Dead-on.
4A GLASS HALF-FULL… OF IRONY
THOSE TWO WERE NOT HUMAN,”I say the moment the vampire couple leaves.
The head rolls himself on the floor, seeming happy to continue functioning like a Roomba on a dry-mop function. Right, of course this revelation wouldn’t impact him; he’s not a real live human himself. At least, not anymore.
“I thought you wouldn’t notice,” he says.
“I’m not an idiot. I know that more than humans live in Salem.”
Knowing and seeing are different things, though. It’s rare for vampires and other paranormal beings to interact with humans. Grandma always said they keep out of sight, avoiding human notice by wearing magical jewelry with markings called runes. Unless, of course, you’re friends.
I bolt the front door and slip the vampires’ contact information into my pocket. Not to save it, though. The phone numbers for Dave and Amanda, whose nameshardlysuggest creatures of the night, now join a wad of lint and rubber bands in transit to the trash can.
“So this must be why you took my presence in stride!” declares Bulan the deviant head. “Youdoshare Rose’s predilection for the supernatural. In spite of your attempt to bury me—”
“I am taking nothing in stride. I am severely traumatized and masking.”
The head laughs because he thinks this is a joke.
“Also,” I add, “if you’re trying to make me think you knew Grandma Rose, it’s not working.”
“How come?”
“I don’t share apredilectionfor anything supernatural.”
“I suppose it was a poor choice of words. A penchant, perhaps? A partiality? As I understood from dear old Rosie, your family line is fully human and non-magical yet has been allowed to dabble in the paranormal world ever since your ancestor was scapegoated in a witch trial for an infestation of albino pigeons.”
“Crabs,” I correct. “It was crabs.”
“Be that as it may, with a name likeMortifie, who’s surprised he got targeted? Not me! Ha!”
I fold my arms as I consider the head-turned-dust-collector and his knowledge of my sordid ancestry. “Fine. So maybe you did know Grandma personally,” I allow. “And you two seem to have ended on good terms, in spite of your dismemberment.”
“Of course we did! My limblessness was a preexisting condition, nothing to do with dear Rosie. So if you don’t mind, I’d appreciate it if you refrained from another burial attempt. It’s rather rude.”
“Noted,” I say, although it’s not a promise or anything.
Maybe Grandma’s possession of the head wasn’t a convoluted scheme to make me to befriend her little cabal, like I’d suspected. But why is it, or he, still here?
“What do you want?” I ask the head. “Seriously.”
He looks up at me earnestly.
“At present? To know why you aren’t thinking of helping the happy couple,” he says.
Nope. We’re not revisiting that.
“You must be aware already that there’s nothing to fear,” he says as I actively ignore him. I am instead busying my hands with herb organization. It’s concerning how many of these vials are labeledPoison. What’smoreconcerning are the ones labeledPoison, Maybe. “Vampiresaren’t all bad. In fact, they’re kind of wimpy. I’ve heard of their victims biting them back and winning. Of course, they still turned into vampires afterward.”
I pick up a concerning vial ofBalm of Kitten. What does that even mean?
“I’m not calling them,” I tell the head. “Or taking on that job. Or staying in Salem.”
“Hmm. So if it’s not a predilection you have, is it fear?”
I roll my eyes. I’m not afraid of the paranormal itself. But do I harbor a fear of falling into Salem’s paranormal world? Of it consuming me, destroying me, making me an irresponsible and inadvertently cruel mess of a person, like it did to my mom and my grandmother and countless Spüks before them?
