Chapter 24: Eating & Talking

Kirby sat next to Patty at the long table of the dining room of Adelaide’s estate. He finished his third sandwich, then picked up a fourth from the rapidly shrinking pile on the platter before them. Still clad in her sports bra and cycling shorts, the older woman matched him sandwich-for-sandwich.

“That’s good ham, huh?” Kirby asked, after a gulp of beer.

Patty nodded as she swallowed. She took a few gulps of her own beer. “Makes you hungry as all hell, doesn’t it? The fights, the damage, they squeeze the life outta you. The healing magic helps, but it makes you hungry and thirsty for everything. You’ve gotta refill the tank.”

“Is that why I want to go out there and grab a couple of briskets and start wolfing them down?” He pointed to the line of large barbecue rigs, visible through the dining room window and merrily smoking away.

“Probably.”

She finished crunching a mouthful of chips and washed it down, emptying her third bottle of beer in the process. As she grabbed another, he asked, “How did you do what you did, Patty? I couldn’t see it all through the fence, but I saw you fight that fucker. You hit him so hard that his feet left the ground. You took those punches and rolled right back to your feet. You’re, what, pushing sixty? You’re fit, but…”

“You’re asking how I was able to take a lickin’ and keep on tickin’?” She bit off nearly half a carrot and crunched loudly.

For a moment, Kirby wondered if that was lesbian humor. “Yeah. That guy, the asshole with the sunglasses, wasn’t natural. He only hit me twice—shoved me really—and Amy said I had a concussion, two fractured vertebrae, six broken ribs, and I was bleeding into both my lungs. You went toe-to-toe with him. What am I not understanding?”

“You’re right. There’s more than meets the eye with this old gal.” She winked. “I thought there was with you, too. In fact, I’m shocked there isn’t. I don’t claim to know what an Abyssal wolf is, but Marci talks about them like they’re the goddamn Terminator. I just assumed you were one of Miss Adelaide’s guys. Y’know, like Butch? It wasn’t until we started talking at lunch that day last week that I realized you had just been some bystander—and you killed one of those goddamn Terminator wolves. How the fuck did you do that if you’re not even prepared?”

“Prepared?” He knew his cluelessness was appallingly evident.

“Look, I’ve always been good at roughhousing,” she explained, “but I’ve had some training. A lot of training, really.” From the side pockets of the cycling shorts, she produced her fingerless gloves, tossing them on the table. “Plus, Marci made those for me.”

“She sewed you gloves?”

“She enchanted those,” Patty talked over his question, “put some hellacious mumbo-jumbo on ‘em. Trust me: when I dick-punched that asshole this morning, he felt it.”

“Magic gloves. Got it. But how did he get so strong? How could the two of you clobber each other after he Hulked-out and got strong—and you used the magic gloves—and not wind up with shattered ribs and punctured lungs? Are you on magic steroids? Are you some kind of cyborg?”

“Kirby, I’ve been enhanced. Call it ‘performance enhancing magic’ if you want. Over the years Marci and some of the top mumbo-jumbo experts in the Guild have strengthened my bones, my joints, and my muscles. My reflexes are better—and my endurance. I’ve been trained to see the mumbo-jumbo, to spot some of the more common dangerous things. I heal fast, too.”

“Like Wolverine? Or Deadpool?”

“Shit!” Patty shook her head. “That Deadpool movie was funny but, no, I couldn’t regrow an arm or anything, Marci says. If I did lose an arm or a leg, though, my stump would heal pretty quick. I probably wouldn’t bleed to death. Probably.”

“And you said that Butch was enhanced, like you? That Adelaide had other ‘guys’ who were?”

“Sure,” she said, picking up another sandwich from the platter. “Rich, powerful people have armed bodyguards and fixers. Makes sense that powerful folks in the mumbo-jumbo crowd would have the same—and that their people would be outfitted to handle magical-type situations.”

“Well, yeah.” He could see her point. “When you put it that way… So, you’re Marci’s bodyguard and her partner?”

“Reverse the order of that,” Patty said through the quarter-sandwich she had shoved into her mouth. “We were together for ten or more years before she suggested the idea of enhancing my muscles and bones. She told me she was worried for my safety, that being with her made me a potential target as she and Miss Adelaide rose higher in the Guild. Honestly, she doesn’t need much guarding. Marci might just be the deadliest woman in the Western Hemisphere. Most of the time, I’m just along for the ride.”

