Once A Witch Part 5

"Hel-lo," she says.

"I love a man who feels free to put his filthy feet all over my furniture" But she's using her pudding voice, warm and sweet and familiar. Agatha can say anything in that tone and no one would take offense. Compared to Rowena, she's an amateur, but then again it's hardly fair to compare anyone to Rowena, and I've seen the Agatha Effect in action. And Gabriel is no exception. He dusts off her chair with wide sweeping motions while saying, "Wow, sorry- this looks like a family heirloom."

"Maybe it is," Agatha says, handing me my c.o.ke before cracking hers open.

Then she gives him her lightning-fast smile and holds up her can.

"Want some? I'll find a cup for you since I don't want your germs all over the place. I mean, maybe if I knew you bettera"I obey my cue.

"Gabriel, this is Agatha. Agatha, this is Gabriel." They shake hands, the movement of their arms long and ropy. I press the edge of the soda tab into my palm until the metal pinches my skin.

"So how do you know Tam?" Agatha asks him.

"Tam and I go way back" His eyes meet mine briefly. My face feels warm and I drink some c.o.ke quickly.

"Oh?" Agatha says.

"Family friends," I say.

"Gabriel and his mom just moved back here."

"Cool," Agatha says.

"So, do you think I captured her essence?" she asks and, to my horror, holds out her sketchpad to Gabriel.

"That's my a.s.signment. *Capture the essence of your subject. *

""Um ... he doesn't need to see that," I say, moving forward to snag the sketchpad out of Agatha's hand. But she sidesteps me and I'm too late anyway-Gabriel is already examining her drawing with interest.

"Not so good, right?" she prompts as they both study the page and then me so intently that I want to sink through the floor.

"Not your fault," Gabriel says at last.

"Take it from me, Tarn's pretty hard to pin down on paper."

"You're right," Agatha says as if that's the most profound thing she's heard all day. Just in time I remind myself it's probably not all that attractive to snort. Her gaze snags on the yellow flyer, now on my desk.

"What's this?"

"That's my show. You should come.

"Agatha nods enthusiastically. Like me, she loves checking out bands on the weekends.

"Where?"

"Silver Tree."

"Awesome. Our fake IDs work there" She drinks more of her c.o.ke, sets the can on her desk, and rummages around for a few minutes.

"Where did I put my freaking charcoals?"

"They're probably in your closet. On the top shelf," Gabriel says helpfully. Agatha gives him a dubious look but walks over to her closet anyway, reaching for the top shelf. Then she whirlsaround, charcoal set in hand, her eyes wide and wondering.

"How did you know that?" Gabriel shrugs.

"Uh ... it's where I like to keep all my important stuff. In the closet."

"Thanks for stopping by," I say brightly, pinning the flyer to the cluttered square of corkboard over my desk.

"So you're coming next weekend?" I nod. I really wish that I could come up with something witty right about now, but he doesn't give me time.

"Great to meet you," he tells Agatha before winking at me and walking out the door.

"Does that mean he's gay?" Agatha muses after we hear the hallway door close. I choke on my soda.

"That closet comment he made," she prompts when I stare at her.

"I don't think so," I gasp, my nose tingling sharply. Agatha whacks me on the back.

"Good, because he is hot. Hot with three t's." I settle back down onto the beanbag, arranging my legs in a more comfortable position.

"You think so?" I say neutrally after a minute. The soda tab snaps off the top of the c.o.ke can. The metal is now warm from my hand.

"Don't you?"

"He's okay," I say. Agatha gives me a wry look over the top of her sketchpad.

"And he's totally in love with you."

"What?" I sit upright.

"Be still," Agatha says, lifting her pencil. She's smiling. "But you don't-"She rolls her eyes, tapping her pencil on the page.

"It's obvious, stupid." I lean back, trying to digest this information, trying to figure out how I feel. Then I shake my head.

"He's a friend of the family.

"Agatha frowns at me.

"So what?" How can I explain to Agatha that for me that's something to be avoided at all costs? That falling for Gabriel would really torch any hope of escaping from the seriously suffocating arms of my family. I roll the soda tab between my fingers.

"Not my type."

"Hmm," Agatha says, studying my face a little too long.

"Try not to move so much this time." I sigh inwardly, relieved that she's off the topic of Gabriel. But then she adds, "And stop blus.h.i.+ng, too."

SIX.

BY THE TIME Gabriel's show comes around a week later, I feel ready for a break from school. Agatha and I have been quizzing each other relentlessly on SAT vocab words every night before bed. Consequently, I dream of opening up a test booklet full of words that I've never seen before. And every day more and more college catalogs arrive at the downstairs front desk for us to look at.

Agatha keeps mentioning Reed and Stanford and the University of San Diego. I don't have the heart to tell her that my parents will never let me leave the state, let alone go across the country. We spend our usual amount of time getting ready. Me: ten minutes. Agatha: going on an hour as she tries on and discards every s.h.i.+rt in her closet before moving over to mine.

"That looks great," I say for the fourth time, my head bent over my copy of The Tempest.

"Am I getting fat?" Agatha moans, standing before the full-length mirror that we glued to the back of the door. Who knows how we're getting it off at the end of the year. "No," I say automatically, then snap my book shut. I wander over to my makeup kit, pick up my green glitter eye shadow, and decide to apply another coat to my eyelids. I'm relatively happy with my outfit, a denim overalls mini dress with my green and gold tube top underneath.

