Burning for You (Blackwater) (4 page)

“It’s amazing I found anything to
make at all,” I say, quietly agreeing with her.  I would try to make these for
Michael but without being able to afford good truffle oil, mine never
compared.  “So don’t pretend like you didn’t just drop a bomb on me, Isabel. 
What is a catalyst?  And what is it that my mother never talked to me about?  I
mean besides everything.”

Isabel winces, feeling the truth
behind my words.  “Your mother has had a hard time, Leah,” she says, making me
not want to hear what she has to say.  It’s hard to dredge up sympathy for a
woman who made it clear that she wanted me out of her life at an early age. 
“She’s changed since your dad left.  Without him, she’s not everything she can
be.”

“Where’s the part where you get to
the catalyst?” I ask.  “I want to know what that means.”

“You’re always so impatient,”
Isabel says, picking up a piece of cheese and tearing it apart with her long
nails.  “I was going to explain.  Your dad is your mother’s catalyst.  A
catalyst is the person who makes you realize your full potential.  Your mother
has powers that she can no longer use when your dad isn’t around.”

“Powers?” I say.  “Like
witchcraft?”

“Like witchcraft,” Isabel agrees. 
“Or crafting.  You already knew that you come from a long line of crafters.”  I
nod.  That’s never been a secret.  On both my father’s and my mother’s side of
the family, there have been crafters the whole way back, as far as we can
trace.  It’s something you grow up knowing about in Blackwater, but you aren’t
allowed to talk about as a child.  My parents were never open about crafting
and their own abilities.  I’d suspected as much, from the women who came to see
my mother to ask about the gender of their unborn children, or whether their
daughters would ever be married, or their sons would wind up dead before the
next male in the line would be born.  Lineage is important to people in
Blackwater.  If you can count your family back at least six generations, you’re
solid.  Anything less would be considered a newcomer.  “Since your dad left,”
Isabel continued, “Your mother is empty.  He is her catalyst.  He is what fuels
her craft and gives it life.  Without him, she isn’t able to do what she has
been born to do.”

“And what exactly is it she can
do?” I ask.  “She’s never bothered to share with me anything about her craft. 
She’s shut me out my entire life.”

Isabel smiles and takes another
bite of her eggs.  The steaming forkful pops into her mouth and comes out
clean.  “Do I need to teach you the elementals?” she asks.

I shake my head.  “No, I know what
it means.  Elementals are what element in nature controls your craft, like
earth, air, fire and water.”

She nods.  “Good.  So you know
something.”

“Everyone in Blackwater knows
that.”

She shrugs.  “I suppose.  You’d be
surprised.  Your mother is a water elemental.  Water elementals have the
ability to know things.  They can see things others can’t see.”

“You mean like you?” I ask.  Isabel
nods.  “But wait, you said that without my dad as my mother’s catalyst, she
can’t craft.  How can you craft?  Was your husband your catalyst?”

“Hell no,” Isabel says.  “The only
thing that man was good for was getting me out of my mother’s house.”  She
pauses and her hand flutters to her chest with a flash of sparkle from her
nails.  “Did I ever tell you about Nerita?”

“You mean your twin sister that
died?” I ask her.  Isabel’s eyes lower and she nods.  I remember hearing the
story about her twin sister that fell out of a window and broke her neck when
she was only six.  “Was she your catalyst?”

“She still is,” Isabel says,
pulling her necklace out from under her shirt.  It’s a locket that’s the most
modest piece of jewelry that she owns, but she’s always wearing it.  She opens
it up and I see a small tuft of something that looks like hair inside, the
exact color as Isabel’s.  “As long as I have this piece of her on me, I will
have my craft.  It will never be as strong as when she was alive, but I still
have it.”

“I see,” I say, mystified.  “So
when you said I met my catalyst, how did you know?”

“Because you’re ignited,” she
says.  “I can feel it all over you.  You’re radiating heat and energy.”

“Ugh, now you’re reading my aura?”
I say with a smirk. Something about what she is saying is ringing true with me,
though.  I’m feeling different this morning than I did yesterday morning.  Of
course, yesterday I woke up knowing I’d be leaving Michael.  Today I woke up
knowing I’d left Michael and that chapter of my life is complete.

Isabel swats my hand playfully. 
“Don’t belittle other people’s talents,” she tells me.  “Your own are going to
serve you well, and I’m pretty sure they’re alive and kicking inside of you
right now.”

