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I went back to Zillow and selected “all” housing types rather than just houses, townhouses, and condos. And boom, there it was.
“Unique live-work space” read the ad. From what I could tell, the place was a storefront with a loft space above it. Everything looked as though it had been recently rehabbed and refurbished. And although I wasn’t sure whether living on Globe’s main drag was really my first choice, I had to admit that the busiest street in that small town was probably quieter than my own neighborhood in West L.A.
Also, even though I’d never admitted my desire to anyone, thinking it had to be forever out of reach, I’d always secretly wanted to have my own New Age/witchy store, similar to Mazey’s Crescent City. Every time I walked in that shop, I had a smile on my face, and I thought it would be amazing to have a place of my own like that.
True, my only retail experience was a disastrous two months working at the local Kohl’s when I was a senior in high school, but I figured it would be different if I were running my own store.
Whether or not there was even a market for a New Age shop in sleepy little Globe remained to be seen. After all, a brief Wikipedia search wasn’t enough to give me much of a feel for the place. But it was definitely the best prospect I’d seen, and while I usually took a long time to make a major decision like this one, weighing the various pros and cons until I felt comfortable with my choice, I knew I didn’t have the luxury of reflection in this particular instance. Not because I was too worried about someone snapping up the property before I could get to it — from what I could tell, the place had been on the market for almost six months — but because I had no idea when Lucien Dumond might decide to make his grudgeveryup close and personal.
Before I could start to hedge, I filled out the contact form on the listing and sent it. There. I’d done all I could. For all I knew, the shop/loft wasn’t even available anymore, and the real estate agency had just neglected to take down the ad.
But even as I got up to fetch my neglected cup of tea, my phone rang from inside my purse. I hurried over to grab it and noticed right away that the area code was an unfamiliar one, definitely not anything in the L.A. area.
Again, I made myself answer rather than letting it roll over to voicemail. Trying to sound cheery and brisk, I said, “Hi, this is Selena Marx.”
“Oh, hello, Selena!” exclaimed a woman’s voice, gushing, almost theatrical. “This is Josie Woodrow, the listing agent for the property on Broad Street in Globe. I just got your email. When would you like to look at the property?”
“Well….” I hesitated, wondering if there was some way to say I wanted to buy it sight unseen without sounding like a lunatic.
Probably not.
Obviously sensing my hesitation, Josie sailed right in before I had a chance to say anything more. “Oh, I understand that you’d be coming from out of state. My schedule isveryflexible.”
“Thanks,” I replied, although the flexibility of Josie Woodrow’s schedule really wasn’t the point. “No, I actually wanted to know if you had a video walk-through of the place. If I like it, I’ll take it.”
A long pause on the other end of the line. Then she said, “Well, I don’t have one at the moment, but I can pop down there and film a virtual tour on my phone and send it to you. Would that work?”
“It would be great,” I replied, hoping I hadn’t just shot myself in the foot. What if the walk-through revealed flaws that the still images on the Zillow listing hadn’t revealed? Then I’d have to decline and feel guilty for making Josie go to all that extra effort….
But apparently, she wasn’t too concerned about the property’s possible shortcomings, because she said, “I can go do it right now. Just give me a half hour or so.”
“Oh, there’s no hurry,” I said automatically, even though there sort of was. However, since I couldn’t really tell her that I needed to get out of L.A. as quickly as possible because a rabid necromancer had decided he didn’t want me operating in the same town — well, without her thinking I was a complete loon — I only added, “But thanks. I really appreciate it.”
“No problem at all. I’ll send you the video when it’s ready. ’Bye!”
She hung up then, and I was left standing there as I stared down at the phone in my hand and wondered if I might have taken leave of my senses.
The die was cast, though, and so there wasn’t much I could do except pour myself another cup of tea and try to look around and take a quick inventory of my possessions. The situation seemed to require stealth, and so it wasn’t as though I could have a moving pod deposited in front of the house so I could pack my things at my leisure.
And really, I wasn’t so attached to my stuff that I couldn’t leave most of it behind. Obviously, I’d take my books and my crystals and favorite pieces of art, along with the items on my altar, as well as my clothes and jewelry. But most of the furniture was thrift store and garage sale finds. I didn’t need to take it with me. A few discreet ads on Craigslist, and I could probably get rid of most of it without much of a problem.
As for my clients…well, if I told them I was moving out of state, I’d be tipping my hand, and word might get back to Lucien. Probably better just to say I’d decided to get out of the psychic business, and then give them referrals to other witches in the area that I knew could take them on as clients and provide the kind of readings they expected.
And family?
Well, my mother and I weren’t very close. It wasn’t that we had an acrimonious relationship, more like, since I’d proved to her that I was able to support myself from the time I was nineteen, she didn’t see a huge reason to be intimately involved in my life. My choice of vocation had bemused her more than anything else, although I knew that when she spoke about me to her husband’s friends, she always referred to me as a “life coach.” I guessed that “hedgewitch” wouldn’t go over too well at cocktail parties. Yes, L.A. had its share of New Age types, but most people didn’t think magic was real.
I knew better, however.
Anyway, if I told my mother that I’d decided to move to Arizona, she would probably take the news calmly in stride just like she did just about everything else in life. Even an unexpected pregnancy at twenty-three hadn’t really thrown her for a loop. No, Elizabeth Marx just kept on keeping on.
In a way, I wished I could be more like her. Nothing ever seemed to rattle her cage.
Whereas I was seriously planning on upheaving my life because of a rumor.
No, it was more than that. If Mazey had only been telling tales out of school — which really wasn’t her style — then the cards and the pendulum would have shown me it was safe to disregard her warnings. Instead, they’d pointed me toward a new beginning in a new place. And that meant I was probably doing the right thing, even if it might have seemed crazy to an outside observer.
My phone beeped, signaling that I had a text. I unlocked the screen and went to my messages, then opened up the attached video Josie had sent. It was a little jerky, probably because she’d been hurrying, but it showed me pretty much everything I’d wanted to see.
