The Witch's Want Ch. 03

"Farah," she said with a smile which threatened to make him forget those names of his, "just plain Farah."

His eyes opened wide, "So it really is you? You're Farah LaMontagne?" His pronunciation was absolutely perfect.

It surprised the hell out of her.

"Yes," she said with a small bit of shock. "Why? Have you heard of me or something? I cannot imagine that you would."

He grinned, "Actually, I've never heard of you, but I wish that I had. I just read it from your business license there on the wall, Farah. Would you like to go?"

"Yes," Farah said with a laugh at being taken in so easily, "I love the coffee there and they will not sell me anything at the other store in town."

He waited for her to lock up and said, "You're not missing much, but are you serious? They refuse to sell you anything? Why?"

She sighed, "Because they shout at me that I am a witch and think that I must be trying to ruin the children of the town or something. I can't even complain because the store is private property and like any store, the owners can refuse to sell to whomever they like. I have been told that if I go there again, I will be charged with trespassing. Anyway," she said, changing the subject, "I prefer to go to this one. It is a little bit fancier, and they charge a little more for that, I guess, but it reminds me of a bistro. Well that is because it is a bistro, I suppose. But I can have a croissant with my coffee there and it actually tastes a little like they do in Europe."

Waiting in the shop to order, she looked at his very dark brown hair and said, "Thank you for saying my name correctly. I cannot remember the last time that I have heard it spoken like that. I have learned that most Americans could not pronounce French if their lives hung in the balance, though it's not their fault. It makes me wonder how you learned to speak French because I don't think that you could say it correctly without knowing how."

He smiled self-consciously and shrugged, "My mother is American, but my father was a Canadian Ojibwa. I was born in the US, but lived in Canada until we moved back to the states when I was 12 after he died. We lived in a town with a fairly large French-speaking population, so I speak English, French, Ojibwemowin and I can manage a little Chippewean, which is related but a bit different. But the French isn't quite the same as European French, though it's close enough, I guess. I do hear some big differences, though."

They stopped their conversation while they were served, but after, he said, "I have the sense that you feel a little bit sentimental about Europe. If you're French, I think I can understand that, living here. But it makes me wonder why you're living here in the first place."

She smiled at him over her croissant, "Is it that obvious? I am a citizen and I really like it here, but I do always feel a little bit, ... wishful for something which I can't seem to have." She took a bite and he waited until she finished it. Touching the corner of her mouth with her napkin, she continued. "I am what you might call a piece of collateral damage from several dreams of others – and even my own."

"The short version of a complicated story is that my grandparents were Bejawi – most people in the Sudan call them the Beja – they traveled to Iran to work and escape the never-ending civil wars. My mother was born in Iran and grew up there. She met and married my father, who was a young Azeri Iranian officer in the army. He was sent to France to attend the military academy at St. Cyr."

She paused to sip her coffee. She had a thought flit through her mind and as a result, she laid her hand on the table and touched his hand with her fingers lightly to rest them there.

"Anyway, there was a great deal of unrest in Iran at the time, and with a lot of effort, my father was able to get my mother to France before the revolution which removed the Shah from power. They changed their name to LaMontagne, and I was born in France, far from the lands of either of my sets of ancestors," she smiled. "There were attempts by the revolutionaries to track down and kill some of the Iranian expatriates and though my parents didn't think that they'd have been of interest, they tried to hide anyway. I was named after Farah Pahlavi, the Shahbanu, queen and empress of Iran."

"But my father had his dream," she said, "his American Dream. He always wanted to come here, and so he left when I was small. He worked like a dog for the money, and my mother and I came some years after him. I was ten, and did not want to come at all anymore by then. We were strangers to each other. I felt bitter because his dream cost me my father, but it would cost me even more very soon. We came here to this town then."

"So I grew up here in this place, never quite fitting in because of my name and the way that I look. I got very little of the way that I look from my father. My mother always said that she and I ought to go to visit the place where our people come from. She said that we could probably walk right in and fit, but I never believed that."

