That Magic Mischief (12 page)

The Pooka purred like a cat, and wished she could shift-shape into one, just for the minute, but she knew it was more trouble than it was worth at this stage. She was stuck being this hybrid hazel tree/potted plant until Annabelle figured out how to liberate her. The Pooka was confident that her human would sort it out. She’d already gotten Annabelle to speak to her properly, hadn’t she?

Oh, if only she could have a bit of a stretch! Unfortunately, when she had tried to move about the flat a bit she had, apparently, raised quite a bit of noise dragging that stupid pot around — enough noise for that meddlesome, chubby fella to come poking around, banging on the door, and generally making a nuisance of himself, in a patently transparent attempt to chat up Annabelle.

He hadn’t a chance in heaven, not with
her
woman, or the woman she was becoming. The Pooka allowed herself another round of smugness. So far, so good. Annabelle and Jamie had met, and Annabelle was more than interested; the girl’s career was back on track, and all that was left was The Kiss. Then the Pooka would be free, and Annabelle would be, too.

Until such time, however, a little bit of fun here or there couldn’t hurt anyone …

“
I
had a busy day,” said Annabelle snidely as she locked her front door. “And you? Oh, good, sat around, grew a bit here, trimmed a bit there, did you? Great. Great.

“Oh, what
did
I get up to? Thanks for asking!” Annabelle hung her bag up on the hooks that were mounted on the inside of her ‘office’ closet door, and hung up her coat as well. “Let’s see … worked a bit in the library, during which time I tried to research how to get rid of you. Funnily enough, every time I got close to finding a clue, ‘something’ would happen, and I’d have to run off and pick up all the books from the floor because the trolleys had fallen over — just as an example.”

She picked up the grocery bag she’d left by the door, and haphazardly started unpacking it. “I know it’s you! Don’t shake your bloom at me! You are messing with my life out there, in the world!” Annabelle tore the cardboard cover off the top of her take-out lasagna, and practically threw it into the oven.

She plopped herself down on her little couch, and glared at the plant. It held its stalk ramrod straight, and its branches were stiff with dignity. “Don’t give me that, that outraged sensibilities thing.” She reached into the pocket of her jeans and waved a piece of paper around. “I’ve found just the thing, smarty pants.” Annabelle sneered as the plant seemed to rear back in surprise and dismay. “Just the thing to put you in your place.” Tossing the paper down onto her tiny coffee table, she went into the bathroom and shut the door.

The plant’s longest branch reached over and opened up the folded sheet, and the bloom appeared to be reading down the list Annabelle had copied down. It nodded, satisfied, and when it heard the toilet flush, let the paper drop back down into its original position.

Annabelle burst out of the bathroom, hoping to catch the plant in action, but was greeted to the agricultural equivalent of thumb twiddling.

“I’m onto you,” she growled, and moved around her apartment, gathering up supplies. Putting some atmospheric rain forest music on the CD, she took down a white china bowl out of the cupboard over her stove, chose two cones of frankincense from the drawer under her sink, and took four tea lights out of the box she kept on top of the refrigerator. Also on top of the fridge were several mason jars full of herbs, and, consulting her list, saw that she was missing meadowsweet, but thought that lavender would do in a pinch. The book had also suggested sage, but she was up to
there
with the stuff. A handful of sea salt and a smaller bowl full of water rounded out the spell’s ingredients.

Turning, she approached her altar. “Would you mind?” she asked snootily, and the plant cleared some the space it had been hogging. Nice.
Someone
had drawn a moustache and glasses on the picture of Wilson that was still there. “Aren’t you
funny
. A real laugh riot.”

She removed everything from the altar’s surface but for the two white candles in the crystal holders, and then sank down to the floor, and set up the incense, the four candles, and the two bowls. Putting the herbs into the larger bowl, she lifted it to her face, and breathed in the earthy scents of the mixed herbs: the lavender and rosemary and cinquefoil. She put the bowl on the floor, in the center of the square of light made up by the votive candles, and slowly breathed in as the smoke of the incense blended with the fragrance of the herbs.

