The Accidental Witch (12 page)

“Robert? He called me “wide load” in high school,” I said.

Aaron laughed. He set me down on the bed and kissed me and brushed my hair behind my ear.

“Never do anything like that again,” he said. “I don’t want to lose you to some psycho.”

“He wasn’t a psycho,” I said.

“You have a good heart,” he said. “But you can’t save everyone.”

“Don’t you try to save everyone?” I asked.

Aaron pulled off my dress and washed me. He got out my nightshirt and pulled it down over my head and helped me under the covers. I felt loved. No one had ever done anything like this for me in any part of my life that I could remember. I broke my leg once as a girl and my father had said I needed to learn to be independent and had purposely left me to fend for myself. As Aaron dressed me, he answered my question.

“I try to save everyone, but I know I can’t. There can’t be life without death. The Bible says that there is a season for everything, a time to live and a time to die. I have faith and I believe in Heaven and I know most of my patients go there and I would certainly never try to save a patient if he were dangerous.”

“He wasn’t dangerous,” I said.

Aaron gave me another pill and I took it with a glass of water. He sat down beside me on the bed and I drifted off to sleep gazing into his eyes.

* * *

I awoke a little after four in the morning. My entire body ached. The pain medicine must have worn off. Aaron was sleeping next to me. I sat up and looked around. I needed to get to the cabin, so I could help Jeremy. I tried to stand up, but the cast wouldn’t support any weight. I had to be quiet. Aaron couldn’t know what I was doing I hopped towards the door. It is impossible to sneak quietly and hop with a broken leg in the dark at the same time, especially if you are as clumsy as me. I bumped into the dresser and cursed in the dark before I decided to crawl on the door. Even that was a little tricky. My lack of coordination was definitely a problem.

I stubbed my toe and said, “Crap,” quietly to myself. How can someone stub their toe when they are crawling? I finally made it out the bedroom door and to the top of the stairs, and by that time I knew there was no way in hell I was going to hobble-hop down the muddy trail to my cabin in the dark, I stumbled down the stairs trying not to break my other leg as I went and pulled myself into the kitchen. I found a few candles and some pretty stones and made a little altar on the ground in the moonlight. I had to do something about my damned leg if I was ever going to make it back out to the cabin.

I lit the match and lit the candle. I went through the motion and the flames leapt and danced. Again my shadow man came and sat with me while I worked my magic. I wasn’t afraid of him like I’d been before, but I was nowhere near used to him. I put out my candle and he vanished.

“What are you doing?” Aaron had walked in on me.

For the life of me, I couldn’t think of any kind of plausible lie. I was sitting in my PJs on the cold kitchen floor next to a pile of rocks and candles. I probably looked like I needed to be admitted to the hospital.

“Aroma therapy?” I said with a shrug. I knew it was lame as it came out of my mouth, but what else could I say? I couldn’t say that I was summoning spirits from the Netherworld to heal my leg so I could cast a spell to save a formerly possessed mental patient from a world of injustice. It is really pathetic when aroma therapy is the more logical answer.

“Aroma therapy?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “My leg was hurting and I didn’t want to wake you.”

“And you thought lighting candles on the kitchen floor might help?” he asked.

“It couldn’t hurt, could it?”

“How did you even get down here?” he asked.

“Magic,” I said.

He laughed. “You really are a strange woman.”

“You have no idea,” I said.

He picked me up again and carried me back to bed. He gave me another pill and I fell right to sleep. In the morning, there was no pain at all. Aaron was already up and in the shower. There was a pair of crutches next to the bed. I stood up and stretched. It was as if nothing had happened. My leg was better. I grabbed the crutches and walked to the bathroom at the end of the hall. I was going to have to pretend for the time being.

C
HAPTER
4

S
UMMONING
THE
L
ADY

OF
THE
L
AKE

Aaron took me to church that day. I had forgotten I had told him I was going to go. Going to church would have been torture enough, but trying to maneuver heals and crutches at the same time while navigating an ocean of southern Baptists was special torture. It was even more agonizing because I knew my leg was fine, but I had to pretend it was still broken. I looked like hell, because my face was pretty torn up, but I smiled and faked happiness as much as was possible. I wore a new long sundress that hid my cast beneath its folds, so I didn’t feel quite so conspicuous.

Church was uneventful enough and I even managed to remain conscious through much of the ordeal. I listened and smiled and Aaron introduced me to his half-brothers and sisters. His mother was a pleasant sort of woman who looked entirely out of place. Her Welsh accent was so thick, I had to nod and pretend to understand. Real comprehension was impossible.

After church, there was a family dinner. I had to talk to everyone in Aaron’s entire family.

“Are you for Alabama or Auburn?” His step-father asked me in a pleasant enough way.

Oh, how I hated that question. I hated all football questions. “I’m for Alabama,” I said.

“Good,” his father said. “We’d have to throw you out, otherwise.”

Listening to Aaron’s mother and stepfather talk was like deciphering ancient hieroglyphics. Her accent was so impossibly Welsh, I got lost navigating it and his accent was so thickly southern, I almost choked on it. I wondered if they understood each other or if they just subsisted on hand gestures and sex. They had six children, so I figured the sex might be their primary means of communication.

Aaron’s siblings were all jovial and talkative. I sat quietly and ate and smiled, but I couldn’t wait to escape.

“You have such pretty hair,” Girl Sibling #2 said. I couldn’t possibly remember all their names. There were just too many of them and they all looked essentially the same to the untrained eye.

“So do you,” I replied with a fake smile. My face was starting to hurt. The stitches felt stretched thin.

“It must be hard working with all those crazy people,” she commented. She was trying to be nice. I had to give her that.

