Chapter 36
The next morning, Ingrid lay in her bed and wondered if it was a reasonable idea to stay under the covers forever.
Miles would allow her a grace period to wallow in her sadness, she thought. He would bring her takeout from Bull Street Taco and Mirabelle. She could maybe count on a week or two, she figured, before he got tired of waiting on her. Before they started dipping into the money she’d saved.
Which she knew would not stretch far.
She would have to get her ass in gear. She had adult responsibilities. An obligation to Edie and the Goddess. She just didn’t know how she was going to do any of it without Sailor. She’d come to depend on her—her contacts, connections, money.
A few days later, when the direct deposit into Ingrid’s checking account did not appear, the reality of her predicament hit her.
If she didn’t continue getting just as many, if not more, customers, Ingrid would be back to broke once again, quicker than she even imagined.
Besides that, she missed Sailor, badly. She felt sick knowing her friend was angry at her.
Panic enveloped her. Although she had tried to honor Sailor’s wishes and not call, this was too much. What was she going to do? Go down without a fight? She couldn’t. Trembling, she tapped Sailor’s number, but the call rolled straight to voicemail.
“Sailor, it’s Ingrid,” she said in a breathless voice. “I just wanted to talk to you. Just for a minute …”
She closed her eyes. Waited a beat.
“I swear to you on the earth and all the elements, I never intended for anything to happen to your mother. I was only trying to help. To do what you wanted me to do. And … I don’t mean to be unfeeling …
but maybe it’s for the best, what’s happened.
Maybe she can heal and get better and … I don’t know, be the mother you’ve—”
There was a click, and a robot voice informed her that her message had been erased, but she could wait for the beep and record again. She hung up.
She called again after that—five, six, seven times—each time getting Sailor’s voicemail message, each time hanging up.
That was when the devastating truth dawned.
There was no going back. Her life with the Loefflers, her friendship with Sailor, had been nothing but a brief, wondrous dream. But it was over.
Not thinking to grab her purse or phone, she burst out of the house and headed down the street.
She didn’t know where she was headed, and when she arrived at Forsyth Park in the dimming light of the early evening, she sat on one of the benches that encircled the fountain and watched the sprays of water jetting out in all directions.
Lulled by the sound of the water, she let the tears flow.
Hadn’t Edie warned her over and over again of something like this happening?
Performing magic, any kind of magic, was a serious undertaking.
It was so easy to lose sight of the point of her practice, so easy to let her own emotions cloud her intentions.
But that’s exactly what she had done.
She should’ve talked Sailor out of the spell. She should’ve been strong enough to do the right thing.
Her phone rang. It was Mrs. Leimberger, talking in a distant, crisp voice, telling Ingrid to cease and desist all phone calls to Miss Loeffler—and if she didn’t, Ingrid would be hearing from the family’s lawyer, forthwith.
Ingrid only uttered one word in reply—“okay”—then hung up, feeling nauseated all over again. She left the park and went home, dully stumping up the stairs to her bedroom. Even though it was only eight o’clock, she immediately fell into a deep sleep.
She dreamed that Edie and she were sitting in Edie’s doctor’s office.
Ingrid was eighteen years old again, holding Edie’s hand—or rather it was the other way around because Edie had known there was something deeply wrong with her, and she wanted to shield Ingrid from the blow. Edie’s cancer diagnosis.
“I know it’s not much comfort,” the doctor said to Edie, “but maybe something to think about for Ingrid here. You have what’s known as chronic beryllium disease. An exposure to the toxic metal beryllium which probably occurred years ago.”
Edie, holding fast to Ingrid’s hand, said nothing.
The doctor went on. “We usually see this type of exposure in workers in nuclear, biomedical, electronics, defense, and semiconductor fields. As that isn’t you, we might conclude there were other sources.
Contaminated soil, perhaps. Volcanic ash.
Kitty litter. Is there any sort of contamination like that in your house? ”
In the dream, Scoot Loeffler appeared behind the doctor’s plush, leather chair.
On the doctor’s desk, on a wooden stand, was a beaker of gray ash.
Scoot plucked it from the stand and dumped it into a silver milkshake cup.
She stirred it with a red-and-gold fountain pen, Rill’s pen, then poured the concoction into a glass, squirted whipped cream over it, and plopped a maraschino cherry on top.
“What is it?” Ingrid asked Edie. “What’s she making?”
As Scoot slid the glass toward Edie, a malevolent smile curled the corners of her lips. “I’m taking care of her.” Scoot turned her gaze upon Ingrid. “I’m fixing her little red wagon.”