Kelly McClymer-Salem Witch 02 Competition's A Witch (18 page)

Tara shrugged. “If his mom’s a problem, I could cast a look the other way spell on her.”

“That’s against the rules,” I pointed out.

“Since when are you a go-by-the-rules girl? Remember Daniel? You broke rules for him.” She grinned. “I’d definitely break rules for Angelo.
Yummy
.”

“He is cute,” I agreed. “For a mortal.”

“So when are you going to hook us up?”

I let it hang there for a moment, hoping one of the other girls—who seemed to be hanging on to every word Tara and I uttered—would pick up on the problem. Finally Elektra piped up: “Will your parents let you date a mortal, Tara? Mine would freak.”

A few others nodded, but not with shock, just that aura of delight when someone else asked a question you were dying to ask. Which was when it dawned on me that there was more than one person interested in Angelo. I guess Angelo had that effect on girls, be they witch or mortal.

But Tara just laughed. “I don’t tell my parents everything. Do you?”

“No.” Elektra doesn’t know a rhetorical question from a pop quiz. Fortunately, she doesn’t know when to drop a subject, either. “But I can’t imagine that they wouldn’t find out. They found out when I took that little side trip to Sundance.”

“You went to Sundance?” I leaned forward and pretended to be even more eager to hear about her trip than I actually was.

Elektra grinned. “I heard the buzz about this little film about witches and I couldn’t resist.”

“Was it any good?” Several people asked the question in unison. It was a perennial annoyance how mortals could be so certain magic didn’t really exist, and yet so persistent in writing stories in which they got everything all wrong.

“Of course not,” Elektra scoffed. “They did the broom thing, but actually tried to spice it up a bit by substituting vacuum cleaners.”

Everyone groaned, and Tara chimed in with one of her trademark snarky comments. “How long were the electrical cords? Don’t mortals ever follow the logic?”

I was just about to relax, thinking that I’d effectively maneuvered past having to deliver Angelo to Tara on a sterling silver platter. But then she turned back to me. “Of course, some of them are cute enough that it doesn’t matter.”

Sigh. But the conversation had given me a way to look like I was cooperating and still get more than I was giving up.

“Well, I don’t know. His mom is more protective than witch parents. But maybe she’d let him go out with you if you won her heart by volunteering at Old Salem Village on Halloween.”

“Talk about not getting it right,” Tara said, rolling her eyes.

“To be fair, it’s about mortals, not witches. It was mostly mortals who got arrested and tried. And it’s kind of neat to see how our parents lived, too,” I pointed out.

Tara frowned. “My mother was definitely not raised in Salem. She was born in London.” This was, I had learned, an even more sore spot with witches than mortals.

Maybe it’s because I was raised in Beverly Hills, where pedigree was more about paycheck and Hollywood A-list, but I couldn’t work up any steam to care about who was born where, when. Not that I’d say so to Tara. Rumor had it she’d gotten another girl kicked off the team for daring to speak her mind on this subject.

“Why would I want to waste my time with mortals?” she asked.

“Not just mortals—a whole day with Angelo.”

“Not alone, though,” Tara objected.

I hated to do it, but it would dial me up to faux friend in Tara’s address book, which would make team cooperation a lock. “He and I are supposed to play a young couple, so you’d get to play house with him. You can’t tell me you wouldn’t think that was fun? Besides, who knows where it would lead?”

“True.” Tara nodded. “And if I was bored, I could just leave.”

“I wouldn’t get bored with Angelo,” Celestina whispered, and she turned bright red when we all turned to look at her. Tara did not look happy.

Uh-oh. Was there going to be a catfight?

Charity shouldered in to protect her main girl’s stake on her chosen guy. “Hey, if you like him, let me know and I’ll make sure he asks you out. There’s this little spell I know—”

Elektra shook her head. “
Then
you’d have to tell your parents.”

Tara did a little hair flip, the polite girl’s version of “get lost.” “That’s what you think.”

Everyone giggled. Except me. I wasn’t happy that it was Angelo hunting season.

If only Daniel would stop playing games and come back. I could use a little distraction from all this Angelo/mortal stuff. Daniel might be trouble, but at least he was a witch.

After all my hot and heavy efforts to test out of remedial magic classes, I found myself with feet so cold, I practically had toesicles. The more I learned, the more I learned I didn’t know. I felt like that Greek guy who kept rolling the boulder up the hill every day and watching it roll down every night. Sisyphus, I think Mr. Dooley said his name was.

When we got the summons from Agatha, I wondered—briefly, before I replaced the terrible thought with some pepilicious up-talk—if it was possible that Agatha might have actually known some of those cranky Greek gods and goddesses.

I was right to worry. After Mom pestered her for a date,
Agatha abruptly sent an appointment notice for us—leaving us barely five minutes to get ready before she scrapped the whole idea. So we showed up.

Agatha barely looked at my mother. She saved all her icy disdain for me. “Mr. Phogg has agreed to test you on October thirty-first. Midnight sharp.”

“Halloween?” But I was supposed to volunteer all day. Not to mention sell the fund-raising calendars we’d made.

Agatha seemed more than a little pleased that I was unhappy enough to show her I didn’t like the short lead time. “It seems fitting that we test you, raised in the mortal world, on the day the mortals mock us and the whole idea of magic.”

“It isn’t mockery, exactly.” I thought guiltily of all the ugly, pointy-nosed, and warty witches I’d seen trick or treating. I’d never wanted to be one, but I hadn’t stood up for witches either. I’d just gone for fairy princess, ballet dancer, and cheerleader and not said a word to anyone who might put on green makeup and a hairy wart. Of course, I’d noticed in the last few years that there were more Harry Potter—type witches and fewer Wicked Witches of the West. I suppose you could call that progress.

