Witches in Flight (39 page)

Elsie grinned.
 
This
was the fun part.
 
“It’s a
secret.
 
I want to do the reveal
once I find a place.”
 
She winked
at Lauren.
 
“And no peeking.”
 
She needed all the mind witches in her
life on their best behavior.

Lauren chuckled.
 
“Well then, let’s find you a place.
 
Are you looking to rent or buy?”

“Rent.”
 
It was the
only choice that made financial sense.
 
“That way I can try on the space to see if it fits, and I won’t tie up
all my budget.”

Lizard scowled.
 
“You sank your budget into my maps.”

“Yes.”
 
And she
didn’t regret it one bit.
 
“It
won’t be money that makes this work, or at least, not only money.”
 
Elsie waved the sheet of paper with her
list of requirements.
 
“But the
first thing I need is help finding the right place.”

Lizard picked up the list and started reading.
 
She groaned at a couple of things.
  
Snorted at a couple of
others.
 
And by the time she looked
back up, curiosity was doing a double-Dutch jump-rope routine in her eyes.
 
“Exactly what kind of business is this?”

“A secret one.”
 
Elsie was enjoying herself immensely.
 
“Do I have a hope of finding something for under two
thousand dollars a month?”
 
Anything more was going to wreak havoc with her budgeting spreadsheet.

Her roommate surveyed the list one more time, munching on a
brownie.
 
“Probably.
 
Especially if you throw in some
cookies.
 
Your new landlord has a
weakness for snickerdoodles.”

Snickerdoodles?
 
Elsie frowned.
 
“I’m serious
about this.”

“So am I.”
 
Lizard
spoke around a mouthful of brownie and handed the sheet of paper to
Lauren.
 
“Sounds like your rental
property over on Bancroft would totally work.
 
It’s empty and zoned for business, right?”

“It has good parking.”
 
Lauren took the paper, scanning quickly.
 
“Yup.
 
Even has
a big kitchen and a soundproof garage.”
 
She looked up, amused.
 
“You
planning to start a rock band?”

Elsie laughed—that wasn’t so far from the truth.
 
A garage’s worth of musical instruments
was on her list.

Lauren reached into a drawer for keys and tossed them to
Lizard.
 
“Go take a walk—it’s
not far.
 
Rent will be sixteen
hundred a month, plus a steady supply of snickerdoodles.”

Elsie closed her eyes, savoring the grown-up version of
straddling Gertrude Geronimo at the top of the hill.
 
She could do sixteen hundred.
 
It was going to work.
 

And then opened her eyes and lifted her feet.
 
“Let’s go.”

~ ~ ~

She could feel endings drawing near.
 
Vero moved sheet music around on her piano, a sure sign she
had things on her mind.

Some endings were joyful, meant to be greeted with
celebration.
 
Lizard and Elsie
neared the end of their formal journeys with WitchLight, and that was all well
and good.
 
They were nicely
ensconced in the witching community now, their feet set on interesting paths.

Their journeys would not be over, of course.
 
They never truly were.

She needed to remember that.
 
There were other journeys drawing to a close as well, ones
that lay bittersweet on her heart.
 
Melvin held her hand quietly more often these days—he knew it too.

Vero shook her head, chuckling.
 
Maudlin had never suited her for very long.
 
Her student would be here soon, and if
Jennie’s emails were to be believed, Elsie was readying to leave the nest.
 
Which carried bittersweet tinges of its
own—Vero was rather fond of this particular little birdling.

She looked up as Elsie entered the music room, clutching her
beloved guitar.
 
“Ah, tired of
listening to my piano, are you?”

“Not ever.”
 
Elsie’s
smile was soft, with a hint of something else.
 
“But I can’t play the piano, and I have something to sing
for you.”

Forty years on stage taught you to recognize moments—the
ones that would stay behind your eyes for decades to come.
 
Vero knew she was about to be blessed
with one more.
 
And she knew how to
be an audience.
 
Slowly, she
rearranged herself on the piano bench, eyes attentive, heart waiting.

Elsie pulled over a stool and sat quietly tuning her
guitar.
 
The girl had an excellent
ear, even if she couldn’t play to save her life.
 
And then she looked up, with still hands and gathering
passions.

Vero waited.

She knew the song the moment Elsie struck the first chords.
 
They’d sung Hallelujah together many
times.
 
Sad versions and glorious
ones, some gritty and others light as angel wings.

This one was different.
 
This one held all those things.

The song of a woman who had finally begun to understand all her
notes.

Vero listened as the music soared.
 
Elsie’s voice was competent, no more.
 
Her guitar playing, not even adequate.
 
And it was a song that would have
pulled a sold-out concert hall to its feet.
 

It spoke of a heart open to possibility, a mind aware of the
thorns, and a soul’s courage.

