Magical Weddings (73 page)

I have this instant knowing of what she is going to say next. Not the specifics, but the broad overview is hovering just above my head. Then it lands with a clunk. Right in my medulla oblongata. The part of my brain that controls my heart function.

“But the part we didn’t tell you is she died trying to break the wedding curse on our family.”

I blink. I knew that was what she was going to say even if no one ever said it aloud before. “Okay,” I say as calmly as possibly. Part of me even believes that I can handle this. That the basic human functions are still operating correctly inside my stunned body. “I’m going to take her journal and have a look at it in my room.” I hold it up for us all to see, and then whirl around and head for the stairs.

“Aspen?”

“Nope. I don’t want to talk about anything right now.”

“But,” Aunt Ivy stutters.

“And no mourning party!” I flee up the stairs, half stumbling up them as quickly as someone can who is in a state of semi-numbness and with a heart as heavy as a ten-ton stone.

When I reach the second floor landing, I have the unfortunate experience of hearing someone knocking at the front door. The sound of my aunts bickering also carries up the stairs. They’re in disagreement over the journal. Whoever is at the door quiets their arguing. Then, it’s as if I’ve lost control of my body. My feet drag like anvils are tied to my ankles. My traitorous, curious nature has to know if Rook has returned with Perry.

“Come inside, Rook,” Aunt Jet’s voice lifts to me as I lean over the hand railing.

“How are you, dear thing?” Aunt Ivy says.

I can’t see them, but I hear everything, even Rook’s boots as they hit the mat by the door and then his socks against the wood floor as he enters the house.

“Good afternoon, ladies,” he says in his perfect purring baritone.

“We already know what happened today. Aspen won’t be coming down. But I’d love it if you would join me in the kitchen. I’ll put on some fresh tea and we can chat for a moment.”

“I wanted to speak to you both, so I’m glad to hear that Aspen is otherwise preoccupied.”

“Oh, well, that’s good, dear. Let me cut you a piece of cake,” Aunt Ivy says.

Their talk fades as they make their way into the kitchen. My hand feels clammy around the book. I switch it to my other hand and wipe the sweat on my pants. Then I run up the next flight of stairs and don’t stop until my bedroom door is securely shut. With my back pressed against the wood, I slip down to the floor and stare at nothing and everything.

The small powder blue vase filled with lilies sitting on my nightstand catches my attention immediately.

“Ugh…” That definitely was not there before I left the house today. I glance over at my balcony door and wonder if Rook was just up here, or when he could have placed the flowers in my room.

He knows how much I like them and he isn’t stingy in giving them to me. In all honesty, I’m a little surprised at how small the vase is this time. He usually spoils me with huge bouquets. The soft blue glass is pretty on my antique-white table. The three white lilies are gorgeous in their simplicity and grace.

I close my eyes at the reminder of his thoughtful and generous nature. Searching the interior of my mind yields no relief, but I refuse to move. Unfortunately, the floor begins telling my butt that it’s too hard to continue slouching here. I pull myself up and go slump in the window seat, as far away from the vase of flowers as possible. A few minutes after staring out my window, I see Rook’s truck pulling down the drive.

Knowing that I can’t see him again tears a hole in me and I glance down at my chest expecting to see the gaping wound where my happiness use to reside. Of course I don’t actually see the injury, but I feel it acutely. I’m also aware of the horse hair and the lingering scent of Rook on my riding clothes. With the utmost care, I tuck my mom’s journal under one of the window seat cushions and then go shower and change.

A cloud of raspberry coconut scented steam pours from the bathroom as I wrap a towel around my head and walk back into my room. My converted attic space isn’t the largest bedroom in the house, but it’s more space than one person needs. I have everything I need up here and thanks to the roof deck and the outside stairs, I wouldn’t even have to visit the rest of the house if I didn’t want to. But I know Aunt Ivy would be disappointed if I didn’t show up for breakfast and dinner, so I pretend that I don’t have my own living quarters. I check on Estella, my chinchilla, and see that she’s asleep, so I don’t give in to the urge to pet her silky fur. Then I wonder where Basil is. He tends to wait for me at the barn, but I didn’t notice him when I came back from my ride with Rook. With the thought of my incredibly loyal, if somewhat quirky, Basset hound/retriever mix, I hear him announce his presence with a small woof. I turn the doorknob and he squeezes into the room before I barely have time to open the door.

