Chapter VI Bitchcraft
Chapter VI
Bitchcraft
C lark knew there would be hell to pay at work that Tuesday.
Instead of addressing his misstep, however, having crashed the party just days before, Monica approached him with those high-arched eyebrows under her fringe, and that smile that didn’t quite reach those icy blue eyes.
“After Labor Day comes Fashion Week, and it’s zero to one thousand for us,” she informed him with her nose turned up. “It’s our busiest time of the year as we head into fall and the holidays. Charisma has her own collection to show, and it’s the highlight of the season—obviously. Then, she attends a few select shows with friends, the who’s who of the fashion world. It’s a week of nonstop parties and events and house calls with some very important people.”
“What’s a house call?” Clark asked.
“A house call,” Monica said with a roll of her eyes, “is not unlike a party, but more than a séance of yore. Charisma gathers the troops—us, that is, the assistants—and assembles at a client’s home for a night of witchery: reading her clients, drawing the cards, sometimes a conjuring or two, maybe more. It’s a chance to see Charisma at work. Nothing she does is ever cheap or tawdry. It’s always a spectacle to behold—but she only books with very special clients anymore. She’s a very busy woman.”
“Ah, I see,” Clark said, his curiosity piqued. “And when Charisma is unavailable, she sends you, right?”
“Correct.”
Monica led him to “the Closet,” which was where, she informed him, “we stock our resources.” Monica told him this as they exited onto the third floor of the penthouse, and walked not far down the hall, stopping just short of an oak door.
She turned to him and the words emanating from her glossy pink lips dripped in sweet venom: “So, I heard you want to be more involved with the Coven. Is that right?”
“Oh, yeah, I’d like to be.” Clark was a little embarrassed that he had been outed by Lorena. “Very much!”
“Well,” Monica began, “if you finish all your tasks and help us prepare our kits—and you’re on your best behavior—maybe you can come help on Charisma’s next house call yourself...”
“Okay!” Clark said, bright-eyed. Finally, he thought, this is my shot...I get to do something that actually matters here... He couldn’t help but entertain the prospect.
The Closet was less a closet and more a studio; without question, it was larger than his own apartment. All around were drawers radiating from the room’s center like a sundial, with armchairs, a table, a mirrored wall opposite them, and even a small bar and refrigerator. But for Clark, there was something more that caught his attention.
Resting in the center of the Closet and elevated on a platform of three steps was a large terrarium atop a pedestal. It sat below a single, circular skylight, the Closet’s only source of natural light. Planted in its center on a mossy base of smooth pebbles was a majestic miniature tree, whose many tiny leaves and branches radiated up to the edge of its domed glass house, as if rays of electricity in a plasma ball.
Or the veining of an eye . . .
To Clark’s almost delighted surprise, and what he found to be the most peculiar about the tree inside, were the tiny, round, red apples it bore. The terrarium was a diorama. An altar... he thought to himself as he stepped up to approach, his eyes not daring to turn away. Clark’s stomach twinged and his forehead tingled, and he wondered why he was feeling so activated .
Is it just me or is the tree moving . . . ? Like a slight breeze blowing through its branches . . . ?
“Ahem?” Monica said. Clark turned to look at her, and with a final glance at the terrarium, detached himself as told.
She put him to work for the foreseeable future, wiping down the contents of the drawers. Inside, he removed acrylic crate upon acrylic crate of crystals and candles of every color and size, next to bundles of sage and incense and dried herbs. Clark almost gagged handling candles labeled “human tallow.”
“It is a privilege to be in the Closet,” Monica announced, shooting him a look. “Most juniors never get to see it...” At this, Clark erased any trace of disgust from his face and put the tallow candles back.
There were a couple of jars of mandrake roots and “dead man’s toe,” finger-shaped fungi he thought were only in movies, and a giant selenite athame— more like a sword , bright white and translucent. Was his arm humming as if touching a current? He could swear it was electric with energy, as he picked it up and wiped it down.
