55 Quinn
Quinn
Four months before the fall
I’m freezing outside on my dad’s doorstep.
It’s still firmly winter. Scabs of snow dot the ground all around me.
New Year’s passed with a trip to the spell circle and a sleepover at my house after.
Elena brought a bottle of André, of course, and we did an illusion spell to change my hair color to lavender.
Then we summoned some sparklers and danced around, ringing in the new year.
We’re only two months in, and it already feels like this year is going to be… different.
I knock three more times and call out. “Dad?” No response, so I try the door.
It’s unlocked. Inside, he’s right there, ten feet from me, asleep on the couch.
Passed out, actually. I shake him, try to wake him up, but he doesn’t rouse, just lets out a snore.
We were supposed to host his friends for poker tonight, but maybe they’re avoiding him after what happened.
Two days ago, he drove his car into a telephone pole in town.
It was awful. I pull a blanket over him and let him sleep.
I drop my overnight bag in the kitchen. A box of stale Triscuits sits in the pantry next to a few cans of beans. In the fridge, there is just a crusted jar of mustard and a cloudy pickle container. And a pizza box. With a flicker of hope, I open the lid, but it’s empty, stained with grease.
I steal another look at him on the couch, his leg dangling off the side like he wanted to get up but couldn’t quite manage it.
It’s so early. It’s not even four. I wring my hands and look up at the ceiling, hoping for an answer to this mess to be printed there.
I wish I knew how to save him, but alcoholism is in the mind as much as it’s in the bottle.
Even I know that. And it’s powerful. River’s grandfather was an alcoholic, the asshole kind.
He told me horror stories about his grandfather’s physical decline and drunk driving incidents that never landed him in jail—probably because River’s dad is a cop—and how he punched a tourist right outside the Strike for no apparent reason—again, no charges—at sixty years old.
Booze makes people lose themselves. I’m losing my dad, and I wish there was a way to help him.
I sling my bag onto my back and head out the front door.
Around the back of the house where the yard meets the woods, I look down the hill and see the spell circle.
I wonder if I could do a spell to help him.
I turn a fraction, thinking about the merit of this idea.
Would I even consider doing a spell on my own?
That’s when I see it, all the way at the top of the hill.
The glass house. It’s lit up, which makes me pause.
I’ve never seen lights on in there before.
I thought the place was abandoned. But bright white lights shine out from the windows.
I have no idea what compels me toward it, maybe it’s boredom, or maybe it’s because it looks like a beacon.
Either way, I start to walk up the hill.