Twenty
ZACH
Three days since Morgan's birthday, and the anger hasn't settled down. Somewhere deep down, I know the anger is a mask for hurt. But I don't let myself feel that; I lean into the anger.
As we do most Saturday afternoons, Eric, Frank, and I go over to Juan's and practice in his garage. And I take the opportunity to wail on my drums. I beat the shit out of them for our first couple songs. Pour all my rage into the swinging of my arms, deriving deep satisfaction from the vibration of each strike of the drums running up my arms.
How dare she? How fucking dare she?
Was I starting to come around and do I now believe in magic? Yes, sure. How could I not after the light show she put on? And I truly do believe she can talk to the spirits of dead people, incredible though that seems.
If magic is real—and I now admit it is—and her family isn't conning the world, what reason does she have to make up the power to talk to the dead? Yeah, I even believe there's some ghost named Maria who hangs around her.
It does weird me out to think of all the times she might have been watching or listening and I had no idea. In that, I should have trusted Morgan sooner.
But fucking telling me my mom just randomly appeared to her one day out of nowhere? That's fucking bullshit. We've barely even talked about my mom. All Morgan knows is she died when I was a kid.
I don't understand what would make her do something so cruel as to bring up my mom. But there's pretty much nothing else she could have done that would hurt me more. I don’t understand why she would want to be so cruel. It’s so incongruous with the woman I’ve been spending time falling for.
But my mom died because of me. I don't know if Morgan can sense that or something. But there's no way I want to use a medium to talk to my mom. Her ghost must be furious with me.
And to think, I really thought I was falling in love with her. I wanted to keep dating her, and for a fleeting moment, I even imagined what it could be like if I moved in with her after my lease is up.
Fucking idiot.
I just have to get through the next week, get through the wedding, and I don't have to see her again, except at the occasional family function. Now that I don't have to snoop around to prove the Goodes are frauds, I can stop going to Sunday dinner at Dad and Angela's.
I guess that's one good thing that came out of this whole disaster of a non-relationship between me and Morgan. I believe in magic and I'm no longer worried about my dad marrying into the Goode family.
Cold comfort.
After four songs in a row, Eric signals we should take a break .
I'm breathing hard as I set down my sticks. The beginning of an ache is starting up in my shoulders.
When I look up, all three of my bandmates are staring at me.
"Something on your mind, Zach?" Juan asks.
"Yeah, what the fuck?" Frank adds.
I frown. "What? What did I do?"
"I thought you were going to smash right through one of your drums," Juan says, reaching for his water bottle.
I glance down at my set, then up at my friends. "Just some family shit." It's kind of true. In a week, Morgan will be my stepsister. And that's just weird.
I stand up and stretch my arms, trying to work out some of the strain.
"Pretty sure this isn't about family. It's about the girl you've been hooking up with." Eric fiddles with the microphone stand.
"Woman," I say without thinking.
Eric rolls his eyes. "Sorry. Woman you've been hooking up with."
I look at each one of them, frowning. Frank's nodding and Juan raises his eyebrows at me.
"How do you guys know about her? I haven't said anything." I don't talk about my personal business at work. Even with these guys.
Even though I've known all about Juan and Bonita's relationship, from the day he decided he wanted to ask her out to her now being three months pregnant.
I know all about Eric's mom's gradual deterioration from MS. And how hard it is for him to find her adequate care in Owl Cove, even with good health insurance.
I know that Frank has been pining over a technician in another lab at work, but isn't sure if the tech is also into men, and hasn't found the courage to ask the guy out .
I know where they each grew up, I know where they went to college, I know little details of what they like to do for fun.
And all they know is my dad is getting married next week to one of the Goodes. For all they know, my parents are divorced and my mom is remarried and lives in Toledo. They all open up to me, and I don't tell them anything in return.
Shit.
I'm a pretty shitty friend. And I didn't share nearly as much with Morgan as she shared with me. Which is saying a lot, considering Morgan isn't exactly a highly emotive person.
All three of them laugh at my protest.
"Haven't said anything?" Eric says. "You only talk about her all the live-long day."
"Honestly kind of sick of hearing about her," Juan adds.
"I don't know, it's a toss up as to which is worse. Hearing him sing Morgan's praises or hearing you talk about Bonita's morning sickness." Frank pokes Juan in the shoulder.
"Fuck off." Juan swings back at Frank, but Frank dodges it.
"I don't... I don't talk about her that much." I'm a quiet worker. I've gotten used to the background noise of my friends talking as we work. But I don't join in all that often.
The three of them exchange looks that say they clearly disagree.
I roll my shoulders, trying to ease the stiffness that's building there. "Well, whatever. Don't worry, I won't be talking about her anymore. We're done."