Another drawer contained vials of oils and essences he had never heard of, sitting next to pickled remains of brains and hearts, even skulls. Next to those were heavy brass horse charms in varying symbols, and decks of hand-illustrated tarot cards housed in velvet pouches. There were blank, faceless plush dolls in the shape of humans, which Clark surmised were for cursing, scrying mirrors and crystal balls Clark imagined were for divination, and in one drawer— of course —teacup sets and tea leaves of every flavor for reading. Except, these were no typical teacups: these sets were hand-painted with runes and inscriptions.
All the while, Clark would steal a glance at the terrarium and its miniature tree, as if it were watching him back. There was no denying there was something extraordinary about it.
At the table, Monica broke away from her laptop to look at her phone. “Melissa needs you in the library,” she said, “when you’re finished.”
Clark was not even aware there was a library. He had only made a dent in the Closet’s cleaning list, to Monica’s disdain. With an exasperated sigh, she escorted him downstairs to Main, to that first room he had explored on his first day, the one with the enormous portrait of Charisma.
“The library is where Charisma keeps her most valued possessions,” Monica said, “so no touchy.” She led him to a shelf on the northernmost wall, to a small statue of two hands intertwined. Monica grasped the highest of the hands at its middle finger and snapped it backward. With a crack, the bookshelf popped out of place in its mounting and swiveled open to reveal a hidden entrance to a softly lit study beyond. Inside, Melissa was already waiting.
“Oh good. I’ll give him back to you quick, girl,” Melissa said. “Promise.”
“Yeah, right...” Monica flashed a terse half smile before turning on foot.
“Just kidding,” Melissa said smugly once she left. She turned to Clark and sized him up and down. “I need you for a bit.”
Clark gulped: this was their first time alone.
The library was filled floor-to-ceiling with shelving, containing many volumes of old books, most stored, dustless, behind window-pane cabinetry. The loft above contained more valuables illuminated under the soft glow of lamp light, including a bust of Medusa, an urn, a box, and a golden lamp, all of which said “Do not under any circumstances open.” Propped in a glass container in the center of the room was an ancient-looking sword set in a laser-cut stone. All were stored away under lock and key. There were cameras everywhere, but the sword, Clark noticed, had its own. His imagination ran wild thinking about what knowledge awaited his discovery here.
“So,” Melissa said suddenly to Clark, who was taken aback, “Gran died and I got the townhouse—finally! How about you? What’s your story?”
“Oh, I, um...I’m sorry to hear about your Gran,” Clark said, dumbfounded. “I’m from Astoria.”
Melissa looked at him, perplexed, and then it dawned on her. “Ohhhh yeah, that’s right.”
Clark finished her sentence in his head: “—you’re poor!”
Melissa returned to scanning the shelves, putting Clark to work doing the fetching and the heavy lifting. They spent about an hour loading up the table with a few volumes, some relics in foreign languages Clark couldn’t read, which they handled with cotton gloves. “For my house calls,” she said. Clark saw her snapping photos of some of the pages with her phone. What she was documenting and for what, he couldn’t be sure. She definitely didn’t let him open the books himself despite his deep, desperate longing to do so. All the while, Clark swore he could see Melissa staring at him out of the corner of his eye, but when he’d turn to catch her in the act, she would avert her gaze. That he almost preferred though: there was something about her emotionless, wild eyes when she looked at him that gave him great pause, a feeling both familiar and frightening. To Clark, it was as if she was ingesting, assimilating something about him...or from him.
The rest of the week, Clark was carted up and down the penthouse mansion, back and forth between Monica and Melissa. Helping them organize and restock the Coven’s “kits”—black luggage bags of crystals, cards, candles, and other witchy paraphernalia—which really meant doing their work entirely while the two sat on their phones or laptops. Clark had been so determined to make it on the house call Monica had mentioned that he went above and beyond, hurrying from express train to crosstown bus to get his errands done as fast as possible, taking great care with every task.
“Extra whipped cream, please,” he had requested to the baristas.
