Witch Ways (13 page)

“Just say it.” Bree limped after me on her crutches. “You can’t start something like that and not finish it.”

“All right.” I climbed onto the porch and held open the screen door for her. “On my first day at Faith Despaign, I imagined a big dog chewing up the student’s shoes and it happened.” I put the pot down on the table and slipped off the oven mitts.

“What happened?”

“People started screaming. Students started pushing and shoving each other. And this great big, slobbery Great Dane showed up.”

Bree dropped into a chair. “Of all the things to visualize—why a Great Dane?”

“I don’t know. There were so many people, no one was paying any attention to me . . .”

“That’s too silly. You couldn’t have had anything to do with a dog showing up at the school.”

“I know, right? It’s like the whole ‘tell the universe what you want and it magically happens for you’ thing.” I shook myself. “I need to find something to keep this in.” I looked in a cupboard and pulled out two empty mason jars.

“You should let that cool some more before you try to pour it,” Bree said. “You know the whole ‘tell the universe’ thing doesn’t work, right? Remember how Candace was so into that? She was telling the universe multiple times a day she wanted Bryce Collins—until he got Mellissa Hopkins preggers. Then she didn’t want him anymore.” Bree propped her bad leg up on a chair. “Besides, why would you tell the universe you wanted a dog to chew people’s shoes?”

“I didn’t really. Just like I didn’t want you to really fall out the window, but the point is I said it, and then it happened.”

“And now you find out your grandmother is a witch, and she thinks you have powers.”

I sat down beside Bree. “I don’t think I want to have special powers.”

“Are you kidding me?”

“If you had special powers, what would you ask for?”

“My own bathroom.”

“That’s fair.”

“What about you? Other than the dog and my falling out of trees and other stupid stuff.”

I thought about it. Dylan Fox’s smile flashed in my mind. I dismissed him, because I couldn’t tell Bree I thought of him like that. I put the oven mitts back on. Carefully, I poured the still steaming elixir into two mason jars—one for Bree and one for me. It smelled like flowers, the earth, and the night sky.

“I guess I really want to talk to my mom.” I went to the sink to wash the pot. “I know that sounds lame.”

“No, I get it. You’re freaked out about your grandmother—and the whole science room thing. You don’t want to ask Birdie questions, because you don’t trust her. You know what your uncle is going to say—the M word. But your mom—she might have some answers, or at least, some clues about your grandmother.”

I nodded.

“How are we going to keep your uncle from drinking the elixir?” Bree asked.

“Easy. We’ll tell him it’s for females.” I took a scrap of paper and wrote “DO NOT DRINK, FOR GIRLS ONLY” on it. “For a scientist, he’s wussy about all things female. If I mention tampons, he pretty much leaves me alone for a week.”

I really thought my note would work, and that the elixir wouldn’t.

I was doubly wrong.

I woke the next morning to the sweet smell of Janette’s lemony blueberry muffins. Rolling over, I faced Bree. She’d obviously just woken up as well. She had bed-head, mascara smudges, and a look of envy on her face.

“You are so lucky Janette Sparks is in love with your uncle,” she said.

“I know, right? And he doesn’t even appreciate it as much as he should. He’s definitely an “open a can of soup” type of guy. For him, food is fuel.”

“Janette can feed me anytime.” Bree inhaled deeply and lay back against the pillows with her eyes closed. “This is heaven. You don’t even know how lucky you are. At my house right now, I can guarantee you the littles are watching the cartoon network at top volume, Gabby is probably practicing her trumpet, Josh and Candace are fighting over the bathroom, Dad’s griping about someone spilling cereal on the floor, and the dogs are eating the spilled cereal.” Bree gave a happy little sigh. “And I’m here. The sun is shining. I can primp in a bathroom without anyone knocking on the door, and best of all, Janette’s muffins are here, too.” Bree’s eyes flew open. “Do you think your uncle will eat all the muffins?”

“Not a chance. She always sends over at least six, even though there’s only the three of us, including Mrs. Mateo. You can have my second one—and probably Mrs. Mateo’s, too. She doesn’t really like Janette.”

“How can anyone not like Janette?”

“I think she’s worried that if Uncle Mitch marries Janette—or anyone, really—she’ll be out of a job. She gets huffy whenever Janette comes over.”

Bree sat up. “Oh, I hope she’s huffy! Then we can each have three muffins!”

