Flesh
A food cart hitched to a covered porch. That’s what it looked like, and no amount of self-made lies would tell Sharon otherwise. Though it lacked wheels, the trailer hitch was clearly visible to the naked eye. The porch lacked a foundation, and was little more than mesh wires and two-by-fours slap-dashed beneath a tarp. Yet there was a light from within the cart that brought her steps forward. Warm and yellow, it blazed from the dark enclosure through the mesh. It’s radiance burned the pitch of evening.
She stepped forward, close enough to see just past the mesh. There was a card table propped with a jaunty centerpiece, with two lawn chairs on either end. Beyond that lay the cart, a rough wooden counter bolted beneath a sliding glass window. The light was brightest from within it, to the point it hurt just to look at it. Her face screwed with a wince as she rapped against the door. It rattled within it’s frame with such a clatter that it echoed throughout the night.
Sharon stood there as the sound of her own breathing grew louder. She thought about turning heel. Just walking away into the cold embrace of the dark. She glanced down at her phone, still open to Google Maps. An hour and half drive-and for what?
A prank?
It wasn’t the first time she’d gone on these little trips. The month before, she had traveled to a cemetery. A drowned mire of a place that had boasted a real vampire. She had stood in the cold and damp for nearly an hour, at midnight. No one had shown. The month before that had been the trip to Colorado, to go running with the pack. Countless times before then, countless trips. Thousands of miles and hours had brought her no closer to what she needed most.
Need. That’s how she’d come to think of it. It had surpassed a want a long time ago. Every trip, every disappointment only served to feed it.
She had developed a system though. Do research, drive out, wait roughly twenty minutes for the alleged engagement. If nothing happened, leave. Find a local diner, maybe a hotel if it was a long drive. As she stood before the ratty door, she was closing on minute fif-
“Coming! One sec, let me get dressed,”
Sharon felt her bowels clench in a way they hadn’t since the very first trip. That time, it had been hunting the fae. She had found a ring of mushrooms in a super old set of woods. She had even came with sugar, their favorite thing. She had poured it in the center of the circle and waited. It had been dark that night, just like now. A twig had snapped behind her. Every part of her had seized as she turned her head-only to be met with absolutely nothing.
Save the bugs that had came for the sugar, and decided to start on her ankle.
That first night had been so disappointing. As had all the others. But she kept taking these trips. She kept surfing forums and travel blogs. She couldn’t put her finger on why-there had to be a reason, didn’t there?
She could just be one of those e-wiccans, she thought. She wiped the sweat from her brow, the heat palpable and muggy despite the sun being long gone. She glanced back up at the cart-only to wince as a switch was flicked from within, and the covered porch illuminated. She staggered back, and raised a hand to her brow as her pupils adjusted to the light. Out of the newfound false day came a shape, one that held the same voice as before.
“It’s not business hours right now-but business ain’t booming either. Can I help you with something?”
Sharon blinked into focus on the shape, and watched as features sluiced into defined tones. The woman was thin, with straight auburn hair. Her style was eclectic but comfortable-baggy pajama bottoms with Harry Potter houses printed all over them. The sweatshirt hung loose over her, and looked like it belonged to a college. Sharon squinted, but could hardly read the worn script. The woman smirked, and stepped forward.
“Oh, don’t tell me you’re the type I have to invite in. C’mon now, I asked you if I could help you?”
“I-uh. Are you-are you the witch?” Sharon said after a beat.
The woman snorted as she threw back her head. She rolled her eyes, and gave a sigh as her green eyes rested on Sharon.
“Why do people always say I’m a witch? Why, I like to think I make fine company,” she said. She gave a half hearted giggle as she approached the screen door. She nudged it open with her foot, and beckoned towards Sharon with a finger.
“C’mon, c’mon. There’s a box fan I can pull out of the back, and iced tea. You drove a ways, didn’t you?”
Sharon paused, but the cotton feel of her throat bobbed her head. “Uh, yeah. Georgia actually. That tea is sweet, right?”
“Spoken like a true Georgian. Of course. Take one of those chairs-I’ll get the fan and some tea. You want it sweet, but do you want it to burn too?” said the woman as she crossed the planks. Every foot fall seemed to bring a squeak. Sharon stepped in side, but skewed her brow as she looked at the woman.
“I thought you said it was iced?”
The woman snorted again as she shrugged. A shoulder crept from the neck of the sweatshirt, which Sharon could read clearly now.
ENCANTADO UNIVERSITY CLASS OF 19-
The woman crossed her arms before she could get a year. “I mean, yeah. But that doesn’t mean I don’t have whiskey if you want it,” she said.
Sharon looked up at her, and watched as the woman smiled wider. She still had to drive back. She wasn’t entirely sure who this woman was-much less, if she could trust her to mix a drink. But the smile was one she felt she could trust. It wasn’t tinged like others had been. Other times, other trips, in far worse places.
“You know what? Sure. I’m Sharon,” she said. She extended a hand, one the woman leaned forward to take with both of hers.
“You can call me Cindy,” she replied. “Now, let’s get those drinks,”
@@@
The whiskey burned, but the tea hid it well enough. Cindy had more than a few glasses, but didn’t slur a single syllable during small talk. Sharon tried her best to keep up. The conversation bounced from one topic to the next. If Sharon wasn’t so keenly aware of the drive still, she would have swore she had just drove down the street to see a friend.
Cindy would laugh, and lean into joke after joke. She smiled, and the lights on the porch seemed just a little brighter for it. She didn’t push or pry-rather, she let Sharon walk into the why of what brought her there all her own.
After a second glass of tea, Sharon swallowed the doubt in her throat and decided there was only one way to ask.
Directly.
“So you’re like, a sorceress or something?”
