by Sarra Cannon
Mostly, I thought about Aldeen and all the witches who had died.
It hit really close to home for me. I’d almost been killed three times since I came to Peachville. The thought of being responsible for all those lives made me feel both humble and scared. For the first time, I think I really understood why everyone was so upset when I risked my life to save Jackson that night at the old hospital.
Friday, I was finally allowed to go back to school. It was great to see my friends, but it was Jackson I wanted to talk to. I needed to ask him about the guy in braids. When I first mentioned seeing that guy watching me, he’d had a strange reaction. His face had gone pale, like he recognized the guy I was talking about. He’d denied it so I let it go, but now, I needed to know for sure. I had to make sure I wasn’t in any danger.
Unfortunately, Jackson wasn’t at school on Friday.
“He hasn’t been here the past couple days,” Mary Anne said. “Maybe he’s sick or something.”
“Can demons even get sick?” I asked.
She shrugged. “Maybe he just got tired of coming to school since you weren’t here,” she said.
“I’m here today.”
“He probably doesn’t know that,” she said. “You could try to talk to him after school.”
I sighed. I couldn’t go to his place after school. I had to report to Mrs. Ashworth’s house to help decorate for the Halloween Ball tomorrow night.
Was he still even planning on coming with me to the ball? To be honest, I didn’t understand why we were even still having the damn thing. After what happened in Aldeen, it seemed tacky to celebrate anything right now.
“It’s our one hundredth year as a demon gate,” Brooke said while we were gathered in the tent behind the Ashworth house after school. We’d been given the task of decorating the tables. “There’s no way we could have canceled it. Not this year.”
“So no one else thinks it’s completely wrong to have a party so soon after a tragedy?” I asked.
Allison shrugged and avoided my gaze. Heaven forbid she disagree with Brooke for a change.
Lark gave me a tentative smile. “My mom says the best way to deal with the tragedy is to get back to normal routine and just remember to always be thankful for what we have here in Peachville.”
One of the cheerleader’s moms passed by us. She stared at me for a long time as if she was afraid I was just going to drop dead at any second. There was so much sadness and fear in her eyes, I had to look away.
“What does your costume look like?” Lark asked, changing the subject. She grabbed a box of black orchid centerpieces and started placing them on the silk tablecloths. “I have the most beautiful white wings. I’m so excited.”
I held back a groan. I completely forgot about finding a costume. We’d all decided to dress up as angels for the party. Lark thought it would be hilariously ironic.
But between the cheerleading competition, the attacks, the Heritage ritual and then what happened in Aldeen, this party had been the last thing on my mind.
“It’s going to be crowded enough without your wings getting in everyone’s face,” Brooke snapped. She had a clipboard in her hand and had been barking out orders all afternoon.
Lark scrunched up her nose and stuck out her tongue when Brooke turned her back.
I smiled for the first time all day.
“You’re still dressing like an angel, right Brooke?” Allison asked.
Brooke shrugged. “I’m wearing a white dress and a halo,” she said. “But I think wings are going to be annoying so I’m not wearing any.”
“Well, I’m wearing wings,” Lark said. “What are you wearing Harper?”
I used magic to float the rest of the centerpieces onto the tables. “I haven’t exactly decided yet,” I said.
Lark paused. “You don’t have a costume?”
I turned and adjusted one of the white tablecloths. “I’ll figure something out.”
Brooke sighed and rolled her eyes.
“What?” I snapped. I was seriously losing my patience with that girl.
“We all know you never wanted to come to this party in the first place,” she said. “But you’re supposed to be the future Prima. You’re supposed to set an example and be supportive of everything the Order does in this town.”
“Leave her alone, Brooke,” Lark said. She leaned in close to me and whispered, “Just ignore her. She’s been pissy ever since she broke things off with her boyfriend.”
Brooke and the governor’s son broke up? “When did that happen?”
Lark shrugged. “Last week, I think.”
“Whisper all you want,” Brooke said. There was a bite to her tone. “It won’t change the fact that you’re a terrible future.”
“You think you could do better?” I said, gripping the edge of the table.
Brooke flicked her eyes upward and crossed her arms. “Are you kidding me? I would be a much better Prima than you could ever be,” she said. “You don’t deserve it.”
“I never asked for this,” I said. “I’m doing the best I can considering I just moved here less than three months ago. Believe me, if I could just hand it over to you, I would.”
“Maybe you’ll get your chance,” she snapped.
“Something wrong, ladies?” Mayor Chen dropped a box of candles on the table between us. The tension between us so thick it hung in the air like a mist.
“No,” Brooke said with a forced smile. “Everything’s just peachy.”
That Smile
I’d almost gotten the hang of making wings when a knock on my bedroom door ruined my concentration.
“Who is it?” I called. There was a hint of irritation in my voice. I’d been on edge ever since Brooke’s comment earlier. What did she mean I’d get my chance? Was I reading too much into it?
“It’s me.” Mary Anne’s musical voice was unmistakable. “Can I come in for a sec?”
I sighed. “Sure, come on in.”