“Basil, my cute pup,” I say as his tail thumps against my leg. “Where were you, champ? I could have used a kiss earlier. Now I’m all shiny and clean. Oh no you don’t,” I say as he begins to rub his furry body against my clean flannel pajama bottoms. The distinct odor of barn lifts off of his fur and begins to fill the room.

“To the shower, young man.” He lowers himself to the floor and starts G.I. Joe crawling toward his dog bed. “Uh-uh,” I say, and point to the bathroom.

Basil decides that he’s of an independent mindset today, and continues to slink away from me defiantly. I try a different tactic. The one that never fails. “You know the rules. If you’re going to roll in the manure you have to take a shower. Now get in that bathroom and you’ll receive your treat as soon as you smell as nice as I do.”

Basil rises to his full height, all twelve inches of his doggy manliness, and trots off to the bathroom. It’s true that I have some amazing abilities to work with animals, but I’m not foolish enough to think that my dog understands everything I tell him. I know very well he comprehends about five percent of the words coming from my mouth. The two words I guarantee he knows are “bathroom” and “treat.” The rest of this apparently amazing compliance from my filthy dog is the result of endless hours of training, repetition, and his undying love of pumpkin and bacon biscuits.

With the use of a simple cleaning charm on the scrub brush and the flexible shower nozzle, my wooly hound—I did mention my dog is hound
and
retriever—is clean in a couple of minutes. I set the towels to work on him while I continue the charm on the shower until it has finished cleaning itself.

Basil actually grins at me when I hand him his cookie. With the pumpkin snack gobbled up in a microsecond, we settle onto the window seat moments later. Basil must have had quite the day. He stretches out next to my leg and is snoring in seconds. I, on the other hand, can’t stop staring out the window wondering about what Rook said to my aunts and also wondering if I will ever see his truck making the return trip down the long drive.

The sun is low on the horizon and the hue of the evening light casts the end of the day glow over the distant treetops and across the paddock. I glance at the sea beyond the far cliffs at the edge of our land and watch the golden highlights on the crest of every swell and ripple across the ocean.
This is my life.
Looking out the window of this big house and wondering if I’ll be alone forever like all the Morgan witches that lived here before me.

We’re really not alone, but on days like today, it feels that way. I mean, I’m completely free to date and sleep with whoever I want. Who in the world wants the responsibility of a long term relationship weighing them down and making them accountable to someone for a lifetime?
Blah! Why would I want that?

The self-talk isn’t working. Neither is the sarcasm and cynicism. It’s only serving up the very familiar plate of sadness about my predicament.
Why did my mother even have me? She knew what I would have to endure.

It’s time
, I tell myself. I reach under the cushion and pull out her journal.

****

I startle from a deep sleep thanks to a rattling sound surprisingly close to my ear. When I open my eyes, I’m even more disturbed by the sight of a dark, wet nose snorting and chortling in my face. Basil’s snores cease abruptly and his droopy lids part to display inquisitive brown eyes. A long pink tongue begins to lap at my face. His good morning kiss runs from the side of my mouth to my left nostril and keeps going toward my eye.
Basil is a poor substitution for Rook.

“Basil…I love you, but ewww.” I sit up and wipe the dog slobber away.

Apparently, I never left the window seat last night and now I’m paying for it. The towel that was wrapped around my head falls to the floor and I realize that I had used it as a blanket, along with my dog and a half dozen pillows from my window nest. It’s not exactly the same comfort that my big cozy bed affords, but it could have been worse. The last time I fell asleep reading by the bay window I woke up when I rolled onto the floor, so I should be grateful that I didn’t have that repeat performance.

I reach over and flip off the light that was left on all night, or should I say all morning. It was super late by the time I actually fell asleep. Turning back to my reading nook, I search for the journal and find it right next to Basil.

His eyes are trained on me.
What does he want?
A belly rub, probably another pumpkin dog treat, and then to be let outside to do his morning business and check on the barn. Then he’ll find Aunt Ivy for his gourmet breakfast. I oblige him, but not with another cookie.

