Chapter One #2
On Lavey Avenue his phone buzzed again. Beau was getting beyond antsy.
In fairness, Schuyler was late for the Wednesday Night Check-In.
A tradition they’d had in their family since Schuyler had come to live with Beau and Marshall fulltime after his mother passed.
She’d been sick, and before Eleana shuffled off the mortal coil, she felt the need to drop a deathbed confession on Schuyler’s father, admitting he’d been under her spell since the day they met.
The one fear he’d always harbored being a non-witch yet married to one, and she’d confirmed it—and then died before he could respond.
It was a Croy family trait: never letting anyone else get the last word.
Nicholas left that night. No one heard from him again.
Beau and Marshall agreed his leaving was for the best, but Schuyler, only seven at the time, stopped talking.
After a couple of weeks, Beau dragged him into their home’s sunroom, filled with his favorite food and snacks, and declared no one was leaving till they’d discussed absolutely everything bothering them and got out what needed to get out.
The idea worked. Soon after, the Wednesday Night Check-In became a mandatory weekly ritual, occurring in person or virtually. They saw Schuyler through some of the roughest times of his life.
The pizza still warm in his hands, he turned onto Nevergreen Terrace and enjoyed one of the perks of being home: seeing the looming grand Queen Anne Victorian he’d grown up in sitting quietly at the end.
The house lorded over the street on which only two other large houses had residence.
But Estelle, as the house had been christened, stood proud with her west-facing circular turret, tallest on the street.
From the six gables to the collection of shingled roofs, the wraparound porch, down to the corner boards, Estelle had been bathed in hues of rich black, deep purple, dark navy with pops of goldenrod throughout.
On the East side of the house boasted a three-story sunroom.
A cascade of curved frosted windows reached from a third-floor gable to the ground around which a flower bed had been planted.
The space’s interior was filled with greenery; a lush array of large leafy plants secured from the ironwork at the top, in their large pots, hung over them as natural chandeliers.
Beautifully full vines clung to iron framework of the stairs and draped from walkways like curtains.
On the crowded floor was a collection of miniature versions of trees: Dutch Elms, Redwoods, and Oaks, all potted and thriving.
Flower beds for every climate, desert to swamp, multiple herb gardens, workstations, everything his potion-making uncles required.
In the center of the luxurious fauna was a circular sunken conversation pit with a couch layered in overly fluffy cushions and the softest pillows.
The couch surrounded a table with a mosaic top depicting an abstract expression of the four seasons and phases of the moon in vibrant colors, which now pizzas, drinks, and plates crowded on top of.
Schuyler settled in, watching his uncles; Beau buzzed around the room with a flutter in his step.
Whether he was happy and excited or simply anxious was unknown.
He swished around looking for a lighter, and Schuyler wasn’t sure how to tell the man who’d raised him that he had slid right into being one of those fussy southern gays he always complained about having to grow up with.
The ones who fancied themselves a Blanche; Dubois or Deveraux, take your pick.
Beau set the retrieved lighter down next to the frosted black glass bong on the table.
“Family,” he announced with goofy reverence in his southern twang, “tis time.” They bowed their heads, grateful for their blessings. Beau lifted the bong and wickedly smiled as he hit it and passed it to his husband of over thirty years, Marshall.
Schuyler listened as Marshall talked about his day shopping at the markets and going to the gym.
How he was thankful Schuyler was home to give him a break.
Beau’s day comprised of making a new batch of their shop’s bestselling potency salve and gossiping on the phone with Clandeen Carlise from across the street.
Schuyler stared as the bong arrived at him. He wasn’t sure he wanted to talk about it. To relay it all out loud.
“You could start with why you’re late. It’s ritual night. We’re on a time crunch. The moon, she waits for no witch.” Beau said things often in a tone which suggested he forgot Schuyler was forty and was still a kid.
“Are you okay, son?” Marshall asked, hushing his husband.
“I was at the pier,” Schuyler admitted, “determined, to end it all.”
Even though there was no outpouring of sympathy, he continued anyway.
“I found out Zach got remarried—whatever—that’s that, I don’t care, but it does appear my coven, my so-called friends, all chose Zach. They’ve not reached out, no messages, no calls.”
“The cow whores!” Beau shouted.
