, reading the thoughts of Elizabeth Hardy (who woke up one morning in 1789 to find a Bible on her doorstep; it’s now on the table in the foyer for whomever might wish to read it), Victoria Grady (who was anonymously invited to a group bible study at the church in 1868, but arrived to find an exorcism being prepared for her), Charlotte Andrews, my grandmother, (who in December 1941 found a letter in her post box blaming her for the attack on Pearl Harbor) and the rest of the women in my family who stood up against the hatred facing them.
I live just outside of what had been Salem Village and is now known as Danvers, Massachusetts in the house that has been occupied constantly by my family for as long as we’ve lived in America. It started as a small one story farmhouse with just two rooms and expanded over the years to have the two drawing rooms in the front separated by the foyer with a dining room attached to the back of the bright drawing room and the kitchen tucked behind the stairs. A small spare bedroom can be found behind the dark drawing room and upstairs are 4 more bedrooms. There are two bathrooms, one upstairs, one down. It’s not a huge house, but a lot of children have been raised here and a lot of memories have been made. There had once been 150 acres of farmland around the house, but they’d long since been sold off, leaving just one acre that has long since overgrown.
I took out the new leather bound journal that I was using to create a more concise “bible”. Fahrenheit 451 was forgotten for the night. I had a stack of papers where I’d transcribed all of the information on various illnesses that my ancestors had dealt with. I had already sorted through it and put it all into sections based on the disease causing the symptoms as well as a miscellaneous section to house the many lists of symptoms and treatments without any specific causes. I opened the journal to where I’d left off in the cancer section and consulted my notes on the illness. I was trying to remove all the duplicates and find all the secret jewels hidden amongst the general chatter about life. I wrote in the journal for a few hours before turning off the light and heading to bed.
Chapter 3
Saturday morning, I thought when I awoke the next morning. It’s not generally my best day, but since I didn’t have any patients I figured that the day wouldn’t be too awful. I just had to run a few errands which would take just a couple of hours or so; deposit the weeks earnings, shop for groceries, stop by the library to exchange the books I’d finished for new ones. I try to spend the least amount of time in town because of the stares I usually get from locals; I fill out all deposit slips at home, have a strict grocery list and use the internet hold system to order library books. I am the master of efficiency. I rolled out of bed and took a long shower to prepare me for the day.
I ran into no problems at the bank and was halfway through my grocery shopping when I bumped into Jacqueline Cox, literally. I guess I wasn’t paying attention and my cart hit hers as I came out of the dried bean aisle. I hate to say it, but the glare she gave me made my blood run cold. I’m really not cut out for being hated; I have really thin skin and don’t handle confrontation well.
“Watch where you’re going!”
“I’m sorry. It’s my fault. Please go ahead, you have the right of way,” I told her as calmly as I could. I bowed my head unintentionally, trying to avoid the way her eyes bore into me. I heard her sniff loudly and then saw her cart pull away. I decided to go in the opposite direction even though I’d already gotten everything I needed from those aisles. I wanted to give Ms. Cox as much head start as I could. The rest of the trip went smoothly, though I did take extra care at all intersections and made sure that she wasn’t already on any aisle that I was about to enter. I’m sure I looked odd, but it certainly wasn’t the activity that would get me into Ripley’s Believe It or Not.
My one respite was at the library where luckily, or not, the head librarian is one of my patients. Of course, in this town, such a connection isn’t advertised. Mrs. Johnson tended to treat me a bit coldly in public, though she’s a real dear when coming to me for treatment of her lumbago. She sends me a large, and quite tasty, fruitcake for Christmas every year. As usual, she handed me my books without saying a word or meeting my eyes, but I later found an envelope in one of the books with a two photos: one of her newest granddaughter and one of her wearing an obscenely large hat with an equally obscenely large hydrangea on top, some flower seeds from her garden, and a note thanking me for her last treatment.
I actually have quite a few patients in this town, but you’d be hard pressed to identify them by our interactions in public. I was fine with this, figuring, like my great, great…grandmother that such ties were allies in waiting. In private, these patients were some of the nicest ladies and gentlemen, no matter how they treated me in public. They were never outwardly mean, just a lot like Mrs. Johnson, choosing to appear afraid or otherwise actively avoiding me. But I still receive an astounding number of Christmas gifts delivered by my wonderful postman. I’m helping with his daughter’s cystic fibrosis.
I finished the errands and drove home. There was a truck already parked outside of my house. I said a quick prayer that it was friend not foe and pulled into the driveway myself.
“Hey. How’s it going?” Officer Whitworth was leaning against the truck. He was dressed in jeans and a blue v-neck t-shirt rather than the uniform he’d worn the night before. He walked over to help me with my groceries. “Got enough beans?” he asked grabbing the bag. I’d bought ten of the one pound bags of various types of the dried beans.
“Ugh. Don’t talk to me about beans.” Officer Whitworth raised his eyebrows. “I ran into Jacqueline Cox at the market this morning.”
“Oh. I see….on the bean aisle?” he asked with a chuckle in his voice and a twinkle in his eye.
“And that’s why you’re the police officer. I’m impressed,” I said with an appreciative nod. “But in any case, I like beans. They’re easy to cook, nutritious, I can add them to anything and make enough leftovers to feed me for a week.”
“You eat a lot of leftovers?” Officer Whitworth asked as I let him into my house.
“Well, yeah. I mean, it’s really hard to cook for one and in my line of work, I never know when I’m going to have time. So when I do cook I make a lot and freeze it. Don’t judge,” I said with a fake scowl.
“Hey, I’m not judging,” he said, putting the grocery bags on the counter and holding his hands up. “I eat a ton of fast food and frozen dinners. It’s impressive that you cook for yourself.”
“So, you’re single,” I surmised, deciding that it wouldn’t hurt to check him out. Easily over six foot tall, dark hair and blue eyes, looks that belong in July of the firefighter’s calendar. Not bad at all.
“Now who deserves a badge? Is there anything else in the car?”
“Just my library books.” I started putting away the groceries.
“I’ll go get them for you.” He started walking towards the door.
“Thanks, they’re in the front seat,” I called to him. I wondered why he was here as I put the milk and eggs into the fridge. I’d started to cut the ground beef into usable portions when Officer Whitworth walked in with my books. “You can put them on the table. Thanks again for getting them for me.”
“It’s not a problem. I’m the one intruding; it’s the least I could do.” He picked up a bag of beans, “Where do these go?”
“Oh, the cabinet behind you; not the top shelf though, please.” I’m insanely short and I hate having to drag out the step stool to get things while I’m cooking.
Nathan laughed. “But there’s nothing on the top shelves.”
“And that’s the way it should stay. Anything that belongs on the top shelf is something that I’m only going to use once a year and therefore does not belong in my kitchen.” I put all but one of the ground beef portions into the freezer and the last into the refrigerator along with the chicken thighs then emptied the rest of the bags before I put them on the table in the foyer. Nathan put the canned vegetables into the cabinet next to the beans while I put the fresh fruit and vegetables away. “There. All done. Now, are you hungry? I haven’t eaten lunch yet.” I decided that since it had been so long since I’d had a visitor who wasn’t looking for relief from illness, I was going to treat this as a social visit and let Officer Whitworth be the one to tell me why he was here. Plus, I did feel a little guilty about the way I'd rushed him out the night before.
“Sure, I could eat.”
“Is there anything you crave, or will re-heated lasagna suit you?”
“Lasagna is fine.”
I took two portions of the lasagna out of the refrigerator and popped them into the microwave. I grabbed two apples and two carrots out of the basket and started to peel and slice them on the cutting board.
“Do you want any help?” Nathan was watching me as he leaned casually against the counter.
“Umm…well, I guess you can make me a glass of milk. The glasses are in the cabinet behind your head. And you can pour yourself a glass of whatever you want to drink. There’s juice, water and besides the milk. Sorry, I don’t keep soda in the house.” I started arranging the apples and carrots on two small plates as the microwave beeped. I used a towel to protect my hands from the hot plates and took them to the dining room. Nathan was putting the drinks on the table then he beat me to the kitchen to retrieve the veggies and a pair of forks. I sat down then realized that this was the first time I’d shared a meal with someone other than a family member, well, ever. He sat as well and we stared at each other awkwardly.
“Umm…you can say grace if you wish…or whatever it is that you do before eating. I don’t normally, but it doesn’t bother me if others do,” I told him, mumbling shyly.
“Actually I was waiting to see if you said anything before digging in,” he laughed and took a bite of lasagna. “Wow, you made this? It’s great!”
“Yep, right down to the tomato sauce which I made from the vegetables in my garden. Believe it or not, I don’t get out much, so I have plenty of time to garden and cook stuff like jams and tomato sauce.” I took a bite of the lasagna, too. I couldn’t think of anything to talk about but the silence wasn’t uncomfortable.
Nathan leaned back in his chair after he finished eating, patting his stomach. “I’m going to have to start stopping by more often. I mean, I could definitely use the home cooked meals, and you obviously need someone to help you eat your food.”
“Really? You’ll only visit for the food. I feel so used and you’ve only stopped by once.” I laughed though, and reached for his plates to stack on mine before I took them to the kitchen.
“I’ll do the dishes,” Nathan stood up and grabbed the dishes for himself. He took them into the kitchen and placed them in the sink.
“I don’t have a dishwasher, so you’ll be scrubbing by hand.”
“That’s okay; I don’t have a dishwasher, either.” He pantomimed rolling up his sleeves and winked at me. “I’m an educated man: I can wash dishes and clothes, mop and vacuum floors, even iron and clean the toilet. On a good day, I even put the toilet seat down.”
I pretended to fan myself. “My hero,” I swooned. Then laughed. Talking to Nathan was incredibly easy. I wished talking the Reverend’s crew was so easy. He cleaned the dishes quickly and did even did a good job. When he finished, I decided to break my vow to not ask why he was here, since he didn’t seem keen to tell me on his own volition. I led him into the bright drawing room.
“So, the suspense has been killing me…why in the world are you here?” I asked as we settled into the wing-back chairs.
“Oh, I dunno, really. I just decided to come and visit.” Nathan wasn’t looking at me, though.
“Officer Whitworth…”
“Call me Nathan,” he interrupted. I didn’t mention that that’s what I’d been calling him in my head for a while now
“Nathan, that’s a really lame excuse,” I said smiling. “Why are you really here?”
He shrugged, but his eyes did finally meet mine. “I really don’t know. I left here yesterday and spent most of the night thinking about what you’d said. I know your history, of course, but I guess I’d never wanted to confront what I decided were just rumors. I got stuck with the case against you because I’m low man on the totem pole at the precinct and nobody else would touch it. I’m not sure if it’s because they thought that you would hex them, or because they’re your patients, or because they didn’t want to deal with Ms. Cox. It’s probably some combination of the three, but either way, I’m the one it was given to. It surprised me how thorough your contract is to make sure that no one has grounds to sue you and how I could find no evidence of someone ever suing you or your family for fraud. I came to the conclusion that you must be able to do something and, well, I want to be a detective eventually, so I couldn’t just leave such an idea alone. I hope you don’t mind, but I really just want to know what your secret is. Am I an awful person?”
I stared at him for a full minute. Then I burst into laughter. “You want to learn what exactly I am?” I asked when I could catch my breath. I wiped away a tear. "Sure, ask whatever you want. I wouldn't go around telling people, though; they'll think you're crazy."
"So, you're really a witch?" Nathan’s eyes widened. I had a feeling that he’d made that long speech all while hoping that I was not. “You could hex me if you wanted?” He definitely was starting to look worried.
I decided to test him. I looked deeply into his eyes, leaning forward. “Yes.” And I snapped my fingers. A pile of papers on the desk flew around the room as though caught by a tornado, then stopped in mid-air, floating. A second later they flew back to the desk and settled there as neatly as they’d been before their flight.
There was an audible gulp from Nathan. I looked at him and he looked as though he’d swallowed a guppy. “Are you alright?” I asked him. He did not look healthy and I thought that I’d caused an aneurism. “Crap.” I stood up and kneeled next to his chair. I ran my fingers through his hair, looking for a sign that he was still with me. I placed my hands on his temples, and with a deep inhale I took the stress away from his body. I shivered as the panic attack worked its way through me and felt it settle into the pit of my stomach. I tried to hide the fear that was now in my eyes when I asked again if he was alright.
“Yeah…” His voice was feeble and he still looked an awful shade of green. “What did you do to me?”
“I just took away the anxiety that I caused. I’m really sorry. I’ve never done anything like that before. I thought you could handle it.” The panic attack swirling in my stomach was not helping things and my voice was starting to rise. There were tears in my eyes again, but this time were caused by fright. “Excuse me.”
I nearly ran out of the room and into the downstairs bathroom. The panic within me was now clearly on my face and I saw it in the mirror. It was a good thing Nathan was still out of it or he might have had another fit. I washed my face trying to wash away what I’d done. What an awful prank. I groaned and wrapped a cool cloth around my neck, hoping that it would help me keep the attack at bay until it wore off.
I went back into the drawing room. Nathan was still sitting in the chair, but he looked noticeably calmer. I, on the other hand, was trembling. He looked at me with his eyebrows raised, “What’s wrong with you? I’m the one that should be terrified, but oddly I feel fine.”
“Yeah, that’s because I’m an idiot.” I sat on the edge of my seat and took the cloth from my neck and started to wring it in my hands. I took a deep breath and stared at the floor. “When I heal someone, I feel the effects. Always. When you looked like you were going to go insane from the fright, I took it away and now I’m dealing with all the feelings that were just running through your body—the increased heartbeat, the sweating, the nausea—all the standard components of a panic attack.” I took another deep breath and felt the effects easing. “Luckily, I have an increased metabolism for illnesses and what would normally take an hour to get over, I can get over in ten minutes.” I looked up at him. “See, it’s better already. I’m really sorry for that. It’s just been so easy to talk to you, I thought maybe you could bear such a prank.” I looked down, “I’ll understand if you don’t want to stop by anymore.” Shoot, I was that close to having a real friend and I screwed it up. How I wish I was normal!
Nathan sighed. “Well, I think that if I had your power, I’d have done the same thing. And I haven’t been completely honest with you. I’m not just some guy on the police force. My mom is Reverend Brown’s sister. You of all people should understand what that means.”
I stared at him, dumbfounded. “You must have had a horrible childhood.” I cringed “…Sorry, I didn’t mean to say that out loud.” I meant that. "Not that my childhood was better. If I'd had friends, maybe I'd know what is or is not an appropriate prank."
“No, it’s fine. Mom is kind of the female leader of the anti-Scarlet Hawthorne club. It’s another reason why I was handed Ms. Cox’s case; my mom wouldn’t let me let it get lost in the shuffle like the Chief was hoping would happen. I’ve always given you and your family the benefit of the doubt, figuring that mom had some kind of bad run in with your family years ago. Don’t take this the wrong way, but if she knew that the stuff you do is real, she’d probably have more fuel.” He must have seen my eyes widen and raised his hands. “I’m not a spy! I’m really here for my own personal reasons and if my mom knew I was here she’d probably make me bathe in salt water and vinegar. I don’t plan to tell her anything, nor do I plan to tell anyone else. I’m just a selfish person who doesn’t let questions go unanswered…even if I’m not physically capable of accepting the answers.” He actually let out a chuckle. “How are you feeling? Has…your…my panic attack left yet? …Weird.” He shook his head.
I did a general check of my system and found no out of place feelings. “I’m good. The attack is gone. And that’s the last time I use my magic for pranks.”
“Well, it was a good prank.” He smiled sweetly and I half returned the smile.
“God, you sure can make a girl feel awful.”
The phone rang. Nathan waved for me to go ahead and answer it and I smiled apologetically.
“Hello?”
“Scarlet? I need your help!” The voice on the other end was frantic. “It’s Stacy Collins. I’m at the hospital with Charlotte. She’s dying!” Stacy’s voice was high pitched and filled with tears.
“Stacy, calm down. Charlotte needs you to be calm. I’ll be there as soon as I can. I’m leaving now. Bye.” I hung up the phone.
“I have to go. A patient is in the hospital with her daughter…” My voice trailed off and I realized that Nathan’s panic attack might not have left completely or else I was having one of my own.
Chapter 4
Nathan seemed to read my mind. “I’ll give you a ride. Come on.”
I realized that it was great being friends (were we friends?) with a cop. Nathan has a light that he can put on the top of his personal vehicle and he used it, getting me to the hospital in half the time it normally takes me. He dropped me outside of the main entrance and told me that he would find me inside.
I ran through the doors and stopped briefly at the front desk. I’ve spent a lot of time at this hospital comforting many of my patients and the staff knows me well enough. I was quickly informed that Charlotte Collins was in the NICU and that I should probably hurry. I rushed to the stairs.
Before I was allowed in the NICU, I had to put on the sterile scrubs. I quickly put the scrubs on over top of my clothes and when I finally made it to the bedside of Charlotte, I wished I could have moved faster. There were tubes all around her and she was very pale and still.
“What’s wrong?” I asked the doctor who was listening to her heartbeat.
“It seems to be a bacterial infection. She came in two days ago lethargic with mild diarrhea and has just gone downhill from there. She’s losing fluids faster than we’re able to replace them. It doesn’t look good. And worst of all, there are four more infants with the same illness in similar states.” Dr. Natalie Stephans looked at me and I saw her eyes pleading for help.
I looked around the NICU and saw four more groups of parents, nurses and tiny babies around the room. A few of the parents were looking at me with mixed expressions. I rubbed my face and turned back to Charlotte.
“What are the symptoms exactly and what ideally do you think will save them?” I asked Dr. Stephans quietly.
“Diarrhea, vomiting, body aches, exhaustion and a rash”
“Wonderful,” I said sarcastically under my breath. “And the cure?”
“Getting rid of the bacteria, obviously, but the levels of antibiotics that is needed would kill these infants anyway. Their bodies just can’t handle that treatment in the state that they’re in.”
“So, theoretically I could take the symptoms away and then you’d be able to pump them full of the antibiotics? And that would save their lives?”
“I hope,” Dr. Stephans said quietly. She cleared her throat. “I’ve never seen this aggressive of an infection. I really have no idea what to do, but we can’t just leave these children to die without trying everything.”
I looked at Stacy. “Please,” she begged.
“Ugh. This is going to royally suck for me, but I’m not going to let 5 babies die just so I can avoid the plague.” I turned to Dr. Stephans. “I need you to get all the babies into a separate room away from their parents. They don’t need to see the puddle of disgustingness that I know I’m going to turn into. Tell the parents whatever you need to so that I don't get sued." I hate the fact that saving myself from lawsuit has to come before helping others. It's one reason why I stay away from emergency cases, beside the fact that my body can handle some symptoms better than others in polite company.
I took Stacy’s hand and pulled her to the side. “How are you holding up?” “Not well at all,” she sobbed.
“Where’s Ralph?”
“Dr. Stephans and I sent him to work this morning. You know how he feels about you and if he knew that you were involved he would have hired an armed guard to keep you away from Charlotte.” Ralph was one of Reverend Brown’s people and he didn’t know that I was the reason why Stacy had been able to conceive Charlotte in the first place. Stacy was infertile and had spent 5 years going through various failed fertility treatments before she came to me. We weren’t sure how Ralph would react if he ever found out, but neither of us was keen to find out for ourselves. The last time I ran into Ralph in public he’d publicly announced that I was a witch and would go to Hell as punishment for my dealings with the devil.
“As soon as I’m out of the picture, call him. He should be here, whatever the outcome is. I’d take away some of your anxiety right now, but I can’t. I need to be on top of my game if I want to save Charlotte, you know that.”
“Hell, I’d take away your stress if it would help you save her,” Stacy told me. I hugged her and we waited for Dr. Stephans to come back with permission to move the babies.
“Four out of the Five are willing to let you work. Luckily for the infants, the couple that doesn’t trust you has the baby that’s the least sick and is currently fairing well on the antibiotics he’s been given. The babies will be moved within the next five minutes and then you can go to work.” Dr. Stephans left us to supervise the movements.
“Stacy, Officer Nathan Whitworth brought me to the hospital. He’s here somewhere. Could you please find him and explain what’s happened? I wouldn’t ask you, but I think the task will be good for your nerves and I think that he’ll be able to comfort you while you wait.”
“You…with a guy? If this wasn’t such a serious moment I would demand the details.”
“I’ll spill later. It looks like the babies are ready.”
“Good luck!” Stacy let out another sob. But she was definitely more relaxed now than she had been when I first arrived. I hoped that she was right in putting so much faith in me.
I walked into the exam room that the babies had been moved into. The nurses were setting up the last of the equipment and then left the room, Dr. Stephans stayed with me.
“If I collapse before I’m done, prop me up. Throw water on me if I become unconscious. I don’t want to leave this room before I’ve done what I can for all of the children,” I told her firmly. She nodded. I closed my eyes and said a prayer that somehow we could pull this off. I’m quite serious when I pray. I don’t know if I’m praying to the same God as the Reverend Brown, but I believe that he’s listening to me and helping me use my gift. I rolled up my sleeves. “Okay. Let’s do this.”
The babies had been lined up from worst sick to least. Charlotte was first. I placed my hands on her stomach and took in a deep breath as I pulled the urge to vomit out of her, along with the diarrhea and everything else she was suffering from right down to the rash. Glamorous, my job is not. I doubled over from the pain almost instantly and saw stars. You wouldn’t think that an adult would feel the same amount of distress as an infant when you remove the symptoms, given the difference in our sizes, but I’m not a large woman and I was trading my health and immune system. Dr. Stephans grabbed me around the shoulders and held me up. She checked the monitors over Charlotte.
“She’s stabilizing. It’s working, I think.”
I groaned and nodded to the next baby. I repeated the process and the urge to vomit doubled. Dr. Stephans had luckily thought ahead and ordered a five gallon bucket into the room as well. The lasagna tasted awful the second time around. I stumbled to the third infant, nearly falling on the bassinette. I groaned again as my stomach did flips. My bowels were on fire and I hate to say that I was losing control over it. The third baby sent my bowels over the edge. “Crap…double, literal crap,” I cursed to Dr. Stephans through gritted teeth.
“We’ll clean you up once we’re done. We’ve got the best staff ready to put you back to rights. One more baby to go.”
I put my head between my knees and almost fell over from the smell. I moaned and Dr. Stephans gently pushed me to the last infant. My eyes were squeezed shut, I needed to scratch every inch of my torso, and I could barely stand. I placed one hand limply on the last baby pulling out the illness and shoving in the last of my immune system. As I removed my hand, my body ceased to work. I collapsed to the floor and fell into wonderful unconsciousness.
I woke up naked in a tub full of warm water curled up with my head resting on the edge. It was the best feeling in the world, except that I had obviously not been unconscious very long because moments later I felt my bowels let loose again. I let out a sound somewhere between a growl and a moan.
“What was that noise?!” I groaned for real and hid my face. That was Nathan’s voice.
“Go away. I want a real, and female, nurse,” I called weakly lifting my head. I noticed the IV tube stuck into my hand. I shivered; I hate needles.
Nathan’s head peeked around the doorframe. “Well, I sent them all away, so I’ll have to do,” he grinned.
“This is hazardous waste; you should stay away because I’m refusing to heal you if you get sick. Besides, I’m naked. Don’t you care about my sense of decency?” I really didn’t want him to see me in this state. I was a mess, covered in mess, and I was starting to really like this guy. I didn’t want to scare him off by looking like this.
He walked in and sat on the floor next to the tub. “I’m a cop and have been trained in both haz- mat and emergency medicine. You have nothing that I haven’t seen before,” he said quietly. He reached for a bathrobe lying on the toilet, “Come on, honey,” he nudged for me to stand.
I looked at his face. He gentlemanly turned his head and looked away to give me a bit of privacy. I grunted as I grabbed his arm to help me stand up and leaned heavily against him as he wrapped me in the robe. My head was spinning again, but Nathan manfully held me up as he took the IV bag from the wall and put it between his teeth. He picked me up and carried me to the bed.
“You must be well liked here; they gave you one of the maternity recovery rooms,” he told me after he laid me down and put the IV bag on the wall hook. “High thread count sheets, sofa with pull out bed, TV with more than 3 channels…I’ve been in hotel rooms that aren’t so nice.” He tucked me in and looked down at me, smiling.
I scowled at him. I felt miserable and embarrassed and he was looking at me like I had a broken leg caused by falling off a runway during a fashion show. I decided to change the subject. “How are the babies doing?”
“The four you helped are recovering beautifully. The fifth baby is also doing well, but at a much slower pace. His parents look like they’re regretting not asking for your help, but I don’t think anyone should rub that in their faces. And if you care at all, you’re doing remarkably well yourself. They’re pumping you full of anti-diarrhea and anti-nausea medicine to go with the saline.” I tried not to look at the needle sticking out of my hand. “But the most important thing you can do now is get some sleep.”
“What time is it, anyway?”
Nathan checked his watch. “Three o’clock. You were unconscious for about an hour.”
“Not bad,” I sighed as I sank down into the bed. “Yeah, sleep sounds nice.” I yawned and closed my eyes, pretending to go to sleep. I heard Nathan walk away and figured that he was leaving me for the afternoon. I fell asleep for real a short time later.
Much later that night I awoke to someone standing over me. “Who’s there?” I asked.
“It’s just me.” Dr. Stephans turned on a small light above my head. “I wanted to check on you before I left for the night.”
I heard a strange snort from across the room. I sat up and saw Nathan sleeping on the couch, his feet hanging off the end. “What’s he doing here?” I asked more or less to myself.
“He told the nurses that he wasn’t going to leave you. Nice guy you’ve found for yourself.” Dr. Stephans was smiling at me. “Good for you. I’ve always feared that you’d end up a lonely old cat lady.”
“I don’t like cats and I barely know the guy.” “Well, he volunteers with the rescue squad so he comes through here as often as you do. He’s a great guy and if you don’t grab him, there are a half dozen nurses who would gladly take him off your hands.”
“Yeah, but one day soon he’s going to realize that our first date, if anyone could call it that, was punctuated with me leaking out of every opening in my body and feeling like I’d opened up a few extra crevices to do the job.” There was another loud snore from the couch.
“Well, he snores. You can always use that as leverage.” Natalie stifled a laugh. “Well I should go and get some sleep myself.”
I shook my head, laughing too. “Before you leave, can you please get this thing out of my hand? You know how I feel about needles.”
“Sure, so long as you’re feeling better,” she said, reaching for a glove off the table next to the bed.
“Yup, I’m feeling great. A bit squishy from all the fluids I’ve had pumped into me.” I turned my head away as she pulled the needle out of me and ignored the small flip my stomach made as I thought about the IV. Dr. Stephans turned the light off and left the room after saying good night to me. I rolled over and went back to sleep.
I woke up to sunlight streaming through the open blinds. Nathan was sitting on the couch eating a bowl of cereal he’d scrounged from somewhere. “Good Morning!” he said way too jubilantly, standing up and walking over to me. “The nurse already came through. You’re lucky Dr. Stephans signed your chart about taking out the IV last night because the nurse was cursing up a storm about you removing it yourself. I’m not sure how you slept through it, though maybe the fact that that the nurse was muttering the whole tirade helped. You hungry?” He took a bite of cereal and milk dribbled down his chin. This guy was much too cute for his own good. “Dang,” he cursed as he wiped his chin on his sleeve.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Yeah, I’m starving. I think I had more food in my stomach when I was born.”
“Well, you’re in luck again because Dr. Stephans also wrote that you’re allowed solid foods in your chart. I’ll go see if I can find the food cart for you.” He put his cereal on the bedside table and left.
I couldn’t help myself and grabbed the bowl to take a just a bite. It was wonderful and I quickly ate it all, even drinking the milk. I adjusted the robe, which wasn't doing a very good job of keeping me covered. Thankfully the blanket had been up to my neck when I woke up. Nathan came back a few minutes later with a tray full of food that he set on the rolling bed table. He reached for his cereal bowl and saw that it was empty. I tried to hide the smile on my lips, not looking at the forelorn expression on his face, but was unable to do either. He shook his head and grabbed the Danish off the tray, mumbling about a man’s cereal not even being safe and sat on the edge of my bed. I snorted a laugh and dug into the eggs and sausage. There was too much food on the tray for me, even in my famished state, but Nathan was quick to help me eat it all.
I leaned back on the pillows, content. “Have you heard when I can leave this place?”
“Dr. Stephans wants to check on you when she gets in this morning and she’ll probably let you loose then. Oh,” he turned towards me, looking at me seriously. “I took the liberty of going to your house to get you some clean clothes last night. I wasn’t able to, though. I opened the door and felt a static electric shock. I took a couple more steps inside and got a feeling of dread, like if I didn’t leave right then, things weren’t going to end very well for me. So, I turned around and came back here. Could you please explain to me what that was?”
I coughed. “Umm…well, don’t freak out again, but that was magic. I don’t have a conventional burglar alarm. What you felt were the warnings that you aren’t allowed. If you’d stayed any longer you would have gotten a much heavier shock that probably would have knocked you to the floor for a while. Sorry about that. If you’d told me that you were going, that wouldn’t have happened unless you tried to touch something that you aren’t allowed to touch.”
“Hey, I’m fine. It’s my fault for entering your house. I’m actually a lot more accepting of your abilities now than I was 16 hours ago. I’ve seen just how much you give of yourself and it’s not scary or evil.” He held my hand, looking down. “You’re a saint who wears a pointy black hat to keep people away.” He rubbed the back of my hand with his thumb. “Actually,” he said, looking up, “I’m wondering if you can put that spell on my apartment so I never have to worry about intruders again. You don’t know how upsetting it is to wake up in the morning to find a squirrel eating peanuts on your head…so messy,” he said grinning. I smacked him with my free hand, my stomach doing flips again, but this time they were pleasant.
“Well, how is the patient doing this morning?” Dr. Stephans came through the door. I reflexively tried to pull my hand out of Nathans, but he sensed me about to do so and held on tight. I looked at him, saw his comforting smile, and relaxed, leaving my hand in his as though it was the most natural thing ever. Natalie noticed, smiled, and left it at that. “I brought you some clothes since yours were… well they had to be burned as soon as we got them off of you. Hurry up and get dressed, the parents want to visit you, then you’ll be free to leave.” Natalie put the bag of clothes on the chair and left.
“Alright, let me up,” I told Nathan, shoving off the blanket. He moved and stood ready to catch me should I prove myself incapable of standing, but I was fine. I made sure the robe was covering me and grabbed the clothes off the chair and took them into the bathroom. The room had been cleaned while I slept, thankfully. I used the soap and shampoo provided and took a much deserved hot shower. I grimaced when I pulled out the clothes Natalie had brought me. I usually wear t-shirts and jeans, nothing too fancy, but Natalie seemed to think that I should dress up, bringing me a light blue sundress with spaghetti straps. She’d thought of everything, though, including a raiser and shave cream in the bag. I thanked her silently, because I was a bit prickly at the moment. I hopped back into the shower to shave quickly and didn’t even nick myself. She must know me better than I thought because the strapless bra and panties were the right size and the dress fit me well. A pair of casual flip flops completed the outfit. I had a feeling that I might be wearing my birthday present for this year. I combed my hair, collected everything I’d used into the bag, shut off the light and took a deep breath before I opened the door.
Nathan was lying on the bed watching TV. He glanced at me when he heard the door open, but sat up quickly and stared at me when he realized what I was wearing. I was embarrassed, but appreciated his enthusiastic reaction to my looks. “Stop that,” but I laughed at his expression. He didn’t reply. His face was similar to how it had looked when I made the papers fly around the room. I waved my hand in front of his face and he barely registered the movement. “What in the world?” I put my hand on his forehead and searched for what was causing this reaction. When I found the cause, I pulled away from him quickly. “Odd,” I said to myself. He was aroused and for some reason, that was causing the catatonic state. I sat on the bed before I gritted my teeth, put my hand on his neck and pulled the arousal into myself. He shook his head groggily and I bit back the urge to kiss him. Women are just not built to hold the same level of stimulation as men. No wonder males never seem to be satisfied.
“What was that?” Nathan asked me. “One minute I’m looking at you, then next I feel like a total dunce.”
“Don’t ask,” I said, turning my back on him. I hoped that there wouldn’t be any visitors until I’d managed to reel in the fire that was currently running through me and planting itself in the pit of my stomach.
“Are you okay?” he asked, putting his hand on my shoulder.
I pushed his hand away, moving further away from him while still not looking at him. “Don’t touch.” I put my head between my knees breathing deeply trying to push out the effects I was feeling. We kept completely still for the next five minutes, I tried not to think about the color and depth of Nathan’s eyes that I felt staring at me trying to figure out why I was acting so strangely. After what felt like an eternity I felt Nathan’s need finally leave me. I sat up and straightened my back. I turned around and looked at him. “Guys are weird,” and left it at that. Nathan looked as though I’d hit him with a frying pan, he was so confused.
“Will you ever explain to me what just happened?”
“No. Probably never.”
With impeccable timing, Dr. Stephans knocked on the door and opened it. “Scarlet, I’d like to introduce you to Mr. and Mrs. James. You helped their daughter Natasha recover from the infection.” As though I didn’t remember. I did wonder which baby Natasha had been, though, but it would be awkward for me to ask that detail. I shook hands with the James’ and prepared myself for the excessive thanks that I would receive.
“I don’t know how we could ever thank you enough,” Mr. James was saying while Mrs. James rung my hand and let a small sob escape. They were a young couple, and Natasha was probably their first child. “Let us pay you for your service. What is your fee?”
“Oh, you really don’t have to pay me. I never charge for emergency calls,” which is the truth. “Your thanks is enough payment.”
“No, we insist. We don’t take charity from anyone. Is $2000 enough?”
“No, no, no!” I said waving my hands.
“You want more? That’s fine.”
“No! I don’t want payment. Really.” Why do so many people think that payment is the only way to say thank-you? I really just want a simple thank-you and maybe a nice word passed on about me to other people.
Mrs. James grabbed me and hugged my neck, crying. She seemed to be a very emotional person. She was blubbering something into my ear that I didn’t understand, but made for a much better expression of gratitude than her husband’s insistence that he throw money at me. I awkwardly patter her back. Mrs. James hung on me for a few minutes before her husband stepped in to pull her off of me.
“Well, thanks again,” said Mr. James. He took his wife tenderly beneath his arm and led her out of the room.
It seemed like a sudden goodbye until I turned around and saw the check lying on the table by the bed. He’d wanted to get out of there before I could give it back to him. I shook my head. The check was made out for $5000. A young couple they might be, but they were certainly not poor.
Nathan had an amused look on his face. Natalie had slipped out of the room at some point without my notice. “Quiet you,” I told him. I picked the check up and put it into the bag of toiletries.
“You don’t charge for emergency calls?” Nathan sounded genuinely interested.
“No, I don’t. I can’t guarantee that I’ll be of any help in an emergency, so I never charge. Most of the time I’m only able to relieve the pain and let them have a good last hour with their families, and unfortunately a lot of people know of the rumors about me and think I can cure the dying, which just isn’t true. I try to stay away from the emergency calls and don’t charge for them no matter what the outcome because then it would seem like I’m just here for the money.”
Natalie knocked again and brought in the Jacksons. This couple was much more appreciative in a way that I could handle. I was hugged by both of them and the mom handed me a box of chocolates and a bouquet of flowers. I thanked them both genuinely for the presents and we parted pleasantly. They promised to keep me updated on Thomas’ progress.
“Now, that’s my type of people,” I said, smiling.
Natalie brought in the last parent, a single mother named Anne Richely. She told me that she was too poor to pay me anything, which I assured her, was fine, and thanked me heartily for saving her son, John. Her thanks were short, sweet, and perfectly wonderful. Natalie showed Ms. Richely out then came back into my room. “Ralph is with Stacy and Charlotte right now. She told me that she’ll talk to you later. Well, let’s sign this paperwork so you can get out of here.”
Nathan grabbed my bag and Natalie walked with us to the door. We were walking past the nurses’ station outside the ICU hall when Dr. Vickers called to me.
“Scarlet,” he said, walking up to me. “We tried to call you last night. Sarah Mahoney was brought in yesterday and it looks serious. Her family was wondering if you could make her last moments easier. Do you mind?”
“No, I don’t mind at all. Nathan? It shouldn’t take too long.” I didn’t wait for his reply, but followed Dr. Vickers to Sarah’s room. I hated these calls and the less time I spent thinking about what I was doing, the easier the task went.
All of Sarah’s family was around her bed, right down to her youngest granddaughter Elizabeth. Sarah’s son Kenneth shook my hand as I walked to Sarah’s bed. “I’m glad you could come. She’s always spoken so highly of you and the comfort you’ve brought her. We’re sorry for bothering you at a time like this, but mother is insisting that you come.”
“It’s not a problem. I’d love to help.” The family cleared a space and I walked up to stand next to Sarah.
“Hello Sarah, how are you feeling?” I brushed the hair off her forehead while I began pulling the pain out of her. I also pumped some of my strength into her.
“I’m feeling much better with you here, sweetheart.” She was able to sit up a little bit and her eyes were clear. I moved my hand from her forehead to her hand. “You’re looking nice today, new dress?”
I smiled. “I borrowed it from a friend.” I turned my head away from Sarah and coughed. I found the morphine inside of her that she wouldn’t need with her pain gone and took it too, using it to hide the pain I now felt. “Well, Sarah, I’m going to let you spend some quality time with your family. I’ll see you later.”
I didn’t look at her family, but Elizabeth took my hand and whispered thank-you as I walked out of the room.
I leaned against the wall with my eyes closed. Nathan put his arm around my shoulders, “Come on, let’s get you home.”
The ride home was quiet, but the morphine I’d taken was working pretty well. They hadn’t given her a very heavy dose. I guess they were waiting until later to do that; to deaden the pain, but also leave her unable to talk to her family clearly. Nathan walked with me into the house. I stopped just inside of the doorway and debated lying down in the dark drawing room. Instead I ended up sitting on the stairs crying. Nathan knelt in front of me and pulled me into a big hug. I put my arms around his neck and buried my face in his shoulder. He didn’t try to comfort me with words, just rubbed my back. We stayed like that for nearly ten minutes, even after I ran out of tears.
I pulled back and ducked my face while I wiped away the tears. “Thanks,” I said, my voice hoarse. I checked my watch. 2:30. I stood up. The pain of the final stage of cancer was gone, but the pain of losing a dear friend was going to take a lot longer to disappear. I cleared my throat. “You can go if you want. I’m just going to putter around the garden for a few hours.”
“Do you want to be left alone? Because sometimes it’s nice to have company even if we don’t talk.” Nathan was looking at me with an expression of real concern.
“I’m fine. This isn’t the first time I’ve done that particular task and she lived a full life. I can’t prevent death, but I can make it less painful. I’ve had plenty of practice getting over loss. It doesn’t make it any easier, but I heal.” I smiled and gave him a playful shove. “Go. You have your own life. If you get hungry, dinner is at 6:30. I’ll make something besides Lasagna. How does fried chicken sound?”
He smiled slowly, giving a half nod. “Fried Chicken sounds great. I’ll see you later, then.” He let himself out of the house.
Chapter 5
I went out the back door into my garden. Most of my yard is overgrown with ancient trees and wild vines, but a plot of earth roughly twenty feet by twenty-five feet had been cleared for as long as my family has lived here. The kitchen garden was enclosed by a three foot high stone wall that was crumbling in some places. Some of my plants came from seeds descended from the vegetables my relatives had grown. This year my crop included tomatoes, corn, cucumbers, various types of lettuce, bell and pablano peppers, various beans, spinach, radishes, carrots, potatoes and watermelons, which were currently trying to take over the entire plot.
I started with the watermelon plant, coaxing the newest growth back into the row it belongs. The fruit themselves were nice and plump. I trimmed some of the leaves to let the plant put more energy into the three melons. I moved to the next row, putting the vegetables that were ripe into one basket and pulling out the weeds with more vigor than was probably necessary and putting the scraps into another basket for the compost pile. I completely lost track of time and wasn’t aware of how late it had gotten until Nathan tapped my shoulder. I jumped.
“You’ve been gardening for four hours?” He asked while I rubbed my chest, trying to get my heart rate down.
“Has it been that long? Wow.” I looked up and realized how low the sun had gotten. “I guess it’s unnecessary to say that I’ve forgotten to cook dinner.” I stood up, wiping my hands on my dress. I looked down and cursed myself silently. I’d forgotten to change into jeans and my legs were covered in dirt, too. Nathan laughed, seeing my mistake. I rolled my eyes at my forgetfulness. “Come on, I need to change.”
I left the basket for the compost on the wall and carried the vegetables into the kitchen. I turned around and saw Nathan waiting on the top step, just outside of the door. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m waiting for expressed permission to enter your home. I don’t want to get shocked again.” He had a goofy expression on his face, including lopsided smile.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Did you need expressed permission when you brought me home this morning?” I rolled my eyes at him and left him on the step, going upstairs to wash my legs off and change into jeans. Instead of putting on a typical t-shirt, I found one that was more low cut. I hoped that it wouldn’t knock Nathan unconscious again, but I’d been showing off my assets all day, why not a little longer.
I went back downstairs. Nathan had gotten the hint and was sitting at the table in the kitchen. “It’s much more subtle than a literal ‘welcome into my home’,” I told him, including the air quotes. “It kinda reads your intentions and whether our relationship warrants unannounced intrusion into my house. Intending to take something out, even to bring to me, gets a worse response than the little old lady who came in to leave me flowers.” I washed my hands in the sink and took the chicken and an egg out of the fridge. I looked off into the distance, “I seem to get a lot of flowers…”
I took the bread crumbs out of the cabinet along with the salt and pepper as well as the oil to fry the chicken in. I poured the oil in a pan so it could heat up while I prepared the chicken. “If you could wash and cut up the potatoes, that would be great.” He went to work while I started coating the chicken. I pulled the skin off of the thigh I was making for myself, but before I automatically did the same with the rest of the chicken I realized that I was cooking for a man. They tend to eat more than I do. “Umm…you like thighs, right?”
“Yeah, yours are fine,” he said. He turned to look at me, smiling lewdly and unmistakably checked me out.
I stared at him, mouth open, completely flabbergasted. “How do I even respond to that?” I asked him.
He flicked water on me, laughing. “Cool off. I’ll take 3 please, those pieces are tiny. And you can leave the skin on, unless we’ve reached that point, after knowing each other for a whole 48 hours, where you care about my cholesterol levels.” He winked.
I looked down. I had chicken skin in my hand and it took an enormous amount of self control to keep me from throwing it at him. Instead, I took a step closer to him, judged the distance and kicked his butt. Unfortunately, my leg was too short and I ended up hitting his thigh. How ironic.
I went back to the chicken while Nathan cut the potatoes up and put them in water to boil. We finished cooking supper with some steamed peas and carrots from my garden.
“Wow, woman, you can cook!” Nathan had the stupid grin on his face once more.
I pursed my lips together. “And you can eat.” He’d not only polished off the three thighs, but a double serving of mashed potatoes and a heaped spoonful of peas and carrots.
“Hey, I’m a growing boy.” He stretched his legs under the table, kicking me. “Whoops, sorry about that. I didn’t mean to kick the cook. Kiss the cook, maybe, but never kick the cook.”
I looked at him, thinking, my eyes narrowing. I shook my head. I still couldn’t figure out what had caused his sudden onset catatonic state earlier. He didn’t seem to have any trouble flirting with me now.
“What? Why are you looking at me like that?” Nathan sat up, curious.
“I’m reading your mind and not liking what I’m seeing….pervert.”
“You…you can read minds? I should go then…” Nathan jumped up, knocking over the chair. He fumbled to pick it up and I burst into laughter, slapping the table in amusement.
“Well, actually I can’t, but I can see from your reaction that I was right,” I said, catching my breath. I stood up. “Let’s leave these dishes and watch a movie or something.” I took his hand and dragged him to the bedroom on the first floor that I had set up as a casual living room complete with television and my computer.
