I watch Trevor’s gears turn, wondering if Morgan has, in fact, always worn reading glasses. Luna walks in from the storeroom with three new candles and arranges them on a table display. “Your eyesight starting to go?” she asks.
“I’ve had these forever. None of you pay enough attention to me.”
“I haveneverseen you wear glasses,” she replies.
Trevor’s puzzlement turns to indignation. “Yeah! That’s what I thought, too.”
Morgan’s dark stare flickers to me. “I wear them all the time. My vision is highly impaired. Ask me to look at something.” He removes his glasses. There are red marks on thebridge of his nose from his ill-fitting nose pads, which must pinch.
Trevor holds a book aloft,The Encyclopedia of Elemental Witchery. “What’s this?”
Morgan squinches up his face. “A duck.”
Trevor examines the book, as if to make sure it hasn’t somehow become a duck. “Not even close. Your eyesight sucks, man.”
I have refused to speak to Morgan Angelopoulos for two weeks. Not for lack of him trying to rope me into conversations, though; everywhere I go, there he is, too. At Moonville Market, both of us hunting for taco seasoning. At the ATM. In the apartment bathroom upstairs, which he insists on using because Luna’s hand towels are softer than the ones in the shop bathroom.Wanna go check out this dead thing I found in a mousetrap and see if it might be a paranimal? Hey, do you have a safety pin on you, by any chance? Guess what? The toaster at Half Moon Mill is burning images of goldfish into slices of bread. I emailed Pepperidge Farm and Guinness World Records to come check it out.
But this, right here—he finally wins a reaction. “Why would there be a duck in our shop?”
Morgan lifts his nose, prodding his glasses back into place. “Oh, are we talking now? P.S., that’s offensive to say to somebody who’s visually impaired. When you’re at the mercy of weak eyes, like I am, everything looks like ducks.”
“I’mvisually impaired. I wear contacts.”
He gives me an injured look as he throws himself into his desk chair and spins twice before opening his laptop. Musicpours through his headphones, so loud that I can hear every word. Soon he is playing the violin and belting out a song. “Nobody gonna slooow me dooowwwn. Oh no! I got. To. Keep. On. MOOOVIIING!”
Shaking my head disapprovingly, I refocus on my own computer.
A ridiculous human being, I type.
A ridiculous human being in a three-piece suit patterned to look like a brick wall. He takes a wind-up frog toy out of his desk and sets it in motion, watching the frog toddle off the edge of the desk, onto the floor. He and Trevor cheer when it lands on its feet and keeps walking.
I am never going to get any work done in here. He is intentionally disruptive! It is inconsiderate and unprofessional.
This is a story about an author who never starts her book because a man eats Funyuns loudly and brews coffee loudly and when he talks to you it’s like he’s trying to be heard over the din of a house party.
“I’d read that story,” Morgan says, his voice close (and loud) enough that my whole body jerks. He’s materialized behind my shoulder.
I slam my laptop shut. “Mind your business.”
“I can mind multiple businesses. Have you heard from our friend Bob?” He hops up onto the counter, gaze like an X-ray. His frames are tortoiseshell, and there’s a small scratch on one lens. It’s infuriating that this makes him even more attractive. He uses his powers for evil.
“What do you care?” I grumble.
“Tell Bob you’re through with him, and go out to dinner with me tonight. I know a fabulous place upstate. We’ll see some sights…get a hotel…”
A hotel with Morgan.My insubordinate stomach swoops. I remind myself that I do not like him anymore, and he doesn’t mean anything he says.
I cannot abide a liar.
“I wouldn’t develop feelings for you even if doing so gavemeincredible powers,” I hiss. “Not even for telekinesis. Or the ability to fry an egg just by looking at it.”
He frowns. “Your sisters were right. You’re a heartbreaker.”
I gather up my laptop, then march from the room.
“Is it something I said?” he calls out.
The back door bangs shut to slice off his last word. In the courtyard behind The Magick Happens, I slam my laptop down onto a picnic table with more force than the poor thing deserves. This machine has been loyal to me throughout three and a half novels and much abuse of the backspace key. I should probably have a name for it, like Harvey or Dellatricia.
