Page 8 of Again, In Autumn

“You got me a coffee?” I awe.

“Darryl’s paying for our whole trip, and I know you’re going to go broke on box wine this week, so I figured you needed a pick me up.”

I pull her in for a hug. “Thank you.”

“Hey, don’t let your sister boss you around, this week,” she says, pulling back. “Okay? And don’t let old memories make new memories feel bad.” She shakes my shoulder. “Have fun.”

I give her a soft smile, pushing away the tug of old memories. “I’ll try.”

Chapter Three

Heddy’s shop, Minerals and Magic, is smushed between a used bookstore and do-it-yourself ceramics workshop, one in a collection of businesses nicknamed “Beatnik Alley.” This is where you find the weirdos.

I can say that, I’m family to a weirdo. I’ve dabbled in weirdness myself. I spent some chunk of last night yelling at burnt banana bread so I’m sure that counts.

My sixty-one-year-old surrogate mother can usually be found here, fixing string lights and refreshing the planter boxes. Her shop’s exterior brick is forest green, the two bay windows painted black. One of her many ex-husbands made the hanging wooden sign that she takes down every few months for paint touch-ups.

“Heddy!” I call out, the doorbell ringing behind me.

A woman to my right jumps out of her skin and nearly knocks over a rack of greeting cards.

“You scared me,” she breathes, flashing her eyes angrily.

“Sorry,” I offer.

It’s never empty in here, but I always enter as if I’m in Heddy’s private home and she’s somewhere lost in the fog of incense. Customers don’t appreciate my over-familiarity while they peruse vintage jewelry or open apothecary table drawers to sort through collected feathers, seashells, and critter bones.

“Hey, Zander,” I offer to the man behind the counter. Sets of carefully curated vintage bowls chatter and low-hanging chandeliers jingle when I cross the wooden floorboards. “Do you know where she is?”

He leans his bare arms over the counter and twirls a single tiger’s eye earring. “She’s in the back, and she’s in a mood.”

Well, I’m on the precipice of a mood myself, so we can’t both be problematic today.

I pause, craning my neck for her. “What is it this time?”

“Candles.” His voice lowers. “Glass ones.”

I thank him and head past the long table of color-organized crystals. Crossing the hazardous wooden threshold into a brick-paved second room painted a deep aubergine, I find my godmother standing on a chair.

She’s stacking glass candles on a different chair that balances precariously on a mosaic bistro table. The crown of her head scratches dried flowers hanging from the ceiling.

My feet stop just within her periphery, to not startle her. There’s broken glass on the floor behind her.

“Hi Vee Vee,” she says without looking at me. She stacks the candles in a pyramid formation. The table sways.

“Heddy, you can’t leave glass on the floor of your business unless you want to get sued,” I say, walking to the storage closet to collecting a broom.

She argues, “I’ve done all right so far. I just tell people Harold did it.”

I laugh, “Well then the ghost has been busy today.”

“He’s always busy,” she mumbles. “Especially if the kids moved his doll.”

I freeze. “Don’t do that. You know how I feel about that.”

“You can believe what you want, but that doesn’t make it any less true,” she responds with quiet focus. Her hands slowly and she inches down from her chair to the floor.

Heddy’s stringy waist-length grayish-black hair swings with braids and ribbons tied into it. Her tan, dry skin crinkles around a smile of whiter than white teeth. Purplish lipstick, tacky gemstone rings on each finger, low-rise Seven For All Mankind jeans. She wears a hand-painted sleeveless khaki vest portraying a fox and dog playing together.

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