Nathan looked through my movie collection. “Oh, I have some different ones that I picked up from the library.” I went into the dining room where Nathan had put my books and grabbed the DVDs off the top of the pile. I walked back into the den reading the titles as I went, “Though I’m not sure how much you’re interested in There’s Something about Mary, Lucky Number Slevin, or Monty Python and the Holy Grail.”
“Monty Python!” I swear Nathan’s ears literally perked up.
I laughed, turned on the television and put in the DVD. Nathan turned off the light and settled onto the couch. I grabbed the remote and sat next to him. “I must warn you. I’m obsessed with changing the volume.”
“That’s fine. I channel surf during commercials,” he told me, putting his arm around me.
I laughed, “I do that, too.”
“We’re totally soul mates,” he said casually. I nodded, resting my head on his shoulder as the video started.
---
“I love that movie,” Nathan said as the credits began to roll. “ ‘...and that, my liege, is how we know the Earth to be banana shaped.’ ” He extricated himself from me and turned the movie off. “I should go. I have work in the morning.”
I stood up, stretching. “Okay, I’ll see you later.” We walked into the foyer and stopped short of the door. We stood there a bit awkwardly. Nathan moved first, kissing my cheek.
“Bye,” and he left hastily.
---
I touched my cheek, smiling, and looked at myself in the mirror above the table. Short brown hair framing my round face, the beginnings of a blush forming on my cheeks. I turned away. I don’t like looking in mirrors. They show a girl barely five foot in height, with glasses, who on various occasions finds herself covered in crap; not a gorgeous blond supermodel that belongs with a guy as good looking as Officer Nathan Whitworth. Why is that guy single? I wondered.
I went into the dining room and collected the dishes, taking them to the kitchen to wash. I put away the leftovers and cleaned up the kitchen. I saw the blinking light on my answering machine.
“Scarlet, it’s Meg Fairfield. I was wondering if you could make that thing we talked about. Jack says he’s ready.” There was a giggle. “Well, thanks, bye.”
I smiled. Meg had come to me a few weeks ago asking if there was some way she could put the spice back her marriage. I only have recipes for a couple of potions, but one of them happens to be a kind of love potion. Or maybe a lust potion would be more accurate. It only works on two people who already have an intimate relationship, such as a married couple, but which has faded away due to years of malnourishment. It won’t make two strangers want to fall into bed together, but it will give two lovers a night that in most cases saves them from divorce. I only make it for couples when both of them come to me interested and we have a bit of a marriage counseling session. I think that the counseling session often does more for the marriage than the potion does, but I don’t tell people that. I’d already discussed things with both Meg and Jack, but he’d seemed unenthusiastic, even after agreeing to the counseling. Meg told me that she would get him to agree to use the potion, and it looked like she’d finally succeeded. Normally I would have made them both come back for another session, but Meg and I both had a suspicion that Jack was having a performance problem and that was the issue holding their marriage back. This potion would solve that and might be the push Jack needed to go to the doctor and get a more permanent solution. I only allow couples to this potion once from me. It’s highly addictive, as you might expect.
It was after ten, so I made a note on my calendar to call Meg in the morning to set up a time for her to pick up the potion. It must be used within 5 hours of completion.
It had been a long day so I decided to call it a night. I found Fahrenheit 451, and read a few pages before falling asleep.
---
I woke up at 8:30. I ate breakfast in my pajamas then made the call to Meg.
“Well, Jack doesn’t get home from work until nearly six, and I know he’ll want to eat dinner before we use the potion, so I guess we’ll come over around nine to pick it up, if that’s okay?”
“I want you to know that it works for a few hours and you have to use it within five hours of me making it. To be honest, you will probably be up all night.”
“We just won’t tell Jack that. He can take the day off tomorrow and if that potion works like you told me it might, he’ll want to. We won’t have to worry about feeling tired halfway through?”
“No, no, you won’t have to worry about that.” Meg and Jack are easily 62 and 65 years old respectively. I had a feeling that they usually went to bed at nine o’clock. “I’ll make sure that your potion is ready when you come to get it.”
“Thanks, hon. I’ve got some shopping to do. I think Jack will like to see me in some new lingerie—it can’t hurt.”
I tried to block the mental image and failed horribly. “You’re right, it can’t hurt,” I told her, keeping my voice light.
“See you later, dear.” And she hung up the phone.
I shivered trying to get the image out of my head. I turned my thoughts to planning out the potion. I went to my office upstairs. I opened up my bible to the page I’d marked holding the love potion recipe. I turned to the cabinet full of the materials I use for potion making, looking for the necessary ingredients. I had the cinnamon, rose petals, butterfly wings, and vanilla scented candles on hand, but I needed the red wine for the base and a bar of very dark chocolate. I had to make a special trip to the grocery store.
I sighed and went to my room to get dressed. I found the dress Natalie had lent me lying on the floor and took it downstairs to put into the wash. I started a load of clothes in the washer and decided that I couldn’t stall any longer and got in my car to go to the store.
It ended up being a short, easy trip, though these were never guaranteed. I decided to work on the introduction of the bible since I couldn’t make the potion until much later that day and takes about three hours to make it.
I read over what I’d written. It was good, but needed revision. I was hungry and my watch said that it was now 2pm. I went downstairs and made myself a sandwich and moved the clothes from the washer into the dryer. I went into the den and put My Fair Lady into the DVD player. It’s one of my favorites.
When the movie was over, I decided to start the potion for Meg and Jack. I went upstairs to get the ingredients and my book. I might store everything upstairs, but I make the potions at the dining room table on a hot plate because of the extra space it gives me.
The love potion must be created in a very hot location. I turned the heat up to 90 on the first floor of the house, closing all of the doors to concentrate the heat. I changed into shorts and a tank top that I only wear when I do this and pulled my hair up as high as I could to get it off the back of my neck. Ideally I needed the house to be between 95 and 100 degrees, but anything over 85 will do the trick. I started by organizing the ingredients in the order that I would need them: wine, butterfly wings, and rose petals which would stew for about an hour. Then I would add the chocolate and an hour later, melted wax from the lit candle. During the last 10 minutes, the cinnamon is added. It’s a pretty straightforward recipe, but the important aspect is what I have to do while the potion bubbles away. The unofficial ingredient is a steamy romance novel I need to read during the hours of stewing and the love I have for another, which I’m supposed to think about after I add the cinnamon and as I bottle the concoction.
I checked the thermostat and it had reached 85. It was only 5:30 and I didn’t have to start it until six, so I decided to give the heater another fifteen minutes to work. I opened up the romance I’d gotten specifically for this potion. I try to have the book have themes similar to the circumstances of the couple needing the potion. I’d decided that I couldn’t handle reading a book about an older couple having sexual interactions, but I had found a story about an older couple with an incredible love that couldn’t be destroyed by disease. Why yes, I was reading The Notebook. I thought that it was fitting that the physical romance was set in the past since the Fairfields needed to remember the romance they’d had. I hoped that it didn’t matter that I’d seen the movie, because the important part of reading the novel is that the feelings are new and raw. The stronger the feelings, the better it gets into the potion, and the stronger the potion is. Unlike doctor prescribed medications, the beauty of magic potions is that they pose no harm physically to the user so long as they are properly given; not that older men shouldn’t be given stimulating potions, but the use by those whom the potion isn't intended for; like a pair of strangers being given this potion. The strangers aren’t supposed to use it and would feel ill as a result. But an older man using this potion properly doesn’t even have to worry about his heartbeat being outside of the normal range. My potions have a special property that protects the user from the ill effects caused by the activity. No heart attacks during sex will happen on my watch. I checked the clock. 5:52. Time to begin. I set a thick bottomed pot on the hot plate and poured the bottle of wine into it, turning the temperature knob to medium. I gently set five rose petals and three butterfly wings floating on top of the wine. I set the timer for one hour and opened The Notebook keeping half an eye on the mixture to make sure that it didn’t boil; it had to stay at a strict simmer. When the hour was up, I shaved exactly two ounces of dark chocolate into the pot and turned the temperature up to high letting it reach a rolling boil. I set the timer for twenty minutes and when that was up I turned the temperature down to low and stirred the mixture ten times counter clockwise. I then set the timer for forty-five minutes. That time up, I lit the candle and set the timer for 10 more minutes. When the bell rang, I poured three drops of the hot wax into the pot and set the timer for another 35 minutes.
It was getting to be unbearably hot, so I took a minute to check the thermostat. It’d hit 95. I stood in front of the window pretending I was standing in the cool night outside while I read the chapter where Noah and Allie have sex for the first time. I didn’t hear Nathan knock on the door or notice him walk into the house. I did hear his exclamation about the heat. I turned around.
“Close the door please. I need to keep the heat in.” I’d never talked during a potion building session before. It was a lot harder to do than I would have thought.
“Are you crazy, or just incredibly weird?” Nathan asked, closing the door.
“I’m creating a potion for a client. This one required excessive heat.” I checked the timer and checklist. “Just 41 minutes to go. Feel free to leave and come back at 9.”
“Nah, I’ll stick around. I’ll add this to my research. But I am going to need to take off some clothes before I die of heatstroke.” I waved my hand to say he was free to do so as he kicked off his shoes, loosened his tie, and unbutton his shirt. He was still wearing his uniform. Within two minutes he was barefoot with his pant legs rolled to his knees, in his un-tucked undershirt. I went back to the book while Nathan lay down on the rug. The story was getting steamy and I could feel the potion getting stronger.
The timer rang and I got up to add the sprinkle of cinnamon. Normally I think of my mother when I make this potion, since I had no experience of a romantic kind and in this case, love is love and a sexual nature is unneeded. I’d just set the timer for the final 10 minutes when Nathan came up behind me, wrapped his arms around me and kissed my neck. He was hard.
“You are so hot right now,” he moaned between the kisses, licks and love-bites he was planting on my neck and shoulder. It felt amazing, but part of my brain knew it was wrong. I turned around and tried to push Nathan’s mouth away from me, but he just transferred his affections to my fingers and palm…which, by the way, have a lot of nerves in them.
“What…in the world…are you doing?” I panted. I could feel Nathan through my sweat-soaked clothes. God this man was made of muscle. I wrapped my free arm around his neck, pressing myself closer.
“I have… no idea, but it feels wonderful.” Nathan’s eyes were half closed as he nuzzled my neck and moved his mouth to kiss mine. From the place far, far away that my brain currently was, I knew kissing him would not end well.
“No…don’t kiss me…yet.” I pulled my head away and he kissed my jaw and my throat. His hands were on my butt working their way into my back pockets. There was no distance between us, but it wasn’t stopping either of us from trying to get closer, breathing deep. He seemed to realize that clothes were keeping us apart and moved his hands from my pockets to my waist, pulling at my tank top. I let him take it off me and he sat down in a chair as his mouth moved from my throat to my breasts, sucking my nipples through my bra. I dimly thought that it was a good thing he didn’t try to sit on my potion.
“My potion!” Somehow the words I said aloud were nowhere near the scream I’d heard in my head. I dragged my brain away from Neverland and pushed Nathan’s head away from my chest. There was still a minute left on the timer. I tried to catch my breath while fending off Nathan’s advances. His mouth and hands seemed to have a mind of their own and he pulled me onto his lap, rubbing my inner thighs while his mouth kissed whatever bit of skin he could find. I focused on the timer, trying to keep my sanity while the seconds ticked by. The timer beeped and I pried myself out of his grip. “Stay!” I told Nathan. I shut off the timer and reached for the bottle that I would give to Meg. My bottom got within his reach, though, and I felt a pinch. I ignored it, poured the potion carefully and stoppered it.
With the potion done, I turned the hot plate off and ran to the doors to throw them open. I shut off the heater and opened all the windows. I also found my shirt and put it back on. Nathan was still in the chair, watching my every move and, was he drooling?
“Are you okay? It looks like the fumes from my potion got the best of us.”
“Yeahhhh…”Nathan drawled. He was definitely moving slower and I realized that my head was clear, all traces of the potion leaving as the room dropped below 85. I looked at his crotch and he was still aroused. There was definitely a connection between Nathan getting sexually excited and him acting like a slow motion movie. I put my hand on his neck and pulled out the desire. He woke up while I decided that I really wanted to continue where we’d left off. I figured that the potion I’d made was probably the strongest I’d ever made. Meg and Jack would probably be up until noon tomorrow.
“Whoa, that’s some powerful stuff. Did you just make a love potion?” Nathan was looking at me curiously. I was more interested in the way his t-shirt pulled snuggly across his chest and that his nipples were pronounced. His lips were moist and a little shiny. And his eyes were a lighter shade of brown than I remembered. I leaned forward and kissed him full on the mouth. It’s a good thing that I’d filled him full of all my innocence or we might have been back to square one. Instead he kissed me back timidly, a bit shocked, eyes wide, and then pushed me off when I tried to stick my tongue in his mouth. “What are you doing?” he asked, very surprised.
I realized what I’d done and ran to the bathroom. I was washing my face and trying to calm my hormones down when there was a knock at the front door. I heard Meg’s voice asking where I was. I opened the door and when I didn’t attack Nathan, I decided that I was safe to come out. Thankfully he’d pulled his pant legs down, though he was still barefoot.
“Hey Meg, Jack. Let me get your item.” I went into the dining room and got the bottle. I handed it over slowly, wondering whether I should warn them. I didn’t think that a love potion should ever be made under the circumstances that that one was. “That’ll be $100 and you'll need to each drink half of the bottle.” I felt like I should be paying them because I doubted I’d get another chance like that with Nathan again, especially with his intimacy problem. Meg gave me the money and she winked at me, looking pointedly at Nathan. I grimaced, but smiled and Meg and Jack left.
“They’re the ones that are going to use that? Dang. You aren’t worried about either of them not being healthy enough for sexual activity?” Nathan looked at the closed door, impressed.
“Not a problem with my products.” It was a weird jumping off point, but it was something Nathan needed to address if he ever wanted to have a meaningful relationship with a woman. I might as well be the one to talk about it with him. “The real question is whether you are healthy enough for sexual activity.” I paused. “Have you always had that problem around women?”
Nathan looked confused. “What problem? Is it the one that you told me you would never explain?”
“You’ve never noticed that whenever you get…excited…about a woman, you turn into Tweedle Dum, but with more Dum than Tweedle? You become completely catatonic.” I narrowed my eyes. “How could you not notice losing up to thirty minutes of your life when you get caught off guard by a beautiful woman?”
“Because I don’t spend much time around beautiful women. If you’re asking me to recall all the times when I’ve felt like I did earlier tonight and yesterday morning, that’s it. It’s never happened before.” He looked into my eyes. “Are you saying that that happened because I got a hard-on? Am I sick or something?” He was starting to look worried.
“I don’t think that you’re sick, but I can do a check of your health if you want. I didn’t feel anything especially weird, except for the particular cause of your condition, when I removed it.” I looked down.
Nathan burst into laughter. “THAT explains why you acted so weird! Wow, a tiny girl like you pumped full of male hormones; no wonder you attacked me earlier. Why did I push you off?” He wondered aloud.
“You pushed me off because in exchange for all your hormones, I had to pump you full of my girlish innocence. I bet you went back to pre-puberty. And if I hadn’t, you would have relapsed, making the first removal pointless.” I stared at him sardonically.
“Well, do me a favor and check me out. I don’t want to have a stroke when too much blood leaves my head.” He went into the dark drawing room, the door to which I'd left open, turning the light on and laying on the bed.
“Sure, go right ahead and lay on my bed,” I said sarcastically, though I didn’t really mind. I knelt on the edge of the bed next to his head and closed my eyes, opening myself up to let the magic flow freely. I put my hands lightly on his forehead searching for abnormal blood vessels or anything else that might cause the catatonic state. There was nothing. I let my hands move down his body slowly, scanning. I heard a giggle when my hands passed lightly over his crotch. I paused just long enough to say, “Real mature,” and I continued the scan. Nothing stood out.
I sat back, my face twisted in thought. I rubbed my chin.
“How’s your relationship with your mother?” I asked a bit suddenly, looking at him.
“What?” Nathan looked at me, putting his hands behind his head. “Typical mother-son, I guess. Probably more close than some families for some things, farther apart for others, as you know, but otherwise average. Why do you ask?”
“There’s this theory,” I started, “that’s bounced around my family for a few generations about where our talents came from. The leading idea is that at some point there was a severe split
between two very passionate families. On one side, mine, the women developed the ability to actually heal the sick with, well, magic. On the other, the women developed a hatred of magic so severe that it repels the goodness that my family expels. I told you that Reverend Brown’s crew has been trying to push out my family since before the Witch Trials. The theory is that the family whose descendants became the Browns is that second family. They developed a magic as powerful as mine that assists them in repelling magic and use Christianity to make it legitimate. Does that even make sense?” I asked, looking for understanding in Nathan’s eyes.
“Yeah, it does, a bit. I mean, we know that everyone in this town is afraid to admit that they think you’re an asset to the community because of the power that Rev. Brown holds over them. It makes sense that magic is helping them.” He sat up. “But what does that have to do with me?”
“Well, if your mom is a descendent then she probably has some magic. I don’t know how it’s passed down in your family, so it might be spread further than in mine, less concentrated. She probably has it and doesn’t even know it, but was able to use it to influence you. If she’s more attached to you than you think, then it’s very possible that she’s caused this problem to keep you away from girls. Are you an only child?”
“Yeah…you think my mom caused my problem so that I couldn’t find a girl and move away? But I live in my own apartment and mom has no problem with it. She doesn’t demand that I visit daily and we rarely talk on the phone.”
“Just because she has been able to hide it from you doesn’t mean that it wasn’t swirling around her stomach. All parents want to keep their children safe from everything, but that doesn’t stop them from letting them ride their bikes around the neighborhood, play tackle football, and dare to be different in a school full of bullies. I know my mom felt guilty for making me go to the public school, but it wouldn’t have been good for me to try to grow up out here away from everyone, and she knew that. It would have made going to the supermarket every week even more awkward than it already is. I’m just saying that without knowing how her magic works, it wouldn’t surprise me that some underlying fear your mom has is the cause for your problem.”
“And what am I supposed to do about it? I can’t go around for the rest of my life freezing whenever a pretty girl turns me on. I’m only 27 for Christ’s sake!” He stood up and stuck his hands in his pockets.
I sat on the edge of the bed, crossing my ankles. “If you’ve never experienced the problem around other women, then logically it’s only trying to keep you away from people like me.”
“Why you? I mean, my mom doesn’t have a clue that I’m…interested in you.” He looked away from me.
I blushed. “Well, maybe she recognizes that you have a certain attraction to ‘unholy’ things and it’s a general spell she’s cast over you. But I doubt telling your mom to let you go will work since she doesn't even know that she's done it. She’ll definitely put you in that bath of salt water and vinegar.” My smile was sad. “Hang on.” I ran upstairs and grabbed my bible. Nathan would be the first person outside of my family to see it. “If there are answers anywhere, it would be in here,” I said showing him the large book as I walked back into the room.
I opened the book to a page near the back. It was from the era of my great-grandmother Elizabeth. She’s the one who first postulated about the Browns having magic. She’d been a pretty awesome woman—she’d run away from here at 18 to New York City to work in a speakeasy and was a total Flapper. But like us all she was drawn back by the magic and the need to help. She’s the only one of us to ever live outside of this town.
“Alright, Elizabeth is the one who started the idea of the Browns,” I told Nathan. “She wrote that there was a connection between the hatred the family felt and the power that they held. And she wondered if it might be possible to change them by showing them a certain amount of kindness. She tried to take young Stephanie Shield under her wing, but it ended very badly. Stephanie’s father accused Elizabeth of enchanting Stephanie when Stephanie decided to tell him that the way he treated my family was horrendous. Stephanie ended up being sent to live with a strict, spinster aunt and Elizabeth barely stayed out of jail. If I’m right, Stephanie is your grandmother. If she’s still alive, then maybe she’ll help. She was 12 when she was sent away, so old enough to remember what caused it. You never know.”
“Yeah, Gran’s alive. We’ve never been close, though…mom was always closer to her father and you know how pious she is. He was the same. It wouldn’t surprise me if my great-grandparents had a heavy hand in Gran’s marriage to Zachary Brown.” He checked his watch. “It’s late and I should go if I want to wake up for work tomorrow. I’ll see if I can get in touch with Gran.”
We walked into the foyer. “I’d kiss you good-bye, but who knows what would happen.” He reached for the doorknob, but turned back to me. “Wait, why didn’t I have any trouble during that make-out session caused by the potion?”
“I suppose it has something to do with the nature of the potion. I told you that there’s no need to worry about being healthy enough for sexual activity because the potion is for romance and nothing kills romance like a heart attack. So, the potion also acts to keep the body in perfect health while it’s working. I guess the potion overrode your standard reaction and when the potion wore off, you turned back into your usual charming, frozen self.”
“Huh. Well, if nothing else, I’ll keep you in business buying a weekly dose of that potion.”
“No, you won’t. I only sell to couples and only once when the relationship needs it.”
“Man! I just can’t catch a break.” He turned to leave.
“Wait, why did you come here tonight?”
“Huh? Oh, I just wanted to see you, I guess.” He blushed. I guess he really was interested in me for more just than my abilities. The fact that the fumes from the potion had made us attack each other meant that there might be more than just a minor mutual attraction, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. “I should go, though.” And he did make it out the door.
Chapter 6
I walked into the dining room and began to clean up the remnants of the potion. There had to be a way to help Nathan, if only because I admitted to myself that I wouldn’t mind having another make out session with him. We knew that he only has a problem when he’s around me, and by his willingness to use the potion, it was obvious that he was just as interested in making out as I was. I was positive that it was caused by magic. But as to how to fix it, I didn’t have a clue. I’d never been faced with a magical ailment and neither had my ancestors.
If it had been any other ailment I would have just taken the symptoms and let him heal himself, but that didn’t seem to be the answer. Nathan was barely aware of the problem, how could he force himself through it? I stared at the wall. Nothing came to me. I shook my head. Maybe Stephanie could shed some light on this. I gathered what was left of my supplies and took them upstairs. I needed to collect some more butterflies, but I’d worry about that later.
I took a long cold shower. I felt bruises beginning to form on my shoulder. Nathan had gotten a little too excited; there were even teeth marks. Funny, I didn’t remember feeling any pain while he’d been biting me. I stepped out of the tub and dried off. I put on a lose night gown and went to bed.
I woke up late the next morning to the phone ringing. I answered groggily, “Hello?”
“Scarlet,” I heard some sensual music playing in the background. “It’s Meg. I just wanted to thank you so much for the potion.” She giggled. “Jack, stop that!” she said playfully and giggled again. “Jack’s telling me to get off the phone. Thanks again,” she hung up.
I shook my head as I replaced the phone on the cradle. Meg share’s way too much. I lay back on the pillows. I had a long day ahead of me; I looked at the clock. And the day was about to begin. My first patient was going to be here in just under an hour. I rolled out of bed and dressed in a t-shirt with Toucan Sam on it and my favorite pair of jeans. I was in the middle of eating a bowl of cereal when my patient arrived, early as usual.
“Pamela, welcome,” I smiled as I opened the door. Pamela suffers from extreme depression and low self-esteem. She has a regular appointment with me every Tuesday morning and she always arrives twenty minutes early. We usually talk for an hour before I remove the symptoms of the depression and that in itself seems to do a lot. She meets with a real psychologist every Thursday. Her husband had long ago decided that she was crazy, but he was perfectly willing to pay for her treatments, since he couldn’t deal with her himself. From what she told me, he spent most of his time drunk with another woman. I wasn’t sure how much was truth and how much was her depression talking, but that wasn’t my problem. I just wanted her to leave feeling good about herself. I’m good at that.
“Hi Scarlet.” She sniffed loudly. She’d been crying.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, motioning for her to go into the bright drawing room. She sat on the couch.
“Oh, the same as always. Scott spent the night with his girlfriend and didn’t even bother to come home this morning. I don’t know why he even stays married to me if he really wants to stay with her all the time.” She cleared her throat and continued with her usual rant about how she can’t seem to do anything right when it comes to her marriage, that she just wasn’t pretty enough, wondering why she could never find the energy she once had, convinced that she was the reason why her husband strayed.
I try very hard not to complain about my patients, but an hour listening to Pamela is just as draining as taking on the actual depression she was feeling. I might be able to help people heal from illness, but I’m not a saint. After a while she began to wind down and apologized for the tirade.
“I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t go on like that; it’s just another thing I screw up.”
“It’s fine. I’m happy to listen.” A tiny white lie with a kind smile. “Are you ready for the treatment?” I asked her.
“Oh yes, go right ahead.” She settled into the chair and closed her eyes. I put my hand on hers and began to take away the depression, boosting her self-esteem in the process. One of the reasons why I’m able to listen to Pamela with so much patience is that I’ve felt the pain she lives with; the mental anguish. I felt my mood darkening, but saw the relief spread across Pamela’s face. She visibly relaxed, settling back against of the sofa.
“All done,” I said, plastering a fake smile on my face.
Pamela hopped up. “Thank-you so much!” She shook my hand violently, pumping it up and down. If Pamela ever got over her depression, she would be a very boisterous woman all the time. She smiled ear to ear. “Here’s your check. I’m going to Opera Club, now. I’ll see you next week.” Did I mention that Pamela is an opera singer? Her club meets every Tuesday to sing and act and that’s why she schedules today for her session. I seem to do a better job at cheering her up enough to go to the club than her real psychiatrist. Don’t worry, the treatment I give her lasts a few days, so her husband does get to enjoy some time with her while she’s happy, but her opera buddies definitely see the best side of her. I walked her to the door and told her that I hoped she had fun at the club meeting.
I went into the den and put There’s Something about Mary into the DVD player. It wasn't nearly as funny as it could have been, but then that’s a general side-effect of depression. The movie ended and I was still a long way from feeling my best. I only charge Pamela for 3 hours worth of recovery, but I really give her twice that amount. After her first session I realized just how lousy she feels on a regular day and decided to ‘double the dose’ so to speak, but I couldn’t charge her more. It just wouldn’t feel right. For all this magic relies on the conservation of mass in that I must give of myself when I take from others, my high metabolism means that the cumulative effects are almost exponential. Ten minutes of work from me leaves a person with days or even weeks of relief, depending on what the ailment is and I only have to recover for a couple hours. Pamela gets about five days of real happiness while I get seven hours of pure mental anguish. Of course, recovery time is definitely dependent on the healer. Some of my ancestors took a full 24 hours to recover from a healing, but I suspect that that often was because they used inefficient methods.
I had no energy to put in another DVD after Mary ended, so I flipped through the channels looking for anything that caught my limited amount of interest. Titanic was on, and stupidly I decided to watch it. By the end, I was sobbing uncontrollably and was quite a mess. I still had a good hour before my spirits returned to normal, but unfortunately I heard a knock at my front door.
I mopped my face up and tried to put on a happy expression before I opened the door. One glance into the mirror showed me that I would just frighten small children and dogs, so I dropped the smile and went with a sullen expression.
Nathan was outside. I checked my watch. It was only 4pm, he should have still been on duty. “Hey. I was in the neighborhood and I wanted to tell you that I called my Gran this morning. She said that we could stop by her house this evening if we wanted to talk about…stuff. Are you okay?”
“Never better.” My voice cracked and I thought I was going to weep at the idea of this man’s devotion to his grandmother. Not that that line of thinking made any sense at all. I wiped my nose on a handkerchief. “Sorry. My client was depressed this morning. I’m still working through the emotions. I watched Titanic because I’m a genius and that really made me feel chipper.” I tried to laugh but it really just came out as a whimper.
“Come on," he said, walking into the foyer. "I can only stay for a minute, but you need a strong cup of coffee.”
“Tea. I don’t drink coffee.”
“Whatever—you need something in you.” Nathan put his hand on my back and steered me towards the kitchen.
“I’ll be fine in a little while,” I promised. But at the same time I was feeling very warm and fuzzy thoughts about Nathan who now showed so much concern for me. I shook my head. I wasn’t sure how I’d crossed my wires with the depression and low self-esteem, but I was feeling less lethargic and more a weepy mess. I think that I’m doomed to always be leaking when I’m around Nathan.
After I drank the cup of tea and ate some chocolate chips Nathan had found in my pantry, I was feeling much better. “Sorry about that. I’m not used to having company after a session with a client…especially this particular client. I’ve never really reacted this way before.” To say I was embarrassed would be an understatement.
“It’s fine. I need to go, but I’ll pick you up at six if you’re feeling up to it.”
“Yeah. I’ll be back to normal by then. See you.” I didn’t walk him out.
---
I spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning the house. I folded the clothes that I’d washed the day before. I set aside the dress in case Natalie wanted it back. By six I was back to normal emotionally and marveled at the roller coaster ride I’d just been on. I’d thought I’d done a simple switch of depression for happiness, but somehow I’d picked up some sentimentality—I’ve never been one to cry when I’m happy or when I find something to be especially sweet, but there I had been blubbering about Nathan calling his grandmother to arrange a meeting that we’d discussed as necessary the night before. I shook my head. I didn’t know much about psychiatry and emotional illnesses, so I suspected that my lack of knowledge in this field was the problem. Since up until last Saturday I hadn’t really had anyone to share my recovery time with, I’d never noticed the extent of the emotions I’d felt after helping Pamela. I probably wouldn’t find much help in my bible of medical fixes because emotional illnesses were definitely a modern disease. My great, great grandmother Margaret’s husband had come back from World War One with what they called “shell shock”, modernly known as post-traumatic shock disorder, and he refused to let her help him through his feelings. The treatment back then was to ignore it, for all the good that did. After the war, their marriage hadn’t been a happy one, hence the reason Elizabeth ran off to New York.
I answered the knock at my door quickly enough. Nathan hadn’t changed out of his uniform, but the top button of his shirt was un-done.
“Feeling better?” he asked.
“Oh, yes, much better. Tuesday’s are not my best days, but that’s my life.” I smiled, genuinely so he could see that I wasn’t trying to hide some dour thoughts.
“You did have me worried, but since your better now, we should get going.” I grabbed my purse and locked the door while he unlocked the passenger door of his patrol car.
“Umm…do you mind if we take my car?” I asked him. “I’d just rather not ride in a cop car if I can help it.”
“What?” He looked at his car. “Oh, good point.” He re-locked the doors on his car and we got into my Ford. He gave me the directions to his grandmother’s house and I was relieved to learn that it wasn’t within Rev. Brown’s compound. Okay, it’s not really a compound, but it’s an expensive gated community that many of his followers live within. I’m not welcome there for obvious reasons.
The drive was actually awkwardly silent. Given how easily we’d flirted with each other for the past three days I was surprised at the almost cold shoulder Nathan was giving me. But I guess it’s not every day that you find out that magic is interfering with your love life.
“What are you thinking about?” I finally asked him.
“Hmm? Oh. Just stuff, I guess.” He didn’t want to comment further, which I found annoying.
“My limited mind reading capabilities told me that much. Come on, either tell me what it is or I start supplying various possibilities with increasing levels of embarrassment.”
He looked over at me then turned back to look out his own window. “How the hell can I have sex with you if I turn into a zombie whenever I get aroused?” he blurted.
I’m not sure how I kept the car in the middle of the road when he made that pronouncement, but I definitely stopped breathing for a minute or two. “Uhhh…” I stammered. “Well, that was definitely the possibility at the top of my embarrassment meter.”
He grimaced. “Sorry. I’m not usually that up-front with a girl I want to sleep with. Wait, that sounds terrible.” He shook his head. “I suck at this. This...problem,” he gestured angrily at his crotch, “is totally screwing up my life!”
“I’m sorry.” I really meant it. “If I could fix it I would—I’ve never faced a problem I couldn’t at least do something for, but right now I’m completely at a loss.”
“Yeah.” We rode in silence for the rest of the way. I was still reeling from his admission that he wanted to sleep with me. I’d never been “Miss Popular” in this town, no matter that everyone knew my name and my story. I’d never had a boyfriend or even anyone who’d really been remotely interested in me; well, except for a creep from the next town over who wanted to catch me doing something freaky so he could make money off of it. He’d tried to date me, but it’d become obvious very quickly that he didn’t have any interest in me for my sake. I’d given him a frightful scare to keep him away, but he was the reason why there is a powerful enchantment on my house: he hadn’t taken my rejection very well.
His grandmother’s house was, for lack of a better word, cute. It was small and square with lots of detailed scrollwork around the eves. It looked like it could have passed for the gingerbread house in the story of Hansel and Gretel, though I was confident that Stephanie would not be anything like the witch in that story; too many of her relatives would better fit that description.
Nathan knocked lightly before opening her front door and leading me inside. The inside of her house was warm and inviting, not at all like I would have pictured from the mother of the current Rev. Brown and wife of the former Rev. Brown.
“Gran? It’s Nathan,” he called into the house.
“I’m in the kitchen,” a kindly voice called and a pleasantly plump lady of about eighty-five years peaked her head out the door to look at us. “Oh, she’s cute.”
I blushed and slowly followed him into the kitchen, trying to will away the color from my cheeks. Funny that it never works for me.
“You’re just in time for supper. I made meatloaf, if that’s okay.”
“I’m sure it’ll be delicious,” I smiled at her and watched as Nathan made himself a plate. Mrs. Brown insisted that I fill mine before her, which made me feel awkward, but since Nathan seemed used to it, I guess that’s how his family is.
I took my plate into the dining room and Nathan asked me what I wanted to drink. I told him juice if there was any. I stayed standing, unsure of what was expected of me. I’ve never eaten at someone else’s house before.
“Sit, sit, girlie. We don’t bite…much,” she said, laughing. I couldn’t help but think about the bite marks I’d found on my shoulder the night before. I hoped that the blush that reemerged on my face was blamed on my lack of knowledge about how to eat at another’s house. Nathan came out an joined us at the table, bringing our drinks with him. I looked around the room; this was obviously the most important room in this house. One wall was covered in photos of various family members, including, I noted, a few of Nathan at various ages. He’d been a gawky kid.
“It took me awhile to grow into my height,” Nathan told me when he saw where I was looking. I laughed and relaxed somewhat.
“So, what brings you to visit me?” Mrs. Brown asked. I shot a look at Nathan; didn’t he tell his grandmother who I was and why I was there?
Mrs. Brown caught the look. “Oh, Scarlet, I didn’t mean it that way,” she said kindly. My heartbeat slowed down some. “He told me that you wanted to talk about your great-grandmother, but he wasn’t very specific. We, as a family, don’t talk about your family openly, as you probably guess. Many spit on the floor three times or toss salt over their shoulder at the merest mention. Those of us who don’t think unkindly of you still prefer to remain vague when we talk. It’s a force of habit, I guess.”
“I see. Well, we were curious about what you and my great-grandmother thought about the origins of our families…uh, magically speaking. And whether you have any thoughts about whether the Browns do have some kind of magical talent.” I took a bite of the meatloaf and it was heavenly. I wasn’t sure if it was the taste, the fact that I didn’t have to make it myself, or the fact that I wouldn’t be stuck eating it for the next week, but it was the best meal I’d eaten in a long time, and I told Mrs. Brown that.
“We’ll talk about your serious questions after dinner, but now let’s chat. I don’t see my grandson often enough. How’s life?” Mrs. Brown gave Nathan such a serious glance that he didn’t even have a choice at being noncommittal at such a vague question. He told her about his past week, though he tactfully left me mostly out of it, I guess so that I could choose what I wanted to add. He did tell her how we’d met while he was doing the dirty work of Rev. Brown’s crew and how we’d started chatting friendly-like. No need to mention disgusting puddles of goo or nearly ripping each other’s clothes off because of the fumes of a love potion. He did tell some interesting stories about a couple of drunks he’d dealt with earlier in the week while he was running squad. He filled me in that he volunteers for the Wednesday night crew and also works one Saturday a month.
“And how have you been?” Mrs. Brown fixed her eyes on me.
I squirmed, not used to people actually caring what I have to say, nor caring about how I spend my off time. “Oh, umm…just work, I guess. And I watched a bunch of movies, read a few books. And I worked in my garden some. I guess I’m not a very interesting person.”
“On the contrary dear, I think you’re a very interesting person. You just don’t like to talk about the most interesting things, which is fine.” She smiled at me and patted my hand.
“Yeah, it normally weirds people out and I can’t really say too much because I don’t want to risk my client’s anonymity.” I smiled back at her.
“If you’re finished we can leave Nathan to wash the dishes and the two of us can go chat in the living room.” I nodded and followed Mrs. Brown and sat next to her on the sofa in the other room. Now I understood why he’d been so comfortable doing the dishes at my house.
“Now that he’s busy, we can talk about him without him overhearing us.” I gulped. “So, you think he’s handsome don’t you?” She peered at me with silvery eyes. I nodded. “Tell me why you both so suddenly have the desire to crack this mystery,” she took my hand gently.
I cleared my throat. “Umm…we found out something…awkward. That affects whatever we might…want to do with each other.” I blushed and stared a hole into the floor. I’d never talked about such things with anyone—my mom hadn’t really been the type, especially at the end.
“I realize that we talked before about how my family is vague about you, but honey, that tells me nothing.”
“Oh please don’t make me talk about this. Sorry, but I’m not comfortable talking about…it.” I was trying very hard to keep the hole I’d been putting in the floor from becoming real and letting it swallow me up. Magic sucks when you’re trying to be normal.
Mrs. Brown put her arms around me and hugged me tight. “Girlie, are you trying to say that you two are having bedroom troubles?” she whispered into my ear.
I nodded into her shoulder, “essentially, but not that we’ve actually done anything,” I said quickly, still into her shoulder. I couldn’t bear to meet her eyes. “It’s just a… requirement that we’ve noticed doesn’t…work properly.”
“I see. And you think that the Browns have some kind of magic that’s causing the problem?”
“Yes.” I took a deep breath and let go of Mrs. Brown. “Sorry for wigging out just now. I just don’t have anyone to talk about that stuff with—never really have. I guess I thought we could find out what we need without that aspect being revealed—or that Nathan had already told you.”
“Well, he’s never talked about that aspect of his life with his old grandmother—what man does? Ah, here he is.”
Nathan walked slowly into the room as though afraid we were going to turn on him. “Have I missed something?” he asked wearily.
“Not too much. We just established the heart of the problem you two want to solve.” I was back to staring at the floor.
“Uhh…yeah. Anyway. What kind of information can you give us?” He slumped into the recliner in the corner.
“Well, Elizabeth was convinced that the reason why the Browns hold so much power in this town is because they have some kind of magic that keeps people from even wanting to oppose them, no matter how much everyone else actually likes you. She supposed that it would be possible to break the hold that the Browns have if she put enough effort into gaining their respect. Given that she didn’t go about that in the best way, I can’t be sure how right or wrong her assumptions were. I mean, she got me sent away to my aunt’s home and was lucky that nothing else happened to her—my parents were not happy that she took such an interest in me. But her parents weren’t exactly stable either, which is why she ran off to New York. But that’s beside the point. Once Liz put the idea into my head, I started playing around with the idea that we Browns have some kind of magic. And I’ve concluded that we do have a bit of power. It’s very subtle and mood related, so I’m confident saying that I think it does have some power over your…problem.” Mrs. Brown smiled at Nathan. He blushed. “Nobody in our family has ever been interested in someone of yours before,” she said to me, “so I can’t say whether you, Nathan, are the first to experience the problem.” She turned back to him. “But from what I’ve been able to do, the way to alter the magic is to somehow break the emotional bond that forms it. I can’t tell you whether it’s an individual specific spell, for lack of a better term, or if it’s the community’s wish to keep such relationships from happening. To break the enchantment you’re going to have to somehow woo the favor of those who control it.”
“What have you been able to do with the magic you’ve discovered?” I asked.
“Oh, just little things. I successfully blocked a television station a couple years ago.”
“What?!?” I was shocked.
“No, it wasn’t that big of a deal. It was only blocked on televisions that I was within about 50 feet of, nothing more widespread. I’d just decided that I did not like watching sports, so I focused all my will on ESPN not working. It took about six months, but I was able to foil all the men’s attempts to watch football during Sunday dinner.”
“That’s…impressive. What else have you done?”
“I scared cows away from me back when I was a kid. They terrified me so I created an invisible wall that they could not cross. I also was able to hex this guy in my high school.”
“Hex?” Nathan sounded worried at that particular term.
“Well, not so much a hex, but he had a crush on me and I didn’t reciprocate, so I made him get the hives whenever he got too flirty with me.” Mrs. Brown looked thoughtful at that one. I suspect that she had been quite excited to learn that she had some magical talent. “’Course, my magic is so spread thin that I can’t sustain more than one item at a time.”
“That hex you used sounds a little like my problem,” Nathan surmised. “But what are the odds that someone in our family is using such a specific spell against me?”
Mrs. Brown looked at Nathan. “Everyone likes you, so I’d say it’s slim to none. Unless someone really is worried that you’re dealing with someone you shouldn’t. I might put out some feelers to see if anyone has taken a particular interest in your romantic interests, if you want.”
“Well, I don’t want someone to suddenly take an interest if they didn’t have one before, so I think we should limit the amount of references to it outside of this room.” Nathan looked embarassed, and rightly so. I mean, we’d just met a couple days ago and we were already talking like we were going to be an item.
Nathan checked his watch. “It’s getting late. We should go.” He stood up and kissed his grandmother’s cheek. I thanked Mrs. Brown for her help and dinner before following him out to the car.
The drive back to my house was considerably less awkward than the drive out.
“Well, you’ve seen me covered in my own vomit and feces. I don’t see why we’re suddenly scared of telling each other intimate secrets—I mean, there’s not much worse a person can get.” I smiled at him and he laughed.
“I just feel like we’re doing this thing backwards or something. Moving too fast.”
“Not possible.” I said deadpan. “When you move too fast you slow right down.”
That got a good roar of laughter out of Nathan. “You’re right about that one.” He sighed. “I like you and you know that.” I nodded. “And I guess you like me?”
I nodded again.
“And our mutual desire to rip each other’s clothes off last night wasn’t purely caused by the potion?”
“That potion should not have worked at all. It’s not meant for use by complete strangers looking for a good time. I mean, I’ve never had company when I’ve made it, but I know that strangers can’t drink it and expect the same results as two people with a known relationship with each other. I assume the same would be true of two strangers smelling the fumes.”
“So it’s pretty certain that there’s more between us than just friendship?”
“Yeah, I’d say that’s true.” I was glad the car was dark. I was certain that I was blushing once again and I was able to get a bit of courage from the darkness since Nathan couldn’t see my face.
“Good.” Nathan let out a breath. I guess he was worried that the feelings were one sided. “So…now what do we do?”
“Umm…no idea. Well, I know what we can do about your family—try to get me on their good side. But as to the other thing, I have no experience.” I wondered if he understood just how little experience I have.
“So, no crazy ex-boyfriends in your past?”
“Well, when you put it that way, yes, there is one crazy guy, but he shouldn’t be much of a problem. I scared him off much the same way I scared you during our first, or I guess it was second, meeting. Only I didn’t take away the panic attack and left him blubbering on the side of the road.”
“Umm…please tell me that he was crazy before you left him blubbering.”
“He was. Quit thinking that I’m some loony woman who enjoys tormenting the normal people! He was trying to use me for some kind of monetary gain and I wasn’t going to have it. When he wouldn’t leave me along peaceably, I used my talents to convince him to. Now, are there any crazy exes in your past?”
“None crazy, but I guess you could count four serious exes in total.”
“Mmm” There’s not much I could say to that.
Nathan was quiet for a little while. “I like you, you like me, and I can’t kiss you for fear of going catatonic.”
“That just about sums it up.”
“The world hates us.”
“That’s my line. The world hates me and you’re just unfortunate enough to come along for the ride.” I smiled. “You know, it is possible to date other girls. Ones who carry around less baggage. We were both perfectly fine before you decided to charge me with fraud.”
“I don’t think you were better off.”
