\u201cWe\u2019ve got one!\u201d I said before my sister could even start her greeting.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know, there were films besides Ghostbusters, Aliens, and Mystery Men,\u201d she said, discouragingly.<\/p>\n
\u201cPerish the thought. I also quote from GalaxyQuest and occasionally modern shows. You have your squeeze?\u201d<\/p>\n
She sighed. \u201cIf you mean Roberto, yes, he\u2019s here. We have demon-sign?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNow who\u2019s doing it? If you stack a bunch of demons you could have a demon-striation, right?\u201d I mused.<\/p>\n
\u201cPossibly. What does\u2026 oh. Yeah, I don\u2019t think the pun quite hit it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI was hoping it rocked.\u201d I waited for the mental bah-dump-dump-ching sound, and continued. \u201cSeriously, though, yeah. Sixteenth street mall, Denver, maybe an hour ago.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn this traffic?\u201d she asked. \u201cThat might as well have been last Tuesday.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLast Tuesday we hadn\u2019t gotten confirmation that it was my ex-\u2018s friend\u2019s ex-boyfriend.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s a tenuous connection, I\u2019d say. Like you know a dude who knows a dude.\u201d She punched the open channel key, also known as speakerphone.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes, but can\u2019t we use that?\u201d I asked. I got a half-shrug from Nen. \u201cIsn\u2019t it a wart on the first law?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThou shalt not rile up a woman because she\u2019ll go have sex with djinn and angels and you\u2019ll be like uncle to a billion deadly sins? Or Newton, an object at rest rarely gets motivated to do anything else but slouch around? \u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIs that the first law? I was thinking similarity. Contagion. That sort of thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, THAT first law.\u201d I heard Roberto say something, but they must have been outside, because traffic overwhelmed whatever he had to say. \u201cFine,\u201d my sister responded. \u201cThere are lots of first laws. It\u2019s like primo uno in spades. Or something like that. Let\u2019s not number the laws, okay? Or rules. I think Gibbs had two number ones, too. And don\u2019t go there. Toilet humour is so 3rd grade it\u2019s poopy.\u201d<\/p>\n
I tried to restrain a snort.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe first law is of that of naming,\u201d Rayya said, late to the conversation. Or maybe she was just trying to be helpful and remind me.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m more surprised no one argued my wart comment, and explained that it was a polyp or a strange cyst-like growth. That isn\u2019t an invitation, by the way. Magda had a way of tracking people, and it\u2019s a staple of magical fiction. Can you do that, only tracking the tracker?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI think you meant a corollary, and got caught up in the net of capillary instead. Um. Isn\u2019t the law of similarity an artistic conceit of gestalt psychology?\u201d<\/p>\n
I rolled my eyes. Sometimes I forgot my sister was, well, my sister. \u201cPoint taken. Can you do it?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think so. It\u2019s too tenuous. That\u2019s wizard territory, really. If it were my own bloodline, then it\u2019s a real maybe.\u201d She sounded disappointed.<\/p>\n
I tried cheering her up. \u201cSo I should never try and hide from you?\u201d<\/p>\n
She laughed. \u201cYou never could. Remember trick or treating that year you were dressed in a thrift store tux?\u201d<\/p>\n
I groaned. \u201cOh please, don\u2019t remind me.\u201d<\/p>\n
She chortled and then sighed. \u201cI will remind you whenever I need to threaten you. What\u2019s plan B?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAn option when Plan A fails,\u201d I fired off, trying to give myself a second to formulate one. \u201cFind something that can sniff out a demon and run the hounds on it?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s kind of just Plan A with three little letter \u2018I\u2019s after it. Know a pious skinshifter?\u201d she asked, off-handedly.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot to my knowledge, but then again, why would I?\u201d I meant it both ways. Why would I know one, and why would I know they were one.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have weird friends,\u201d was all she said.<\/p>\n
I couldn\u2019t deny that. \u201cA wizard, you say?\u201d Was I in debt to one, did one owe me a favour? I tried to add up the balance sheet real quick, but found myself probably even with the Questor\u2019s wife. Misko. I finally had a use name for her, and I should use it.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know one?\u201d she asked, suddenly interested.<\/p>\n
\u201cA weird friend,\u201d I said, vaguely.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
I couldn\u2019t interpret that one, so I left it. \u201cI don\u2019t know if she\u2019d be willing to get involved, or what I would have to pay her, though. She\u2019s the kind who might get involved if she were interested, but I have a feeling this is maybe a bit more dangerous now that I am thinking about it and she has kids.\u201d I was half-thinking aloud, so I wasn\u2019t going to worry about my sister\u2019s grammatical sensitivities. \u201cThe feeling I\u2019ve had around the guy is like he\u2019s a maw of infinite space.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBound by a nutshell of bad dreams?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cShould I be hoping it\u2019s a hard nut to crack?\u201d Back to banter. It was safer than thinking about that feeling. It made me want to shudder and sweat. It didn\u2019t get better on repeat, but worse.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou ever think you\u2019re the bad guy, E?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n
The question seemed like a huge non-sequitur from our conversation, and it completely derailed my thinking. \u201cUm, only when it comes to people calling me a dragon slayer, or, well,\u201d I thought of a few times I\u2019d done bad things. Maybe I didn\u2019t have a huge catalog of them, but there were always enough. It was the lazy path to humility, the stumble that led to a great Fall. \u201cWhy?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cJust thinking aloud,\u201d she said, brushing me off. \u201cSo, great dragon slayer, you going to call your weird wizard friend, or are we going downtown? I could do with some nosh.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSince when do you use \u2018nosh\u2019 as a term?\u201d I demanded.<\/p>\n
\u201cSince I was chatting with mom earlier. She was making a sweet kugel. If you make a kegel joke I will hit you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNever even crossed my mind.\u201d Truth, for once.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, dinner and maybe demons downtown?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDefinitely a date.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEw.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEw! You\u2019re my sister. I was just alliterating.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, pick up your a-litter, trash boy.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2026 doesn\u2019t even make sense.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNeither do you. See you at the deli near the Historical Society?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cProbably bringing the sibs.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought I heard sins, and I was going to tell you to pray for them, but you might pray for those weird friends of yours, too. I\u2019m probably,\u201d she dripped sarcasm into the word, \u201cbringing this guy, although he has no appreciation for good food.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe probably thinks a knish is a low-class empanada. If he can\u2019t appreciate a really good pastrami, dump him.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI heard that,\u201d I heard, and then with a chuckle, the call ended.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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