Smoke & Silver

We stayed for a bit longer, drinking and talking until after midnight.

“Alright, boys. If we've got something to do tomorrow, we'd better all get some rest.” I said, standing. They both looked at me like children who were told they were up past their bedtime.

“Come on. We're not as young as we were.” They kept looking at me.

“Fine. I'm going home. Should I send the limo back for you?” I asked John. He started to respond, but was interrupted by Isaac.

“You're both welcome to stay the night here.”

John and I exchanged a quick glance.

“And I can send someone for your things, John. I know you're staying in a dingy motel.”
John shrugged.

“I know you don't live terribly far away, Georgia, but I've got another room that you're welcome to as well. If you'll give me a house key, I'll have one of my employees stop by and get anything you would like for the evening.”

I handed over a key from the set in my purse, dropping it into his broad palm. I told him my address and he wrote it on a scrap of paper from his desk.

“Excellent.” Isaac smiled from his place at the end of the couch. The full ashtray on the table to his right made me think he spent quite a bit of time in that very spot. “Let me show you to your rooms.”
There was a kind of excitement that I could tell he was trying to quell. To be honest, I was buzzing with the same. We three had been great friends before we scattered to the winds, and it felt good to be together again.

He brought us to rooms that were on either side of the master bedroom, across the hall from each other.

“Just like the old days, huh?” He asked.

“It'd be more true to memory if there was a drunk frat boy pissing from the balcony, but, yeah. It's pretty close.” I smiled. The men chuckled.

“One last drink before bed?” Isaac asked us. We all grinned at each other and almost raced into his room, like we were kids again.

"So, how have you been?" Isaac asked. His voice was cheerful and warm as he poured a whiskey for me and a pair of martinis for John and himself.

"Same as ever." John was standing at his elbow, ready to help with drinks once they were prepared. I had found a place on the leather sofa to curl up on. My heels were tucked safely under the table beside me. There was no reason to stand on ceremony and wear uncomfortable shoes.

"How remarkably specific." Isaac smiled at John, handing over one of the martinis and the highball glass.

"Well, you haven't missed much since the last time I called you. I finished up that last case, turns out, they didn't so much need an exorcist as an exterminator, but I did get that creepy doll back."

I looked at him in confusion and faint disgust as he handed me the whiskey. He missed my expression since he was still looking toward Isaac.

"Oh, that's good. I knew you were worried about it." Isaac took his own glass and crossed to sit beside me on the couch. He let out a soft grunt as he fell back into the plush sofa. The leather creaked under his weight.

"And you, Georgie?" He asked me. The fingers that weren't wrapped around the crystal stem of his martini glass rested companionably on my knee. The warmth from his palm seeped through my dress, comfortable and familiar. I smiled at him. He frowned.

"You're in trouble, aren't you? That's the face you always made when you'd fucked up but didn't want to talk about it."

John sat in an armchair close by and locked eyes with me.

"It's about that scumbag from your bar, isn't it?" His voice was a growl.

I shook my head and started to protest. Isaac's hand gripped my knee.

"You've always been the worst liar. You can tell us." His voice was gentle but firm. I took a drink of my whiskey.

"Can I smoke?"

Instead of speaking, Isaac reached into his pocket for a lighter. I watched my hand shake as he lit my cigarette.

"I need you both to promise that you won't interfere."

"No." They said in unison. I bit down on my tongue.

"But, we promise," Isaac looked to John and back to me, "we promise that we won't do anything without your knowledge."

I shook my head. "No. I'm a grown woman, and I don't need either of you playing the hero any more than you have already."

"Just tell us, Georgia." Isaac pleaded. John was silent, staring at me over the lip of his martini glass. That was a habit from the old days. What they called a martini was straight gin in a martini glass. Sometimes garnished with a single olive, if they were feeling fancy.

"I needed money to get started. I heard through the grapevine that Vinnie del Rocco was the guy to go to for a small business loan."

"You thought the guy whose name is straight out of a mobster movie would be safer than a bank?" John's voice was acidic. Isaac shot him a look and rubbed my knee through my dress, urging me to go on wordlessly.

"I made a mistake. I was fresh out of school and new to the city, and I just... I don't know. I thought I could handle it." I heard my voice start to waver and get thin. I reached for my drink again and took another drag from my cigarette before continuing, "Like you said, I've always been good with sex magic. I just didn't think that it'd go the way it did."

"And how did it go?" I could tell that Isaac was trying to monitor his tone. Something dangerous lurked beneath the calm facade. There was the faintest tremor in his hand as it gently gripped my knee.

"No, Isaac. Nothing's happened to me. He's just... he's got the creepiest crush I've ever seen. I'm safe, I think. But, I'm never sure. He's never laid a hand on me."

There was a beat of absolute silence in which rage crackled like static in the air. Isaac rubbed his hand back and forth on my knee, realizing I was still wearing the silk dress from before.