“Aww come on. I was great not having to worry about what I was wearing, what I was eating, whether or not I was covered in crap.”
“Scarlet, you weren’t invisible. I didn’t just start noticing you three days ago. I’ve had a crush on you since high school. I was a senior and you were a freshman. And I was such a dumbass, I didn’t have the courage to talk to you.”
“You had a crush on me?” I was flattered.
“Hell yes. You were…are cute and definitely mysterious. Everything a horny 17 year old boy wants.”
“I bet you weren’t very horny,” I said cheerfully.
“I’ll give you that one.” He said, chuckling.
“So, which one were you in high school? I don’t pretend to remember much about that time in my life.”
“Yeah, I guess it was a terrible time for you. I was on the football team, pretty popular, I guess. I was dating Shelia Andrews.”
“Captain of the cheerleader squad?” I tried to remember back. “Oh, you were voted homecoming king, right?”
“Right. So you do remember some stuff?”
“I remember being told that I didn’t belong in that school, sometimes by teachers. I remember almost flunking calculus my senior year because the teacher didn’t want me to be an honor graduate. I remember getting beat up sophomore year just because everyone knew that I had nobody to stand up to the principal for me…” my voice cracked, “not even a parent.” My mom died shortly after my 16th birthday.
Nathan reached over and rubbed my shoulder. I was glad we were nearly to my house. “Sorry. I should have known better than to bring that up.”
I shrugged. “You wouldn’t have known. You went off to college after my freshman year. It’s not like I advertised the misery. There were plenty of people who would at least ignore me tactfully, even if they weren’t able to stand up for me completely.” We pulled into my driveway, but didn’t bother to get out.
Nathan pulled me into a hug and I enjoyed being comforted, even if it was awkwardly done in the front seat of a small car. I didn’t cry. I’d cried too much over this issue.
“Do you want to come inside?” I finally asked him.
“Yes!…no…yes?” Nathan looked at his patrol car and his watch, but I knew that he really wanted to stay with me.
“Go. I’ll be fine. Dinner is at 6:30. Oh, you have squad tomorrow don’t you?”
“Yeah, I won’t be free until Thursday night.”
“That’s fine. Come over if you want. I’ll probably be serving leftovers, but there might be something new for you.”
“Sounds good.” And he very carefully kissed me on the lips. I could tell that he was trying to keep it chaste, not even pretending to use his tongue. It was incredibly sweet, even though it was utterly necessary. Our lips barely moved against each others for fear that it would become too sexual, instead pressing them hard together to express pleasure at the shared kiss. He broke it off way too soon, but before we needed to worry about it going too far.
“Not enough,” he groaned, but I guess some well imagined images of drowning puppies or a garbage dump (I hoped to God that he wasn’t picturing me covered in crap) kept him grounded. He rested his forehead on mine and looked into my eyes. For two people who couldn’t even reach first base why did it feel like we were moving too fast?
I decided that I should be the one to end the stalemate where neither of us wanted to leave the little bubble that the car formed around us. I unbuckled my seat belt and exited the car. Nathan followed suite, but we’d silently agreed to not make things worse. He got into his patrol car and left, I went into my home and took a cold shower. What hurt the most was that it was only a matter of time before he would grow tired of not being satisfied and would find someone else. It took a lot of self-restraint for me to not bang my head against the wall of the shower.
Chapter 7
I spent Wednesday trying to keep busy. I didn’t have a client scheduled until the next day (my appointment book revealed that I was booked almost solid for the next two weeks), so I decided to go to the hospital and see if I could be of some help. I’m not really a glutton for punishment, but I couldn’t sit around the house waiting for my heart to break further.
I took the dress and shoes I’d borrowed from Natalie so that I could give them back to her if I saw her. The hospital was quiet when I got there. I greeted Sandra and Leo who man the front desk.
“Is there an emergency?” Sandra asked me.
“No, no. I just didn’t have anything to do today so I thought I’d stop by.”
“Honey, you need a life, and you know I say that lovingly.” Sandra is about thirty-five, married, with two kids in middle school. Leo is easily sixty and a grandfather to five.
“I know, but it’s been a stressful couple of days—I’ll get a life tomorrow.” I smiled at them and went up to Natalie’s office. The hospital is small, so the doctors share a pair of conference rooms that they use as collective offices. But they each have their own desks and filing cabinets. Natalie had lucked out and got a desk by the window. I was putting the bag with the dress in it into her chair when she walked in.
“Hey! What brings you here?” she gave me a hug. “Is that the dress? Girl, that was a present. Keep it. I know Nathan will enjoy seeing you wear it again…and again.” She smiled at me, holding my shoulders at arm’s length. “What’s wrong? You don’t look like a girl who’s enjoying a post-coital high.”
“Yeah, things are weird with Nathan right now. It’s nothing to worry about, but…yeah. Look, I just want to help a few people, maybe pass out for a few hours, and if you don’t want the dress back, that’s fine, because I gardened in it and I don’t think I got all the dirt stains out.” I stuffed the bag into my purse, which is more backpack than fashion statement.
“You gardened in that dress?” Natalie might be an insanely busy doctor, but she always takes the time to be impeccably dressed, unlike me.
“Yeah, it was a bad day and I forgot what I was wearing. Sorry.” I was feeling miserable again.
“I think you need to talk to a doctor, instead of playing doctor. What’s going on?” She led me into the doctors break room and made me a cup of hot chocolate and herself a cup of coffee.
I slumped in my chair, wanting to hug my chocolate. “I can’t talk about it specifically, but we can’t be intimate with each other.” I took a big gulp of the drink and burned my tongue.
“Is it because of your…gift?” Natalie was probably the closest thing to a friend I could claim. I guess at some point I could have let her into my life, but I didn’t want to risk destroying hers. I’d figured out a long time ago that it was safer for everyone if I kept myself to myself, kept everyone at a distance. Nathan was the first person who’d, well, steamrolled his way in.
“Yes, no, maybe…so.” I laughed; it was a short and harsh noise. “It’s complicated and annoying as hell.”
“And is Nathan aware of the problem?”
“He’s as aware as he can be…well, he was. Now he’s very aware. And he’s going to get tired of the awareness and he’s going to find someone else.”
“Honey, you excel at being vague.”
I looked around to make sure that no one could overhear us. “He can’t get hard when he’s around me. Or well, he can, but then his brain leaves his body,” I said in a low voice, inclining my head.
“Uh, I’m pretty sure that you’re a virgin, but that sounds like typical male behavior. The blood leaves their upper brain and goes to their lower brain. After that, they’re only thinking about one thing. Are you really that inexperienced?”
I blushed. “I know how men normally react. But Nathan is different. He goes completely vacant. He can’t even move.”
“Like a stroke?”
“Almost, but the after effects aren’t so serious. Once the stimulus subsides, he’s completely back to normal and he didn’t even realize what was going on until I told him.” I couldn’t believe that I was having this discussion with Natalie.
“Weird. And I guess it’s entirely outside of my expertise.”
“Yup. Outside mine too.” I took a smaller sip of my chocolate. I felt better, for some reason. I still wanted to get trashed and pass out, but at least I didn’t feel like I was completely alone. There was now someone I could hope would be there to pick up the pieces when Nathan went to someone else. Nathan had seriously turned my life on its head.
“And it only happens around you?”
“Yeah.”
“Wow, no wonder you look awful. Do you really think he’s the type that would dump you just because he can’t have sex?”
“A: we’re not dating, so how could it be considered dumping. And B: it’s not just sex. It’s getting turned on. When I walked out of the bathroom wearing that dress on Sunday, he lost it. We can’t even get to first base without him flaking out.”
“Have you tried?”
“No, but come on. How hard is it for a guy to get hard?” It was a rhetorical question, but even if she planned to answer, she was interrupted by a pair of male doctors coming into the room seeking coffee. Thank God they didn’t enter the room until after I’d asked my question.
“Oh, hello Scarlet. Are you just visiting?” Dr. Howard Murphy, average height, average face, above average tan—I think he spray tans biweekly, but otherwise is a nice guy—looked at me appraisingly. I’m not often checked out, and given the current status of my…relationship(?) I actually didn’t like it, but I ignored his looks.
“Ehh…visiting, working, whatever. Just tired of sitting around the house.” I smiled at him.
“I don’t think you should be hanging around the hospital.” I looked over at the second doctor that had just walked in and stifled a groan. It was Nick Smith, the hospital’s resident Brownie. The sneer he was giving me was awful. “We don’t take kindly to ambulance chasers here.”
“You know she isn’t an ambulance chaser,” Natalie started.
“Ms. Stephans, you should know better than to defend her heathenism.” The glare in his eyes made my stomach squirm. I was not built for this and I was about to back down and go home when I saw Natalie’s demeanor change. I watched as she visibly turned her back on me. She had stood up when Nick first spoke, standing in front of me. As his glare bore into her, she shifted her weight, stepping away from me. I stood up and looked at her face. She didn’t look at me, but her eyes looked slightly glazed over and her face was blank. I reached out with my senses and felt the magic flooding the room. I wondered if Nick even realized that he had the talent, or whether he believed that it was his personality that made him so commanding. It really ticked me off, especially when I looked at Howard and saw his smile turn into scorn. I guess that whatever the magic was telling him, I was now just a hot body encasing the devil.
“Why must you antagonize me?!?” I can’t believe that I shouted at Nick, stepping up to stand in front of him. I don’t shout at people, but here I was. “I HELP people! I literally give everything I can of myself to help and all I get is a crappy life! I have NO friends, no family,” my voice broke as tears began to stream down my face, “and the one guy who’s ever shown an interest in me can’t be with me because of his stupid family! I HATE IT!” I turned around and ran out of the room, blindly heading for the restroom that I knew was located down the hall. I locked myself in the first stall and cried like I’d refused to let myself cry for years.
No one came looking for me. Once the tears subsided, I realized what I’d just done. I never raise my voice, I never confront people. Now that my anger was gone, I was just embarrassed. I’d acted like a child, blowing up like that. If I was supposed to be making friends with the Browns, I’d definitely gone about it the wrong way. I did allow myself to bang my head on the door then.
“Ms. Hawthorne?” a timid voice asked, actually knocking on the door to the restroom.
What? I wanted to growl, but I decided that would not be a good idea. “Yes?”
“There’s a situation downstairs, and Dr. Stephans wanted me to ask you to join her.”
“Okay.” I opened the door of the stall and washed my face in the sink. I squared my shoulders, burying my feelings once more where they belonged. My eyes weren’t very red and my nose had stopped running—I guess I wasn’t going to scare too many people.
The girl that had been sent to fetch me looked barely eighteen and I guess she was a volunteer. I followed her to a room downstairs where a woman was in labor. Natalie was waiting just inside the door, talking with the obstetrician. She looked ashamed when she caught my eye, but I’d already forgiven her and gave her a small smile.
“I’m so sorry. I don’t know what came over me. You know that I don’t agree with what they say…”
“It’s fine. Trust me; I know that you have no control over what they want you to feel. I know probably better than anyone.” I turned to look at the woman in bed. “So, what do you need me for?”
“Well, Mrs. Swane is going to have a baby in a few hours and wants a completely natural birth with no pain medication. The problem is that we’ve found that the baby is breech. We were wondering if you would help take some of the pain while we attempt to manually turn the baby.”
“Uh…sure. This is the first time I’ve attempted something like this,” I told Mrs. Swane walking over to her bed. “But it shouldn’t be too radical. Are you familiar with what I do?”
“Yes,” she grimaced through a contraction. I waited while she regained her breath. “Yes, I’ve heard what you do. I don’t agree with it, but I’ve never been one to judge a person. I’ve heard just terrible things about medications and babies, though. I think that if you can help it would be better than the harm that medicines cause.”
I pulled a form from my purse, but it looked like Mrs. Swane wasn’t exactly in the right frame of mind to read the tedious form. “This is my standard contract. I don’t think you want to go through the technical jargon right now, but I’m going to go ahead and write in what I’m going to do. If you want, you can sign it now or later or never, and I’ll leave you a copy. I’m not going to charge you anything, this is purely pro bono.” I wrote in that I was doing pregnancy pain removal for the duration of the procedure to turn the breech fetus, no charge, then I dated and signed it myself. “Do you want to look at it, or should we just get the procedure started?”
Mrs. Swane barely glanced at it before another contraction occurred. “Procedure. Now.”
The OB came to the bed and instructed Mrs. Swane to lie back. I guessed that they’d already told her that this procedure was not guaranteed to work. If it didn’t, she would be forced to undergo a C-section and local anesthesia would be used.
I stood next to her and took her hand, drawing out the pain of contractions and that of the OB inserting his hands into her to turn the baby. To say it was uncomfortable would be an understatement, but Mrs. Swane was fine. I’d never experienced pain like that experienced during childbirth. I wasn’t sure whether I was strong enough to ever choose to go natural, even with my high pain tolerance. It took about half an hour before the doctor declared that the fetus was in the proper position. I let go of Mrs. Swane’s hand and as I collapsed into a chair next to the bed I noticed that she flexed her hand a lot after I let it go. I think I’d been gripping it tightly as I fought to keep the pain off my face.
“How are her contractions?” I finally managed to ask.
The OB checked the monitor. “The contractions are right on schedule, but…Mrs. Swane, are you feeling the pain from them?”
“No…” she said slowly. Then she looked worried. “Am I okay? And the baby?”
“You’re fine.” Dr. Kent said. I’d finally seen the name on his lab coat. “You’re both fine.” He turned to me. “I suppose that while you were taking the pain away from the procedure you also somehow took her contraction pains away?”
“It looks that way.” I rubbed my abdomen. I’d never think of my period cramps as awful again—this was a hundred times worse. “I don’t suppose you want them back?” I asked Mrs. Swane, laughing a bit. I immediately regretted my words. I’d just broken my rule number one: the client must never know that I feel their aches and pains.
Luckily Mrs. Swane didn’t seem to notice my slip. She rubbed her stomach marveling as the machines told her she was experiencing a contraction, but she felt none of the pain. Dr. Kent looked at me, anxiously. Most of the doctors at this hospital know that I feel the pain. Dr. Nick Smith doesn’t because I don’t want the Brownies to know.
Natalie came over and took my arm, leading me out of the room and into an empty exam room. She gave me some pain medication and settled me on the table. “I’ll get you in a little bit. We shouldn’t need this room for awhile.”
I curled up into the fetal position waiting for the medicine to kick in. I finally fell asleep after laying there for a good half hour.
“Scarlet. Wake up.”
“Blargh?” I’m not exactly coherent when I wake up. I sat up and tried to figure out where I was. Oh, right. Baby.
“Come on. You should eat something.” Natalie was standing next to me as I slid off the table. We walked to the cafeteria. I checked my watch, it was only 1 o’clock. I got a hamburger and small salad while Natalie got a turkey sandwich. We found a table in the corner so that we could talk in peace.
“So, I know you’re still feeling terrible, but do you mind if we talk about what happened this morning…with Nick?” Natalie looked concerned.
“I’m fine, really. And what I could tell you about Nick would probably destroy your life.”
“Scarlet. I was suddenly viewing you as an enemy. Not just an enemy, but as a leech. That’s not me—not at all. If I wasn’t a woman of science, I would think that there was magic involved.”
I couldn’t stop myself. I narrowed my eyes at her, “and with that logic out in the open, exactly what do you think it is that I do?”
“Okay, okay. You’re right. I’ve been trying to convince myself that there is some scientific explanation for what it is that you do. But really? You want me to go as far as to call it magic?”
“Yup.” I took a bite of my burger.
“But if you do magic, then does that mean that magic made me go all hostile?”
“Yup.”
“But you wouldn’t make me hostile towards yourself. Who else has magic in this town?” she stared at her sandwich for a while. “No. No, it can’t be.” She leaned towards me. “The Browns?” she whispered.
I nodded.
“Damn,” though she actually sounded awed. “They’re using magic to turn people against you because you use magic? How is that even possible?”
“Not sure. I don’t know where magic comes from—I think that’s one of those philosophical questions, like whether there is a God. I’m more pragmatic—I know that they must have magic because that’s the only way they could do what they do, I’m not so much worried about the how.”
“So how do you combat it?”
“I have an ally who has given me some ideas—none are practical, but they’re ideas.”
“Well, let me know if you need any help. I don’t like the idea of mind control no matter how it’s done. I have free will, God damn it!”
We finished our lunch chatting about happier topics: a new TV show that we’d both fallen in love with.
We walked back to the hall with the patients rooms.
“Are you still going to stick around here?”
“Yeah. I don’t want to go home.”
“Still stressed about Nathan?”
“Yup.”
“Well, you can do some rounds visiting patients. I’m sure they’ll love your company. Let me know if you need some pain medication." She left me at the nurse’s station.
I knocked gently on the door of the first patient’s room. Inside I found an elderly woman who looked bored.
“Hi. My name is Scarlet. I’m a volunteer and I’m just going around visiting patients. Do you care for some company?”
“Oh, hello dear. Yes, I’d like some company—nobody in my family has come to see me at all.”
“That’s awful. I don’t have a family, but if I did and any of them were sick, I’d visit them a lot.”
“Aren’t you a sweet-heart.” She patted my hand.
“So, what are you in for?” making it sound like she was in jail—over the years I’ve learned that most people actually enjoy sharing about their illnesses, even if they hate the building.
“I broke my hip!” She sounded indignant. “My son’s stupid dog got under my feet and tipped me over! I’ve been telling him for years that that dog was good for nothing. It’s one of those lap dogs that you carry around in a purse. My son! Carries a stupid dog around in a purse!”
“Well…that’s definitely different,” I said, trying not to laugh. “Maybe that’s why he hasn’t visited? He’s embarrassed?” I shifted my hand so that I had a finger on hers and started to remove some of the discomfort from her hip.
“Hell no. He hasn’t come because he can’t bring that stupid dog into the hospital. And his wife isn’t any better.”
We sat and chatted about the weather, the news, and books for almost forty-five minutes. We would have talked more, but her doctor came in and shooed me out. Next door to her was a little girl with pneumonia who wasn’t very excited to talk, but her mom was happy to have company. I took the girl’s cough and fever. I thanked my high tolerance and quick metabolism because I was already recovered by the time I left and she was feeling healthy enough to enjoy a tea party with her mother.
The next room held a man who was in the last stages of life. His family was surrounding him, but he’d been given the final dose of morphine and was no longer coherent. I only murmured my condolences to his children before taking leave of the room.
There was a birthday party being held in the next room. The teenage boy in the bed was quite flirtatious when he offered me a piece of cake, holding my hand and telling me how beautiful I was. The cap on his head wasn’t able to hide the baldness associated with chemo treatment, so when I was finally able to extract my hand from Robert’s, taking with me stress and the beginning of a headache, I promised that I’d be back to visit after his procedure the next day. I paused outside his room to write down his name, room number and the time of his treatment into my appointment book. It would be a long day, with two chemo therapy patients, but I’d make it work. Robert wasn’t going to expect me, and probably wouldn’t want me, to show up as soon as it was over.
I went to the little nook near the nurses station on the first floor that the hospital had set aside for the EMS personnel to be able to grab a soda and rest while they completed paperwork between calls. The couches were comfortable and I laid on one to let my headache work through. I hadn’t stayed with Robert and his family long enough to be ready to go to another patient. Chapter 8
I slept for almost two hours before Natalie found me again. I guess one of the EMS guys had seen me when they brought in a woman in labor and told her where I was.
“There you are. A couple of patients asked whether you were still here.”
“Huh?” I stretched. “Do they want to see me?”
“No, they just wanted to thank you for visiting. Mrs. Jones in 201 wanted to tell you that your visit was the highlight of her otherwise miserable stay in this hospital. And she wants to invite you to Thanksgiving this year since you told her that you have no family. She said that after the treatment her son has given her, it’ll probably be just the two of you this year.”
I laughed. Mrs. Jones’ son was going to be living in the dog house until he got rid of that dog…and possibly his wife.
“Oh…on a sadder note, Sarah Mahoney’s family called us to tell you that the viewing is tonight, the funeral is tomorrow. They want you to know that you have no obligation, but thought that you might want to know.”
“Oh yeah, thanks.” I don’t go to viewings or funerals, preferring to remember people as they were when they were alive. “I’ll send a card or something.” I made a note in my appointment book to buy flowers.
“Well, now that you’re thoroughly depressed, how about we go to the nursery and make funny faces at the babies until they laugh?”
“Sounds like fun. Oh, how are the babies that I helped Saturday?”
“The four you helped were discharged yesterday. Little Johnny, whose parents declined help, will probably go home tomorrow.”
“Good, good. I love happy endings.”
We spent two hours in the nursery playing with the babies. I love giving babies their bottle because they cuddle and love you unconditionally just because you have food. Unfortunately, there are rarely babies that need strangers to feed them in hospitals since there are mommies and daddies who do that to bond with their new babies. But we did change a few diapers and made lots of funny faces.
“Scarlet?” Natalie asked as we walked out of the nursery.
“Yeah?”
“I was wondering if you can tell if a coma patient will ever wake up.”
“Uhh…I don’t know. I mean I can always try. Is there someone you want me to check out?”
“Yeah, there’s this guy who’s been here for about three months. His family is really stressed about what to do.”
“Okay, let’s go.”
The ICU is located on the third floor, in a very bright wing. Since most of the people in this ward are unconscious and need constant attention there is just one large room with curtains attached to the ceiling to provide privacy when necessary.
Mr. Gregory Strickland was in the bed farthest away from the door, I guess so that visitors wouldn’t notice that he was still there months after he was first admitted. He was a handsome man, about thirty-five with blond hair and strong bone structure.
Natalie moved to take his pulse, though with all the monitors attached to him, it didn’t seem necessary. I noticed that her thumb rubbed the back of his hand slowly. I had a feeling that Natalie might have a bit of crush on Mr. Strickland.
“What happened to him?”
“Car accident.” Natalie wasn’t looking at me.
“Nat…before I do anything, I need to know whether you have a personal interest in Mr. Strickland.”
She sighed. “I’ve developed a crush on him,” she admitted. “At first he was just a patient, albeit a cute one. Then when I started talking with his family I learned that he is a pretty awesome guy. I know it’s silly since I’ve never seen him with his eyes open, but he totally sounds like someone I would date, and you know how few of those exist in this town. Plus his mom and sisters are very nice, too.”
“I’m not a miracle worker and I don’t even know if I can be of any help. He could still die.”
“I know. It’s just a crush, and even if he wakes up there’s no guarantee that he’ll like me, or even that he’ll be the great guy that his family describes. You know as well as I do that family always speak highly of the sick and dying, no matter whether they were detested pigs when they were healthy.”
“Okay, well, here we go.” I put my hands on Mr. Strickland’s head and started searching for injury. I found swelling deep within his brain and it appeared that that was causing the coma, but I scanned the rest of him looking for other injuries. There were none.
“I can’t help him.”
“You can’t?” Natalie looked stricken.
“I can’t take away illnesses and injuries that put my own life in jeopardy. Or well, I can, but it might kill me and that doesn’t help the rest of the people in this world who are sick.” I told her about the swelling and that if I were to take it away, I could end up in the coma.
“So what can we do?”
“Well, if he’s stable, then I don’t see why you can’t keep him here until his family makes a decision. He’s still registering brain function, so I see no reason to do anything drastic. The swelling could go down and he’ll wake up…or he might not. I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault. Thanks for looking at him. I think I’ll keep this new information to myself, though. His family is stressed enough already.”
“Do you want me to look at anyone else?”
“No, everyone else up here is in a medically induced coma or improving. It was just him.”
“I’m hungry,” I told Natalie as we got back to the first floor. She was just opening her mouth to probably tell me that we’d go to the cafeteria when a nurse called her over to a patient.
“You go eat; I’ll grab something out of a vending machine. I’ll see you later,” she called to me as she rushed across the lobby.
I went to the cafeteria by myself for a sandwich and entertained myself with the book I found in my purse. I hadn’t finished Fahrenheit 451 yet, so I sat at the table in the cafeteria engrossed in my book. The ending surprised me, but the essays the author had written for the copy I had were very interesting. It’s quite ironic that there are people who succeeded in censoring the ultimate book on censorship.
My butt had fallen asleep while I was reading so I went for a walk around the hospital to stretch—half looking for Natalie to tell her bye before I left for the night. I had just entered the emergency wing when the doors to the ambulance bay burst open and people started calling for the crash cart. I pressed myself against the wall to get out of the way of the gurney being pushed towards the operating room. I recognized Nathan, who was straddling the patient on the gurney forcibly giving compressions while a partner worked the resuscitation bag.
I was a little shaken by the scene. I don’t often see people in a situation like that—my clients are always stable in one way or another. I knew Nathan and the rest of his crew would go to the EMS lounge before they left, so I went in there to wait. Okay, maybe I am a glutton for punishment—I wanted to see Nathan.
He walked into the lounge about fifteen minutes after I’d seen him on the gurney. He didn’t notice me at first, going straight for the mini-fridge and getting a Coke before he even realized that there was someone else in the room with him.
“Hey. Oh, hi!” he said when he recognized me, his tone improving immensely. “What brings you here?”
“Just helping out, since I had the day off.”
He came over to the couch I was sitting on and sat next to me, putting his arm around my shoulders, pulling me against his side. It was wonderful to feel the solidness of him. I laid my head against him.
“You need a life.”
“Why does everyone say that to me?” but I wasn’t angry. I knew it was true.
“Because the only difference between what you do for work and what you do on your day off is whether or not you get paid.”
“It works for me. And what about you? When you aren’t helping people as a cop, you help people as an EMT.”
“Yeah, but both jobs have plenty of down-time where I socialize with my co-workers.”
“Hey! I spent a lot of time socializing with Natalie and spent 3 hours talking with some of the patients here. And don’t say that I need to make friends outside of work, because you know that isn’t fair. I don’t want to drag anyone into the Brown’s wrath with me.”
“Sorry.” He did sound chastised and he squeezed my shoulders in half a hug.
“What happened with that guy?”
“Shot. You saw me?” I looked up at his face and his eyes twinkled. “Did I look dashing while trying to save the guy’s life?”
“I wouldn’t say dashing, but you did look intense. Are you often the one giving CPR?”
“Whenever I can manage it. The crew I work with has an agreement that whoever does the least amount of work to save the patient does the paperwork. I get to ride on the gurney while doing compressions and they get stuck trying to remember what all we did.” I felt his fingers gently stroke my arm.
“Did he make it?”
“I don’t know—I just handed him off to the doctors in the ER and changed my shirt before I came in here.”
“I’m sure you did everything that you could.”
“Yup.” He took a long swallow of soda. He didn’t speak further on it. We sat in silence for awhile, his arm sliding to wrap around my waist. I put my hand on his and caressed his fingers.
“Nathan! Come on man, you need to sign this so we can go. Oh!” a tall, gangly guy who looked just out of high school barged into the lounge. “Sorry. I didn’t realize your girlfriend was here. Hey.” He waved at me.
“Hi.” I was feeling awkward about being found cuddled next to Nathan. He extracted his arm from around me, standing up and throwing the Coke can into the recycling bin. He didn’t bother with introductions, but took the clipboard from the kid and read through the report quickly before signing it. I stood up and started collecting my things to leave the hospital.
I followed the two of them out of the lounge where they picked up the third member of their crew, a girl who looked about my age. Nathan stopped and looked at his crew and at me and suddenly realized that he was being distant. The look that crossed his face was priceless and he shook his head.
“Sorry. Not sure where my head’s been. Fred, Dalia, this is Scarlet.” He didn’t elaborate, but I shook hands with Fred and Dalia.
“You’re his girlfriend?” Fred asked. I guessed that Nathan’s moods were well known, since Fred hadn’t demanded an answer to his earlier supposition until after Nathan had finally made introductions.
“Uh…” I didn’t know how to answer.
“Not yet.” Nathan supplied, but the look he gave Fred said that he shouldn’t push for more information.
Dalia turned towards me, “Well, girlfriend or not, I’m glad that he’s found someone finally, because he’s been really moody the past few months and I’m tired of trying to figure him out.” The look she shot at Nathan told me that she was the one in charge of mental health on their crew.
I smiled at her. “Well, I can’t make any promises, but I’ll try to make him keep his moodiness to a minimum.”
“Good. It’s nice to meet you, but we should get back to the station before the captain wonders where we’re at. Bye.” Dalia grabbed Fred’s arm and dragged him down the hallway towards the ambulance bay. I thought it was a weird exit until I turned to Nathan and he caught my mouth with his in a goodbye kiss.
“Drive safe.” He murmured before following his partners out the door.
Natalie had seen the kiss (as had everyone at the nurse’s station) and she came over to me with a large grin on her face. “You two are adorable together!” she actually squealed.
I was embarrassed and told her a quick “bye” before I left in search of my car and went home.
Chapter 9
I started Thursday morning by cleaning out my refrigerator. My supply of leftovers wasn’t very large especially since I’d actually been able to get all that lasagna eaten, but there was some stuff that I put into my compost pile. I still had some ground beef that needed to be cooked, so I started chili with some beans I’d started soaking the night before in my crock-pot and added some vegetables that were getting old in the fridge. I still had an hour before Jill Green was due for her appointment so I called the florist and ordered some flowers to be sent to the family of Sarah Mahoney. Then I went into my garden to pick vegetables and pull weeds.
I’d left a sign on my front door telling Jill to come around the back if I didn’t answer the front door and as suspected, I didn’t hear her arrival. I brushed my knees off and we went into the house.
Jill was not even forty years old when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She’d had a double mastectomy a year ago, but it hadn’t stopped the cancer from spreading. It didn’t keep her from being in great spirits, though. Jill might know that she doesn’t have long left to live (her last doctor’s appointment had not left her with the best news), but it doesn’t stop her from living life to the fullest. If she didn’t tell people that she is sick, you’d never know. She’d made the decision to stop traditional treatment two months ago, but she still comes to me weekly and sometimes calls for help when she’s having a really bad day and also does some other alternative treatments. Her doctors are surprised that she has lasted this long, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she gets another two good months. Some people might think she’s not a fighter when they hear that she stopped conventional treatment, but I’ve known her for 3 years and she’s fought for every day of life.
“How was this past week?” I asked her as we sat at the kitchen table with a cup of tea in front of each of us. When she transferred to alternative medicine only, she’d insisted that we move our sessions out of the light drawing room since, she told me, she didn’t want to be reminded of the way she’d felt during that time of her life. So, we sit at my kitchen table or we go for a walk for her session.
“Oh, it wasn’t too bad. Hank and I went to New York City last weekend and we saw a few shows on Broadway and went shopping. We saw a few museums, too. But I bet you want to know about my health. I had a bad night in New York, but it didn’t interrupt my good time too much. We stayed in, ate marvelous room service and watched a great movie. Even the most active travelers need to take a day to recuperate, so I looked at it as nothing specific to being healthily challenged.” Jill doesn’t like to say that she’s sick.
“That’s great,” I told her, smiling. We talked about her four children, the oldest of which was just starting high school, the youngest in third grade before she told me that she should get going and she gave me her hand.
Since she wasn’t actively suffering I couldn’t just grab a lump of pain. It was a much more subtle challenge I faced. I pumped her full of my healthy immune system while taking away the twinge of pain I sensed around the edges of her aura, grabbing the worry over the fate of her children out of her mind, and stealing the fear she keeps hidden from everyone. It took just minutes, but the effects were seen instantly. There was a healthy color in her cheeks and the tiny lines of worry around her eyes disappeared.
“Thank-you, Scarlet.” She said, kissing my cheek before getting into her car. I’d given her the basket full of vegetables that I knew would just go to waste in my house. Her husband Hank was waiting in the car. He always drives her, but she makes him stay in the car, never letting him see her at what she perceives as her worst. When our sessions became informal she still refused to let him come inside because she said that we were having girl-talk and it wouldn’t be girl-talk if there was a man in the room. I waved at Hank and he waved back in reply.
I went back into the house to watch a movie. I never feel awful after helping Jill, but I wasn’t my usual self. I’ve often tried to describe the various feelings I have after helping people. Sometimes it’s easy—pain or nausea—and sometimes it’s nearly impossible. I guess that’s because sometimes my feelings make no sense, especially when I’m removing feelings that I cannot relate to, such as a worry about children that I do not have.
By the time the movie was over I felt normal again, so I stirred the chili and went back to the garden. Robert’s treatment had been scheduled for ten that morning so once I’d eaten lunch I called the hospital to ask when he might want a visitor. I was told that he didn’t want visitors until after three o’clock.
I called Nathan’s cell phone telling him that I was going to the hospital that afternoon and that if I wasn’t back by the time he got here, he was welcome to come in and get a bowl of chili.
I went up to my office to start the paperwork early. I had two appointments for Friday and they were both going to be tough. I wrote out receipts for both of those appointments as well as a deposit slip with the checks I’d already collected this week. It wouldn’t be difficult to add two more Saturday morning if I wasn’t up to it Friday night. I also started organizing my receipts for my accountant: I had to take her the quarter’s receipts on Monday. Since I work out of my home I have to attempt to differentiate between expenses for my home and expenses for my business. Or at least Penny wants me to do that. I keep telling her that it’s too much work to try and figure out how much of my cleaning supplies go to clean work spaces or how much water I use to serve tea and flush the toilet while clients are here. I’d finally convinced her to be happy deducting ten percent of my home property taxes since there are about ten rooms in my house and I use one specifically for my business (I didn’t tell her about the dark drawing room, which she would try to convince me is a business room). She also wants me to keep track of my pro bono work and deduct that. I think she just really hates taxes and looks for any way for her clients to pay less. It gives me a headache and since I have more than enough money to take care of myself, even after taxes, I don’t have any desire to try and keep more for myself. Whenever she asks me about pro bono work, I always tell her that I did about ten hours worth, about a thousand dollars. In reality, the one time I’d counted the hours, I’d worked for free almost as often as I worked for pay.
My phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Oh, Scarlet, I’m glad to reach you. It’s Stacy.”
“Hi Stacy. What’s up?”
“No emergencies,” she laughed. “I just finally found time to say thank-you for saving Charlotte.”
“You’re welcome, though you know I’d always help if I’m physically able.”
“You sure are a good Christian woman, I don’t care what my husband says.”
“Thank-you for those sentiments. I don’t hear that much in this town.”
“Are you going to be free this weekend? I’d like to visit and bring Charlotte. Ralph is going to a football game Sunday afternoon with some of his buddies, so it will be easy to get away.”
I looked down at my calendar. “Yeah, I’m free Sunday. Feel free to come over whenever you can.” I didn’t like that she had to sneak behind Ralphs back, but in the world we lived in, it was required.
“Awesome. Well, I need to feed Charlotte. I’ll see you Sunday.”
“Alright. Bye.”
I finished checking the figures in my accounting ledger and put the receipts into an envelope. It was two o’clock and I decided to go to the hospital early.
Natalie cornered me as soon as she saw me walk in.
“I don’t kiss and tell.” I said automatically.
“You’d better!” and she dragged me to her office and pushed me into a chair, hovering over me. “Spill.”
“There is nothing to spill. You know that we’ve been together. Is it really so shocking that we’ve kissed each other?”
“Oh, I guessed that you two have kissed before, but what’s really important is knowing what kind of kisser he is. That wasn’t just a peck of friends saying goodbye; that was a sneak attack kiss. And it curled our toes, too—that is mine and the nurses. Come on. We’ve all fantasized about Nathan—is he as great a kisser as he looks?”
“Yes?” I told her, emphasizing the question mark. “I really wouldn’t know, seeing as how he was my first real kiss.” Weird that these conversations were getting easier everyday.
“Well, does he make your blood boil?”
“He makes your blood boil when he kisses me—do you really think that he doesn’t make mine?”
“Point—stupid question. Does he slobber?”
“What? No. Definitely not.”
“Is he gentle? Or does he show his dominance?”
“Gentle, I guess, but that’s because of the problem.”
“Oh, right.” She looked disappointed. “So you haven’t gotten a fully passionate kiss from him? That sucks. You need to work through that problem quick because inquiring minds want to know what that man looks like naked.”
“Natalie!” I blushed and decided that she did not need to know about our potion induced make-out session.
“If you can’t tell us, then just take a picture—I’ve heard that they’re worth a thousand words.”
“NATALIE!”
She giggled. “Weren’t you planning on visiting Robert this afternoon?”
“Yes, that’s the only reason I came here today—not to be interrogated.”
“Well, he should be wanting visitors now,” she stepped back, allowing me to stand up. “You may go.”
Robert was napping when his mom let me into his room.
“I’m sorry you came all this way to visit him,” she whispered.
“Actually, I was wondering if you would let me help him feel better. I have a special talent and many people have benefited from my services.”
“You’re that Scarlet?” she looked shocked.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“We can’t pay you. Our insurance is barely willing to pay for the treatments we’re currently getting.” Her expression dared me to demand payment.
“I don’t expect you to pay me. I’m volunteering my services because I can help.” This was not the first time I’d had this conversation and when I’ve put myself in others’ shoes, I’ve had the same level of skepticism. “This is my standard contract, for legal purposes,” I told her, handing her the form. I’d already filled it in for her.
She read it over rather thoroughly. “So you’re only going to take away the symptoms of the chemo?”
“Yes.”
“But not the cancer?”
“I’m sorry, but I can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“My talent doesn’t work that way, I’m afraid. I wish that it did, but I can only take away symptoms.”
“Don’t you think that’s a bit convenient for you?”
“It’s as convenient for me as it is to the American Cancer Society that there isn’t a cure for cancer. When a cure for cancer is made, the ACS will no longer be necessary and how many people currently working in the organization would be out of work then? I’m not the only person making a living off cancer and other illnesses, but trust me when I say that I would cure it if it were physically possible, but it’s not. I do what I can.”
“What help do you give? You do not do anything to cure the disease.” She looked furious that I wasn’t the immediate fix that she would give her life for.
“I help people want to live. I know that the side-effects of chemo can be worse than the symptoms of the disease it’s supposed to fight. Many people give up the will to live purely because they tire of the pain and fatigue that comes from the treatment that often has poor results. I make them feel good so they can get out and live when the alternative is to lay in bed and wonder if death is better.”
Robert’s mother had tears in her eyes. “Do it. Please. I know he’s in pain, no matter how he tries to hide it. I just want my son back.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I walked over to Robert and laid my hand on his. Like I’d done hundreds of times before I pulled out the pain, the nausea, the fatigue that so many people pray will give them life. I don’t belittle the benefits of chemo and I know that it’s greatly extended, and saved, many of my clients’ lives. But for many people who get the treatment, their quality of life is lessened because of the side effects. I wish that I could help more cancer patients get more out of their treatments—help more people get the energy to get out and enjoy the world, but I’m only one person who can’t really leave this town.
Robert’s eyes opened as I took my hand away. “Woah. I feel great.” I smiled down at him, trying not to let him see my pain. “Mom, that’s the best treatment I’ve had so far!”
“Yeah, honey. It was experimental. I’m glad you’re feeling good. No. No, don’t get out of bed yet.” The tears that had been threatening finally did spill out of her eyes. She quickly wiped them away and moved to keep Robert from jumping out of bed. “Thank-you.” She murmured to me. I took that as permission to leave and nodded to her as I walked out of the room. I leaned against the wall with my eyes closed, debating whether I could work up the energy to find an empty couch or bed. Someone took my arm, and led me away from the wall.
“Come on, let’s find you a place to lie down.” I recognized the voice of Dr. Vickers.
“Thanks.” I said, leaning against his arm.
“Sorry it’s not more private, but all the rooms are in use right now.” He’d brought me to the EMS lounge and helped me lay down on one of the couches. He brought me a pillow and blanket from the nurse’s station and I fell asleep quickly.
Chapter 10
I didn't wake up until nearly 7:30.
"Shit," I grumbled groggily. I quickly grabbed my stuff and stumbled to the nurse's station. "Can I borrow your phone?"
"Sure." The nurse smiled in a way that made me worry.
"Nathan, hey. Sorry about being late. I didn't expect to sleep so long."
"It's fine. I called the hospital when I got here and you weren't back yet. They told me you were still sleeping in the lounge." I glanced at the nurse and she was giggling. Apparently my sex-life, or lack-there-of, was the big news of the week. "I've been eating your chili and reading your books, but I'm bored. You should come home." His tone was low, seductive. I blushed, which just made the nurse, she looked sixty, twitter louder.
“I’m leaving now.” I tried to make it sound light, I’m not sure how well that came across. I replaced the phone, trying not to meet the eyes of the nurse.
As I put my purse on my shoulder she said, just loudly enough for me to hear, “That’s a fine man you’ve got. And I do mean fine.” She winked at me. It took a lot of self-control for me to not run out of the hospital.
Nathan greeted me at the door with a kiss and led me into the den. He was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt and I’d noticed his truck in the driveway.
“What’s this?” I asked as he gestured for me to sit on the couch.
“I’m welcoming you home after a long day of work, with a bowl of chili that, okay, you cooked. Let me take off your shoes and rub your feet.” He’d handed me the bowl of chili and tugged my legs onto his lap. I twisted so that my back was resting on the arm of the couch. It was nice.
“But…why?” My body squirmed involuntarily as his hands began to work their magic on my feet.
“I’ve had plenty of time to think about you during the last two days. And I realized that sex is just a minor part of a healthy relationship…
“Dr. Ruth would beg to differ,” I interrupted.
“And I don’t want to lose you because of something so minor,” he finished, ignoring my interruption. “Plus I’ve been thinking about your power and what exactly happens to me. I don’t feel poorly while I’m under your spell,” Not my spell! I wanted to shout, but refrained. “And I have some awareness. So, I don’t see why we need to let it stop us.” His right hand left my feet and started massaging its way up my leg. It felt delicious, but I realized what he was trying to do.
“Wha…stop!” I slid my legs off of him and moved away, setting the chili on the table.
“Sorry! Sorry!” Nathan held his hands up. “I thought you wanted…”
I shook my hands at him. “You’re fine. It’s me.” Stupid, stupid man! Oh this was awkward. “Look, I get what you’re offering me, but it’s not what I want. I… uh…I need for you to be here for that. I can’t just use you.” I knew my face was bright red.
“Oh…um…you’re a virgin?” He looked embarrassed.
“Yeah.” I said shortly, not looking at him.
“Okay. I…uh…didn’t think about that. Of course you wouldn’t want to just throw yourself at me. Not that you would do that if you weren’t a virgin. Umm…”
I laughed, a little hysterically, “Oh there are plenty of ladies at the hospital who would jump your bones at the slightest wink, whether or not you’re mentally present.” I sobered some. “I need a bit more guidance.”
“No problem.” Nathan tentatively handed me back my bowl of chili and reached for my feet again. I ate while he rubbed and told me about how dull his day had been. “I parked centrally downtown for three hours and I was only reprieved from that when the chief called me to do a coffee and donut run. Do not make any jokes,” he said, raising his finger and glaring.
“I’d never.” I said sagely. “Were they jelly?”
Nathan grabbed my empty bowl while reaching to tickle my side. I’m incredibly ticklish and I don’t think I’d told Nathan that yet. I squealed and squirmed, trying to avoid his hands, but there wasn’t much room to maneuver on the couch and he was adept at keeping me from escaping. I tried to tickle him back, but that wasn’t affective. I needed relief; I couldn’t breathe because I was laughing so hard. I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled his mouth to mine, rubbing myself against him. It worked and he froze.
“Hah.” I gasped. “I found your Achilles heel.” I looked up at him while I got my breathing under control—he’d straddled me at some point and before he’d froze he’d put his hands on both sides of my head to keep his weight off of me. His mouth was still in kissable range and his expression was scorching, even with his eyes half-closed. I kissed him again while I pulled his desire away.
His mouth started moving against mine again, but uncertainly. I was contemplating whether I should take his shirt off while he seemed to be confused about what to do with his tongue. We kept kissing as his confidence grew and my desire faded to a more natural level.
I pulled back from him. “Do you really think we should do this?”
