Locals

The morning after my rather disquieting introduction to Richard Fink, I nevertheless made my way through the gravel parking lot of the Cold Hollow Café and took a seat in my favorite peeling red vinyl booth. Fink’s threat was intimidating, I’ll admit, but stubbornness comes naturally to me, and also happens to be one of the better qualities of a good journalist. If anything, Fink’s effort to frighten me had the opposite effect, and emboldened me to continue building on the shaky foundation of my story.

I caught Cindy’s eyes from across the café and she gave me a small wave as she chatted about dreams with an older gentleman named Curtis who sat a few tables away by the window. I smiled back at Cindy as I pulled out my notebook and started jotting down a few stray thoughts about Fink. It was possible that he overheard the conversation I had with Cindy when we talked the day before about the missing women. Was that what he was afraid of having his name associated with? He was desperate enough to threaten a complete stranger, so I knew there was likely something he had to hide. I just didn’t know what exactly.

A steaming hot stream of coffee was suddenly poured into my cup. I glanced up to find a young bearded man with dark hair and kind eyes serving me.

“Hi there,” He said, giving me a small nod. “I’m Jordan.”

“Oh,” I lay my arm across my notepad, obscuring it from his view just slightly. “Hi.”

“I’m the owner here.” He said, slipping one hand into the pocket of his white grease-stained apron. “Your name is Kelly, isn’t it? Kelly Kane?”

I was beginning to realize that I was the talk of the entire town. “Yep, that’s me. I’m the new reporter everyone seems to be so antsy about.”

“Well,” Jordan smiled sheepishly, “you can’t blame us. Small town, nothing too exciting happens here, you know?”

“Except that it does, which is what brought me here. Cold Hollow’s got something of a reputation for disappearing women.” I took a long sip of my coffee. I felt a little bit on the defensive like I needed to put up walls around every person I met in this small snowy town.

“Well, you got me there. Lots of secrets in Cold Hollow. ” He nodded, his mouth pressed into a thin line.

I suddenly sat up straighter. “Secrets? What do you mean?”

Jordan laughed easily, “Don’t go picking up your pen just yet. I don’t know much. Rumors, mostly. Working at the café all day, you hear things. Mysterious happenings. Trouble blowing in and out of town.”

“Pretty vague...” I said, smirking a little at him.

“Yeah, well... Listen, I just wanted to apologize for what Mr. Fink said to you yesterday. I didn’t hear it myself, but Cindy told me all about it after the two of you left.”

“Oh, you don’t have to apologize for him,” I said, waving it off. “I appreciate it, but I get where he’s coming from. People don’t like strangers getting into their business.”

Jordan nodded along and glanced out the window behind me, seemingly drifting in and out of thought. “Hey, you know who you ought to go and see? Millicent up in Montgomery. I mean, if you’re looking for details about goings-on in this place she’s likely to know.”

“Millicent,” I jotted the name down on my notepad. “Who is she? How do you know her?”

“Oh, she’s popped in the café a few times. Her husband, Curtis, is right over there,” he said, pointing to the man Cindy had been chatting with. “He’s a regular, but Millicent mostly keeps to herself. She’s a, uh, what do they call it... a dowser? Is that the right word?”

“Not sure,” I said, frowning. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard that word before.”

“Well, she’s like a mystic or something. She makes her living doing séances for people so they can communicate with their loved ones who’ve passed on.”

My jaw dropped slightly. I couldn’t help but release a small laugh. “This town gets more and more interesting every day.”

“Well, you’re going to love this. Millicent used to live out in Oregon and she relocated here to Cold Hollow a few years ago because of its energetic draw.” Jordan grinned boyishly and wagged his eyebrows. “Spooky, huh?”

I had no reason to believe that Millicent was truly communicating with those in the afterlife, but I wondered what would happen if she tried to reach out to the missing women. If they were no longer living, would they respond?

“Thanks for this, Jordan. I really appreciate it.”

“Yeah, no problem, Kelly. If Fink gives you trouble again, no worries. I got your back. He’s a blow-hard. Nothing to really worry about,” he said, reassuringly. “Well, I’ll let you get back to your work. Hope to see you again.”

“You will,” I said and Jordan made his back into the kitchen,leaving me alone in the dining room.

The Mystic of Montgomery

 The next day was Saturday and I used my day off from the Chronicle to make the drive to Montgomery. I always loved driving around Cold Hollow when the threat of icy roads wasn’t present. The winding mountain passages and the cool air coming in through a crack in my driver’s side window were calming and refreshing. My latest article on the history of the local cider mill hadn’t been a very thrilling assignment, like most of the stories I was given, so I was eager to make some headway in my investigation.

When I arrived at the stripped-down cabin off a dirt road from Montgomery’s main thoroughfare, a part of me wondered what the hell I was really doing there. Was I so desperate for a lead in this story that I was chasing after self-described mystics?

The cabin’s exterior was faded, sun-bleached, and garnished with dried-out bunches of flowers and bundled of herbs hung upside down with red string from the roof. A gaggle of crows flew away noisily as I shut my car door. I knocked on the door and took a step back. For many moments, no one answered.

I knocked again. “Millicent? Hi, it’s me, Kelly. We spoke on the phone yesterday.”

The door opened, as if she had been standing there all along, and Millicent appeared in the doorway. Her abrupt appearance caused me to stumbled back a step.