Cindy raised her brow from over her glass, and nodded. She swallowed, and gave another smile. “That I am. Quite a few of us, but not so many like me. Just how’d you hear about me?”
“Well, uh-” Sharon started, pushing against the warm fuzz in her thoughts, “-there was this post online, and-”
“Oh god. Please tell me they didn’t own a curio shop,” Cindy said, giving a massive faux frown. “I swear, that guy is-”
“Nonono!” said Sharon as she jabbed a finger into the table top. “No, it was like this girl you had helped out? She uh, she said you like, changed her? Like her body?”
“Oh! Her! Yeah, I remember her. Lydia,” said Cindy. Another smile, and Sharon swore the lights really did get brighter. “Yeah, she wanted a different body. So I gave her one,”
Sharon snorted, and shook her head. “So you’re like what, a beautician? Is that what this is?”
Cindy paused, her face focusing on Sharon with an intensity that made the laughter building in the traveler’s throat die. Sharon blinked, an excuse clawing it’s way over her tongue before cindy saved her the embarrassment.
“Oh, no dear. I’m the real deal. I gave her a new everything. She certainly deserved it as well. And you? What would you like to change?”
The whiskey roiled in Sharon’s stomach as she clenched her jaw. Be it the implication she needed work or the shift in tone, she couldn’t say. A moment passed before she inhaled slow through her nose, and leaned across the table.
“Well? What kind of change can you give me? Hrm?”
Cindy’s fingers taped against the side of the glass as she stared at the girl before her. Her eyes closed and her fingers stopped. Her head leaned against the back of her chair as her hand pulled from the glass, poised to snap.
When they did, the lights flickered in the little porch. The snap, it sounded so much like that time in the fae circle. Sharon’s stomach clenched as she pulled back from the table, breath rising hot and heavy into her lungs.
She happened to look at her hands-and stopped.
Her nails were perfectly done, manicured and pedicured. Lacquered and lengthened in a way she hadn’t seen since prom. The breathe she had held exited her mouth in a phrase, one that punctuated the little porch like a knife.
“What the fuck?”
Cindy opened an eye, her smile returning as she glanced at the girl. “Do ya’ like them? I wasn’t too sure about the color, so if you’ve got a preference, I could-”
“You did my fucking nails,” sputtered Sharon, her hands as far from her chest as her arms would take them.
“I mean yeah, I figured-”
“You did my nails?” interjected Sharon, her eyes wide as she looked at the witch. One she believed in more than what a simple title could grant. Cindy frowned, and leaned forward. She rested her elbows on the table top and tilted her head.
“I mean I could do a different style if you wanted, it’s no big deal. Like, seriously-”
“I-I just-I’m just in shock is all, like holy fuck. Magick is real, you’re real, and-and it’s just a lot? You know?”
Cindy busted into laughter, and gave small nod.”Yep, sure is. I mean, I can’t like. Do stupid stuff like throw fire from my hands or anything. That’s not my gift. But I can give you the you you’ve dreamed of. And well, that’s something right?”
Sharon blinked, and brought her hands to rest atop the table at last. She stared at her perfectly set fingernails, and then eyed her glass. Cindy snorted, and leaned into her view.
“More tea?”
“With way more whiskey than tea. And, um. You can do more than-”
“Yes dear,” replied Cindy. “But magick isn’t just give. You’ve got to take something as well. You understand that, right?”
Sharon’s stomach didn’t clench. Not even a little bit. But it did hit the boards right below her.
“Oh god. I’m not a virgin or anything, so-”
“What kind of witch do you think I am?!” said Cindy, her tone incredulous. She rolled her eyes, and leaned back into her chair. “No, nothing like that. Every change, it’s as permanent as you want. Well, as permanent as your life choices allow. Smoking, all that? Yeah, it’ll ruin you. What I take? It’s a year of your life. Off the ass end, so like, alllll the crappy years nobody wants,”
“A what?” said Sharon.
“A year of your life! Nothing big. Small stuff, really. Like, do you really want to be shitting yourself in depends in a home somewhere? Ew, no. I say enjoy your life for what it is now, and be glad the end is short. Ya’ know?”
Sharon’s heart could have rivaled a Metallica concert as the next words escaped her mouth.
“Do…do you know how long I’ll-”
“You know, I always get that question. All the time, actually. I can’t give you a number. Fate, the universe, all that. But I can give you a ballpark figure. Your eighties, somewhere in there. Well, late seventies right now. That’s still a good run!” said Cindy, her smile widening as she shrugged.
“But you know? Early seventies or late sixties-that’s a good run too, ain’t it?”
“I..I suppose it is,” said Sharon. Her eyes met Cindy’s own as her tongue rolled over her lips, and her heart began to slow. She studied Cindy’s face-every inch of it. The lack of wrinkles, the way not a single blemish was on her skin. How her hair had health, luster and shine.
“But I think late fifties would be fine with me too,” she said.
Cindy clapped, and rose from her chair. “Nice! I’ll get the drinks, and we’ll get to work on you. Hey, you really don’t need to drive home. I’ve got a couch in there if you want?”
“You fit a couch in a food cart?” said Sharon. Cindy snorted as she rose, pushing the lawn chair beneath her away.
“Wait, you can accept witch craft but not a couch in a food cart?”
It was Sharon’s turn to laugh as she lifted her hands, and turned them over to view her nails.
“I mean, it’s just a lot, you know?”
Cindy rolled her eyes, and made her way to the cart. As she rounded it towards it’s back door, Sharon called out to her once more.
“Hey! Cindy! How old are you exactly?”
“Three hundred and seventy five, fixin’ to be damn near four hundred!”
“How’s that-wait, what do you-”
But Cindy had already made her way inside the cart, the door flapping into the night. The lights flickered, and there came another snap.