A Witch In Time: Magic and Mayhem Book Three (16 page)

He pressed his fingers to my mouth so I couldn’t say anything stupid. Then he turned around and walked out.

I touched my lips and slid to the floor. It didn’t matter that the cold hard ground made my ass hurt like a mother-humper. I was too stunned to care. Was love that damn easy? If it was, why didn’t my mom love me? I loved her. Shit, maybe I still did.

***

“All right people, we’re going to take it from the top,” Fabio yelled as he cocked his beret jauntily to the left.

He’d returned from getting the money and now it was time to get the freak show in shape.

“Why is there a hole in the butt of your dress?” Sassy asked as she posed in the splits holding wire hangers over her head.

“I called the Goddess
old
,” I muttered as I yanked on my dress to examine the damage. Had I been walking around with my ass hanging out all day and Sassy was the first one to point it out? Crap, maybe she really was my friend.

“You want me to fix it?” she asked as she grunted in pain and gingerly eased out of the splits.

“Can you?” I asked doubtfully.

“Of course I can.” She rolled her eyes and tossed her hair. “I fixed all of your sweaters I stretched out due to my alluring bosom, I’m sure I can patch a butt hole,” she said with an evil giggle at her unfortunate pun.

“That pun was really awful and please refrain from saying bosom ever again.” An involuntary grin pulled at my lips.

“Will do. But the butt hole thing was awesome. Right?” she crowed and wiggled her fingers.

“Awesome,” I mumbled as I bit back a laugh.

My dress tingled and sparked. I gasped at my stupidity for letting her have a go at anything that was literally on my body… but then it stopped as abruptly as it began. Slowly and with great trepidation I looked over my shoulder. Much to my surprise it was fixed. Not only fixed—it was perfect.

“Oh my Goddess,” I gasped. “I thought I was going to go up like a fire work. You’re amazing. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Her faced glowed and her expression was almost shy. Sassy wanted me to like her—and I did… sort of. She was all kinds of awful, but there was also something good. If I searched really, really, really hard, I could find it. Maybe I hadn’t been looking hard enough.

“Um, Sassy… I want to give you carte blanche of my closet,” I blurted out in a rush before I could change my mind. “You can borrow whatever you want except for the Birkin bag and underwear.”

“Is this because I repaired your butt hole?” she asked with a silly grin.

“No, but my butt hole thanks you. I decided this the other day, but every time I thought about telling you, it got wedged in my throat,” I confessed.

“It would have given me gas,” she admitted me as she slowly slid back into the splits. “However, I am wildly grateful and will repair any damage I cause. Can I touch the Birkin bag?” she queried wishfully.

I had to think about that. It was a difficult decision. I was turning over a new leaf, but that didn’t mean there was going to be some leftover materialism. A girl could only change so much. “You can sniff it,” I bargained. “And possibly sit next to it, but only if I’m there.”

“Sounds fair.” Sassy smiled and blew me a kiss.

“While all this bonding is nice, albeit a little disconcertingly nauseating, this does not mean I’ll stop giving you shit or threatening to zap you bald,” I stated firmly, trying to keep a small semblance of who I was intact. At this rate I wasn’t going to recognize myself next time I looked in the mirror.

“I’d expect and want no less,” she assured me. “And I will continue to annoy the living Goddess out of you and behave inappropriately.”

“This could work,” I muttered aloud as I moved away and got ready for my heinous entrance. Any more bonding might give me hives.

“Zelda are you ready?” Dad called out.

“No, but I’m gonna do it anyway,” I yelled back as I took a deep breath and said a quick prayer to the Goddess for the ability not to blow anything or anyone up during the play practice.

“That’s my girl,” my dad said proudly.

I was.

I was his girl… and it felt nice.

CHAPTER 16

“Oh my Goddess, I’m so nervous,” Sassy squealed at decibels that would attract stray dogs within a hundred miles.

I glanced around the makeshift dressing room in the Community Center and grinned. We were really going to do this. DeeDee and Wanda had on more make-up than any drag queen would comfortably wear and were still applying. Wanda’s adorable four-year-old son Bo was running around the room kissing everyone for luck. There was an enormous array of gorgeous flowers for me from Mac. The card was simple, but to the point.

I picked them from our secret place.

The blooms are nowhere as beautiful as you.

I’ll meet you in the tree house after the show.

xoxo Mac

He was being awfully bossy, but then again I secretly liked that macho, alpha wolf quality. However, the tree house meant sex and sex meant mating. Mating meant embedded fangs in my neck. But mostly it meant I needed to make a decision. I pushed the thoughts away and concentrated on becoming
Mommie
. I was as nervous as Sassy. I was simply trying not to let it show.

“Most of the audience is soused,” Wanda informed us with pride and a huge smirk. “I made my Long Island ice tea. It’s a killer.”

“Are the NASTY people here?” DeeDee asked while dramatically signing everything she was saying to warm up for her debut.

I was pretty sure there were no deaf people in the audience, but DeeDee was so wound up I wasn’t going to burst her bubble.

“Yep and they’re wasted. Fabio has been plying them with drinks for the better part of an hour and I’m pretty sure Bob is puking his guts out in the men’s room,” Wanda said as she passed Bo off to her raccoon Shifter husband Kurt so they could get seated.

She gave them a quick kiss and let the male half of the cast know we were dressed and it was safe to join us. My dad had outdone himself on the costumes. They were so authentic it was almost creepy.

“How do I look, Mommie?” Sassy asked as she twirled around in a pale pink dress layered with yards and yards of frothy tulle.

“You look just like Christina,” I told her, giving up my snarky ways and playing along with her game.

“Well, I should think so. Fabio procured all of the costumes from the private vault of Joan Crawford,” she informed me.

