Chapter 6 The Only Normal Person in Salem
I do admit the nub glides smoothly.
Anyway, it’s midday once I’m done streaming the lecture, reorganizing my notes, and reviewing my daily flash cards. I still haven’t heard back from anyone at EFG about my illness or the fact that I haven’t come in for my first day of work.
So that’s encouraging.
I should probably try and block it out.
Outside on the streets of Salem, a cold front has breezed across the sidewalks.
My walk crackles with unnecessarily crisp, earthy, autumnal scents.
The witchy, woo-woo foot traffic picks up steadily as I approach downtown.
To make myself feel better, I decide to think of the experience like a Target run the week before Christmas: a lot of bustle, a bit of tired, a hint of manic, and a pickle-juice shot of weird.
Not that I’m helping the situation by walking around with a severed head under my arm.
“Let’s start with Derby Square,” Bulan says, because he’s merciless.
“Eww.”
“What’s wrong with that?” he objects against my backpack strap.
“That’s where all the ghost tours meet up.”
Never mind that we’re essentially going on a paranormal tour of Salem too.
Here’s what’s different: I’m not in Halloween socks, vaping herbal medicine, or carrying a hand-carved pagan wand.
Already I hate that my lack of seasonal fervor makes me stand out against the crowds and the moody, burgundy-hued brick buildings—my just deserts for being the only normal person in Salem.
Also, this alley smells like pee.
Nose twitching, I nonetheless carry Bulan, who is proudly wearing a purple-sequined bucket hat, to the stately rear of Old Town Hall. This is where we are assaulted by a tourist holding a wet gyro wrapped in a map.
“Are you here for the two p.m. crypt tour too?” he asks. He looks like he’s been couch surfing. No judgment there. Having slept on countless sofas myself, I can churn up a sense of kinship for this tourist. We both know what it’s like to test the limits of dry shampoo.
Inexplicably, before I can answer the disheveled brunette, Bulan announces: “We’re here for an exorcism!”
“Wow.” The tourist laughs around his sloppy cabbage. “You’re an amazing ventriloquist!”
There goes the kinship. “Thanks.”
“Do another!”
“Well, how about—” says Bulan, but I bustle us away before the cabbage eater asks how far my puppetry skills go.
Or how I’m performing with both hands visible.
I wonder if Bulan enacted some kind of magic when he held a Sharpie in his teeth and drew on the inside of his newly acquired hat.
It would make as much sense as anything else he did.
As I leave the tourist and Derby Square behind, Bulan dolefully turns his eyes up at me. They’re annoyingly blue and adorable and devious, like a husky puppy’s.
“Aww,” he says. “I had a good joke lined up, Sabby.”
Of course this is what I get for being nice and taking him out of my bag. Under my breath, I hiss at my fake-puppet overlord, “Why did you want to start here anyway?”
“Because this lovely place is where my ship first landed in 1803!” Bulan says.
“Back then it was dreadfully boring. The homes had no central heating. Or plumbing. And most witches were still hiding from Puritans in the woods and befriending the Algonquin, who sadly found me terrifying. All I had for company were mermaids and—”
“Stop. I don’t want your life story, Head. I need to know more about vampires so I can pull off a wedding for them. That’s it.”
“History is important.” Bulan sniffs. “It explains why we are the way we are, as a community and as individuals. Aren’t you the least bit curious about me?”
“Nope,” I say. “Mostly because I think you’re having me on. The water line’s over five hundred feet away. People would’ve noticed mermaids flopping across the pavement.”
“Well, obviously the waterline moved over several centuries, Sabby. They’re not here anymore, anyway; they’ve retired to Winter Island.
We used to have a pickpocketing merm at the wharf, though.
Your grandmother would bring trinkets for her to steal on purpose whenever she felt like cleaning out the junk drawers.
“As for that particular mermaid,” he goes on, hat slipping over his thick eyebrows and heavily lidded eyes, “plenty enough rubbish is carried on the currents these days, so she doesn’t come out much. I hear she’s built a small junk kingdom down in the bay. Also, that she summers in Nantucket.”
“Uh-huh,” I say absentmindedly. Since Bulan isn’t in the mood to supply me with useful information, I allow myself to meander backward into childhood memories.
Grandma sometimes took me fishing around the wharf, back before she let her friends attempt to kill me ritualistically.
Around the corner was a secret garden I loved.
