Page 48 of Potion Sickness

“Where did you hear about the website?”

“Everyone’s heard of it.” She blows her nose. “It’s not some secret. It comes up in the town Facebook group sometimes. It’s got a whole section for” —she makes a vague gesture at her own face— “maintenance.”

“Who’s everyone, Tiffany?”

“Ask anyone,” she shrugs. “I told Skye about it, when she came in for her facial. Girl talk. And she said she’d already heard of it. I said ‘Glamoury’ and she nodded before I finished the word. Lots of people have heard of it, Mari. Lots of people.”

“Okay,” I say. “I believe you.”

“Are you going to tell everyone?”

“No, you are. Tonight, before rehearsal. You tell Vivian and you tell Pru. Do you still have the bottle?”

“It’s in the trash, out back. Pickup hasn’t⁠—”

“Go get it. Don’t wash it. Annabel will want to read it.”

She nods.

“What if I don’t tell them?” she asks, sniffling. “Can’t you do it for me? I just want to hide.”

“It’d be better if it came from you. You’re great with an audience.”

She laughs, despite everything, and then she stands up, pointing me back into the chair.

“Sit back down,” she says. “You have wet hair, Marigold, and I haven’t even cut it yet. You’re not walking down Main Street half-finished on my watch. I confessed to a crime today. My salon reputation is all I have left.”

“Fine, but⁠—”

“Don’t worry,” she says. “I’m not going to give you bangs. My mother owes you an apology for those.”

* * *

Tiffany walks into the Community Center with the brown potion bottle in a zip-lock. She asks Vivian if she can take the stage, and tells the story straight through, holding the freezer bag up so everyone can see the bottle. Nobody heckles. The people of Duskboro love a public confession.

When she finishes, Vivian stands up from the front row.

“Thank you for telling us yourself,” Vivian says. “You will, of course, be stripped of the understudy role. You’ll keep Third Witch, though, as long as Pru doesn’t object, because I need three witches, and because you’re good in the role, but you’ll never again be alone with a prop, a cup, or a costume in this building. Dana will see to it.”

“Who covers me, then? If something happens?” Pru asks from her seat.

“Moonbeam will hold the book, if it comes to that.”

“Then nobody in this company will so much as breathe near Prudence until we open,” Englebert says, and there’s a ripple of quiet laughter.

“You’ll pay Annabel’s consulting fee for the goblet analysis,” Pru says, looking up at Tiffany. “I’ve seen her rates. They’re fair.”

“And that’s it? That’s all you’re going to do to me?”

“I’ll leave the rest to management.”

Englebert, seeing this as his cue, rises, stretches, and ascends to the stage in two jumps.

“TIFFANY REAGAN,” he says, projecting to his greatest ability. “You have offended against the play itself. Prudence may forgive you, and the various legal apparatuses that vaguely govern this town will never hear of your indiscretions, but the play keeps its own accounts. There is a very old procedure for those who bring harm upon a production from within its own company, and this troupe has been rehearsing it in that parking lot, all summer.” He sits, looking up at her. “You will go out those doors. You will turn three times. You will adhere to the ritual, and this time, it will be meant.”

“Englebert,” Vivian starts, “she didn’t say the name⁠—”

“The ritual is not about the name,” Englebert says, without turning his head. “It is about respect.”