The pair started on the plate of oatmeal cookies that had been carried in during Patty’s explanation. As they ate and swigged more beers, Kirby thought over their earlier meeting in the library with Adelaide, Marci, and Amy. Also present had been a dark-skinned black woman named Blossom and a small, mixed-race woman who did not speak, but from whom he had received several intense stares. She had been both attractive and intimidating. Of course, he found nearly all attractive women intimidating. He, Amy, and Patty had related the details of the attack in front of Kirby’s bungalow, then answered questions from Adelaide and Blossom. When the debriefing was over, he had hoped to ask a few questions of his own. Instead, he and Patty had been invited to clean up and to get something to eat. They left the library and Amy remained behind.

When Adelaide’s kitchen staff had cleared away everything but the cookies and given them each a fresh bottle of beer, Kirby did his best to stifle a belch. “Okay, you told me to shut up and pay attention to the road on the way here. I did. Then, I answered all the questions I was asked in the library, but I didn’t get the chance to ask any of my own. We’re alone. Can you tell me who the fuck Mr. Sunglasses this morning was? Why is there a war? Who’s fighting whom? Why did they send Mr. Sunglasses to kill Marci—and is it the same people who tried to kill Adelaide two weeks ago, who tried to kill me and Butch on Saturday?”

Patty shook her head slowly. “And you’re asking me because…?” She grabbed one of the lacy, embroidered napkins from the table and blew her nose loudly. “That’s not how it works, Kirby. The chiefs are upstairs. I’m down here with you. I’m one of the Indians.”

Undeterred, Kirby pressed on. “Yeah, but you’ve been around this stuff longer than I’ve been alive, haven’t you? You’ve got to have some clue what’s going on. I only met my first sorceress two weeks ago. I’m in over my head. I feel like I’m drowning in the mumbo-jumbo deep end.”

“Yeah. Okay, that’s gotta be pretty miserable and confusing.” There was sympathy in her voice. “From what Marci’s told me, the attack this morning, the one against Miss Adelaide, and the one on Saturday—which they think was actually supposed to get Marci, because she had originally planned to make that pick-up with Butch—all come from the same people, a Guild affiliate called the Binding, who’ve teamed up with a Guild faction called the Union of Weavers.”

“Why are parts of the Guild attacking Adelaide?”

Patty explained. “Marci’s text this morning said they’d declared their independence from the Guild and that can’t be allowed—and, before you ask, you’d be better off asking one of the chiefs why. I’m only involved because of Marci, and I trust her judgment. If she says letting these factions break away is a really bad idea, then it must be a pretty goddamn bad idea. The fact that they tried to kill Marci, Miss Adelaide, you, Amy, and Butch also gives me some hints about their character.”

“What about the guy this morning?” he asked. “Was he one of these Binders?”

“Yeah. That thing you described where he glued you to Amy’s car, that’s straight out of the binders’ playbook—and they can do a lot more than that. I studied up on how they do their mumbo-jumbo, and you were lucky.”

“He was a sadist, a real psychopath, talking about how he was getting paid extra to mutilate and/or violate Marci or Amy.” Kirby tensed with anger as the hatred he felt for the late Mr. Sunglasses surged within him. Then, he shuddered as his body recalled the agony of his broken ribs, of nearly drowning as his lungs filled with blood. He forced himself to take a deep breath, to feel his perfectly whole and healthy ribs and lungs expand and dispel the memory. “Are they all like that,” he asked, “the Binders and the Weavers? And if they are, why do the good mumbo-jumbo people put up with their shit?”

“Marci did an apprenticeship with the Weavers way back when, and the ones I’ve met seemed okay— although there was an ugly incident a few years back with the Chief Weaver, a woman named Tilda,” Patty said. “I don’t know that I’ve met a binder before this morning. I don’t remember being introduced to any. This Mr. Sunglasses guy probably isn’t typical of the Binding. I’d bet my left tit that he was a contract killer. Going after Marci is, more or less, a suicide mission, even if I’m not around. They wouldn’t risk one of their better resources on a sloppy play like the one this morning, so they likely brought in a pro. If he got lucky, they’d pay him. If he didn’t, they didn’t lose anything but the down payment on his contract. Anyway, people who kill other people for a living are pretty much always psychopaths. They’re all majorly screwed-up in the head.”

