I started this part of the scene not sure of who the third witch (who has died) should be. Then, because I live in LA and the narrator does, too, it popped into my head that the witch should be someone famous, which would lead to the narrator doubting what she’s being told, and to a  further complication – the other witches couldn’t investigate what happened to a famous person very easily, so they haven’t been able to confirm their suspicions or do anything about what they believe.

So far, I like how it works.

Here’s this week’s entry:

Nikki unburdened her shoulder of the enormous insulated tote bag she’d brought with her, handing out bottles of lemonade and iced tea, unfolding her own beach towel and creaking down to sit on it.

She ran a hand through her sweating curls, took a long swallow of lemonade, and said, “Well, I’m pretty sure you guessed it. She died. Not of natural causes.”

“You mean someone murdered her?” I said, only a tiny bit skeptical. At our age, women are murdered less frequently than during childbearing years—murder is the leading cause of death in pregnant women, at least in the US. But it still happened.

“Yes, she was murdered.”

“And have the police found the perpetrator?”

“No. She was killed by magical means. It looked like a heart attack.”

I looked at her but she was busy brushing sand off her towel. “Maybe it was a heart attack,” I said gently. Grief made people imagine all kinds of curious things.

“It was not,” Serena put in briskly. “Her heart was in excellent health.”

“And I could tell,” Nikki said. “I could sense the magic on her.”

“Maybe she tried a spell that backfired.”

“It wasn’t her magic that I sensed,” Nikki said.

“So the police aren’t investigating it as a murder,” Serena put in. “And we’re fairly limited in what we can do—”

“Why?” I asked.

“Why?” She sounded utterly confused.

“Why are you limited? You’re witches, aren’t you? Can’t you ….” I waved my hand like waving a magic wand and Serena and Nikki rolled their eyes. I think the grim did, too.

“That’s not how it works,” Nikki said.

“Well, how do I know?” I asked. “I’ve been a witch for about twelve minutes.”

“You’ve been a witch your whole life,” Serena said. “You just didn’t know it.”

I waved that away with my imaginary wand. “Whatever. Surely there’s an investigation you could have pursued?”

“Such as?” Serena asked. “We’re not the police; no one is going to answer our questions about where they were the night of April third. And we don’t have access to her belongings, so we can’t find out if she’d been in contact with some whack-a-doodle—”

I couldn’t help myself. “Whack-a-doodle?”

“Whack-a-doodle,” she confirmed. “Someone who might have had it in for her and instead of yelling at her or suing her like a normal person….” She shrugged.

“Why couldn’t you look through her personal belongings?” I asked. “You were all friends, right? Been friends for a long time? Had each others’ house keys so you could water the plants?”

Serena and Nikki shared a glance and then Nikki said, “We were friends, yes, but we didn’t water her plants. She had a service for that.”

Of course she did. Sometimes I forget where I live.

“You know what I mean,” I said, waving the objection away with a dismissive hand.

Serena sighed. “The third witch in our coven, as you call it, was Cynthia Stryker.”

Cyn (or Sin, for the more literal-minded tabloids) Stryker was a famous actor who’d made her name in the 80s and 90s and had still been an in-demand actor, though usually not with top billing, up until her recent death. She was beautiful, funny, and charming, and she had managed to burn with a mystique that kept viewers watching her long after the usual length of a woman actor’s career.

A formidable broad, my father would have called her, like Judi Dench but from Hollywood, not London.

She’d died of a heart attack a few weeks before, while doing the final filming for the latest season of a Netflix reality show she was in.

Suuuure, I wanted to say. Sure Cyn Stryker was your bestest friend. Mine, too.

That fact is, whenever I’m bored or lonely I find some of her old movies on whatever streaming service houses them at the moment or I look up the old television series she was on, the one where she played one-half of a team of private eyes and I let the banter make me smile. And though I know what her next line is going to be, I enjoy watching it anyway; it’s like meeting an old friend who never fails to cheer you up.

“And did Cyn know she was part of your coven?” I asked.

Serena clicked her tongue. “Of course! She was an active member for many years. How do you think she was so successful in her later years, when every other actress has been put out to pasture? She knew how to weave a glamor. Knew it from a young age, but became more intentional about it over the years.”

Nikki’s lips had firmed into a thin, uncompromising line. “You don’t believe us?”

I shrugged. “I barely know you and I’m trying to assimilate. But, okay, let’s say you are—or were—friends with Cyn Stryker and she did die of a magical attack and not of a heart attack like everyone from innocent bystanders to the medical examiner agrees is what happened—I’ll stipulate that. Let’s say it’s true. The question is, why would someone want her dead? Someone with magical power or access to magical power. What was she doing that was getting in the way of someone else? Or what did someone want from her that they weren’t getting?”

“Hey, now!” Serena exclaimed. “Don’t blame the victim!”

“I’m not,” I said. “Look, whoever killed her is to blame. I’m just saying that murder is usually motivated. Doesn’t mean she caused it or deserved it. Just saying that asking the question can bring us closer to a suspect. Even knowing, for example, that she had a batshit crazy fan obsessed by her would give us something to go on.”

Serena and Nikki looked at me, then at each other, then back at me.

“We’re not seeking vengeance,” Serena said slowly. “We’re just … concerned.” She tilted her head in the direction of the grim. “We don’t want you to wind up in the same situation.”

“’The situation’ meaning ‘dead’?” I inquired. “I don’t want that to happen either.” I said this with full sincerity. “But why would I be a target just because she was?”

“You mean other than the obvious sign?” She slanted aa glance at the grim, who now had his tongue out, panting.

“Yes,” I said. “For all I know we’re all imagining the … stray.”

“We’re not imagining the omen.” She emphasized omen and I half-expected her to break into a lecture but she managed to restrain herself.

“Still,” I said. “Why me? What is the particular reason you’re worried about me? Besides … Fido.”

I like to diminish things that frighten me as a way to cut them down to size. Not that it really works, but I do it anyway. “If not for Fido, if it was just Cyn died a magical death, would you be concerned about me?”

“Yes,” Serena and Nikki said together without pausing to think about it.

“Why?”

Nikki cleared her throat. “Cyn was a member of the Three for a long period of time.” I could practically hear the capital letter in the Three. “Perhaps fifteen years.” She raised an eyebrow at Serena.

“Yes, fifteen or sixteen years,” Serena agreed.

“But after she died there have been … others.”

“Others?” I pronounced the s hard. “As in more than one? She died in April. It’s just the beginning of May. How many others?”

“Three,” Serena said.

“Three?”

“So far, you’ve lasted the longest,” Nikki put in.

~~~

Jennifer Lawler has been a writer-editor for more than twenty-five years and has published more than forty novels and nonfiction books. She is the founder of the online education company Club Ed LLC.