Fiddling with the tuning knobs on his guitar, Frank says, "What happened?"
"She, uh, she told me she's been talking to my mom. Who died when I was a kid." I say it quietly, staring at my cymbal.
I can still see the anger on Mom’s face as she snatched up her purse, told my dad she needed to get out of the house, and stormed out without looking back at me. It hurt in the moment that my mom was ignoring me. And now, knowing it was the last time I'd ever see her, it slices deeper than I thought anything ever could.
For Morgan to just throw that in my face...
"Oh, shit. And you think she's making it up." Eric's staring at me with an expression of teasing mixed with sympathy.
"Exactly. And that's a shitty thing to do."
"Dude, how many times do we need to go over this? Magic is fucking real and you're a dipshit." Frank shakes his head.
I toy with my sticks. "I know magic is real, OK? She, uh, she showed me some pretty undeniable stuff."
Juan cackles. Like, he actually cackles. "Yeah she did."
I flip my middle finger at him. "Not like that." Well, some of it like that.
Eric comes to stand in front of me, the drums between us. He puts his hands on his hips. "So, you believe she can talk to spirits. You just think she's making it up that it's your mom?"
"Yes."
"And you believe, after all the time you've spent with her and all the glowing things you say about her all damn day, that she's the kind of person who would do something that would so obviously hurt you?"
I can't look at him. He has a point and I hate that. "Yes... maybe. I don't fucking know, OK?" I scrub my hands over my face, then leave them covering my face so I don't have to see Eric staring at me. "I don't fucking know."
All I know is when she brought up my mom, I saw red. Like, literally, everything in my field of vision took on a reddish cast.
"Man, you better figure your shit out quick," Frank says. "You clearly like this woman a lot. You really gonna let it fall apart over something like this?"
I drop my hands to glare at him. "Something like this being she weaponized my dead mother."
"Something like this being maybe you're overreacting because that's a really emotional subject for you and she didn't handle it the best but she's a pretty decent person and didn't actually weaponize anything?" Eric counters.
In this moment, I hate them all.
Because what if they're right? What if I blew things up with Morgan because I'm the one who can't handle it?
MORGAN
It's not quite time for me to try conjuring my dad again, but what the hell. I'm doing it early.
Maybe with the wedding in a week, he'll finally talk to me. And with Samhain so close, the veil between the worlds is at its thinnest. Maybe I can reach him.
I need to be able to reach him. I need the deities to grant me this one thing. Because everything else is horrible.
I set everything up on my northeast altar, and in the dim light, I do the ritual. It feels routine, like I'm going through the motions but not really feeling it. I don't think about the words I'm saying, don't smell the rose oil as I light the candles.
"Frederick Goode, I humbly request that you show yourself to me. Come so that we may make our family whole, if only for a moment. Come and talk with me, share your wisdom. I beseech you. Your family loves and misses you."
The magic crackling in the air is familiar and discouraging. Nothing feels different.
And it breaks something inside me. More than any other time, I need my dad to answer me today.
"Please, Daddy. I need you," I whisper. So quietly, I doubt he or the deities can hear.
I wait. And wait. And wait some more. I wait longer than usual. And he's not there .
"OK, Dad. I guess maybe it's time I stop trying so hard, huh? You've made your message more than clear. But fuck you! I am worth visiting, you asshole!"
I lean in to blow out his candle when a noise behind me makes me pause.
"Morrigan, wait."
I spin toward at the unfamiliar voice. And there he is.
My dad.
Tears well up in my eyes, then stream down my cheeks. Thankfully, after that first weird night, all my tears have been back to normal tear water. No more crystals.
"Dad?" I whisper.
"Yeah, baby. It's me."
I want to run to him and collapse into an embrace I'm sure he'd return. But I can't. Lack of corporeality and all. Instead I wrap my arms around myself, hugging myself instead of him. "You're really here?"
"I'm so sorry it took me so long. The deities, they've, well, it's a long, complicated story, but they've had me working for them. Which made me unavailable to you." His face is the picture of regret.
"Fucking deities," I mumble.
One side of his mouth curls up and for a moment he looks so much like Bronwen, it's startling. "They're not so bad. They mean well. But just like humans, they're very fallible."
Don't I know it.
"So, you mean, all this time, it wasn't about me?" The enormity of that nearly overwhelms me. I move to the overstuffed armchair I have next to my main altar and drop down into it. "And, uh, sorry for calling you an asshole."
Dad comes over to stand next to me, waving away my apology. "No, it was never about you, baby girl. I've wanted to answer every one of your calls. But I couldn't."
