“Maybe. We’d sure have to pick the right moment.”

“Fiji? What are they?” This was the first time Manfred had dared to ask.

“I think you know what they are,” she said.

“Are they . . . really angels?”

She raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah, what do I think?” Manfred translated her expression. “I think they are. But they’re not the kind of angel that was in Jesus’s tomb.”

“No,” Fiji said. “They’re not. I’m sure they’re fallen.”

“What did they do wrong, you think?”

Fiji drank some tea while she thought about her answer. She said, “You know how when Jesus came, he brought a new philosophy. Before that, the word of God was always along the lines of, ‘I’m going to smite your enemies if you’re faithful to me, and you can take an eye for an eye.’ Well, under the new policy, you were supposed to turn the other cheek every time you were struck. Here’s my theory, and it’s based on tiny bits of conversations I’ve had with them over the years. Chuy and Joe just couldn’t make that change. They couldn’t agree to turn their other cheeks. So here they are.”

Manfred digested that, once he’d gotten over his surprise that she’d actually answered him. He said, “Their punishment was being banished to Midnight?” That was faintly amusing.

She laughed. “Yeah, doesn’t seem right, does it? Let me remind you, this is just my theory. I only know they were humans hundreds of years ago, then angels, and now they’re sort of in between.”

“But they have families! I remember when Chuy’s family came to visit.”

“They reconnected with their descendants,” Fiji said. “And somehow got them to believe they remember them. That’s a lot of pronouns, but you understand. The descendants believe Joe and Chuy are current relatives. It’s a comfort to Joe and Chuy, and they can do some good to their families that way.”

Manfred nodded. “I can see that they don’t believe in waiting for after-death justice,” he said. “When I think about the Lovells.”

Fiji nodded back at him. “Big clue,” she said. She sat forward in her chair, and he realized it was time for him to go.

“Good-bye, Fiji, and thanks again for helping Mamie,” he said. “You’re a good neighbor to have, and I know she would tell you how much she appreciates it if she were a little more together.”

“De nada,” Fiji said. “I better open up the shop.”

“Me, too,” Manfred said. “Time to start answering phones.” He reached down and scratched Mr. Snuggly’s head, which the cat accepted regally. “Have a good day, Snug. Hey, how does it feel to know that Rasta’s owners are angels?” The cat strolled away with his tail held high, as if he had barely noticed Manfred.

Fiji laughed as she stretched. “Are you trying to put him in a bad mood for the rest of the day?” She was only partially kidding. “Mr. Snuggly feels it very deeply that I’m just a witch, and Joe and Chuy aren’t human anymore. On the other hand, Snug can talk. Rasta’s just a bunch of fur and bone, Snug always says.”

“I’ll try to be more tactful,” Manfred told her. He worried a little about Fiji as he was crossing the road. She’d given him much more information than he’d expected, almost as if she weren’t thinking about what she was saying. Abstracted. She’d seemed abstracted. As if she were thinking about something else entirely.

He shrugged. She hadn’t complained or asked for his help. As he went back into his own house, Manfred was thinking, I know a pair of angels. I talk to angels. I live on the same street as angels. And across from a talking cat and a witch. And yet, he admitted to himself, this didn’t feel strange at all. It felt quite normal.

20

Fiji was not a happy witch. She remembered over and over that she’d deliberately caused pain to Teacher.

But she’d felt it was necessary, and nothing had happened to change her conviction. Necessary steps (maybe necessary evils) didn’t always make you feel good afterward.

Plus, she’d called Bobo when she’d promised herself she would not do so again.

Plus, the creature was talking to her.

Its voice was not coming as frequently, which she figured was due to the fact that no one had died at the crossroad in five days, but she still felt it thinking at her.

Fiji was glad she had several customers that morning, and that not a single one of them was suicidal. Fiji would have enjoyed closing the shop for lunch and walking down to Home Cookin, but she wasn’t ready to face Madonna.

Fiji had a strong feeling that Teacher would know why he had been stricken, and she was pretty sure he’d share that with his wife. If he did, Madonna was not the kind of woman to take an attack on her husband lying down. Madonna would find some way to retaliate, if she got the chance. Better, and safer, to eat canned soup and grilled cheese in her own kitchen . . . if only she’d had some soup. Her Piggly Wiggly trip had not been as comprehensive as she would have liked.

Feeling irritated with herself, and therefore the world, Fiji pulled on her jacket and walked over to Gas N Go. She had completely forgotten about the new manager until he looked up from his card game. Not tarot, she saw. Solitaire.

“Oh, hi, new guy,” she said. “I’m Fiji Cavanaugh, I live in the house with the Inquiring Mind sign in the front.” He was good-looking in a very stern and dark way, but she found she wasn’t afraid of him as she often was of overtly lovely people.

“Fiji,” he said, tilting his head courteously. “I’m Sylvester Ravenwing. Can I help you today?”

“I need soup,” she said.

“Second aisle, second shelf on the left,” he said, and went back to his game.

It was kind of pleasant to be left in peace. Teacher, in his interim stint as manager, had always been so glad to see someone that it had sometimes been hard to get out of the store, and Shawn Lovell had always been so eaten up by his worries that shopping had been something of an ordeal.

“So, you think you’ll be here for a while, Sylvester?” Fiji asked. She put the can of Campbell’s Bean and Ham on the counter.

“I do think so,” he answered. “This all you want?”