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“None of your concern, my dear,” says Marcel dismissively. “Now would you be so kind as to vacate the premises, we have business to attend to.”
“No fair,” says Rita huffily. “I want in, I can’t believe you’re not going to involve me in whatever kind of thing you three have got going on.”
Marcel grabs her by the shoulder and escorts her to the door. “We are not involving you dear Rita, because what we are endeavouring to do requires a cleansed environment and you are the human equivalent of a rubbish dump, so now, are you going to get out, or am I going to have to kick you out?”
Rita doesn’t respond to Marcel’s harsh words, but instead gives him the finger and skulks out the door. Once she’s gone Marcel breathes out a long breath, turns on his heel, looks directly at myself and Gabriel, and asks, “So my darlings are we ready for some magic?”
Chapter Four
The Monster Inside of You
When Marcel mentioned magic I was hoping for the kind that you can actually see, but no such luck. It seems that, conveniently, Marcel’s magic is as invisible as the air we breathe. Or, dare I say it, non-existent as far as I’m concerned. I mean, perhaps somewhere along the way I’ll be miraculously proven wrong and astounded by some kind of evidence whereby the existence of the supernatural is found to be an incontrovertible truth. But let’s just say that I’m not going to hold my breath on that one.
Marcel and Gabriel led me to that “special” back room, which is just a glorified storage closet with a carpeted space and big Asian beaded cushions, surrounded by several wooden alchemist style chests of drawers and a couple shelves.
Marcel went about lighting candles and waving incense sticks around to cleanse the air or some nonsense, while Gabriel sat down, closed his eyes and started meditating. When Marcel was finished with his fussing about he came and sat down, the three of us forming a circle.
What followed was basically me, Marcel and Gabriel sitting quietly with our eyes shut and holding hands for a half an hour, with the two of them speaking some sort of chant in an ancient language every couple of minutes. Neither of them told me what the results were at the end of it, but merely said that they will need a few more sessions before they can make any definite conclusions.
It is now Friday, and thankfully Marcel hasn’t been around much all week so we haven’t had the chance to conduct another session. But I’m sure I’m not out of the woods just yet. I won’t get paid my first weeks wages until next Thursday, so I have an entire weekend stretched out in front of me with only nine pounds in my pocket.
I walk home from Indigo to an empty apartment and a frozen shepherd’s pie in the freezer with my name on it. My life is just one excitement after the other. When I turn the corner of my street I’m accosted by Nicky who had been coming from the opposite direction. She’s got a plastic bag with a bottle of vodka inside and a carton of orange juice. She tells me that we’re going to get dressed up, get drunk and then go out to Crimson where we are to meet Amanda, Susan and Dillon.
I tell her that I don’t have enough money to go out, but she tells me she’ll pay for everything. Bless her. I am about to protest again but then realise that going out will probably be less depressing than staying in and eating a miserable frozen dinner all by myself.
Nicky has brought over even more clothes for me to wear. I have to tell her to stop doing that. She hands me a vintage lace off-white mini dress, some fancy black hold up tights, a pair of black Doc Marten boots and a stylish tight black leather jacket. I laugh and tease her that she has more clothes than Joan fucking Collins. As we each drink a glass of vodka and orange juice, Nicky does my hair in a bastardised Goth version of a French twist.
The drink soothes my nerves about seeing Ethan at the club. I assure myself that he probably won’t be there because he is the owner and most likely has lots of business typed stuff to be doing. We take a cab and join the mile long queue outside.
A few minutes later Amanda and Dillon show up without Susan because she decided to go somewhere else with her new boyfriend. A group of girls behind us bitch when our friends skip the queue. When we finally get to the door my heart skips a beat because Lucas is standing there with the bouncer. He’s having a conversation with somebody on his ear piece and staring off into the distance, so he hasn’t noticed me yet.
The bouncer steps forward and asks us for ID while giving Dillon’s red sequins stilettos a wide eyed glance. I fumble in my bag for my passport as my friends do the same. When I look up I lock eyes with Lucas and his lips tilt up in a grin as he continues speaking on his bluetooth and gives my outfit a look up and down. The kind of amused look that makes me ashamed of trying to be “sexy” and wanting to run home to change into a black bag.
“Hello Tegan,” he says after finishing his conversation. “H
ow are you tonight?”
“I’m – I’m good,” I reply, feeling embarrassed for no reason as my friends look at me wondering how I know him.
Then Lucas pats the bouncer who’d been waiting for our ID’s on the shoulder and tells him that there’s no need and to let us straight in. The man steps aside and we walk through the entrance, as I pass by Lucas he touches me lightly on the arm, bends down to my ear and says, “I’ll tell Michelle to let you and your friends through free, so you don’t need to queue to pay.”
“Oh, no you don’t have to do that,” I say, surprised.
“Sorry. Ethan’s orders,” he smiles.
“How does he know I’m here already?” I ask, but Lucas just taps his ear piece and ushers me forward into the club. I should have known Ethan was the one he’d been speaking with.
Nicky gushes to me over the fact that we got in free because I know the owner. We leave our coats in the cloakroom and get little paper tickets with numbers on them from a bored looking Japanese girl with multiple tattoos on her arms and neck.
When we get inside my friends go to the bathroom to touch up on their make-up, but I’m not in the mood to squeeze my way into an overcrowded toilet just to take a peek at my face in a mirror, so I head to the bar by myself instead. That Judy girl is working again, alongside a tall man in his late twenties with Celtic design tattoos on his muscled arms and long light brown dreadlocks.
I hover until I’m certain Judy’s busy serving another customer, because I don’t want to have to speak to her, and then I ask the guy with the dreadlocks for a Bacardi Breezer. I tried to think of something classy to order, but when you think about it, there aren’t that many classy drinks aside from wine, and I’m not fond of how I get when I drink wine. So fuck it, I’m going to have an un-classy alco-pop, I even get myself a straw and everything.
I stand by a high table a little away from the bar, sucking my drink through my straw and fidgeting awkwardly, willing Nicky to hurry the hell up in the bathroom. I dislike being left by myself in night clubs. When my eyes wander back to the bar I realise that Judy is leaning against the counter and eyeing me while talking to a blond girl who’s standing on the other side. I drop my gaze quickly and look away, pretending not to notice, but knowing that she’s probably saying something wicked about me.
A moment later I sense somebody standing behind me, and I know that it’s Ethan even though he hasn’t yet moved or said anything. Strange. It’s like a picture of him standing there was projected straight into my head. He places a hand on my lower back and then comes around to face me.
“You didn’t call,” he says in a low voice.