“You talk about it like it’s a baby,”
I say.  “So who’s my catalyst?” I ask her.  “The only person I ran into
yesterday other than my mother…well, I literally ran into them.  With my car.”

“Your car?” Isabel asks.  “You got
into an accident?  I didn’t see any damage.”

“What are you talking about?” I
say, alarmed.  “Betsey’s front end is crumpled like a Styrofoam cup!”

Isabel shakes her head.  “I walked
by Betsey this morning, and since I hadn’t seen her in years, I was surprised
to see what good condition she’s in.  Practically looking better than when I
saw her over ten years ago.”

I shove my chair back and run
toward the front door, flinging it open and running outside.  The fall air is
crisp and cold.  I’m still only wearing boxer briefs with my t-shirt and no
shoes, but I have to see what the hell Isabel is talking about.  I gasp when I
see Betsey.  Not only is the damage completely gone, but she’s shiny and clean,
without a single bump or dent or ding.  Betsey hasn’t been perfect since I took
her to Chicago and mastered the art of parallel parking in the city.  And by
“mastered”, I mean pushing the car behind me and the car in front of me with
Betsey’s bumpers to make room for myself and get closer to the curb.  “What the
hell?” I say.  “She looks new!”

“That’s what I thought,” Isabel
says, coming up behind me, putting a hand on my arm.  “It’s cold outside, Leah,
come back in the house.”

“But this is wrong,” I say, shaking
my head.  Were yesterday’s events just a twisted hallucination?  It can’t be
true, I remember my mother looking right at the damage with me when I pulled in
to the driveway.  I’m pretty sure she was annoyed that my trashed up car was
lowering her property value.  Still, I let Isabel turn me around and away from
Betsey and back toward the house.  “Just yesterday I pulled up to the house and
the front was bashed in, Isabel, I swear….”

“Sit down,” she commands me and
leads me back to the kitchen table, in front of my plate of half-finished
eggs.  I shove the plate away, since I’m no longer hungry.  “Breathe,” Isabel
commands, and I realize I’m holding my breath.  I lean back and take a few deep
breaths and let them out slowly.  Isabel gets up from the table and pours me a
glass of water from the dispenser on the fridge and places it down in front of
me.  “Drink,” she commands.

“Stop babysitting me,” I grumble, my
face fallen in frustration and confusion.  I’m completely shaken by what I just
saw.  “Isabel, I swear, I smashed into the back of a black SUV yesterday at
Emerald and Center-“

“I hate that damn light,” Isabel
says, scowling.

“Me too,” I say.  “Anyway, Betsey
was smashed in front.  The SUV was okay, just a small dent in the bumper.  But
I don’t understand, what the hell happened to fix the damage?  Even if someone
got Betsey fixed behind my back, there’s no way that much damage could be fixed
that quickly.”

“Who did you hit?” Isabel says. 
“It was a black SUV?”  I nod, push back my chair and walk over to the counter,
where my purse still is from last night. 

“He wrote down his information for
me,” I tell her.  “So I could contact him for insurance reasons.” 

As I rummage through my purse, I
see Carlton standing at the entrance to the kitchen, little head poking around
the doorway, huge body hidden by the wall.  He must have sensed my hand was in
my purse right next to his cat food cans.  He decides to curl his fat self
around the door frame and howls at Isabel.  “Holy shit!” Isabel jumps up from
the table, knocking over the glass of water she got me.  “Where did that damn
cat come from?”

“That’s Carlton,” I say.  “He’s
mine.”

“Is he pregnant?” Isabel asks,
making me laugh out loud.  She goes to the counter and grabs a large handful of
paper towels and begins to wipe up the spill.  “I thought they only had cats
that fat in China.”

“No, he’s just big boned, aren’t
you Carlton?” I coo at him.  Carlton looks annoyed.  I grab a can of cat food
out of my giant purple purse and pop it open and set it down on the floor
without bothering to find a bowl to put it in. 

“What are you feeding him, Foie
Gras?” Isabel asks, naming my most favorite fattening French delicacy.  She trashes
the wet paper towels and bends over to stroke him from head to tail.  She’s hit
on Carlton’s favorite way to be petted, and he immediately warms up to Isabel,
turning away from the food and rubbing his self in a figure eight between her
legs. 

“Wow, you distracted him from
eating,” I say.  “I didn’t think it could be done.”

