50+ Ways to Annoy the Death Witch: Epilogue

 

Epilogue: Not really annoyed, at the moment, actually.

My phone was ringing.

I’d woken up in bed, and was trying (and failing) to convince myself to go back to sleep, and now my phone was ringing.

It was someone I knew, all my contacts are set to ring with a noise like an actual ringing telephone, anyone else got the quietest ‘ringtone’ the phone had. “Well, I guess I’m up,” I said, and rolled over to grab my phone.

Callahan sighed. “Yeah, me too,” he said. He patted my hip and sat up. “I’ll make some coffee.”

“You don’t have to,” I said, getting my hand on my phone just as it went to voice mail.

“I know.” He headed out of the room.

My missed call was from my brother. As I checked my phone, I got the voice mail notification. I called him. We’d been texting the last few days, but this was the first call since the one after I came out of surgery.

“Hey.”

“Morning.”

“Did I call too early?” he asked. “I don’t know when you get up, sorry, I just- I heard you’re coming to town?”

“Yeah, here in a week or so, after my next follow up probably. Whenever the doctor says I can. The Council wants to talk to us about that lady. They swear I’m not in trouble, I guess they want me to look at all those spellbooks we found at her house, after, too.” She had a ton.

“Oh, was that when you were dying and still trying to work?” he asked.

“I wasn’t dying,” I said. “I was hurt, sure, but I’m fine. I’ll try to visit when I’m there, I should be able to make time, we’re gonna be there for a couple of weeks.”

“You were dying. I came to see you in the hospital, you were definitely dying.”

“I wish I remembered that,” I said. I’d been on enough meds that I barely knew my own name. “I know it was bad, I’m not saying it wasn’t, but-”

“Was your daddy this bull-headed?”

“No, he was worse,” I said, and sighed. “I’ve got a friend out here keeping an eye on me, okay? I’m not dealing with it alone. And I’m mending well.”

“Yeah, that redneck ex-cop who you’ve been complaining about for years, he’s suddenly living with you?”

“Yeah, okay, so I do get why that’s concerning,” I said. “We were- we had a lot of misunderstandings, but we’ve sorted them out, and he- look, I’m not saying I was dying, but if I was dying, he made sure I didn’t. And yeah, he’s got on my nerves, but I’ve always been able to trust him, or I wouldn’t have worked with him. He didn’t know all the stuff about what happened when I was little and it was- anyway, he’s fine. You’ll meet him when we come to town, you can judge for yourself, okay?”

“I will,” he said. “Listen, I got something to talk to you about, okay? I know how you feel about Momma, I get it, I respect it, and I’m not trying to say you’re wrong.”

I sighed. “But she wants to talk to me. Darius, I told you not to-”

“No. Um, she’s got cancer.”

I felt my heart drop. “She’s- say that again?”

“Cancer, melanoma.”

“Melanoma,” I said. “I- shit.”

“Yeah. I didn’t know until last night, we went over for dinner and she was wearing the worst wig I’ve ever seen. I swear to God, she must have got it at the discount bin at Party City.”

“She’s been sick a minute, then,” I said.

“Yeah, she was diagnosed at the end of February, and they’ve been cutting moles off and she started chemo and she didn’t say shit to me about it until her hair started falling out.” He sounded mad as hell.

“Jesus Christ. How bad?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “To listen to her, everything’s fine, and they got the cancerous moles and the chemo is just to clear everything else out. But Dad is worried.”

“You think it’s more than just ‘my wife has cancer’ worry?”

“Yeah.”

“Fuck.”

“I know how much I’m asking, here. But I know there’s- that’s the one thing that your kind of magic is real good at, is helping with chemo and cancer stuff. You can make sure it kills the stuff it needs to kill and leaves the rest of her alone.”

I sighed, shutting my eyes. “I’ll talk to her,” I said. “She might not let me. I know you say she’s better, but most people feel weird about my kind of magic, and she was weirder than most. And I cannot do it to someone who’s not cooperating. I’ll talk to her when we’re in town, and I’ll do it if she’ll let me, but it’s not all on me.”

“I know.”

“She’s got her share of stubborn, too.”

“Lord, I know. But I think she’s more afraid of dying. I’ll talk to her before you come up, get her thinking about it. Maybe if she feels like it’s her idea-”

“Yeah, that might do it,” I said. “How’s Emily doing? Her mom, uh… it was lung cancer, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah. It’s hitting her real hard.”

“How about you?”

