Merry Meet

by Isobel Bird

  Something else still bothered her about the breakup. She was trying hard to convince herself that it was Scott who was making the mistake. But maybe it wasn’t Scott. Maybe she had made a mistake in the first place by using magic to get him to notice her. Maybe the breakup just meant the magic had finally run out. It was possible that Scott had never really been interested in her in the first place. She’d been letting herself believe that the spell was over and that Scott was with her because he wanted to be. But now she thought she might have been wrong all along, and that the breakup was what she deserved. That was even harder to take than the idea that they’d split up because he was going off to college.

  She was able to distract herself on Sunday by helping her father at his sporting goods store after church. Putting price tags on cans of tennis balls normally bored her out of her mind, but on that particular day the repetition of picking up a can, running the pricing gun over it, and putting the can on the shelf lulled her into a state of half consciousness in which she was able to not think about anything at all.

  But then Monday had come. Just as she’d feared, the news about her breakup with Scott was already all over school. When she walked to her locker, she found Tara, Jessica, and Sherrie waiting for her with mournful expressions on their faces.

  “I am so sorry,” Jessica said, putting her arm around Kate.

  “Sherrie told us what happened,” Tara added. “And if you ask me, Scott’s a big loser.”

  “I’ve already made up a list of potential new boyfriends,” Sherrie said. “Do you want to go over them?”

  “Later,” Kate said. “But thanks for the thought.”

  The rest of the day was a blur, mainly because Kate spent every moment trying not to run into Scott. Besides, she got tired of everyone acting as if someone had died. Cooper was the only person who didn’t offer her condolences. “Good riddance,” was her succinct appraisal of the situation, and for once Kate appreciated her friend’s cynicism.

  The only other person who didn’t seem upset for Kate was Sasha. “It’s sad and all,” she said at lunch. “But he’s just a guy, right?”

  Kate wished she could be as independent as Sasha seemed to be. When she liked a guy, she wasn’t afraid to say so. But she didn’t seem to need them around her, like Sherrie did, or to hide her interest in them, the way Cooper did. She just took them as a matter of fact.

  As for Scott, he’d kept a low profile all day. Kate had only seen him once, as she was walking to history after lunch, and he had turned and gone the other way when he noticed her coming.

  “Running away with his tail between his legs,” Sasha said, then made sounds like a dog scurrying off in fear, making Kate smile in spite of her unhappiness.

  By Tuesday night, Kate was feeling better. If Scott wanted this breakup, that was fine with her. It didn’t matter if the reason had been the spell’s wearing off or something else. The fact was, she didn’t need him around to be happy. For once she was going to take a lesson from her friends. If Sasha could be independent, then so could she. As she walked into Crones’ Circle for the second witchcraft class, she was determined to have a good time.

  There were fewer people at the second class. Kate noticed, as she and her friends took their seats, that some faces were missing. She quickly made note that Tyler was there again before looking away unconcerned. She was glad to see Lea was still there, though. Something about the way the older woman carried herself appealed to Kate. I bet she’s never waited around for any man, Kate thought, giving Lea a smile.

  The second class was led by Anya, another member of the Coven of the Green Wood. Anya was a thin, almost bony, woman with brown hair that she wore in two long braids. She moved her tiny hands like bird wings when she talked, and watching her made Kate think of a sparrow hopping from tree to tree.

  “Our topic tonight is magic,” Anya said. “Last week we talked a little bit about what witchcraft is. When most people think of witchcraft, they think of magic. So we thought we’d spend a little time talking about what magic is, what it does, and what it should and should not be used for.”

  Anya picked up a pot that had a small plant growing in it. “This is a lavender plant,” she said. “I grew it from seeds that I started indoors about a month ago. When it’s warm enough, I’m going to plant it in my garden.”

  Kate didn’t understand what Anya was getting at. Sure, a lavender plant would be pretty, but it was hardly magic.

  “It took a lot for that little seed to become this plant,” Anya continued. “The seed contained everything it needed to make the plant, but without the help of the water and the light, it would have stayed dormant. And without more of it, the plant won’t bloom and fill my garden with its fragrance. In a way, magic is like the water and the light. We have the potential to make all kinds of things happen. But if we don’t find ways to use that potential—to nourish it—then nothing happens.”

  “You mean the magic is already in us?” asked a woman in the back.

  “That’s right,” Anya said. “Many people mistakenly think of magic as something mysterious or supernatural. It is, in a way, because it’s something extraordinary. But true magic is simply finding ways to make the things happen that we already have the ability to make happen.”

  “Can you give us a concrete example?” asked Lea.

  Anya thought for a moment. “Suppose I need money,” she said. “Maybe I need six hundred dollars to pay for repairs on my car. I might do a spell in which I ask for money to come my way. A few days later, I might get a raise at work, or someone who owes me money might pay me back. I might even get a tax refund I didn’t know was coming.”

  “But that’s not magic,” the first woman said. “That’s just luck.”

  “Is it?” asked Anya. “What is magic? It’s removing the obstacles that are preventing you from getting what you want or need. When I do a ritual or cast a spell, I’m really asking for help in finding ways around the obstacles that are in my way. If I need money, I look for ways that I can get that money. I don’t expect it to just fall out of the sky.”

