Witch Ways (7 page)

“Well, what happened to him?” Lincoln wanted to know.

“He died,” she said.

“Oh,” Lincoln said. “How come?”

“Not an appropriate question, love,” his mom told him.

“It’s all right,” Janette said. “My husband died of a heart attack. It was a long time ago.”

“Lincoln, you need to walk the dogs,” Mrs. Henderson said with a sigh.

“All of them?” His voice squeaked.

Mrs. Henderson nodded.

“Even Penguin? He’s too slow.”

“Good,” Bree muttered.

While Lincoln bashed around in the mudroom, trying to harness the dogs, Mrs. Henderson, Janette, and Bree turned their attention back to me.

“It’s a lot to ask,” Mrs. Henderson said.

“We can’t ask anyone else,” Bree said.

“What about Erin?” I asked, even though I thought I knew the answer.

Bree, Mrs. Henderson, and Janette each glanced at each other, as if silently coming to an agreement.

“Erin had to back out of the play,” Mrs. Henderson said. “She took a role in the Nutcracker Suite.”

That
surprised me. “When? Why?”

Bree shrugged. “You’ll have to ask her,” she said with a small satisfied smile.

“We knew you would want to step in and help Bree,” Janette said.

“And you can totally do it,” Bree put in.

“But what if you don’t get your cast off in time?” I asked, my heart skipping while I thought about playing the leading role. I was pretty happy as a Munchkin. “Do I have to dance?”

“Are you okay with singing the solos?” Janette asked. “Mrs. Olson said she’d help you.”

I knew I could sing. I also knew I couldn’t dance.

“We’ll modify the dances,” Mrs. Henderson said.

“Yeah, no reason for you to have to learn those since I’m going to get my cast off in time anyway,” Bree said.

Mrs. Henderson looked at her sympathetically before turning back to me. “Mrs. Olson said she could help you with the music Wednesday after school. Does that work for you?”

I nodded. Even though I had expected something like this, the reality of it smacked me in the face, taking away my breath. I felt confident about filling in during the rehearsals, but what if Bree wasn’t better by opening night? She couldn’t be Dorothy with a giant pink cast on her leg.

“Lincoln,” Mrs. Henderson called out. “I want you to run upstairs and bring down the ruby slippers.”

Lincoln groaned. “I just got the dogs roped up!”

“Take them with you,” Bree said.

While Lincoln and the dogs trooped through the kitchen, Janette showed me the scripts and handed me the score, but when Dylan and Josh walked in—both without their shirts—I pretty much lost all interest in anything Oz related.

The next day when I passed Dylan in the hall, he looked right past me. I thought about bumping into him, or throwing my books at his head, but instead, I swallowed my disappointment. It was a lot easier going down than my tuna sandwich at lunch.

Court must have noticed, because she whispered, “Why do you keep staring at Dylan Fox?”

I glanced at Ryan and Austin, not wanting them to overhear. They were arguing about a video game involving werewolves and she-demons.

“I know him. Or at least, I met him.” I shrugged and tried to look like I didn’t care. “I’ve seen him without his shirt, and that should mean something. I should at least get a hello.”

“Not with guys like him,” Court said.

I looked down at my sweater dress. It was on its second day, and everyone knows you can’t wear the same thing two days in a row. But since it was the only navy or gray thing I owned, I felt like I didn’t have any other choices. I wasn’t about to wear something colorful. I’d stand out like a butterfly in a swarm of moths. I had thought about wearing my black dress, but I didn’t want to look like I was in mourning, and since it was what I wore to Grammy Jean’s funeral, I was pretty sure that was exactly how I would look.

“How do you know him?” Court asked.

“He’s friends with my neighbor.”

“Oh, lucky you,” she crooned.

“Not feeling so lucky. More like snubbed.”

“Don’t let him bug you.” Court motioned at a tall, reed-thin blonde lounging at Dylan’s table. “See her?”

I nodded.

“That’s Heather, his ex.”

“She’s wow. Just wow.”

Court nodded. “And she’s still in love with him.”

“How do you know?”

“Everyone knows. It’s totally obvious.” Court bit into her apple and chewed. “I’m just telling you the competition is steep.”