It was the song of a woman in flight.

~ ~ ~

Lizard sat on the front steps of the little apartment building
and surveyed the street.
 
She could
name the people who lived in at least half the houses she could see.
 
That was a good start.
 

Most of them had messy, lived-in yards.
 
Also good.
 
The cars weren’t too shiny, the diner was around the corner,
and the skateboarder was the fifth kid on wheels in the last ten minutes.

It could work.

Leaving her two-ton book bag on the stoop, she let herself in
the front door.
 
Two apartments up,
two on the main level.
 
The vacant
one with the lockbox was up and to the right.

She cursed when her hands shook typing in the code.
 
This was no big deal.
 
No freaking big deal at all.

“Hello, dearie.”
 
The voice came from a tiny old man who barely reached to Lizard’s
shoulder.
 
“I’m Frankie.
 
You moving into Mabel’s old place?
 
It’s a good one.”

Frack—had somebody died here?
 
“What happened to Mabel?”

“Went to live with her daughter.
 
Don’t you worry about her at all—someone that grumpy’s
bound to live until she’s 103.”
 
Frankie peered up at Lizard.
 
“You’re not grumpy, are you now?”

“Depends who you ask.”

Frankie cackled and pushed open the door.
 
“Come on in—I’ll show you
around.
 
You young people don’t
have any idea how to check a place out.
 
You have to look in all the nooks and crannies, check out the bones of a
place.”
 
He grinned.
 
“I’ll even show you the secret trapdoor.
 
You can let your boyfriends in and out
that way.”

She wandered into the main room, letting Frankie’s chatter wash
over her.
 
Good light.
 
Nice window seat.
 
Cozy, or it would be with a couch and a
chair or two.

Lizard turned left into the kitchen, expecting standard rental
blugness.
 
And gaped.
 
Frankie grinned.
 
“Mabel was a real cook.
 
Lived here twenty-five years and talked
the landlord into every kind of gadget.”

She’d met the landlord—talking him into a stainless-steel
range and a marble-topped island must have required Lauren-sized negotiation
skills.
 

The marble would rock for biscuit making.
 
Not the pay-your-way-onto-Freddie’s-bus
biscuits.
 
Just the regular old
share-with-your-neighbors kind.

She looked around one more time.
 
Yeah.
 
She could
see it.
 
Lizard’s halfway
house.
 

“You’re not going to tell, are you.”

Elsie looked up as Nat entered the studio space, eyes
twinkling.
 
“Tell what?”

“Whatever has you so happy.
 
You’ll drive Witch Central crazy by sunset.”
 
Nat bent down, starting to re-roll the
mats Elsie had just cleaned.
 
“Am I
about to lose my intern again?”

Pangs hit Elsie’s heart—and then she caught sight of Nat’s
happy smile.
 
“Sort of.
 
I have some ideas about how we can keep
working together, if you might be interested.
 
We can talk after the big reveal tomorrow.”
 
And after she turned half a kitchen’s
worth of tomatoes into spaghetti sauce.

“The answer will be yes.”
 
Nat paused in her rolling.
 
“And the door is open anytime
you
need a space to move and breathe.”

“I have roots here.”
 
Elsie could feel the truth of it in the warm strength of the bamboo
beneath her feet.
 
“You helped me
learn how to do that, to find a way to move inside and breathe my way out of
emptiness.
 
I won’t forget.”

“And now you’ll pass it on.”

Elsie eyed her mentor and friend.
 
“They’re really sure you’re not a mindreading witch?”

“Just a woman with eyes.”
 
Nat scooped up a pile of six mats in a way that would have caused an
avalanche if anyone else had tried it.
 
“You like to help.
 
You
thrived leading the workshop.
 
Once
you’ve tasted that, it’s a hard thing to let go.”

“I didn’t do it alone.”
 
That was one of the reminders to herself Elsie had neatly inscribed in
her business plan.
 
“And I won’t do
this next part alone either.”
 
She
liked being part of a team—and that was one of the WitchLight discoveries
she treasured most.

As was the one that the best therapists had a bit of witch in
them.
 
And often didn’t call
themselves therapists.

“It’s good you plan to give us something to do.”
 
Nat’s lips twitched.
 
“Getting Witch Central out of your hair
might involve a move to Outer Mongolia.”

“Not a problem.”
 
Elsie stretched, her shoulders a little scrunched from mat
scrubbing.
 
“I have a list of jobs
a mile long people can help with.”
 
She giggled suddenly, remembering one in particular.
 
“I have Jamie’s name down for managing
the lime-green tape.”

“I can be there when you give it to him, right?”
 
Nat’s eyes lit with glee.
 
“I think I might even have your
original roll in the back office somewhere.”
 
She headed in the direction of the hallway.
 
“Wait here, I’ll go see if I can find
it.”