“So, you’re telling me that you have at least some previous experience with psychopathic contract killers?”

“It’s like I said,” she told him. “There’s more than meets the eye with this old gal.”

ͽʘͼ

After the abnormally large, unhurried meal—which involved losing count of the number of beers they had enjoyed—Kirby sought out Adelaide in her office. There, Katherine the secretary pointed to the closed inner door and informed him that Miss Adelaide was meeting with several important members of the Women’s Arts Council of the Southwest about the last-minute details of tonight’s fundraiser. She welcomed him to have seat and wait, and he did. Fifteen minutes later, she invited him to wait in the library, assuring him that she would send for him when her employer was free. He got the impression that she might have been annoyed with his fidgeting and tuneless humming.

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He found himself alone in the library until the maid, Suzanne, stepped in to ask him if he needed anything. He requested another beer and more cookies. When she was gone, he occupied one of the plush armchairs by the window, browsing the internet on his cell phone. In addition to another plate of cookies, Suzanne delivered two bottles of the good brown beer “Just in case you get thirsty, and I’m called away,” she told him with a smile.

Kirby watched her go. He hadn’t meant to, but the shape of her backside caught his attention. Adelaide’s got good taste.

He was nearly done with the second beer, and quite surprised at the continuing strength of his thirst, when Suzanne returned. “I’ve been sent to tell you that Miss Adelaide can see you now,” she announced.

“So how does that work?” he asked, feeling the warm glow of the alcohol. “With you the maid and her the boss and all? Do you always call her ‘Miss Adelaide’?”

“Maybe you shouldn’t ask personal questions of strangers when you’ve been drinking, Mr. Kirby.”

“Okay, no offense intended.” Chastened, he followed her out of the library on unsteady feet and was guided back to Adelaide’s office.

ͽʘͼ

“Thank you for being so patient Jeffrey,” Adelaide greeted him as Katherine ushered him into the office. She stood and shook his hand. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am for what happened to you this morning.”

“And to Amy,” he reminded her.

Adelaide, however, needed no reminder. “I love Amy dearly and share things with her that I cannot share with my own daughters. What happens to her is very important to me.”

“And to Patty.”

“Yes,” agreed the older woman, “to her as well. But she and Amy have chosen to be part of this life. They volunteered, so to speak.”

“But not me, right?”

“No, Jeffrey. Not you.” She smiled like she had just solved a mystery. “You’ve been drinking quite a bit, haven’t you?”

“I have had,” he pronounced with great deliberateness, “more than a few. I’m surprised I’m not totally hammered.”

“Yes,” she acknowledged. “Your body has undergone significant stresses from both the injuries and the healing.”

“Patty said I’m so hungry because I’ve gotta put gas in the tank.”

Adelaide nodded. “Your body needs fuel, but the healing magic also enhances the life force, the natural drives and appetites. It’s the most common side-effect.”

“Yeah, but I wasn’t hundgury...uh...humbgry...I mean hungry like this, y’know, after I got my nipple bit off. Got healed then, right?”

“That was different. The bite of the Abyssal wolf required a different kind of healing. Most of what Amy did to save you then was removing the...curse, if you will, that its bite left behind. That’s a different magic. You’ll likely feel wonderful for—”

“I do feel pretty wonnerful!”

“You’ll likely feel wonderful for the next eight or ten hours,” she continued, “hungry for everything, then fall into a deep sleep and—”

“And nightmares and fucked-up dreams, right? I see that damn wolf in my dreams, Adelaide. It scares the shit out of me. That shit this morning was so fucking fucked-up! That asshat nearly killed me. Got my ass kicked by Mr. Sunglasses. Drownin’ in my own blood. Fucked up.”

“On the bright side, no, you shouldn’t have nightmares about today. When magic enhances the life force, like the magic that healed you, it promotes a corresponding healing process in the psyche. I only wish we could have done more to help your psyche recover from what you suffered on the night we met. By the time Amy had removed the curse that was killing you, well…”

“It was tooooooo late. Hey, tell me, do you think I might be drunk? I just wanna know.”

“Yes, dear Jeffrey, I think you might be.”

