Page 22 of The Nowhere Witch

“It’s right there, see?” He pointed to some dots and dashes and circles. “These mean walk toward the sunrise in the morning.”

“How will we know what building?” Were there more dots or wrinkles that were going to answer that too?

“Oh, that’s easy. Government buildings only show up at appointment time. Whatever isn’t there today will be it.”

The obstacles to live here kept growing, but here was the only place I could ever be myself. How could I go back to Salem now? They’d have to let me stay. Somehow, I’d make this right.

“What if when I see them tomorrow, they kick me out?” I asked Zab. He didn’t have an answer either, but there was no one else to ask.

“We’ll figure something out.”

* * *

My feet were sore and my head was pounding as I made my way home. I couldn’t shake the eerie feeling that I was being watched, and after the note on my door, maybe I was.

There was a faint chattering in the distance, and I scanned the area for the source. Then I saw the Hear No Evil, See No Evil, and Speak No Evil monkeys running across the street toward me. They climbed up to my stoop, standing all six inches tall, in front of my door.

“What are you guys doing here? Does Marvin want to see me?” Even if he did, I wasn’t going. I was too tired and too sick of Xest people right now, especially him and his factory. This night had already been too long several hours ago.

“We heard you bust people out of the factory?” Speak No Evil said.

“I don’t bust people out. I helped one person relocate.”

I wrapped my arms around myself. The walk from Zab’s to my place hadn’t been that bad, but the night had been that long. If I opened my door to go inside, would these little jerks follow me in? Theywerelittle. I could probably take all three of them at once if I had to. I could probably nudge them out of the way with my boot. It wasn’t like they were that nice. Kind of obnoxious, if I remembered correctly.

I reached over them, opening my door to little cheers below me.

“I wasn’t inviting you in,” I said.

They didn’t seem to care as they ran inside. By the time I shut my door, they were already on my couch. A trail of dusty prints led underneath where they sat. At least the dust bunny was accepting the furniture.

Ignoring my guests, hoping they’d leave, I moved to the wood stove.

“The air has the slightest chill and needs to bewarmed.”Not hot. Please, not hot.The thing burst into flames that looked like they’d been taken from the surface of the sun.

“You guys can’t stay here,” I said, throwing off my jacket.

“We have nowhere else to go,” Speak No Evil said.

All three little faces looked at me. I knew what that felt like all too well. Still, I didn’t like them. Did I really have to help them? No. They had to go.

But did they have to keep looking at me like that?

“Isn’t Marvin looking for you?”

“He’s mean. He makes us sit on his shelf all day. It’s like a jail,” Speak No Evil said, clearly the spokesperson for them.

I had to toughen up and couldn’t afford to piss more people off by aiding and abetting Marvin’s statues.

And then Hear No Evil started crying.

“Fine,” I said. “You can stay, but just for tonight.”

A little cheer went up, and then the three of them were doing flips on my couch.

“Only tonight,” I said.

They stopped jumping to nod.