“Please send it back and replace it for my boss, Charisma Saintly ,” he had said at the department store shoe rack, striking fear into the snooty salespeople with his words alone.
Clark had completed his errands and his tasks so diligently, in fact, and without an ounce of recognition, and still he had yet to hear any word of when the house call would be and when he would be tagging along to see the Great Charisma at work. Then again, wasn’t this all a ruse anyway? Parlor tricks, poppycock, and just a bunch of hocus pocus? He was beginning to think so. Clark couldn’t help but smile to himself nonetheless.
Charisma herself was in and out on those days. Early to leave, late to arrive, often she returned to refresh her looks before making her way to the next show or party. Sometimes, he could hear her from afar like the Ghost of the Penthouse, catching flashes of the back of her copper hair and the trail of her floral-fag fragránce —a term he’d coined himself in a mocking English accent—dressed in fabulous outfits and shoes, with Alicia hurrying not far behind her. Often she was on the phone as she made her exit. Sweetie darling sweetie... he parroted in his head. So silly ...Why did he love to hate her so much?
On the last day of Fashion Week, as Clark helped load up the elevator with the Coven’s twelve luggage bags, he mustered up the courage to approach Monica.
“Hey, Monica?” The closed mouth doesn’t get fed , he reminded himself.
She rolled her eyes, and turned around to look at him. “What?”
“Um...You mentioned being able to join the Coven on a house call with Charisma if I completed my tasks. I’ve cleaned up the entire Closet, done my runs around town, and restocked the kits as asked, and so...I was wondering if I could maybe come along with you all?”
Monica turned to look him dead in the face: “You? Come along on a house call? Are you insane? I promised you no such thing.” She leaned within inches of his face and said, “I thought I already told you: a good junior never forgets one’s place, and a good junior never asks for more. Now, get to that list of runs I’ve sent you by text, and do your job .” And that was the end of that. With her back turned, he could have sworn he heard the word “psycho” uttered under her breath.
She walked into the elevator and disappeared, leaving Clark speechless, standing in that mirrored foyer, alone in that penthouse-mansion.
The whirlwind of Fashion Week had come and gone, and the following week, the momentum had not died down. Still, Clark could not let go of the carrot Monica had dangled, nor the goalpost she had moved. But what could he do, what could he say when he was just the help himself? He thought it so cruel and so despondent that that odd swelling of his tonsils had happened again. One day he came to work so feverish that Monica had, disgusted, sent him on errands to keep him out of the penthouse, “Lest you get us all sick.”
“I remember once being so ill with food poisoning at a house call with Charisma,” she said, “that every few minutes I was in the bathroom, absolutely retching.” Clark thought it so shameless that she even mentioned “house call” to him. “And still, I had to show up and work. That’s what being a professional is about. A junior once called out sick on an event day and was never seen here again. Last I heard she now works at the checkout of a grocery store—in Newark.”
On that day and on his way out of Hell’s Entrance, delirious and discouraged, Carolina the cook surprised Clark by bringing him to the downstairs kitchen. She sent him home with lentil soup and an armful of Tupperware containing the kitchen’s leftovers. That was one thing to be grateful for: being able to eat lunch at Lorena’s behest could at least give him some sense of normality, even if he was forced to work through it. It wasn’t anywhere near the extravagant meals prepared for the assistants. Usually, it was the maid’s meals or just the scraps, but still, it was something. It seemed that the ladies of the kitchen had banded together to leave him food to take home from there on out, of whatever leftovers would otherwise go to waste, in a discreet corner of the fridge. It seemed to Clark that this was their way of quietly letting him know he was not as alone as he thought.
A few days later, one more surprise came unexpectedly.
Melissa was escorting Clark back up to the Closet where Monica was when, in the elevator, she leaned in close.
“Hey, kid,” she said in a lowered voice, “I’m getting the fuck out of here. Why don’t you come with me and make some real coin?”
Dare I ask why...? Clark whispered back, “What do you mean? Where are you going?” He glanced up at the elevator’s camera.
