Little Red Gem (14 page)

But by the time I dragged
my legs through the bedroom door, my melancholy mood meant I could
barely manage the effort of slipping under the covers. I did,
though, and I piled them over my head to make a cave. These sheets
whiffed of something different than mine. Mom liked to wash our
linen in floral scents. I inhaled orange blossom. Ordinarily I
wouldn’t have cared which scent tickled me to sleep, but my cranky
mood made me want to lash out at everything. So I cried into the
pillow, telling myself I’d never get to sleep with this stupid
vapor trail of fruit.

In truth, I was angry
because I wanted to return from the grave in
my
body, not Audrey’s. I
wanted
my
life,
not Audrey’s. I wanted
my
problems, nobody else’s.

At home, on my bedside sat
a framed photograph of Leo and me, taken on our third date. I’d
packed a picnic and we’d hiked from my house into the woods.
Beneath a canopy of fir trees, we’d found the perfect place to have
a romantic lunch. Afterward, I’d lifted the camera in the air and
taken a photo of us lying on our backs amongst a bed of white wild
flowers. At night, I used to stare at the photograph until my eyes
grew too heavy to stay open.

Zipping home to hold the
photo frame would have made it easier for me to sleep. Trouble was,
when I’d been a ghost I’d simply wished to be somewhere and, hey
presto, I arrived, even if I did need someone to open the door.
Inside this mortal body I was bound by something more impossible -
rules and curfews. Even if I could figure out how astral projection
worked, I’d be an idiot to step one foot into the world where I’d
trapped my half-sister.

I should check up on her,
I told myself. Tomorrow. Or the next day at the very
latest.

Check up on Audrey.
Convince Leo to spend time with me in order to squirrel out the
depths of his love. Find a way to tell my mother that other than
being dead I was okay. Try not to dwell on the possibility that I
was fated to end up trapped in limbo like Anne and
William.

I had a lot to achieve and
I had no idea how much longer this spell would last.

***

Tossing and turning should
have been an Olympic sport. After two hours of it, and on my way to
winning a gold medal, I begrudgingly tossed aside the covers, got
up, and flipped open the laptop only to discover that Audrey had
her laptop protected with a password. I’d taken over her body, but
not her memory. Dejected, I then ripped the phone out of the
charger and gazed longingly at the blank screen. I’ll send a text
to Leo, I told myself. I used to send a goodnight text, and until I
did, I could never get to sleep.

Common sense prevailed and
I put the phone back on the desk. I don’t know how I managed, but I
eventually dozed off, thinking things could only
improve.

Chapter Seven

If yesterday rated high on
my too-hard register, the moment I set foot on the school grounds,
shivers along my spine signaled that things would not improve. For
a start, I’d slept in so I’d missed out on the opportunity to catch
Leo driving into the school parking lot. During the morning’s
lesson changeover I didn’t once set eyes upon him. And I
practically had to sever off Hannah’s arm in order to slip out of
her clutches when the lunch bell rang.

I rushed from class to the
courtyard, knowing Leo would be heading there after a history
lesson, and provided our timetables hadn’t changed in the past
week, the lunch room was the only place our paths would cross. I
spotted Leo heading straight for me and I clenched my fists, ready
to punch anyone who got in my way. He continued walking toward me
and I channeled my thoughts to him:

“
Look at me. Look at me.
For the love of god, LOOK AT ME!”

One second I was admiring
the top of Leo’s head and sending silent commands to notice
me.

The next second his head
lifted and his eyes clocked mine.

At the third strike he
looked away.

There were no words to
describe the blackness. What had gone wrong? The love of my life
had spoken to me yesterday, yet now I copped the cold shoulder. So
did everyone else, I noticed, when Leo walked past his usual table
and disappeared inside the boy’s toilets. I didn’t see him come
out. Then the bell rang and lunch was over.

The rest of the day was
spent as if walking in a thick haze. The despair would not leave
me, and by the time I got home Teri immediately noticed my forlorn
expression.

“
What on earth is the
matter?”

Tears gushed. I let them.
Teri devoured me in her motherly arms.

“
Is it school?” she asked.
“You know a problem shared is a problem halved.”

Shaking my head, I gently
pried myself out of her grip. “School’s not the
problem.”

“
Ah, so it’s a
boy.”

“
It’s not
just
a boy, it’s—”
Something warned me not to give away Leo’s identity. “It’s more
serious.”

“
Oh, sweetheart.” Teri
gently pressed my head back against her bosom and she stroked my
hair. “Boys can’t help but break our hearts. They don’t know any
better. And I know you don’t believe this, but if this boy doesn’t
like you, it’s not the end of the world.”

“
It
is
the end of the world, at least to
me it is. Anyway, I have a solution to my problem. Do you know how
to make a love potion?”

Teri’s smile wavered. “I’m
thrilled you finally want to learn magic, but there’s no such thing
as a love potion.” I must have had a stricken look on my face
because she quickly added, “There is, however, a love
spell
.”

My eyes lifted in hope.
“Do you know how to perform a love spell then? Please, I need to
know.”

“
Of course I do. But,
Audrey, I have to warn you, free will is impossible to
control.”

The butterflies in my
stomach, earlier crushed beneath the weight of a deflated ego,
began to stir with life once more. Hope. I clung to it like I’d
never clung to anything before.

“
Please. I want to
try.”

Teri slipped off into the
back room and returned carrying a handful of books which she placed
on the counter. She then swept aside the curtain separating the
store from a tiny back room. Inside the little room were a shelf
with mugs and a bench with a sink and kettle. She filled the
kettle, switched it on, and brought two mugs down from the shelf. I
dragged a stool over from the corner, surprising Oleander who
faithfully hissed at me. My confidence bolstered, I hissed
back.