“I had a lotta beer. Sorry,” he apologized with the sincerity of the intoxicated. “You’ve got that good brown beer from Texas and those sandwiches. And the cookies. It was hard to stop.”

“No need to apologize. As I said, your thirst is just a normal side-effect of the healing magic. I’d like you to switch to something non-alcoholic and sober up for a while until the party begins in,” she checked her watch, “roughly three hours. You should sober up rather quickly while under the influence of the healing. I’d like to introduce you to some people this evening and it’s probably better if you were sober.”

“Check.”

“Good. I’ve had your tuxedo brought to the safe room and there are still some of the clothes we purchased for you during your recovery. If you’d rather another room, it could be arranged, but since you were already familiar with the Winslow Homer room, it made sense—”

“That’s the painting, right? In the room? Of the ocean?”

“Indeed. It’s one of my favorite pieces.” She sighed. “I feel a little guilty that I haven’t donated it to a museum so that others can enjoy it, but I’m having trouble letting go.”

With a soul-sure sincerity, he matched her sigh. “It’s fuckin’ beautiful. Am I gonna die?”

“I’m not quite sure I follow.”

“I mean...I mean...uh, you know. I’ve nearly been killed three times since I met you.” He held up three fingers and fumbled to fold one down as he counted off each incident. “The abysmal wolf...you know what I mean, Abyssynal. The big rock walrus-thing. And Mr. Sunglasses. I just wanted to help the lady with the blowout, y’know? You wrecked her car? Now, I’ve got monsters and assassins and iss a war now and all. And my goddamn hand is black. You were gonna protect me from all of the sorcery stuff and hope the mal’factor didn’t notice me and you gave me a cool job at the bar, and a bungalow, and let me use your Land Cruiser, but—” His less-than-sober recital of recent events was halted by an enormous, echoing belch, half of which he managed to quietly stifle. The rest sprang forth into the world like a thunderclap from the upper reaches of his digestive tract. Shocked at the volume—in both senses of the word—of his eructation, Kirby looked to Adelaide, embarrassed. “Sorry.”

Her bemused smile and raised eyebrows were the only evidence that she had even noticed. “Please continue with what you were saying.”

“Well, like you said, Amy and Patty—and I guess Butch—and you all signed up for all of this stuff and I didn’t. I’m just in the middle and I’m getting my ass kicked. I don’t really want to be in your war, no offense, but here I am. The magical bungalow fence and the ‘nchanted Land Cruiser can’t keep me outta harm’s way. I gotta go be a teacher again in, like, five weeks and I can’t hide at my house all the time and I’m gonna die if I don’t get tougher or get some kinda weapon for protection—I don’ even have a gun. I’m not saying this is your fault or anything. I don’ wanna fight any monsters or ‘ssassins or whatever, but since thass what I’ve been doing for the past two weeks, I need to have some kinda fightin’ chance.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

ͽʘͼ

After his conversation with Adelaide, Kirby had followed her advice and stopped drinking to sober up for the party. Still feeling the hunger brought on by the healing magic, he made his way back to the kitchen, where, amid the insane bustle of the house staff and the temporary workers hired for the event, he found Amy seated at a small table in a relatively quiet alcove. Joining her, they teamed-up to finish nearly half of a smoked brisket.

Now, they sat picking their teeth, their hunger sated. Amy licked the spicy grease from her fingers. “That was soooo good.”

Kirby tried to ignore the lusty thoughts Amy’s oral cleansing of her tiny digits brought on. “You are scary! No one your size should be able to eat that much. It’s uncanny!”

“Well, the Lady healed my nose and my neck and my other bumps and bruises, so my life force is in overdrive, which means that my appetites are on overdrive too.”

“What lady?”

“The Nameless Lady, duh.” She chomped into a roasted potato, like that was all that needed to be said.

“Well, that clears things right up.” It did not.

Amy sighed. “This morning. In the meeting. The itty-bitty, light-skinned black woman. Didn’t say anything.”

“Oh, yeah, her. She just stared. It was a little spooky, intense. But she’s got really nice eyes. She’s very pretty, really.”

“Does King Beard-O have a royal crush on someone new? Will he stop flirting with my girlfriend now?”

“I wasn’t… Uh… But…,” he shook his head, sputtering guiltily.