“I want to. It feels weird, but I love kissing you,” he said, moving to put his mouth back on mine.
“What do you mean it feels weird?” I asked, pushing on his shoulders gently to make him look at me.
“Huh? Oh, I’m not sure. I mean, I’m kissing you with part of me literally shut off. It feels good... no...great, but I actually have to think about it. I guess I’ve been using my natural instinct to kiss before, and now I’m stuck using my real brain.” He smiled down at me nervously. “I hope I’m doing a good job: I’ve never been worried about my kissing skills before, which is actually a bit arrogant now that I think about it.
“Well, the girls at the hospital want to know whether or not you’re a good kisser, so I’ll tell you the same thing I told Natalie: I wouldn’t know. I’ve never been really kissed before,” I admitted.
“Wow. I’m your first for everything then?”
“Yeah.” I liked the implications of that statement.
“Talk about pressure. You’ll measure every man that succeeds me up to the standard that I set.”
“What makes you think that there will be other men?” I asked a bit indignantly.
“Good,” he growled and kissed me possessively. “Are we official yet?”
“What?”
“Fred will want to know that you’re officially considering yourself my girlfriend. I’m not pressuring you or anything, but I’ve never felt this strongly about a woman before.”
I sighed and looked up at him. Half of me was screaming to say yes because I really thought I was falling in love with him. The other half of me was saying no because I really thought I was falling in love with him. But falling in love with him meant that I was going to hurt a lot when he decided that he needed more than foot massages, good food, and the occasional ten minute kissing match.
“What’s wrong?” he asked after I hadn’t said anything for five long minutes.
“I just don’t want to get hurt,” I said finally, my voice strained. I pushed against his chest to tell him to move so that I could sit up.
“I won’t hurt you, ever,” he told me firmly, settling next to me with his arm around me.
“Not now. But what happens in six months, a year, when you decide that you need sex? You already offered yourself for me to use as a…” I couldn’t say it. “Sure, we would both get carnal satisfaction, but I know it’s not enough, even if I could do things that way with you.” Tears escaped my eyes and I wiped them away furiously. “I realize that you aren’t shallow, but let’s face the facts. You are a man, you have needs, and I can’t fulfill them.”
“There are plenty of ways for me to get satisfaction without your help and without cheating on you.”
“I know that. And I’m actually a girl who doesn’t believe that that stuff is cheating, so please feel free to use those outlets. But that’s still not going to replace the pleasure that comes from physically being with a woman—you are going to desire that and no matter how much you fight it, you are going to leave me to be able to lie in the arms of another. And I hope to God that when you do, we won’t be together because I don’t take kindly to cheaters.”
“I’m not going to cheat on you. I’m stronger than you give me credit for.”
“Now. But think about the future. Do you really thing that you can sustain yourself with magazines?”
“I can when I have you to cuddle with afterwards. And what about you? Are you telling me that you will be satisfied with being a virgin your whole life? Or are you going to want a man who can send you to the moon without taking a vacation there himself? I might call you a saint because you give more of yourself than you have, but when it comes to this, you have no more self-control than I have.” He glared at me, daring me to try and top that. Then he waggled his eyebrows at me, ruining the effect.
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to laugh or cry. I hugged him. “Ugh. It’s stupid of me, and I will be a sappy mess when it ends badly, but right now I just want to be with you,” I told him, my head resting on his shoulder.
I felt his breath on my neck. “I promise that if I ever feel the need to sleep with a woman, you will be the first to know.”
I sat back and looked at him. “And if I ever get the desire to…uh…change my virginal status, you’ll be the first to know.”
“Good. Then I can set up some mood lighting and music and draw you a few diagrams to guide you along after I take my mini-vacation. ‘Put item one into hole two…’” I smacked him playfully and he pulled me tight against him. “We’ll figure this out,” he murmured into my hair.
“Yeah.”
After awhile I sat up and looked at him shyly. “Do you want to stay the night?”
“Yes,” he said instantly. He followed me up stairs to my bedroom. I grabbed some pajamas out of my drawer before going into the bathroom to change and brush my teeth. Nathan had already taken his shirt and belt off and was standing barefoot waiting for me when I came back. He was just as muscled as I’d imagined. I knew that nothing would happen tonight, but I was still suddenly nervous.
“Uh…if you want to brush your teeth, there’s an extra toothbrush on the counter in the bathroom,” I told him, awkwardly jerking my arm to point out the door.
He grinned. “Ah, the subtle hint that my breath stinks.”
“Wait, what? I didn’t say that at all!” But he was already walking past me to the bathroom. It took me a full minute to realize that he’d said that only because he could tell I was anxious. I grabbed a pillow off the bed and stood to the side of the door so that he wouldn’t see me when he walked in. It made a satisfying thump when it connected with his stomach.
“Hey! What was that for?” He asked wearily, raising his hands to show me he was unarmed as I readied myself for another attack.
“For implying that I would complain about your breath.” I swung my pillow at his head, but missed. Nathan took the time that I was off balance to grab another pillow from my bed, arming himself. He smacked me on the butt while I finally did hit him over the head. We both got our fair share of hits, tickles, and kisses before falling onto the bed laughing, our legs hanging off the end.
He brushed my hair out of my face before resting his hand on my stomach. “I think I love you.”
My breath caught…probably not a good thing since I was already trying to catch my breath from laughing so hard… “Woah.”
“Too soon?” he asked, wincing. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. I think I love you, too, I just wasn’t expecting you to say it first.” I grinned at him.
He kissed me deeply, before standing and pulling me up with him. He turned down the comforter and gestured for me to climb into bed. He tucked me in before turning out the light and walking around the bed to get in next to me. We fell asleep cuddled together.
I woke up to the feeling of lips on mine.
“Whaa?” I opened my eyes and saw Nathan looking down at me. Oh, I wish I was more coherent in the morning—I felt like a moron.
“Good morning,” he whispered smiling.
“ ’Morning,” I groaned. “What time is it?” I looked around, trying to see the clock without my glasses.
“Early. I have to go so I can get ready for work.” He’d already gotten dressed. “Sorry for waking you up, but I didn’t want to just leave.”
“That’s sweet of you.” I blinked at the sunlight just starting to lighten the sky out the window.
“You don’t believe that,” he said, laughing. “You think I’m a jerk who needs to leave you alone so you can go back to sleep.”
“You’re a mind reader,” I chuckled. “But come here anyway.” I reached my arms up, wrapped them around his neck and kissed him thoroughly. “See you later?” I asked when I released his mouth.
“Oh hell’s yes,” he growled, his eyes slightly crossed. I laughed. He kissed my forehead before leaving the room. I rolled over and hugged the pillow he’d used the night before. There might then have been some uncontrollable giggling because, hell, spooning is fun! I couldn’t believe that Nathan had spent the night with me—Squee!
I laid on my bed and stared at the ceiling, trying to memorize the exact feeling of his body next to mine. I’d spent my whole life feeling like a person who’d drawn the ultimate short straw. Who would want to date a girl who has the fury of an entire church—with magic aiding them, no less—against her? I’d spent my whole life just trudging along, praying to stay invisible, while wondering if any male would ever get the courage to get to know me. For all my ancestors had written about their talent, they hadn’t left me much information on their personal lives. I knew that they’d all gotten married at some point, otherwise I wouldn’t be here, but I didn’t know much about the husbands. All the siblings left town, I knew that. If I could, I would have left this town, but that’s one of the quirkiest quirks of this “gift”. The same personality trait that makes me give every ounce of myself to help people who don’t really want to have anything to do with me (though with the information I’d gained recently, my annoyance with that detail had greatly been redirected) also gives me no desire to leave. It’s not my house, it’s not the atmosphere, it’s not because I have some sick need to hurt myself. Nope. Great-Grandma Elizabeth had left for almost five years before she had to come back. She wrote five pages in the bible while she tried to figure out what it was that made her come back and she didn’t get very far. All of her entries have a certain amount of scorn about being back in this town. I don’t have much scorn—I’ve always just been resigned to the situation as one I could not change.
Now that Nathan was in my life, I wouldn’t have changed a thing. They say that it’s “better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all” and the way I felt right now, I think that’s true. Whatever the future brings, I’d always have this time to remember, so I was going to enjoy every second. Plus, I didn’t feel like getting out of bed, and I was too antsy to go back to sleep.
Eventually I did get up to take a shower and prepare for the day.
I was sleeping in the dark drawing room when there was a knock on my front door. It was five-thirty and I wasn’t expecting anyone, so when I opened my door and saw Nathan standing on my porch in jeans, I was slightly confused. He handed me a single yellow rose.
“What’s this for?” I asked, smelling it.
“Our one week anniversary,” he replied, stepping inside and greeting me with a kiss.
“Has it really just been a week? Sheesh.” I went into the kitchen and filled a bud vase for the rose. I put it in the center of my dining room table. “Very pretty.”
“You mentioned that you like to get flowers.”
“That, I do.” We sat in the chairs in the light drawing room. “How was your day?”
“Same old, same old. We did have a stolen car to track down. Some kids went joy-riding last night. Yours?”
“Average. Two bouts of Chemo.”
“You do a lot of cancer treatments?”
“Yeah. That and arthritis, with the occasional migraine. Most other things are too trivial for people to seek me out. Pain management is my main business.”
“That sucks.”
“Not really,” I told him. “I give over a lot of my energy when I do the treatment, so I go to sleep as soon as my patients leave. I only ache for a few minutes before I go into the other room and pass out for a few hours. I don’t feel the pain while I’m asleep.”
“Is that why the bed in that room is so comfortable?” He looked across the foyer to the other drawing room.
“Yep. That’s my recovery room. My mom just had a regular bed in there, but I used some of my first earnings to buy the best mattress I could find.”
“What happened to your mom? She’d always looked fine when I saw her around town; it was a shock when we heard that she’d died. ‘Course, Uncle Edward was thrilled, as you’d expect. He threw a little party for his followers to celebrate the deaths of all your relatives in town.”
“That doesn’t surprise me in the least.” I hesitated to talk about my mom, though. Sure, I loved her, but I still resented what she’d done. “Let’s go start dinner,” I said, reaching for his hand.
He didn’t press the subject and we decided that we’d just have sandwiches and salads for dinner. We’d just settled in the den with our food when Nathan brought up the subject of my mom again.
“Are you going to talk about her eventually?” His eyes probed mine.
“Yes. Eventually. I’m just new to this whole sharing feelings thing and I’m not ready for that subject to be voiced. Forgive me?”
“Nothing to forgive. I asked a question and you don’t want to talk about it. I expect that will happen a lot in the course of our relationship, and on both sides of the table. I just hope that we’ll be able to talk about those things together at some point.”
“Speaking of not talking about feelings, then, what’s this about you being moody for months? Dalia did look worried about you.”
“Huh? Oh,” he blushed. “My ex-girlfriend cheated on me after nearly getting me to leave this town and I’ve been pissed off at her. I was very close to throwing everything away here and moving to California to be with her when I found out.”
“Someone would cheat on you?!” I was honestly shocked. “Why?”
“Why does that surprise you?” but his eyes looked amused. “No really, tell me why you think a girl would be out of her mind to cheat on me.” He took a bite of his sandwich and had to wrestle with a slice of tomato that fell out.
“Well,” I started, lowering my voice, “you’re incredibly modest and very sophisticated.” I wiped at the tomato juice on his chin with my finger and licked it clean.
“Careful or I’m going to go visit mars.”
I laughed. “Greasy, grimy gopher guts stuffed in lettuce,” I sang.
“Thank-you for that wonderful picture.”
“That’s what I’m here for.” I bit into my own sandwich, doing so very neat and primly.
“Well aren’t you Miss Classy”
“I exude elegance.”
“You exude something, but I’m not sure if it’s elegance.”
“I thought we decided never to refer to that incident.” I tried to sound controlled, but that really had been the most embarrassing moment of my life.
“Whoops! Sorry!” He looked aghast. “I was totally thinking kindness, confidence, and killer sex appeal. But graceful, you are not, which contradicts the idea that you’re elegant. I did not even think about that other thing. But if I may,” he started, holding his hand up so that I wouldn’t hit him, “I would say that I’ve never seen a sexier pile of mess than I saw when you saved those children. If men are biologically ingrained to find a woman who will be a great mother, then you set off all those sensors in me when you walked into that room knowing full well that you would come out of it in that state. In a world where many women care more about their appearance than anything else, it was a huge turn on when you gave that up to help others.”
I smiled at him. “Well, that’s very sweet for you to say, but I never want my bodily functions to be discussed in this house again. Ever.” I narrowed my eyes.
“Done.” He took another bite of his sandwich.
We debated what movie to watch, which somehow ended up in a philosophical argument on the meanings of Harry Potter, I’m not sure how, before we finally settled on Lucky Number Slevin—which, really ,was an easy decision because I hadn’t watched it yet and I had to return it to the library on Saturday no matter what.
The movie was good, but I spent a lot of it debating whether or not I was ready to talk about my mom. After we finished eating we’d stretched out on the couch together. His chest was very warm on my back and I wondered if I would ever feel like my mom did. I loved Nathan, or at least, I figured this was what love felt like. I could easily see us doing this every night. I could even see us having children if that ever becomes possible, though I was seriously wondering if that was the kindest thing to do in this town. He made me feel good about myself. I realized that I hadn’t really been living before, I’d just gone through the motions—waking up, doing my work, and pretending that I didn’t exist. Now I had someone to talk about things with, my relationships with others had been transformed, too.
Natalie and I had always been on friendly terms, but I’d never confided my worries with her before. I think she’d tried to get me to share more, but I’d always wanted to protect her. The less people know me, the less fuel the Brownies would have to use against them. With the revelation about their magic, it was apparent that it was less safe for people I might want to call friends than I’d thought, but after tasting this new world, I couldn’t bear to let it go. Oh, I would in a heartbeat if it was the only way to save them, but I really didn’t want to.
I heard a soft snore and twisted around to look at Nathan’s face. He was out. Funny, I didn’t remember hearing him snore the night before—maybe it was a couch thing. I let him sleep and watch
ed the rest of the movie confident that I would share everything with Nathan when he woke up.
As the credits rolled, I sat up and stretched, letting the arm that was around me settle onto my lap.
“Hmm…?” I was happy to see that Nathan looks as confused as I do when he first wakes up. “Wha did I miss?” he asked groggily.
“The whole movie…or at least everything after you fell asleep.”
“Oh.” He reached for me. “Back to sleep then.” He pulled me against him, his face rubbing against my neck. “You smell good.”
“Thank-you.” We were laying on our sides, looking at each other.
“You’re beautiful, too.”
“You’re just full of flattery. If I wasn’t sure otherwise, I’d say that you’re just trying to get laid.” I ran my fingers through his soft hair.
“I am trying to get laid, my equipment is just broken.”
“You wouldn’t say such things if you could get into my pants.” I told him, scowling.
“That is one hundred percent true. But that’s one of the beautiful things about being a modern guy in a superficial world. Women find it to be a total turn on when a guy really wants to do something but can’t for either physical or moral reasons and admits it to her. You ever read Twilight? Bella totally digs Edward more because he wants to drink her dry but is able to control himself, barely. It’s his “sacrifice”, see the air quotes, that gives him a double bump in hotness.”
“Okay…the fact that you’ve read Twilight is subtracting from whatever sexy points you hoped to gain by admitting that you are trying to get into my pants, but can’t,” I said, poking him in the chest.
“Hey, it wasn’t my choice. My third girlfriend was obsessed with the books and I had to read them to understand what she was saying half the time. Let’s just say that it wasn’t my most honorable moment when I realized that more than half of the reason why I was breaking up with her was because of the Twilight thing.” He looked ashamed. “I really wasn’t paying attention when we started going out or I would have seen the precursors to that particular development.”
“What was wrong?” I realize that it’s probably not normal for a current girlfriend to be interested in the exes of her boyfriend, but with my limited relationship experience, I felt that it was important for me to know these things. I really liked that he wasn’t calling her weird, or a psycho-bitch for her obsession. His ability to speak so matter-of-factly about his exes told me that he didn’t feel the need to belittle them to make himself look better.
“Well, since we’re discussing things in terms of Twilight, I guess it was because she was a lot like Bella. She was always certain that I was going to leave her for someone better.”
I blushed. Hadn’t I already confessed to him that I knew that he was going to leave me for someone else?
He seemed to read my mind. “Hey, the discussion we had was completely viable—it wasn’t like you were telling me that I was going to leave you for someone taller, or skinnier, or blonde-er.”
“Oh, so you’re telling me that I’m short, fat, and brunette?” I scowled at him. He looked flabbergasted. “I’m just yanking your chain.” I smiled, kissing his cheek.
“Do not scare me like that! Do you realize how many guys have nightmares about the ‘does this dress make me look fat’ debate?” He looked relieved.
“Really? Girls actually do that and they want a serious answer? That sucks.” I was serious. A lack of girl, or guy, friends leaves you ignorant of these social norms. “I’d always thought that was just used in television and movies for comedic relief.”
“Yeah. It’s not one of their more flattering charms. But for the record, if you were to ever ask me that question, what do you want me to say?”
“You know how you reacted when you saw me come out of the bathroom wearing that dress? That was perfect.”
“Huh…but what if you literally use the words ‘does this dress make me look fat’? Even after my eyes bug out? Then how do you want me to answer?”
“I want you to be honest, because I don’t want to be dressed up and have everyone else think I look fat. I’d rather change. But if I see your eyes bug out, I probably won’t ask you that, because honestly, I could look like an elephant and I wouldn’t care after you looked at me like that.”
“Okay,” he said slowly. “But you’ll have to excuse me if I’m not quick to test the theory that you want me to tell you that you look fat.”
“Fair enough. I don’t expect to have many opportunities to wear dress up clothes anyway.”
“Why not?”
“Nathan. Come on. Do you really want to publicize our relationship in this town?”
“Yes,” he said instantly. “It sounds cliché, but I want to scream it from the rooftops.” He smiled down at me.
“Do your parents know?” I asked quietly.
“No, but that’s because I wanted to talk about it with you first. You have as much invested in this relationship as I do.”
“I don’t think it will change my status any for your family to learn who you’re dating, but I think you should really re-think your screaming from the rooftops plan. It’s not an easy life that you want to enter. None of the husbands have had it easy and you can imagine the strain it puts on the marriage. I don’t have many personal accounts about the marriages, but there are a few complaints about how hard it was for the husband to get a job. Could you imagine losing your job because of me?”
He sighed. “This town sucks. You want to runaway together?” His arms tightened around me.
I laughed grimly. “I wish I could, but I physically can’t. I’ll get dragged back here by the magic just like Elizabeth did.” I paused. “Tell me about your past girlfriends.”
“WHAT?!” He didn’t quite shout but he definitely looked at me like I’d grown a second head.
“I don’t have any relationship experience, so I want to know what they did that made the two of you break up. What they did that you liked. I’m not going to try and change myself to be like, or not like them, but I want to know why you dated them. To start off, what’s your type?”
“My type of girl? Sheesh. You don’t have any relationship experience—these aren’t questions girls ask of their boyfriends.”
I shrugged. “I don’t care what’s normal. I want to know what your type of girl is.”
He sighed. “I don’t think I have a type. Or at least not a specific type of physical appearance. My exes have all looked different—all shapes sizes and colors. My first girlfriend was my freshman year of high school. We weren’t very serious and dated for a few months. It was a mutual break up—we were more friends than lovers, I guess, if that makes sense since we weren’t having sex. My second girlfriend was Shelia. We got together junior year. She was my first…” he cleared his throat. “Anyway. We broke up after graduation, though I probably should have broken it off earlier. I think she just wanted to be with me because I looked good on her arm, but like I told you: I was a horny teenager—I wasn’t dating her for the conversations. And if you’re looking for a reason to think less of her as a person, then I’ll tell you that I wasn’t her first.” He searched my eyes, probably looking for evidence that he was telling me too much.
“I’m not surprised by that piece of info, but I don’t care. I have enough of my own problems to deal with to bother worrying about others. Anyway, that’s two. Then there was the third who was obsessed with Twilight…”
“We met in college and dated for two years, I guess. She got a bit clingy, like being with me twenty-four/seven would keep me from wanting to date others.”
“And finally the one who cheated?”
He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “We met three years ago, after I’d started on the police force here. We hit it off immediately and got pretty serious quickly. But she is an ambitious woman. She thought that I should schmooze my way to be the youngest police chief ever. I ignored her prodding, since she wasn’t very pushy. She wants to make a name for herself and this isn’t the place to do that. She started looking for work in the big cities, travelling for interviews. She finally got an offer for a once in a lifetime position in California and we were talking about moving there when I accidently intercepted a text from some guy in New York looking for a hook-up. When I asked her about it, she broke down quickly telling me about all the guys she’d slept with on her way to the top, while still dating me. I guess she thought she’d get my sympathy because they were all ‘casting couch’ situations.” He huffed. “I think she wanted me to believe that it was rape, but if that were the case, why didn’t she tell me after the first time? Or at least, why did she let it happen more times? And worse: why did some of the guys have her phone number? Anyway. I broke up with her that night. I kept the apartment, yeah, we were living together, and she moved across the country. That was six months ago.”
“That bitch,” I said simply. He looked happy at that sentiment.
“Wow, that actually felt really good to get off my chest.” He started to pull me against his chest again, but I resisted.
“You shared a lot, so I guess I should share too.”
“Scarlet, you don’t have to.”
“No, I thought about it during the movie. I want to. I think it will make me feel better, too.” Now it was my turn to take the deep breath. “My mom committed suicide. I mean, in the only way one of my kind would, but it was still a conscious decision to do more than her body could handle. My dad was killed in a car accident when I was three—mom never forgave herself for not being able to save him. She didn’t neglect me, but she was never all the way there. We didn’t talk about many of the things teenage girls talk to their moms about, hence why my education about relationships is limited to what I read in books. She taught me the basics of the gift, but mostly left me to figure it out for myself from the bible. I guess that’s because she knew that I wouldn’t have her to lean on later. She mostly buried herself in work, leaving me to deal with my problems alone. The day after my sixteenth birthday she went to the hospital to do rounds and saved a man who was having a heart attack, having it instead for herself. Her files showed that she’d planned to kill herself for years. She’d left a will that dictated that I get everything and a notarized statement from a lawyer saying that she felt that I was capable of caring for myself and that I should be ruled an emancipated minor. Well, this town being how it is, nobody wanted to take me in as a foster kid, nor did they want to publicize to the state that they didn’t care about ‘one of their own’, so a judge here, heavily under the influence of Rev. Brown, ruled in that favor. At barely sixteen I was left alone in the world. But I don’t blame my mom. I only hope that I love…someone as much as my mom obviously loved my dad.” Surprisingly, the tears didn’t come.
Nathan looked stricken. “I don’t care that you don’t blame your mom, that’s horrible.”
“Oh, I didn’t say that it wasn’t/isn’t horrible, but I have clients who are clinically depressed—trust me when I say that it is a terrible existence that no one should have to deal with. I don’t want to be so dependent that I commit suicide, but to feel that amount of love that causes it, just for a little bit, would be wonderful. I guess it’s because I’ve never really felt loved before.” I couldn’t look at his face.
He tilted my chin up until my eyes met his. “I love you. Period. End of statement. And as a man who loves you I can tell you that if anything happens to me, I do not want you to ever hurt yourself, especially if we have a child that needs to be cared for. I’m sorry that your mom went through what she did, but you are stronger than that.”
I held up a hand, “You’re speaking to the choir. It took me a long time to forgive my mom, and my first experience with a severely depressed patient greatly helped me do that. She needed help and she didn’t seek it. I want the love—NOT the mental illness. I think my dad rolled over in his grave when mom killed herself.”
“You have the love,” he said, smiling down at me. I kissed him.
“We’ll see. You haven’t met that tall, skinny, blonde who can have sex with you yet,” but he just laughed at that.
It was nearly midnight when we finally decided to turn in. Nathan went out to his truck to grab a backpack that he’d brought some clothes in.
“I do not want to sleep in jeans again,” he declared. I went into the bathroom to change and brush my teeth, but was interrupted halfway through the latter when Nathan knocked on the door. “Scoot over,” he instructed. He was shirtless again, wearing a pair of plaid pajama pants and I took the time to marvel at his chest and back while he brushed his teeth. There is only one sink in the bathroom, so we fought over who got to spit and rinse first. He followed me to the bedroom and once again we fell asleep entwined in each other’s arms.
Chapter 12
The seven months that passed were the happiest of my life. Nathan and I had to learn how to keep our relationship secret especially when we bumped into each other in public places. It was difficult to keep my mouth shut when we found ourselves in line together at the supermarket and the girl behind the check-out counter flirted with him. I couldn’t hide the eye-roll I gave when she doubled his discounts. She saw it, called me a “fat cow who couldn’t get a real man if I paid him”, and charged me twice on my ground beef without even pretending to do otherwise. I let it go, especially since we were sharing food costs and it actually ended up costing us less. Nathan had heard the insult, but we’d decided that we didn’t want to draw attention to us, so he also kept his mouth shut. He was waiting at my car when I came outside and gave me a hug.
“You’ll notice that she paid me when she doubled my discounts, and yet, who is it who has me?” which made me feel a lot better. “And you are NOT a fat cow.”
“Moo.” I couldn’t help myself. He put his bags into my car and I took them back to my house. He’d complained about the lack of junk-food in my kitchen, so I told him he could buy his own and keep it on the empty top shelf in my pantry. He was practically living with me, though he kept his apartment for appearances sake and because he still had a few more months on his lease. When his buddies wanted to watch sports at his place, that’s where they went, a perk that I really liked, actually. Otherwise, the only time he went to the apartment was to pick up his mail. Whether anyone noticed that his truck and patrol car were rarely in the parking lot of his apartment building, we’ll never know. I only went there once, to drop him off so that he could move his patrol car to my house. My house is on the outskirts of town, practically in the woods and way off the beaten track with plenty of bushes to obscure it from the road, so random passers-by can’t see who is parked there. My clients probably noticed that the truck was parked there, but did not comment. I suspect that they knew whose truck that was and kept it quiet for the same reasons that they don’t publicize their own visits to my home. The nurses and Natalie continued to hound me for details, but I just smiled and dodged the questions. It was our business and no one else’s. Nathan was now regretting that public kiss at the hospital—everyone, including Fred and Dalia, expected a repeat whenever we were seen together in a somewhat private area (like the EMS lounge), though thankfully this wasn’t the case when the spot was more public.
Jill passed away peacefully at home, after doing a month long tour of Europe, surrounded by her friends and family. Robert was in remission. His mom asked me to help him through the rest of his treatments and I was happy to take him on as a client. When I take on a client who cannot afford to pay me I only ask that they “pay it forward” in some way. I see their whole family at the hospital, volunteering to help other families get through the ordeals that they knew so well. Stacy brings Charlotte to visit me as often as she can. Charlotte had no ill effects from her trip to the hospital and is growing beautifully.
Nathan and I continued to try and figure out a way to get over his intimacy problem. I tried to get a meeting with various members of the Brownies, but they refused to even take my calls. I tried to make my trips to the hospital more apparent, to let people see that what I do is good. I even tried to go to church one Sunday, but I was just glared at and I noticed that not only did the service start late, but it seemed totally geared towards passages denouncing witchcraft and heathenism. I suspected that the late start was because the Reverend wanted to re-write his entire sermon.
For his part, Nathan read my bible, looking for anything that I might have missed. He did find one strange thing. Many of my ancestors noted weird results, where, in their attempts to heal one thing the results were not the one-to-one that we expect. One time, a simple cough was transferred as a runny nose. Another time, a headache became a sore back. It was like the symptom got lost in transit. We talked about it and decided to see if I could force this to happen.
Over the months we’d learned that Nathan got about an hour of relief from his problem after I woke him up. We could then touch each other intimately and he wouldn’t get so turned on physically and thus could enjoy it. I joked with him that I hoped his normal recovery time wasn’t so long. But our first attempts at trying out my possible new ability were slow:
“I’m not going to hurt you or let you hurt yourself.”
“Well, how can I try and alter symptoms when I have nothing to swap? It’s frustrating that I have to wait an hour to try again.” We’d decided that the easiest way to see if we were making progress would be to turn his desire into a cramp in my foot. So far I’d only been able to make my foot feel numb and that had taken three days of trying. I couldn’t continue to give him my innocence because that was what was taking an hour to wear off. If only I had some pain or symptom to give to him instead.
“I know,” he said, hugging me. “But we’re not going to turn sadistic and trade punches or cuts.”
That was the dilemma we found ourselves in for most of the month of October. It wasn’t until I woke up feeling sick that we made progress.
“You want to give me what?!” Nathan was looking green and glanced unhappily at his bowl of cereal.
“My cramps. I also have some fatigue or bloating if you want to go that way.” I tried to sound casual, though this was probably the first time I had a frank discussion of my period since my mom first explained it to me.
“I must really love you because I’m still sitting here thinking about this.” He sighed and pushed away his bowl. He crossed his arms across his chest. “Okay, my first question is whether there will be any damage to me since I don’t have your equipment—I really don’t need to further harm my reproductive system.”
“You have the same muscles, which is where the cramps are.” I gestured at my lower abdomen.
“What does it feel like?”
“Uhh…I don’t really know how to explain it. Maybe similar to a guy getting hit in the crotch? Though I wouldn’t know that feeling. It’s painful, though not as painful as labor, but exercise helps a lot, as does heat…and chocolate.”
“And how long will it last?”
“Umm…well, you know about my lack of control over my own strength,” I’d been trying to get the innocence to a minimum dose, but that hadn’t worked. “So it might last an hour, too. We won’t know until we try.”
“You know, this is the ultimate in emasculation.” He groaned. “Okay, I’m game, but this goes the way of the hospital mess story—never to be referred to again, got it?”
“Scout’s honor,” I told him, holding up the two fingers. I grabbed some Hershey’s minitures out of the pantry and a bottle of Advil and followed him into the den. We settled on the couch and started making-out. No matter how our relationship is stressed, we loved the fact that we could sit on a couch on a Sunday morning and make-out without feeling unproductive.
It didn’t take long for him to get aroused, but I paused before I transferred my pain, thinking through the three exchanges I had to make: take his desire, give him my cramps, and somehow wrestle his desire into a cramp in my foot—all at the same time. I started the transfer slowly, sending the cramps while grabbing onto his desire. It was easier this time. I’d never really thought about what the “innocence” was when I gave it to him. It wasn’t anything I could describe in particular, just a general feeling. I knew then that emotions were not my forte—pain, however, is. Pain is tangible, pain is real, pain has a shape, a form, and can be held…or at least in my imagination, which is half of the act of doing magic. Previous attempts had been like juggling eels—I’d used all my consciousness trying to figure out exactly what innocence is and sending it to him that when the desire entered my body, I’d already missed my chance to grab it and shape it to my own will. This time, I’d already sent the pain, in a controlled dose, to him when I grabbed the desire, and the desire never had a chance to escape into my body. It was no trouble to stuff it down into the muscles of my foot.
“Oh! OUCH!” My foot was contorted in a strange angle, clearly cramped up.
“Are you okay?” Nathan was looking green again and he rubbed his abdomen roughly, working through his own cramp.
“I’m fine. You?” I rubbed my foot, trying to get the muscles to relax.
“Well, it’s definitely not the same feeling as getting hit in the balls. It’s more like a tooth ache, I guess, though on a larger scale.”
“Yeah, a dull ache would explain it pretty well.” I flexed my foot. It still hurt, but it was moving again.
Nathan reached for some chocolate. “Please forgive me and all male-kind for not being more sympathetic to the misery women go through every month. This goes on for five days plus the other symptoms?” He curled up on his side, still rubbing his guts.
“Huh? Oh, I’m not sure how other women’s are, but mine just super sucks the first day because I get everything at once. By the second day, I’m usually done with the symptoms except for the bleeding. I do tend to get extra emotional the day before, though.” My foot was starting to feel more like normal again. “Move your hands.” I rubbed my hands together to warm them up and pressed them to Nathans abdomen, his eyes rolled up in his head for a second.
“That feels good.” He rested his hands on top of mine and closed his eyes.
“Well, remember this trick next month for me and I’ll be insanely happy.”
“Done.”
I had to re-warm my hands three times before the cramps subsided from his body. It’d only taken about twenty minutes, a third of the time it’d taken us before.
“Ugh,” Nathan groaned, finally able to stretch out on the couch. “I’ve never been so happy to be a man before.” He looked at me and absently rubbed his stomach. “So I guess it worked?”
“Yup. I figured out the problem was that I didn’t have something tangible to hold on to when I gave you so called ‘innocence’.”
“Ah. Does that mean that I’m stuck getting cramps or do you think that you can figure out how to hold on to innocence? Because I’m a bit partial to never having a period again…and I can’t believe that statement just came out of my mouth.”
“Honey, when you’ve spent forty-eight to ninty-six hours feeling fat, sore, exhausted, irritated, weepy, and very, very messy, you can tell me that again.” I smiled at him and rubbed my own abdomen; my cramps were returning.
“I hope to God that I never piss you off so bad that you make me experience all of that.”
“Trust me when I say that you couldn’t.” I smiled at him. “So, do we try that again or do we call it a day?”
“Ah hell, let’s do it again. You need the practice and I need to atone for being a man.”
We were recuperating after our fourth or fifth trial when there was a frantic knock on the door.
“I’ll get it,” I told him, limping to the front door. Stacy was there and she looked frightened. Charlotte, now almost two years old, was in her arms. She looked fine except that her arm was bent at a slightly odd angle and she was crying, though not loudly. “What happened?” I asked her, showing her into the light drawing room.
“I don’t know,” she told me, her voice shaking. “We were at the park and she was running after some birds. She bent down to touch something and then a bird flew up into the sky from where she was. She started crying and I ran over to her, thinking that the bird had just scared her, but then I saw her arm and it…I think it’s broken.” She broke down then, tears streaming down her face.
I silently took Charlotte from Stacy’s arms, settling her onto my lap. While I was inspecting her arm to determine that it was indeed broken I felt my own discomfort leave my body. “Woah!” I yelled. I held Charlotte away from myself, though that wasn’t stopping the child. I quickly grabbed my various cramps and set the child back on her mother’s lap. Stacy looked at me strangely, but her tears had stopped. She looked very confused.
“What was that about?” she asked.
“Umm…awkward,” I told her. I stood up and began to pace around the room. “Okay, first off, her arm is broken, so you’re going to need to take her to the hospital. Secondly, we have a situation.”
“What kind of situation?” She looked alarmed.
“The kind that keeps you from having friends in this town,” I said quietly. “Biologically speaking, she’s my daughter, not yours.”
“What?!? How is that possible? I conceived her, I carried her…” she held Charlotte closer to her and the child whimpered. I reached over and pulled some of the pain from the broken arm into myself.
“It’s possible because when you came to me for fertility treatment I exchanged five of my healthy eggs for five of your non-healthy eggs. I told you this when I did the treatment.” I suddenly felt tired. It’s very difficult to raise a child with this gift and it would be even worse with her living with a Brownie father.
“Why is her arm broken?”
“It’s broken because that’s the one thing I haven’t publicized. When someone in my family gives aid to another, we take on the physical illness that we claim to help. When I help someone’s headache, I get the headache. When I saved Charlotte and the rest of the babies, I took their symptoms into myself. Charlotte has the gift and she healed that bird’s broken arm, taking it upon herself.”
“But why? How does she know that she can help others?”
“It’s instinctual,” I told her. “We have no control over it: we just want to help others. My family has an obscenely high mortality rate for girls under age five who are born with the gift. Children that young don’t understand that they can get hurt and die while helping others and they will unknowingly help at the expense of their own health.”
“What can I do?”
“You have to keep her away from sickness. She can’t touch people who are ill because she will take their illness upon herself. And we need to teach her to control her instincts starting right now." Charlotte whined a little when her arm didn't do what she wanted it to. "But first and foremost, she needs to have her arm set by a doctor. I'm going to call Natalie and explain to her the situation. She'll keep everyone non-essential away from her. Do you want me to come with you?"
"No. I need to call Ralph and he's going to be pissed that I waited this long to tell him. I still don't know what explanation I'm going to give him. How often do toddlers break their arms at the park?" Tears leaked from her eyes as she stood with her daughter in her arms.
"Often enough. Kids are always falling down. Go. I'll call Natalie." They left while I went to my address book.
Nathan came into the room as Natalie answered. I turned towards him.
"Nat? It's Scarlet. Stacy is bringing Charlotte in with a broken arm. I need you to pay special attention that she stays away from other people."
"What? Why?" She sounded scared and I knew instintively that she was fearing the worst.
"It's not that. Charlotte is like me, but she's way too young to keep her powers to herself and if she's not careful she's going to hurt herself." I saw Nathan's eyes go wide, but he didn't reach for me.
"Okay." Natalie said slowly. "You're going to need to explain that one to me the next time you come to the hospital, but I'll do what I can to keep Charlotte safe. I just want to know. Did you know about this before?"
"Definitely not. I just did what I could to help her conceive. I did not know that this was even possible."
There was a noise in the background. "Ugh. I'm getting paged. I'll talk to you soon. Bye."
I hung up the phone and looked at Nathan.
"She's like you? What does that even mean?" he asked.
"Well, she took the broken arm from a bird in the park an hour ago. So I think that means that she's my heir, for lack of a better term."
"I thought that it passed from mother to daughter."
"It does. So I guess that technically Charlotte is my daughter."
"How?"
"I traded Stacy five of my eggs for five of her unhealthy ones."
Nathan let out a breath. "Wow." He sat in one of the wingback chairs and reached for me. I sat on his lap. "So you're a mom."
"No. I'm an egg donor. I hope to God that Ralph never doubts the paternity of Charlotte because I have a feeling that she'll come back with my DNA. If I've ever wondered where there's any scientific evidence of what I've done, I guess this is it. Crap." I wasn't ready to deal with a child who has my abilities; and certainly not a child whose father would possibly rather see her dead than possess them. He would have her exorsized immediately. I leaned my head against Nathan's drawing on his strength, though not literally.
"It'll be okay," he told me. And I almost agreed with him.
“Alright. Just sit here and relax. This won’t take but 10 minutes or so.” My patient tentatively leaned back against the chair and closed her eyes. I placed my hands on her shoulders, closed my own eyes, and let the magic flow through me, searching for the pain and exhaustion within her so that I could pull it into myself.
Mrs. Dozier, a tiny seventy year old, with her white hair neatly permed, was facing her second bout with breast cancer in five years and had come to me for help with her treatment. Some people call me a mystic, some call me a witch, and others call me a fraud, but whatever I’m called, I do make a living by taking the symptoms of diseases away from the ill.
“All done,” I told Mrs. Dozier. I straightened up slowly, hiding the pain that I now felt. I showed her out of the drawing room, into the foyer where her husband waited. He looked at me expectantly, wanting to know how the treatment had gone, but Mrs. Dozier showed him the results better than I ever could have. Instead of the woman who had barely been able to walk from the car into my home stood a woman looking twenty years younger. She nearly ran to her husband to wrap her arms around him.
“I’ve never felt so good!” she exclaimed as she kissed him. I smiled, then hid the cough I felt suddenly as I cleared my throat.
“I don’t mean to rush you, but I do have another appointment coming. That will be three hundred dollars.”
“Oh yes. Here’s your check,” Mr. Dozier said as he handed me the slip of paper. I gave him a receipt I had made out earlier and told Mrs. Dozier to schedule an appointment with me when she knew her next Chemotherapy session. Mr. Dozier took his wife by the arm and the two of them left.
I didn’t really have another appointment that afternoon, it was just my excuse to get my patients out of the house before I collapsed as a result of their symptoms now coursing through my body. I walked into my second drawing room, a room that is the complete opposite of the one I use for the treatment of patients. While that one is bright, with the windows uncovered, bringing the outdoors in, my second, private one is dark, with heavy curtains drawn over the windows. Instead of the pair of old fashioned wing backed chairs, I lay on the most expensive piece of furniture in my home, a bed with a fantastic mattress. While I sleep on just the basic mattress in my bedroom, when recovering from a healing, I lay on a sophisticated piece of engineering that feels like I’m lying on a cloud. It’s the only real change I’ve made in this house’s furnishings since I took over after my mother’s death.
I lay on the bed and tried to will away the nausea so that I could sleep off the rest of the symptoms.
I woke up a few hours later feeling again like myself. And I was hungry, always a good sign with illness. I got up and put a slice of the lasagna I’d made the day before into the microwave. I’d left the Dozier’s check on the table in the foyer, so I picked it and the rest of that week’s payments up and took them back to the kitchen with my ledger. I filled out the deposit slip and recorded that week’s income in the ledger while I ate the lasagna. After I finished, I checked the time. It was only 7:00. I looked at my appointment book. My next patient wasn’t until the following Tuesday. I had an entire weekend to myself, the first in a long time. That is the problem when the majority of your patients are cancer patients. Chemotherapy treatments tend to be regularly scheduled and in my case, the majority of my patients had their treatment at the same time. I’d spent the past three weeks with barely one day without the nausea and body aches and the cycle would start again in a week or so. I hoped that my next group of cancer patients would be more spread out. It might seem callous, but so long as cancer exists, my descendents and I will continue to be in business.
This business had spread purely by word of mouth since my “too many greats to remember” grandmother helped her neighbor during childbirth and I didn’t realize how wide it had spread until a woman with a French accent had rung my doorbell asking for relief from an ulcer. She’d heard about me from a pen pal and made a special stop during her vacation in the United States. I had a suspicion that the doctors at the local hospital were doing a lot to help my business, but I had never asked my patients how they had come to hear about me. Few people will admit to seeing a witch for treatment and most only around the closest friends. A lot of my patients use a fake name and pay with cash for fear that I will use their name to control them or some other such nonsense. Not to say that I can’t control someone using their name, but to think that I would bother is silly. I spend a good deal of my time feeling sick and in whatever free time I can find I enjoy reading and hiking and doing stuff that just can’t be done with a headache and/or nausea.
I went into my treatment drawing room and picked up Fahrenheit 451. It had been such a busy week that I hadn’t gotten much read of the book. I was just settling into my chair when the doorbell rang. I sighed as I set my book aside and went to the door.
Chapter 2
I opened it to find a tall police officer standing on my stoop.
“Ms. Scarlet Hawthorne?” he asked.
I cringed as I always did at my mother’s idea of a joke. She'd been so excited when she met my father, Steven Hawthorne, since that meant she could name me after her favorite book: The Scarlet Letter. “Yes, that’s me. How can I help you?”
“I’m Nathan Whitworth. I’m investigating a claim that you have charging for services under false pretenses. There has been a report that you say that you heal the sick and take money for this service, but you don’t heal the person and instead make them come back for more ‘treatments’. What do you have to say about this?”
I stared at him a bit dumbfounded. “Come in. There has been a serious misunderstanding, not that I’m surprised.”
I showed Officer Whitworth into the bright drawing room and gestured for him to sit. I took my place in the second wing backed chair.
“Okay. What is...wait,” I stood up, went to the desk in the corner and found the form that I needed. “This is the disclosure form that all patients must read, understand, and sign before I do any treatment,” I said as I handed it to him and sat down again. “I’ll tell you what I tell all my patients. I do not claim to heal anyone and that page in front of you says that explicitly. All I claim to do is to relieve people of the symptoms caused by underlying disease; I do not remove the disease itself. For example, if you look at the form, there is a blank where we write in the disease that the person is suffering from as diagnosed by their doctor and you’ll see that it says that this is merely for reference when researching the associated symptoms. In the next blank we write any treatment the patient is receiving from their doctor and any side effects associated with that. And in the third blank we write what symptoms and side effects the patient wishes to have removed. Then there’s the customary paragraph of various disclaimers that my lawyer said should be included in the litigation ruled world we live in. Now, if you’d tell me who made such a claim about me, I can find my copy of this form for that person and we can talk about what they said I was supposed to do and what I actually did. There’s another form that patients fill out after their treatment has been completed that lets me know of their satisfaction, though that one is not required.”