"Oh. Georgie. As stunning as you look, you must be uncomfortable." He stood quickly, "I've got some clothes you can borrow until Margaret gets back with your things." I watched him hobble over to a massive chest of drawers and fish out a pair of grey sweatpants and an old tshirt. John continued to glower at me from across the room.

As I took the clothes from his hand, he nodded toward a bathroom adjacent to the sitting room we were in. I kissed his cheek before going to change.

While I was in the bathroom, I took the opportunity to wash the makeup from my face. The lines at the corners of my eyes were deeper than they had ever been, but I'm sure no one else would have noticed them. The circles under my eyes were dark enough to distract. I sighed. We never thought we'd get older, but here we were.

When I came back, fresh-faced and hair in a twist, they were both shirtless and in sweatpants identical to the ones that I had been handed. My heart twisted in my chest. They were both covered in scars. They had both gotten tattoos since the last time I'd seen them, but I couldn't focus on anything but the scars. They were chatting in low voices, surely so I couldn't hear what the discussion was about. I cleared my throat.

They looked up.

"I told my story. Time for you two to catch me up." As I sat next to Isaac again, I put my hand on the twisted knot of scar tissue on his shoulder. It was a broken crescent that stretched from his right collarbone down to the bottom of his ribs on the right side, stretching across both his chest and his back. Something in the shape looked familiar, but I couldn't place it. "Start with this one." I said.

"Troll." Isaac took a sip of his gin.

"What?" The way my voice squeaked made me reach for my whiskey.

"You thought it just got my leg?" He chuckled softly. There was nothing mocking in the laugh, only amusement as sweet and pure as a mountain stream.

"I thought you would have told me that it wasn't just your leg!"

"Well, oops." He and John grinned at each other, college boys again.

"This isn't funny." I tucked my left leg under myself and turned to face Isaac. He slowly stopped chuckling.

"These are from its teeth. John distracted, wounded, or otherwise got him to spit me out, and we handled it. Well, he handled it. I was bleeding out."

John continued to glower from his chair. I reached out a hand and traced the raised ridges with shaky fingers. He smiled at me.

"Before you ask, it doesn't hurt. Not anymore." His voice was soft. I found myself unable to speak, so I just leaned against his side and turned my attention to John.

"You look like you passed out at a party and a drunk anthropology major got after you with a sharpie."

He grinned.

"Well, you'd know, since you were the drunk anthropology major once."

"I recognize most of those sigils."

"I made up a few myself."

"They work?"

"Mostly." He scratched the crook of his left elbow, distracted. There was another tattoo, just below the crease, in a crude script. There was another one in the same place on his other arm. Isaac and I had them too. One night, we'd all been too drunk and too enamored with magic and the bonds we shared. We'd tattooed phrases in Latin on each other. Little snippets of a dead language that served as wards and blessings for the uncertain future.

"Some better than others. Haven't lost my keys once since I got this one." He rubbed at a mark on the side of his left wrist. Isaac grinned at him, not looking at the sigil that I couldn't look away from. I knew that symbol. I couldn't place it, but it wasn't mundane magic. It was something much bigger.

Our conversation trailed off. More drinks were poured, cigarettes smoked, and laughs exchanged than I could remember having in a long time. As I leaned against Isaac, the old feelings came back. I realized that I hadn't felt this safe and happy in ages, maybe not since we all went our separate ways.

I caught myself starting to doze and looked up at the clock.

“Guys, we should probably sleep soon.” When I spoke this time, I realized my words were slurred. They looked at me like I was speaking a foreign language, then looked up at the clock for themselves.

“Shit...” John muttered.

I stood up and promptly grabbed the arm of the sofa I had been curled up to Isaac in. John and Isaac chuckled at me and made a few jokes about how I couldn't hold my liquor anymore. I just snorted and tried to focus on getting to the door. I heard the men snicker behind me. John said goodnight and had as much success standing as I did. I shot him a smug glance as I stumbled toward the door.

“Isaac, you're the best host.” I said, bracing on the door frame as John approached, nodding vehemently in agreement. Isaac simply smiled and put out his cigarette.

“I'll see you two for breakfast at eleven.” He said simply, staying seated. I guessed it was because he was just as drunk as we were and didn't want to show it. John and I staggered into the hallway, laughing.

I braced myself against the wall beside my door and watched John drunkenly saunter in the opposite direction. The whiskey loosened my tongue.

“Where's my goodnight kiss?” I taunted.

He froze, turned to face me, grinned.

The gin he'd drank didn't slow or trip him up at all as he crossed the hallway to my side. One hand braced against the wall above my left shoulder, as his left hand fisted in the hair at the nape of my neck. He kissed me fiercely, and I returned the kiss with as much passion as I could. Minutes passed as we embraced, hands pawing at clothes and scrambling for purchase as we tried to get as close as we could.

The kiss was over. He was straightening his jacket when he said, “Goodnight, Georgia.” as casually as if we'd seen each other on the street.

I slammed my door as I went into my room.