That sounded like a lot of muffins, but I rolled out of bed, eager to scope out the baked goods situation. “Let’s go.”

I padded down the stairs with Bree and her crutches behind me. I stopped on the landing so suddenly that Bree bumped into me. If I hadn’t grabbed the banister, we both would have toppled down the stairs. I pointed at the mirror hanging in the dining room.

Janette Sparks sat on Uncle Mitch’s lap. Their lips locked. He had his hands in her hair and . . . ew . . . just ew.

“Oh my gosh!” said Bree.

I flew down the stairs and into the kitchen. One jar of the elixir was empty. I glanced around for my “DO NOT DRINK, FOR GIRLS ONLY” sign and couldn’t find it. A breeze blew in through the slightly ajar back door. I ran to the porch, and spotted my note fluttering outside on the lawn. Tripping down the back stairs, I picked up my note. Morning dew had turned FOR GIRLS ONLY into a blur of blue ink.

I stomped back into the house, picked up the empty Mason jar and headed for the dining room.

The kissing couple continued their groping. Two empty teacups stood on the table beside little plates covered with muffin crumbs.

“Stop this!” I said.

Janette opened an eye to look at me, but Uncle Mitch just tightened his hold on Janette.

I held out the empty jar, like I was holding an exhibit. “Did you drink this?”

“Of course, they did. Just look at them,” Bree said.

“Uncle Mitch!”

He broke contact with Janette and looked at me with glazed eyes and bruised lips. He looked as if he’d never seen me before. “Why aren’t you at school?”

“It’s Columbus Day. No school.”

“Ah.” And then he went back to kissing Janette.

“Uncle Mitch!”

He pulled away from Janette, but kept his eyes on her lips. “Giddiness, racing heart, flushed skin and sweaty palms. Dopamine, norepinephrine and phenylethylamine releasing all at once!”

“Ew!” I said.

“Too much information, Uncle Mitch,” Bree said, trying not to laugh.

“Dopamine, the pleasure chemical, produces a feeling of bliss,” Uncle Mitch said.

“Oh, Mitch,” Janette sighed and cupped his face in her hands. “That is so romantic.”

“No, it’s not. It’s gross,” I said.

“Just wait,” Uncle Mitch said. “Someday it will happen to you.” He leaned back toward Janette to continue the make-out session.

Bree nudged me. “Ask if we can have their muffins.”

I shook my head, no longer hungry.

“The human body releases the cocktail of love rapture only when certain conditions are met,” Uncle Mitch murmured. “Men more readily produce it than women. Do you feel it?”

“Oh, I do,” Janette muttered back.

“I have
got
to give this to Dylan,” Bree whispered in my ear. Spinning on her crutches, she headed for the kitchen.

“This isn’t right.” I followed. “That is definitely not like Uncle Mitch. We can’t let him go on like that. He’s going to regret it,” I whispered.

Bree picked up a muffin and shook it in my face. “Is he? What’s the worst thing that can happen? He’ll end up married to Janette and have to face a life full of incredibly delicious baked goods.” She bit into the muffin and gave a moan of pleasure.

After another worried glance into the dining room, I went to the window. “Do you really think Josh is taking Lincoln fishing today?”

“Who cares about Josh and Lincoln? We have to find Dylan.” Bree licked her fingers.

“
That
,” I pointed at the dining room with a trembling finger, “proves nothing.”

“Right. We need more data,” Bree said. “That’s why we need to find Dylan. For science.”

Bree’s phone buzzed with a text. She looked at it and groaned. “I have to go home and watch the littles so my mom can run errands.”

“Okay. Let’s meet up when you figure out where Dylan is.”

My phone started buzzing when I got out of the shower. The international number told me it was my mom.

“Pansy?”

“Mom!” I pinned the phone between my ear and my shoulder while I stepped into my clothes. “I have so much to tell you!”

Mom’s comforting laugh sounded over the airwaves. “I’ve missed you, baby. How are you?”

“So strange . . . so many crazy things have been happening.” I pulled my sweater over my head and glanced out the window at the dark clouds forming over the horizon.

“Mmm, sounds like you need a trip to India, you’d love it here. There are monkeys, poppy fields that stretch forever, endless blue skies, and warm trade winds.”

A few raindrops pinged against my window.

“That sounds nice, but I—”

“You know you don’t have to take care of your Uncle Mitch, right?”

“I know . . . Mom, Uncle Mitch is . . .” I didn’t know how to find the words.