“Cats and I have an understanding,”
Isabel says.  “Right, Carlton?”  I can hear Carlton purring from across the
kitchen.  I’m astounded, but I get an idea.

“Do you want to keep him at your
apartment?” I ask her.  “I can supply the food and litter and everything, but
as long as I’m living here, I don’t think my mother will tolerate him for very
long.  I’ll take him back when I move out.”

Isabel shrugs.  “If it’s okay with
Carlton.”  We look and see Carlton lying on his back, belly in the air, almost
like an overweight Pug. 

“I think it’ll okay with Carlton,”
I say.  “You’d be doing me a huge favor.  I appreciate it.”

Isabel laughs.  “I’ve been cleaning
up your messes almost your whole life.  What’s one more?  Now back to what you
were doing.  Find that information.”  I nod and find my wallet somewhere in the
mess of my purse, between the cans of cat food and the crumpled receipts and
the countless empty inhalers and tubes of lip balm.  I find my notebook nestled
between a brochure that some religious fanatic gave me on the train about a
year ago and a magazine that’s from two years ago.  I make a mental note to
clean out my purse in an attempt to get my life in order, or just trash this
purse and get a new one.  I come back to the table and hand the notebook page
to Isabel, whose eyes widen.  “Ash Lavanne,” she whispers.  “Of course.”

“You know him?” I ask her. 

Isabel nods.  “Your mother always
knew that you possess the fire elemental.  Like your dad.”

“So?” I ask.  “What’s so special
about fire?”

“Fire allows you to change things
as they are,” Isabel explains.  “Fire elementals are the alchemists of the
crafting world.  You can build, destroy, create and damage.  It’s arguably the
most dangerous elemental there is.”

“So Ash Lavanne,” I say.  “He’s a
fire elemental?”

“He is,” Isabel agrees. 

“How do you know that?” I ask her. 

Isabel rolls her eyes.  “I know
everything,” she snorts.  “You should know that by now.”

“Forgive me for questioning your
vast knowledge,” I say sarcastically.  “Listen, this is all well and good, but
I don’t know the first thing about crafting, I don’t know about fire and alchemy
and all of this stuff sounds like a dumb video game Michael used to ignore me
to play all night long.”

“Your car,” Isabel interrupts me. 
“You changed the damage.  You fixed Betsey.”

“That’s insane,” I say.  “I’m not a
mechanic.”

“You’re a fire elemental,” Isabel
says.  “You don’t have to be a mechanic.”

“But I didn’t do anything,” I say. 
“I didn’t touch Betsey.  I drove her here, parked her, and went inside.  I
haven’t been outside since I got here.”

“You wanted her fixed, didn’t you?”
Isabel asks me.  I nod.  “Sometimes that’s all it takes.  A desire so strong,
it can change something you want changed.”

I sigh.  “Okay.  Let’s glaze over
that part.  I need to wrap my head around some other things.  Like this Ash
Lavanne guy.  He’s apparently the catalyst, isn’t he?”

“It would seem that way,” Isabel
says.  “You were drawn to him.”

“More like Betsey was drawn to his
SUV,” I remark.

“How did you feel when you met
him?” she asks me.

I pause.  “Like I couldn’t
breathe.  Like I was alive for the first time in my life.”

She nods smugly.  “There you go.”

Isabel leaves, taking Carlton home with
her, and I decide to go for a run in the woods behind our house.  Running is
the only thing that will clear my head.  There’s too much happening in there so
it needs some major clearing.  I realize that waking up at noon, eating lunch
and going for a run is not the most productive use of my day, but it’s Sunday,
and there’s not much I can do about getting my life together on a Sunday. 

Social Distortion is blaring
through my ear buds and as “Ball and Chain” comes on, I almost laugh.  Michael
hasn’t called, and I doubt he’d follow me here.  I feel exhilarated by the fact
that I’m free.  I mean hell, I could go hit a bar and fuck anyone I want
tonight, if I were so inclined.  The fact that I am still technically married
to the guy and that there aren’t really any pickup bars that I know of in
Blackwater are irrelevant.  Looking ridiculous, I spread my arms to the sides,
closing my eyes and enjoying the feel of the crunching leaves beneath my feet
and the cold wind whipping against my face, tossing my ponytail back away from
my head.  I make it this way for about fifteen paces when I slam directly into
something, knocking the wind right out of me.