Over coffee I tell her about Beatrice and how she saved my hide because of my lapse of time with Dee.

"Wow, Dee's business is doing good. It's a great stress reliever from what I hear." She leans over her cup and steam twirls around her face. "Maybe I need to take a class."

"You should." I encourage her. "We can be like those other groups of ladies that go in and bead all day."

I'd love to have a group of girlfriends here.

"If I ever get a day off." She snickers and puts yogurt cups out on the counter.

"It's strange how beading comes natural to me." I sip the hot liquid.

"You never know," Addy says, and waves her hands around as if destiny is in the Cafe Beginnings' air, "maybe that's your destiny."

She goes on about our karma, and our lots in life. I believe in anything that'll bring me good luck. Hence the Buddha. Because God knows, after losing my family, and living with Aunt Grace, I need it.

With little time to spare, I thank Addy for the early bird special and jog home.

By the time I got to work and got my beaded jewelry on, the television crew is set up in the middle of the boutique. Beatrice looks fantastic in a black cap-sleeved mini dress and red high heels. Her chic short hair makes my beaded chandelier earrings even more beautiful.

"Wow! You look great." I run my hand down the seam of her dress to straighten out the silver beading along the front of it. "Great choice of shoes too."

"Are you nervous?" she whispers. "All my friends and family are watching."

"I wasn't until now," I say and bite the bottom of my lip. "You're going to do fantastic."

"Okay we're ready." The makeup lady motions for us with her blush brush. I shake hands with Sheila Gray, the morning news anchor and become a little star-struck.

I ramble on about the boutique and my role. I introduce her to Beatrice. Beatrice perks up and flashes me a grin before she takes them on a quick tour of the boutique.

"We are on in five, four, three... Stop! Go to commercial." The camera man screams looking at me. "What is on her knuckle?"

He grabs my hand. He motions for the makeup lady who begins to blot it with some thick gooey stuff.

"It completely stands out on the camera." He whines.

I want to put him in time-out for acting like a three year-old.

"I ... it's a mosquito bite." I sputter, lying through my teeth.

"That's the biggest mosquito bite I've ever seen. Cover it up and let's get going." He hides behind the camera as I apologize.

"Five, four, three, two ...." The camera man points to us.

"Good morning, Tri-State. I'm here at the new Gucci boutique with regional manager Hallie Mediate." Sheila Gray lets her on-camera persona take over. It puts us all at ease. "Can you tell us a little bit about what you're wearing?"

I'm dying to tell her about my jewelry, but I hold back. "I'm getting ready for fall in this Gucci tweed trench." I look down and the sleeve hits perfectly at my wrist, showing off the bracelet.

"Nice bracelet." Sheila points to my wrist. "Gucci?"

"No." I fumble with a couple of the beads. "I made it."

"I love the color." She admires it a little more. "It's gorgeous, and it shows the orange in your trench."

I take the bracelet off, and hand it to her. "I made it, and I'd like to give it to you."

"I couldn't." Sheila puts her hand up to her chest.

"Yes. Please take it as a thank you." I put it on her wrist. "A perfect fit. You have to take it."

My confidence takes a leap through the roof, and I'm ready to take on the world.

Chapter Twenty.

After the interview, I can't concentrate on work. All of this bead talk has thrown me for a loop. I'm doing the job I've always dreamed of and now I can't keep my head in it.

What is it about the beads? Do they relax me? Why do they call my name?

With my head full of jumble, I decide to take my lunch break early and stop by Aunt Grace's.

"Aunt Grace, I brought lunch." I gulped my sandwich down before I get to her apartment because there's no way I'll be able to eat in there. I had to do it for years with no option, but now that I have the option, I prefer my food without roaches at the table.

She greets me by pulling my hand to her eyes. She inspects my knuckle from the top and all sides. Without a word, she drags me down the hall and right into someone else's apartment.

"Inas, you hear me?" Aunt Grace hollers into the dimly lit room.

"Aunt Grace, you can't do this!" Has she totally lost her mind? "Just because you are the landlord doesn't give you the right to barge in."

I jump when I hear a woman's voice. "I've been expecting you." The gypsy standing near the small table with a crystal ball flicks on a light.

The apartment is clean. Unlike Aunt Grace's pad, Inas doesn't have a bug one, or one that I see, anyway. The window treatments create heavy shadows in the dark, airy space. Oriental rugs adorn the floors. One little table sits in the middle of the room. No other furniture in sight, just large pillows flung all over.

"Let me see, please." My hand is in Inas' before I can protest.

She inspect my red swollen knuckle before her gaze trails up my arm, around my neck and up to my eyes.

I jerk as our eyes meet but stay silence, not sure if I'm scared or in shock.