“I don’t want him to like me . . . or at least not in that way.”

“No?”

I flushed. “Well, maybe I do, but even if he doesn’t—don’t you think he should at least say hi? You know, acknowledge me?”

Court wagged her head back and forth, looking somber. “You want too much.”

“I guess.” After another look at Ryan and Austin, I leaned closer to Court. “What can you tell me about him?”

Court chewed thoughtfully. “He’s rich, but you probably knew that from his car.”

I nodded.

“He’s captain of the tennis team.”

So, I’d guessed that spot on.

“Why do you look like that?” Court asked.

“Like what?”

“I said tennis, and you looked as if I said Disco.”

I rolled my eyes. “I was just thinking it’s probably a good thing we’re not friends.”

“Why’s that?”

“I can’t play tennis.”

“Why not?”

“I’m super clumsy.”

Court looked at me as if I’d admitted to having a flesh-eating virus. “No.”

“Really truly. And if we were friends, maybe he’d ask me to play tennis, and then . . . it’s just safer for everyone if I’m not holding a racquet.”

Court put down her apple core. “I’m going to teach you how to play tennis.”

I shook my head. “It’s hopeless. And a little dangerous.”

“Look, if you want to see the king of the forest, you have to play in the woods. You have to hang in his natural habitat.”

I sighed. “You’re right.”

“I know I am. If you want him to notice you, you have to go to where he hangs out. This is my new mission,” Court stated.

“What is?” Ryan asked, dialing into our conversation.

“I’m going to teach Evie how to play tennis.”

“Cool,” Ryan said. “Can I watch?”

“No,” I said.

“I want to play,” Austin said.

I shook my head. “This is not happening.”

“Oh, it’s happening,” Court said.

“I’m riding the bus home tomorrow,” I said to no one in particular, hoping to change the subject.

“Oh yeah,” Ryan said. “Me, too. Where do you get off?”

“Leroy Street.”

“That’s right before my exit!” Ryan said.

“Great. Save me a place.”

“Nice try, but that has nothing to do with anything,” Court said. “But tomorrow, we’re eating lunch by the courts. Do you have tennis shoes?”

I shook my head.

“I’ll bring you my old pair until you can get some,” Court said.

During English, I battled sleep while the teacher, Dr. Price, yammered about Charles Dickens’s
Bleak House
. Dickens also wrote
Hard Times
. At least we didn’t have to read both. Because school had started two weeks ago, and the advanced English class had assigned summer reading, I was thousands of pages behind, with
Bleak House
making up about eight hundred pages of that. Fortunately, I had already read some of the books, and I liked to read. Just not about bleak houses. If he were alive today, Dickens would probably write a book called
This Sucks
.

And I hoped it didn’t matter, because I wanted to swap advanced English for the journalism class.

I was seriously struggling to take in the class discussion until some girl on the front row raised her hand and said, “Mrs. Price, because I was curious, I did some research on spontaneous human combustion.”

My first thought was,
kiss-up
, but then the phrase spontaneous human combustion caught my attention.
Human combustion?

“Very good, Vanessa,” Mrs. Price adjusted her bottle lens glasses so she could focus on Vanessa.

Vanessa, whose glasses mimicked Mrs. Price’s, looked exactly like the sort of girl who would do unassigned research.

“But the thing to note is even though we might not believe in spontaneous human combustion, Dickens did.” Mrs. Price settled her ample bottom on the edge of her desk. “A more important question might be why Dickens chose to employ this rather nasty end for poor Mr. Krook?”

No. That was not the important question. The important question was
spontaneous human combustion?

Ryan raised his hand. “I think it was a simple way for Dickens to off a character.”

Off a character?

I put my hand on my forehead, trying to gauge my temperature. I found it pretty much impossible to think about anything else for the rest of the day.

When I got home, I found a plate of warm chocolate chip and butterscotch cookies on my nightstand next to a stack of books. I wondered about the cookies, but not for very long, because chocolate chip and butterscotch cookies were my absolute favorite. I didn’t see the note beneath the plate until I’d eaten about half of a cookie.

