"Yeah, so she was pissed."
Racey reported, flipping her streaked hair back. She leaned against the wall in the tiny curtained dressing cubicle and took a sip of iced coffee.,
"Yeah?'
I asked absently, unhooking my bra so I could try on a tie-dyed halter top. "What'd she say?"
"She said the next time I missed a circle, my ass would be grass," Racey cocked her head, which made her short, asymmetrical haircut look almost even.
I gave a quick grin-Racey's mom was a riot. More like an older sister than a mom. My grandmother was cool in her own way, but you couldn't get away from the fact that she was a grandmother. True, she was aging well-in fact, her looks hadn't changed much for as long as I could remember. Those were the genes I wanted to inherit-those and Nans force de magie. "And she'd be the lawn mower?" I guessed.
"Yep. Turn around so I can see the back"
"I'm going to look" I pushed open the Indian-bedspread curtain and stepped out to look in the full-length mirror mounted on one wall. I loved Botanika-they always had cool stuff. Food, coffee, tea, witch supplies like candles, oils, crystals. Books, music, incense. A small selection of retro clothes, tie-dyed and batik and funky. Plus it felt so normal here, I'd told Racey about my horrible vision, but only a bit, and I hadn't really told her how freaked I'd been. Even now, days later, I felt a bit weird, like something was about to happen. It was stupid.
Outside, the mirror was cheap and warped, so that I had to stand on my tiptoes to get a good view of the halter. I looked at myself, thinking, I so lucked out Conceited? Well, yeah. But also realistic. Why should I pretend that I didn't enjoy my natural assets? I tugged the shirt up so my silver belly ring showed. Cool.
"Was your grandmother mad?" Racey asked, stirring her coffee with the straw.
"Oh, yeah." I grimaced. "She was burned. I had to vacuum the whole house."
"Poor Cinderella." Racey grinned. "Good thing you have a small house." The contrast of her dark brown hair streaked with white gave her a faintly camouflaged look, like a zebra or a tiger. Her big brown eyes were rimmed in teal today. She'd been my best friend and partner in crime since kindergarten. It helped that her parents and my grandmother belonged to the same coven. The coven we had blown off, the night of the new moon, so we could go bar hopping in the Quarter.
"But it was worth it," I said firmly, checking out my rear view. "I love Amadeos-full of college guys and tourists. Didn't you have fun?" I smiled, remembering how I hadn't needed to buy myself a single drink-and not because I was working on those guys with spells. It had been just good old-fashioned female charm,
"Yeah, I did, but my magick wasn't worth crap the next day. The alcohol."
"There is that" I admitted, deciding to buy the halter. Someday I'd have to find a way around that annoying truth. I pushed my black hair over my shoulders, then saw how it looked against my skin in back. Excellent, Thanks, Mom, Nan had one picture of my mom, and I looked like hen black hair, green eyes, and the weirdest thing of all, we both had a strawberry birthmark in the exact same place, I was still trying to decide if I wanted to get it lasered off-it was on my left cheekbone and looked like, well, frankly, what it looked like depended on how much you'd had to drink. Sometimes a small thistle flower, sometimes an animal footprint (Racey said a very tiny three-toed sloth), sometimes a fleur-de-lis. And my mom, who had died when I was born, had had the same thing, Quelk bizarre, nest-cepas?
I was heading back into the cubicle when I felt, literally felt, someone's gaze on me, I looked through the few clothing racks out to the main part of the store. And saw him.
My breath stopped in my throat and I froze where I stood, Diesse. This was the definition of poleaxed, this stunned feeling, where time stood still and all that crap.
"What?" said Racey, almost bumping into me. She followed my line of vision. "Whoa."
The Hottest Guy in the World was staring right at me, I've known my share of hot guys, but this one was in a whole different league. His sable-colored hair was too long, as if he couldn't be bothered to get it cut prop' erly. Dark eyebrows angled sharply over dark eyes. He was young but with strong features, like a man, not a boy. In that instant, I knew we would be together. And I also knew that he wouldn't be easy to wrap around my little finger, like other guys. His open, interested look was a challenge. One that I was going to accept.
I raised my eyebrows slightly, then went slowly into the cubicle, giving him a good look at my back, all bare skin because of the halter, Racey followed me in a second later, and I made an awed, oh-my-God face at her. She shrugged noncommittally.
"Yon don't think he's too old?" she whispered.
I shook my head and laughed, surprised and a little freaked to notice that my fingers were trembling, Racey helped me undo the back ties, and I scrambled back into my bra, I felt like I'd just run a thousand-meter race, hot and cold and trembly all over.
I was dressed for comfort in an over-dyed man's tank top and a ratty pair of jean shorts that were cut off right below my underwear. While it would have been nice to be wearing something more sophisticated, I knew that most guys would think I looked damn fine.
"That guy is fantastic," I said.
Racey shrugged again, "We don't know him," she pointed out,"He could be anyone,".