I turned my back to the mirror and stared at the sad excuse for wings protruding from my back.
Mary Anne laughed, then quickly brought her hand to her mouth. “Sorry,” she said. “Those, um, look great.”
I rolled my eyes. “Don’t lie,” I said. “They’re awful.”
“What are you doing anyway?”
I released the glamour and let the wings disappear. “Trying to figure out my costume for this stupid Halloween Ball the Order is throwing tomorrow night. A group of us are supposed to be going as angels,” I said. “Are you coming?”
“There’s a strict guest list for that party,” she said. “They never invite people like me. Only members of the Order and their families.”
“Jackson’s going,” I said. I ran my hand along the soft leather of his jacket. I still hadn’t had the chance to return it to him after that night at the gym. “Or at least I think he is.”
“Wow,” she said, sitting down on my bed. “How’d you manage to convince the Order to let him in?”
I shrugged. “I guess when you’re the future leader of the group, you get special privileges.” I looked at her and wondered why she wasn’t ever asked to join the cheerleading squad. “I bet I could get you an invite if you wanted to come. Maybe Courtney too.”
Mary Anne shook her head. “No way,” she said. “I would feel completely out of place. Especially since everyone knows about my family now.”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.”
“Why do you think you were never recruited onto the squad?” I asked. “I mean, before they knew your family wanted to take over the town and all.”
She smiled. “Yeah, that basically killed my chances, huh?”
I laughed. “It might have hurt a little bit.”
Mary Anne pulled a black velvet pillow into her lap and played with a frayed edge. “I don’t know,” she said. “I guess I never gave it too much thought.”
I wasn’t sure I believed that. Her family had spent nearly a century try
ing to break into the Order. Surely some part of her wondered why girls like Brooke and Lark were asked to join while more powerful witches like Courtney and Mary Anne were ignored.
“I was just thinking that it would make more sense if the Order welcomed any girl who had powers, you know?” I sat next to her on the bed. “Why exclude anyone?”
“You better not let the others hear you talking like that,” she said. “Somehow I don’t think the council would like to hear their future leader saying they should invite a traitor into their group.”
“You’re not a traitor,” I said softly. “You saved my life.”
The silence that followed held the weight of unspoken words. I knew Mary Anne still felt guilty about what her family had tried to do, but I also knew she wasn’t anything like her family. She proved that, and I really believed I could trust her. I got the sense that she still wasn’t ready to talk much about that night. She seemed to have a lot of conflicting feelings about her family. Her mother especially. I had seen her in her room a few times staring at that burned doll she took from her village.
I decided to change the subject. “So did you want to talk to me about something?”
“It’s not important,” she said. Her blue eyes lit up. “But you know what? I might have an idea for your costume.”
She grabbed my arm and pulled me out into the hallway. She looked both ways to see that no one was out there, then led me toward the stairs to the third floor. Not the secret third floor, but the small one with all the boxes in it at the end of the hallway.
We disappeared inside and Mary Anne closed the door softly behind us. “We’re not really supposed to be in here,” she said. “Ella Mae caught me in here once snooping around and told me that most of this stuff belongs to Mrs. Shadowford. She said I had no right to go looking through someone else’s stuff, and at the time, I agreed with her.”
“But?” I questioned, letting my eyes adjust to the dark room.
“But now, I think I just realized that Ella Mae was lying.”
Mary Anne pulled a chain that was attached to a light bulb suspended from the ceiling. I’d seen this room before, but only for a moment. It looked the same as I remembered. Mostly full of dusty boxes. Exactly what you’d expect in an attic.
“Lying about what?” I asked.
Mary Anne smiled and opened one of the boxes close to her. She pulled a sundress out and held it up for me to see. “I don’t think this stuff ever really belonged to Mrs. Shadowford,” she said. “I mean, seriously, can you see her ever wearing something like this?”
I laughed. “No,” I said. “I can’t.”
I peered into another one of the boxes. It was full of stuffed animals. A monkey. Several tattered bears. If this stuff didn’t belong to Mrs. Shadowford, then whose was it? My first thought was that it probably belonged to other girls like us. Foster home girls who’d come and gone.
Then, under a reddish brown bear, I saw a framed picture that stopped my heart.
The child in the photo couldn’t have been older than six or seven. Her blonde hair was pulled up into pig tails and she held the same reddish brown bear in her hands. It was the smile that I recognized first. I had inherited that smile.
“I think I know whose stuff this is,” I said. I turned the photo out so that Mary Anne could see. “I think all of these things belonged to my mother.”
Fallen Angel
With every new item I pulled from the dusty boxes, my heart grew a little bigger. Just holding so many things that once belonged to her was like being closer to her than I ever thought I could be.
Each dress or toy held a story in my mother’s life. Maybe if I could study the things in these boxes, I could piece together a story of her life.
I barely noticed the tears on my cheeks until one fell onto a piece of paper on my lap, smearing the ink. “Crap,” I said.
“Are you okay?” Mary Anne asked. “I had no idea these things belonged to your mother.”
