Page 41 of Thirsty
“Thank me? Hah!” She beckoned them inside. “Your pal here’s the one doing me a favor.”
“Is he?” Charlie asked, staring at Lorenzo. He made a mental note to ask about the phrasehuman companionlater.
They followed Roberta through her home to the dim, black-curtained room where she conducted her business. She offered them each a seat at a circular table with a crystal ball in the center. The room was decorated in the occult-glam style he would’ve expected—jewels and macabre artifacts, talismans and feathers and glitter. On the mantelpiece, in a place of pride, was a very old, very well-loved troll doll.
“I was thrilled when you called,” Roberta was saying to Lorenzo. “This is going to tide me over nicely. We should make it a regular thing!”
“I told you,” Lorenzo said firmly. “Just this once. And you have to answer Charlie’s questions.” In a faux aside, he added, “He can be quite annoying.”
“Oh shush,” Charlie told him. Turning to Roberta, he said, “So, uh, how do you two know each other?”
Roberta beat Lorenzo to the punch. “We go way back, Lorenzo and me! Of course I shouldn’t say that about a vampire, I’ll date myself.” She laughed throatily at her own joke. “And I guess I have you to thank for Lorenzo’s help tonight.”
“Help? With what?”
“Oh, vampires are fantastic conduits.”
“Conduits?”
“It’s like a—a pulley and a lever,” she explained. “I don’t know shit about physics, but I know you rig up one of those contraptions and you can lift double, triple the weight, right?” Charlie nodded, unsure, and she continued: “Vampires are like that for those of us with the gift. They enhance,” she said, with a meaningful waggle of her entire slight frame.
“Does it—does it hurt?” he asked. “Is it dangerous?” Lorenzo glanced at him, looking surprised and maybe even—touched?
“Not at all!” Roberta said. “It’s like, ah—when you shine light through a prism and it becomes a rainbow. Don’t hurt the prism. But you and me, we get all those gorgeous colors.”
Lorenzo was glaring at her. “Okay,” Charlie said slowly. He still felt like he was missing something—namely, why Lorenzo seemed so reluctant to help this woman. “And what—I mean—what is he going to enhance, exactly?”
“Her ability to scam people,” Lorenzo said flatly.
“Hey, whoa, hey, oh!” Roberta protested, throwing both hands in the air. “I don’t scam. I provide a service.”
“She’s a hustler.”
“Excuse you,” she snapped back. “I am a bona fide medium. I speak to the dead.”
“I’m confused,” Charlie said. “Are you—do you have magic?”
“In spades, doll,” Roberta said with a toothy smile.
“She is a very weak medium,” Lorenzo retorted. Robertagasped, but he continued on: “And rather than use what little gift she has to make legitimate readings and communications with the dead, she—”
“I make it work,” Roberta cut him off. “Look, you think that every time someone comes in here wanting to talk to their great-aunt Patsy, she’s actually in the room with us? What kind of luck would that be? Most of the dead, they’ve moved on, they’re at peace. So I—”
“You lie,” Lorenzo said flatly. Charlie shifted, uncomfortable.
“I tell people that their beloved friends, their lovers, their pets—that they all knew in the end that they were loved,” Roberta said. “That all their arguments were settled and all their grudges gone, and that they’re at peace. That they can move on.”
“You make things up,” Lorenzo said, unimpressed.
“Not anymore.” She held her hand out to Lorenzo, but still he hesitated. To Charlie, Roberta said, “One night with this one, and with my powers enhanced, I actuallycanreach all of my regulars’ loved ones. I can get them real answers.”
“And you’ll use that to keep them on the hook for more appointments and more fees,” Lorenzo said, shaking his head. “More scams.”
She sat forward, quirking an eyebrow. “You want me to answer the kid’s questions or what?”
Suddenly understanding, Charlie said, “You couldn’t find any other witches for us to talk to.”
“Oh, of course not,” Roberta answered for him. “Most witches hate vampires. They’re predators, after all, and witches think they’re the most human humans.”