“Oh, hi. Millicent, I’m–I’m Kelly Kane.” I held my hand out to her.

She was a tall, thin woman with long gray-streaked chestnut hair. Her eyes were pale and she wore an almost equally pale shade of lavender lipstick. She eyed me carefully, looking me up and down a few times before a surprisingly warm smile cracked her previously stern expression.

“Kelly, Kelly, yes. Come in.” She stepped aside for me to enter.

I was immediately met with the thick musky scent of palosanto and pine firs. Her home was cramped with pieces of homemade wooden furniture and piles upon piles of stacked books. There was a thick layer of dust on most of the surfaces.

“Tea?” she asked and gestured for me to sit down at an unfinished wooden table in the kitchen beside an open window.

“Uh, yes, thank you,” I said and removed the notebook from my bag while trying to keep my face as neutral as possible as I took in my surroundings.

“So, Kelly Kane, someone recommended you speak with me? Jordan, the owner of that little café everyone loves so dearly, yes?” Millicent busied herself at the stove, pouring steaming water into two ceramic cups and adorning them with tea strainers.

“Yeah, that’s right. Like I said on the phone, I’m a reporter and I was telling Jordan about a story I’m working on––”

“And he thought I could be of some help to you?” She set a cup down in front of me.

“It seems so,” I said, lamely. “I don’t really have much to work off of, to be honest. But I know that Cold Hollow has had a number of... disappearances over the last few years. All women. All gone without a trace and still unsolved. I guess I was wondering if maybe you could help.”

“Disappearances. Yes, I’ve heard. Terrible, but I’m not sure what help I could possibly be. I would think the police would have more of the information you’re looking for, no?”

“Well, that’s just it,” I said, stirring a bit of fresh milk into my tea. “I’ve already gathered what information I could from public records and, honestly, there’s not much to go on. As it stands, none of the women have been discovered, alive or dead, so it appears there’s been no crime, which means the police can’t really help.”

Millicent offered honey, but I like my tea like I like my women, hot and bitter.

“I see. That must be frustrating, but I still don’t quite see how I can be of any assistance,” Millicent said seeming genuinely apologetic.

I paused for a moment and took a sip of my tea, stalling to muster up the courage to ask, “I was thinking maybe a…a séance could provide some insight?”

Another wave of doubt suddenly ran through me. What was I saying? A séance? Was I just wasting everyone’s time?

Millicent lowered herself down into a chair across from me, her long emerald green dress dusting the floor. Her eyes flashed at me and she grinned before taking a sip from her mug. “Well, it isn’t so simple.”

I tapped my pen against the table a few times, one of my nervous habits. “Right. I mean, that makes sense. Maybe we could just talk about what it is that you do. You’re a…I mean, what you do is called—”

“I think the term you’re looking for is ‘witchcraft,’ although that’s not the label I prefer,” she said, cringing a little.

She then went on to offer a lengthy explanation about the history and etymology of the word witchcraft, and how it traditionally was used a pejorative term for those who used certain rituals and charms to secretly cause others harm. She wanted to be clear that she wasn’t that sort of witch. Millicent, among many other practitioners, prefer to see themselves as keepers of an ancient tradition that preferred to live harmoniously with nature and who studied the elements to heal and help people. This, she said, was distinct from those who practiced the “Left-hand path” of “magick” which was all about colluding with the forces of darkness to increase one’s personal power.

“There are many different types of magic in this world. What I practice is considered to be white magic as opposed to black magic,” she explained. “We do not harm others or perform blood-rites in secret, nor do we eke out punishments for misdeeds done against us. If I had to put my practice into words, I would say that I read and, on occasion, harness the unseen and misunderstood energies of the natural universe.”

“Energies?” I asked. “Like... ghosts?”

Millicent laughed a somewhat patronizing laugh. I felt certain then that I was completely out of my element. Perhaps coming here had been a bad idea. Then again, I didn’t have any other leads in the story. If all else failed, I thought, I could write a piece on Cold Hollow’s very own self-identified witch.

I wrote down nearly every word Millicent spoke until my wrist began to cramp up.

“Attempting to communicate with someone who has simply gone missing, rather than someone who has passed on into the Otherworld is not really something I’ve ever attempted,” Millicent said. “Perhaps it could be done, but in order to use my abilities I must forge a connection with the person I’m trying to contact. I must have something of theirs and spend time getting to know and understand their spirit through photographs, tales from loved ones, things like this.

I nodded along dutifully, but it was hard to keep a straight face at times. As she spoke, I couldn’t help but wonder if Millicent was nothing more than a two-bit fraud taking advantage of a town that had suffered a series of misfortunes. I had never before given any credence to the supernatural, but her confidence in herself and her abilities was somewhat intriguing.

She went on. “I should warn you though. An effort like this, more than likely,will fail. Not only that, but it could possibly expose me and anyone who assisted me to darker more dangerous spirits attempting to reach out beyond the spirit world.”

At that point it was her doubt that made her more convincing. On the other hand, it could have been just a sales tactic to demand a higher price. I didn’t feel like haggling with a witch.

“Well, I don’t want anyone to get hurt…or possessed, or anything like that,” I said, half-way expecting Millicent to counter with something, but she didn’t. Instead, she apologized sincerely, wished me luck, and invited me to return if I was in the neighborhood and in need of tea.