I find the next one and then the next one—the bird rises out of the hat a little more with each painting. Mom would love this. She was always planning scavenger hunts for me after school with a note taped to the front door and a plate of cookies hiding at the end. She made the best butterscotch chip cookies.

Finally, I reach a navy door painted with the same small hat and a dove flying free above it. A Black girl sits perched on a stool beside the door. She wears a green sequined dress that pops against her dark brown skin and falls around her knees in points. Miniature silk flowers in an array of colors line the hem. Her black hair curls down to her waist, and as she shifts to look at me, the gold glitter sprinkled into her hair flashes in the light. She reminds me of Tinker Bell.

“This is what you’re looking for.” Her words jar me. Her voice is deep and smooth, like she’s a breath away from singing, and it feels like a kind of magic already. Her warm brown, gold-rimmed eyes stare right into mine like she’s reading my mind.

“How do you know?”

A soft smile spreads across her face, and she slumps a little on her stool like she’s breaking character. She nods to the flyer in my hand.

“Oh. Right.” I twist the paper again before tucking it away and pulling money from my pocket. I hold it out, but she doesn’t take it.

“Are you sure?” she asks instead.

I just stare at her. She’s the one who told me this was what I was looking for.

“You can’t go back, you know,” she says.

She must be in character, trying to unsettle me before the show even starts, but there’s an earnestness in her eyes that almost makes me step away from her.

But then she smiles again and waves my money away. “The first show’s on us.”

She hops from the stool in a swirl of flashing green, pulls open the door, and gestures toward the dark. I step into a heady mix of perfume, cologne, sweat, and alcohol. Underneath, the dank, old smell of the building bides its time, waiting to take control when the room empties. Old buildings always have that same mustiness at their base. It’s comforting. Something I can count on.

I step around the hipsters heading toward the booze. The gleaming metal stools contrast with the tired oak of the bar.

Unfortunately, there’s no music, and noisy shouts and drunk laughter grate on my nerves.

Someone bumps my shoulder. The crowd swells, and I let myself flow with it toward the seats set up in front of a metal stage draped with plain and simple twinkle lights, the kind I get sick of seeing around the holidays. They aren’t magical. If anything, they’re tacky.