"Okay, how's this?" Agatha has paired my My Little Pony T-s.h.i.+rt with a white miniskirt.

"Great! Ready?" She looks at me, horrified.

"I have to do my makeup!"When we reach the bar, it's standing room only and the show has already started. Gabriel is on stage, wearing jeans and a black T-s.h.i.+rt with the sleeves cut off. His acoustic guitar is cradled in his arms, his face illuminated by a narrow spotlight overhead. A girl wearing a pink and black slip over incredibly skinny jeans is singing in a whispery, almost breathless way into the mike, her hips twisting and turning slowly with the music. The guitar chords wrap just under her silvery voice as she sings something about the sea and a shadow she can't ever forget. I listen to the words and try to ignore the thought that she's probably Gabriel's girlfriend.

"Beer?" Agatha says in my ear, and I nod, my eyes still fixed to the stage.

Gabriel plays on and the girl sings another song, sometimes picking up a flute to accompany him on the guitar. The bar is crowded, people flickering in and out of the dimlight, sometimes jostling into me. Agatha comes back after a while and presses a cold gla.s.s into my hand, then waves away my offer of money.

"They're pretty good," she says finally, and I'm grateful that she doesn't say she's pretty good. I nod and sip my beer, and just then the girl announces in a totally normal voice that they will take a set break. Then her voice dips a little again and she reminds the crowd that CDs on the back table are an amazing bargain at ten dollars each. She gives this hint of a smile and a wiggle of her body as she says this, and all around me people clap and a few guys wolf whistle. The lights brighten slightly and a crush of people moves to the bar on the other side of the room.

"Bathroom," Agatha announces.

"Hold this?" I take her beer and stand in the crowd, letting it break around me until Gabriel appears in front of me.

"You made it," he says simply, then lifts one of the gla.s.ses from my hand.

"Keep drinking that and you owe Agatha a beer," I say after he takes a swallow. He grins but hands the gla.s.s back to me, and I spend a few seconds studying the open hollow of his throat and the way his tattoo seems to s.h.i.+ne against his faintly damp skin.

"So-" he begins. At the same moment I rush in with, "You're great. Great up there. Looking good" Shut up, shut up, I tell myself.

"Thanks" He studies me for a minute and then saysabruptly, "That clock you want me to find. Are you sure that's really what you want me to find?" I gape at him.

"What? Yeah, I'm sure. Why?" He shrugs.

"I don't know. It's like ... it doesn't exist."

"It has to," I say doggedly. Why would Alistair ask me to find something that doesn't exist? An image of Alistair's face when he didn't look like Alistair flashes into my head.

"What?" Gabriel says intently, staring at me.

"Nothing" I drain my gla.s.s and start drinking Agatha's beer absent-mindedly.

"Anyway, I found something-" he begins.

"What?" I say, nearly choking on the beer.

"Why didn't you say so right away?" I jump on the b.a.l.l.s of my feet until beer sloshes over my wrist.

"Because I didn't find the actual clock," Gabriel says, and my happy fantasies abruptly end.

"I was going to say I found something that you might want to see, but it's complicated. It's not what you asked me to find."

"Well, that's helpful," I mutter, dabbing ineffectually at my wrist. He pins my gaze with his own, then says, "Maybe if you would tell me the truth about-"The girl who he was singing with appears at his side.

"We're up, baby," she coos into his ear. She gives me a fleeting smile, a lip spasm, really, before winding her long white arms around Gabriel's neck as if preparing to drag him back to the stage. "Tomorrow? " I nod.

"Where?"

"Chester and Rennie's house." I frown.

"Why there? It's ... oh, are you staying there? I thought you were staying in the dorms at Juilliard?" I thought you were like me.

"I am. Sometimes I practice there with the band. Anyway, tomorrow. Eight o'clock?"

"Sure," I call as he follows the girl back to the stage, their hands entwined.

SEVEN.

FAINT STREET NOISE penetrates the thick walls of Uncle Chester and Aunt Rennie's townhouse: the occasional honk of a horn, a burst of song from someone pa.s.sing by the windows. But inside, the house is silent, waiting. Gabriel stares at the painting on the wall for so long that I think he's gone into a trance.

It's a drawing room scene, very similar to the upstairs drawing room. Rich yellow drapes with fancy-looking gold tiebacks frame the large picture windows and the room is scattered with sofas and chairs. A fire is blazing in the fireplace, the flames looking as though they're about to leap beyond the fire screen.

However, the three people standing in the picture don't seem to be paying attention. Two of them are men, dressed in long black frock coats. Their backs are turned to the viewer while the third figure, a woman, is caught in profile. My eyes wander over her slim painted features and then over her dress, a brilliant red, which is a perfect echo of thetiny points of red, maybe rubies, on the face of the clock hanging directly above her head. The clock that looks exactly like the one that Alistair wants me to find.

"That's not the same clock," Gabriel says at last. I've been holding my breath without realizing it, and now it all escapes me in a rush that sounds like a cross between a what and a huh.

"Whua!"Smiling for the first time since we entered the house, he says, "'Whua'? Well-"But I'm not in the mood.

"Look!" I snap Alistair's painting at him, the paper making a crackling noise as I wave it in front of Gabriel's face.

"It's exactly the same. And that explains why it was so familiar to me," I add, rattling Alistair's paper some more.

"Obviously, I've seen Uncle Chester and Aunt Rennie's painting before."

Gabriel looks at the print I'm holding and then at the painting on the wall.

"Yeah, I know," he says with what I feel is exaggerated patience.