Officer Whitworth spent two minutes reading the form that I’d handed him. He looked at me, looked at the page, leaned back and seemed to think about what I’d told him. He scratched his chin as he leaned forward to look at me closer. “What you’ve told me seems to clear your name, so I guess I need to see the form of Ms. Jacqueline Cox so that I can look into this further.”
I groaned audibly and Officer Whitworth’s eyes widened at the sound. “Ms. Cox is not one of my patients. She’s a member of the Reverend Brown’s group of, for lack of a better word, cronies that has been trying to get my family thrown out of this town since before 1692.” I heard my voice rising so I took a deep breath. I hadn’t been able to vent my frustration on this subject for years and things were just getting worse. “Look, I’m sorry that you had to come all the way out here, but Ms. Cox has no experience with my abilities and so any claims she’s making about me are fake. I have a feeling that I could turn the tables and press charges on her for making such claims,” Officer Whitworth nodded, “but I’m not. I’d rather just forget about it.” I stood up. “If there’s nothing else, I’ll show you to the door.”
Officer Whitworth stood, too. “I’m sorry to have bothered you. I guess I should have called and asked if Ms. Cox was a client before coming out here and annoying you. I’ll go now.” We walked to the door. “It was nice to meet you, though,” he said a bit awkwardly.
“Yeah, it was nice to meet you, too, I guess. Maybe under different circumstances things would be better." I think I was being rude, but it was hard to be polite when all I wanted to do was punch a wall in frustration. "Well, Goodbye.” I shut the door as he walked away, and leaned against it, thinking.
I went into my bedroom and pulled the large, ancient leather bound book from inside my bedside table. I went across the hall into the upstairs office where I did most of my studying and crafting.
I pushed some scrap fabric and lacewings to the side of the table and set the book gently on it. The book is over four hundred years old and is essentially my bible. It is everything that my ancestors have compiled about our talent with hints and instructions for everything they could think of that a person in my position would need to know. There were also places where they vented their own frustrations with neighbors that felt that “our kind” didn’t belong in this town. My ancestor, Mary Pickworth, was here during the Witch Trials of 1692, and gave a very detailed account of the massacre. She was never charged, which, given our history, is astonishing in my opinion. I suspect that her relationship with the mother of Simon Bradstreet, one of the Massachusetts Bay Colony leaders, had something to do with it. Mary kept a list of the women and children she treated, I assume as insurance should she find herself charged with witchcraft, and Mrs. Bradstreet was listed as suffering from a very painful bowel ailment. I flipped the pages carefully, reading the thoughts of Elizabeth Hardy (who woke up one morning in 1789 to find a Bible on her doorstep; it’s now on the table in the foyer for whomever might wish to read it), Victoria Grady (who was anonymously invited to a group bible study at the church in 1868, but arrived to find an exorcism being prepared for her), Charlotte Andrews, my grandmother, (who in December 1941 found a letter in her post box blaming her for the attack on Pearl Harbor) and the rest of the women in my family who stood up against the hatred facing them.
I live just outside of what had been Salem Village and is now known as Danvers, Massachusetts in the house that has been occupied constantly by my family for as long as we’ve lived in America. It started as a small one story farmhouse with just two rooms and expanded over the years to have the two drawing rooms in the front separated by the foyer with a dining room attached to the back of the bright drawing room and the kitchen tucked behind the stairs. A small spare bedroom can be found behind the dark drawing room and upstairs are 4 more bedrooms. There are two bathrooms, one upstairs, one down. It’s not a huge house, but a lot of children have been raised here and a lot of memories have been made. There had once been 150 acres of farmland around the house, but they’d long since been sold off, leaving just one acre that has long since overgrown.
I took out the new leather bound journal that I was using to create a more concise “bible”. Fahrenheit 451 was forgotten for the night. I had a stack of papers where I’d transcribed all of the information on various illnesses that my ancestors had dealt with. I had already sorted through it and put it all into sections based on the disease causing the symptoms as well as a miscellaneous section to house the many lists of symptoms and treatments without any specific causes. I opened the journal to where I’d left off in the cancer section and consulted my notes on the illness. I was trying to remove all the duplicates and find all the secret jewels hidden amongst the general chatter about life. I wrote in the journal for a few hours before turning off the light and heading to bed.
Chapter 3
Saturday morning, I thought when I awoke the next morning. It’s not generally my best day, but since I didn’t have any patients I figured that the day wouldn’t be too awful. I just had to run a few errands which would take just a couple of hours or so; deposit the weeks earnings, shop for groceries, stop by the library to exchange the books I’d finished for new ones. I try to spend the least amount of time in town because of the stares I usually get from locals; I fill out all deposit slips at home, have a strict grocery list and use the internet hold system to order library books. I am the master of efficiency. I rolled out of bed and took a long shower to prepare me for the day.
I ran into no problems at the bank and was halfway through my grocery shopping when I bumped into Jacqueline Cox, literally. I guess I wasn’t paying attention and my cart hit hers as I came out of the dried bean aisle. I hate to say it, but the glare she gave me made my blood run cold. I’m really not cut out for being hated; I have really thin skin and don’t handle confrontation well.
“Watch where you’re going!”
“I’m sorry. It’s my fault. Please go ahead, you have the right of way,” I told her as calmly as I could. I bowed my head unintentionally, trying to avoid the way her eyes bore into me. I heard her sniff loudly and then saw her cart pull away. I decided to go in the opposite direction even though I’d already gotten everything I needed from those aisles. I wanted to give Ms. Cox as much head start as I could. The rest of the trip went smoothly, though I did take extra care at all intersections and made sure that she wasn’t already on any aisle that I was about to enter. I’m sure I looked odd, but it certainly wasn’t the activity that would get me into Ripley’s Believe It or Not.
My one respite was at the library where luckily, or not, the head librarian is one of my patients. Of course, in this town, such a connection isn’t advertised. Mrs. Johnson tended to treat me a bit coldly in public, though she’s a real dear when coming to me for treatment of her lumbago. She sends me a large, and quite tasty, fruitcake for Christmas every year. As usual, she handed me my books without saying a word or meeting my eyes, but I later found an envelope in one of the books with a two photos: one of her newest granddaughter and one of her wearing an obscenely large hat with an equally obscenely large hydrangea on top, some flower seeds from her garden, and a note thanking me for her last treatment.
I actually have quite a few patients in this town, but you’d be hard pressed to identify them by our interactions in public. I was fine with this, figuring, like my great, great…grandmother that such ties were allies in waiting. In private, these patients were some of the nicest ladies and gentlemen, no matter how they treated me in public. They were never outwardly mean, just a lot like Mrs. Johnson, choosing to appear afraid or otherwise actively avoiding me. But I still receive an astounding number of Christmas gifts delivered by my wonderful postman. I’m helping with his daughter’s cystic fibrosis.
I finished the errands and drove home. There was a truck already parked outside of my house. I said a quick prayer that it was friend not foe and pulled into the driveway myself.
“Hey. How’s it going?” Officer Whitworth was leaning against the truck. He was dressed in jeans and a blue v-neck t-shirt rather than the uniform he’d worn the night before. He walked over to help me with my groceries. “Got enough beans?” he asked grabbing the bag. I’d bought ten of the one pound bags of various types of the dried beans.
“Ugh. Don’t talk to me about beans.” Officer Whitworth raised his eyebrows. “I ran into Jacqueline Cox at the market this morning.”
“Oh. I see….on the bean aisle?” he asked with a chuckle in his voice and a twinkle in his eye.
“And that’s why you’re the police officer. I’m impressed,” I said with an appreciative nod. “But in any case, I like beans. They’re easy to cook, nutritious, I can add them to anything and make enough leftovers to feed me for a week.”
“You eat a lot of leftovers?” Officer Whitworth asked as I let him into my house.
“Well, yeah. I mean, it’s really hard to cook for one and in my line of work, I never know when I’m going to have time. So when I do cook I make a lot and freeze it. Don’t judge,” I said with a fake scowl.
“Hey, I’m not judging,” he said, putting the grocery bags on the counter and holding his hands up. “I eat a ton of fast food and frozen dinners. It’s impressive that you cook for yourself.”
“So, you’re single,” I surmised, deciding that it wouldn’t hurt to check him out. Easily over six foot tall, dark hair and blue eyes, looks that belong in July of the firefighter’s calendar. Not bad at all.
“Now who deserves a badge? Is there anything else in the car?”
“Just my library books.” I started putting away the groceries.
“I’ll go get them for you.” He started walking towards the door.
“Thanks, they’re in the front seat,” I called to him. I wondered why he was here as I put the milk and eggs into the fridge. I’d started to cut the ground beef into usable portions when Officer Whitworth walked in with my books. “You can put them on the table. Thanks again for getting them for me.”
“It’s not a problem. I’m the one intruding; it’s the least I could do.” He picked up a bag of beans, “Where do these go?”
“Oh, the cabinet behind you; not the top shelf though, please.” I’m insanely short and I hate having to drag out the step stool to get things while I’m cooking.
Nathan laughed. “But there’s nothing on the top shelves.”
“And that’s the way it should stay. Anything that belongs on the top shelf is something that I’m only going to use once a year and therefore does not belong in my kitchen.” I put all but one of the ground beef portions into the freezer and the last into the refrigerator along with the chicken thighs then emptied the rest of the bags before I put them on the table in the foyer. Nathan put the canned vegetables into the cabinet next to the beans while I put the fresh fruit and vegetables away. “There. All done. Now, are you hungry? I haven’t eaten lunch yet.” I decided that since it had been so long since I’d had a visitor who wasn’t looking for relief from illness, I was going to treat this as a social visit and let Officer Whitworth be the one to tell me why he was here. Plus, I did feel a little guilty about the way I'd rushed him out the night before.
“Sure, I could eat.”
“Is there anything you crave, or will re-heated lasagna suit you?”
“Lasagna is fine.”
I took two portions of the lasagna out of the refrigerator and popped them into the microwave. I grabbed two apples and two carrots out of the basket and started to peel and slice them on the cutting board.
“Do you want any help?” Nathan was watching me as he leaned casually against the counter.
“Umm…well, I guess you can make me a glass of milk. The glasses are in the cabinet behind your head. And you can pour yourself a glass of whatever you want to drink. There’s juice, water and besides the milk. Sorry, I don’t keep soda in the house.” I started arranging the apples and carrots on two small plates as the microwave beeped. I used a towel to protect my hands from the hot plates and took them to the dining room. Nathan was putting the drinks on the table then he beat me to the kitchen to retrieve the veggies and a pair of forks. I sat down then realized that this was the first time I’d shared a meal with someone other than a family member, well, ever. He sat as well and we stared at each other awkwardly.
“Umm…you can say grace if you wish…or whatever it is that you do before eating. I don’t normally, but it doesn’t bother me if others do,” I told him, mumbling shyly.
“Actually I was waiting to see if you said anything before digging in,” he laughed and took a bite of lasagna. “Wow, you made this? It’s great!”
“Yep, right down to the tomato sauce which I made from the vegetables in my garden. Believe it or not, I don’t get out much, so I have plenty of time to garden and cook stuff like jams and tomato sauce.” I took a bite of the lasagna, too. I couldn’t think of anything to talk about but the silence wasn’t uncomfortable.
Nathan leaned back in his chair after he finished eating, patting his stomach. “I’m going to have to start stopping by more often. I mean, I could definitely use the home cooked meals, and you obviously need someone to help you eat your food.”
“Really? You’ll only visit for the food. I feel so used and you’ve only stopped by once.” I laughed though, and reached for his plates to stack on mine before I took them to the kitchen.
“I’ll do the dishes,” Nathan stood up and grabbed the dishes for himself. He took them into the kitchen and placed them in the sink.
“I don’t have a dishwasher, so you’ll be scrubbing by hand.”
“That’s okay; I don’t have a dishwasher, either.” He pantomimed rolling up his sleeves and winked at me. “I’m an educated man: I can wash dishes and clothes, mop and vacuum floors, even iron and clean the toilet. On a good day, I even put the toilet seat down.”
I pretended to fan myself. “My hero,” I swooned. Then laughed. Talking to Nathan was incredibly easy. I wished talking the Reverend’s crew was so easy. He cleaned the dishes quickly and did even did a good job. When he finished, I decided to break my vow to not ask why he was here, since he didn’t seem keen to tell me on his own volition. I led him into the bright drawing room.
“So, the suspense has been killing me…why in the world are you here?” I asked as we settled into the wing-back chairs.
“Oh, I dunno, really. I just decided to come and visit.” Nathan wasn’t looking at me, though.
“Officer Whitworth…”
“Call me Nathan,” he interrupted. I didn’t mention that that’s what I’d been calling him in my head for a while now
“Nathan, that’s a really lame excuse,” I said smiling. “Why are you really here?”
He shrugged, but his eyes did finally meet mine. “I really don’t know. I left here yesterday and spent most of the night thinking about what you’d said. I know your history, of course, but I guess I’d never wanted to confront what I decided were just rumors. I got stuck with the case against you because I’m low man on the totem pole at the precinct and nobody else would touch it. I’m not sure if it’s because they thought that you would hex them, or because they’re your patients, or because they didn’t want to deal with Ms. Cox. It’s probably some combination of the three, but either way, I’m the one it was given to. It surprised me how thorough your contract is to make sure that no one has grounds to sue you and how I could find no evidence of someone ever suing you or your family for fraud. I came to the conclusion that you must be able to do something and, well, I want to be a detective eventually, so I couldn’t just leave such an idea alone. I hope you don’t mind, but I really just want to know what your secret is. Am I an awful person?”
I stared at him for a full minute. Then I burst into laughter. “You want to learn what exactly I am?” I asked when I could catch my breath. I wiped away a tear. "Sure, ask whatever you want. I wouldn't go around telling people, though; they'll think you're crazy."
"So, you're really a witch?" Nathan’s eyes widened. I had a feeling that he’d made that long speech all while hoping that I was not. “You could hex me if you wanted?” He definitely was starting to look worried.
I decided to test him. I looked deeply into his eyes, leaning forward. “Yes.” And I snapped my fingers. A pile of papers on the desk flew around the room as though caught by a tornado, then stopped in mid-air, floating. A second later they flew back to the desk and settled there as neatly as they’d been before their flight.
There was an audible gulp from Nathan. I looked at him and he looked as though he’d swallowed a guppy. “Are you alright?” I asked him. He did not look healthy and I thought that I’d caused an aneurism. “Crap.” I stood up and kneeled next to his chair. I ran my fingers through his hair, looking for a sign that he was still with me. I placed my hands on his temples, and with a deep inhale I took the stress away from his body. I shivered as the panic attack worked its way through me and felt it settle into the pit of my stomach. I tried to hide the fear that was now in my eyes when I asked again if he was alright.
“Yeah…” His voice was feeble and he still looked an awful shade of green. “What did you do to me?”
“I just took away the anxiety that I caused. I’m really sorry. I’ve never done anything like that before. I thought you could handle it.” The panic attack swirling in my stomach was not helping things and my voice was starting to rise. There were tears in my eyes again, but this time were caused by fright. “Excuse me.”
I nearly ran out of the room and into the downstairs bathroom. The panic within me was now clearly on my face and I saw it in the mirror. It was a good thing Nathan was still out of it or he might have had another fit. I washed my face trying to wash away what I’d done. What an awful prank. I groaned and wrapped a cool cloth around my neck, hoping that it would help me keep the attack at bay until it wore off.
I went back into the drawing room. Nathan was still sitting in the chair, but he looked noticeably calmer. I, on the other hand, was trembling. He looked at me with his eyebrows raised, “What’s wrong with you? I’m the one that should be terrified, but oddly I feel fine.”
“Yeah, that’s because I’m an idiot.” I sat on the edge of my seat and took the cloth from my neck and started to wring it in my hands. I took a deep breath and stared at the floor. “When I heal someone, I feel the effects. Always. When you looked like you were going to go insane from the fright, I took it away and now I’m dealing with all the feelings that were just running through your body—the increased heartbeat, the sweating, the nausea—all the standard components of a panic attack.” I took another deep breath and felt the effects easing. “Luckily, I have an increased metabolism for illnesses and what would normally take an hour to get over, I can get over in ten minutes.” I looked up at him. “See, it’s better already. I’m really sorry for that. It’s just been so easy to talk to you, I thought maybe you could bear such a prank.” I looked down, “I’ll understand if you don’t want to stop by anymore.” Shoot, I was that close to having a real friend and I screwed it up. How I wish I was normal!
Nathan sighed. “Well, I think that if I had your power, I’d have done the same thing. And I haven’t been completely honest with you. I’m not just some guy on the police force. My mom is Reverend Brown’s sister. You of all people should understand what that means.”
I stared at him, dumbfounded. “You must have had a horrible childhood.” I cringed “…Sorry, I didn’t mean to say that out loud.” I meant that. "Not that my childhood was better. If I'd had friends, maybe I'd know what is or is not an appropriate prank."
“No, it’s fine. Mom is kind of the female leader of the anti-Scarlet Hawthorne club. It’s another reason why I was handed Ms. Cox’s case; my mom wouldn’t let me let it get lost in the shuffle like the Chief was hoping would happen. I’ve always given you and your family the benefit of the doubt, figuring that mom had some kind of bad run in with your family years ago. Don’t take this the wrong way, but if she knew that the stuff you do is real, she’d probably have more fuel.” He must have seen my eyes widen and raised his hands. “I’m not a spy! I’m really here for my own personal reasons and if my mom knew I was here she’d probably make me bathe in salt water and vinegar. I don’t plan to tell her anything, nor do I plan to tell anyone else. I’m just a selfish person who doesn’t let questions go unanswered…even if I’m not physically capable of accepting the answers.” He actually let out a chuckle. “How are you feeling? Has…your…my panic attack left yet? …Weird.” He shook his head.
I did a general check of my system and found no out of place feelings. “I’m good. The attack is gone. And that’s the last time I use my magic for pranks.”
“Well, it was a good prank.” He smiled sweetly and I half returned the smile.
“God, you sure can make a girl feel awful.”
The phone rang. Nathan waved for me to go ahead and answer it and I smiled apologetically.
“Hello?”
“Scarlet? I need your help!” The voice on the other end was frantic. “It’s Stacy Collins. I’m at the hospital with Charlotte. She’s dying!” Stacy’s voice was high pitched and filled with tears.
“Stacy, calm down. Charlotte needs you to be calm. I’ll be there as soon as I can. I’m leaving now. Bye.” I hung up the phone.
“I have to go. A patient is in the hospital with her daughter…” My voice trailed off and I realized that Nathan’s panic attack might not have left completely or else I was having one of my own.
Chapter 4
Nathan seemed to read my mind. “I’ll give you a ride. Come on.”
I realized that it was great being friends (were we friends?) with a cop. Nathan has a light that he can put on the top of his personal vehicle and he used it, getting me to the hospital in half the time it normally takes me. He dropped me outside of the main entrance and told me that he would find me inside.
I ran through the doors and stopped briefly at the front desk. I’ve spent a lot of time at this hospital comforting many of my patients and the staff knows me well enough. I was quickly informed that Charlotte Collins was in the NICU and that I should probably hurry. I rushed to the stairs.
Before I was allowed in the NICU, I had to put on the sterile scrubs. I quickly put the scrubs on over top of my clothes and when I finally made it to the bedside of Charlotte, I wished I could have moved faster. There were tubes all around her and she was very pale and still.
“What’s wrong?” I asked the doctor who was listening to her heartbeat.
“It seems to be a bacterial infection. She came in two days ago lethargic with mild diarrhea and has just gone downhill from there. She’s losing fluids faster than we’re able to replace them. It doesn’t look good. And worst of all, there are four more infants with the same illness in similar states.” Dr. Natalie Stephans looked at me and I saw her eyes pleading for help.
I looked around the NICU and saw four more groups of parents, nurses and tiny babies around the room. A few of the parents were looking at me with mixed expressions. I rubbed my face and turned back to Charlotte.
“What are the symptoms exactly and what ideally do you think will save them?” I asked Dr. Stephans quietly.
“Diarrhea, vomiting, body aches, exhaustion and a rash”
“Wonderful,” I said sarcastically under my breath. “And the cure?”
“Getting rid of the bacteria, obviously, but the levels of antibiotics that is needed would kill these infants anyway. Their bodies just can’t handle that treatment in the state that they’re in.”
“So, theoretically I could take the symptoms away and then you’d be able to pump them full of the antibiotics? And that would save their lives?”
“I hope,” Dr. Stephans said quietly. She cleared her throat. “I’ve never seen this aggressive of an infection. I really have no idea what to do, but we can’t just leave these children to die without trying everything.”
I looked at Stacy. “Please,” she begged.
“Ugh. This is going to royally suck for me, but I’m not going to let 5 babies die just so I can avoid the plague.” I turned to Dr. Stephans. “I need you to get all the babies into a separate room away from their parents. They don’t need to see the puddle of disgustingness that I know I’m going to turn into. Tell the parents whatever you need to so that I don't get sued." I hate the fact that saving myself from lawsuit has to come before helping others. It's one reason why I stay away from emergency cases, beside the fact that my body can handle some symptoms better than others in polite company.
I took Stacy’s hand and pulled her to the side. “How are you holding up?” “Not well at all,” she sobbed.
“Where’s Ralph?”
“Dr. Stephans and I sent him to work this morning. You know how he feels about you and if he knew that you were involved he would have hired an armed guard to keep you away from Charlotte.” Ralph was one of Reverend Brown’s people and he didn’t know that I was the reason why Stacy had been able to conceive Charlotte in the first place. Stacy was infertile and had spent 5 years going through various failed fertility treatments before she came to me. We weren’t sure how Ralph would react if he ever found out, but neither of us was keen to find out for ourselves. The last time I ran into Ralph in public he’d publicly announced that I was a witch and would go to Hell as punishment for my dealings with the devil.
“As soon as I’m out of the picture, call him. He should be here, whatever the outcome is. I’d take away some of your anxiety right now, but I can’t. I need to be on top of my game if I want to save Charlotte, you know that.”
“Hell, I’d take away your stress if it would help you save her,” Stacy told me. I hugged her and we waited for Dr. Stephans to come back with permission to move the babies.
“Four out of the Five are willing to let you work. Luckily for the infants, the couple that doesn’t trust you has the baby that’s the least sick and is currently fairing well on the antibiotics he’s been given. The babies will be moved within the next five minutes and then you can go to work.” Dr. Stephans left us to supervise the movements.
“Stacy, Officer Nathan Whitworth brought me to the hospital. He’s here somewhere. Could you please find him and explain what’s happened? I wouldn’t ask you, but I think the task will be good for your nerves and I think that he’ll be able to comfort you while you wait.”
“You…with a guy? If this wasn’t such a serious moment I would demand the details.”
“I’ll spill later. It looks like the babies are ready.”
“Good luck!” Stacy let out another sob. But she was definitely more relaxed now than she had been when I first arrived. I hoped that she was right in putting so much faith in me.
I walked into the exam room that the babies had been moved into. The nurses were setting up the last of the equipment and then left the room, Dr. Stephans stayed with me.
“If I collapse before I’m done, prop me up. Throw water on me if I become unconscious. I don’t want to leave this room before I’ve done what I can for all of the children,” I told her firmly. She nodded. I closed my eyes and said a prayer that somehow we could pull this off. I’m quite serious when I pray. I don’t know if I’m praying to the same God as the Reverend Brown, but I believe that he’s listening to me and helping me use my gift. I rolled up my sleeves. “Okay. Let’s do this.”
The babies had been lined up from worst sick to least. Charlotte was first. I placed my hands on her stomach and took in a deep breath as I pulled the urge to vomit out of her, along with the diarrhea and everything else she was suffering from right down to the rash. Glamorous, my job is not. I doubled over from the pain almost instantly and saw stars. You wouldn’t think that an adult would feel the same amount of distress as an infant when you remove the symptoms, given the difference in our sizes, but I’m not a large woman and I was trading my health and immune system. Dr. Stephans grabbed me around the shoulders and held me up. She checked the monitors over Charlotte.
“She’s stabilizing. It’s working, I think.”
I groaned and nodded to the next baby. I repeated the process and the urge to vomit doubled. Dr. Stephans had luckily thought ahead and ordered a five gallon bucket into the room as well. The lasagna tasted awful the second time around. I stumbled to the third infant, nearly falling on the bassinette. I groaned again as my stomach did flips. My bowels were on fire and I hate to say that I was losing control over it. The third baby sent my bowels over the edge. “Crap…double, literal crap,” I cursed to Dr. Stephans through gritted teeth.
“We’ll clean you up once we’re done. We’ve got the best staff ready to put you back to rights. One more baby to go.”
I put my head between my knees and almost fell over from the smell. I moaned and Dr. Stephans gently pushed me to the last infant. My eyes were squeezed shut, I needed to scratch every inch of my torso, and I could barely stand. I placed one hand limply on the last baby pulling out the illness and shoving in the last of my immune system. As I removed my hand, my body ceased to work. I collapsed to the floor and fell into wonderful unconsciousness.
I woke up naked in a tub full of warm water curled up with my head resting on the edge. It was the best feeling in the world, except that I had obviously not been unconscious very long because moments later I felt my bowels let loose again. I let out a sound somewhere between a growl and a moan.
“What was that noise?!” I groaned for real and hid my face. That was Nathan’s voice.
“Go away. I want a real, and female, nurse,” I called weakly lifting my head. I noticed the IV tube stuck into my hand. I shivered; I hate needles.
Nathan’s head peeked around the doorframe. “Well, I sent them all away, so I’ll have to do,” he grinned.
“This is hazardous waste; you should stay away because I’m refusing to heal you if you get sick. Besides, I’m naked. Don’t you care about my sense of decency?” I really didn’t want him to see me in this state. I was a mess, covered in mess, and I was starting to really like this guy. I didn’t want to scare him off by looking like this.
He walked in and sat on the floor next to the tub. “I’m a cop and have been trained in both haz- mat and emergency medicine. You have nothing that I haven’t seen before,” he said quietly. He reached for a bathrobe lying on the toilet, “Come on, honey,” he nudged for me to stand.
I looked at his face. He gentlemanly turned his head and looked away to give me a bit of privacy. I grunted as I grabbed his arm to help me stand up and leaned heavily against him as he wrapped me in the robe. My head was spinning again, but Nathan manfully held me up as he took the IV bag from the wall and put it between his teeth. He picked me up and carried me to the bed.
“You must be well liked here; they gave you one of the maternity recovery rooms,” he told me after he laid me down and put the IV bag on the wall hook. “High thread count sheets, sofa with pull out bed, TV with more than 3 channels…I’ve been in hotel rooms that aren’t so nice.” He tucked me in and looked down at me, smiling.
I scowled at him. I felt miserable and embarrassed and he was looking at me like I had a broken leg caused by falling off a runway during a fashion show. I decided to change the subject. “How are the babies doing?”
“The four you helped are recovering beautifully. The fifth baby is also doing well, but at a much slower pace. His parents look like they’re regretting not asking for your help, but I don’t think anyone should rub that in their faces. And if you care at all, you’re doing remarkably well yourself. They’re pumping you full of anti-diarrhea and anti-nausea medicine to go with the saline.” I tried not to look at the needle sticking out of my hand. “But the most important thing you can do now is get some sleep.”
“What time is it, anyway?”
Nathan checked his watch. “Three o’clock. You were unconscious for about an hour.”
“Not bad,” I sighed as I sank down into the bed. “Yeah, sleep sounds nice.” I yawned and closed my eyes, pretending to go to sleep. I heard Nathan walk away and figured that he was leaving me for the afternoon. I fell asleep for real a short time later.
Much later that night I awoke to someone standing over me. “Who’s there?” I asked.
“It’s just me.” Dr. Stephans turned on a small light above my head. “I wanted to check on you before I left for the night.”
I heard a strange snort from across the room. I sat up and saw Nathan sleeping on the couch, his feet hanging off the end. “What’s he doing here?” I asked more or less to myself.
“He told the nurses that he wasn’t going to leave you. Nice guy you’ve found for yourself.” Dr. Stephans was smiling at me. “Good for you. I’ve always feared that you’d end up a lonely old cat lady.”
“I don’t like cats and I barely know the guy.” “Well, he volunteers with the rescue squad so he comes through here as often as you do. He’s a great guy and if you don’t grab him, there are a half dozen nurses who would gladly take him off your hands.”
“Yeah, but one day soon he’s going to realize that our first date, if anyone could call it that, was punctuated with me leaking out of every opening in my body and feeling like I’d opened up a few extra crevices to do the job.” There was another loud snore from the couch.
“Well, he snores. You can always use that as leverage.” Natalie stifled a laugh. “Well I should go and get some sleep myself.”
I shook my head, laughing too. “Before you leave, can you please get this thing out of my hand? You know how I feel about needles.”
“Sure, so long as you’re feeling better,” she said, reaching for a glove off the table next to the bed.
“Yup, I’m feeling great. A bit squishy from all the fluids I’ve had pumped into me.” I turned my head away as she pulled the needle out of me and ignored the small flip my stomach made as I thought about the IV. Dr. Stephans turned the light off and left the room after saying good night to me. I rolled over and went back to sleep.
I woke up to sunlight streaming through the open blinds. Nathan was sitting on the couch eating a bowl of cereal he’d scrounged from somewhere. “Good Morning!” he said way too jubilantly, standing up and walking over to me. “The nurse already came through. You’re lucky Dr. Stephans signed your chart about taking out the IV last night because the nurse was cursing up a storm about you removing it yourself. I’m not sure how you slept through it, though maybe the fact that that the nurse was muttering the whole tirade helped. You hungry?” He took a bite of cereal and milk dribbled down his chin. This guy was much too cute for his own good. “Dang,” he cursed as he wiped his chin on his sleeve.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Yeah, I’m starving. I think I had more food in my stomach when I was born.”
“Well, you’re in luck again because Dr. Stephans also wrote that you’re allowed solid foods in your chart. I’ll go see if I can find the food cart for you.” He put his cereal on the bedside table and left.
I couldn’t help myself and grabbed the bowl to take a just a bite. It was wonderful and I quickly ate it all, even drinking the milk. I adjusted the robe, which wasn't doing a very good job of keeping me covered. Thankfully the blanket had been up to my neck when I woke up. Nathan came back a few minutes later with a tray full of food that he set on the rolling bed table. He reached for his cereal bowl and saw that it was empty. I tried to hide the smile on my lips, not looking at the forelorn expression on his face, but was unable to do either. He shook his head and grabbed the Danish off the tray, mumbling about a man’s cereal not even being safe and sat on the edge of my bed. I snorted a laugh and dug into the eggs and sausage. There was too much food on the tray for me, even in my famished state, but Nathan was quick to help me eat it all.
I leaned back on the pillows, content. “Have you heard when I can leave this place?”
“Dr. Stephans wants to check on you when she gets in this morning and she’ll probably let you loose then. Oh,” he turned towards me, looking at me seriously. “I took the liberty of going to your house to get you some clean clothes last night. I wasn’t able to, though. I opened the door and felt a static electric shock. I took a couple more steps inside and got a feeling of dread, like if I didn’t leave right then, things weren’t going to end very well for me. So, I turned around and came back here. Could you please explain to me what that was?”
I coughed. “Umm…well, don’t freak out again, but that was magic. I don’t have a conventional burglar alarm. What you felt were the warnings that you aren’t allowed. If you’d stayed any longer you would have gotten a much heavier shock that probably would have knocked you to the floor for a while. Sorry about that. If you’d told me that you were going, that wouldn’t have happened unless you tried to touch something that you aren’t allowed to touch.”
“Hey, I’m fine. It’s my fault for entering your house. I’m actually a lot more accepting of your abilities now than I was 16 hours ago. I’ve seen just how much you give of yourself and it’s not scary or evil.” He held my hand, looking down. “You’re a saint who wears a pointy black hat to keep people away.” He rubbed the back of my hand with his thumb. “Actually,” he said, looking up, “I’m wondering if you can put that spell on my apartment so I never have to worry about intruders again. You don’t know how upsetting it is to wake up in the morning to find a squirrel eating peanuts on your head…so messy,” he said grinning. I smacked him with my free hand, my stomach doing flips again, but this time they were pleasant.
“Well, how is the patient doing this morning?” Dr. Stephans came through the door. I reflexively tried to pull my hand out of Nathans, but he sensed me about to do so and held on tight. I looked at him, saw his comforting smile, and relaxed, leaving my hand in his as though it was the most natural thing ever. Natalie noticed, smiled, and left it at that. “I brought you some clothes since yours were… well they had to be burned as soon as we got them off of you. Hurry up and get dressed, the parents want to visit you, then you’ll be free to leave.” Natalie put the bag of clothes on the chair and left.
“Alright, let me up,” I told Nathan, shoving off the blanket. He moved and stood ready to catch me should I prove myself incapable of standing, but I was fine. I made sure the robe was covering me and grabbed the clothes off the chair and took them into the bathroom. The room had been cleaned while I slept, thankfully. I used the soap and shampoo provided and took a much deserved hot shower. I grimaced when I pulled out the clothes Natalie had brought me. I usually wear t-shirts and jeans, nothing too fancy, but Natalie seemed to think that I should dress up, bringing me a light blue sundress with spaghetti straps. She’d thought of everything, though, including a raiser and shave cream in the bag. I thanked her silently, because I was a bit prickly at the moment. I hopped back into the shower to shave quickly and didn’t even nick myself. She must know me better than I thought because the strapless bra and panties were the right size and the dress fit me well. A pair of casual flip flops completed the outfit. I had a feeling that I might be wearing my birthday present for this year. I combed my hair, collected everything I’d used into the bag, shut off the light and took a deep breath before I opened the door.
Nathan was lying on the bed watching TV. He glanced at me when he heard the door open, but sat up quickly and stared at me when he realized what I was wearing. I was embarrassed, but appreciated his enthusiastic reaction to my looks. “Stop that,” but I laughed at his expression. He didn’t reply. His face was similar to how it had looked when I made the papers fly around the room. I waved my hand in front of his face and he barely registered the movement. “What in the world?” I put my hand on his forehead and searched for what was causing this reaction. When I found the cause, I pulled away from him quickly. “Odd,” I said to myself. He was aroused and for some reason, that was causing the catatonic state. I sat on the bed before I gritted my teeth, put my hand on his neck and pulled the arousal into myself. He shook his head groggily and I bit back the urge to kiss him. Women are just not built to hold the same level of stimulation as men. No wonder males never seem to be satisfied.
“What was that?” Nathan asked me. “One minute I’m looking at you, then next I feel like a total dunce.”
“Don’t ask,” I said, turning my back on him. I hoped that there wouldn’t be any visitors until I’d managed to reel in the fire that was currently running through me and planting itself in the pit of my stomach.
“Are you okay?” he asked, putting his hand on my shoulder.
I pushed his hand away, moving further away from him while still not looking at him. “Don’t touch.” I put my head between my knees breathing deeply trying to push out the effects I was feeling. We kept completely still for the next five minutes, I tried not to think about the color and depth of Nathan’s eyes that I felt staring at me trying to figure out why I was acting so strangely. After what felt like an eternity I felt Nathan’s need finally leave me. I sat up and straightened my back. I turned around and looked at him. “Guys are weird,” and left it at that. Nathan looked as though I’d hit him with a frying pan, he was so confused.
“Will you ever explain to me what just happened?”
“No. Probably never.”
With impeccable timing, Dr. Stephans knocked on the door and opened it. “Scarlet, I’d like to introduce you to Mr. and Mrs. James. You helped their daughter Natasha recover from the infection.” As though I didn’t remember. I did wonder which baby Natasha had been, though, but it would be awkward for me to ask that detail. I shook hands with the James’ and prepared myself for the excessive thanks that I would receive.
“I don’t know how we could ever thank you enough,” Mr. James was saying while Mrs. James rung my hand and let a small sob escape. They were a young couple, and Natasha was probably their first child. “Let us pay you for your service. What is your fee?”
“Oh, you really don’t have to pay me. I never charge for emergency calls,” which is the truth. “Your thanks is enough payment.”
“No, we insist. We don’t take charity from anyone. Is $2000 enough?”
“No, no, no!” I said waving my hands.
“You want more? That’s fine.”
“No! I don’t want payment. Really.” Why do so many people think that payment is the only way to say thank-you? I really just want a simple thank-you and maybe a nice word passed on about me to other people.
Mrs. James grabbed me and hugged my neck, crying. She seemed to be a very emotional person. She was blubbering something into my ear that I didn’t understand, but made for a much better expression of gratitude than her husband’s insistence that he throw money at me. I awkwardly patter her back. Mrs. James hung on me for a few minutes before her husband stepped in to pull her off of me.
“Well, thanks again,” said Mr. James. He took his wife tenderly beneath his arm and led her out of the room.
It seemed like a sudden goodbye until I turned around and saw the check lying on the table by the bed. He’d wanted to get out of there before I could give it back to him. I shook my head. The check was made out for $5000. A young couple they might be, but they were certainly not poor.
Nathan had an amused look on his face. Natalie had slipped out of the room at some point without my notice. “Quiet you,” I told him. I picked the check up and put it into the bag of toiletries.
“You don’t charge for emergency calls?” Nathan sounded genuinely interested.
“No, I don’t. I can’t guarantee that I’ll be of any help in an emergency, so I never charge. Most of the time I’m only able to relieve the pain and let them have a good last hour with their families, and unfortunately a lot of people know of the rumors about me and think I can cure the dying, which just isn’t true. I try to stay away from the emergency calls and don’t charge for them no matter what the outcome because then it would seem like I’m just here for the money.”
Natalie knocked again and brought in the Jacksons. This couple was much more appreciative in a way that I could handle. I was hugged by both of them and the mom handed me a box of chocolates and a bouquet of flowers. I thanked them both genuinely for the presents and we parted pleasantly. They promised to keep me updated on Thomas’ progress.
“Now, that’s my type of people,” I said, smiling.
Natalie brought in the last parent, a single mother named Anne Richely. She told me that she was too poor to pay me anything, which I assured her, was fine, and thanked me heartily for saving her son, John. Her thanks were short, sweet, and perfectly wonderful. Natalie showed Ms. Richely out then came back into my room. “Ralph is with Stacy and Charlotte right now. She told me that she’ll talk to you later. Well, let’s sign this paperwork so you can get out of here.”
Nathan grabbed my bag and Natalie walked with us to the door. We were walking past the nurses’ station outside the ICU hall when Dr. Vickers called to me.
“Scarlet,” he said, walking up to me. “We tried to call you last night. Sarah Mahoney was brought in yesterday and it looks serious. Her family was wondering if you could make her last moments easier. Do you mind?”
“No, I don’t mind at all. Nathan? It shouldn’t take too long.” I didn’t wait for his reply, but followed Dr. Vickers to Sarah’s room. I hated these calls and the less time I spent thinking about what I was doing, the easier the task went.
All of Sarah’s family was around her bed, right down to her youngest granddaughter Elizabeth. Sarah’s son Kenneth shook my hand as I walked to Sarah’s bed. “I’m glad you could come. She’s always spoken so highly of you and the comfort you’ve brought her. We’re sorry for bothering you at a time like this, but mother is insisting that you come.”
“It’s not a problem. I’d love to help.” The family cleared a space and I walked up to stand next to Sarah.
“Hello Sarah, how are you feeling?” I brushed the hair off her forehead while I began pulling the pain out of her. I also pumped some of my strength into her.
“I’m feeling much better with you here, sweetheart.” She was able to sit up a little bit and her eyes were clear. I moved my hand from her forehead to her hand. “You’re looking nice today, new dress?”
I smiled. “I borrowed it from a friend.” I turned my head away from Sarah and coughed. I found the morphine inside of her that she wouldn’t need with her pain gone and took it too, using it to hide the pain I now felt. “Well, Sarah, I’m going to let you spend some quality time with your family. I’ll see you later.”
I didn’t look at her family, but Elizabeth took my hand and whispered thank-you as I walked out of the room.
I leaned against the wall with my eyes closed. Nathan put his arm around my shoulders, “Come on, let’s get you home.”
The ride home was quiet, but the morphine I’d taken was working pretty well. They hadn’t given her a very heavy dose. I guess they were waiting until later to do that; to deaden the pain, but also leave her unable to talk to her family clearly. Nathan walked with me into the house. I stopped just inside of the doorway and debated lying down in the dark drawing room. Instead I ended up sitting on the stairs crying. Nathan knelt in front of me and pulled me into a big hug. I put my arms around his neck and buried my face in his shoulder. He didn’t try to comfort me with words, just rubbed my back. We stayed like that for nearly ten minutes, even after I ran out of tears.
I pulled back and ducked my face while I wiped away the tears. “Thanks,” I said, my voice hoarse. I checked my watch. 2:30. I stood up. The pain of the final stage of cancer was gone, but the pain of losing a dear friend was going to take a lot longer to disappear. I cleared my throat. “You can go if you want. I’m just going to putter around the garden for a few hours.”
“Do you want to be left alone? Because sometimes it’s nice to have company even if we don’t talk.” Nathan was looking at me with an expression of real concern.
“I’m fine. This isn’t the first time I’ve done that particular task and she lived a full life. I can’t prevent death, but I can make it less painful. I’ve had plenty of practice getting over loss. It doesn’t make it any easier, but I heal.” I smiled and gave him a playful shove. “Go. You have your own life. If you get hungry, dinner is at 6:30. I’ll make something besides Lasagna. How does fried chicken sound?”
He smiled slowly, giving a half nod. “Fried Chicken sounds great. I’ll see you later, then.” He let himself out of the house.
Chapter 5
I went out the back door into my garden. Most of my yard is overgrown with ancient trees and wild vines, but a plot of earth roughly twenty feet by twenty-five feet had been cleared for as long as my family has lived here. The kitchen garden was enclosed by a three foot high stone wall that was crumbling in some places. Some of my plants came from seeds descended from the vegetables my relatives had grown. This year my crop included tomatoes, corn, cucumbers, various types of lettuce, bell and pablano peppers, various beans, spinach, radishes, carrots, potatoes and watermelons, which were currently trying to take over the entire plot.
I started with the watermelon plant, coaxing the newest growth back into the row it belongs. The fruit themselves were nice and plump. I trimmed some of the leaves to let the plant put more energy into the three melons. I moved to the next row, putting the vegetables that were ripe into one basket and pulling out the weeds with more vigor than was probably necessary and putting the scraps into another basket for the compost pile. I completely lost track of time and wasn’t aware of how late it had gotten until Nathan tapped my shoulder. I jumped.
“You’ve been gardening for four hours?” He asked while I rubbed my chest, trying to get my heart rate down.
“Has it been that long? Wow.” I looked up and realized how low the sun had gotten. “I guess it’s unnecessary to say that I’ve forgotten to cook dinner.” I stood up, wiping my hands on my dress. I looked down and cursed myself silently. I’d forgotten to change into jeans and my legs were covered in dirt, too. Nathan laughed, seeing my mistake. I rolled my eyes at my forgetfulness. “Come on, I need to change.”
I left the basket for the compost on the wall and carried the vegetables into the kitchen. I turned around and saw Nathan waiting on the top step, just outside of the door. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m waiting for expressed permission to enter your home. I don’t want to get shocked again.” He had a goofy expression on his face, including lopsided smile.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Did you need expressed permission when you brought me home this morning?” I rolled my eyes at him and left him on the step, going upstairs to wash my legs off and change into jeans. Instead of putting on a typical t-shirt, I found one that was more low cut. I hoped that it wouldn’t knock Nathan unconscious again, but I’d been showing off my assets all day, why not a little longer.