“I’m taking my clients and starting my own coven—and quick. I’m breaking out of this shit hole.”
A “shit hole”...? We’re riding in one of this shit hole’s three private elevators... “Aw, why is that?” he said, feigning interest.
“It’s time I did my own thing. I’ve got my clients eating out of the palm of my hand; they’ll come with me wherever I go. Life’s too short to be working like this. Nobody becomes Charisma by working for Charisma!”
Clark squinted, skeptical at hearing all this.
“Besides, I’m tired of working with little British bitch house sitters like you-know-who. What are they paying you here, anyway? Nothing, I bet.”
Why lie . . . ? he thought. “Juniors don’t get paid.”
Melissa stood up and back with a look of prideful contempt. “See what I mean?”
Clark almost wondered why she was confiding in him of all people, the junior, when he was just the help, but he figured that was likely the exact reason why. Under this roof, he was voiceless and powerless. When he paused to consider this, coming from a woman who had bragged about inheriting her deceased grandma’s townhouse in their first moments alone, he was not surprised in the slightest.
Ding . The elevator door opened to the fourth floor and Melissa turned and looked at him, and in a flash, Clark had an idea. He was actually a little pleased with himself at how effortlessly the words had come, even through a throat that was still a little sore.
“Melissa...” Clark began slowly and quietly. “Who’s that guy that’s been coming up to the penthouse?”
“That’s Charisma’s financial advisor,” she said dismissively.
“Nah, not him. This one isn’t a delivery guy either. I mean, at least I don’t think he is, I’ve never seen him with deliveries or anything like that. He’s always sneaking out in the early mornings before I start.”
“What’s he look like?”
“He’s youngish—older than me but not by much. Bearded, muscular, deep voice. Really hot. I just wanted to know if, you know, he’s someone’s husband, or someone’s boyfriend...”
At that, as Clark made to step out onto the landing, Melissa blocked him with her arm. Hastily, she pressed Lower Level. The doors closed again, taking them back down for one more lap.
“No, none of our husbands look like that, they’re old and dusty as shit! How many times have you seen this guy?”
“Oh, just a couple,” he said. “He was at Charisma’s birthday.” Truthfully, Clark hadn’t seen him since Charisma’s return from holiday, but Clark couldn’t get him out of his mind.
“Really...” Melissa said, racking her brain. She turned to face him. “You know you can tell me anything, right, kid? You can trust me.” Her eyes were hungry with intrigue. “Promise.”
“Oh, it’s nothing, I swear,” he demurred. “It’s just that, I thought this was, you know, a mostly female-centric team, and that I was one of the only guys.”
Melissa’s eyes were searching, and Clark could see alarms going off in her head. The elevator opened and Melissa pressed the button for Four again.
“Yeah,” Clark said. “He sneaks in—I mean, he comes up through the help’s entrance. I’d seen him all the time when I started, before you came back from your vacation.”
Spell it out for her, Clark .
“But then again, for those weeks, it was just me and Monica here, so...”
A bemused smirk crept onto Melissa’s face. “Thanks for telling me, kid,” she said with those wild eyes.
“No problem,” he replied.
Ding. Clark and Melissa had arrived.
Melissa spoke briefly to Monica, something about a contract and “paying the paps at Witch’s New Year,” whatever that meant. No sooner had she left did he begin to sing like a canary.
“Monica?” Clark said.
She let out an exasperated sigh. “What? What is it now?”
“Just a question...I’ve been wondering: what’s next for you after Charisma’s?”
Monica eyed him suspiciously. “Think you’re being funny? What are you getting on about?”
Clark’s ears began to heat. “I mean, what happens when an assistant like you has done all she can here? Does she get promoted? Does she move on? Does she, say...take her clients with her?”
Monica looked at him through slanted, cutting eyes. After a pause, she answered: “A few witches have come through Charisma’s and gone on to make a name for themselves. Take Queenie Mitchell, for example, whom Charisma once sent to the Carters when she was away. They loved Queen’s work so much that they continued to book her, and the rest is history. Now she’s practically American royalty in her own right.”