I smiled through my tears. “Bringing me up here is the most amazing thing you could have ever done for me.”
Mary Anne leaned back against the wall, her shoulders relaxing.
I swiped at the stray tears on my cheeks. “What were you going to show me up here anyway? Something I could wear to the party?”
Mary Anne nodded and smiled, her blue eyes twinkling with excitement. She walked to the far side of the room and pulled a dress from the large trunk that sat against the wall.
My jaw dropped and a lump formed in my throat. It was one of the most beautiful dresses I’d ever seen.
“Just knowing it belonged to your mother makes it all the more special,” she said.
I took the dress and held it up against my body. “If Mrs. Shadowford sees me in this, she’s going to know we were snooping around up here.”
Mary Anne crossed her arms in front of her. “So what?” she said. “Even if she makes it out of her room long enough to get to the party, who cares if she sees you? These things rightfully belong to you.”
She had a point. Let Mrs. Shadowford get mad. She never should have kept these things from me in the first place.
“It’s black,” I said with a sniff. “We’re supposed to be dressing as angels.”
“Do you really want to walk in there looking just like Brooke Harris?” she said with a smile.
I laughed. No, I didn’t want to look just like Brooke. As of tonight, I was going to stop dressing the way she told me to. If everyone thought I was such a bad Prima Futura, why was I always trying so hard to use glamours and be someone I wasn’t just to please her and the rest of the Peachville Order?
Tomorrow night, I was going to take a cue from my mother and be different.
I would be a fallen angel.
Just Like Her
I stayed in the small attic room long after Mary Anne had gone to bed. I wanted to look through every box. Look at every picture.
When I found a full-length stand mirror toward the back of the storage room, I decided to try on my mother’s dress and make sure it fit. I stared in awe at my own reflection. I looked so much like her. We shared the same light blonde hair. The same soulful brown eyes.
And the dress was a perfect fit. The top was a boned corset trimmed in silk and adorned with black glass beads. The skirt billowed all the way down to the floor with layers and layers of chiffon and black lace. I looked like the perfect fallen angel.
I turned to study the dress from the side when something caught my eye. A shift in the surface of the mirror. I blinked, thinking maybe it was trick of the light. But when I turned again, the silver mirror became transparent. Instead of showing only my reflection, I could also see through the mirror to a small compartment on the other side.
I stepped behind the mirror to try to get a better view of the compartment, but there was nothing back there. Was this some kind of magic?
I studied the front of the mirror again. The compartment was inside the mirror, and I could just make out the shadow of a book laying inside. With trembling hands, I reached forward, letting my hand pass through the silvery surface and straight through to the secret hiding spot inside the mirror. I grabbed the book and pulled it free.
It was one of those basic composition notebooks. The kind you use in English class to write poetry or short stories. On front, in pretty script writing, was the name Claire. I held it close to my heart and twirled around, giddy with excitement.
I’d found my mother’s journal! I bet no one had ever seen this. The magic of the mirror probably made it so that no one but Claire could see what was inside. Except maybe someone who looked just like her.
I brushed off the top of the trunk beside me and sat down to read.
The Hardest Thing
June 20
I saw him again today. P. understands me more than anyone else in the universe. Ever since my parents died in March, I have felt so disconnected and alone, but P. makes me feel alive again. I’m falling in love, and I’m so scared that I wil
l never be able to tell him.
July 4
Fireworks over the lake. We sat on a blanket together at the town celebration and our pinkies touched in the darkness. His wife was right there in front of us gossiping with her friends. She didn’t say as much as two words to him the entire night. She always takes him for granted.
Their daughter is so beautiful with her dark black hair and pretty pale skin. She’s eight, but she’s just a tiny thing. She sat on my lap, and I imagined what my life would be like if she was my daughter instead. If I were older and married to her dad. I would love that life. I hate being a Brighton.
September 15
L. doesn’t understand. She thinks I’m making a huge mistake with P. If my mother or anyone in the Order found out, they’d… what? They wouldn’t hurt him, would they?
But how will they find out? We’re so careful to meet after midnight at the old Randolph house. No one ever goes out that way anymore. L. is the only one who knows. I hope I can trust her. She’s always been my best friend, but the way she talks lately, I wonder.
December 25
P. gave me a ring for Christmas. It’s not a diamond or anything fancy. Just a silver ring with a rose etched into the band. It’s the single most thoughtful gift anyone has ever given me. He said that if I had been ten years older and had gone through school at the same time he did, he never would have married M. I asked him why he stayed with her if he was so unhappy. He didn’t answer and I left feeling sad.
February 10
Tonight was our Valentine’s celebration. He’s going out with his wife on the real day, and believe it or not, I’m babysitting while they go out. Don’t know how his wife roped me into that one.
At least we had tonight. It was the most beautiful night of my life. He was all mine, and for the first time, I was all his. I never knew it could be like that. He brought the most romantic picnic to the Randolph house and we set up some candles and drank wine and stayed together until the sun came up. I love him so much it hurts.
March 8
P. says we can’t keep seeing each other.