I went back downstairs. Nathan had gotten the hint and was sitting at the table in the kitchen. “It’s much more subtle than a literal ‘welcome into my home’,” I told him, including the air quotes. “It kinda reads your intentions and whether our relationship warrants unannounced intrusion into my house. Intending to take something out, even to bring to me, gets a worse response than the little old lady who came in to leave me flowers.” I washed my hands in the sink and took the chicken and an egg out of the fridge. I looked off into the distance, “I seem to get a lot of flowers…”
I took the bread crumbs out of the cabinet along with the salt and pepper as well as the oil to fry the chicken in. I poured the oil in a pan so it could heat up while I prepared the chicken. “If you could wash and cut up the potatoes, that would be great.” He went to work while I started coating the chicken. I pulled the skin off of the thigh I was making for myself, but before I automatically did the same with the rest of the chicken I realized that I was cooking for a man. They tend to eat more than I do. “Umm…you like thighs, right?”
“Yeah, yours are fine,” he said. He turned to look at me, smiling lewdly and unmistakably checked me out.
I stared at him, mouth open, completely flabbergasted. “How do I even respond to that?” I asked him.
He flicked water on me, laughing. “Cool off. I’ll take 3 please, those pieces are tiny. And you can leave the skin on, unless we’ve reached that point, after knowing each other for a whole 48 hours, where you care about my cholesterol levels.” He winked.
I looked down. I had chicken skin in my hand and it took an enormous amount of self control to keep me from throwing it at him. Instead, I took a step closer to him, judged the distance and kicked his butt. Unfortunately, my leg was too short and I ended up hitting his thigh. How ironic.
I went back to the chicken while Nathan cut the potatoes up and put them in water to boil. We finished cooking supper with some steamed peas and carrots from my garden.
“Wow, woman, you can cook!” Nathan had the stupid grin on his face once more.
I pursed my lips together. “And you can eat.” He’d not only polished off the three thighs, but a double serving of mashed potatoes and a heaped spoonful of peas and carrots.
“Hey, I’m a growing boy.” He stretched his legs under the table, kicking me. “Whoops, sorry about that. I didn’t mean to kick the cook. Kiss the cook, maybe, but never kick the cook.”
I looked at him, thinking, my eyes narrowing. I shook my head. I still couldn’t figure out what had caused his sudden onset catatonic state earlier. He didn’t seem to have any trouble flirting with me now.
“What? Why are you looking at me like that?” Nathan sat up, curious.
“I’m reading your mind and not liking what I’m seeing….pervert.”
“You…you can read minds? I should go then…” Nathan jumped up, knocking over the chair. He fumbled to pick it up and I burst into laughter, slapping the table in amusement.
“Well, actually I can’t, but I can see from your reaction that I was right,” I said, catching my breath. I stood up. “Let’s leave these dishes and watch a movie or something.” I took his hand and dragged him to the bedroom on the first floor that I had set up as a casual living room complete with television and my computer.
Nathan looked through my movie collection. “Oh, I have some different ones that I picked up from the library.” I went into the dining room where Nathan had put my books and grabbed the DVDs off the top of the pile. I walked back into the den reading the titles as I went, “Though I’m not sure how much you’re interested in There’s Something about Mary, Lucky Number Slevin, or Monty Python and the Holy Grail.”
“Monty Python!” I swear Nathan’s ears literally perked up.
I laughed, turned on the television and put in the DVD. Nathan turned off the light and settled onto the couch. I grabbed the remote and sat next to him. “I must warn you. I’m obsessed with changing the volume.”
“That’s fine. I channel surf during commercials,” he told me, putting his arm around me.
I laughed, “I do that, too.”
“We’re totally soul mates,” he said casually. I nodded, resting my head on his shoulder as the video started.
---
“I love that movie,” Nathan said as the credits began to roll. “ ‘...and that, my liege, is how we know the Earth to be banana shaped.’ ” He extricated himself from me and turned the movie off. “I should go. I have work in the morning.”
I stood up, stretching. “Okay, I’ll see you later.” We walked into the foyer and stopped short of the door. We stood there a bit awkwardly. Nathan moved first, kissing my cheek.
“Bye,” and he left hastily.
---
I touched my cheek, smiling, and looked at myself in the mirror above the table. Short brown hair framing my round face, the beginnings of a blush forming on my cheeks. I turned away. I don’t like looking in mirrors. They show a girl barely five foot in height, with glasses, who on various occasions finds herself covered in crap; not a gorgeous blond supermodel that belongs with a guy as good looking as Officer Nathan Whitworth. Why is that guy single? I wondered.
I went into the dining room and collected the dishes, taking them to the kitchen to wash. I put away the leftovers and cleaned up the kitchen. I saw the blinking light on my answering machine.
“Scarlet, it’s Meg Fairfield. I was wondering if you could make that thing we talked about. Jack says he’s ready.” There was a giggle. “Well, thanks, bye.”
I smiled. Meg had come to me a few weeks ago asking if there was some way she could put the spice back her marriage. I only have recipes for a couple of potions, but one of them happens to be a kind of love potion. Or maybe a lust potion would be more accurate. It only works on two people who already have an intimate relationship, such as a married couple, but which has faded away due to years of malnourishment. It won’t make two strangers want to fall into bed together, but it will give two lovers a night that in most cases saves them from divorce. I only make it for couples when both of them come to me interested and we have a bit of a marriage counseling session. I think that the counseling session often does more for the marriage than the potion does, but I don’t tell people that. I’d already discussed things with both Meg and Jack, but he’d seemed unenthusiastic, even after agreeing to the counseling. Meg told me that she would get him to agree to use the potion, and it looked like she’d finally succeeded. Normally I would have made them both come back for another session, but Meg and I both had a suspicion that Jack was having a performance problem and that was the issue holding their marriage back. This potion would solve that and might be the push Jack needed to go to the doctor and get a more permanent solution. I only allow couples to this potion once from me. It’s highly addictive, as you might expect.
It was after ten, so I made a note on my calendar to call Meg in the morning to set up a time for her to pick up the potion. It must be used within 5 hours of completion.
It had been a long day so I decided to call it a night. I found Fahrenheit 451, and read a few pages before falling asleep.
---
I woke up at 8:30. I ate breakfast in my pajamas then made the call to Meg.
“Well, Jack doesn’t get home from work until nearly six, and I know he’ll want to eat dinner before we use the potion, so I guess we’ll come over around nine to pick it up, if that’s okay?”
“I want you to know that it works for a few hours and you have to use it within five hours of me making it. To be honest, you will probably be up all night.”
“We just won’t tell Jack that. He can take the day off tomorrow and if that potion works like you told me it might, he’ll want to. We won’t have to worry about feeling tired halfway through?”
“No, no, you won’t have to worry about that.” Meg and Jack are easily 62 and 65 years old respectively. I had a feeling that they usually went to bed at nine o’clock. “I’ll make sure that your potion is ready when you come to get it.”
“Thanks, hon. I’ve got some shopping to do. I think Jack will like to see me in some new lingerie—it can’t hurt.”
I tried to block the mental image and failed horribly. “You’re right, it can’t hurt,” I told her, keeping my voice light.
“See you later, dear.” And she hung up the phone.
I shivered trying to get the image out of my head. I turned my thoughts to planning out the potion. I went to my office upstairs. I opened up my bible to the page I’d marked holding the love potion recipe. I turned to the cabinet full of the materials I use for potion making, looking for the necessary ingredients. I had the cinnamon, rose petals, butterfly wings, and vanilla scented candles on hand, but I needed the red wine for the base and a bar of very dark chocolate. I had to make a special trip to the grocery store.
I sighed and went to my room to get dressed. I found the dress Natalie had lent me lying on the floor and took it downstairs to put into the wash. I started a load of clothes in the washer and decided that I couldn’t stall any longer and got in my car to go to the store.
It ended up being a short, easy trip, though these were never guaranteed. I decided to work on the introduction of the bible since I couldn’t make the potion until much later that day and takes about three hours to make it.
This book is dedicated to the generations of women before me who spent their lives helping friends and neighbors live a full life after being diagnosed with traumatic illnesses. If you are reading this book then I assume that you have been inducted into this beautiful calling by virtue of your birth. I also hope that you have been blessed with a mother able to teach you everything within this book before you are left on your own to continue the tradition.
If you are reading this, but do not have the gift then I’m asking you to please find the girl who can save the sick from the pain of their disease and give this book to her. She needs to know all that she is capable of, which is more than she ever thought possible.
To the girl with the gift, I welcome you. My name is Scarlet Hawthorne and I’m either your direct grandmother of unknown number of greats, a relative, or some random woman you are now related to due to the haphazard way this gift is passed when no daughter is born to the current holder. This gift has been passed on from mother to daughter for longer than anyone can imagine. The companion to this book is the work of all of my, and hopefully your, ancestors, where they compiled all that they learned while exploring the gift. This book is supposed to be the quick reference. That book is the entire story and will walk you through the life of the women that have faced just about everything you will, but with little of the information we have now. I hope that you can read it for yourself.
This book will give you a guidebook into how to treat the people you will come to call your patients, but you won’t always be able to refer to it before helping someone. For this reason, it is of upmost importance that you study these books and know what you can and cannot do. It took me a long time to learn a few simple short cuts. I want you to know them first, but if you try to leave your knowledge to just them and not the tried and true practices of the past, then you will find yourself using more energy and time than is necessary.
What you need to remember is that literally, the imagination is limitless. Your magic is only limited by the law of conservation of mass, ironically enough. When it comes to healing, you must take into yourself whatever you remove from your patient. So if you choose to remove a tumor, you will have that tumor enter your body at the same place as your patients was. This is why we cannot cure diseases. We can only take away symptoms that our bodies are able to metabolize. We have the ability to recover from illnesses quicker than the average person, but this will not allow us to survive in cases that aren’t survivable. We have to fight the disease just as our patients do. We cannot pass on the illness to an inanimate body because you would be re-filling yourself with the inanimate material, which is not survivable. Just remember, you are able to do anything within your imagination, but whenever you take from someone else, you put yourself into that person and your health is replaced by their sickness.
Once you understand that, then you can learn to be creative. You will be able to help others by taking on their pain in ways that don’t hurt you in the same way that it hurts them. I have almost never taken on a case as a simple one for one. I transfer the pain to a place that is easy for me to deal with. There is, of course, a need to maintain the severity of the symptoms. To do this, you can choose to break a bone to make the pain less or give yourself an equivalent rash. Or any other way you wish.
But don’t think that this blurb is enough to teach you everything you need to know. If you think that it’s important to know that when treating a patient for the side-effects of chemotherapy that you can give them complete relief by just taking away the pain and fatigue, and filling the void you created with your immune system, then you need to read the rest of this book. Tips like that are what fill it and are what keep you from passing out from the simplest healing. The novice will expend most of their energy treating one symptom at a time and replacing each individually with their health. The expert will learn which symptoms are the most important for healing and combine them for the most efficient care.
Besides this, you’ll need a high tolerance for pain, nausea, and fatigue, which are the most common ailments you’ll be taking on. Hopefully your mother will let you build one by letting you help with treatments. If no mother is available, then start small. Your patients will want you to last a long time, not burn yourself out early on. But, it’s important to not let your patients be too aware of the pain you feel. Because if they know, then the majority will not let you help and those who don’t care about your pain, who just want to be healed, are not patients you want to take on.
I read over what I’d written. It was good, but needed revision. I was hungry and my watch said that it was now 2pm. I went downstairs and made myself a sandwich and moved the clothes from the washer into the dryer. I went into the den and put My Fair Lady into the DVD player. It’s one of my favorites.
When the movie was over, I decided to start the potion for Meg and Jack. I went upstairs to get the ingredients and my book. I might store everything upstairs, but I make the potions at the dining room table on a hot plate because of the extra space it gives me.
The love potion must be created in a very hot location. I turned the heat up to 90 on the first floor of the house, closing all of the doors to concentrate the heat. I changed into shorts and a tank top that I only wear when I do this and pulled my hair up as high as I could to get it off the back of my neck. Ideally I needed the house to be between 95 and 100 degrees, but anything over 85 will do the trick. I started by organizing the ingredients in the order that I would need them: wine, butterfly wings, and rose petals which would stew for about an hour. Then I would add the chocolate and an hour later, melted wax from the lit candle. During the last 10 minutes, the cinnamon is added. It’s a pretty straightforward recipe, but the important aspect is what I have to do while the potion bubbles away. The unofficial ingredient is a steamy romance novel I need to read during the hours of stewing and the love I have for another, which I’m supposed to think about after I add the cinnamon and as I bottle the concoction.
I checked the thermostat and it had reached 85. It was only 5:30 and I didn’t have to start it until six, so I decided to give the heater another fifteen minutes to work. I opened up the romance I’d gotten specifically for this potion. I try to have the book have themes similar to the circumstances of the couple needing the potion. I’d decided that I couldn’t handle reading a book about an older couple having sexual interactions, but I had found a story about an older couple with an incredible love that couldn’t be destroyed by disease. Why yes, I was reading The Notebook. I thought that it was fitting that the physical romance was set in the past since the Fairfields needed to remember the romance they’d had. I hoped that it didn’t matter that I’d seen the movie, because the important part of reading the novel is that the feelings are new and raw. The stronger the feelings, the better it gets into the potion, and the stronger the potion is. Unlike doctor prescribed medications, the beauty of magic potions is that they pose no harm physically to the user so long as they are properly given; not that older men shouldn’t be given stimulating potions, but the use by those whom the potion isn't intended for; like a pair of strangers being given this potion. The strangers aren’t supposed to use it and would feel ill as a result. But an older man using this potion properly doesn’t even have to worry about his heartbeat being outside of the normal range. My potions have a special property that protects the user from the ill effects caused by the activity. No heart attacks during sex will happen on my watch. I checked the clock. 5:52. Time to begin. I set a thick bottomed pot on the hot plate and poured the bottle of wine into it, turning the temperature knob to medium. I gently set five rose petals and three butterfly wings floating on top of the wine. I set the timer for one hour and opened The Notebook keeping half an eye on the mixture to make sure that it didn’t boil; it had to stay at a strict simmer. When the hour was up, I shaved exactly two ounces of dark chocolate into the pot and turned the temperature up to high letting it reach a rolling boil. I set the timer for twenty minutes and when that was up I turned the temperature down to low and stirred the mixture ten times counter clockwise. I then set the timer for forty-five minutes. That time up, I lit the candle and set the timer for 10 more minutes. When the bell rang, I poured three drops of the hot wax into the pot and set the timer for another 35 minutes.
It was getting to be unbearably hot, so I took a minute to check the thermostat. It’d hit 95. I stood in front of the window pretending I was standing in the cool night outside while I read the chapter where Noah and Allie have sex for the first time. I didn’t hear Nathan knock on the door or notice him walk into the house. I did hear his exclamation about the heat. I turned around.
“Close the door please. I need to keep the heat in.” I’d never talked during a potion building session before. It was a lot harder to do than I would have thought.
“Are you crazy, or just incredibly weird?” Nathan asked, closing the door.
“I’m creating a potion for a client. This one required excessive heat.” I checked the timer and checklist. “Just 41 minutes to go. Feel free to leave and come back at 9.”
“Nah, I’ll stick around. I’ll add this to my research. But I am going to need to take off some clothes before I die of heatstroke.” I waved my hand to say he was free to do so as he kicked off his shoes, loosened his tie, and unbutton his shirt. He was still wearing his uniform. Within two minutes he was barefoot with his pant legs rolled to his knees, in his un-tucked undershirt. I went back to the book while Nathan lay down on the rug. The story was getting steamy and I could feel the potion getting stronger.
The timer rang and I got up to add the sprinkle of cinnamon. Normally I think of my mother when I make this potion, since I had no experience of a romantic kind and in this case, love is love and a sexual nature is unneeded. I’d just set the timer for the final 10 minutes when Nathan came up behind me, wrapped his arms around me and kissed my neck. He was hard.
“You are so hot right now,” he moaned between the kisses, licks and love-bites he was planting on my neck and shoulder. It felt amazing, but part of my brain knew it was wrong. I turned around and tried to push Nathan’s mouth away from me, but he just transferred his affections to my fingers and palm…which, by the way, have a lot of nerves in them.
“What…in the world…are you doing?” I panted. I could feel Nathan through my sweat-soaked clothes. God this man was made of muscle. I wrapped my free arm around his neck, pressing myself closer.
“I have… no idea, but it feels wonderful.” Nathan’s eyes were half closed as he nuzzled my neck and moved his mouth to kiss mine. From the place far, far away that my brain currently was, I knew kissing him would not end well.
“No…don’t kiss me…yet.” I pulled my head away and he kissed my jaw and my throat. His hands were on my butt working their way into my back pockets. There was no distance between us, but it wasn’t stopping either of us from trying to get closer, breathing deep. He seemed to realize that clothes were keeping us apart and moved his hands from my pockets to my waist, pulling at my tank top. I let him take it off me and he sat down in a chair as his mouth moved from my throat to my breasts, sucking my nipples through my bra. I dimly thought that it was a good thing he didn’t try to sit on my potion.
“My potion!” Somehow the words I said aloud were nowhere near the scream I’d heard in my head. I dragged my brain away from Neverland and pushed Nathan’s head away from my chest. There was still a minute left on the timer. I tried to catch my breath while fending off Nathan’s advances. His mouth and hands seemed to have a mind of their own and he pulled me onto his lap, rubbing my inner thighs while his mouth kissed whatever bit of skin he could find. I focused on the timer, trying to keep my sanity while the seconds ticked by. The timer beeped and I pried myself out of his grip. “Stay!” I told Nathan. I shut off the timer and reached for the bottle that I would give to Meg. My bottom got within his reach, though, and I felt a pinch. I ignored it, poured the potion carefully and stoppered it.
With the potion done, I turned the hot plate off and ran to the doors to throw them open. I shut off the heater and opened all the windows. I also found my shirt and put it back on. Nathan was still in the chair, watching my every move and, was he drooling?
“Are you okay? It looks like the fumes from my potion got the best of us.”
“Yeahhhh…”Nathan drawled. He was definitely moving slower and I realized that my head was clear, all traces of the potion leaving as the room dropped below 85. I looked at his crotch and he was still aroused. There was definitely a connection between Nathan getting sexually excited and him acting like a slow motion movie. I put my hand on his neck and pulled out the desire. He woke up while I decided that I really wanted to continue where we’d left off. I figured that the potion I’d made was probably the strongest I’d ever made. Meg and Jack would probably be up until noon tomorrow.
“Whoa, that’s some powerful stuff. Did you just make a love potion?” Nathan was looking at me curiously. I was more interested in the way his t-shirt pulled snuggly across his chest and that his nipples were pronounced. His lips were moist and a little shiny. And his eyes were a lighter shade of brown than I remembered. I leaned forward and kissed him full on the mouth. It’s a good thing that I’d filled him full of all my innocence or we might have been back to square one. Instead he kissed me back timidly, a bit shocked, eyes wide, and then pushed me off when I tried to stick my tongue in his mouth. “What are you doing?” he asked, very surprised.
I realized what I’d done and ran to the bathroom. I was washing my face and trying to calm my hormones down when there was a knock at the front door. I heard Meg’s voice asking where I was. I opened the door and when I didn’t attack Nathan, I decided that I was safe to come out. Thankfully he’d pulled his pant legs down, though he was still barefoot.
“Hey Meg, Jack. Let me get your item.” I went into the dining room and got the bottle. I handed it over slowly, wondering whether I should warn them. I didn’t think that a love potion should ever be made under the circumstances that that one was. “That’ll be $100 and you'll need to each drink half of the bottle.” I felt like I should be paying them because I doubted I’d get another chance like that with Nathan again, especially with his intimacy problem. Meg gave me the money and she winked at me, looking pointedly at Nathan. I grimaced, but smiled and Meg and Jack left.
“They’re the ones that are going to use that? Dang. You aren’t worried about either of them not being healthy enough for sexual activity?” Nathan looked at the closed door, impressed.
“Not a problem with my products.” It was a weird jumping off point, but it was something Nathan needed to address if he ever wanted to have a meaningful relationship with a woman. I might as well be the one to talk about it with him. “The real question is whether you are healthy enough for sexual activity.” I paused. “Have you always had that problem around women?”
Nathan looked confused. “What problem? Is it the one that you told me you would never explain?”
“You’ve never noticed that whenever you get…excited…about a woman, you turn into Tweedle Dum, but with more Dum than Tweedle? You become completely catatonic.” I narrowed my eyes. “How could you not notice losing up to thirty minutes of your life when you get caught off guard by a beautiful woman?”
“Because I don’t spend much time around beautiful women. If you’re asking me to recall all the times when I’ve felt like I did earlier tonight and yesterday morning, that’s it. It’s never happened before.” He looked into my eyes. “Are you saying that that happened because I got a hard-on? Am I sick or something?” He was starting to look worried.
“I don’t think that you’re sick, but I can do a check of your health if you want. I didn’t feel anything especially weird, except for the particular cause of your condition, when I removed it.” I looked down.
Nathan burst into laughter. “THAT explains why you acted so weird! Wow, a tiny girl like you pumped full of male hormones; no wonder you attacked me earlier. Why did I push you off?” He wondered aloud.
“You pushed me off because in exchange for all your hormones, I had to pump you full of my girlish innocence. I bet you went back to pre-puberty. And if I hadn’t, you would have relapsed, making the first removal pointless.” I stared at him sardonically.
“Well, do me a favor and check me out. I don’t want to have a stroke when too much blood leaves my head.” He went into the dark drawing room, the door to which I'd left open, turning the light on and laying on the bed.
“Sure, go right ahead and lay on my bed,” I said sarcastically, though I didn’t really mind. I knelt on the edge of the bed next to his head and closed my eyes, opening myself up to let the magic flow freely. I put my hands lightly on his forehead searching for abnormal blood vessels or anything else that might cause the catatonic state. There was nothing. I let my hands move down his body slowly, scanning. I heard a giggle when my hands passed lightly over his crotch. I paused just long enough to say, “Real mature,” and I continued the scan. Nothing stood out.
I sat back, my face twisted in thought. I rubbed my chin.
“How’s your relationship with your mother?” I asked a bit suddenly, looking at him.
“What?” Nathan looked at me, putting his hands behind his head. “Typical mother-son, I guess. Probably more close than some families for some things, farther apart for others, as you know, but otherwise average. Why do you ask?”
“There’s this theory,” I started, “that’s bounced around my family for a few generations about where our talents came from. The leading idea is that at some point there was a severe split
between two very passionate families. On one side, mine, the women developed the ability to actually heal the sick with, well, magic. On the other, the women developed a hatred of magic so severe that it repels the goodness that my family expels. I told you that Reverend Brown’s crew has been trying to push out my family since before the Witch Trials. The theory is that the family whose descendants became the Browns is that second family. They developed a magic as powerful as mine that assists them in repelling magic and use Christianity to make it legitimate. Does that even make sense?” I asked, looking for understanding in Nathan’s eyes.
“Yeah, it does, a bit. I mean, we know that everyone in this town is afraid to admit that they think you’re an asset to the community because of the power that Rev. Brown holds over them. It makes sense that magic is helping them.” He sat up. “But what does that have to do with me?”
“Well, if your mom is a descendent then she probably has some magic. I don’t know how it’s passed down in your family, so it might be spread further than in mine, less concentrated. She probably has it and doesn’t even know it, but was able to use it to influence you. If she’s more attached to you than you think, then it’s very possible that she’s caused this problem to keep you away from girls. Are you an only child?”
“Yeah…you think my mom caused my problem so that I couldn’t find a girl and move away? But I live in my own apartment and mom has no problem with it. She doesn’t demand that I visit daily and we rarely talk on the phone.”
“Just because she has been able to hide it from you doesn’t mean that it wasn’t swirling around her stomach. All parents want to keep their children safe from everything, but that doesn’t stop them from letting them ride their bikes around the neighborhood, play tackle football, and dare to be different in a school full of bullies. I know my mom felt guilty for making me go to the public school, but it wouldn’t have been good for me to try to grow up out here away from everyone, and she knew that. It would have made going to the supermarket every week even more awkward than it already is. I’m just saying that without knowing how her magic works, it wouldn’t surprise me that some underlying fear your mom has is the cause for your problem.”
“And what am I supposed to do about it? I can’t go around for the rest of my life freezing whenever a pretty girl turns me on. I’m only 27 for Christ’s sake!” He stood up and stuck his hands in his pockets.
I sat on the edge of the bed, crossing my ankles. “If you’ve never experienced the problem around other women, then logically it’s only trying to keep you away from people like me.”
“Why you? I mean, my mom doesn’t have a clue that I’m…interested in you.” He looked away from me.
I blushed. “Well, maybe she recognizes that you have a certain attraction to ‘unholy’ things and it’s a general spell she’s cast over you. But I doubt telling your mom to let you go will work since she doesn't even know that she's done it. She’ll definitely put you in that bath of salt water and vinegar.” My smile was sad. “Hang on.” I ran upstairs and grabbed my bible. Nathan would be the first person outside of my family to see it. “If there are answers anywhere, it would be in here,” I said showing him the large book as I walked back into the room.
I opened the book to a page near the back. It was from the era of my great-grandmother Elizabeth. She’s the one who first postulated about the Browns having magic. She’d been a pretty awesome woman—she’d run away from here at 18 to New York City to work in a speakeasy and was a total Flapper. But like us all she was drawn back by the magic and the need to help. She’s the only one of us to ever live outside of this town.
“Alright, Elizabeth is the one who started the idea of the Browns,” I told Nathan. “She wrote that there was a connection between the hatred the family felt and the power that they held. And she wondered if it might be possible to change them by showing them a certain amount of kindness. She tried to take young Stephanie Shield under her wing, but it ended very badly. Stephanie’s father accused Elizabeth of enchanting Stephanie when Stephanie decided to tell him that the way he treated my family was horrendous. Stephanie ended up being sent to live with a strict, spinster aunt and Elizabeth barely stayed out of jail. If I’m right, Stephanie is your grandmother. If she’s still alive, then maybe she’ll help. She was 12 when she was sent away, so old enough to remember what caused it. You never know.”
“Yeah, Gran’s alive. We’ve never been close, though…mom was always closer to her father and you know how pious she is. He was the same. It wouldn’t surprise me if my great-grandparents had a heavy hand in Gran’s marriage to Zachary Brown.” He checked his watch. “It’s late and I should go if I want to wake up for work tomorrow. I’ll see if I can get in touch with Gran.”
We walked into the foyer. “I’d kiss you good-bye, but who knows what would happen.” He reached for the doorknob, but turned back to me. “Wait, why didn’t I have any trouble during that make-out session caused by the potion?”
“I suppose it has something to do with the nature of the potion. I told you that there’s no need to worry about being healthy enough for sexual activity because the potion is for romance and nothing kills romance like a heart attack. So, the potion also acts to keep the body in perfect health while it’s working. I guess the potion overrode your standard reaction and when the potion wore off, you turned back into your usual charming, frozen self.”
“Huh. Well, if nothing else, I’ll keep you in business buying a weekly dose of that potion.”
“No, you won’t. I only sell to couples and only once when the relationship needs it.”
“Man! I just can’t catch a break.” He turned to leave.
“Wait, why did you come here tonight?”
“Huh? Oh, I just wanted to see you, I guess.” He blushed. I guess he really was interested in me for more just than my abilities. The fact that the fumes from the potion had made us attack each other meant that there might be more than just a minor mutual attraction, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. “I should go, though.” And he did make it out the door.
Chapter 6
I walked into the dining room and began to clean up the remnants of the potion. There had to be a way to help Nathan, if only because I admitted to myself that I wouldn’t mind having another make out session with him. We knew that he only has a problem when he’s around me, and by his willingness to use the potion, it was obvious that he was just as interested in making out as I was. I was positive that it was caused by magic. But as to how to fix it, I didn’t have a clue. I’d never been faced with a magical ailment and neither had my ancestors.
If it had been any other ailment I would have just taken the symptoms and let him heal himself, but that didn’t seem to be the answer. Nathan was barely aware of the problem, how could he force himself through it? I stared at the wall. Nothing came to me. I shook my head. Maybe Stephanie could shed some light on this. I gathered what was left of my supplies and took them upstairs. I needed to collect some more butterflies, but I’d worry about that later.
I took a long cold shower. I felt bruises beginning to form on my shoulder. Nathan had gotten a little too excited; there were even teeth marks. Funny, I didn’t remember feeling any pain while he’d been biting me. I stepped out of the tub and dried off. I put on a lose night gown and went to bed.
I woke up late the next morning to the phone ringing. I answered groggily, “Hello?”
“Scarlet,” I heard some sensual music playing in the background. “It’s Meg. I just wanted to thank you so much for the potion.” She giggled. “Jack, stop that!” she said playfully and giggled again. “Jack’s telling me to get off the phone. Thanks again,” she hung up.
I shook my head as I replaced the phone on the cradle. Meg share’s way too much. I lay back on the pillows. I had a long day ahead of me; I looked at the clock. And the day was about to begin. My first patient was going to be here in just under an hour. I rolled out of bed and dressed in a t-shirt with Toucan Sam on it and my favorite pair of jeans. I was in the middle of eating a bowl of cereal when my patient arrived, early as usual.
“Pamela, welcome,” I smiled as I opened the door. Pamela suffers from extreme depression and low self-esteem. She has a regular appointment with me every Tuesday morning and she always arrives twenty minutes early. We usually talk for an hour before I remove the symptoms of the depression and that in itself seems to do a lot. She meets with a real psychologist every Thursday. Her husband had long ago decided that she was crazy, but he was perfectly willing to pay for her treatments, since he couldn’t deal with her himself. From what she told me, he spent most of his time drunk with another woman. I wasn’t sure how much was truth and how much was her depression talking, but that wasn’t my problem. I just wanted her to leave feeling good about herself. I’m good at that.
“Hi Scarlet.” She sniffed loudly. She’d been crying.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, motioning for her to go into the bright drawing room. She sat on the couch.
“Oh, the same as always. Scott spent the night with his girlfriend and didn’t even bother to come home this morning. I don’t know why he even stays married to me if he really wants to stay with her all the time.” She cleared her throat and continued with her usual rant about how she can’t seem to do anything right when it comes to her marriage, that she just wasn’t pretty enough, wondering why she could never find the energy she once had, convinced that she was the reason why her husband strayed.
I try very hard not to complain about my patients, but an hour listening to Pamela is just as draining as taking on the actual depression she was feeling. I might be able to help people heal from illness, but I’m not a saint. After a while she began to wind down and apologized for the tirade.
“I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t go on like that; it’s just another thing I screw up.”
“It’s fine. I’m happy to listen.” A tiny white lie with a kind smile. “Are you ready for the treatment?” I asked her.
“Oh yes, go right ahead.” She settled into the chair and closed her eyes. I put my hand on hers and began to take away the depression, boosting her self-esteem in the process. One of the reasons why I’m able to listen to Pamela with so much patience is that I’ve felt the pain she lives with; the mental anguish. I felt my mood darkening, but saw the relief spread across Pamela’s face. She visibly relaxed, settling back against of the sofa.
“All done,” I said, plastering a fake smile on my face.
Pamela hopped up. “Thank-you so much!” She shook my hand violently, pumping it up and down. If Pamela ever got over her depression, she would be a very boisterous woman all the time. She smiled ear to ear. “Here’s your check. I’m going to Opera Club, now. I’ll see you next week.” Did I mention that Pamela is an opera singer? Her club meets every Tuesday to sing and act and that’s why she schedules today for her session. I seem to do a better job at cheering her up enough to go to the club than her real psychiatrist. Don’t worry, the treatment I give her lasts a few days, so her husband does get to enjoy some time with her while she’s happy, but her opera buddies definitely see the best side of her. I walked her to the door and told her that I hoped she had fun at the club meeting.
I went into the den and put There’s Something about Mary into the DVD player. It wasn't nearly as funny as it could have been, but then that’s a general side-effect of depression. The movie ended and I was still a long way from feeling my best. I only charge Pamela for 3 hours worth of recovery, but I really give her twice that amount. After her first session I realized just how lousy she feels on a regular day and decided to ‘double the dose’ so to speak, but I couldn’t charge her more. It just wouldn’t feel right. For all this magic relies on the conservation of mass in that I must give of myself when I take from others, my high metabolism means that the cumulative effects are almost exponential. Ten minutes of work from me leaves a person with days or even weeks of relief, depending on what the ailment is and I only have to recover for a couple hours. Pamela gets about five days of real happiness while I get seven hours of pure mental anguish. Of course, recovery time is definitely dependent on the healer. Some of my ancestors took a full 24 hours to recover from a healing, but I suspect that that often was because they used inefficient methods.
I had no energy to put in another DVD after Mary ended, so I flipped through the channels looking for anything that caught my limited amount of interest. Titanic was on, and stupidly I decided to watch it. By the end, I was sobbing uncontrollably and was quite a mess. I still had a good hour before my spirits returned to normal, but unfortunately I heard a knock at my front door.
I mopped my face up and tried to put on a happy expression before I opened the door. One glance into the mirror showed me that I would just frighten small children and dogs, so I dropped the smile and went with a sullen expression.
Nathan was outside. I checked my watch. It was only 4pm, he should have still been on duty. “Hey. I was in the neighborhood and I wanted to tell you that I called my Gran this morning. She said that we could stop by her house this evening if we wanted to talk about…stuff. Are you okay?”
“Never better.” My voice cracked and I thought I was going to weep at the idea of this man’s devotion to his grandmother. Not that that line of thinking made any sense at all. I wiped my nose on a handkerchief. “Sorry. My client was depressed this morning. I’m still working through the emotions. I watched Titanic because I’m a genius and that really made me feel chipper.” I tried to laugh but it really just came out as a whimper.
“Come on," he said, walking into the foyer. "I can only stay for a minute, but you need a strong cup of coffee.”
“Tea. I don’t drink coffee.”
“Whatever—you need something in you.” Nathan put his hand on my back and steered me towards the kitchen.
“I’ll be fine in a little while,” I promised. But at the same time I was feeling very warm and fuzzy thoughts about Nathan who now showed so much concern for me. I shook my head. I wasn’t sure how I’d crossed my wires with the depression and low self-esteem, but I was feeling less lethargic and more a weepy mess. I think that I’m doomed to always be leaking when I’m around Nathan.
After I drank the cup of tea and ate some chocolate chips Nathan had found in my pantry, I was feeling much better. “Sorry about that. I’m not used to having company after a session with a client…especially this particular client. I’ve never really reacted this way before.” To say I was embarrassed would be an understatement.
“It’s fine. I need to go, but I’ll pick you up at six if you’re feeling up to it.”
“Yeah. I’ll be back to normal by then. See you.” I didn’t walk him out.
---
I spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning the house. I folded the clothes that I’d washed the day before. I set aside the dress in case Natalie wanted it back. By six I was back to normal emotionally and marveled at the roller coaster ride I’d just been on. I’d thought I’d done a simple switch of depression for happiness, but somehow I’d picked up some sentimentality—I’ve never been one to cry when I’m happy or when I find something to be especially sweet, but there I had been blubbering about Nathan calling his grandmother to arrange a meeting that we’d discussed as necessary the night before. I shook my head. I didn’t know much about psychiatry and emotional illnesses, so I suspected that my lack of knowledge in this field was the problem. Since up until last Saturday I hadn’t really had anyone to share my recovery time with, I’d never noticed the extent of the emotions I’d felt after helping Pamela. I probably wouldn’t find much help in my bible of medical fixes because emotional illnesses were definitely a modern disease. My great, great grandmother Margaret’s husband had come back from World War One with what they called “shell shock”, modernly known as post-traumatic shock disorder, and he refused to let her help him through his feelings. The treatment back then was to ignore it, for all the good that did. After the war, their marriage hadn’t been a happy one, hence the reason Elizabeth ran off to New York.
I answered the knock at my door quickly enough. Nathan hadn’t changed out of his uniform, but the top button of his shirt was un-done.
“Feeling better?” he asked.
“Oh, yes, much better. Tuesday’s are not my best days, but that’s my life.” I smiled, genuinely so he could see that I wasn’t trying to hide some dour thoughts.
“You did have me worried, but since your better now, we should get going.” I grabbed my purse and locked the door while he unlocked the passenger door of his patrol car.
“Umm…do you mind if we take my car?” I asked him. “I’d just rather not ride in a cop car if I can help it.”
“What?” He looked at his car. “Oh, good point.” He re-locked the doors on his car and we got into my Ford. He gave me the directions to his grandmother’s house and I was relieved to learn that it wasn’t within Rev. Brown’s compound. Okay, it’s not really a compound, but it’s an expensive gated community that many of his followers live within. I’m not welcome there for obvious reasons.
The drive was actually awkwardly silent. Given how easily we’d flirted with each other for the past three days I was surprised at the almost cold shoulder Nathan was giving me. But I guess it’s not every day that you find out that magic is interfering with your love life.
“What are you thinking about?” I finally asked him.
“Hmm? Oh. Just stuff, I guess.” He didn’t want to comment further, which I found annoying.
“My limited mind reading capabilities told me that much. Come on, either tell me what it is or I start supplying various possibilities with increasing levels of embarrassment.”
He looked over at me then turned back to look out his own window. “How the hell can I have sex with you if I turn into a zombie whenever I get aroused?” he blurted.
I’m not sure how I kept the car in the middle of the road when he made that pronouncement, but I definitely stopped breathing for a minute or two. “Uhhh…” I stammered. “Well, that was definitely the possibility at the top of my embarrassment meter.”
He grimaced. “Sorry. I’m not usually that up-front with a girl I want to sleep with. Wait, that sounds terrible.” He shook his head. “I suck at this. This...problem,” he gestured angrily at his crotch, “is totally screwing up my life!”
“I’m sorry.” I really meant it. “If I could fix it I would—I’ve never faced a problem I couldn’t at least do something for, but right now I’m completely at a loss.”
“Yeah.” We rode in silence for the rest of the way. I was still reeling from his admission that he wanted to sleep with me. I’d never been “Miss Popular” in this town, no matter that everyone knew my name and my story. I’d never had a boyfriend or even anyone who’d really been remotely interested in me; well, except for a creep from the next town over who wanted to catch me doing something freaky so he could make money off of it. He’d tried to date me, but it’d become obvious very quickly that he didn’t have any interest in me for my sake. I’d given him a frightful scare to keep him away, but he was the reason why there is a powerful enchantment on my house: he hadn’t taken my rejection very well.
His grandmother’s house was, for lack of a better word, cute. It was small and square with lots of detailed scrollwork around the eves. It looked like it could have passed for the gingerbread house in the story of Hansel and Gretel, though I was confident that Stephanie would not be anything like the witch in that story; too many of her relatives would better fit that description.
Nathan knocked lightly before opening her front door and leading me inside. The inside of her house was warm and inviting, not at all like I would have pictured from the mother of the current Rev. Brown and wife of the former Rev. Brown.
“Gran? It’s Nathan,” he called into the house.
“I’m in the kitchen,” a kindly voice called and a pleasantly plump lady of about eighty-five years peaked her head out the door to look at us. “Oh, she’s cute.”
I blushed and slowly followed him into the kitchen, trying to will away the color from my cheeks. Funny that it never works for me.
“You’re just in time for supper. I made meatloaf, if that’s okay.”
“I’m sure it’ll be delicious,” I smiled at her and watched as Nathan made himself a plate. Mrs. Brown insisted that I fill mine before her, which made me feel awkward, but since Nathan seemed used to it, I guess that’s how his family is.
I took my plate into the dining room and Nathan asked me what I wanted to drink. I told him juice if there was any. I stayed standing, unsure of what was expected of me. I’ve never eaten at someone else’s house before.
“Sit, sit, girlie. We don’t bite…much,” she said, laughing. I couldn’t help but think about the bite marks I’d found on my shoulder the night before. I hoped that the blush that reemerged on my face was blamed on my lack of knowledge about how to eat at another’s house. Nathan came out an joined us at the table, bringing our drinks with him. I looked around the room; this was obviously the most important room in this house. One wall was covered in photos of various family members, including, I noted, a few of Nathan at various ages. He’d been a gawky kid.
“It took me awhile to grow into my height,” Nathan told me when he saw where I was looking. I laughed and relaxed somewhat.
“So, what brings you to visit me?” Mrs. Brown asked. I shot a look at Nathan; didn’t he tell his grandmother who I was and why I was there?
Mrs. Brown caught the look. “Oh, Scarlet, I didn’t mean it that way,” she said kindly. My heartbeat slowed down some. “He told me that you wanted to talk about your great-grandmother, but he wasn’t very specific. We, as a family, don’t talk about your family openly, as you probably guess. Many spit on the floor three times or toss salt over their shoulder at the merest mention. Those of us who don’t think unkindly of you still prefer to remain vague when we talk. It’s a force of habit, I guess.”
“I see. Well, we were curious about what you and my great-grandmother thought about the origins of our families…uh, magically speaking. And whether you have any thoughts about whether the Browns do have some kind of magical talent.” I took a bite of the meatloaf and it was heavenly. I wasn’t sure if it was the taste, the fact that I didn’t have to make it myself, or the fact that I wouldn’t be stuck eating it for the next week, but it was the best meal I’d eaten in a long time, and I told Mrs. Brown that.
“We’ll talk about your serious questions after dinner, but now let’s chat. I don’t see my grandson often enough. How’s life?” Mrs. Brown gave Nathan such a serious glance that he didn’t even have a choice at being noncommittal at such a vague question. He told her about his past week, though he tactfully left me mostly out of it, I guess so that I could choose what I wanted to add. He did tell her how we’d met while he was doing the dirty work of Rev. Brown’s crew and how we’d started chatting friendly-like. No need to mention disgusting puddles of goo or nearly ripping each other’s clothes off because of the fumes of a love potion. He did tell some interesting stories about a couple of drunks he’d dealt with earlier in the week while he was running squad. He filled me in that he volunteers for the Wednesday night crew and also works one Saturday a month.
“And how have you been?” Mrs. Brown fixed her eyes on me.
I squirmed, not used to people actually caring what I have to say, nor caring about how I spend my off time. “Oh, umm…just work, I guess. And I watched a bunch of movies, read a few books. And I worked in my garden some. I guess I’m not a very interesting person.”
“On the contrary dear, I think you’re a very interesting person. You just don’t like to talk about the most interesting things, which is fine.” She smiled at me and patted my hand.
“Yeah, it normally weirds people out and I can’t really say too much because I don’t want to risk my client’s anonymity.” I smiled back at her.
“If you’re finished we can leave Nathan to wash the dishes and the two of us can go chat in the living room.” I nodded and followed Mrs. Brown and sat next to her on the sofa in the other room. Now I understood why he’d been so comfortable doing the dishes at my house.
“Now that he’s busy, we can talk about him without him overhearing us.” I gulped. “So, you think he’s handsome don’t you?” She peered at me with silvery eyes. I nodded. “Tell me why you both so suddenly have the desire to crack this mystery,” she took my hand gently.
I cleared my throat. “Umm…we found out something…awkward. That affects whatever we might…want to do with each other.” I blushed and stared a hole into the floor. I’d never talked about such things with anyone—my mom hadn’t really been the type, especially at the end.
“I realize that we talked before about how my family is vague about you, but honey, that tells me nothing.”
“Oh please don’t make me talk about this. Sorry, but I’m not comfortable talking about…it.” I was trying very hard to keep the hole I’d been putting in the floor from becoming real and letting it swallow me up. Magic sucks when you’re trying to be normal.
Mrs. Brown put her arms around me and hugged me tight. “Girlie, are you trying to say that you two are having bedroom troubles?” she whispered into my ear.
I nodded into her shoulder, “essentially, but not that we’ve actually done anything,” I said quickly, still into her shoulder. I couldn’t bear to meet her eyes. “It’s just a… requirement that we’ve noticed doesn’t…work properly.”
“I see. And you think that the Browns have some kind of magic that’s causing the problem?”
“Yes.” I took a deep breath and let go of Mrs. Brown. “Sorry for wigging out just now. I just don’t have anyone to talk about that stuff with—never really have. I guess I thought we could find out what we need without that aspect being revealed—or that Nathan had already told you.”
“Well, he’s never talked about that aspect of his life with his old grandmother—what man does? Ah, here he is.”