“He’s what, baby? Sick? Difficult?”

“No, he’s . . . Birdie gave me some of her spell books.”

“Evie! I told you not to listen to her!”

“You told me everything she said was a lie, so what harm could a love potion do?”

“You made a love potion?” Mom sounded more amused than concerned.

I told her about me and Bree making the potion, letting it steep in the moonlight, and leaving it out on the counter.

“And Mitch drank it?”

“Janette, too, I’m pretty sure.”

Mom huffed or laughed, I couldn’t tell which. “And now they’re in love?”

“Uncle Mitch is downstairs, right now, practically swallowing Janette Starks whole.”

Mom’s laughter rang out, and I had to hold the phone away from my ear.

“It’s disgusting!”

“I bet he doesn’t think so! I assume Janette doesn’t mind being swallowed?”

“No, she’s been bringing him baked goods for years and years. But don’t you think it’s strange that now, the morning they drank a love potion, they’re suddenly all kissy?”

“Don’t you think it’s strange your uncle waited until he was almost fifty to get kissy?”

“There’s more weirdness.” I told her about the sudden appearance of the dog and about Bree falling out of the tree after I told her to.

The laughter in my mom’s voice faded. “Sweetie, there’s a thing call connectivity. It’s a principle that thoughts are tangible and real—like organized energy.”

“That sounds like, as Uncle Mitch would say when he isn’t so dopey with love hormones, malarkey.”

“Ask him. He’ll tell you thoughts are degrees of light, invisible to our human eye, just like molecules, atoms, or protons. Thoughts are just as tangible as the chair you’re sitting on.”

“I’m not sure I believe that, but even if I did—so what?”

“Sweetie, when you control your thoughts, you control your world.”

“But I can’t control Uncle Mitch.”

“Of course not. But maybe by making the potion and leaving it available for him to drink, you subconsciously gave him permission to act on his pent up emotions.”

“Sounds like the M word, Mom.”

“Maybe so, but I promise you, your mind is much more powerful than a book of spells, or your grandmother and her voodoo.”

“Mom, what happened between you and Birdie?”

Mom sighed. “It’s complicated, but what it really boiled down to was that your grandmother had expectations I couldn’t meet.”

“You mean she wanted you to be a witch.”

“Well, yes. That was part of it.”

“And you thought the whole witch thing was bogus.”

Mom laughed again. “Bogus Birdie—that’s a good name for her.”

“I think she misses you.” I told her about how Birdie had enshrined her room.

Silence fell over the phone. “Your grandmother and I . . . when you’re older, I’ll tell you about it.”

“Don’t you think you should tell me now?”

“How’s this—you come and stay with me, and we’ll talk about my rocky relationship with your grandmother.”

“I want to go to school here. I don’t want to go to school with monkeys.”

“There are monkeys in every high school, no matter where you are.”

“But I want to stay here.”

“Even if you can’t go to Hartly?”

I nodded, even though I knew she couldn’t see me. “Did you like going to Faith Despaign?”

“It’s an excellent school, despite its peculiar past.”

“I know. I read about Faith Despaign.”

“But it doesn’t pretend to be a witch school. Almost everyone there was normal when I went there.”

“There wasn’t like a witch coven?”

“Of course there was. But I dare you to show me a school full of teenage girls without a few witches! I know you won’t find one.”

“And the dog and the love potion—”

“Connectivity, sweetie, connectivity.”

“I miss you, Mom.”

After telling her I’d think about coming for Christmas break, I turned on my laptop. While I waited for it to boot up, I glanced out the window. Drizzle had turned to full-fledged rain. Through the streams of water pouring down the window, I noticed the cat sitting on a branch, looking sad and wet.

I opened the window and it leaped inside. Ignoring me, she padded over to my bed, jumped up on my pillow and began to lick her wet fur. I thought about telling her she couldn’t stay, but then decided to call her Amber, after her eyes. When I closed the window, I saw Dylan’s car pull into the Hendersons’ driveway.

I grabbed my phone and shot Bree a text.
“Test monkey is on his way!”

Bree replied immediately.
“Get over here!”

I considered slopping through the mud and rain and decided against it.
“No. You deliver the package. I need to work on my English assignment.”
My mind itched with possible things I could write about. But before I even thought about my paper, I Googled connectivity and discovered Wallace D. Wattles and his
Science of Getting Rich
.