“What if…” said Boris slowly, leaning forward in his chair, elbows planted on the counter so that he could rest his chin in his hands and stare at Jack with blue, blue eyes. “…itisEnzo?”
Jack’s heart flipped. He resolutely ignored it. Now wasnotthe time. “Maybe we can force him to reverse it,” he suggested, though he wasn’t entirely sure how one forced a member of the mob to do anything. Maybe they could hold him hostage, try to intimidate him, but it wouldn’t matter. Too many people would come looking for him. People with big guns.
He didn’t even want to think about that.
“Yeah,” said Boris slowly, refusing to break eye contact. “What if itisa curse? What if we… cut it off at the head?”
Jack reeled back, shocked. “You wanna kill him?”
“Hell no. I’m just saying, we mightneedto.”
“What if we kill him and it makes thingsworse?”
“I’m not saying weshouldkill him,” Boris barked, then lowered his voice like he’d suddenly realized that it was a bad idea to plot a murder in a hotel lobby at full volume.
“You might be right,” Jack mused. And then, because hedidn’t want to talk about it anymore, he added, “I’m gonna go to the library. See what I can find.”
“Good idea,” said Boris, nodding. “I’m gonna go through the phone book. I think we need a witch. They might have some ideas for this Enzo guy.”
“You can just find witches in the phone book?”
“No, but you can find candle stores and curiosities shops and stuff. If you know where to look, you can find the right people.”
“Have you called a witch before?”
“I used to date one,” said Boris, suddenly fascinated by a scuff on the file cabinet. He refused to meet Jack’s eye. “But she changed her number. I don’t know how to get ahold of her anymore.”
“You dated a witch?” Jack blinked.
“Why is that surprising?”
“I thought you were kinda, um, maybe not that into women.”
Boris pulled his magazine from underneath the counter, held it up, and rolled his eyes. “This isn’t an act. I can like both. And men can be witches, too, just FYI.”
“Right,” said Jack. Heat flooded his face. “Good luck with the, uh, the witches. I’m gonna head out now.”
And he fled, out the door and down the street, feet carrying him away from the hotel as fast as they could without actually running.
It shouldn’t be weird. He liked Boris. He was into Boris. He’d slept with other men before. And even if he didn’t know where he stood with Carla, he shouldn’t be so embarrassed, so nervous to have such a basic discussion.
Maybe it was because he didn’t usually talk to people about their sexuality. When he was in certain clubs, there was no need to. Outside, he dated women almost exclusively. That way, there was no need to explain things to anyone. People always wanted some sort of explanation, some balm to soothe their discomfort, their confusion, their disapproval. It was exhausting. Endless.
But it didn’t matter. The time loop would end, and Jackwould go back home to his miserable job and never see Boris or Carla again.
Or the loopwouldn’tend and he’d die at the hands of thatthing.
Both options filled him with dread.
The library had onlya few books on the occult. Jack scanned every shelf just in case.
Carla was right. There were only ten shelves total, though they reached nearly from the floor to the ceiling and were wider than he was tall. The librarian gave him a glare so severe that it was amazing the thick, plastic rims of her glasses didn’t melt, then returned to sorting through a cart of returns.
There was only one other person, an exhausted-looking old man who sat in one of the armchairs by a greasy window overlooking the downtown strip, a dog-eared crime novel propped on his gut. Jack waved; the man ignored him.
There has to be something, he told himself as he examined the shelves. But there were few options. A book on hauntings. Another about demonology. One about alien encounters. A tarot guide.
The book of demonology was the most useless. Jack copied down all the symbols he could find and recorded their meanings, but he doubted Carla would recognize any of them. (He certainly didn’t.) The book contained absolutely nothing about actually summoning demons—it only listed off their characteristics. None of them closely matched the creature. Regardless, he scrawled a few distant possibilities.