Nathan walked slowly into the room as though afraid we were going to turn on him. “Have I missed something?” he asked wearily.
“Not too much. We just established the heart of the problem you two want to solve.” I was back to staring at the floor.
“Uhh…yeah. Anyway. What kind of information can you give us?” He slumped into the recliner in the corner.
“Well, Elizabeth was convinced that the reason why the Browns hold so much power in this town is because they have some kind of magic that keeps people from even wanting to oppose them, no matter how much everyone else actually likes you. She supposed that it would be possible to break the hold that the Browns have if she put enough effort into gaining their respect. Given that she didn’t go about that in the best way, I can’t be sure how right or wrong her assumptions were. I mean, she got me sent away to my aunt’s home and was lucky that nothing else happened to her—my parents were not happy that she took such an interest in me. But her parents weren’t exactly stable either, which is why she ran off to New York. But that’s beside the point. Once Liz put the idea into my head, I started playing around with the idea that we Browns have some kind of magic. And I’ve concluded that we do have a bit of power. It’s very subtle and mood related, so I’m confident saying that I think it does have some power over your…problem.” Mrs. Brown smiled at Nathan. He blushed. “Nobody in our family has ever been interested in someone of yours before,” she said to me, “so I can’t say whether you, Nathan, are the first to experience the problem.” She turned back to him. “But from what I’ve been able to do, the way to alter the magic is to somehow break the emotional bond that forms it. I can’t tell you whether it’s an individual specific spell, for lack of a better term, or if it’s the community’s wish to keep such relationships from happening. To break the enchantment you’re going to have to somehow woo the favor of those who control it.”
“What have you been able to do with the magic you’ve discovered?” I asked.
“Oh, just little things. I successfully blocked a television station a couple years ago.”
“What?!?” I was shocked.
“No, it wasn’t that big of a deal. It was only blocked on televisions that I was within about 50 feet of, nothing more widespread. I’d just decided that I did not like watching sports, so I focused all my will on ESPN not working. It took about six months, but I was able to foil all the men’s attempts to watch football during Sunday dinner.”
“That’s…impressive. What else have you done?”
“I scared cows away from me back when I was a kid. They terrified me so I created an invisible wall that they could not cross. I also was able to hex this guy in my high school.”
“Hex?” Nathan sounded worried at that particular term.
“Well, not so much a hex, but he had a crush on me and I didn’t reciprocate, so I made him get the hives whenever he got too flirty with me.” Mrs. Brown looked thoughtful at that one. I suspect that she had been quite excited to learn that she had some magical talent. “’Course, my magic is so spread thin that I can’t sustain more than one item at a time.”
“That hex you used sounds a little like my problem,” Nathan surmised. “But what are the odds that someone in our family is using such a specific spell against me?”
Mrs. Brown looked at Nathan. “Everyone likes you, so I’d say it’s slim to none. Unless someone really is worried that you’re dealing with someone you shouldn’t. I might put out some feelers to see if anyone has taken a particular interest in your romantic interests, if you want.”
“Well, I don’t want someone to suddenly take an interest if they didn’t have one before, so I think we should limit the amount of references to it outside of this room.” Nathan looked embarassed, and rightly so. I mean, we’d just met a couple days ago and we were already talking like we were going to be an item.
Nathan checked his watch. “It’s getting late. We should go.” He stood up and kissed his grandmother’s cheek. I thanked Mrs. Brown for her help and dinner before following him out to the car.
The drive back to my house was considerably less awkward than the drive out.
“Well, you’ve seen me covered in my own vomit and feces. I don’t see why we’re suddenly scared of telling each other intimate secrets—I mean, there’s not much worse a person can get.” I smiled at him and he laughed.
“I just feel like we’re doing this thing backwards or something. Moving too fast.”
“Not possible.” I said deadpan. “When you move too fast you slow right down.”
That got a good roar of laughter out of Nathan. “You’re right about that one.” He sighed. “I like you and you know that.” I nodded. “And I guess you like me?”
I nodded again.
“And our mutual desire to rip each other’s clothes off last night wasn’t purely caused by the potion?”
“That potion should not have worked at all. It’s not meant for use by complete strangers looking for a good time. I mean, I’ve never had company when I’ve made it, but I know that strangers can’t drink it and expect the same results as two people with a known relationship with each other. I assume the same would be true of two strangers smelling the fumes.”
“So it’s pretty certain that there’s more between us than just friendship?”
“Yeah, I’d say that’s true.” I was glad the car was dark. I was certain that I was blushing once again and I was able to get a bit of courage from the darkness since Nathan couldn’t see my face.
“Good.” Nathan let out a breath. I guess he was worried that the feelings were one sided. “So…now what do we do?”
“Umm…no idea. Well, I know what we can do about your family—try to get me on their good side. But as to the other thing, I have no experience.” I wondered if he understood just how little experience I have.
“So, no crazy ex-boyfriends in your past?”
“Well, when you put it that way, yes, there is one crazy guy, but he shouldn’t be much of a problem. I scared him off much the same way I scared you during our first, or I guess it was second, meeting. Only I didn’t take away the panic attack and left him blubbering on the side of the road.”
“Umm…please tell me that he was crazy before you left him blubbering.”
“He was. Quit thinking that I’m some loony woman who enjoys tormenting the normal people! He was trying to use me for some kind of monetary gain and I wasn’t going to have it. When he wouldn’t leave me along peaceably, I used my talents to convince him to. Now, are there any crazy exes in your past?”
“None crazy, but I guess you could count four serious exes in total.”
“Mmm” There’s not much I could say to that.
Nathan was quiet for a little while. “I like you, you like me, and I can’t kiss you for fear of going catatonic.”
“That just about sums it up.”
“The world hates us.”
“That’s my line. The world hates me and you’re just unfortunate enough to come along for the ride.” I smiled. “You know, it is possible to date other girls. Ones who carry around less baggage. We were both perfectly fine before you decided to charge me with fraud.”
“I don’t think you were better off.”
“Aww come on. I was great not having to worry about what I was wearing, what I was eating, whether or not I was covered in crap.”
“Scarlet, you weren’t invisible. I didn’t just start noticing you three days ago. I’ve had a crush on you since high school. I was a senior and you were a freshman. And I was such a dumbass, I didn’t have the courage to talk to you.”
“You had a crush on me?” I was flattered.
“Hell yes. You were…are cute and definitely mysterious. Everything a horny 17 year old boy wants.”
“I bet you weren’t very horny,” I said cheerfully.
“I’ll give you that one.” He said, chuckling.
“So, which one were you in high school? I don’t pretend to remember much about that time in my life.”
“Yeah, I guess it was a terrible time for you. I was on the football team, pretty popular, I guess. I was dating Shelia Andrews.”
“Captain of the cheerleader squad?” I tried to remember back. “Oh, you were voted homecoming king, right?”
“Right. So you do remember some stuff?”
“I remember being told that I didn’t belong in that school, sometimes by teachers. I remember almost flunking calculus my senior year because the teacher didn’t want me to be an honor graduate. I remember getting beat up sophomore year just because everyone knew that I had nobody to stand up to the principal for me…” my voice cracked, “not even a parent.” My mom died shortly after my 16th birthday.
Nathan reached over and rubbed my shoulder. I was glad we were nearly to my house. “Sorry. I should have known better than to bring that up.”
I shrugged. “You wouldn’t have known. You went off to college after my freshman year. It’s not like I advertised the misery. There were plenty of people who would at least ignore me tactfully, even if they weren’t able to stand up for me completely.” We pulled into my driveway, but didn’t bother to get out.
Nathan pulled me into a hug and I enjoyed being comforted, even if it was awkwardly done in the front seat of a small car. I didn’t cry. I’d cried too much over this issue.
“Do you want to come inside?” I finally asked him.
“Yes!…no…yes?” Nathan looked at his patrol car and his watch, but I knew that he really wanted to stay with me.
“Go. I’ll be fine. Dinner is at 6:30. Oh, you have squad tomorrow don’t you?”
“Yeah, I won’t be free until Thursday night.”
“That’s fine. Come over if you want. I’ll probably be serving leftovers, but there might be something new for you.”
“Sounds good.” And he very carefully kissed me on the lips. I could tell that he was trying to keep it chaste, not even pretending to use his tongue. It was incredibly sweet, even though it was utterly necessary. Our lips barely moved against each others for fear that it would become too sexual, instead pressing them hard together to express pleasure at the shared kiss. He broke it off way too soon, but before we needed to worry about it going too far.
“Not enough,” he groaned, but I guess some well imagined images of drowning puppies or a garbage dump (I hoped to God that he wasn’t picturing me covered in crap) kept him grounded. He rested his forehead on mine and looked into my eyes. For two people who couldn’t even reach first base why did it feel like we were moving too fast?
I decided that I should be the one to end the stalemate where neither of us wanted to leave the little bubble that the car formed around us. I unbuckled my seat belt and exited the car. Nathan followed suite, but we’d silently agreed to not make things worse. He got into his patrol car and left, I went into my home and took a cold shower. What hurt the most was that it was only a matter of time before he would grow tired of not being satisfied and would find someone else. It took a lot of self-restraint for me to not bang my head against the wall of the shower.
Chapter 7
I spent Wednesday trying to keep busy. I didn’t have a client scheduled until the next day (my appointment book revealed that I was booked almost solid for the next two weeks), so I decided to go to the hospital and see if I could be of some help. I’m not really a glutton for punishment, but I couldn’t sit around the house waiting for my heart to break further.
I took the dress and shoes I’d borrowed from Natalie so that I could give them back to her if I saw her. The hospital was quiet when I got there. I greeted Sandra and Leo who man the front desk.
“Is there an emergency?” Sandra asked me.
“No, no. I just didn’t have anything to do today so I thought I’d stop by.”
“Honey, you need a life, and you know I say that lovingly.” Sandra is about thirty-five, married, with two kids in middle school. Leo is easily sixty and a grandfather to five.
“I know, but it’s been a stressful couple of days—I’ll get a life tomorrow.” I smiled at them and went up to Natalie’s office. The hospital is small, so the doctors share a pair of conference rooms that they use as collective offices. But they each have their own desks and filing cabinets. Natalie had lucked out and got a desk by the window. I was putting the bag with the dress in it into her chair when she walked in.
“Hey! What brings you here?” she gave me a hug. “Is that the dress? Girl, that was a present. Keep it. I know Nathan will enjoy seeing you wear it again…and again.” She smiled at me, holding my shoulders at arm’s length. “What’s wrong? You don’t look like a girl who’s enjoying a post-coital high.”
“Yeah, things are weird with Nathan right now. It’s nothing to worry about, but…yeah. Look, I just want to help a few people, maybe pass out for a few hours, and if you don’t want the dress back, that’s fine, because I gardened in it and I don’t think I got all the dirt stains out.” I stuffed the bag into my purse, which is more backpack than fashion statement.
“You gardened in that dress?” Natalie might be an insanely busy doctor, but she always takes the time to be impeccably dressed, unlike me.
“Yeah, it was a bad day and I forgot what I was wearing. Sorry.” I was feeling miserable again.
“I think you need to talk to a doctor, instead of playing doctor. What’s going on?” She led me into the doctors break room and made me a cup of hot chocolate and herself a cup of coffee.
I slumped in my chair, wanting to hug my chocolate. “I can’t talk about it specifically, but we can’t be intimate with each other.” I took a big gulp of the drink and burned my tongue.
“Is it because of your…gift?” Natalie was probably the closest thing to a friend I could claim. I guess at some point I could have let her into my life, but I didn’t want to risk destroying hers. I’d figured out a long time ago that it was safer for everyone if I kept myself to myself, kept everyone at a distance. Nathan was the first person who’d, well, steamrolled his way in.
“Yes, no, maybe…so.” I laughed; it was a short and harsh noise. “It’s complicated and annoying as hell.”
“And is Nathan aware of the problem?”
“He’s as aware as he can be…well, he was. Now he’s very aware. And he’s going to get tired of the awareness and he’s going to find someone else.”
“Honey, you excel at being vague.”
I looked around to make sure that no one could overhear us. “He can’t get hard when he’s around me. Or well, he can, but then his brain leaves his body,” I said in a low voice, inclining my head.
“Uh, I’m pretty sure that you’re a virgin, but that sounds like typical male behavior. The blood leaves their upper brain and goes to their lower brain. After that, they’re only thinking about one thing. Are you really that inexperienced?”
I blushed. “I know how men normally react. But Nathan is different. He goes completely vacant. He can’t even move.”
“Like a stroke?”
“Almost, but the after effects aren’t so serious. Once the stimulus subsides, he’s completely back to normal and he didn’t even realize what was going on until I told him.” I couldn’t believe that I was having this discussion with Natalie.
“Weird. And I guess it’s entirely outside of my expertise.”
“Yup. Outside mine too.” I took a smaller sip of my chocolate. I felt better, for some reason. I still wanted to get trashed and pass out, but at least I didn’t feel like I was completely alone. There was now someone I could hope would be there to pick up the pieces when Nathan went to someone else. Nathan had seriously turned my life on its head.
“And it only happens around you?”
“Yeah.”
“Wow, no wonder you look awful. Do you really think he’s the type that would dump you just because he can’t have sex?”
“A: we’re not dating, so how could it be considered dumping. And B: it’s not just sex. It’s getting turned on. When I walked out of the bathroom wearing that dress on Sunday, he lost it. We can’t even get to first base without him flaking out.”
“Have you tried?”
“No, but come on. How hard is it for a guy to get hard?” It was a rhetorical question, but even if she planned to answer, she was interrupted by a pair of male doctors coming into the room seeking coffee. Thank God they didn’t enter the room until after I’d asked my question.
“Oh, hello Scarlet. Are you just visiting?” Dr. Howard Murphy, average height, average face, above average tan—I think he spray tans biweekly, but otherwise is a nice guy—looked at me appraisingly. I’m not often checked out, and given the current status of my…relationship(?) I actually didn’t like it, but I ignored his looks.
“Ehh…visiting, working, whatever. Just tired of sitting around the house.” I smiled at him.
“I don’t think you should be hanging around the hospital.” I looked over at the second doctor that had just walked in and stifled a groan. It was Nick Smith, the hospital’s resident Brownie. The sneer he was giving me was awful. “We don’t take kindly to ambulance chasers here.”
“You know she isn’t an ambulance chaser,” Natalie started.
“Ms. Stephans, you should know better than to defend her heathenism.” The glare in his eyes made my stomach squirm. I was not built for this and I was about to back down and go home when I saw Natalie’s demeanor change. I watched as she visibly turned her back on me. She had stood up when Nick first spoke, standing in front of me. As his glare bore into her, she shifted her weight, stepping away from me. I stood up and looked at her face. She didn’t look at me, but her eyes looked slightly glazed over and her face was blank. I reached out with my senses and felt the magic flooding the room. I wondered if Nick even realized that he had the talent, or whether he believed that it was his personality that made him so commanding. It really ticked me off, especially when I looked at Howard and saw his smile turn into scorn. I guess that whatever the magic was telling him, I was now just a hot body encasing the devil.
“Why must you antagonize me?!?” I can’t believe that I shouted at Nick, stepping up to stand in front of him. I don’t shout at people, but here I was. “I HELP people! I literally give everything I can of myself to help and all I get is a crappy life! I have NO friends, no family,” my voice broke as tears began to stream down my face, “and the one guy who’s ever shown an interest in me can’t be with me because of his stupid family! I HATE IT!” I turned around and ran out of the room, blindly heading for the restroom that I knew was located down the hall. I locked myself in the first stall and cried like I’d refused to let myself cry for years.
No one came looking for me. Once the tears subsided, I realized what I’d just done. I never raise my voice, I never confront people. Now that my anger was gone, I was just embarrassed. I’d acted like a child, blowing up like that. If I was supposed to be making friends with the Browns, I’d definitely gone about it the wrong way. I did allow myself to bang my head on the door then.
“Ms. Hawthorne?” a timid voice asked, actually knocking on the door to the restroom.
What? I wanted to growl, but I decided that would not be a good idea. “Yes?”
“There’s a situation downstairs, and Dr. Stephans wanted me to ask you to join her.”
“Okay.” I opened the door of the stall and washed my face in the sink. I squared my shoulders, burying my feelings once more where they belonged. My eyes weren’t very red and my nose had stopped running—I guess I wasn’t going to scare too many people.
The girl that had been sent to fetch me looked barely eighteen and I guess she was a volunteer. I followed her to a room downstairs where a woman was in labor. Natalie was waiting just inside the door, talking with the obstetrician. She looked ashamed when she caught my eye, but I’d already forgiven her and gave her a small smile.
“I’m so sorry. I don’t know what came over me. You know that I don’t agree with what they say…”
“It’s fine. Trust me; I know that you have no control over what they want you to feel. I know probably better than anyone.” I turned to look at the woman in bed. “So, what do you need me for?”
“Well, Mrs. Swane is going to have a baby in a few hours and wants a completely natural birth with no pain medication. The problem is that we’ve found that the baby is breech. We were wondering if you would help take some of the pain while we attempt to manually turn the baby.”
“Uh…sure. This is the first time I’ve attempted something like this,” I told Mrs. Swane walking over to her bed. “But it shouldn’t be too radical. Are you familiar with what I do?”
“Yes,” she grimaced through a contraction. I waited while she regained her breath. “Yes, I’ve heard what you do. I don’t agree with it, but I’ve never been one to judge a person. I’ve heard just terrible things about medications and babies, though. I think that if you can help it would be better than the harm that medicines cause.”
I pulled a form from my purse, but it looked like Mrs. Swane wasn’t exactly in the right frame of mind to read the tedious form. “This is my standard contract. I don’t think you want to go through the technical jargon right now, but I’m going to go ahead and write in what I’m going to do. If you want, you can sign it now or later or never, and I’ll leave you a copy. I’m not going to charge you anything, this is purely pro bono.” I wrote in that I was doing pregnancy pain removal for the duration of the procedure to turn the breech fetus, no charge, then I dated and signed it myself. “Do you want to look at it, or should we just get the procedure started?”
Mrs. Swane barely glanced at it before another contraction occurred. “Procedure. Now.”
The OB came to the bed and instructed Mrs. Swane to lie back. I guessed that they’d already told her that this procedure was not guaranteed to work. If it didn’t, she would be forced to undergo a C-section and local anesthesia would be used.
I stood next to her and took her hand, drawing out the pain of contractions and that of the OB inserting his hands into her to turn the baby. To say it was uncomfortable would be an understatement, but Mrs. Swane was fine. I’d never experienced pain like that experienced during childbirth. I wasn’t sure whether I was strong enough to ever choose to go natural, even with my high pain tolerance. It took about half an hour before the doctor declared that the fetus was in the proper position. I let go of Mrs. Swane’s hand and as I collapsed into a chair next to the bed I noticed that she flexed her hand a lot after I let it go. I think I’d been gripping it tightly as I fought to keep the pain off my face.
“How are her contractions?” I finally managed to ask.
The OB checked the monitor. “The contractions are right on schedule, but…Mrs. Swane, are you feeling the pain from them?”
“No…” she said slowly. Then she looked worried. “Am I okay? And the baby?”
“You’re fine.” Dr. Kent said. I’d finally seen the name on his lab coat. “You’re both fine.” He turned to me. “I suppose that while you were taking the pain away from the procedure you also somehow took her contraction pains away?”
“It looks that way.” I rubbed my abdomen. I’d never think of my period cramps as awful again—this was a hundred times worse. “I don’t suppose you want them back?” I asked Mrs. Swane, laughing a bit. I immediately regretted my words. I’d just broken my rule number one: the client must never know that I feel their aches and pains.
Luckily Mrs. Swane didn’t seem to notice my slip. She rubbed her stomach marveling as the machines told her she was experiencing a contraction, but she felt none of the pain. Dr. Kent looked at me, anxiously. Most of the doctors at this hospital know that I feel the pain. Dr. Nick Smith doesn’t because I don’t want the Brownies to know.
Natalie came over and took my arm, leading me out of the room and into an empty exam room. She gave me some pain medication and settled me on the table. “I’ll get you in a little bit. We shouldn’t need this room for awhile.”
I curled up into the fetal position waiting for the medicine to kick in. I finally fell asleep after laying there for a good half hour.
“Scarlet. Wake up.”
“Blargh?” I’m not exactly coherent when I wake up. I sat up and tried to figure out where I was. Oh, right. Baby.
“Come on. You should eat something.” Natalie was standing next to me as I slid off the table. We walked to the cafeteria. I checked my watch, it was only 1 o’clock. I got a hamburger and small salad while Natalie got a turkey sandwich. We found a table in the corner so that we could talk in peace.
“So, I know you’re still feeling terrible, but do you mind if we talk about what happened this morning…with Nick?” Natalie looked concerned.
“I’m fine, really. And what I could tell you about Nick would probably destroy your life.”
“Scarlet. I was suddenly viewing you as an enemy. Not just an enemy, but as a leech. That’s not me—not at all. If I wasn’t a woman of science, I would think that there was magic involved.”
I couldn’t stop myself. I narrowed my eyes at her, “and with that logic out in the open, exactly what do you think it is that I do?”
“Okay, okay. You’re right. I’ve been trying to convince myself that there is some scientific explanation for what it is that you do. But really? You want me to go as far as to call it magic?”
“Yup.” I took a bite of my burger.
“But if you do magic, then does that mean that magic made me go all hostile?”
“Yup.”
“But you wouldn’t make me hostile towards yourself. Who else has magic in this town?” she stared at her sandwich for a while. “No. No, it can’t be.” She leaned towards me. “The Browns?” she whispered.
I nodded.
“Damn,” though she actually sounded awed. “They’re using magic to turn people against you because you use magic? How is that even possible?”
“Not sure. I don’t know where magic comes from—I think that’s one of those philosophical questions, like whether there is a God. I’m more pragmatic—I know that they must have magic because that’s the only way they could do what they do, I’m not so much worried about the how.”
“So how do you combat it?”
“I have an ally who has given me some ideas—none are practical, but they’re ideas.”
“Well, let me know if you need any help. I don’t like the idea of mind control no matter how it’s done. I have free will, God damn it!”
We finished our lunch chatting about happier topics: a new TV show that we’d both fallen in love with.
We walked back to the hall with the patients rooms.
“Are you still going to stick around here?”
“Yeah. I don’t want to go home.”
“Still stressed about Nathan?”
“Yup.”
“Well, you can do some rounds visiting patients. I’m sure they’ll love your company. Let me know if you need some pain medication." She left me at the nurse’s station.
I knocked gently on the door of the first patient’s room. Inside I found an elderly woman who looked bored.
“Hi. My name is Scarlet. I’m a volunteer and I’m just going around visiting patients. Do you care for some company?”
“Oh, hello dear. Yes, I’d like some company—nobody in my family has come to see me at all.”
“That’s awful. I don’t have a family, but if I did and any of them were sick, I’d visit them a lot.”
“Aren’t you a sweet-heart.” She patted my hand.
“So, what are you in for?” making it sound like she was in jail—over the years I’ve learned that most people actually enjoy sharing about their illnesses, even if they hate the building.
“I broke my hip!” She sounded indignant. “My son’s stupid dog got under my feet and tipped me over! I’ve been telling him for years that that dog was good for nothing. It’s one of those lap dogs that you carry around in a purse. My son! Carries a stupid dog around in a purse!”
“Well…that’s definitely different,” I said, trying not to laugh. “Maybe that’s why he hasn’t visited? He’s embarrassed?” I shifted my hand so that I had a finger on hers and started to remove some of the discomfort from her hip.
“Hell no. He hasn’t come because he can’t bring that stupid dog into the hospital. And his wife isn’t any better.”
We sat and chatted about the weather, the news, and books for almost forty-five minutes. We would have talked more, but her doctor came in and shooed me out. Next door to her was a little girl with pneumonia who wasn’t very excited to talk, but her mom was happy to have company. I took the girl’s cough and fever. I thanked my high tolerance and quick metabolism because I was already recovered by the time I left and she was feeling healthy enough to enjoy a tea party with her mother.
The next room held a man who was in the last stages of life. His family was surrounding him, but he’d been given the final dose of morphine and was no longer coherent. I only murmured my condolences to his children before taking leave of the room.
There was a birthday party being held in the next room. The teenage boy in the bed was quite flirtatious when he offered me a piece of cake, holding my hand and telling me how beautiful I was. The cap on his head wasn’t able to hide the baldness associated with chemo treatment, so when I was finally able to extract my hand from Robert’s, taking with me stress and the beginning of a headache, I promised that I’d be back to visit after his procedure the next day. I paused outside his room to write down his name, room number and the time of his treatment into my appointment book. It would be a long day, with two chemo therapy patients, but I’d make it work. Robert wasn’t going to expect me, and probably wouldn’t want me, to show up as soon as it was over.
I went to the little nook near the nurses station on the first floor that the hospital had set aside for the EMS personnel to be able to grab a soda and rest while they completed paperwork between calls. The couches were comfortable and I laid on one to let my headache work through. I hadn’t stayed with Robert and his family long enough to be ready to go to another patient. Chapter 8
I slept for almost two hours before Natalie found me again. I guess one of the EMS guys had seen me when they brought in a woman in labor and told her where I was.
“There you are. A couple of patients asked whether you were still here.”
“Huh?” I stretched. “Do they want to see me?”
“No, they just wanted to thank you for visiting. Mrs. Jones in 201 wanted to tell you that your visit was the highlight of her otherwise miserable stay in this hospital. And she wants to invite you to Thanksgiving this year since you told her that you have no family. She said that after the treatment her son has given her, it’ll probably be just the two of you this year.”
I laughed. Mrs. Jones’ son was going to be living in the dog house until he got rid of that dog…and possibly his wife.
“Oh…on a sadder note, Sarah Mahoney’s family called us to tell you that the viewing is tonight, the funeral is tomorrow. They want you to know that you have no obligation, but thought that you might want to know.”
“Oh yeah, thanks.” I don’t go to viewings or funerals, preferring to remember people as they were when they were alive. “I’ll send a card or something.” I made a note in my appointment book to buy flowers.
“Well, now that you’re thoroughly depressed, how about we go to the nursery and make funny faces at the babies until they laugh?”
“Sounds like fun. Oh, how are the babies that I helped Saturday?”
“The four you helped were discharged yesterday. Little Johnny, whose parents declined help, will probably go home tomorrow.”
“Good, good. I love happy endings.”
We spent two hours in the nursery playing with the babies. I love giving babies their bottle because they cuddle and love you unconditionally just because you have food. Unfortunately, there are rarely babies that need strangers to feed them in hospitals since there are mommies and daddies who do that to bond with their new babies. But we did change a few diapers and made lots of funny faces.
“Scarlet?” Natalie asked as we walked out of the nursery.
“Yeah?”
“I was wondering if you can tell if a coma patient will ever wake up.”
“Uhh…I don’t know. I mean I can always try. Is there someone you want me to check out?”
“Yeah, there’s this guy who’s been here for about three months. His family is really stressed about what to do.”
“Okay, let’s go.”
The ICU is located on the third floor, in a very bright wing. Since most of the people in this ward are unconscious and need constant attention there is just one large room with curtains attached to the ceiling to provide privacy when necessary.
Mr. Gregory Strickland was in the bed farthest away from the door, I guess so that visitors wouldn’t notice that he was still there months after he was first admitted. He was a handsome man, about thirty-five with blond hair and strong bone structure.
Natalie moved to take his pulse, though with all the monitors attached to him, it didn’t seem necessary. I noticed that her thumb rubbed the back of his hand slowly. I had a feeling that Natalie might have a bit of crush on Mr. Strickland.
“What happened to him?”
“Car accident.” Natalie wasn’t looking at me.
“Nat…before I do anything, I need to know whether you have a personal interest in Mr. Strickland.”
She sighed. “I’ve developed a crush on him,” she admitted. “At first he was just a patient, albeit a cute one. Then when I started talking with his family I learned that he is a pretty awesome guy. I know it’s silly since I’ve never seen him with his eyes open, but he totally sounds like someone I would date, and you know how few of those exist in this town. Plus his mom and sisters are very nice, too.”
“I’m not a miracle worker and I don’t even know if I can be of any help. He could still die.”
“I know. It’s just a crush, and even if he wakes up there’s no guarantee that he’ll like me, or even that he’ll be the great guy that his family describes. You know as well as I do that family always speak highly of the sick and dying, no matter whether they were detested pigs when they were healthy.”
“Okay, well, here we go.” I put my hands on Mr. Strickland’s head and started searching for injury. I found swelling deep within his brain and it appeared that that was causing the coma, but I scanned the rest of him looking for other injuries. There were none.
“I can’t help him.”
“You can’t?” Natalie looked stricken.
“I can’t take away illnesses and injuries that put my own life in jeopardy. Or well, I can, but it might kill me and that doesn’t help the rest of the people in this world who are sick.” I told her about the swelling and that if I were to take it away, I could end up in the coma.
“So what can we do?”
“Well, if he’s stable, then I don’t see why you can’t keep him here until his family makes a decision. He’s still registering brain function, so I see no reason to do anything drastic. The swelling could go down and he’ll wake up…or he might not. I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault. Thanks for looking at him. I think I’ll keep this new information to myself, though. His family is stressed enough already.”
“Do you want me to look at anyone else?”
“No, everyone else up here is in a medically induced coma or improving. It was just him.”
“I’m hungry,” I told Natalie as we got back to the first floor. She was just opening her mouth to probably tell me that we’d go to the cafeteria when a nurse called her over to a patient.
“You go eat; I’ll grab something out of a vending machine. I’ll see you later,” she called to me as she rushed across the lobby.
I went to the cafeteria by myself for a sandwich and entertained myself with the book I found in my purse. I hadn’t finished Fahrenheit 451 yet, so I sat at the table in the cafeteria engrossed in my book. The ending surprised me, but the essays the author had written for the copy I had were very interesting. It’s quite ironic that there are people who succeeded in censoring the ultimate book on censorship.
My butt had fallen asleep while I was reading so I went for a walk around the hospital to stretch—half looking for Natalie to tell her bye before I left for the night. I had just entered the emergency wing when the doors to the ambulance bay burst open and people started calling for the crash cart. I pressed myself against the wall to get out of the way of the gurney being pushed towards the operating room. I recognized Nathan, who was straddling the patient on the gurney forcibly giving compressions while a partner worked the resuscitation bag.
I was a little shaken by the scene. I don’t often see people in a situation like that—my clients are always stable in one way or another. I knew Nathan and the rest of his crew would go to the EMS lounge before they left, so I went in there to wait. Okay, maybe I am a glutton for punishment—I wanted to see Nathan.
He walked into the lounge about fifteen minutes after I’d seen him on the gurney. He didn’t notice me at first, going straight for the mini-fridge and getting a Coke before he even realized that there was someone else in the room with him.
“Hey. Oh, hi!” he said when he recognized me, his tone improving immensely. “What brings you here?”
“Just helping out, since I had the day off.”
He came over to the couch I was sitting on and sat next to me, putting his arm around my shoulders, pulling me against his side. It was wonderful to feel the solidness of him. I laid my head against him.
“You need a life.”
“Why does everyone say that to me?” but I wasn’t angry. I knew it was true.
“Because the only difference between what you do for work and what you do on your day off is whether or not you get paid.”
“It works for me. And what about you? When you aren’t helping people as a cop, you help people as an EMT.”
“Yeah, but both jobs have plenty of down-time where I socialize with my co-workers.”
“Hey! I spent a lot of time socializing with Natalie and spent 3 hours talking with some of the patients here. And don’t say that I need to make friends outside of work, because you know that isn’t fair. I don’t want to drag anyone into the Brown’s wrath with me.”
“Sorry.” He did sound chastised and he squeezed my shoulders in half a hug.
“What happened with that guy?”
“Shot. You saw me?” I looked up at his face and his eyes twinkled. “Did I look dashing while trying to save the guy’s life?”
“I wouldn’t say dashing, but you did look intense. Are you often the one giving CPR?”
“Whenever I can manage it. The crew I work with has an agreement that whoever does the least amount of work to save the patient does the paperwork. I get to ride on the gurney while doing compressions and they get stuck trying to remember what all we did.” I felt his fingers gently stroke my arm.
“Did he make it?”
“I don’t know—I just handed him off to the doctors in the ER and changed my shirt before I came in here.”
“I’m sure you did everything that you could.”
“Yup.” He took a long swallow of soda. He didn’t speak further on it. We sat in silence for awhile, his arm sliding to wrap around my waist. I put my hand on his and caressed his fingers.
“Nathan! Come on man, you need to sign this so we can go. Oh!” a tall, gangly guy who looked just out of high school barged into the lounge. “Sorry. I didn’t realize your girlfriend was here. Hey.” He waved at me.
“Hi.” I was feeling awkward about being found cuddled next to Nathan. He extracted his arm from around me, standing up and throwing the Coke can into the recycling bin. He didn’t bother with introductions, but took the clipboard from the kid and read through the report quickly before signing it. I stood up and started collecting my things to leave the hospital.
I followed the two of them out of the lounge where they picked up the third member of their crew, a girl who looked about my age. Nathan stopped and looked at his crew and at me and suddenly realized that he was being distant. The look that crossed his face was priceless and he shook his head.
“Sorry. Not sure where my head’s been. Fred, Dalia, this is Scarlet.” He didn’t elaborate, but I shook hands with Fred and Dalia.
“You’re his girlfriend?” Fred asked. I guessed that Nathan’s moods were well known, since Fred hadn’t demanded an answer to his earlier supposition until after Nathan had finally made introductions.
“Uh…” I didn’t know how to answer.
“Not yet.” Nathan supplied, but the look he gave Fred said that he shouldn’t push for more information.
Dalia turned towards me, “Well, girlfriend or not, I’m glad that he’s found someone finally, because he’s been really moody the past few months and I’m tired of trying to figure him out.” The look she shot at Nathan told me that she was the one in charge of mental health on their crew.
I smiled at her. “Well, I can’t make any promises, but I’ll try to make him keep his moodiness to a minimum.”
“Good. It’s nice to meet you, but we should get back to the station before the captain wonders where we’re at. Bye.” Dalia grabbed Fred’s arm and dragged him down the hallway towards the ambulance bay. I thought it was a weird exit until I turned to Nathan and he caught my mouth with his in a goodbye kiss.
“Drive safe.” He murmured before following his partners out the door.
Natalie had seen the kiss (as had everyone at the nurse’s station) and she came over to me with a large grin on her face. “You two are adorable together!” she actually squealed.
I was embarrassed and told her a quick “bye” before I left in search of my car and went home.
Chapter 9
I started Thursday morning by cleaning out my refrigerator. My supply of leftovers wasn’t very large especially since I’d actually been able to get all that lasagna eaten, but there was some stuff that I put into my compost pile. I still had some ground beef that needed to be cooked, so I started chili with some beans I’d started soaking the night before in my crock-pot and added some vegetables that were getting old in the fridge. I still had an hour before Jill Green was due for her appointment so I called the florist and ordered some flowers to be sent to the family of Sarah Mahoney. Then I went into my garden to pick vegetables and pull weeds.
I’d left a sign on my front door telling Jill to come around the back if I didn’t answer the front door and as suspected, I didn’t hear her arrival. I brushed my knees off and we went into the house.
Jill was not even forty years old when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She’d had a double mastectomy a year ago, but it hadn’t stopped the cancer from spreading. It didn’t keep her from being in great spirits, though. Jill might know that she doesn’t have long left to live (her last doctor’s appointment had not left her with the best news), but it doesn’t stop her from living life to the fullest. If she didn’t tell people that she is sick, you’d never know. She’d made the decision to stop traditional treatment two months ago, but she still comes to me weekly and sometimes calls for help when she’s having a really bad day and also does some other alternative treatments. Her doctors are surprised that she has lasted this long, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she gets another two good months. Some people might think she’s not a fighter when they hear that she stopped conventional treatment, but I’ve known her for 3 years and she’s fought for every day of life.
“How was this past week?” I asked her as we sat at the kitchen table with a cup of tea in front of each of us. When she transferred to alternative medicine only, she’d insisted that we move our sessions out of the light drawing room since, she told me, she didn’t want to be reminded of the way she’d felt during that time of her life. So, we sit at my kitchen table or we go for a walk for her session.
“Oh, it wasn’t too bad. Hank and I went to New York City last weekend and we saw a few shows on Broadway and went shopping. We saw a few museums, too. But I bet you want to know about my health. I had a bad night in New York, but it didn’t interrupt my good time too much. We stayed in, ate marvelous room service and watched a great movie. Even the most active travelers need to take a day to recuperate, so I looked at it as nothing specific to being healthily challenged.” Jill doesn’t like to say that she’s sick.
“That’s great,” I told her, smiling. We talked about her four children, the oldest of which was just starting high school, the youngest in third grade before she told me that she should get going and she gave me her hand.
Since she wasn’t actively suffering I couldn’t just grab a lump of pain. It was a much more subtle challenge I faced. I pumped her full of my healthy immune system while taking away the twinge of pain I sensed around the edges of her aura, grabbing the worry over the fate of her children out of her mind, and stealing the fear she keeps hidden from everyone. It took just minutes, but the effects were seen instantly. There was a healthy color in her cheeks and the tiny lines of worry around her eyes disappeared.
“Thank-you, Scarlet.” She said, kissing my cheek before getting into her car. I’d given her the basket full of vegetables that I knew would just go to waste in my house. Her husband Hank was waiting in the car. He always drives her, but she makes him stay in the car, never letting him see her at what she perceives as her worst. When our sessions became informal she still refused to let him come inside because she said that we were having girl-talk and it wouldn’t be girl-talk if there was a man in the room. I waved at Hank and he waved back in reply.
I went back into the house to watch a movie. I never feel awful after helping Jill, but I wasn’t my usual self. I’ve often tried to describe the various feelings I have after helping people. Sometimes it’s easy—pain or nausea—and sometimes it’s nearly impossible. I guess that’s because sometimes my feelings make no sense, especially when I’m removing feelings that I cannot relate to, such as a worry about children that I do not have.
By the time the movie was over I felt normal again, so I stirred the chili and went back to the garden. Robert’s treatment had been scheduled for ten that morning so once I’d eaten lunch I called the hospital to ask when he might want a visitor. I was told that he didn’t want visitors until after three o’clock.
I called Nathan’s cell phone telling him that I was going to the hospital that afternoon and that if I wasn’t back by the time he got here, he was welcome to come in and get a bowl of chili.
I went up to my office to start the paperwork early. I had two appointments for Friday and they were both going to be tough. I wrote out receipts for both of those appointments as well as a deposit slip with the checks I’d already collected this week. It wouldn’t be difficult to add two more Saturday morning if I wasn’t up to it Friday night. I also started organizing my receipts for my accountant: I had to take her the quarter’s receipts on Monday. Since I work out of my home I have to attempt to differentiate between expenses for my home and expenses for my business. Or at least Penny wants me to do that. I keep telling her that it’s too much work to try and figure out how much of my cleaning supplies go to clean work spaces or how much water I use to serve tea and flush the toilet while clients are here. I’d finally convinced her to be happy deducting ten percent of my home property taxes since there are about ten rooms in my house and I use one specifically for my business (I didn’t tell her about the dark drawing room, which she would try to convince me is a business room). She also wants me to keep track of my pro bono work and deduct that. I think she just really hates taxes and looks for any way for her clients to pay less. It gives me a headache and since I have more than enough money to take care of myself, even after taxes, I don’t have any desire to try and keep more for myself. Whenever she asks me about pro bono work, I always tell her that I did about ten hours worth, about a thousand dollars. In reality, the one time I’d counted the hours, I’d worked for free almost as often as I worked for pay.
My phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Oh, Scarlet, I’m glad to reach you. It’s Stacy.”
“Hi Stacy. What’s up?”
“No emergencies,” she laughed. “I just finally found time to say thank-you for saving Charlotte.”
“You’re welcome, though you know I’d always help if I’m physically able.”
“You sure are a good Christian woman, I don’t care what my husband says.”
“Thank-you for those sentiments. I don’t hear that much in this town.”
“Are you going to be free this weekend? I’d like to visit and bring Charlotte. Ralph is going to a football game Sunday afternoon with some of his buddies, so it will be easy to get away.”
I looked down at my calendar. “Yeah, I’m free Sunday. Feel free to come over whenever you can.” I didn’t like that she had to sneak behind Ralphs back, but in the world we lived in, it was required.
“Awesome. Well, I need to feed Charlotte. I’ll see you Sunday.”
“Alright. Bye.”
I finished checking the figures in my accounting ledger and put the receipts into an envelope. It was two o’clock and I decided to go to the hospital early.
Natalie cornered me as soon as she saw me walk in.
“I don’t kiss and tell.” I said automatically.
“You’d better!” and she dragged me to her office and pushed me into a chair, hovering over me. “Spill.”
“There is nothing to spill. You know that we’ve been together. Is it really so shocking that we’ve kissed each other?”
“Oh, I guessed that you two have kissed before, but what’s really important is knowing what kind of kisser he is. That wasn’t just a peck of friends saying goodbye; that was a sneak attack kiss. And it curled our toes, too—that is mine and the nurses. Come on. We’ve all fantasized about Nathan—is he as great a kisser as he looks?”
“Yes?” I told her, emphasizing the question mark. “I really wouldn’t know, seeing as how he was my first real kiss.” Weird that these conversations were getting easier everyday.
“Well, does he make your blood boil?”
“He makes your blood boil when he kisses me—do you really think that he doesn’t make mine?”
“Point—stupid question. Does he slobber?”
“What? No. Definitely not.”
“Is he gentle? Or does he show his dominance?”
“Gentle, I guess, but that’s because of the problem.”
“Oh, right.” She looked disappointed. “So you haven’t gotten a fully passionate kiss from him? That sucks. You need to work through that problem quick because inquiring minds want to know what that man looks like naked.”
“Natalie!” I blushed and decided that she did not need to know about our potion induced make-out session.
“If you can’t tell us, then just take a picture—I’ve heard that they’re worth a thousand words.”
“NATALIE!”
She giggled. “Weren’t you planning on visiting Robert this afternoon?”
“Yes, that’s the only reason I came here today—not to be interrogated.”
“Well, he should be wanting visitors now,” she stepped back, allowing me to stand up. “You may go.”
Robert was napping when his mom let me into his room.
“I’m sorry you came all this way to visit him,” she whispered.
“Actually, I was wondering if you would let me help him feel better. I have a special talent and many people have benefited from my services.”
“You’re that Scarlet?” she looked shocked.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“We can’t pay you. Our insurance is barely willing to pay for the treatments we’re currently getting.” Her expression dared me to demand payment.
“I don’t expect you to pay me. I’m volunteering my services because I can help.” This was not the first time I’d had this conversation and when I’ve put myself in others’ shoes, I’ve had the same level of skepticism. “This is my standard contract, for legal purposes,” I told her, handing her the form. I’d already filled it in for her.
She read it over rather thoroughly. “So you’re only going to take away the symptoms of the chemo?”
“Yes.”
“But not the cancer?”
“I’m sorry, but I can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“My talent doesn’t work that way, I’m afraid. I wish that it did, but I can only take away symptoms.”
“Don’t you think that’s a bit convenient for you?”
“It’s as convenient for me as it is to the American Cancer Society that there isn’t a cure for cancer. When a cure for cancer is made, the ACS will no longer be necessary and how many people currently working in the organization would be out of work then? I’m not the only person making a living off cancer and other illnesses, but trust me when I say that I would cure it if it were physically possible, but it’s not. I do what I can.”
“What help do you give? You do not do anything to cure the disease.” She looked furious that I wasn’t the immediate fix that she would give her life for.
“I help people want to live. I know that the side-effects of chemo can be worse than the symptoms of the disease it’s supposed to fight. Many people give up the will to live purely because they tire of the pain and fatigue that comes from the treatment that often has poor results. I make them feel good so they can get out and live when the alternative is to lay in bed and wonder if death is better.”