"So why now?" I look up at him, feeling very much like a little girl. A little girl trying to absorb information that's too big.
"I'm done with my work for them." He expression turns sad. "It was my job to make sure Angela found the right person."
"Gary." I still barely know the guy, but he seems to make my mom happy. How weird to think all this time, my dad was behind the scenes, making it happen.
Something strange crosses his face. "Yes. Gary."
Of course I can't think about Gary without also thinking about his son. Which causes immediate pain in my chest. In my heart.
"He'll come around," Dad says. Apparently he knows what I'm thinking about too. "Give him time."
The words punch at my heart, hurting even as they give me hope.
"He needs to talk to his mom. It'll happen, and he'll make things right."
I don't ask if this is something he knows from otherworldly knowledge, or if he's just guessing. I don't want to know. Because if he's guessing and he's wrong...
Damn Zachary Werner for making me fall in love with him.
It's my turn to wave Dad off. "I don't want to talk about him. I have so many questions for you."
He frowns. "You know there are some things I can't tell you."
I shake my head. "I know. That's not what I want to know." It is. It's what I desperately want to know.
I know he can't tell me exactly how he died. Spirits aren't allowed to know that via memory. But maybe...
"Have the deities told you anything about your death? What really happened?"
He frowns, the frown of a dad reprimanding his child. And as annoying as it is, it also feels so good to have a moment of normalcy with him. Something I was denied growing up.
Not that I didn't get that look plenty from my mom, Nana, and Sirona.
"All I remember is your mom was insistent on trying a fertility spell so she could get pregnant. I didn't understand the need for it to happen so soon after you were born, but she was determined." His face turns wistful. "And it worked out pretty well, I'd say. Your little sister is a beautiful young woman. Just like her older sisters."
I hate it, but I blush. My cheeks are flaming hot and I can't meet his gaze. So I ignore that part of what he said and barrel on. "What's the last thing you remember?"
He frowns. "You should leave this alone, Morgan. No good is going to come from you digging around in this."
Of course he thinks that. Everyone thinks that. I'm so frustrated, I feel tears pressing the backs of my eyes. " Please , Dad. The good that comes of it is I know. I need to know. It's been this huge hole in my life, since I was little. And then to find her Grimoire and?—"
He holds up a hand to stop what surely would've devolved into a crying rant. "All I know is what I've heard your mother tell other people. The stress I was under—and I want you to tell her it wasn't just the stress of conceiving, there were so many other stresses in our life at that time, not the least of which was being young and having two young daughters already. I wouldn't have traded that for anything, but it was stressful. And we both worked a lot. It was... well, it's not hard to see how it all turned into too much." His expression turns fierce and he reaches for me, then pulls his hand back. He can't touch me anyway.
"I need you to tell your mom that it was, in no uncertain terms, not her fault."
I nod. "OK." We've gotten off track, but I understand why this is important to him. Just like I've carried his supposed rejection of me with me for so long, Mom has carried the guilt of putting too much stress on Dad and feeling like she killed him. "I promise."
"I'm sorry I can't fill in this hole for you. I truly am." He sounds sincere. Then again, as big a presence in my life as he's been, I don't actually know him. I know what others have told me about him.
Still, he's my dad. The dad I don't remember. I look up at him, throat too choked up to talk.
"I'm sorry I wasn't there to help you girls grow up." He smiles sadly. "Watching it happen was a privilege I thank the deities for every day. But I would've given anything to be there with you. And please pass that along to your sisters."
The tears start again, rolling silently down my flushed cheeks. "Me too."
"I can't stay much longer, but now that the deities have freed me, I can come back. Any time you call."
My battered heart skips a beat at that. Now I can finally actually get to know him, even if in limited chunks.
"One more question?" If he knows this, it could answer so many other questions I have.
He nods for me to continue
"There are pages missing in mom's Grimoire. Starting the night you died, up until about six months later."
His face hardens. "Morgan..."
"Please, Dad. All I'm asking is if you know where they are." Something in his expression says I'm onto something here.
There's a long, uncomfortable moment of silence. It drags on so long I'm certain he's not going to answer me.
"What are you going to do with those pages?"
My pulse speeds up. He isn't saying no. "I don't even know why. But I need to know what's in there. And why it was so important, she had to hide them."
He sighs and rubs his jaw. It's weird how he still looks 28, the age he was when he died, when Mom has aged and looks 56. He's my age.
Trippy.
"If I tell you, you have to promise me you're not going to do something to disrupt your mother's newfound happiness." He stares hard at me. Even though he's a spirit, I can feel the weight of his gaze.
"I won't," I say. What even is in that Grimoire that could ruin things?
"Alright, then. I'll tell you where to find the missing pages."