by Tegan Maher
“Oblivius recuro!” Without thinking too much about it, Hagatha whispered a different spell from the itchy one she’d planned. In fact, she couldn’t have said why she changed her mind because she didn’t remember doing so.
There, she thought, that ought to mess up the caroler’s plans quite nicely. She hung back when the group shuffled off to the next house and stood looking at the undecorated porch. To anyone with more than a withered raisin of compassion and a bit of fancy in their hearts, the porch might have looked sad stretched across the front of the house with nothing but an old rocking chair occupying the weathered floor.
Hagatha felt the wave of Frannie’s hatred for Christmas as the fog of it settled over her, but not the underlying pain at its root. Whether her blind spot came from a refusal to examine her own loneliness or from Frannie’s backfiring wishes was anyone’s guess.
Hate Christmas, do you? She sent the thought toward the woman hiding behind the closed door. You haven’t seen anything yet. In the far too many years she’d spent roaming around the mortal coil, Hagatha had learned one thing—well, she’d learned many things, but this one spoke to her wicked soul—people only hate the things they secretly want the most.
The woman lived in a house that looked like Scrooge’s vacation home, and she hated Christmas. What better way to get under her skin than to give her an overload of holiday cheer? Hagatha knew just how to make it happen.
2
No one was more surprised—or dismayed—than Gertrude Granger when she noticed Hagatha skulking around the Santa’s workshop section of her Christmas display the next morning.
“Well, hello, Hagatha. What can I do for you?” Gertrude stepped outside, looked both ways down the street to check for anything odd in her surroundings. Hagatha had a reputation for outlandish behavior, and it was always best to be prepared when she was around. Stories of the old witch bordered on legend, like the time she’d led a turkey parade through town—skyclad.
“Nothing. I was just inspecting the tinsel for…uh…quality control. You can’t be too careful with this stuff.” Reaching out, Hagatha tweaked a shred of glittery silver from the thick rope wound around the workshop’s porch railing. Butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth as she palmed the sparkling tuft, then slipped it into her pocket. “Real silver, I’d say. The genuine article. Am I right? What do you use on it to keep it polished to such a nice shine?”
It was no secret that Gertrude’s favorite topic was anything to do with Christmas. Once convinced Hagatha meant no harm, she launched into a long-winded and detailed lecture on the history of tinsel made from precious metals that included a whole treatise on the proper care of same.
“I could give you my recipe for the anti-tarnish spell if you want.” Once Gertrude warmed up to a subject, she could go all day without taking a breath.
Rarely did anyone get the better of Hagatha, but the sheer magnitude of Gertrude’s verbal assault shocked the old witch into beating a hasty retreat. Well, as hasty a retreat as one can manage using a walker for support.
“That woman could talk the ears off a field of corn and still have breath left to blow out the candles on a cake.” Hagatha stopped to catch her own breath and patted the pocket holding the scrap of tinsel she’d stolen. “She’s not going to be happy with me later.”
Talking to herself didn’t seem at all an odd thing to do. Hagatha spent most of her time alone by choice, and who better to talk to than herself, anyway? Most of the other town witches bored her to tears with how they kowtowed to the non-magical community. What was the use of having powers if you never used them?
And, she thought, it was about time to shake things up a little, and she appreciated the chance to force Christmas on a grouch and rile Gertrude up at the same time. A most efficient use of her powers, if Hagatha did say so herself. Nothing like a good twofer.
To that end, she beefed up the warming spell that kept her toes toasty in winter months, and as she walked back to Frannie’s, laid her own magic over the top of Gertrude’s on the piece of tinsel.
“Inobservatus,” Hagatha spoke the incantation, and while the spell didn’t exactly make her invisible, it did stop people from noticing her as she made her way along the street and back to Frannie’s front porch.
“Now, for a little fun.” She wound the tinsel around the stubby end of a nail sticking out from one corner of the railing, stepped back, and lifting her arms as if conducting an orchestra, set the spell to working. If she gave it a little extra oomph, well, it was the holiday season after all. Go big or go home wasn’t just Hagatha’s motto. It was her creed.