Robert’s mother had tears in her eyes. “Do it. Please. I know he’s in pain, no matter how he tries to hide it. I just want my son back.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I walked over to Robert and laid my hand on his. Like I’d done hundreds of times before I pulled out the pain, the nausea, the fatigue that so many people pray will give them life. I don’t belittle the benefits of chemo and I know that it’s greatly extended, and saved, many of my clients’ lives. But for many people who get the treatment, their quality of life is lessened because of the side effects. I wish that I could help more cancer patients get more out of their treatments—help more people get the energy to get out and enjoy the world, but I’m only one person who can’t really leave this town.
Robert’s eyes opened as I took my hand away. “Woah. I feel great.” I smiled down at him, trying not to let him see my pain. “Mom, that’s the best treatment I’ve had so far!”
“Yeah, honey. It was experimental. I’m glad you’re feeling good. No. No, don’t get out of bed yet.” The tears that had been threatening finally did spill out of her eyes. She quickly wiped them away and moved to keep Robert from jumping out of bed. “Thank-you.” She murmured to me. I took that as permission to leave and nodded to her as I walked out of the room. I leaned against the wall with my eyes closed, debating whether I could work up the energy to find an empty couch or bed. Someone took my arm, and led me away from the wall.
“Come on, let’s find you a place to lie down.” I recognized the voice of Dr. Vickers.
“Thanks.” I said, leaning against his arm.
“Sorry it’s not more private, but all the rooms are in use right now.” He’d brought me to the EMS lounge and helped me lay down on one of the couches. He brought me a pillow and blanket from the nurse’s station and I fell asleep quickly.
Chapter 10
I didn't wake up until nearly 7:30.
"Shit," I grumbled groggily. I quickly grabbed my stuff and stumbled to the nurse's station. "Can I borrow your phone?"
"Sure." The nurse smiled in a way that made me worry.
"Nathan, hey. Sorry about being late. I didn't expect to sleep so long."
"It's fine. I called the hospital when I got here and you weren't back yet. They told me you were still sleeping in the lounge." I glanced at the nurse and she was giggling. Apparently my sex-life, or lack-there-of, was the big news of the week. "I've been eating your chili and reading your books, but I'm bored. You should come home." His tone was low, seductive. I blushed, which just made the nurse, she looked sixty, twitter louder.
“I’m leaving now.” I tried to make it sound light, I’m not sure how well that came across. I replaced the phone, trying not to meet the eyes of the nurse.
As I put my purse on my shoulder she said, just loudly enough for me to hear, “That’s a fine man you’ve got. And I do mean fine.” She winked at me. It took a lot of self-control for me to not run out of the hospital.
Nathan greeted me at the door with a kiss and led me into the den. He was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt and I’d noticed his truck in the driveway.
“What’s this?” I asked as he gestured for me to sit on the couch.
“I’m welcoming you home after a long day of work, with a bowl of chili that, okay, you cooked. Let me take off your shoes and rub your feet.” He’d handed me the bowl of chili and tugged my legs onto his lap. I twisted so that my back was resting on the arm of the couch. It was nice.
“But…why?” My body squirmed involuntarily as his hands began to work their magic on my feet.
“I’ve had plenty of time to think about you during the last two days. And I realized that sex is just a minor part of a healthy relationship…
“Dr. Ruth would beg to differ,” I interrupted.
“And I don’t want to lose you because of something so minor,” he finished, ignoring my interruption. “Plus I’ve been thinking about your power and what exactly happens to me. I don’t feel poorly while I’m under your spell,” Not my spell! I wanted to shout, but refrained. “And I have some awareness. So, I don’t see why we need to let it stop us.” His right hand left my feet and started massaging its way up my leg. It felt delicious, but I realized what he was trying to do.
“Wha…stop!” I slid my legs off of him and moved away, setting the chili on the table.
“Sorry! Sorry!” Nathan held his hands up. “I thought you wanted…”
I shook my hands at him. “You’re fine. It’s me.” Stupid, stupid man! Oh this was awkward. “Look, I get what you’re offering me, but it’s not what I want. I… uh…I need for you to be here for that. I can’t just use you.” I knew my face was bright red.
“Oh…um…you’re a virgin?” He looked embarrassed.
“Yeah.” I said shortly, not looking at him.
“Okay. I…uh…didn’t think about that. Of course you wouldn’t want to just throw yourself at me. Not that you would do that if you weren’t a virgin. Umm…”
I laughed, a little hysterically, “Oh there are plenty of ladies at the hospital who would jump your bones at the slightest wink, whether or not you’re mentally present.” I sobered some. “I need a bit more guidance.”
“No problem.” Nathan tentatively handed me back my bowl of chili and reached for my feet again. I ate while he rubbed and told me about how dull his day had been. “I parked centrally downtown for three hours and I was only reprieved from that when the chief called me to do a coffee and donut run. Do not make any jokes,” he said, raising his finger and glaring.
“I’d never.” I said sagely. “Were they jelly?”
Nathan grabbed my empty bowl while reaching to tickle my side. I’m incredibly ticklish and I don’t think I’d told Nathan that yet. I squealed and squirmed, trying to avoid his hands, but there wasn’t much room to maneuver on the couch and he was adept at keeping me from escaping. I tried to tickle him back, but that wasn’t affective. I needed relief; I couldn’t breathe because I was laughing so hard. I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled his mouth to mine, rubbing myself against him. It worked and he froze.
“Hah.” I gasped. “I found your Achilles heel.” I looked up at him while I got my breathing under control—he’d straddled me at some point and before he’d froze he’d put his hands on both sides of my head to keep his weight off of me. His mouth was still in kissable range and his expression was scorching, even with his eyes half-closed. I kissed him again while I pulled his desire away.
His mouth started moving against mine again, but uncertainly. I was contemplating whether I should take his shirt off while he seemed to be confused about what to do with his tongue. We kept kissing as his confidence grew and my desire faded to a more natural level.
I pulled back from him. “Do you really think we should do this?”
“I want to. It feels weird, but I love kissing you,” he said, moving to put his mouth back on mine.
“What do you mean it feels weird?” I asked, pushing on his shoulders gently to make him look at me.
“Huh? Oh, I’m not sure. I mean, I’m kissing you with part of me literally shut off. It feels good... no...great, but I actually have to think about it. I guess I’ve been using my natural instinct to kiss before, and now I’m stuck using my real brain.” He smiled down at me nervously. “I hope I’m doing a good job: I’ve never been worried about my kissing skills before, which is actually a bit arrogant now that I think about it.
“Well, the girls at the hospital want to know whether or not you’re a good kisser, so I’ll tell you the same thing I told Natalie: I wouldn’t know. I’ve never been really kissed before,” I admitted.
“Wow. I’m your first for everything then?”
“Yeah.” I liked the implications of that statement.
“Talk about pressure. You’ll measure every man that succeeds me up to the standard that I set.”
“What makes you think that there will be other men?” I asked a bit indignantly.
“Good,” he growled and kissed me possessively. “Are we official yet?”
“What?”
“Fred will want to know that you’re officially considering yourself my girlfriend. I’m not pressuring you or anything, but I’ve never felt this strongly about a woman before.”
I sighed and looked up at him. Half of me was screaming to say yes because I really thought I was falling in love with him. The other half of me was saying no because I really thought I was falling in love with him. But falling in love with him meant that I was going to hurt a lot when he decided that he needed more than foot massages, good food, and the occasional ten minute kissing match.
“What’s wrong?” he asked after I hadn’t said anything for five long minutes.
“I just don’t want to get hurt,” I said finally, my voice strained. I pushed against his chest to tell him to move so that I could sit up.
“I won’t hurt you, ever,” he told me firmly, settling next to me with his arm around me.
“Not now. But what happens in six months, a year, when you decide that you need sex? You already offered yourself for me to use as a…” I couldn’t say it. “Sure, we would both get carnal satisfaction, but I know it’s not enough, even if I could do things that way with you.” Tears escaped my eyes and I wiped them away furiously. “I realize that you aren’t shallow, but let’s face the facts. You are a man, you have needs, and I can’t fulfill them.”
“There are plenty of ways for me to get satisfaction without your help and without cheating on you.”
“I know that. And I’m actually a girl who doesn’t believe that that stuff is cheating, so please feel free to use those outlets. But that’s still not going to replace the pleasure that comes from physically being with a woman—you are going to desire that and no matter how much you fight it, you are going to leave me to be able to lie in the arms of another. And I hope to God that when you do, we won’t be together because I don’t take kindly to cheaters.”
“I’m not going to cheat on you. I’m stronger than you give me credit for.”
“Now. But think about the future. Do you really thing that you can sustain yourself with magazines?”
“I can when I have you to cuddle with afterwards. And what about you? Are you telling me that you will be satisfied with being a virgin your whole life? Or are you going to want a man who can send you to the moon without taking a vacation there himself? I might call you a saint because you give more of yourself than you have, but when it comes to this, you have no more self-control than I have.” He glared at me, daring me to try and top that. Then he waggled his eyebrows at me, ruining the effect.
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to laugh or cry. I hugged him. “Ugh. It’s stupid of me, and I will be a sappy mess when it ends badly, but right now I just want to be with you,” I told him, my head resting on his shoulder.
I felt his breath on my neck. “I promise that if I ever feel the need to sleep with a woman, you will be the first to know.”
I sat back and looked at him. “And if I ever get the desire to…uh…change my virginal status, you’ll be the first to know.”
“Good. Then I can set up some mood lighting and music and draw you a few diagrams to guide you along after I take my mini-vacation. ‘Put item one into hole two…’” I smacked him playfully and he pulled me tight against him. “We’ll figure this out,” he murmured into my hair.
“Yeah.”
After awhile I sat up and looked at him shyly. “Do you want to stay the night?”
“Yes,” he said instantly. He followed me up stairs to my bedroom. I grabbed some pajamas out of my drawer before going into the bathroom to change and brush my teeth. Nathan had already taken his shirt and belt off and was standing barefoot waiting for me when I came back. He was just as muscled as I’d imagined. I knew that nothing would happen tonight, but I was still suddenly nervous.
“Uh…if you want to brush your teeth, there’s an extra toothbrush on the counter in the bathroom,” I told him, awkwardly jerking my arm to point out the door.
He grinned. “Ah, the subtle hint that my breath stinks.”
“Wait, what? I didn’t say that at all!” But he was already walking past me to the bathroom. It took me a full minute to realize that he’d said that only because he could tell I was anxious. I grabbed a pillow off the bed and stood to the side of the door so that he wouldn’t see me when he walked in. It made a satisfying thump when it connected with his stomach.
“Hey! What was that for?” He asked wearily, raising his hands to show me he was unarmed as I readied myself for another attack.
“For implying that I would complain about your breath.” I swung my pillow at his head, but missed. Nathan took the time that I was off balance to grab another pillow from my bed, arming himself. He smacked me on the butt while I finally did hit him over the head. We both got our fair share of hits, tickles, and kisses before falling onto the bed laughing, our legs hanging off the end.
He brushed my hair out of my face before resting his hand on my stomach. “I think I love you.”
My breath caught…probably not a good thing since I was already trying to catch my breath from laughing so hard… “Woah.”
“Too soon?” he asked, wincing. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. I think I love you, too, I just wasn’t expecting you to say it first.” I grinned at him.
He kissed me deeply, before standing and pulling me up with him. He turned down the comforter and gestured for me to climb into bed. He tucked me in before turning out the light and walking around the bed to get in next to me. We fell asleep cuddled together.
I woke up to the feeling of lips on mine.
“Whaa?” I opened my eyes and saw Nathan looking down at me. Oh, I wish I was more coherent in the morning—I felt like a moron.
“Good morning,” he whispered smiling.
“ ’Morning,” I groaned. “What time is it?” I looked around, trying to see the clock without my glasses.
“Early. I have to go so I can get ready for work.” He’d already gotten dressed. “Sorry for waking you up, but I didn’t want to just leave.”
“That’s sweet of you.” I blinked at the sunlight just starting to lighten the sky out the window.
“You don’t believe that,” he said, laughing. “You think I’m a jerk who needs to leave you alone so you can go back to sleep.”
“You’re a mind reader,” I chuckled. “But come here anyway.” I reached my arms up, wrapped them around his neck and kissed him thoroughly. “See you later?” I asked when I released his mouth.
“Oh hell’s yes,” he growled, his eyes slightly crossed. I laughed. He kissed my forehead before leaving the room. I rolled over and hugged the pillow he’d used the night before. There might then have been some uncontrollable giggling because, hell, spooning is fun! I couldn’t believe that Nathan had spent the night with me—Squee!
I laid on my bed and stared at the ceiling, trying to memorize the exact feeling of his body next to mine. I’d spent my whole life feeling like a person who’d drawn the ultimate short straw. Who would want to date a girl who has the fury of an entire church—with magic aiding them, no less—against her? I’d spent my whole life just trudging along, praying to stay invisible, while wondering if any male would ever get the courage to get to know me. For all my ancestors had written about their talent, they hadn’t left me much information on their personal lives. I knew that they’d all gotten married at some point, otherwise I wouldn’t be here, but I didn’t know much about the husbands. All the siblings left town, I knew that. If I could, I would have left this town, but that’s one of the quirkiest quirks of this “gift”. The same personality trait that makes me give every ounce of myself to help people who don’t really want to have anything to do with me (though with the information I’d gained recently, my annoyance with that detail had greatly been redirected) also gives me no desire to leave. It’s not my house, it’s not the atmosphere, it’s not because I have some sick need to hurt myself. Nope. Great-Grandma Elizabeth had left for almost five years before she had to come back. She wrote five pages in the bible while she tried to figure out what it was that made her come back and she didn’t get very far. All of her entries have a certain amount of scorn about being back in this town. I don’t have much scorn—I’ve always just been resigned to the situation as one I could not change.
Now that Nathan was in my life, I wouldn’t have changed a thing. They say that it’s “better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all” and the way I felt right now, I think that’s true. Whatever the future brings, I’d always have this time to remember, so I was going to enjoy every second. Plus, I didn’t feel like getting out of bed, and I was too antsy to go back to sleep.
Eventually I did get up to take a shower and prepare for the day.
I was sleeping in the dark drawing room when there was a knock on my front door. It was five-thirty and I wasn’t expecting anyone, so when I opened my door and saw Nathan standing on my porch in jeans, I was slightly confused. He handed me a single yellow rose.
“What’s this for?” I asked, smelling it.
“Our one week anniversary,” he replied, stepping inside and greeting me with a kiss.
“Has it really just been a week? Sheesh.” I went into the kitchen and filled a bud vase for the rose. I put it in the center of my dining room table. “Very pretty.”
“You mentioned that you like to get flowers.”
“That, I do.” We sat in the chairs in the light drawing room. “How was your day?”
“Same old, same old. We did have a stolen car to track down. Some kids went joy-riding last night. Yours?”
“Average. Two bouts of Chemo.”
“You do a lot of cancer treatments?”
“Yeah. That and arthritis, with the occasional migraine. Most other things are too trivial for people to seek me out. Pain management is my main business.”
“That sucks.”
“Not really,” I told him. “I give over a lot of my energy when I do the treatment, so I go to sleep as soon as my patients leave. I only ache for a few minutes before I go into the other room and pass out for a few hours. I don’t feel the pain while I’m asleep.”
“Is that why the bed in that room is so comfortable?” He looked across the foyer to the other drawing room.
“Yep. That’s my recovery room. My mom just had a regular bed in there, but I used some of my first earnings to buy the best mattress I could find.”
“What happened to your mom? She’d always looked fine when I saw her around town; it was a shock when we heard that she’d died. ‘Course, Uncle Edward was thrilled, as you’d expect. He threw a little party for his followers to celebrate the deaths of all your relatives in town.”
“That doesn’t surprise me in the least.” I hesitated to talk about my mom, though. Sure, I loved her, but I still resented what she’d done. “Let’s go start dinner,” I said, reaching for his hand.
He didn’t press the subject and we decided that we’d just have sandwiches and salads for dinner. We’d just settled in the den with our food when Nathan brought up the subject of my mom again.
“Are you going to talk about her eventually?” His eyes probed mine.
“Yes. Eventually. I’m just new to this whole sharing feelings thing and I’m not ready for that subject to be voiced. Forgive me?”
“Nothing to forgive. I asked a question and you don’t want to talk about it. I expect that will happen a lot in the course of our relationship, and on both sides of the table. I just hope that we’ll be able to talk about those things together at some point.”
“Speaking of not talking about feelings, then, what’s this about you being moody for months? Dalia did look worried about you.”
“Huh? Oh,” he blushed. “My ex-girlfriend cheated on me after nearly getting me to leave this town and I’ve been pissed off at her. I was very close to throwing everything away here and moving to California to be with her when I found out.”
“Someone would cheat on you?!” I was honestly shocked. “Why?”
“Why does that surprise you?” but his eyes looked amused. “No really, tell me why you think a girl would be out of her mind to cheat on me.” He took a bite of his sandwich and had to wrestle with a slice of tomato that fell out.
“Well,” I started, lowering my voice, “you’re incredibly modest and very sophisticated.” I wiped at the tomato juice on his chin with my finger and licked it clean.
“Careful or I’m going to go visit mars.”
I laughed. “Greasy, grimy gopher guts stuffed in lettuce,” I sang.
“Thank-you for that wonderful picture.”
“That’s what I’m here for.” I bit into my own sandwich, doing so very neat and primly.
“Well aren’t you Miss Classy”
“I exude elegance.”
“You exude something, but I’m not sure if it’s elegance.”
“I thought we decided never to refer to that incident.” I tried to sound controlled, but that really had been the most embarrassing moment of my life.
“Whoops! Sorry!” He looked aghast. “I was totally thinking kindness, confidence, and killer sex appeal. But graceful, you are not, which contradicts the idea that you’re elegant. I did not even think about that other thing. But if I may,” he started, holding his hand up so that I wouldn’t hit him, “I would say that I’ve never seen a sexier pile of mess than I saw when you saved those children. If men are biologically ingrained to find a woman who will be a great mother, then you set off all those sensors in me when you walked into that room knowing full well that you would come out of it in that state. In a world where many women care more about their appearance than anything else, it was a huge turn on when you gave that up to help others.”
I smiled at him. “Well, that’s very sweet for you to say, but I never want my bodily functions to be discussed in this house again. Ever.” I narrowed my eyes.
“Done.” He took another bite of his sandwich.
We debated what movie to watch, which somehow ended up in a philosophical argument on the meanings of Harry Potter, I’m not sure how, before we finally settled on Lucky Number Slevin—which, really ,was an easy decision because I hadn’t watched it yet and I had to return it to the library on Saturday no matter what.
The movie was good, but I spent a lot of it debating whether or not I was ready to talk about my mom. After we finished eating we’d stretched out on the couch together. His chest was very warm on my back and I wondered if I would ever feel like my mom did. I loved Nathan, or at least, I figured this was what love felt like. I could easily see us doing this every night. I could even see us having children if that ever becomes possible, though I was seriously wondering if that was the kindest thing to do in this town. He made me feel good about myself. I realized that I hadn’t really been living before, I’d just gone through the motions—waking up, doing my work, and pretending that I didn’t exist. Now I had someone to talk about things with, my relationships with others had been transformed, too.
Natalie and I had always been on friendly terms, but I’d never confided my worries with her before. I think she’d tried to get me to share more, but I’d always wanted to protect her. The less people know me, the less fuel the Brownies would have to use against them. With the revelation about their magic, it was apparent that it was less safe for people I might want to call friends than I’d thought, but after tasting this new world, I couldn’t bear to let it go. Oh, I would in a heartbeat if it was the only way to save them, but I really didn’t want to.
I heard a soft snore and twisted around to look at Nathan’s face. He was out. Funny, I didn’t remember hearing him snore the night before—maybe it was a couch thing. I let him sleep and watch
ed the rest of the movie confident that I would share everything with Nathan when he woke up.
As the credits rolled, I sat up and stretched, letting the arm that was around me settle onto my lap.
“Hmm…?” I was happy to see that Nathan looks as confused as I do when he first wakes up. “Wha did I miss?” he asked groggily.
“The whole movie…or at least everything after you fell asleep.”
“Oh.” He reached for me. “Back to sleep then.” He pulled me against him, his face rubbing against my neck. “You smell good.”
“Thank-you.” We were laying on our sides, looking at each other.
“You’re beautiful, too.”
“You’re just full of flattery. If I wasn’t sure otherwise, I’d say that you’re just trying to get laid.” I ran my fingers through his soft hair.
“I am trying to get laid, my equipment is just broken.”
“You wouldn’t say such things if you could get into my pants.” I told him, scowling.
“That is one hundred percent true. But that’s one of the beautiful things about being a modern guy in a superficial world. Women find it to be a total turn on when a guy really wants to do something but can’t for either physical or moral reasons and admits it to her. You ever read Twilight? Bella totally digs Edward more because he wants to drink her dry but is able to control himself, barely. It’s his “sacrifice”, see the air quotes, that gives him a double bump in hotness.”
“Okay…the fact that you’ve read Twilight is subtracting from whatever sexy points you hoped to gain by admitting that you are trying to get into my pants, but can’t,” I said, poking him in the chest.
“Hey, it wasn’t my choice. My third girlfriend was obsessed with the books and I had to read them to understand what she was saying half the time. Let’s just say that it wasn’t my most honorable moment when I realized that more than half of the reason why I was breaking up with her was because of the Twilight thing.” He looked ashamed. “I really wasn’t paying attention when we started going out or I would have seen the precursors to that particular development.”
“What was wrong?” I realize that it’s probably not normal for a current girlfriend to be interested in the exes of her boyfriend, but with my limited relationship experience, I felt that it was important for me to know these things. I really liked that he wasn’t calling her weird, or a psycho-bitch for her obsession. His ability to speak so matter-of-factly about his exes told me that he didn’t feel the need to belittle them to make himself look better.
“Well, since we’re discussing things in terms of Twilight, I guess it was because she was a lot like Bella. She was always certain that I was going to leave her for someone better.”
I blushed. Hadn’t I already confessed to him that I knew that he was going to leave me for someone else?
He seemed to read my mind. “Hey, the discussion we had was completely viable—it wasn’t like you were telling me that I was going to leave you for someone taller, or skinnier, or blonde-er.”
“Oh, so you’re telling me that I’m short, fat, and brunette?” I scowled at him. He looked flabbergasted. “I’m just yanking your chain.” I smiled, kissing his cheek.
“Do not scare me like that! Do you realize how many guys have nightmares about the ‘does this dress make me look fat’ debate?” He looked relieved.
“Really? Girls actually do that and they want a serious answer? That sucks.” I was serious. A lack of girl, or guy, friends leaves you ignorant of these social norms. “I’d always thought that was just used in television and movies for comedic relief.”
“Yeah. It’s not one of their more flattering charms. But for the record, if you were to ever ask me that question, what do you want me to say?”
“You know how you reacted when you saw me come out of the bathroom wearing that dress? That was perfect.”
“Huh…but what if you literally use the words ‘does this dress make me look fat’? Even after my eyes bug out? Then how do you want me to answer?”
“I want you to be honest, because I don’t want to be dressed up and have everyone else think I look fat. I’d rather change. But if I see your eyes bug out, I probably won’t ask you that, because honestly, I could look like an elephant and I wouldn’t care after you looked at me like that.”
“Okay,” he said slowly. “But you’ll have to excuse me if I’m not quick to test the theory that you want me to tell you that you look fat.”
“Fair enough. I don’t expect to have many opportunities to wear dress up clothes anyway.”
“Why not?”
“Nathan. Come on. Do you really want to publicize our relationship in this town?”
“Yes,” he said instantly. “It sounds cliché, but I want to scream it from the rooftops.” He smiled down at me.
“Do your parents know?” I asked quietly.
“No, but that’s because I wanted to talk about it with you first. You have as much invested in this relationship as I do.”
“I don’t think it will change my status any for your family to learn who you’re dating, but I think you should really re-think your screaming from the rooftops plan. It’s not an easy life that you want to enter. None of the husbands have had it easy and you can imagine the strain it puts on the marriage. I don’t have many personal accounts about the marriages, but there are a few complaints about how hard it was for the husband to get a job. Could you imagine losing your job because of me?”
He sighed. “This town sucks. You want to runaway together?” His arms tightened around me.
I laughed grimly. “I wish I could, but I physically can’t. I’ll get dragged back here by the magic just like Elizabeth did.” I paused. “Tell me about your past girlfriends.”
“WHAT?!” He didn’t quite shout but he definitely looked at me like I’d grown a second head.
“I don’t have any relationship experience, so I want to know what they did that made the two of you break up. What they did that you liked. I’m not going to try and change myself to be like, or not like them, but I want to know why you dated them. To start off, what’s your type?”
“My type of girl? Sheesh. You don’t have any relationship experience—these aren’t questions girls ask of their boyfriends.”
I shrugged. “I don’t care what’s normal. I want to know what your type of girl is.”
He sighed. “I don’t think I have a type. Or at least not a specific type of physical appearance. My exes have all looked different—all shapes sizes and colors. My first girlfriend was my freshman year of high school. We weren’t very serious and dated for a few months. It was a mutual break up—we were more friends than lovers, I guess, if that makes sense since we weren’t having sex. My second girlfriend was Shelia. We got together junior year. She was my first…” he cleared his throat. “Anyway. We broke up after graduation, though I probably should have broken it off earlier. I think she just wanted to be with me because I looked good on her arm, but like I told you: I was a horny teenager—I wasn’t dating her for the conversations. And if you’re looking for a reason to think less of her as a person, then I’ll tell you that I wasn’t her first.” He searched my eyes, probably looking for evidence that he was telling me too much.
“I’m not surprised by that piece of info, but I don’t care. I have enough of my own problems to deal with to bother worrying about others. Anyway, that’s two. Then there was the third who was obsessed with Twilight…”
“We met in college and dated for two years, I guess. She got a bit clingy, like being with me twenty-four/seven would keep me from wanting to date others.”
“And finally the one who cheated?”
He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “We met three years ago, after I’d started on the police force here. We hit it off immediately and got pretty serious quickly. But she is an ambitious woman. She thought that I should schmooze my way to be the youngest police chief ever. I ignored her prodding, since she wasn’t very pushy. She wants to make a name for herself and this isn’t the place to do that. She started looking for work in the big cities, travelling for interviews. She finally got an offer for a once in a lifetime position in California and we were talking about moving there when I accidently intercepted a text from some guy in New York looking for a hook-up. When I asked her about it, she broke down quickly telling me about all the guys she’d slept with on her way to the top, while still dating me. I guess she thought she’d get my sympathy because they were all ‘casting couch’ situations.” He huffed. “I think she wanted me to believe that it was rape, but if that were the case, why didn’t she tell me after the first time? Or at least, why did she let it happen more times? And worse: why did some of the guys have her phone number? Anyway. I broke up with her that night. I kept the apartment, yeah, we were living together, and she moved across the country. That was six months ago.”
“That bitch,” I said simply. He looked happy at that sentiment.
“Wow, that actually felt really good to get off my chest.” He started to pull me against his chest again, but I resisted.
“You shared a lot, so I guess I should share too.”
“Scarlet, you don’t have to.”
“No, I thought about it during the movie. I want to. I think it will make me feel better, too.” Now it was my turn to take the deep breath. “My mom committed suicide. I mean, in the only way one of my kind would, but it was still a conscious decision to do more than her body could handle. My dad was killed in a car accident when I was three—mom never forgave herself for not being able to save him. She didn’t neglect me, but she was never all the way there. We didn’t talk about many of the things teenage girls talk to their moms about, hence why my education about relationships is limited to what I read in books. She taught me the basics of the gift, but mostly left me to figure it out for myself from the bible. I guess that’s because she knew that I wouldn’t have her to lean on later. She mostly buried herself in work, leaving me to deal with my problems alone. The day after my sixteenth birthday she went to the hospital to do rounds and saved a man who was having a heart attack, having it instead for herself. Her files showed that she’d planned to kill herself for years. She’d left a will that dictated that I get everything and a notarized statement from a lawyer saying that she felt that I was capable of caring for myself and that I should be ruled an emancipated minor. Well, this town being how it is, nobody wanted to take me in as a foster kid, nor did they want to publicize to the state that they didn’t care about ‘one of their own’, so a judge here, heavily under the influence of Rev. Brown, ruled in that favor. At barely sixteen I was left alone in the world. But I don’t blame my mom. I only hope that I love…someone as much as my mom obviously loved my dad.” Surprisingly, the tears didn’t come.
Nathan looked stricken. “I don’t care that you don’t blame your mom, that’s horrible.”
“Oh, I didn’t say that it wasn’t/isn’t horrible, but I have clients who are clinically depressed—trust me when I say that it is a terrible existence that no one should have to deal with. I don’t want to be so dependent that I commit suicide, but to feel that amount of love that causes it, just for a little bit, would be wonderful. I guess it’s because I’ve never really felt loved before.” I couldn’t look at his face.
He tilted my chin up until my eyes met his. “I love you. Period. End of statement. And as a man who loves you I can tell you that if anything happens to me, I do not want you to ever hurt yourself, especially if we have a child that needs to be cared for. I’m sorry that your mom went through what she did, but you are stronger than that.”
I held up a hand, “You’re speaking to the choir. It took me a long time to forgive my mom, and my first experience with a severely depressed patient greatly helped me do that. She needed help and she didn’t seek it. I want the love—NOT the mental illness. I think my dad rolled over in his grave when mom killed herself.”
“You have the love,” he said, smiling down at me. I kissed him.
“We’ll see. You haven’t met that tall, skinny, blonde who can have sex with you yet,” but he just laughed at that.
It was nearly midnight when we finally decided to turn in. Nathan went out to his truck to grab a backpack that he’d brought some clothes in.
“I do not want to sleep in jeans again,” he declared. I went into the bathroom to change and brush my teeth, but was interrupted halfway through the latter when Nathan knocked on the door. “Scoot over,” he instructed. He was shirtless again, wearing a pair of plaid pajama pants and I took the time to marvel at his chest and back while he brushed his teeth. There is only one sink in the bathroom, so we fought over who got to spit and rinse first. He followed me to the bedroom and once again we fell asleep entwined in each other’s arms.
Chapter 12
The seven months that passed were the happiest of my life. Nathan and I had to learn how to keep our relationship secret especially when we bumped into each other in public places. It was difficult to keep my mouth shut when we found ourselves in line together at the supermarket and the girl behind the check-out counter flirted with him. I couldn’t hide the eye-roll I gave when she doubled his discounts. She saw it, called me a “fat cow who couldn’t get a real man if I paid him”, and charged me twice on my ground beef without even pretending to do otherwise. I let it go, especially since we were sharing food costs and it actually ended up costing us less. Nathan had heard the insult, but we’d decided that we didn’t want to draw attention to us, so he also kept his mouth shut. He was waiting at my car when I came outside and gave me a hug.
“You’ll notice that she paid me when she doubled my discounts, and yet, who is it who has me?” which made me feel a lot better. “And you are NOT a fat cow.”
“Moo.” I couldn’t help myself. He put his bags into my car and I took them back to my house. He’d complained about the lack of junk-food in my kitchen, so I told him he could buy his own and keep it on the empty top shelf in my pantry. He was practically living with me, though he kept his apartment for appearances sake and because he still had a few more months on his lease. When his buddies wanted to watch sports at his place, that’s where they went, a perk that I really liked, actually. Otherwise, the only time he went to the apartment was to pick up his mail. Whether anyone noticed that his truck and patrol car were rarely in the parking lot of his apartment building, we’ll never know. I only went there once, to drop him off so that he could move his patrol car to my house. My house is on the outskirts of town, practically in the woods and way off the beaten track with plenty of bushes to obscure it from the road, so random passers-by can’t see who is parked there. My clients probably noticed that the truck was parked there, but did not comment. I suspect that they knew whose truck that was and kept it quiet for the same reasons that they don’t publicize their own visits to my home. The nurses and Natalie continued to hound me for details, but I just smiled and dodged the questions. It was our business and no one else’s. Nathan was now regretting that public kiss at the hospital—everyone, including Fred and Dalia, expected a repeat whenever we were seen together in a somewhat private area (like the EMS lounge), though thankfully this wasn’t the case when the spot was more public.
Jill passed away peacefully at home, after doing a month long tour of Europe, surrounded by her friends and family. Robert was in remission. His mom asked me to help him through the rest of his treatments and I was happy to take him on as a client. When I take on a client who cannot afford to pay me I only ask that they “pay it forward” in some way. I see their whole family at the hospital, volunteering to help other families get through the ordeals that they knew so well. Stacy brings Charlotte to visit me as often as she can. Charlotte had no ill effects from her trip to the hospital and is growing beautifully.
Nathan and I continued to try and figure out a way to get over his intimacy problem. I tried to get a meeting with various members of the Brownies, but they refused to even take my calls. I tried to make my trips to the hospital more apparent, to let people see that what I do is good. I even tried to go to church one Sunday, but I was just glared at and I noticed that not only did the service start late, but it seemed totally geared towards passages denouncing witchcraft and heathenism. I suspected that the late start was because the Reverend wanted to re-write his entire sermon.
For his part, Nathan read my bible, looking for anything that I might have missed. He did find one strange thing. Many of my ancestors noted weird results, where, in their attempts to heal one thing the results were not the one-to-one that we expect. One time, a simple cough was transferred as a runny nose. Another time, a headache became a sore back. It was like the symptom got lost in transit. We talked about it and decided to see if I could force this to happen.
Over the months we’d learned that Nathan got about an hour of relief from his problem after I woke him up. We could then touch each other intimately and he wouldn’t get so turned on physically and thus could enjoy it. I joked with him that I hoped his normal recovery time wasn’t so long. But our first attempts at trying out my possible new ability were slow:
“I’m not going to hurt you or let you hurt yourself.”
“Well, how can I try and alter symptoms when I have nothing to swap? It’s frustrating that I have to wait an hour to try again.” We’d decided that the easiest way to see if we were making progress would be to turn his desire into a cramp in my foot. So far I’d only been able to make my foot feel numb and that had taken three days of trying. I couldn’t continue to give him my innocence because that was what was taking an hour to wear off. If only I had some pain or symptom to give to him instead.
“I know,” he said, hugging me. “But we’re not going to turn sadistic and trade punches or cuts.”
That was the dilemma we found ourselves in for most of the month of October. It wasn’t until I woke up feeling sick that we made progress.
“You want to give me what?!” Nathan was looking green and glanced unhappily at his bowl of cereal.
“My cramps. I also have some fatigue or bloating if you want to go that way.” I tried to sound casual, though this was probably the first time I had a frank discussion of my period since my mom first explained it to me.
“I must really love you because I’m still sitting here thinking about this.” He sighed and pushed away his bowl. He crossed his arms across his chest. “Okay, my first question is whether there will be any damage to me since I don’t have your equipment—I really don’t need to further harm my reproductive system.”
“You have the same muscles, which is where the cramps are.” I gestured at my lower abdomen.
“What does it feel like?”
“Uhh…I don’t really know how to explain it. Maybe similar to a guy getting hit in the crotch? Though I wouldn’t know that feeling. It’s painful, though not as painful as labor, but exercise helps a lot, as does heat…and chocolate.”
“And how long will it last?”
“Umm…well, you know about my lack of control over my own strength,” I’d been trying to get the innocence to a minimum dose, but that hadn’t worked. “So it might last an hour, too. We won’t know until we try.”
“You know, this is the ultimate in emasculation.” He groaned. “Okay, I’m game, but this goes the way of the hospital mess story—never to be referred to again, got it?”
“Scout’s honor,” I told him, holding up the two fingers. I grabbed some Hershey’s minitures out of the pantry and a bottle of Advil and followed him into the den. We settled on the couch and started making-out. No matter how our relationship is stressed, we loved the fact that we could sit on a couch on a Sunday morning and make-out without feeling unproductive.
It didn’t take long for him to get aroused, but I paused before I transferred my pain, thinking through the three exchanges I had to make: take his desire, give him my cramps, and somehow wrestle his desire into a cramp in my foot—all at the same time. I started the transfer slowly, sending the cramps while grabbing onto his desire. It was easier this time. I’d never really thought about what the “innocence” was when I gave it to him. It wasn’t anything I could describe in particular, just a general feeling. I knew then that emotions were not my forte—pain, however, is. Pain is tangible, pain is real, pain has a shape, a form, and can be held…or at least in my imagination, which is half of the act of doing magic. Previous attempts had been like juggling eels—I’d used all my consciousness trying to figure out exactly what innocence is and sending it to him that when the desire entered my body, I’d already missed my chance to grab it and shape it to my own will. This time, I’d already sent the pain, in a controlled dose, to him when I grabbed the desire, and the desire never had a chance to escape into my body. It was no trouble to stuff it down into the muscles of my foot.
“Oh! OUCH!” My foot was contorted in a strange angle, clearly cramped up.
“Are you okay?” Nathan was looking green again and he rubbed his abdomen roughly, working through his own cramp.
“I’m fine. You?” I rubbed my foot, trying to get the muscles to relax.
“Well, it’s definitely not the same feeling as getting hit in the balls. It’s more like a tooth ache, I guess, though on a larger scale.”
“Yeah, a dull ache would explain it pretty well.” I flexed my foot. It still hurt, but it was moving again.
Nathan reached for some chocolate. “Please forgive me and all male-kind for not being more sympathetic to the misery women go through every month. This goes on for five days plus the other symptoms?” He curled up on his side, still rubbing his guts.
“Huh? Oh, I’m not sure how other women’s are, but mine just super sucks the first day because I get everything at once. By the second day, I’m usually done with the symptoms except for the bleeding. I do tend to get extra emotional the day before, though.” My foot was starting to feel more like normal again. “Move your hands.” I rubbed my hands together to warm them up and pressed them to Nathans abdomen, his eyes rolled up in his head for a second.
“That feels good.” He rested his hands on top of mine and closed his eyes.
“Well, remember this trick next month for me and I’ll be insanely happy.”
“Done.”
I had to re-warm my hands three times before the cramps subsided from his body. It’d only taken about twenty minutes, a third of the time it’d taken us before.
“Ugh,” Nathan groaned, finally able to stretch out on the couch. “I’ve never been so happy to be a man before.” He looked at me and absently rubbed his stomach. “So I guess it worked?”
“Yup. I figured out the problem was that I didn’t have something tangible to hold on to when I gave you so called ‘innocence’.”
“Ah. Does that mean that I’m stuck getting cramps or do you think that you can figure out how to hold on to innocence? Because I’m a bit partial to never having a period again…and I can’t believe that statement just came out of my mouth.”
“Honey, when you’ve spent forty-eight to ninty-six hours feeling fat, sore, exhausted, irritated, weepy, and very, very messy, you can tell me that again.” I smiled at him and rubbed my own abdomen; my cramps were returning.
“I hope to God that I never piss you off so bad that you make me experience all of that.”
“Trust me when I say that you couldn’t.” I smiled at him. “So, do we try that again or do we call it a day?”
“Ah hell, let’s do it again. You need the practice and I need to atone for being a man.”
We were recuperating after our fourth or fifth trial when there was a frantic knock on the door.
“I’ll get it,” I told him, limping to the front door. Stacy was there and she looked frightened. Charlotte, now almost two years old, was in her arms. She looked fine except that her arm was bent at a slightly odd angle and she was crying, though not loudly. “What happened?” I asked her, showing her into the light drawing room.
“I don’t know,” she told me, her voice shaking. “We were at the park and she was running after some birds. She bent down to touch something and then a bird flew up into the sky from where she was. She started crying and I ran over to her, thinking that the bird had just scared her, but then I saw her arm and it…I think it’s broken.” She broke down then, tears streaming down her face.
I silently took Charlotte from Stacy’s arms, settling her onto my lap. While I was inspecting her arm to determine that it was indeed broken I felt my own discomfort leave my body. “Woah!” I yelled. I held Charlotte away from myself, though that wasn’t stopping the child. I quickly grabbed my various cramps and set the child back on her mother’s lap. Stacy looked at me strangely, but her tears had stopped. She looked very confused.
“What was that about?” she asked.
“Umm…awkward,” I told her. I stood up and began to pace around the room. “Okay, first off, her arm is broken, so you’re going to need to take her to the hospital. Secondly, we have a situation.”
“What kind of situation?” She looked alarmed.
“The kind that keeps you from having friends in this town,” I said quietly. “Biologically speaking, she’s my daughter, not yours.”
“What?!? How is that possible? I conceived her, I carried her…” she held Charlotte closer to her and the child whimpered. I reached over and pulled some of the pain from the broken arm into myself.
“It’s possible because when you came to me for fertility treatment I exchanged five of my healthy eggs for five of your non-healthy eggs. I told you this when I did the treatment.” I suddenly felt tired. It’s very difficult to raise a child with this gift and it would be even worse with her living with a Brownie father.
“Why is her arm broken?”
“It’s broken because that’s the one thing I haven’t publicized. When someone in my family gives aid to another, we take on the physical illness that we claim to help. When I help someone’s headache, I get the headache. When I saved Charlotte and the rest of the babies, I took their symptoms into myself. Charlotte has the gift and she healed that bird’s broken arm, taking it upon herself.”
“But why? How does she know that she can help others?”
“It’s instinctual,” I told her. “We have no control over it: we just want to help others. My family has an obscenely high mortality rate for girls under age five who are born with the gift. Children that young don’t understand that they can get hurt and die while helping others and they will unknowingly help at the expense of their own health.”
“What can I do?”
“You have to keep her away from sickness. She can’t touch people who are ill because she will take their illness upon herself. And we need to teach her to control her instincts starting right now." Charlotte whined a little when her arm didn't do what she wanted it to. "But first and foremost, she needs to have her arm set by a doctor. I'm going to call Natalie and explain to her the situation. She'll keep everyone non-essential away from her. Do you want me to come with you?"
"No. I need to call Ralph and he's going to be pissed that I waited this long to tell him. I still don't know what explanation I'm going to give him. How often do toddlers break their arms at the park?" Tears leaked from her eyes as she stood with her daughter in her arms.
"Often enough. Kids are always falling down. Go. I'll call Natalie." They left while I went to my address book.
Nathan came into the room as Natalie answered. I turned towards him.
"Nat? It's Scarlet. Stacy is bringing Charlotte in with a broken arm. I need you to pay special attention that she stays away from other people."
"What? Why?" She sounded scared and I knew instintively that she was fearing the worst.
"It's not that. Charlotte is like me, but she's way too young to keep her powers to herself and if she's not careful she's going to hurt herself." I saw Nathan's eyes go wide, but he didn't reach for me.
"Okay." Natalie said slowly. "You're going to need to explain that one to me the next time you come to the hospital, but I'll do what I can to keep Charlotte safe. I just want to know. Did you know about this before?"
"Definitely not. I just did what I could to help her conceive. I did not know that this was even possible."
There was a noise in the background. "Ugh. I'm getting paged. I'll talk to you soon. Bye."
I hung up the phone and looked at Nathan.
"She's like you? What does that even mean?" he asked.
"Well, she took the broken arm from a bird in the park an hour ago. So I think that means that she's my heir, for lack of a better term."
"I thought that it passed from mother to daughter."
"It does. So I guess that technically Charlotte is my daughter."
"How?"
"I traded Stacy five of my eggs for five of her unhealthy ones."
Nathan let out a breath. "Wow." He sat in one of the wingback chairs and reached for me. I sat on his lap. "So you're a mom."
"No. I'm an egg donor. I hope to God that Ralph never doubts the paternity of Charlotte because I have a feeling that she'll come back with my DNA. If I've ever wondered where there's any scientific evidence of what I've done, I guess this is it. Crap." I wasn't ready to deal with a child who has my abilities; and certainly not a child whose father would possibly rather see her dead than possess them. He would have her exorsized immediately. I leaned my head against Nathan's drawing on his strength, though not literally.
"It'll be okay," he told me. And I almost agreed with him.
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