“Oh, I don’t know. I don’t- I don’t know how I feel. We were just talking about having kids, but with Momma sick and… work going how it is. Blake and Blake says they’ve got a job for me, though. It’s a good offer. Momma hates that man, though. She said not to take it. You know anything about that?”

“She and Councilman Blake were buddy-buddy when I was little, and he was the one who got the tip-off about me being siphoned, so he was the one who came over and broke the siphon.”

Darius went real quiet.

“There’s a reason I don’t talk to her,” I said, after a long moment.

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, okay, that-”

“If the money’s good, take the job. They’re good people, and the Councilman’s always done right by me. He’s the one who got me into doing enchanting- and I like it, I’m good at it, it wasn’t just a pity thing. If it’s a job offer, it’s a genuine one, because they think you can hack it. Okay? And that’s all I’ll say on it.”

He sighed. “Yeah, thank you. Listen, I need to go.”

“Yeah, me too. See you soon.”

He hung up, and I sighed. He did not like being confronted with the fact that she still sucked, he worked hard to convince himself that was past tense. I hoped he took the job, but he might not- he'd have to actually confront that, for once.

I managed to get up on my crutches so I could get into the bathroom to piss, and then I headed to the kitchen, where Callahan was making breakfast. Smelled like fried potatoes.

“My little brother,” I said, sitting down.

“I didn’t ask,” he said.

“You were restraining yourself mightily,” I said. I’d tell him about my mom later, I didn’t want to think about it just then. “I think I’m up and about well enough that you don’t need to actually sleep on top of me, unless you’re feeling particularly moved to.”

“You want your room back?”

“Yeah, a bit. But you said you got your room fluffed out a little.”

“Just until I find a new place.”

In the midst of everything else going on, apparently his landlord had decided to sell the house he’d been living in for ten years. Didn’t let him make an offer, either, so he’s got to move, and with him taking care of me and then going up to Chicago, he doesn’t have time to look for a place. So I told him to stay here for a while and save his money, and the Matthews boys are gonna help him move his stuff down this next week, when I’m feeling more mobile, and before we leave town for several weeks.

“You can stay here as long as you need to. It’s nice to have someone else rattling around in here.”

“Yeah. Um, how much longer do you think I’m gonna have these other folks’ magic? I keep having little visions, and I’m worried about driving.”

“Still?” I asked.

He nodded. “I hadn’t wanted to say anything, but you’ve got an appointment tomorrow, and I just about threw the coffee pot across the room. We might need to call the Matthews and see if one of the boys are up for driving you. But you know about weird magic stuff, can you…”

“I don’t know about borrowing magic like this, that’s your bailiwick.”

He sighed.

“No, we need to look into it. See if Dylan can help you at least sort it out for now, so you’re not gonna drive your truck into a ditch? He said there’s a way he can like. Kick them into some kind of buffer and look at them later, when he’s not driving or doing something important.”

He nodded. “Yeah, I guess- it can’t be forever, though, right?”

“Well, I don’t know. I mean, they’re not around to take it back, and you can’t give it back, so… I kinda thought it would just sort of fade away, but if it’s not doing that, you might be stuck. We’ll have to check. Can you still do earth magic?”

“Yeah,” he said. He sighed. “It does stand to reason, they’re dead and- shit. I wonder if they knew, when they did it.”

“She might have,” I said. “I don’t know how well they could communicate to each other.” I shivered. I fucking hate thinking about them- what was done to them was horrifying.

He put a plate of fried eggs on some home fries down in front of me, with toast, and sat down with his own plate. He sighed. “You’re sure you’re alright with me here?”

“I’d tell ya if I weren’t,” I said. “I just don’t like sharing my room, I’m ornery like that. I tried to convince Summer to stay with us, too, but she swears she’s got a decent place down in Maysville.” Summer was Jacob and Dylan’s mom.

“I think she’s doing some outpatient thing and she can’t stay with us,” Callahan said. “Something to do with that rehab place she went through.”

“Well, she coulda said,” I muttered. “No, I know, that’s personal,” I said, before he could say anything. “Point is, house feels better when there’s people in it, and I missed it. I never lived alone until after Dad died, I always had roommates. And I hated him living alone here, too, it’s too big a house for one person. Always has been. It’s why I kept trying to convince myself I was gonna sell it.”

“You really want me to stay?”

“I really do.”

“Alright, then. I’ll stay.”

“Good.”

“Have you taken your pills?” he asked.

I sighed.

“I’ll go get em,” he said, getting up.

It’s weird, how much can change in a week.

I still don’t know his first name, though. I guess I’ll find out when the mail starts coming in.