“I don’t know what I did in that aspect. I thought we all got along, hell, I slept with half of them. We were all friendly until the divorce. And they choose him. They could have said something. My feelings are hurt and my life’s a mess, end of my check-in.”
“I’ll curse them. I’ll curse their mommas!” Beau stood up, hands outstretched, dramatically ready to strangle. “Marshall, find me my swamp magic book, ain’t nothin’ more vicious than swamp magic. They goin’ learn not to mess with a Croy.”
Marshall looked over at his overly excited husband and in his deep baritone voice released a firm “No” and went back to his pizza.
“First, that bastard cheats on you.”
“He didn’t cheat, we were open.”
“He cheated e-mo-tion-ally, darlin’, and that calls for low down dirty swamp justice! Marshall, get me the damn book.”
“No.”
Schuyler adored his uncle Marshall, who, despite the 250lb of imposing ebony muscle would suggest, was the softest, kindest human being. Soft-spoken and of few words, he was the most grounded of the three and a rock for Schuyler whenever he needed one, compared to the overly excitable Beau.
“I’m coven-less, man-less, no career—no prospects, no casual love interests—no prospects.
No sex life—no prospects. No visible future past undeniable spinsterhood.
I’m going to need sisters. Can I rent them?
And, a final insult; no emotional support nuggets to get me through tonight, because you two wanted pizza—before an orgy? ”
Beau feigned offense, clutching an imaginary up-do, “are you suggestin’ we don’t have orgy ready bodies? Or is it that I cannot digest dairy as I used to? ‘Cause I assure you I can. And you have prospects; you’ve been hiding from them.”
“And good reason, I’m a forty-year-old loser who used to. Used to have a career, used to have a husband, used to have a coven.” Schuyler sighed, taking another hit.
“You still got your hair though,” Beau’s syrupy sweet southern accent broke the silence, “and now you can add dad bod to your profile. I think a lot of men are into that right now.”
“Was that a read?” Schuyler asked defensively.
“Nev-ah,” Beau said with a drawl that suggested otherwise as he scooped up the bong and hit it again.
“You are not a loser,” Marshall announced loudly, unhappy with Schuyler’s self-deprecation. “This is just a blip.”
Beau agreed, “you do get the dramatic flair from me though. We are always one Joan Crawford movie marathon away from going over the edge. You’re a diva, be proud,” Beau took another hit. “A diva with a beard that could stand a trimy-trim and your eyebrows.”
Marshall cleared his throat twice, which, in the language of their marriage, signaled Beau to kindly shut up. “Life happens, son, the Goddesses move things, the universe shifts, we deal.”
“You should join us tonight,” Beau added. “There’s always a circle for those without a coven and those who don’t orgy after the ritual—waste of all that full moon energy, though.”
“An orgy is supposed to help me? Why can’t it ever be something like, ‘there’s plenty of fish in the sea’ or, ‘I’ll get the next one,’ something normal like that?”
Beau scoffed, “What an offensive word. And, you know what else is in the sea, kiddo? A pile of garbage the size of New Jersey. So yeah, I’m justified in telling my son a nice tight piece of ass might solve a couple of your problems or ‘least have you forgettin’ them.
You haven’t met up with anyone since you’ve been home.
Haven’t so much had dinner with a friend.
So, come, find you some moon-soaked boo-boo honey all whipped up into a sexual frenzy, and reignite your power. ”
“How much weed have you smoked today?” Schuyler questioned as he also took another hit to get through the conversation. “And I’m not going.”
“It’s an orgy. You’ll commune with the moon and get laid.
What’s not to like? I know what this is about, don’t think I haven’t noticed that not only have you not been social lately, but you’ve not used any magic since you’ve been home.
Not one conjuration. You were hand washing dishes the other night.
Hand washing, in this house? You were raised better.
A lot of these troubles could be mended with a flick! ”
Beau swished his wrist, allowing magenta streams of energy to vibrate off his fingers, lingering for a few moments before fizzling out.
“I haven’t used magic lately; it’s not a big deal.”
“Well, look at your ass—and everything you don’t know,” Beau snapped. “It is a big deal, you dumbed your abilities down for those Bay leaf-burning TikTok wannabe witch bitches. Did none of them connect that once you were in the mix their spells worked with more potency?