The piece of tinsel twitched once, then twice. Hagatha gestured with spread palms and poured on the power. Her laugh held wicked mirth—emphasis on the wicked. “Go, baby, go.”
One more twitch, and then the silvery rope twined and snaked around the rail, sprouting lights, bows, and sprigs of holly as it went. Large, plastic candy canes marched up the steps, lined themselves up alongside the porch railings, and as a final touch, a sparkling wreath bloomed on Frannie’s door.
Over at Gertrude’s house, Santa’s workshop began to look a little bare.
Inside, Frannie sat at her kitchen table and stared at the ham sandwich she’d made but didn’t want to eat. What was the point? Nothing tasted the same when flavored with loneliness. Nothing felt the same anymore. She couldn’t stand the sound of her own chewing.
Once, long ago, Christmas brought the sounds of bright laughter. Of family and friends coming together to eat, drink, and be merry. But one by one, the older generation had gone. Each one taking a piece of tradition with them.
First, the aunt who always brought the rum balls and never shared the recipe. Then the uncle who played the piano, which still sat silent in the front room.
Oh, her mother had tried to keep the traditions alive, to take up the slack, and when arthritis bent her fingers so she could no longer hold a spoon to stir, Frannie took on the task. Over the years, the guest list whittled itself down to just Frannie and her parents, and then Frannie and her father, and now, just Frannie.
What was the point of it all? With her husband gone and no children of her own, Christmas couldn’t be over fast enough to suit her. By this time next year, maybe the echoes of what she’d lost would stop resonating through her mind, stop pinging at her heart. Or maybe she’d feel like this forever. Frannie couldn’t see into the future, and even if she could, she didn’t want to look in case what she saw would be more of the same.
No one was coming this year, no one was left to care but her, and Frannie just didn’t anymore. She’d just as soon turn off the lights and sit in the dark until Christmas went away.
She no more than finished the thought when tinkling music broke the air, and Frannie stomped to the door, whipped it open to see where the sound was coming from.
“There, that ought to do it.” Satisfied, Hagatha turned to walk away. Over one shoulder, she flicked one more burst of power to set the lights twinkling in time with the music. She made it as far as the end of the wheelchair ramp when the wave of Frannie’s fury hit her. The old witch did her version of a happy dance—she shuffled her feet a little and shook her butt.
“I guess that kicked you right in the old, baggy Scrooge pants now, didn’t it?”
Busy congratulating herself on a job well done, Hagatha magically whisked herself home where she planned to make a nice batch of cauldron stew and think up an even better trick to play the next day. And so, she missed the rest of the show when Frannie stepped out her front door.
“What in the world?” Frannie eyed the brightly decorated porch. As she did, the stern lines of her face softened slightly. The neighbor’s two daughters, she decided, must have thought they were doing their good deed for the year. Bless their hearts; those girls had been good to her daddy, stopping by to hover next to the chair where he sat on the porch of an afternoon and regaling him with bright little stories about their day.
Those moments had been precious
to him, especially during those last few months when his smiles were hard-won from the pain.
She ought to make a nice batch of cookies, Frannie thought, just a little Christmas treat for those two sweet souls. And, she admitted grudgingly, the porch did look nice. Her father would have smiled. Frannie almost did, but she stopped herself just in time.
When the carolers arrived on her porch for the second night in a row—courtesy of Hagatha’s forget and return spell—Frannie left the light on even if she tried hard not to listen to the singing.
3
On the second day of what Hagatha considered the Great Scrooge Comeuppance, she geared up her walker and cast the waterproof and warming spell on her shoes. She’d spent half the night thinking up one dastardly spell after the other to throw at Frannie. In the wee hours of morning, she hit upon a plan that required no magic at all.