At times like these, she always felt really self-conscious. Every single book she’d ever read, every website she’d ever consulted, said that this was the part that would make or break a witch’s ritual. It was the moment of openness that determined whether or not the will behind the exercise could really contain the outcome. Was she strong enough for what she wished for? This didn’t seem so important, this was just a gentle banishing spell, one that was meant to convince the plant that it was time to take its energy elsewhere.

Annabelle closed her eyes and allowed her breathing to steady as she took in equal parts oxygen and frankincense. The light of the candles flickered against her eyelids like wraiths, and she guessed she felt pretty centered. The next thing that was required was to visualize what needed banishment.

This was the hard part. Whenever she tried to meditate, her mind would start skipping like a little girl playing hopscotch, from one idea to the next, to bits of conversations she’d had minutes, even hours before
.
She sighed impatiently, and tried to summon up an image of her hazel plant. There it was, that silly pink bloom, nodding at her, now less energetically, now fading, with its petals dropping one by one, and crumbling into dust.

Oh, no,
thought Annabelle
, I don’t want it to
die
, just go … away, some place else.
She tried to replace the image, and ended up with one of the plant wrapped in a mackintosh and carrying a bag, waiting for the Court Street Bus, which was so silly she started to laugh, and opened her eyes. She grimaced at the plant, which looked like it had been having a bit of a quiet chuckle. “This is serious, if you don’t mind,” Annabelle scolded, and closed her eyes again.

She controlled her breathing once more, and thought maybe it was time to use the phrase the book had suggested. As she lit another cone of incense, and swirled the sea salt and water mixture in the one bowl, she recited the words, first half-heartedly, and then with growing confidence, “
Salt of the sea, smoke of the earth, a spirit here must leave its berth. Light of the sun, fire of bright day, carry this spirit on its way
.”

Annabelle took a pinch from the bowl of herbs, and sprinkled into the salted water. Holding the bowl between her hands, she closed her eyes and spoke the spell again, stumbling once and having to squinch an eye open to find her place. Again, as she regulated her breathing and began to relax, Wilson’s face once more entered her mind’s eye. Not his smiling face, not his first-thing-in-the-morning face, not even his stressed-out work face, but the stone face he showed her the day he dumped her. His slicked-back hair had never looked so sleek, his boyish cheeks had never looked so harsh, his golden brown eyes had never looked so flat. Efforts to replace his image with that of the plant failed; frustrated, she said aloud, firmly, “GO AWAY!”

The CD had played out. Her voice seemed to echo in the quiet. She took the bowl of salted water, and using her fingers, sprinkled some on the bloom of the plant, and on its branches. She poured the rest into its soil. Blowing out the candles, she gathered up all the bits and pieces and put the bowls in the sink. She suddenly felt a little sad, like she would miss it. She turned. It was still there. Maybe it looked a little wan around the edges? Nope. Nothing had changed.

“And that, in a nutshell — no pun intended — is my problem.” Annabelle gathered up the books she’d brought back from the store, and headed off to bed. “Expecting everything to happen instantaneously.” She’d check the book again and see what kind of time frame she was looking at. She really needed to think positive. She knew that, of course, all the books said that a positive attitude was the most important tool in the magical toolbox.
I wonder if there’s a spell to get rid of all these stupid thoughts that are always going through my mind
, she thought as she drifted toward bed …

Annabelle’s bedroom door clicked shut. The rays of the waxing moon filtered down the airshaft into the living room, and the plant was bathed in gentle blue light. Had anyone been watching — and of course, no one was — they would have seen the plant begin to glow as a blue halo emanated from it, root and branch. As the glow intensified, the branches of the plant began to wave, and with a rather inelegant sound akin to that of someone slurping spaghetti, its tentacles retracted, in the blink of an eye, into the pot.

• • •

In the middle of slicing the loveliest leek she’d seen in a good while, Maria Grazia’s phone rang.

MG closed her eyes as she picked up
— sometimes it was still nice to be surprised, ya know?

“Hi, there, Maria Grazia, how’s every little thing?”

And sometimes not.
“Fine, Kelli. Listen, you don’t think I’ve even begun to think about your … wafty babushkas, ’cause let me tell you — ”

“No, no, no, no, no! Of course not! Next week is plenty of time — ” MG slammed the knife
down on the counter and walked away. Better safe than sorry.
Whose fault is this, Maria Grazia, whose? Whose?