Her hands run down my arm and back to my knuckle. I watch as she rubs around it.

"Okay, hi." My voice is flat with fear. "I'm Grace's niece, and it is so nice to meet you."

Slowly I pull my hand away and turn to leave this crazy place. Aunt Grace puts her arm out to stop me. Inas goes around me to shut the door.

I'm trapped!

"Listen, I don't know what this is, but I need to get back to work." Or at least get back to the land of the sane.

Aunt Grace guides me back into the depths of Inas' apartment. Leaving isn't an option.

"I'll go to the doctor." I protest, and make a cross on my chest. "A real doctor, I promise."

"Now, dear child." Before my eyes adjust to what's going on, Inas slaps a wet sticky paste all over my knuckles. "Let that dry on your way home." She hands me a potato. "Cut this potato in half and rub the ointment off." She's so close to my face, I can hear the slight clink of her ear rings. "This is the part where you need to listen closely." Her warm breath grazes my ear. "You need to bury the potato in your back yard, tonight!" Her eyes pierce a pit deep in my soul and her words sting my ears.

What if I don't do it? Then what?

I grab the potato, and take Aunt Grace by the hand. "Let's go."

I give her the look she knows not to cross.

"I came here to tell you I was on the morning news, and they're going to be airing it again tonight, not so you could perform some witchcraft spell thingy." I point to my knuckle with all the goobly glop on it. "How the hell am I supposed to go back to work with shit on my knuckle?"

"Such a pretty girl with an ugly mouth." Aunt Grace shakes her head, and goes about her business as if the voodoo thing hadn't happen.

"Aunt Grace, I don't want some woman touching my body. I will go to a real doctor." I need her to understand she isn't in control of my life anymore. Even though I know I still let her have her way almost all the time.

I wipe some of the mystery goo off my hand.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you." Aunt Grace's spine-chilling voice causes me to stop and take note.

I look at my knuckle and the goo has become hard, like plaster, only it moves with my hand and doesn't crack.

She turns on the noon news like nothing out of the ordinary has happened. I wonder how she does this. She can be frail and old one minute and in the blink of an eye, hunt down witch doctors.

I watch Aunt Grace smiling at the television with pride. "I love that Sheila Gray's jewelry. She always wears the prettiest stuff."

I look a little closer and can't help but put the events of the day behind me and grin ear to ear. Sheila Gray is wearing my bracelet.

Chapter Twenty-one.

After work, I take the potato out of my car. All scenarios play in my head. All the what-ifs.

What if I take the junk off my knuckle with a wet paper towel? What will happen? I didn't. I had to stare at it all afternoon at work.

What if I don't bury the potato tonight, at all?

What if I eat it instead?

What if I do bury the potato and the red lumpy thing on my knuckle does go away?

I take the knife out of the drawer and cut it in half, like Inas' insisted.

"Here goes nothing." I take half of the potato and rub it all over my knuckle. The potato is like a sponge and soaks up the dry goop.

"Ah!" I gasp, staring at my hand. My knuckle is back to olive. Like the rest of my body.

I grab a big spoon out of the kitchen drawer and race out the back door where I find Wilson reading the paper.

"What are you doing with a potato and spoon?" He bends the paper down to get a better view. "You should probably cook it first."

I know he already thinks I'm a nut job, and this will just prove it.

I hold up my perfect knuckle in front of his face.

"What?" Wilson squints, looking for something that isn't there.

"Funny. I don't know." I inspect it a bit more closely in the sunlight. "My aunt's voodoo tenant decided to perform some sort of healing ritual. My knuckle was red rashy and now it's gone."

I dig a hole near the fence.

"What's with the potato? And why are you digging a hole with a spoon?" Wilson's shadow is cast on the hole from standing in the rays.

"I have to bury this potato today." I put the potato in the just-big-enough hole.

Wilson lifts his eyebrows and smiles. "Strange."

I shake my head, and walk back into the house. I can't believe I buried a potato and used a spoon, but I really can't believe I told Wilson.

It's time to put this day to rest.

Chapter Twenty-Two.

I give myself plenty of time to stop by Aunt Grace's before going to the airport to pick up Lucy, Georgia, and Prudence. I need to remind her I'm going out of town for the weekend.

Uncle Jimmy isn't on the stoop, and no one's on the street. That isn't a good sign. It usually means Aunt Grace kicked him out, or he's on a drunken binge.

I look up at Aunt Grace's window to make sure she doesn't confuse me with the whistling woman, because the last think I need to day is a concussion. It's shut tight.

"Aunt Grace?" I knock on the door.

Nervously, I knock louder, and put my ear to the door. If anything does happen to Aunt Grace, I don't know what I'll do.