Clark nodded in understanding, and in relief. “So, this Queenie Mitchell, when she left, Charisma knew?”
“Of course Charisma knew.”
“And Charisma knew that Queenie was taking her clients?”
“Queenie didn’t take her clients; Charisma had sent her blessings. She is like a fairy godmother that way. Nobody takes a client from Charisma and gets away with it, and I mean nobody . Why do you ask?”
“Oh, nothing,” Clark said. “I’m still learning is all...It’s just that, I overheard one of the assistants is planning to go out on her own soon, and taking her clients with her.”
Monica turned away from her laptop and looked at him with narrowed eyes. “Who?” she asked. “Who’s going out on their own?”
“Oh, I can’t say . . .”
“Tell me,” she ordered. “Now.”
Bingo . . . Clark had struck a nerve.
“I don’t want to get anyone in trouble,” he said. “I thought you knew already...And Charisma,” he thought to add.
Monica’s ears perked. “Who? Is it Alicia?”
Clark shrugged.
“Emily?”
Clark shrugged again. “I haven’t spent much time with either of them yet,” Clark said carefully.
“I see...” A smile dawned on Monica’s face and yet didn’t quite reach those cold gray eyes. “Get back to work,” she said. She stood up and, as quick as her stilettos could carry her, exited the room.
A few days later, it was one of those rare moments where Emily, Monica, Melissa, and Clark had the penthouse to themselves while Charisma and Alicia were out.
Monica led Clark to the main floor’s north wing, where Lorena’s office was, except she took him into a room adjacent with a long table and chairs. A meeting room. She had him lay out black folders at every seat. He slid one open: the contents were the financial forecast for the year ahead, of Charisma’s various name brands. The numbers didn’t add up to Clark. How else was Charisma making her billions? Monica appeared at his side suddenly and startled Clark, but she was luckily too enmeshed with her cell phone and emails to notice him snooping.
When the assistants entered, ahead of Charisma and Alicia’s arrival, Lorena paused at the door.
“You,” she said, beckoning that Clark come here with a crook of her index finger. Clark’s stomach dropped. Would he be let go then for crashing the party? The two stepped outside into the hall of portraits, whose intent gazes seemed to be watching their every move.
“So,” she said, “how has the ‘experience’ of working here been thus far?”
He wondered how to answer.
“You can tell me anything, sweetie,” she said. “Trust me.” Lorena looked at him with that all-too-familiar leer.
Clark wanted to tell her the truth—that Monica was a bully to him, how she had cruelly rescinded her offer to him at the eleventh hour, how Melissa had confessed to leaving and taking her clients with her. He knew, though, that nothing good would come of telling the truth, and so he did what he did best: he held his tongue. “Great. I’m very appreciative of the opportunity of being here,” he decided to say, and left it at that. He felt like a robot saying it.
“Good,” she said. “I wanted to inform you that, after much... deliberation , we—that is to say, I— have decided to extend to you an invitation to join us for our Halloween party at So Below, Charisma’s nightclub and event space—”
“Oh my GAWD!” Clark blurted. “Really?! I’d love to go, thank you!”
Lorena was visibly taken aback when he jumped up to hug her, and gingerly patted his back in return for his display of affection. She took a step back and smoothed her dress.
“You have Emily to thank this time, as she was the one who suggested you come. The theme is fairy tales, so dress accordingly.”
“Thank you,” Clark said again. “I’ll be there.”
Lorena replied solemnly, “Do not mistake my kindness for softness, boy. I haven’t forgotten that you attended Charisma’s birthday uninvited.” At this, Clark erupted in a small sweat. “My word still stands. No funny business. No more stepping out of line.”
“Yes, absolutely,” Clark said. Despite what had happened the last time he got his hopes up, Clark couldn’t help but feel elated, knowing he had something to look forward to. Maybe good things happen after all...
Clark was about to find out how wrong he could be.