  “But what if you just want something?” Sasha asked. “I mean, like what if you see a really great leather jacket, but you can’t afford it. Shouldn’t you be able to do magic and just get it?”

  “That’s a good question,” Anya said. “Do you think you should?”

  “Sure,” said Sasha. “If I can do magic, I should be able to get what I want out of it.”

  “What do the rest of you think?” Anya asked.

  Kate thought about the question. She certainly had experience getting something she wanted with magic. And she could definitely confirm that sometimes what you ended up with wasn’t at all what you thought it was going to be. But she didn’t really want to tell the whole class her story, so she kept quiet. She looked at Annie and Cooper, and she knew they were thinking the same thing. After all, they all been through the experience with the mixed-up spells together, and they’d all done magic that had backfired in one way or another.

  “I don’t think you should use magic like a credit card,” Annie said carefully, breaking the silence. “If all you do is take, take, take, then what’s the point?”

  “The point is that you have what you want!” Sasha said. “Why should you have to work so hard for everything when there’s magic?”

  “These are all good arguments,” said Anya. “And they all bear discussion. What we’re going to do tonight is break into groups again for a special exercise. If you can, stay with the group you were in last time. If someone from your group is gone, then just go with another group.”

  Kate tensed. She’d been dreading seeing Tyler again, and now she was going to have to be in a group with him. So far she’d managed to avoid talking to him since coming into the class. But now she found herself seated in a group with him. He was holding an envelope in his hands.

  “This is our assignment,” he explained, waving the envelope at the others. “In here is a piece of paper with
a problem on it. We have to come up with a magical way of solving the problem.”

  “Great, a magical SAT test,” Kate griped.

  “Kate, why don’t you open the envelope and see what our problem is?” Tyler suggested.

  I already know what my problem is, Kate thought. Guys. She took the envelope from Tyler and opened it.

  “’You’re having problems with someone at work or school,’” she read. “’For some reason, the person seems to have it in for you and is making your life miserable. What kind of magical work can you do to make things better?’”

  “I know what I’d do,” Sasha said instantly. “I’d come up with something to make the person really sorry for being mean to me. Maybe a spell to make her unpopular.”

  “That might not be the best way to go,” Lea suggested. “Remember, witches believe that whatever kind of energy you send out comes back to you three times as strong. If you send out negative energy, you might find yourself on the receiving end.”

  “Then, what would you do?” Sasha asked. “If the person is determined to get you, I don’t see what other choice you have.”

  “Maybe the other person is unhappy,” Lea suggested, “and is just taking out all of that frustration on you.”

  “Or maybe she’s mad at you because she thinks you did something you didn’t really do,” suggested Kate, thinking about her own experiences with magic gone astray.

  “How would you address those things with magic?” Tyler asked.

  Kate thought for a minute. “I might do a ritual where I imagined all of my own anger at the person flowing out of me and being replaced by good thoughts about her,” she suggested.

  “Or maybe you could work some kind of a spell designed to make her feel better about herself,” Lea said. “I’ve certainly had a lot of trouble in my own life with people who treat others badly because they’re unhappy about something.”

  “That seems like a waste of time,” Sasha said. “I like the more direct approach. You see something you want—you get it. You need something fixed—you fix it.”

  Anya was walking around the room, listening to the different groups talk. She was standing by Kate’s group when Sasha spoke.

  “Kate and Lea are right,” Anya said. “Sometimes the answer to a problem has to be found in an unexpected place. You might think the answer is to somehow stop the person who’s giving you a hard time. But it might work better to try to establish a different kind of relationship with her instead. Remember what we talked about—magic should be used for removing obstacles, not for plowing through things like a bulldozer.”

  “I still think my way is better,” Sasha said. “I’ve done lots of spells, and they’ve always worked out just fine.”

  “Really?” said Tyler. “What kind of spells?”

  Sasha shrugged her shoulders. “All kinds,” she said. “Spells to get money. Spells to get things. Spells to make people stop talking about me. Once I did this spell where I took a picture of a girl who had taken something from me and I set it on fire. The next night, her house burned.”

  Everyone looked at Sasha in shock.

  “Oh, it was okay,” Sasha said. “She didn’t die or anything. It just burned down her house. But she deserved it, right? I mean, she stole stuff from me.”

  “I think it’s time to hear how the other groups made out,” Anya said. “Why don’t we all go back to our seats.”

  The groups broke up, and Anya continued the class. She asked different people how their exercises had gone. Most of the groups had found interesting solutions to their problems. Kate found it intriguing to see how different people approached their challenges. She’d never really thought about all of the different ways that magic could be used. Like Sasha, she had sort of seen magic as a way to make things happen more easily. But looking at it that way had gotten her into a lot of trouble, and she knew that it wasn’t the way to do things.

  As shocking as Sasha’s revelations had been, maybe she did have a point about something. Maybe there were times when it was important to just go for something you wanted. Maybe, instead of waiting around for Scott to ask her out in the first place, she should have just asked him. She’d been too afraid to do that. She was afraid he would say no, or that he would laugh at her. She was afraid that people would make fun of her if they found out that she had asked a guy out.