He jumps down and we both pad across the throw rugs to the roof deck door. Through the stained glass window I notice that I have a guest.

“Oh, curses,” I mutter, and slink out of sight before he sees my shadow through the colored glass. I hug the wall and stare with longing at the far side of my bedroom—the shady side without any windows.
Why is Rook here?
I saw his outline in the chair. It had to be him. Even through the beveled and warped glass I could easily recognize his profile.

I’m about to make a mad tip-toeing dash across the floor when Basil gives me his hallooing alert that he’s done waiting to be let out. As luck would have it, Basil inherited his father’s voice box and has the loud bellowing troll voice of a Basset hound.

I give him the stink eye of betrayal for ratting me out and then crack open the door. Maybe my bed-head and dog hair covered flannel will help Rook realize that I’m not the bootylicious babe he thinks I am. I leave the door ajar and catch the morning sea breeze mixed with the smell of the dew burning off the grass in the fields. It smells fresh and cleansing, but does nothing to settle my nerves.

Across the room I spot my navy blue sweatshirt lying across the chair by Estella’s cage. I hurry over and grab it. My chinchilla is eyeing me about the same way that Basil just was, so I drop a few food pellets into her dish. She looks at the pellets and then back up at me.

“Don’t beg, Stel,” I say in my most motherly,
I know what’s best for you voice
. “I promise I’ll bring you something special later.”

She seems to accept my word and hops over to her pellets and begins munching. I grab my sweatshirt and pull it over my head, covering up that fact that I was sleeping in one of Rook’s T-shirts.
How am I going to handle this? And what does he want? I broke up with him not even twenty-four hours ago.
My mixed up ideas about him take over the rational side of my brain for all of a second before I shake it off. This is Rook. He’s not unstable. He’s the most reasonable and level-headed person I’ve ever known. But the reassurances don’t stop my heart from pounding as I slip out the door and come face to face with him.

There are tiny lines of strain around his eyes that aren’t usually there, giving him the appearance of not having slept very well.
If at all.
He’s unshaven and that increases his ruffled appearance. Of course, this only serves to make him look sexier, like the way I’ve seen him in the morning after staying the night.

He doesn’t speak and neither do I. Other than the tired look around his burnished copper eyes, he appears as relaxed and at ease as he usually does. I work my somewhat dry lips together and try not to spill my guts to him. If I hadn’t broken it off with him, I would be gushing at the seams telling him the highlights of what I read in my mother’s journal. But now we are two separate entities and I can’t allow myself to share the intimate details of my life. The cords between us have been severed. The frayed ends are obviously on my side and that’s where they need to stay.

A tiny smile lifts one side of his mouth as I approach the patio table where he’s been waiting for me. I hug myself and turn to my spare pair of work boots that had been accidentally left outside so I don’t have to make eye contact. I hate breakups. Yesterday I would have been snuggling up on his lap and nibbling his earlobe as we discuss what the best breakfast juice is. Now I’m overly self-conscious and afraid to say a single word because I’m completely frazzled by the state of my emotions. And it’s cranberry, by the way, no matter how many times Rook insists on orange juice as the morning fruit juice of choice.

From the corner of my eye, I see Rook slide a folded sheet of cream colored stationary across the table. I slip my feet into my mud boots and think about Snowdrop and Perry waiting for their hay. The angle of the morning rays across the yard, and the fact that the sun is already warming my rooftop balcony, lets me know that it’s much later than normal for my morning chores. I glance toward the barn and see my shaggy Bassett hound rounding the corner of the building, probably in search of a fresh pile of manure to roll in.

My feet squash down into cold, soggy boots. I grimace and let my own stubbornness keep me from pulling the boots back off. If I’m going to make ridiculous mistakes like leaving my boots outside to be rained on, then I’m going to have to pay the consequences. This is only half the truth, of course. I don’t want Rook to see me squealing with repulsion as the rainwater squishes between my toes. I’m already embarrassed enough by the state of my hair and lack of refinement. I brush a hand over my head and know it’s useless as soon as I touch the rat’s nest I call a hair style.