"The people here are mostly Baptist, and they assume that I'm Muslim. Even the Muslims think that and all of them are wrong, since nobody asks me. My father was Muslim, but if you want to go by the book, I am a Coptic Christian, though I practice it seldom. Other than a few friends, nobody knows much about me and they all make mistakes in judging me. I don't fit anywhere. Most of my few friends are white and I thank the stars for them or I'd never have made it through school here and I have an East Indian friend who came here with her family two years ago. They run the convenience store and gas station on the other side of town."

She looked off across the street, but he could see that her eyes were focused on something thousands of miles farther away and her voice sounded distant as well. "My mother's family has followed the religion forever, but my father forbade her to teach anything to me. That lasted only a few months after he was gone, because I asked her even as a small child, and so she taught me. The women of our family, she told me, have always had ability. Most of what I practice is Wicca, though I add elements of my mother's teachings to it. I immediately felt more at ease, as though I knew where I belonged. I was always uncomfortable in any church or mosque for example," she shrugged. "I think that a faith lives in one's heart, and not in a building. My church is me, wherever I go. Of course I see that you already know what I am."

"My parents loved each other with a great deal of passion. The other side of that is how they fought almost continuously. Anyway, my parents died in an automobile accident while I was visiting their friends in France when I was eighteen. I only learned of it when I returned, and then I had to deal with everything. When it was all over, I sold everything; the house, furniture, all of it, and I guess that I should have just gone back to France, but I didn't."

"Why not, Farah?" Bart found himself holding her hand as though his own had just decided on it. He was a bit embarrassed, but Farah didn't seem to notice.

She sighed, "Because I already felt like something of a stranger there, and my parents had to renounce our French citizenship to become American. How could I then go back and say that I now wished to change my mind? I grew up pledging allegiance to the flag, just like everybody else. I meant it when I said it too. I felt more of a stranger here, but it was done, ..."

She looked at him, "Sometimes you have to stand for something. I chose America, to try to be an American. But America has never chosen me."

She shrugged, "What could I do to earn my way? I was supposed to go off to university, but with the upheaval and grief, I just needed to live quietly and get over everything, so that is what I did. I thought to open my bookstore, but I couldn't afford to do that in New York where I wanted to."

He watched her thoughtful little smile, "The trouble with that – and I didn't know it at the time, was that my best market was in New York City or Chicago. The farther west that one goes in this country, the more rigid the theology and beliefs of the people, until you get to the west coast. But there I would have the same problem – huge costs to rent a store. So I stay here."

"I did leave once for two years. I married a man that I'd met in New York."

"Well, that is the short and easy way to say it," she said, "I met and married him at twenty. He was too quick with his hands when he was angry or drunk or wasted– and all of those conditions were almost always in evidence. I left him and ran for my life. It cured any notions that I may have had about romance." She shrugged. "I am thankful that I lived, and also that I didn't bring all of what money I had. I left about half in the care of friends here, or he would have burned his way through that as well and left me with nothing if I survived."

"It's too expensive to live in New York and so I came back here. I find that I am not welcome anywhere, really. I never tell anyone what I am. I never bother anybody and always try to be friendly to everyone. But it buys me nothing. I have found that America's heartland is a very cold place. There is no warmth here for me. I find the irony of it a little hard to bear sometimes. I thought that this land was founded by people who came here looking to find freedom from the religious oppression that they had suffered. They left it behind to make their own. It is all around me here."

"Even the pilgrims had to look down on somebody, I guess," Bart said gently, "and not that it makes the slightest difference, but I can relate to how you might feel left out of the dream. Farah."

She came back to herself and felt a little self-conscious, "But you wanted to know about the room, I think. It's not here. You wouldn't want a room here anyway. I have a house on some land outside of town. It was the strangest thing to me. I was thinking about coming back here when I received a letter asking for confirmation and proof of who I am. I thought it to be very strange and the only thing which kept me from throwing it out was the address of the lawyer's office in the letter, and so I called them. It was about some land here that I knew nothing about. The owner had been an old army friend of my father's. I even remembered the name, and when he died, the will left the property to my father or his descendants. I am the only one of those. So I brought them the proof that they asked for. I had to pay some small fees, but I then had a place here to live in the same town where I grew up. And so I came back."

