Cryptic Magic

1. Twisting Shadows-1

“Ladies, are you finished with the toilets yet?” Karin asked for the third time in ten minutes. Kinza didn’t have to look; she knew her boss was standing just outside the public bathroom, nose wrinkled because cleaning stalls were above her. The delight of scrubbing corporate toilets was bestowed upon newer employees, if Kinza’s three and a half years as a cleaner could be considered “new.”

“Yes, your grace. We’ll be out in just a moment,” Mitra said in a singsong voice from the next stall over. Kinza sniggered at the tone. Mitra had been hired a few months after Kinza, both of them fifteen at the time, and they had quickly become friends, commiserating over their shared disdain of Karin’s micromanaging tendencies.

Mitra had a tendency to lighten the gloomy atmosphere that Karin created. The few months prior to her starting, Kinza had worked with another older girl who liked to put headphones in and listen to music on full blast their entire shift. It’s not that Kinza minded, but it was a bit lonely with no one to talk to. Mitra had a way of making the time fly by whenever she was around.

The job didn’t have the greatest pay either, but finding a good job at their age was difficult with so many other teenagers in the area, and both girls had needed the money. So for the past few years, cleaning corporate offices in downtown Chicago after school had been bittersweet.

Tonight’s client was a small health food organization that rented office space in one of the fancy high rises. Wood paneling, infinity sinks, eco-friendly coffee machines, it smelled of high-end luxury. They had different clients most days of the week. Every Tuesday, Karin and her team would show up after the employees had left, and the three of them wouldn’t get out until close to nine.

Karin just snorted and put an imaginary hair back into her bun. She always came to work with her light brown hair in a bun so tight it made her already harsh features almost menacing. After assigning the two girls the more difficult tasks, she always left the ones that required the least physical effort for herself. So when their shifts ended, her clothes were never wrinkled, and she never had a drop of sweat on herself. “I’m vacuuming the section by the elevator, and then I’m leaving, so you had better be done by then,” she said, and Kinza heard her retreating footsteps down the hall.

She didn’t have the energy to throw a retort back; she was exhausted from another nightmare, the sixth in the last week. Who knew that you could be tired when you were both awake and asleep? The nightmare was always the same. She was crawling past a barrier of shimmering air, dense forest around her, and a flat-topped mountain in the distance. She never knew why she had to go; she just did. As soon as she got past the barrier, the scene shifted. There were twisting, dark shapes in a vast room of god-like statues and marble floors. She remembered they were marble because the moonlight would glint off the floors from the skylight above. Something sinister emanated from the cluster of dark shapes, an intention that left her skin feeling oily and her chest heavy the morning after. Unable to speak or move, she would just watch them until suddenly they would all turn to her, eyes boring directly into her. That’s when she would wake up and still feel as if they were watching her.

“I swear, she thinks we’ve never done this before,” Mitra said, popping her head into the stall Kinza was cleaning. She had waist-length, raven hair in a braid and long, dark eyelashes framing deep brown eyes. It was ridiculously unfair how good she looked, even after hours of work cleaning toilets, emptying the garbage, and hauling vacuums up and down stairs.

Kinza just rolled her eyes. “Clearly,” was all she said. She flushed the soap down the toilet and grabbed her bucket, but Mitra was blocking her way out of the stall, hands on her hips. An all-knowing look was on her face. Honestly, Mitra could read her like a book, so it wasn’t too far off. When Kinza wanted to vent, it was great, but when she just wanted to close up like a clam, Mitra was there, trying to pry the pearl out for her own good.

“You had one of those nightmares again, didn’t you? You don’t even need to say it; you have the worst bags under your eyes. I could sell those as knock-off Gucci and retire early. You know my mom has this really good tea you can—”

worst “Sheeeesh, Mitra. Relax, I’m all good,” Kinza said, shouldering past her out of the stall. Of course, she had only vaguely mentioned it a few days ago, and now Mitra was trying to single-handedly cure her of all possible ailments. It was touching, but sometimes she could be smothering. She walked by the enormous backlit mirrors on the way out of the bathroom. Glancing at her reflection, she realized Mitra was right, though; dark circles ringed even darker eyes. It didn’t help that the fluorescent lighting washed out her normally soft brown skin. Before she had left for school that morning, she had scraped her hair into a low, sleek ponytail at the nape of her neck. Unlike Mitra, Kinza had to spend hours flat ironing her usual curls to get them to be that straight. But now, at the end of the day, errant strands stuck to her face, and the ponytail was coming halfway out.

“Well, you look like poop. So I beg to differ,” Mitra said, hauling their stuff out of the bathroom to meet Karin by the elevators.

Kinza laughed. “Poop? Who says poop? Whatever, let’s just get out of here. I have so much homework to do tonight.” She followed Mitra through the halls to the lobby by the elevators where Karin was waiting, wrapping up the vacuum cord. On the way, they passed by a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows, and up on the tenth floor, they had a spectacular view of downtown Chicago at night. This high up, you couldn’t see any of the grittiness, just the neon lights of the city’s nightlife, the reflection off Lake Michigan, and the ever-present flow of traffic on the expressway.

