conjuring johnny depp - part eleven

Once word gets around that Weirdly Ways is closed due to an emergency, it doesn’t take long for the coven to gather, except for Olivia, who I have to assume, is tied up, maybe literally, with GianCarlo, possibly for days.

By two o’clock we’re sitting around Johnny, three on each side. The strong afternoon light is not at all as kind as the candlelight last night, and we look like some Stepfordized version of Macbeth’s Three Weird Sisters and their understudies. He’s still sound asleep. He snores every so often, shifts position, and even drools a couple times. The sleep is deeply unnatural, but he seems normal enough.

“He is so beautiful,” Marnie coos. Her hands flutter in her lap and I know she wants to peek under the blanket. I told her to go ahead and look, but Karen’s shock has so far kept her under control. I’m not sure she will be able to resist, however, if he starts dreaming again. “You mean you found him on your back porch and moved him in here and the boys have been noisy all day, and he hasn’t so much as stirred?”

“He’s stirred, all right,” says Leslie.

“But he doesn’t wake up,” I finish immediately, lest she whet their appetites unwittingly.

“That’s pretty strange, don’t you think?” says Marnie.

“Well, it’s obvious this isn’t a natural sleep,” says Jasmina.

“It’s an enchanted sleep,” says Marnie.

Karen comes in from the living room, where my tiny TV is tuned to CNN. “Um - there was just a report that Johnny Depp’s been reported missing on the set of his latest film. Seems he just vanished. Into thin air.” Her mouth is a thin, tense line.

“Well. I guess that answers that.” Leslie looks like she’s bitten a lemon.

“We have to get Olivia here,” says Clarice pointedly at me.

“But GianCarlo showed up last night. What if he’s taken her off to Fuji or Kilimanjaro or -”

Jasmina puts her arm around me. “We have to find her.”

“She’s the one you conjured him for,” Leslie says.

“She’s the focus of the spell,” says Clarice. “I really don’t think it can be broken without her.”