Gravedancer

6 YEARS AGO.

The mechanic sighed contentedly as he finally finished fixing the big sign.

"'Welcome to Calamity'," he read, "'The only part in America where magic is real'. Seriously, who's gonna fall for this thing?"

"Whoever has enough time to visit this place, apparently," his friend replied merrily. "As if that happens at all. But I think that stupid tagline works the best, though. This is definitely not the most normal town there is, and I don't think we can pride ourselves with the Witch House." He frowned at the mention of the House. "But hey, on the bright side, we finally got this job done."

"Which means we're getting paid," the mechanic agreed. "Yeah. Let's go check out that new restaurant that just opened by Bia's. I heard they made killer sandwiches."

"As long as they don't kill me, sandwiches sound good," the friend said. The mechanic bothered a second or two to give him some side-eyeing.

"That legendary tummy of yours doesn't need any sandwich," the mechanic finally said. His friend laughed and slapped his shoulder.

"But yours does," he pointed back. "Come on, we'll play some rounds there and if you can beat me two out of three, I'm paying."

The mechanic grinned. "Deal."

They were just about to turn around from the post that they just fixed when they heard a car's engine from afar. That stopped the mechanic and drew his friend's attention.

They both turned again and squinted to look at the far end of the street. "What was that?" the friend asked. The mechanic shook his head slowly.

"A car, I think," he said. "That definitely sounds like a car. It sounds like the engine's about to fail."

His friend groaned. "Really? Failing your engine in Calamity?"

The mechanic nodded. "Bad luck at its best."

The only way to describe Calamity was that it was a town in the middle of nowhere. The official address would mention Calamity, Oregon, but that didn't give any further clarity. There was only one lane heading to and from town, and the town wasn't the kind of town where any fuss would get documented into national TV.

Failing your car's engine there isn't exactly something you'd want.

"You know what, I'm gonna stay here and see if I can help," the mechanic said, patting his toolbox. "I've got my box of wonders here, and if I need anything, I know I can just call you."

The friend nodded. "You got that right. Well, I'll go get myself that sandwich. Then we can talk about proposing a name change for this town."

"They tried it two decades ago," the mechanic reminded him. "Didn't work out."

"That was two decades ago," his friend replied. "Today's today. See ya 'round. And be careful, you don't know who you're helping. And," he pointed to the sign, "magic's real here."

The mechanic nodded as his friend left. He has no idea, he thought. He waited patiently by the sign; the sound of the car drawing closer in. It shouldn't be too long until –

The car literally sounded like a mess of metal repeatedly saying the word wreck. The mechanic could tell that the car wasn't in too much better a condition than the word it was spitting out. But the nearer the car got, he could also hear some cursing – a woman's.

Then, as the car came into view, it stopped entirely, just as the mechanic had predicted.

The car was a bright-red vintage muscle car, and the mechanic couldn't help but notice that the paintjob was still sleek.