I wonder if it’s still intact, or if the city turned it into a tourist trap with fake headstones and skulls.
“… and that’s why the merfolk and the kelpies are now thickest of friends with the— Sabby, are you listening?”
I lift the floppy, sparkling brim of Bulan’s hat so we can get eye-to-eye.
“I told you, I want to know about vampires. Not this other stuff.”
“Why?” he whines. “I never had to explain anything so basic to Rose.”
“Right, but I’m Sabby. Different person. My mom and grandma loved the idea of vampires and anything that had to do with”—I throw up finger quotes with my spare, un-head-laden hand—“ ‘the Community.’ I was never interested.”
“Whyever not?”
“Seriously? Why would I want to know about your super-weird paranormal world when I could break the generational cycle, attend college, and have a safe, predictable life? With steady meals and a couch that has never doubled as a mushroom farm?”
“Rosie always hoped you would outgrow your beige phase.”
Of course that’s what she called it. I turn to avoid the caress of a maple-leaf-addled breeze and say, “Vampires. Now.”
Bulan relents.
“All right,” he says. “Vampires are not, in fact, undead, nor are they humans suffering from an unfortunate medical condition. What are they, then? Their own species—with beautiful bone structure, a gift with words, and terrible osteoporosis. Their teeth can’t handle heavy chomping, so they prefer a liquid diet. ”
“You mean blood?”
“True, they are known to drink blood, but not for the reasons you might think! Vampires are quite sustainably minded and they prefer to consume as eco-consciously as possible. Blood is a renewable resource, you see.”
“Unless you over-drink and kill your victim.”
“Oh, certainly,” my spherical tour guide agrees. “It’s best to avoid that. Alas, vampires have been known to farm humans from time to time. It’s led to a bad reputation.”
“Shocking,” I say. I find myself picturing two vampires in overalls, holding pitchforks: an undead American Gothic. “What about sunlight? Is that a problem?”
“Indeed. Their skin is about as weak as their bones.”
“That’s rough. They’re not good at much, are they?”
“They do live forever,” points out Bulan.
“Yes, but so do jellyfish.”
“I didn’t know that! I should visit the beach and start a conversation with one soon. See if they have any tips for longevity…”
We’ve arrived at my secret garden at this point. I’m pleased to see it’s remained intact, and better still, no one lurks nearby. Inspiration striking, I set Bulan on a bench, dig into my backpack, and break out my wire cutters, gloves, and folded duffel bag.
“Sabby,” says Bulan with a nervous twinge to his voice, “why do you have that?”
“I came prepared to work. With what you’ve told me about vamps, I’m starting to have a floral vision.
A budding wedding concept. So I’m going to nab a few plants while we’re here.
” Shriveled-up flowering ones. I’ve a feeling they’ll please my undead couple.
It’ll remind them of their coffins, right? So earthy. So dead.
“I see,” says Bulan.
“The flowers here are organic and local, so they should be vampire-ethics approved.”
“It has been a while since I had legs, so I may not be up to date on human culture at large, but I’m fairly certain florists purchase the items they require, rather than steal them.”
“I’m broke.”
“You could use your down payment for the wedding instead of resorting to theft,” Bulan says.
A down payment? I could’ve asked for one of those? Crap.
“Well, never mind that now,” says Bulan with an over-the-top sigh. “I’ll chirp if I see the police.”
“Thanks a mil.”
The first plant I snip at the stem is wilted aconite. Bulan peers over my arm, brushing his fuzzy mustache and nose against my wrist.
“Is that wolfsbane?” he asks. “It is. Why, Sabby, I suspect you knew that!”
“Every spring and winter break, my mom force-fed me books about her favorite herbs. She called it ‘science class.’ She continued the tradition until she ran off to Mexico.”
“Oh, when was that? After you finished your education?”
“More or less.” I carefully lay the toxic plant in my bag and turn my attention to a pocket of red-leaved New England asters. “Mom put the bills on autopay. I’m super independent, so I was fine by myself.”
It’s mostly true. I mean, there was that late August night when Mom’s credit card defaulted, the power got turned off, and the food in our fridge spoiled.
And when I opened the freezer, some of her weirder plant seeds had sprouted legs.
They were running and sliding around on a half-frozen puddle of Ben & Jerry’s.
Which should’ve stopped me from eating them, but I was a starving teen.
They tasted better than you’d think.