“He did what?” I yelled and looked down at my mint green fitted silk shantung suit and gagged a little. Almost creepy was incorrect—it was truly creepy. “Joan Crawford wore this?”

“She did,” Wanda confirmed. “I’m fairly sure Fabio procured the costumes
creatively
so everyone be careful not to ruin them. I’d hate to see our director spend time in the pokey for wanting us to look fabulous.”

“He’s never going to go on the straight and narrow, is he?” I mumbled as I took in the array of costumes with a critical eye.

“Oh heavens no.” Wanda chuckled and shook her head. “You’re father is special—one of a kind. He might have quit gambling, but he needs some felonious excitement. As long as he’s not hurting anyone, I say fine.”

“Could this generous description of my dad be because you look like a million bucks in your outfit?” I surmised with a raised brow.

“Possibly,” Wanda agreed with a giggle. “Or maybe it’s the fact that I had to sample all the pitchers of Long Island ice tea… ”

Awesome. Wanda was tipsy and I was wearing a mean dead movie star’s clothes.

I’d be having a chat with my dad after the show. We had enough funds to
procure
what we needed legally. However, I would not judge. Hell, it was all I could do not to poof to Paris and go on a shopping spree that would set me back a few decades. One day at a time was my new motto.

“Baba Yoskankaroo is here,” Sassy informed me as she stuffed her bra with wads of toilet paper.

“What are you doing?” I gaped at her in shock. Her knockers were huge. She didn’t need any added help.

“I want to be noticed,” she replied logically.

“And falling over because your boobs are going to outweigh the entire rest of your body is your idea of standing out?”

“You might have a point,” Sassy mused as she removed a roll or three from her bra. “Did you hear me? Baba Yobergermeister is in the audience with her icky little warlock posse.”

“Heard and ignoring,” I answered as I carefully applied blood red Chanel lipstick. Thankfully it was mine and it was new. The thought of wearing Joan’s actual lipstick was gag- inducing and I wouldn’t have put it past my dad to have
procured
that stuff too. “Baba Yoharshpunishment is dating my dad.”

“Sweet Glenda the Good Witch with a broom up her ass, you’re screwing with me,” Sassy shrieked much to the distress of my left eardrum. “Baba Youmpaloompa is gonna be your step-mom?”

“If you value your life, you will never utter the words Baba and mom in the same sentence again,” I snapped. “I already have one scary mother. I don’t need another.”

“Dude, sorry. I feel you on the mom thing. Mine left me at an orphanage for wayward witches when I was seven,” Sassy said and then dropped her gaze from mine.

“For how long?” I asked wishing my mom had done the same. My childhood would have been a lot better.

“Um… for always,” she replied and then went back to stuffing her bra.

Hell’s bells, why didn’t I know that? Well, maybe because Sassy and I had never really talked about anything with substance even though we’d spent nine months in the magical pokey together. Her lack of education and constant need for attention made a little more sense now. She was still a pain in the ass, but there was an explanation.

“What about your dad?”

“No clue who the sperm donor might be,” she said with a careless shrug. “I’ve thought about trying to find him, but I’m sick of being disappointed. I’m happy here. I like Assjacket. Jeeves is the first man I’ve ever met that loves me for me. Plus he’s hung like a horse.”

“Didn’t want to know that.” I groaned and grabbed her hands before she could make her knockers so obscene they would be the star of the show. “Take the toilet paper out. You don’t need it. You are fine just being you.”

“Are you fine being you?” she asked turning the tables and putting an ironically pertinent question on the table.

After a long pause and an even longer sigh, I answered. “I’m trying. I’m really trying.”

***

The Community Center was packed and my stomach churned painfully. Why in the ever-loving hell did I agree to this? I couldn’t act my way out of a hole. Even though I didn’t have to speak a word, I still had to pretend. This was not going to end well.

New leaf, new leaf, new motherfucking leaf.

“Okay everyone,” Fabio whispered, more excited than I’d ever seen him. “Most of the house is blotto, so they’re gonna love it. Just listen to the voice-over and do like we did in rehearsal. You will all be brilliant.”

“What if we forget what we did in rehearsal?” Jeeves asked, slightly less bouncy than normal—and far more pale.

“Go with your gut and make it up on the spot. Just don’t knock anyone off the stage,” my dad advised. “All right everyone, take each other’s hands.”

Sassy grabbed one of my hands and my buddy Simon the skunk grabbed the other. I knew my palms were sweaty and my body trembled.

“You’re gonna be wonderful,” Simon whispered as he gently squeezed my hand. “I’ll keep the spotlight on you and you’ll be so blinded you won’t see anyone in the audience.”

“Promise?” I asked. Simon was a true friend.

“On my life,” he vowed. “Just smile and look pretty. It will be over in fifty one minutes and twenty seven seconds.”

My dad cleared his throat dramatically, wiped a fictitious tear from his eye and straightened his beret.

“Oh Great Goddess,” he began reverently. “Please be with us tonight as we pull one over on our inebriated guests. We are the lucky ones to have been given the gift to perform
Mommie Dearest
. How blessed are we to be wearing the actual clothing of some dead and awful people?”

“Very blessed,” Bob yelled as he entered the room looking like he’d been on a three-day bender.

“Just remember my friends,” Fabio said. “When words simply aren’t enough to tell the story, we sing. And when raising our voices in song can’t convey our deepest emotions… we dance. That is the beauty of theatre. Our bodies are our tools and nothing can stop us!”

“Lack of talent can,” I mumbled.

“Nope,” my dad disagreed. “Lack of talent is a myth. All you have to do is want to be out there and share the four and a half hours of hard work we did and you will be welcomed with open arms and drunken love.”