“So what’s on your mind, Kelli.”
This is what happens when people have money, frickin’ tons of money, they just call you in the middle of your dinner, well, in the middle of making your dinner, and you frickin’ jump like a poodle and —

“I don’t know if you noticed … oh, I don’t know if I should … I know that our Annabelle has only really just begun to emerge from her heartbreak … ” Kelli trailed off predictably
.

What exactly is on your mind, Kelli?
“What exactly is on your mind, Kelli?”

“It’s just that Jamie was asking after our Annabelle.”

“Yeah, the white shirt guy, the artist guy, you already told me.”

“Yes. Jamie Flynn. He’s Irish.”

Huh. Annabelle was into Ireland.
“Yeah, and?”

“Well … ”

“Kelli, I don’t want to rush you, hey, who would, but I’m in the middle of something here.”

“I — I had this idea, and I need your help. If you agree. Only if you agree!” Her voice dropped, dripped with a whisper of slyness. “And Lorna’s help, of course … ”

Maria Grazia’s risotto thickened with the plot, as she stirred and heard Kelli out.

• • •

Lorna had painstakingly applied a cucumber and yogurt mask, carefully polished her toenails, and was about to start thinking about getting her summer clothes out of storage when the phone rang.

“Yes?” she huffed.

“Hi, it’s Maria Grazia.”

“I know your voice, MG, for God’s — ”

“Listen,” Maria Grazia rushed in, “Kelli called me.”

Lorna sat back on her sofa bed and wiggled her drying toes. “Thanks for calling, darling, but surely you know I couldn’t care less?”

“This isn’t about Kelli, not exactly, it’s about — ”

Lorna lit a cigarette. “Dear, I was just about to mentally winnow through my summer collection, something that I’ve been looking forward to all day, all during an incredibly stressful and trying day, and — ”

Maria Grazia cut in again. “I went to that thing, Kelli’s brainstorm thing — ”

“I
know
— ”

“And there was this guy there, well, a man, really, he was more a man then a guy — ”

Lorna sat up and nearly smudged her pedicure. “Oh my Lord, are you going on a date?”

“Of course not!” Maria Grazia shouldered her handset as she patiently stirred and stirred the risotto. “Kelli told me that he was flirting with Belle.”

“Really.” Lorna touched up her toes and gently flapped her feet around to dry the polish. “And she was flirting back?”

“Apparently.”

“Hmmm. Interesting.”

Maria Grazia cleared her throat. This was going to be the hard part. “She … she wants us to help her … to set them up.”

Lorna’s eyes narrowed. “Oh, does she?” She swung her feet carefully onto the floor, and went into the bathroom. Who did Kelli think she was, especially since she, Lorna, was going to throw Anna in the way of a few horny twenty-somethings in a few days? Just exactly who were Anna’s closest friends, anyway, and who exactly would know her better than her very best friends, know what’s best for her, and with whom she should be rebounding?

She glared at the hardening goo on her face. “I don’t think it’s any of her business what Anna gets up to, and who is this guy anyway — ”

“Some Irish guy, a painter or something, he’s doing the backdrops or whatever.” Maria Grazia gently folded the walnuts into the rice. “And he’s very cute, well, okay, handsome, even. Tall, and he was wearing this white shirt, this pristine white shirt.”

Lorna sighed internally at thought of a handsome man in pristine white shirt. “We both know how Anna hates being set up.”

“We know, and Kelli knows, but — but I think Kelli’s right.”

Lorna paused in her ablutions, her face half clean, half greeny-white. “You must be joking.”

Maria Grazia turned off the stove, and poured herself another glass of pinot noir. “It gets worse.” She gulped down a mouthful of the tangy wine. “She wants us to meet.”

Lorna switched ears. “I am unsure that I heard you correctly.”

“She wants us to meet.”

Lorna scrubbed the rest of the mask off her face and began to lightly apply serum to her damp skin. “Surely you know what my answer is — ”

Maria Grazia roared down the line, “Listen! You know I am breaking my cardinal rule! I am meddling! I am running interference! I am colluding! I am plotting! You know what this is doing to me! All I am asking is that you entertain the notion that we might do something to make our friend happy!”