Very few people knew this about Hagatha, but the old witch had a soft spot for animals. People, she could do without as very few of them ever did anything interesting enough to be worthy of her time or attention. In animals, she found an endless source of entertainment.
For instance, a cat enjoyed a variety of moods and cared little for the desires of humans. As far as Hagatha was concerned, cats were very nearly perfect.
That is why, on her way to Frannie’s, she detoured past a certain barn where a litter of tabbies had reached just the right age to be liberated from the tedium of fighting over splashes of milk and the occasional supper of freshly caught mouse.
Bold as brass, Hagatha walked right past farmer Hank Bascome as he applied balm to a sore udder. She settled down on a bale of hay at the back of the barn and tucked her knobby knees up under her to watch the kittens pounce and tumble.
The fattest of the four ambled off first to sprawl with its belly up and slept while the others batted each other over the stray bits of hay that were their only toys. The little ginger, Hagatha noted, was the fastest, but she lacked the fire to defend herself and came away from every battle empty-pawed.
And then there was the inky black bundle of spit and fury with the Halloween orange eyes.
“You’ll do,” Hagatha cooed, and when he striped her hand for having the audacity to pick him up, she practically purred. “You’re perfect.”
Before you start to feel bad for the rest of the kittens, you should know that three children and their baffled parents woke up on Christmas morning that year to find furry gifts under the tree. But that’s another story for another time.
On this day, Hagatha lost a bit more skin as she tucked the black ball of fluff into the inside pocket of her coat, where the darkness and warmth promptly lulled the little beast to sleep until Frannie’s house came into view.
The porch, Hagatha noted, remained decorated. Score one for me, she thought, as she stomped up the ramp and conjured up a few things she thought the kitten would need. It was bad enough to drop the unsuspecting beastie off without so much as a by your leave; she could at least provide a few creature comforts when she did.
“This will push that crotchety old bat right over the edge,” she said with wicked glee. Had anyone reminded Hagatha that it takes one to know one, she’d have probably turned them into a toad.
Frannie sat at her kitchen table, contemplating a cookie on a plate, and wondering where the night had gone, for it certainly hadn’t passed in any sort of restorative sleep. After the flurry of activity around baking cookies, boxing them up, and stuffing them into the mailbox next door, she’d lapsed back into empty despair.
Everywhere she looked, she saw reminders of loss. The photo on the wall with Frannie in her wedding finery, flanked by her parents, beaming smiles on every face. Next to that one, a photo of her husband taken just days before the accident that took him from her. Her father’s favorite chair. Her mother’s sewing machine.
Maybe selling everything and moving home to care for her father had been a hasty decision, but she’d have done it all the same if given the chance again.
Mired in such thoughts, Frannie jumped when she heard hammering at the door.
“What in the world?” She rose and went to look.
Outside, as she heard Frannie’s steps coming closer, Hagatha clapped her hands in anticipation and wiggled her hips as much as she could given the rigors of her advanced years.
“Doesn’t he just look adorable,” Hagatha had attached a pretty red ribbon to the kitten’s collar and tied into a perky bow to make him look sweeter than his actual disposition. “You’ll take him in thinking he’s as sweet as he looks, and then get the surprise of a lifetime, you just wait and see.”
Frannie heard none of that, saw no sign of Hagatha, only the kitten in the cardboard box who gazed up at her with orange eyes. Again, she stepped outside, looked up and down the empty street for a glimpse of whoever brought her such a gift.
If the tear in Frannie’s eye melted so much as a fraction of Hagatha’s resolve, the witch pretended otherwise as the kitten, blast his wretched soul, not only let himself be lifted gently from the box but purred like a little engine. Anyone else would have found the sight enchanting when the tiny beast rubbed his head against Frannie’s chin and snuggled against her bosom as if he’d finally found the human of his dreams.
Hagatha’s hip wiggle turned into a foot stomp as she watched her dirty deed go down in flames. Old Mrs. Scrooge wasn’t supposed to enjoy her comeuppance, she was supposed to cower before the wonder of Hagatha’s magic and then see the error of her ways. Skipping the cowering wasn’t part of the plan.