“Didn’t you just start classes a week ago?” Mitra asked.

“Yeah, but apparently, there’s no ‘easy first week’ with college courses,” Kinza said, throwing up air quotes. “We’ve already had two quizzes. I’m going to die,” she said dramatically.

“Yikes,” Mitra grimaced.

Both girls had graduated last June, and while Mitra was taking a gap year to save up money, Kinza had started on her bachelor’s degree at National Louis. The four-year scholarship into the Human Services program wasn’t entirely a surprise with Kinza’s 4.0 GPA and an extensive list of volunteer and extracurricular hours, but it had her dancing around the kitchen when the acceptance email had come through. Grams had tried to hide her happy tears but failed miserably. Before they died, Kinza’s parents had wanted her to go to college, but with almost no money left behind, the prospect had been bleak. Life had decided to put her into “Difficult Mode,” but she wasn’t about to let that stop her.

The three of them switched the lights off and took the elevator down to the main lobby. They waved at Phil, the night security guard on the way out. Phil was in his late forties, a single dad from a nasty divorce. He had the belly of someone who spent their evenings drinking beer and eating frozen dinners in front of the tv. He loved his kids, though, and frequently worked doubles so he could buy them nice things. The last thing he wanted was for his kids to get teased for being poor as he had been when he was young.

Kinza knew all of this because he would talk her ear off as she and Mitra waited for Karin to arrive on Tuesdays. He was always nice to them and held the door if he saw them coming and waved goodbye when they were done.

The girls lugged their stuff to Karin’s van parked down the street just a few minutes before the meter was set to expire.

“All right, ladies, great work tonight, but let’s try to finish a little earlier tomorrow, yeah?” Karin said. As if they hadn’t been trying to finish as early as possible already.

“Uh, yeah, sure thing, Karin,” Kinza said. She had to scrape the bottom of the barrel to muster even that bit of enthusiasm. She and Mitra grabbed their bags and sweatshirts from the van and waved goodbye, heading down the street to the bus stop. Kinza pulled the ponytail out of her hair, letting the strands flow freely.

“Sure thing, Karin,” Mitra mocked, shaking her braid back and forth.

“Finish a little earlier tomorrow, yeah?” Kinza mocked back, shaking her head like Mitra, making her hair flip.

yeahBoth girls looked at each other and erupted into hysterical laughter. As soon as one would calm down, the other would start up again, and it would take them until the end of the block before they could utter another word without giggling. A few people looked at them in annoyance as they walked by, but they didn’t care. It was Chicago, and everyone was annoyed.

They stopped at the bus stop, Mitra pulling out her phone to show her the i********: pictures of the guy she was currently talking to. She had been telling Kinza about him earlier before Karin had told them to “chat less and work more.” “Seriously, Kinz, look at him. He’s so preeettty.” She sighed. Mitra was constantly on a hunt for a boyfriend; she had five just in high school. Kinza didn’t know how anyone could even like that many people.

preeetttyKinza looked at the shirtless picture of a guy about their age, brown hair perfectly coiffed, sitting in the leather seats of a car that he clearly couldn’t afford. He had a jawline that could cut glass. “Okay, yeah. He’s cute. What does he do?”

“Umm…” Mitra swiped to another picture, orange nails flashing across the screen.

“He has a job, right? Or is he in school or something? Anything?” Unfortunately, Mitra attracted a very specific type of guy. The kind that had all the charm of a goldfish and rode on good looks and the silver spoon they were born with. Kinza didn’t know what she saw in them.

Mitra just gave her a look that said I don’t really care about that.

I don’t really care about that.“Nope! Hard pass,” Kinza said. “He’s clearly a player, Mitra.” The bus pulled up, and they got on. It was pretty empty. Two older men sat on the left, and a woman and a baby were on the right. The girls sat about halfway to the back, avoiding the seat with the stain, and the bus lurched forward, taking them out of downtown and toward the west side of the city.

“I don’t see you tryin’ to find somebody. Don’t you want a boyfriend? You and Max broke up over a year ago.” Images of gorgeous green eyes and a dazzling smile flitted across Kinza’s vision. Max had been her high school sweetheart. When they had started dating freshman year, he had doted on her, bringing her flowers and chocolates to school all the time. When he had gotten a license (and a shiny car from Daddy), he had picked her up every day and drove her to school. He always told her how pretty, and beautiful, and cute, and sweet she was. She was fairly certain that was the only thing he liked about her because all she could remember now was Max’s irritated tone anytime she raised her voice or laughed too loud. They had ended the relationship last year, Max stating that he needed to think about his future and he would need someone a bit more “reserved.” Kinza was pretty sure he wanted a throw pillow for a girlfriend. Silent and decorative.