I looked at her, Racey had never been like this- usually she was as goget-'em as I was. Did she want him for herself? I didn't think so. She didn't look jealous. Just,concerned,
I had to get up my nerve to saunter out of the changing cubicle, the halter in my hand. Which was very unlike me, A guy-any guy-hadn't made me nervous since I was about four years old.
He was still there, not even pretending to be cool or casual. His gaze locked on me like a dark laser, and I felt an actual bona fide shiver go down my spine. Oh my God, this was going to be fun. And scary. Anything that was truly fun always had an element of scary to it.
He didn't smile, or wave, or try to look approachable. Instead, keeping his eyes on me, he nudged a chair out a bit with his foot, Tres suave.
I was dimly aware of Racey fading into the background like a good best friend. Out of the corner of my eye I saw her settle into a seat at'the bar. Then I was at his table, and he pushed the chair out the rest of the way for me, I sat down, dropped the halter on the table, and reached over for his drink. Our eyes stayed locked as I took a sip-he was drinking iced espresso, which seemed impossibly cool. He was perfection. The ultimate. And I was going to show him that we were a matched set.
"I haven't seen you here before," I said, thrilled to hear my voice sound a tiny bit husky, a tiny bit lower than usual. This close, I could see that his eyes were actually an incredibly dark blue, like the sky at midnight. It made him look that much more intense.
“I’m new in town," he said, and he had a French accent God help me.
"How are you liking the local scenery?" I asked, and drank more of his coffee.
He looked at me, and I felt like he was picturing me lying down somewhere with him and he was thinking about what we would do when we got there. My heartbeat sped up.
Tm liking it," he said, understanding my meaning. He took back his glass and drank from it, "I'm Andre."
I smiled, "Clio."
"Clio," he repeated, and my name with a French accent sounded incredible, I spoke some French, like my grandmother did. Our religion was all based in French from hundreds of years ago. But I didn't have an accent, I mean, except an American one, "Tell me, Clio," he said, leaning toward me over the small table. "Are you what you seem? Would you be dangerous for me to know?"
"Yes, And no," I said steadily, lying through my teeth, I had no idea what I seemed to be, and no way would I tell him that I was dangerous only because I didn't intend to ever let him get away, "What about you?" I asked, feeling like I was walking some fine edge, "Are you dangerous for me to know?"
He smiled then, and I felt my heart shudder to a stop inside my chest, At that moment, I would have given him my hand and let him take me across the world, giving up my home, my grandmother, my friends. "Yes, Clio," he said softly, still smiling. “I’m dangerous for you to know.”
I looked back at him, feeling utterly, utterly lost. "Good," I managed, my throat dry.
An instant of surprise crossed his beautiful, sculpted face, and then he actually laughed. He took my hand in both of his. Little sparks of electricity made me tingle all over, and then he turned my hand palm up. He looked at it and slowly traced a finger down the lines in my palm, as if reading my fortune. Then he took out a pen and wrote a phone number on my skin.
"Unfortunately, I'm already late," he said in a voice that was so intimate, so personal, it was as if we were the only two people in Botanika. He stood up-he was tall-and put some money on the table for a tip. "But that's my number, and I'm telling you: if you don't call me, I'll come find you."
"We'll see, wont we?" I said coolly, though inside I was doing an ecstatic victory dance. Something in his eyes flared, making me take a shallow breath, and then it was gone, leaving me to wonder if I had imagined it.
"Yes.’' he said, sounding deceptively mild. "We will." Turning, he walked with long, easy strides to the door and pushed it open. I watched him pass the plate glass window and had to struggle with myself not to jump up, run after him, and tackle him right there.
Racey slid into the seat opposite mine. "Well," she said. "What was he like? Did he seem okay?"
I let out a deep breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding. "More than okay." I uncurled my fingers, showing Racey his number written on my palm.
Racey looked at me, unusually solemn.
"What?" I asked her. "I've never seen you like this"
"Yeah," she said, and looked away. "I don't know what it is. Usually, you know, we see a guy, and bam, we know what the deal is, how to handle him-no surprises, you know? They're all kind of the same. But this one-I don't know.' she said again. "I mean, I just got a funny feeling from him."
"You and me both," I said sincerely, looking at his phone number in my palm.
"It was like I instantly knew he was… really different," Racey persisted.
I looked at her, interested. She was one of the strongest witches our age in the coven, and besides that, she was my best friend. I totally trusted her.
"Different bad?" I asked. "I didn't see that. He totally knocked me off my feet, but it all felt good… Besides the scary stuff, I meant.
Racey shrugged, as if shaking off bad feelings, "I don't know what I'm doing," she said. "Don't listen to me. He is really hot. And I didn't even talk to him," Then she looked at me again. Just… be careful."
"Yeah, of course," I said, having no idea what that meant. We got up, and I paid for my new halter, which I planned to wear the next time I saw Andre.