“
Oleander, stop being a
brat,” Teri snapped, placing a teabag into each of the mugs and
reaching for the pot of honey.

“
You really know how to do
this?” I asked.

“
It’s been a while. You
want honey or sugar in your tea?”

Did I take sugar or honey
in my tea? I was too flustered to really care.
“Whatever.”

Teri dipped the spoon into
the honey pot and took her time to swirl the contents. She placed
the mug in front of me and paused with her mug hanging a breath
away from her lips.

She tilted her head
slightly, and said, “Some say a love spell is how I got your father
to fall in love with me.”

My insides chilled to
freezing. The man she was talking about happened to be my dad.
Simply because I didn’t know him very well, didn’t mean I was happy
that he had left my mom for Audrey’s.

Loosening my tight grip
around the mug, I arranged a smile on my face and tried to make my
voice light. “You cast a spell to make a happily married man fall
in love with you?”

Teri furrowed her brow,
but a moment later her features softened and she gazed off into the
distance. “Your father used to say I had him under a spell. I
fought his advances as long as I could. Suzanne Parker was a
friend. I did everything I could, but your dad can be charming when
he wants to.”

My mom and Audrey’s mom
were friends? This was news to me. But I was overlooking the most
important aspect of this announcement.

“
But. But he was married
to another woman.”

Teri took a casual sip of
her tea which only enraged me more. I had to put the mug down for
fear of throwing it in her face.

She sighed. “Suzanne
Parker had already filed for divorce by the time your father
starting courting me. Of course, as her friend, I told her about
your father’s attempts to convince me to go out with him. She said
she was over him but things got weird between us after your dad and
I got together. Anyway, it’s in the past. We talked a bit at Ruby’s
funeral so we’re okay again. I should invite her over for dinner.
What do you think?”

My mother had always
painted the picture of their relationship in shades of envy and
lust, yet somehow I knew Teri was speaking the truth. I felt
terrible for this slight shift in loyalty. How could I stay angry
with her when she was just as much as victim to Dad’s abandonment
as Mom and I were?

“
Yeah, dinner sounds like
a good idea,” I lied.

Teri hopped off the stool
and banged the mug into the sink. “So you want me to teach you how
to cast a love spell. They don’t work like on TV. You can’t make
someone fall in love with you. You can’t go against free
will.”

What about what I wanted?
“That’s fine. I still want to know how to create the
spell.”

Teri set aside a few items
occupying counter space and opened the largest of the books she’d
retrieved. “Right. For this to work you need a bunch of
ingredients, and then you need to take a long bath and infuse your
body with rose water.”

“
Great. What are the
ingredients?”

Teri read from the book.
“Rose water. White cord. Green candles. Charcoal. Pink candle. Rose
petals. Rose essential oil. Cinnamon stick. Gold pen. Glass bowl of
spring water.”

“
We have everything here
in the store, don’t we?”

Teri spent a few minutes
rummaging around in drawers and cabinets. “Drats. I’m out of
cinnamon sticks.”

I hopped off the stool,
suddenly anxious to walk off the inner turmoil resonating in my
bones from Teri’s announcement that my mother was the one who’d
orchestrated my parent’s separation. “No biggie. I’ll run to the
shops to get some.”

“
Make sure you go to the
supermarket at the west end of Main Street,” Teri added. “They have
organic products.”

“
Sure. Organics. Want to
make sure this spell isn’t harmful to the environment. And
afterward, the guy I’m hot for will notice me?”

Teri scowled. “Audrey,
this isn’t like giving someone a magic potion. You send the request
for love out to the universe and you wait for the universe to
answer. If the answer is yes, then this boy will notice you like
he’s never noticed you before. But magic can’t make someone love
you.”

“
But it’ll work, right,
otherwise, why have the spell in a book?”

Teri slammed the book
closed with a loud
thud
. “You haven’t listened to a thing I’ve said, have you? I’m
not sure I should let you do this.”

“
You have to. My very
existence depends on it.”

“
Oh, sweetie, if this guy
doesn’t notice you he really isn’t worth the trouble.”

She was wrong about
that.

I grabbed the car keys
from the bowl shaped like a cat on the bench behind the
counter.

“
What are you doing?” Teri
cried out in alarm.

“
Huh? Driving to the
supermarket to get organic cinnamon sticks like you
said.”

Even though I was supposed
to drive with a full licensed person in the car with me, all the
teenagers in town drove around on their learner’s
permits.

She stood with her hands
on her hips and I immediately saw the error. “I mean, how exactly
do you propose to drive to the store when you don’t have a driver’s
permit. Go upstairs and change into pants. You can ride your
bike.”

The escaping groan was one
hundred per cent mine, nothing to do with being inside a younger
teen’s body. I stomped up the stairs, hurling a nasty look at the
phone the moment I stepped into the bedroom because it still was
not fully charged, threw on a pair of leggings, and stomped back
down the stairs. When I made it outside, I glared at Audrey’s bike,
innocently leaning up against the wall in the garden, yet it caused
all sorts of cuss words to whirl around inside my head. No motor,
no radio, no comfy chair – it sucked to be fifteen.

After I’d slipped the
helmet on my head, Teri appeared. She leaned up against the wall
and folded her arms across her chest.

“
You’ve never wanted to do
magic before. This boy obviously has something to do with kindling
your interest. Magic isn’t something you do casually. You have to
totally embrace it.”