No one said a word until we were ensconced in the apartment. I was grabbing a beer from the fridge when my mother spoke up.
“We should talk.”
I glanced around the corner, just in time to see her settle into the sofa with a swoop of her coat. Ted observed this with a leery look on his face, as though doubtful of her intentions.
She gazed up at me, and I could see that her normally terse mouth and stern eyes were somehow softer, a look of concern taking their place. It’s funny. We spoke most days, visited at least weekly, but seldom ever focused on one another.
“Do you have any wine?”
Ted was seated on the other side of the sofa, leaning away from her. I flashed the Sleemans label at him, and he nodded.
I am by no means a wine hound. We kept a bottle or two of red in the apartment for guests, but more often in case we needed to bring something to a party or a friend’s place. Come to think of it, that would have been a sensible thing to do for the visit to Clay’s place. Duh.
The wine selection process was very simple. I just walk into the local Vintages and pick something I’ve never had off the shelf. Sometimes I’ll read the little review cards below the bottles, but more often than not I’ll just go for it. The result is that sometimes I pick real crap, other times I look like a wine genius.
I pulled the nicest, or perhaps more accurately, the most expensive — a Barbaresco — Dante Rivetti 1997. Fumbled through the utensil drawer until I found the opener, and worked the cork out. I then did something that would cause many a vintner to cringe, or crush me like a grape. Without decanting or even allowing it to air, I filled a tall narrow glass to just below the rim. At least it was stemware.
I didn’t think my mother would care, and I was right.
The three of us sipped at our drinks in quiet for a moment, then she broke the silence.
“What is this about a love potion?”
Great. What better place to start.
I walked her and Ted through my first few weeks at work. The robbery, most of which they had already heard. I gave her the PG-13 version of the story about the love potion, embarrassing as that was to discuss with my mother. Jamar’s ring, the tiger’s eye stone, even what I had been able to find out about Niki the Bull and his connections to Ruscan Industries.
“So you have this fearstone on you?”
“Yep.” I pulled it from my pocket and dropped it on the table, with the leper coin beside it. She picked up each, one at a time, and studied them as though through a jeweler’s loupe. I noticed that she held the coin like I would hold any common object, calmly turning it in her hand to read both sides and study the simple stampings. The tiger’s egg was another story. That she picked up with her thumb and forefinger, as though mimicking the gesture of picking up a tea cup. And she held it at arm’s reach.
Ted leaned forward to examine both as well, but when he reached out to pick up the stone she slapped his hand away. It was a true deja vu moment — the exact motion she would use when we were kids, to keep us from grabbing a warm cookie off the baking tray. Ted’s reaction was a deja vu moment as well. He slumped back in the sofa with his lower lip jutting out, just as it had when he was a tyke. Deja two.
God, we were dysfunctional.
“This stone worked with your friends at the office?”
“Yup. Ted, too.”
“What? No it didn’t.”
I debated telling them the whole story, but thought better of it. He would be pissed I hadn’t told him. And her? Well, she would either be heartbroken or proud.
“When you were sleeping last night.”
“It isn’t working now.” My mother still held it in her hands.
“I know. It’s weird. With others, if I was far enough away from the stone, it would activate. With Ted it only happened when he was sleeping.”
“So it may not be working because you are close to us?”
“I think so. Don’t know for sure.”
“What did people see? Images, or something concrete?”
“They were real. I could touch them. Didn’t seem dangerous, though. Might move around, but it seemed to me that the illusion was the scary part.”
“Why don’t you move back, to the wall there.”
I stared at her for a moment. I wasn’t liking this at all. But the look on her face suggested that this was not a request.
I gestured to Ted, and he slipped off the sofa and joined me. The two of us then backed away several feet. Nothing, so we backed up a few more.
And the stone began to glow. The air before my mother rippled, then flash.
A man stood before her. Tall, slim, brown hair and beard salted with gray. He was taller than Ted, maybe six three. Wearing a tuxedo, of all things.
Ted and I slid along the wall to get a better look at the man, and in the process we were able to see my mother’s expression. Her eyes were round with fear, mouth open and lip trembling. I sensed revulsion as well, in the way she hunched her shoulders and leaned back into the cushions. She was terrified.
So I cut the experiment short. I stepped forward and snatched the stone from her hand, causing the illusion to dissolve before our eyes.
“Mon Dieu.”
I said nothing, but Ted returned to the sofa, this time by her side. She was wringing her hands, but her breathing slowed and her shoulders dropped.
“Who was that?”
She didn’t answer Ted, just shaking her head as if to deny him or the illusion we had just observed.
“Give me that thing.”
I glared at Ted, determined not to have another member of my family go through with this nonsense. But the look on his face brooked no argument, and my mother stood and joined my side.
“Give it to him, Darnell. We must see what happens.”
Great. My mother was about to discover that her youngest son’s greatest fear was a conversation with her. I sensed years of therapy in the offing. Still, there was no sense in arguing. Two of the three most stubborn people I know had set their minds on this path.
I laid the stone on the coffee table, and my mother and I backed to the spot where I had observed the previous illusion. Ted reached out and picked up the stone, tentative at first, but then flipping it in the air like a coin. He tossed it from hand to hand, and my mother let out a sigh of exasperation.
Nothing.
“Huh. Maybe I’m still too close.” I walked past the sofa, my mother’s heels clacking as she followed me down the hall towards the bathroom. We turned, now twice the distance we had been before.
Now Ted was rolling the stone over his knuckles. I stepped into my bedroom and moved to the far wall.
“Anything?”
My mother peered at Ted. “Nothing.”
“Huh.” I returned to the hall, then the two of us headed back to the living room. “Maybe he isn’t-.”
“AAAACHOOOOOOOOO!”
Scared the hell out of me. Again. My mother and I both stopped dead in our tracks, startled by the explosion of noise.
“Cover your mouth.”
“Sorry. I must be-. AAACHHOOOOO!”
For God’s sake. This building was not earthquake proof.
“Man. My allergies are acting up big time.”
“Well, at least it seems like you aren’t susceptible to magic. Not when you’re awake, anyways.”
He tossed the stone to me, and I palmed it, then slipped it back into my pocket. No point risking another glowing green visitor in the night.
I was expecting some sort of snide remark, but Ted was staring at his hand, the way he would if a puck beat him on his glove side.
“What is it?” My mother moved to his side.
“Look at this.” He held up his hand, the one he had been holding the stone with, and it was dotted with angry red bumps. “Some kind of rash.”
Now that was weird.
“Do you have any calamine lotion?” Count on my mother to remain practical.