I know you must have questions. Perhaps these books will answer a few. Come to my house for lunch on Sunday. I’ll pick you up at 1:00. Birdie

The cookies were still warm, making me wonder when she’d come by. Mrs. Mateo hadn’t mentioned her dropping in.

I went to my door and stuck my head out. “Mrs. Mateo?”

No response. I looked out the window and spotted her in the yard, broom in hand. Opening the window, I called out to her. “Mrs. Mateo, did you talk to my grandmother?”

She looked up with a wide-eyed expression. “When? Why?”

I considered the second warm, gooey cookie in my hand. “Just now?”

Mrs. Mateo shook her head, made the sign of the cross over her heart, and went back to sweeping off the front walk.

I sat on the edge of the bed and pulled the books into my lap.
A Little Night Magic, A History of the Ancient Arts, Spell Craft, Faery Foods.
The last seemed to be nothing more than a cookbook, making me frown at the cookie in my hand. What if she’d put a spell on my cookie? She wouldn’t do that, would she? Of course, she would. But that didn’t mean it would do anything. Right?

I flipped through the books, intrigued by the spells and recipes. When I found a love potion, I stopped.

This,
I decided,
could be very interesting.

Mom had said Faith Despaign had a history steeped in superstition. Wishing that Birdie had sent me something on my school, I flipped through the books one last time before reaching for my laptop to email Mom. I didn’t bother with polite chitchat.

I have questions and I want you to answer all of them. I’ll number them, to make it easier for you.

1. Birdie—she’s a witch. What does that even mean?

2. Is Faith Despaign a witch school?

3. Birdie sent me a bunch of books with witch spells. I don’t know what to do with them.

4. Why didn’t you tell me about her?

5. So, she thinks she’s a witch. Is that really a reason to hate her?

I paused. The question I really wanted to know—no, needed to know—was this: was it possible I had somehow started the fire in the science room? Could I start a fire just by being angry?

Uncle Mitch would know, but I couldn’t ask him. That conversation would lead to panic. And I couldn’t ask my mom, either, because that would cause even more panic. But what if I really had burned down the science room? I’d be sent to juvie. I wouldn’t get into Yale.

What if I really could spontaneously combust like Mr. Krook in
Bleak House
? What if I burned down our house and killed more people than just Lizzy?

I took a deep breath; finished my message to Mom, pressed send, and typed in human spontaneous combustion. My fingers began to shake when the results appeared.

HOW SPONTANEOUS HUMAN COMBUSTION WORKS

In December 1962, a postman discovered the body of 94-year-old Mr. Joseph Riley in his Ohio home. Actually, only a part of Mr. Riley’s foot, presumably all that remained of his body, was found in a pile of ashes. A smoldering hole in the living room floor was the only clue, as the rest of the house remained perfectly intact.

Spontaneous human combustion. What is it? How does it happen? And why? No one really knows, but sadly, the strange case of Mr. Joseph Riley is not an isolated one. Several hundred others just like it have riddled mankind for centuries. Can humans spontaneously burst into flames? A lot of people think spontaneous human combustion is a real occurrence, but most scientists aren’t convinced.

In this article, we will look at the strange phenomenon of spontaneous human combustion, see what believers have to say about it and try to separate the scientific truth from the myths.

Spontaneous combustion occurs when an object—in the case of spontaneous human combustion, a person—bursts into flame from a chemical reaction within, apparently without being ignited by an external heat source.

The article went on to describe a number of other grisly accounts. One look at the pictures and the cookies in my stomach began to roil.

I had a really hard time falling asleep that night.

Thankfully, it rained the next day, postponing my complete and utter humiliation on the tennis court and ruling out the possibility of setting anything on fire.

“Tomorrow,” Court promised, handing me her shoes before I got on the bus to go home. “We’ll stay after school. Mr. Jenson will let us borrow some racquets and balls if we tell him you want to try out for the team.”

“Try out for the team?” My voice squeaked. “You can’t be serious.”

Court nodded, looking very serious indeed. “I need a friend on the squad and I choose you. Besides, if you want to be cozy with the tennis captain, I can’t think of a better way.”

“Mr. Jenson isn’t going to let a total newbie be on the team,” I said, taking the shoes, because Court didn’t look as if she was going to let me leave without them.