  But why shouldn’t she ask a guy out? Why should she wait around for him to ask?

  She glanced over and noticed Tyler sitting a few people away from her. He was watching Anya intently, nodding as she spoke. Kate looked at his face. He really was cute. And he had asked her out.

  She tried to concentrate on what Anya was saying. But her mind kept going back to Tyler. Would it hurt her to go out with him? But she’d just broken up with Scott. It hadn’t even been a week! She was supposed to be all brokenhearted. But why? Why should she sit around crying just because a guy was too stupid to know a good thing when he saw it?

  Anya was ending the class, but Kate hadn’t heard anything she’d said during the past five minutes. As soon as people started getting up, Kate walked over to Tyler, who was helping to put away the folding chairs. Her heart was beating a mile a minute. So, this is what it feels like, she thought as she tried to think of what to say. I wonder if this is how guys feel when they ask us out.

  “Hi, Tyler,” she said.

  He turned and looked at her. Suddenly she felt frozen to the spot. She almost said good night and walked away, but then she thought about getting what she wanted and not being afraid.

  “I know I said I was busy last week when you asked if I wanted to get together,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady. “But this week is a lot better. So I was wondering if you still wanted to do that. Get together, I mean.”

  Tyler smiled. “Sure,” he said. “How about Thursday?”

  “Thursday?” said Kate, trying to think.

  “You know, the night before Friday. I have something on Friday, but Thursday is good for me.”

  “Thursday is great,” Kate said. “How about we meet here at six?”

  “Six it is,” Tyler responded. “See you then.”

  Kate turned around and saw Annie, Cooper, and Sasha watching her with big grins on their faces.

  “You go, girl!” Sasha whispered.

  “I knew you could do better than Dumbo,” Cooper added.

  “And you did it all without magic,” Annie said proudly.

  “I did, didn’t I?” Kate said, realizing exactly what she’d just done. “I think that calls for a little celebration. Let’s go to the ice cream place around the corner. Double scoops on me.”

  Chapter 9

  Kate had been reading the same paragraph for fifteen minutes. She was standing in front of one of the shelves at Crones’ Circle, passing the time by looking at a book about moon rituals. But she couldn’t concentrate, and finally she closed the book and put it back. She wandered over to a mirror and checked her hair in it.

  “You look fine,” said Tyler, coming up behind her unexpectedly.

  Kate blushed. “I didn’t hear you come in,” she said.

  “Apparently,” said Tyler. “Are you ready to go?”

  “Sure,” said Kate. “What did you have in mind?”

  “I don’t know,” he replied. “You asked me out, remember? I figured you’d have the whole thing planned out. But you didn’t even bring me flowers.”

  Kate laughed. “Fair enough,” she said. “Well, how about we grab something to eat at the burger place by the pier?”

  Tyler agreed, and they walked down the street toward the waterfront. At six, it was already getting dark, and the twilight sky was purple and gray. Inside the restaurant, Kate led Tyler to a booth in the back and sat down.

  “I love this place,” she said. “My father used to bring me here when I was little. They make great shakes.”

  “I’ll have to try one,” Tyler said. “My mom is a strict vegetarian, so we don’t usually eat in places like
this.”

  “Your mom seems really great,” Kate said as the waiter brought them menus and glasses of water.

  “She is,” Tyler said. “She’s actually fun to hang around with. I know that sounds weird, but it’s true.”

  “It’s not weird,” Kate said. “I like my parents too. Only I could never talk about you-know-what with them.”

  “You-know-what?” Tyler asked.

  “Witchcraft,” Kate said in a low voice.

  Tyler laughed. “Oh, that.”

  “My parents would never get it,” Kate said. “You’re lucky that your parents do.”

  “Only my mother,” Tyler said. “My father is actually very anti-Wiccan. In fact, he tried to take my sister and me away from my mom when they divorced.”

  “He did?” Kate said, surprised. “Can they do that?”

  Tyler nodded. “It happens a lot. He tried to convince the judge that my mother was practicing some kind of weird religion or that she was in a cult. My sister and I had to go to psychologists and psychiatrists and take all kinds of tests showing we were normal and healthy and happy before the court would let her keep us.”

  “Do you still see him?” Kate asked.

  “Oh, yes,” Tyler said. “Every other weekend. That’s what I’m doing tomorrow night, in fact. He’s taking us to the opera.”

  “Sounds dull,” Kate said.

  “It’s actually okay once you get used to it,” Tyler said. “The worst part is when he goes on and on about how wacky pagan people are. He thinks all of my mom’s friends are crazy. And the worst part is, he makes my sister and me go to private school.”

  “That explains why you’re not at Beecher Falls,” Kate said. “I was wondering about that.”

  “Part of the divorce agreement was that my sister and I have to attend St. Basil’s,” Tyler said.

  “A Catholic school!” Kate exclaimed.

  “My father thinks it will save us from my mother’s influence,” Tyler said. “But my mother thinks it’s kind of funny. The nuns are all terrified of her because she comes in wearing her pentacle and insisting that Rebecca and I be excused on pagan holidays.”