While Frannie and her new friend went back inside, Hagatha took a seat on the rocking chair to revise her plan. She rocked and thought, thought and rocked. What else besides decorations and presents marked the season for humans?
Then it came to her. Food.
“Rain of fruitcake?” She mused. “No, too messy. Life-sized gingerbread men could be fun.” She pictured the look on Frannie’s face when a giant cookie showed up on her doorstep. “Probably get the coven all riled up, and then I’ll have Mag Balefire breathing down my neck.”
Of all the witches in the area, Mag was the only one Hagatha had come up against with enough magic to rival her own. If the younger witch hadn’t been raised a Balefire, Haggie thought, and a stickler for the rules when it came to dealing with mortals, we could have had some fun.
“Better keep my head down on this one before she shows up to spoil my good time.” Not that it had been much of a good time so far. The way Hagatha saw it, she’d scored only one point so far with the decorating, but the kitten debacle canceled it out.
Meanwhile, inside the house, Frannie went through the items Hagatha had so thoughtfully provided for the kitten’s care. A litter box, a tufted pillow for sleeping, and some food.
“I guess we’ll get along just fine so long as you don’t scratch up the furniture,” she said to the cat, who blinked and purred at her. The sound broke up the terrible silence in the house, and for the first time in the weeks and days since her terrible loss, Frannie truly smiled. Having another warm body around, even one as small as a scrap of kitten, made a difference in her outlook.
Had Hagatha known how big a difference, she might have popped a blood vessel at the way her trickery kept backfiring. But as I said before, wishes have minds of their own, and any born of Hagatha’s magic were apt to run as wild as the east wind ahead of a storm.
As she rocked, an even better idea came to the witch. One that made her cackle with glee and rub her fingers together until a red balloon appeared between them. She fitted her mouth to the stem, and blew, mixing a spell in with the air, and then tied the stem off with a complicated knot. Next, she spun the red bubble between her hands and whispered another spell to coat its surface, making it lighter than air, and then let it go.
The balloon bobbed and swayed and rose high above the town. When she judged the time as right, Hagatha held up her left hand, index finger pointed, thumb lifted high to simulate a gun, and said, “Pow,” as she pulled the tr
igger. The balloon popped, dispersing her spell in an arc above the town.
“Get ready for tomorrow, Christmas hater. You’re really in for a show, then.”
Her wicked deed done for the day, and this one was foolproof if she did say so herself, Hagatha went on home where she spent the rest of the evening toasting her toes near the fire and occasionally giggling over what was to come.
Across town, Frannie ran her fingers through the inky silk behind the kitten’s ears and listened to the carolers sing.
4
The day before Christmas Eve dawned as the town of Harmony sat quiet under a dusting of fine snow and magic. Hagatha rose before first light, tossed a mug of pumpkin juice into the microwave—a great invention, right up there with the automatic clothes washing machine and the air popcorn popper. When it suited her, which was any time it made her life easier, she embraced technology. Not that she went nuts and brewed her potions in the gadget or anything. The cauldron hanging over her hearth doubled as a soup pot when she wasn’t brewing up something else, but for that first morning cuppa, she’d go with speed over tradition.
Looking out the window, she reveled in the sparkle of white still drifting down in fitful sprinkles. The timing of the spurt of bad weather made for a perfect delivery system for her spell.
By the time she’d drained the last drop from her cup, the name Frannie Shaw had flitted through the thoughts of every person in Harmony who’d ever known her. Cookies, pies, fruitcakes, and in one case, an extra ham went into boxes to be dropped off at her house during the day.
To Hagatha, a parade of people in and out of her house sounded like pure torture, and she expected Frannie to feel the same. Nothing like dealing with a steady stream of well-wishers all day to chap the backside even if Frannie’s bar might be set a little higher when it came to how many people were too many.