Agatha sighed frostily. “You may perhaps remember that I am not the one who has been living solely in the mortal world for the last sixteen years. I think I know a little more about mockery than you do.”

I decided it was best to play the model student, although I doubt my meek little act fooled anyone in the room. “Of course, Headmistress.”

She smiled, and I swear an icy chill went down my back. “Good. I shall tell Mr. Phogg to expect you at midnight on the dot, then.”

And with that, the meeting was over. I don’t know where Agatha sent Mom, but I popped back into the school hallway with enough time to make practice without any late penalty.

As it turned out, Mom wasn’t any happier about the date than I was. But when I got home after practice, she didn’t even suggest that we fight Agatha. We both knew well enough that would only cause more trouble.

However, she did give me her most sympathetic smile. “I’ll track down Cousin Seamus right away. And you don’t have to worry about babysitting to pay your car insurance. Your dad and I will take care of it until you’ve passed this test.”

I wanted to cry. Because Mom was taking care of me and I didn’t know if it was because she knew I could pass the test with the extra help, or because she was afraid I wouldn’t no matter what.

I knew how I felt. Uncertain. And that was scary. I’ve been positive I could meet any challenge thrown at me as long as I can remember. I wasn’t afraid of hard work, and I
wasn’t particularly dumb. But when it came to doing magic, I wasn’t sure I had the street cred to get me through.

Dad was funny about it. At dinner, after Mom had told him about the test date, he asked, “Would you like help quizzing up on your potion ingredients, spells, chants, charms, and incantations? I could do like I used to do with spelling words and history facts.”

I wanted to cry. “Thanks, Dad. That would be great.” Useless, but great to know he wanted me to succeed. Success was one of those words that had dropped out of my vocabulary after I moved to Salem. I really missed the old days, when “Prudence Stewart” was listed as an example of the definition.

Fortunately, Mom finally dragged Cousin Seamus from wherever he’d been. He was a Magic Talent. Gifted—but flaky. He was my only chance now that Samuel wasn’t talking to me.

“So Old Agatha gave you the test date from hell, huh?” Cousin Seamus didn’t seem to think it was as awful as I did. But then, he didn’t have to take the test himself. And even if he did, he could have passed it without blinking.

“She hates me.” I expected him to disagree and reassure, like most adults would have.

But that wasn’t Seamus’s way. “You’re not the first student Old Agatha has hated, and I’m sure you won’t be the last.”

“What happened to the other students she hated?” I wasn’t sure I wanted to know, but the question squirted out before I could stop it.

He stopped smiling. “Well, mostly they escape without permanent scars. Although there have been rumors—”

“Seamus!” Mom was not amused.

“What? Don’t you remember—”

“There is no time to talk about the past. Prudence needs to study for the test. Now.”

“A little history—”

“Will not help her pass the test, will it?”

Even Seamus had to concede my mom was right on that score. Finding out your headmistress/enemy has eaten others for breakfast is not the most confidence-inducing information ever. Maybe that was why the butterflies in my stomach had begun to turn into something more along the lines of tiny, fluttering porcupines.

Mom was in full-on commando mode. “Her spell work is her strongest magic, so don’t waste time with that,” she instructed Seamus. “I think you’ll do best if you work on potions, transfiguration, dimensional transportation, and perhaps, if you have time left, she could use some drill work on her summoning, to strengthen her simultaneous control over multiple objects. But if not, her father can help with the drill work.”

Seamus saluted. “Yes,
mon capitaine
.”

“Seamus, this is serious. Agatha isn’t going to make this test easy for her.”

“Well, kiddo, it isn’t the end of the world if you fail.”

Ummm. Hello? It is the end of the world as I know it. As much as Coach Gertie loved my insider knowledge about the competitions, she wasn’t going to make a remedial student head cheerleader. It just wasn’t the cheerleader way.

I hadn’t thought it would be so hard to make a place for myself among the kewl kids at Agatha’s. I mean, in Beverly Hills I had it going on (and I don’t say that with a big head). At Agatha’s, I had to hang on to everything that was kewl with clenched teeth.

Although, a question Samuel asked me has been rattling around in my head: “What does it matter if you’re kewl?” It used to matter because the kewl kids were the ones who got what they wanted, from a car on their sixteenth birthday to a full-ticket ride to the college of their choice (which, as we’ve been told since kindergarden, is the only way to have the life we want). I wanted to be—
had
wanted to be—a pediatrician. But did I anymore? I didn’t know. I didn’t even know what my options were. Partly it depended on what Talent I manifested. So I was like all those kids I knew back in Beverly Hills who just wanted to pass their classes and move on to the next year, and the next, until they graduated and escaped. I’d never understood them before. I was a goal-oriented kind of girl. But now … the only thing I knew
for sure was that I didn’t want to find out I could have had what I wanted if I’d kept my kewl status at Agatha’s until I had a clue about how things worked in the witch world.

The one clue I did have? I needed to get out of remedial magic class. And so maybe I was a little too enthusiastic about seeing Cousin Seamus and his electronic friend Toot. They’d helped me out already once before, and I was so glad the cavalry had arrived, I hugged and kissed Seamus on both cheeks. Twice. “Now that you’re here, I don’t have to worry about failing.”

He laughed, but his cheeks were a little pink. I don’t think he gets mauled by females much. Oh, well. I said, “Sorry about that, but you and Toot are the only ones who can slow down time enough to help me learn what I need to know before the test.”

Seamus saluted me sloppily. “Aye-aye, me lovely. Toot, let’s set the time to winter molasses and get started. Miss Pru has a deadline to beat.”