She squeezed his hand lightly and then sat back with a smile, "And that is how a brown-skinned Beja girl whose genes came all the way from the Sudan and Iran came to be here by way of France."

She looked at him, "I hope that you can understand, Bart. I wanted to rent the room to a woman. I would feel a little strange to have a man living there. I think that you can see that a person such as I am is more used to living very privately."

"Of course," he nodded, "I understand completely, Farah. I'm new in town here. The thought of living at the motel much longer is driving me insane, and though I don't have much, I do have to find a place to live, and before winter if that's possible. I need garage space as well. I make enough money to rent a house, but that would be a waste, since there's just me, though it looks like that's what I'll have to do soon."

Farah leaned forward, "I might be able to rent you some space for a garage, at least, Bart. I do have a barn. The place where I live was once a Christmas tree farm, but it hasn't been run for years now, since I know nothing about that. But if you wouldn't mind cleaning it out to make the space that you need, I could rent that to you."

"Is the roof solid and the building not in danger of falling down?" He asked.

"Of course it is," she said, "It is only maybe forty years old and the roof has been replaced with tin. It is a little loud in there when it pours rain, but it is dry. There is not much to move out of your way, either. It even has a small insulated loft there and the owner was using part of it as the office for the farm, it seems. There is water from the well there, and electricity, even a toilet, but no heat. There is a wood stove there, but most would not know how to work that, and so I cannot try to rent it out."

He looked at her thoughtfully, "How big is the office?"

Farah wondered why he'd even ask, but she told him, "About fourteen feet by twelve with one very dirty window. It must get very hot there in summer, you couldn't possibly want to live – "

"It sounds like a palace," he said, "I have no trouble with woodstoves. How much would you want for rent?"

Farah sat back from the table and laughed, "I think that you must be crazy to want to live there. You have not even seen it yet."

"Maybe not," he said, "but I wasn't joking about losing my mind in the motel. It's getting warmer now and there are more and more people now who use the pool outside the back of my room. I like children, but the laughter and the squeals and the splashing drive me nuts. About half of the time, I really need the sleep. Besides, you wouldn't have to worry about a strange man living in your house then, would you? You probably wouldn't even know I'm there, since I don't know anybody around here and I don't throw parties or anything like that. Well, ok, I know you now, I suppose..."

He looked at her a little hopefully, "Look, I don't know what you were going to ask for the room, but if I like the office and the barn and can clean it up to live in there, would you accept eight hundred a month?"

Farah's eye's went wide and for a moment he thought that he might have insulted her. But she laughed again and offered her hand, "D'accord!" she said, "Providing that you think that you could even live there. It may work out for us as neighbors if we respect each other's privacy."

"Alright," he smiled, taking her hand and loving the feel of it in his own. He grabbed his napkin and scribbled on it, "I've got to get at least a little sleep today, before I have a week off. This is my cell number. Please call me any time after about nine tomorrow morning, and I'll be happy to come and look at the place. I assume that you'd want first and last month's rent, so I'll bring that along, and I'll sign a lease if you want – again, if I like it."

She found herself thinking aloud, "If this works, maybe I can finally afford to get my poor old car fixed, if I have not hurt her beyond bringing back. She has always been good for me, but she really needs help now."

She thought his eyes were going to bore through her for a moment, but then she realized that it was how he looked if he was thinking hard. "Farah, what's in the barn now?"

"Nothing much," she replied, wondering what he was getting at, "I haven't even been in there for a while. Just some farm machinery, but it is not too close together, some other equipment that I have no idea what to do with, some tools and – "

"Bingo!" he said.

"Bingo?" she looked at him. He nodded back.

