Magic Street Page 0,96

where the computer was always on.

When Ceese put away his cellphone he stepped into the house. "Do you know where your husband went?"

Ceese didn't ask if he could go back there, he just went, and Nadine didn't even protest. This was a very strange evening, and what she'd heard of the cellphone conversation led her to think that something very bad had almost happened to a girl named Sherita, and that would probably be Sherita Banks, that girl who had inherited her mother's hippopotamus thighs and buttocks at a tragically young age. Her parents had tried and tried to have a baby before they finally got Sherita. It just showed you that even the blessings in your life come with their own burdens. Like Word, with his sudden conversion to Christianity three years ago, and two failed attempts at divinity school, and now this dangerous, foolish attempt to become a preacher at a storefront church in a hellish neighborhood. All the hopes and dreams they both had for that beautiful boy, and this is what he was doing with his life.

But at least he hadn't become a policeman, like Ceese Tucker. How did his mother ever sleep nights? No matter how bad things were, somebody always had it worse.

Byron was sitting at the computer, his face buried in his hands.

Ceese walked around behind him and looked at the screen. Nadine followed him.

Byron had googled "Byron Williams poems" and the screen was showing the first seven of more than three thousand entries.

How could there be three thousand entries about Byron's poetry on the web, and she had never even known he wrote any?

Ceese leaned over and used the mouse to click on the first entry. A moment later, a website came up.

It was a review. "Now that the poems of Pepperdine Professor Byron Williams have been spread through the web like a virus, can anyone tell us whether this was the ultimate in vanity publication, or a cruel joke? Either way, we can all agree that Professor Williams deserves our deepest sympathy. Because it's doubtful any of his students can ever take him seriously again after reading these things."

"Oh my Lord," said Nadine. "Did you really write poetry and publish it on the web?"

"I didn't publish anything," whispered Byron Williams. "It was some hacker."

"No," said Ceese, and his voice was full of pity. "It was the deepest wish of your heart."

Chapter 18

WITCH

They gathered in Ophelia's house, where Mack and Grand helped her calm down.

"Somebody kidnapped me and put me down there." She shivered and sipped a little more tea.

"No," said Mack. "They didn't. It was your wish. To be with your husband."

"What you're talking about is magic. You should be old enough to know better."

"Mrs. McCallister," said Grand, "I don't know how, but you got down in there without the ground being disturbed. Nobody dug to put you down there. We only dug to get you out."

"Why would I wish to be with my husband's dead body?"

"You dreamed," said Mack, "of dancing with him when he was a soldier in that fine uniform. He was heading out for Germany, stationed there, same time as Elvis. You called him 'my own Elvis' and you kept saying, I want to be with you forever and he said, You can always be with me, Feely."

Ophelia McCallister leaned across the table and tried to slap him, but Mack backed away in time. "That's private!" she said. The teacup trembled in her hand so that Grand took it away from her before it tipped and spilled or broke.

"Ma'am," said Mack, "I saw your dreams. I know how these dreams come true. In an ugly way.

A way you'll hate. A way that makes you wish you had never wished. Like - "

"Like Tamika Brown," Ophelia said impatiently. "But what her father did to her is nothing like - "

"Her father pulled her out of that waterbed and saved her life, just like Mr. Harrison and me saved your life tonight. We didn't put you in there, and Mr. Brown didn't put Tamika in there either.

You want to believe there's no such thing as magic, fine. But I know there is, and it nearly killed you tonight."

Ophelia tried for one more long moment to hold on to a rational world. Then she gave up and burst into tears. "I want to lie down."

"We tried to get you to lie down before," said Grand.

"Nothing makes sense!"

"You love your husband," said Mack. "That was the center of your world,