“Gotcha! The truth has been revealed. Kirby’s crushing on my girlfriend. Don’t deny it. ‘I must have hit pretty close to the mark to get you all riled up like that.’” He hated being teased. The glee on her face that teasing him brought did not make it easier to take.

“Misquoting ‘The Empire Strikes Back’ won’t help your case. I can’t flirt, Amy. I’m hopeless at it. Yeah, it’s been an insanely long time since I got lucky—and your girlfriend is hot as hell—but I couldn’t flirt if my life depended on it.”

“Geez. You can’t be entirely lacking in skills. You managed to get married, didn’t you?”

The easy camaraderie they had shared only moments before was interrupted. He tried to control his expression, to keep the emotion from showing on his face. “Yeah,” he finally said, “could we not talk about that right now?”

“Sorry, dude.” She said this with a slightly mocking, exaggerated tone. “It’s been five years since your divorce. You’ve got to move on. Put it behind you. Let it go. Whatever this thing is you’re doing, it totally isn’t healthy. Put yourself out there and take a chance.”

Kirby rose. “Yeah. I’m working on that. I thought I had maybe gotten past it, but it keeps reaching out and biting me in the ass. I’m gonna go and take a shower or something. I need to get ready for this party.”

When he started to move away, she said, “Oh c’mon, Kirby, stay! Let’s hang out. There’s some brisket left.”

“Yeah, babe, I know. Sorry I’m such a moody asshole. I’ve had a lot on my mind, and I need a drink, but I've got to stay sober for a while longer. I think a shower would help.”

“It’d help your smell,” she teased.

“No doubt.”

“So, do you want Dr. Amy’s prescription for happiness? I’m giving it away for free on the Fourth of July.”

“This ought to be good. Sure. Shoot. What does Dr. Amy prescribe?”

“Two words: get laid.”

“So, take two sluts and call you in the morning?”

“Well, if you’ve got two sluts, you might want to call me to take up your slack.”

“Wait. What about Mutt?”

“She’s not a slut!”

“I meant, ‘Why would you need a slut, Amy, when you have a lovely girlfriend like Mutt?’”

“Oh, yeah.” Amy looked sheepish. “Sorry, I thought you were saying she was a… Anyway, she can’t make it tonight, so two sluts is starting to sound pretty good to me.”

“Well, the odds of my finding even one partner to make ‘the beast with two backs’ with are infinitesimally small. If your cheating on Mutt depends on me finding two, then I’d say she was safe from being cuckolded, or whatever bisexual women call it when their lesbian girlfriends hook up with sluts at gala fundraisers on the Fourth of July.”

She shook her hands in frustration. “Dude, I’m the first to admit my lack of knowledge when it comes to dating while straight, but it just can’t be that hard.”

“Look, I’m damaged goods and I know it.”

“Yeah, and lots of damaged guys are hip-deep in women. Some women eat ‘damaged goods’ up with a spoon. How can you be such a dumbass when it comes to women?” she asked, genuinely perplexed.

“It’s a gift.”

He was halfway across the noisy kitchen when he heard her shouted response. “Well, then you’re gifted, dude! You’re truly fucking gifted!”

ͽʘͼ

In the steamy shower of the Winslow Homer room, Kirby considered the erotic thoughts running rampant in his mind and rotated the lever to cold. Maybe this will help. Whooping in dismay at the precipitous drop in temperature, he jumped back and reached through the frigid spray to reverse his hasty decision. He banished the icy water and heat returned.

Nope, he thought. A cold shower isn’t going to do it. I do not need to freeze my balls off.

He stepped out of the shower and dried himself. In the closet he found the tuxedo he had brought out of his house that morning. What he did not find were his dress shoes, which he realized were likely in the vicinity of his front porch as a result of the morning’s events.

How could all of that have happened less than eight hours ago? I almost died! He hadn’t forgotten the pain, the feeling of choking on his own blood, or the helplessness of lying there and watching Mr. Sunglasses assault Amy, but it did take some effort to recall the memory of those sensations. It was like there was some sort of buffer that insulated him from some of the intensity of those memories. I should be traumatized, but I’m not. It’s got to be the healing magic. Adelaide said it boosted the ‘life force.’ She said it helps heal the mental trauma, as well as physical. I guess I can’t complain about not having more to complain about.