"You've just said the magic word – and I wasn't making a joke. If there are tools there, maybe I can help you with that car." He didn't finish the thought, but he actually hoped that the rolling heap wasn't past help himself, since sooner or later it just had to get pulled over and he had no desire to see her taking a bicycle to work.

"But why would you want to do that?" she asked.

Bart laughed, "Well, I think it would be wise to stay on the good side of my landlord, and I like to work on cars once in a while. Besides, I'd be helping a friend." He pointed to her, "You're the only friend I have in this town as of right now."

He looked at her, "And maybe I wasn't kidding when I told you that you might command me better with your touch."

They smiled at each other for a minute, until Farah had a thought.

"But how will you make your food? There is no oven up there and no sink upstairs."

"I'll just buy myself a little bar fridge," he said, "there's only me and that'll be plenty big enough. As for cooking, have microwave, will travel. I'll be fine, since that's how I live now. If this works, I'll finally feel as though I live here. I'm getting so tired of living out of my suitcase."

They bought two more cups of coffee in insulated cups and began to walk back to the shop. Farah looked over at the park nearby.

"Could we walk over there and sit for a little while on a bench? I have no great desire to get back just yet, and I like talking with you very much."

He nodded with a smile, "Sure. Let's go."

As they sat on the bench together sipping, she looked a bit nervous, but looking around in the bright sunshine, she found the courage that she needed.

"Bart, I think that you are an honest man. I just need to know something here." She looked at him searchingly for a moment.

"You and I have met before as we both know," she said, "I was very afraid and then less so, and after thinking about it all for a few nights, I decided that in spite of everything, I can't seem to avoid liking you very much and I know that you feel the same way – I think that we certainly made that plain between us at least in a way that I think seems to fit you and I, though I'm sure that any woman would think that I've lost my mind." She shrugged, "Sometimes when I step back from what I feel, I'm inclined to agree."

"So I find myself sitting here with a handsome man, who is a ... "

She looked at him, "Fill in the blank. I might be a shopkeeper and a witch, but I'm still a woman. I'd like to know about you when you're not Ur-Nammu the red hot hunk in my woods."

"Policeman," he smiled, "I'm a sheriff's deputy. I'm Irish and Swedish, and Ojibwa on the outside, and a Sumerian on the inside. Everybody else but the Sumerian thinks you're wonderful, and the Sumerian recognizes the beautiful descendant of the Nubian and Egyptian empires who's sitting here with him. Any way you look at it, I'm really hoping that you can get past the other things in my past. Or would it work better for me if I whisper as though I had a throatful of gravel and call you 'witch'? Please say something. I'm not going to eat you, for God's sake, I just had a bagel. I'm not even hungry now."

Farah laughed, "I'm still here, aren't I? So tell me why you can't come to me all these nights?"

"Night shift," he said flatly.

She stared at him a little and began to laugh. After a minute, she smiled at him warmly, "I see why you said some of the things that you told me in that way." She put her arm behind his and grinned, "I sit with a conqueror who works nights sometimes to pay the bills, and you're here with a misplaced desert girl. I like you more every minute."

"I found your store the other night while I was on patrol. I waved at you as you left your shop about 1:00AM."

"So that was you?" she grinned, "I wish I'd have known. I was too wide awake to get much sleep and we could have talked. Did you see the man who left before I did?"

He nodded and she smiled, "There are people here who don't like me for any of several reasons, and one of them is what I am. At the same time, there are others who seek me out for advice and for a look at their futures, and some are very loyal customers. But they rarely come in the daytime, fearing that others might know. "she shrugged, "So sometimes I help with a charm and it pays the bills."

She looked over at him and stretched to kiss him for a second, "Well, Ur-Nammu, now that it looks like we can have something of a normal thing here, I think that I'd like it very much if you'd take me out once in a while when you're not fighting crime."

She loved his smile and the way that he nodded to her. "You'll have to help me a little," he said, a bit uncomfortably, "I think that I can understand the way that this is done here from the memories of the man who lived in here before me, but I don't want to make any mistakes."