Man, it sucks being the new guy
/Show of faith. This’ll be easy; it’s just a show of faith. It’ll be nothing, they just want to trust me./ I repeat the words to myself as I make my way down the darkening street. Finally I see my destination in the distance a bit. A loft above a bar or something of some kind. I stop outside the bar and look upwards toward the loft. The lights are on, though I can’t see anything due to the curtains on the windows. Thankfully, there’s some outside stairs I can use to get inside without having to go through the bar. I’m not exactly sure what to anticipate. Just that I’m expected to ‘clean up’ anything magical I find, do a simple cleansing of the area to get rid of any residual magic vibes that may be lingering, and not touch anything ‘else’ I may find. I hear a yowl and involuntarily jump as a cat darts out of the nearest alley. The offending mangy thing skitters away. Stupid cats. I hate cats. Always sitting there, tails twitching, eyes watching, ready to pounce on small defenseless things that they consider to be conveniently snack packaged. The one time I managed to get out of that cage the entire time I was in Willow’s room, her parents had been house sitting their neighbor’s cat and the damn thing nearly had his Meow Mix with a side of Amy for dinner.
/Show of faith, show of faith…/ I keep repeating mentally as I’m climbing up the stairs and use the key they gave me to let myself in. How and why they have a key, I don’t know. I assume after I complete my task, things will be fully explained to me. Glad I was smart enough to take Claire’s advice and bring some gloves with me. Nevertheless, I feel like a damn catburgular or something. Inside, the loft is pretty ordinary. Decorated decently, not fuddy duddy or anything like that, like some old geezer lives here. But then again, why would an old geezer live above a bar in the first place? So far, so good. Nothing weird or out of place looking at all. In fact, the whole place seems downright tidy. Maybe I’ve been over reacting, and this really isn’t a big deal after all, even after what I saw in the coven basement. /I mean, really now, how bad can it- Oh. Yeah, that’s pretty bad./ I stop dead in my tracks as I go around the divider separating the bedroom from the rest of the place.
/Holy shit./ There’s a body, and - well, at least I’m not seeing anything magical so far. Just lots of blood and axeyness. /This is wrong on so very many levels./ I immediately whip out the cell phone and dial the coven house.
“Hey Amy,” Claire’s calm voice greets before I can even say anything. “Is there a problem?”
/Problem? No. I’m just standing in the middle of a homicide scene here, probably looking guilty as hell./ “Well, I’m here, and yeah. And there’s a, the-.”
“The body?” Claire actually laughs; as if she’s listening to a child discover their reflection for the first time. “That would be the ‘anything else’ that you’re not supposed to touch.”
“Ok, but see, I’m not really seeing anything magical.”
“Keep looking, you will,” she says in an amused tone as she hangs up.
/Okayfine./ My eyes dart around the room, trying my best not to look at the body, or rather the various pieces that used to make up a body. The living area, the kitchen, breezing over the bedroom, the ceiling; then I stop as my eyes slowly drift upward again. Sure enough, smack dab in the middle of the ceiling is a pentagram, drawn in some thick black substance. /You have GOT to be kidding me. The ceiling’s stucco for shit’s sake. I’ll never get that out. How am I even supposed to get up there?/ For the first time I notice the ladder in the corner and a small stack of cleaning supplies. This is one damn big show of faith. /I better found out every twice-blessed thing there is to know about this when I get back there./
An hour later I’m very tired and still very wanting to get out of here, but the pentagram on the ceiling is gone. I light a sage wand I brought with me and to cleanse the air and the aura of the building. I randomly wonder about the ladder and stuff, then it dawns on me that they probably have someone coming to check up after me just in case. After all, I’m not sure I’d trust me to thoroughly clean up and cover my tracks, particularly where a murder scene is concerned. I wonder how many people it actually takes to ‘clean up’ something like this? Pushing the thoughts to very farthest corner of my brain, locked in a box under a flight of stairs, I make my way out of the loft.
/Show of faith, show of faith…/ I keep repeating mentally as I’m climbing up the stairs and use the key they gave me to let myself in. How and why they have a key, I don’t know. I assume after I complete my task, things will be fully explained to me. Glad I was smart enough to take Claire’s advice and bring some gloves with me. Nevertheless, I feel like a damn catburgular or something. Inside, the loft is pretty ordinary. Decorated decently, not fuddy duddy or anything like that, like some old geezer lives here. But then again, why would an old geezer live above a bar in the first place? So far, so good. Nothing weird or out of place looking at all. In fact, the whole place seems downright tidy. Maybe I’ve been over reacting, and this really isn’t a big deal after all, even after what I saw in the coven basement. /I mean, really now, how bad can it- Oh. Yeah, that’s pretty bad./ I stop dead in my tracks as I go around the divider separating the bedroom from the rest of the place.
/Holy shit./ There’s a body, and - well, at least I’m not seeing anything magical so far. Just lots of blood and axeyness. /This is wrong on so very many levels./ I immediately whip out the cell phone and dial the coven house.
“Hey Amy,” Claire’s calm voice greets before I can even say anything. “Is there a problem?”
/Problem? No. I’m just standing in the middle of a homicide scene here, probably looking guilty as hell./ “Well, I’m here, and yeah. And there’s a, the-.”
“The body?” Claire actually laughs; as if she’s listening to a child discover their reflection for the first time. “That would be the ‘anything else’ that you’re not supposed to touch.”
“Ok, but see, I’m not really seeing anything magical.”
“Keep looking, you will,” she says in an amused tone as she hangs up.
/Okayfine./ My eyes dart around the room, trying my best not to look at the body, or rather the various pieces that used to make up a body. The living area, the kitchen, breezing over the bedroom, the ceiling; then I stop as my eyes slowly drift upward again. Sure enough, smack dab in the middle of the ceiling is a pentagram, drawn in some thick black substance. /You have GOT to be kidding me. The ceiling’s stucco for shit’s sake. I’ll never get that out. How am I even supposed to get up there?/ For the first time I notice the ladder in the corner and a small stack of cleaning supplies. This is one damn big show of faith. /I better found out every twice-blessed thing there is to know about this when I get back there./
An hour later I’m very tired and still very wanting to get out of here, but the pentagram on the ceiling is gone. I light a sage wand I brought with me and to cleanse the air and the aura of the building. I randomly wonder about the ladder and stuff, then it dawns on me that they probably have someone coming to check up after me just in case. After all, I’m not sure I’d trust me to thoroughly clean up and cover my tracks, particularly where a murder scene is concerned. I wonder how many people it actually takes to ‘clean up’ something like this? Pushing the thoughts to very farthest corner of my brain, locked in a box under a flight of stairs, I make my way out of the loft.