Chapter 2 #2
After watching a couple of YouTube videos about painting, I hit the hardware store just before it closes and buy paintbrushes, rollers, masking tape, and drop cloths. I use my card for the purchases, and after I type in my PIN incorrectly twice, Danny the handyman shows me how to use tap.
“You can tap? I didn’t even know about tap!”
Why hadn’t Warrick told me about tap?
I’m terrified that there won’t be enough money in our account to cover the paint. Warrick takes care of our money (I’m hopeless), but no matter how hard he works or how many hoverboards he stacks in our cottage, there never seems to be enough. But the charge goes through fine.
When I arrive back at the shop, I find that someone has left a parcel of steak-and-cheese pie and mushy peas on the counter. A note on top says, “Welcome to the neighbourhood! From Celeste and Pax.”
I swipe dust off the counter, pull over one of the paint cans to use as a stool, and open up the package, releasing an incredible scent of warm meat, gravy, and pastry into the shop.
A large cream-and-orange shape slinks down the counter to lean against me. “Hello, Rafe.” I hold my hand out for him to sniff, but he shoves it aside with his paw and buries his nose into my dinner.
“Oi, that’s mine. We have to share.”
Cats don’t share. Eminent domain. I am your overlord, and therefore I am seizing ownership of this piece of steak…and also this piece…
“Warrick’s disappearance is getting to me more than I think, because I am literally having a fake conversation with a cat inside my head.
But you definitely look like a cat who operates on pirate code.
” I extract a piece of steak from the pie and drop it on the counter for him.
It disappears before it even hits the wood.
Rafe stares at me with wide, forlorn eyes, his tail flicking with hopefulness.
“I guess you and I are used to surviving on scraps,” I say as I toss another piece of steak at him.
“I don’t know what I’m doing, Rafe. What business do I have opening this shop while Warrick is missing?
If he were here, he’d never allow me to do this.
All his reasons would be perfectly valid.
But it seems like the moment he’s gone from my life, I remember who I was before him. ”
I’m too busy eating to pretend to care about your existential angst. Is there more steak?
I toss Rafe another piece of steak and put Celeste’s and Mina’s numbers into my phone.
I only have five numbers in there: Warrick, Warrick’s executive assistant, Veronika – who’s been texting all day frantically – the doctor, the dentist, and Inspector Hayes, whom I added just this morning.
Now I have two more. So much has happened since my husband left the house that morning three days ago.
As I mask up the room, I notice little symbols carved into the wood – strange collections of half moons and intersecting lines.
They appear near the doorframes and windows.
Sigil magic is not something I know about, so I’m not sure if they mean anything or are just places where Rafe has chewed the wood.
If my mum were alive, I could ask her about them. Protective magic was her thing. They even look like the little symbols she used to draw on things.
In the echoey silence of the empty shop, thoughts of Warrick press in on me.
I picture Inspector Hayes’ face as he read over my statement and his update today.
But it’s all too terrifying, so I fill the silence by giving a steady commentary to Rafe, who is determined in true Siamese cat fashion that he must help by sticking his paws in the paint tray and batting the brushes around the room.
I banish him to the counter, where he luxuriates on his side, paws kicking out as he licks clean the pie container.
“…I think we’ll open with five different meads,” I say as I roll primer on the walls in what I hope is an ‘even, strong-wristed motion’ as per my YouTube tutorial.
“I’ve got a passable batch of lavender mead, for help with sleep, and the spiced elderflower with cinnamon and ginger will help those in the village wanting to spice up their love life.
That blackberry and pomegranate mead has been sitting in an oak barrel for a year, so it will taste amazing, but blackberry and pomegranate is for speaking with the dead, so maybe that’s a little too goth for opening day.
I’ll have to water down the far-seeing mead, as it’s too powerful for consumption by non-witches, but maybe I can turn it into a kind of honey-beer.
Ooooh, and maybe I’ll be brave enough to try a bouchet again—”
What’s a bouchet? That sounds like a fancy hat. I love fancy hats. They make excellent litter trays.
Wait, where’s that voice coming from?
It’s a man’s voice, deep and haughty. It sounds the same as the one I heard before when I was imagining Rafe talking back to me.
I glance out the window. It’s dark out now, but the green is lit by the pub’s windows and a border of twinkling fairy lights.
I see clearly to the tourism office and witch shop opposite.
I was expecting to see the owner of the voice lurking on the stoop. But there’s no one near my shop.
Besides, the voice didn’t sound like it came from outside.
It sounds like it’s inside my head.
My heart hammering, I cast my eyes around the room, but there’s no one there except Rafe and me.
“Did you hear that, Rafe?” I ask nervously, knowing I’m silly for talking to the cat but unable to stop. I set down my brush and move around the counter.
“Merrow?” Rafe peers behind the counter with me. There’s no one there.
That’s strange. I swear I heard a man talking about hats. And it almost sounded like it was inside my skull. But that’s impossible. That would be some kind of dark magic.
It’s been a strange, stressful few days. I’m probably just imagining things.
“I’m a bit silly, aren’t I, Rafe? I’m scaring myself.” I go back to painting and thinking my plans out loud. “I’ll have to find a bottling machine somewhere if I want to sell bottles. Oooh, and I’ll need to design a label. I wonder if I could draw something. I haven’t done any art in a long time—”
“You should put a picture of my face on them. They’ll fly out the door faster than that sparrow Celeste let in once. Mmmm, sparrow.”
Okay, that’s definitely a man’s voice.
It doesn’t sound like it’s inside my head this time.
He’s in this room with me.
I whirl around, and my heart leaps into my throat.
Rafe has disappeared from his spot on the counter. In his place, a tall, red-haired, creamy-skinned man with colourful floral chest tattoos luxuriates like a Bernini model, a mischievous grin playing across his lips as he stretches out his tongue to lick between his fingers.
There’s a strange man in my shop.
And he’s completely naked.