“I like crazy people,” I said. “Most of the time, they make more sense than sane people.”

She looked at me with a virtually indecipherable expression and then she smiled and turned to talk to Girl Sibling #1. I ate my bread and the family kept talking around me.

Boy Sibling #2 looked at me. “You live in the old Black Magnolia plantation?” he asked.

“Yes,” I answered.

“Did you hear about that girl out there?” he asked.

“No,” I said.

“I think she lives in the house next to yours and she’s real sick. She may die. I know her folks. They go to church with us,” he said. “Anyhow, you might want to talk with her. They say she’s doing crazy stuff like talking in weird languages and cursing her parents. That’d be right up your alley, wouldn’t it?”

“Are you talking about the Dollars?” Boy Sibling #2 said.

“Yep,” Boy Sibling #1 answered.

“Now that’s a damn shame. That poor little girl. She’s hardly out of the cradle.”

The conversation continued and I tuned it out. I was tired and the food was barely tolerable. I really just wanted to go home. I was so worried about Jeremy, I could almost feel my hair turning gray. I had cured him and then left him with the wolves. After what seemed like an eternity, Aaron helped me out the door and to the car.

“So, what did you think of my family?” Aaron asked when we left.

“They are very nice,” I said honestly. His family was wonderful and I couldn’t have been more out of place with them.

“They really liked you,” he said. I didn’t believe that for a minute, but it was nice of him to say it, so I said thank you. He smiled and patted my leg and I smiled back. We were all teeth and gums. I couldn’t think of much else to say, so I looked out the window. As soon as Aaron left, I would cast the spell to save Jeremy.

“Would you be all right if I went out tonight?’ Aaron asked.

“Of course,” I said. “I’m not an invalid.”

“I know that,” he said. “I just don’t want you to feel like I’m abandoning you, but it’s poker night.”

“Poker night?” I asked.

“Yeah. Some of the other docs and I get together and play poker.”

“Sure,” I said.

Aaron helped me into the house and got me situated upstairs with a beer and a book. I waited until he’d driven away before I ran down the stairs and started to grab the things I would need for the spell. The cast was beginning to really irritate me, so I took a kitchen knife and sawed the thing off my leg. I knew the spell I was going to cast. I wasn’t taking any chances. This spell had stuck out to me. I can’t entirely say why. Perhaps it was the idea of the Lady of the Lake. It seemed like a powerful spell to call on a goddess from legend.

As a little girl, I had been transfixed with Arthurian Legend and The Lady of the Lake was one of my favorite parts of the legend. I had seen The Lady of the Lake portrayed many ways in various interpretations of the legend, but one thing was always true. She was always the one who gave King Arthur his sword, Excalibur. Sometimes she turned evil and ensnared Merlin. Sometimes she stayed good, but she was always the one who gave Arthur his sword.

I found an old glass bottle, a red candle, some sunflower seeds, and paper. I went out into the woods with my bag of goodies. It didn’t take me long to get to the cabin. I was used to walking so fast, I was almost running. I got to the cabin and went straight to work.

On the paper, I wrote my desire three times. I wrote, “Free Jeremy and bring him happiness.” I lit the candle. I placed the paper in the glass bottle and then poured sunflower seeds in it. I screwed the cap on tight. While I went through these motions, I said my desire over and over again. Finally, I poured the blood red wax from the candle over the bottle. I did this slowly and thoroughly until the entire bottle was encased in wax. The candle burnt down and I took the bottle and left the way I had come.

I didn’t wait. I went straight to the car. I drove through the rolling hills of Southern Appalachia to where Dog Lake lay in the fog between two verdant green mountains. It was a quiet spot. A few fishermen sat on the banks of the lake and a lonely boat floated through the fog. I turned off the ignition and got out of the car. I walked until I found a quiet space and then I lifted up the skirts of my long dress and stepped into the water.

I raised my arms towards the lake and I called out. I called out for the Lady of the Lake. I summoned her and spoke in Latin. The spell was long. It was a chant. It was the longest spell I’d done. I was careful to say all the words as they were written in Latin. I said words I didn’t understand and then I threw the bottle into the water and said the words again. Like something out of a dream or a bad film, a hand emerged from the fog-covered water. It reached up, grabbed the bottle, and pulled it back under the black depths of the swampy waters of Dog Lake. I stood in utter awe.

“Well, God damn,” I said as I stared out into the distance.

“You okay, lady?” a fisherman asked. He was looking at me like I was eating the flesh from a newborn baby.

“I’m fine,” I said.

The wind blew, carrying the mist away and I could hear a faint voice on the wind. It was sweet and feminine. It was lovely, like a song. “Your wish is granted,” it said.

I pulled myself out of the muddy water. It took some doing. The lake bottom was muddy and my feet stuck in the mud. I lost my sandals in the muck. I walked back to the car barefoot and it started to rain. The rain didn’t faze the fishermen, who just kept on fishing. I leaned back and looked up at the sky. The rain washed the mud off my dress and cut through the Alabama heat like a knife. It was lovely and sweet and it smelled like fall. I smiled. Relief washed over me. All the anxiety I had about Jeremy and his terrible fate vanished. I had saved him. I had saved him.

It was a long drive through the hills back home. I parked the car and showered. As I stood there, I couldn’t help but think about Ellie’s offer. I could help more people if I had an outpatient practice. In the hospital, I could only help those who were teetering on the edge of absolute madness. In an outpatient practice, I could help everyone who asked for help. It seemed selfish to confine this power to one small population when I could help the entire town. God knew the town needed helping. There had never been much money in Dismal, but the last economic recession had carried everything away like a flood. Everyone was poor and everyone was hurting. I could fix that.

I got out of the shower and pulled on some old sweats. I grabbed a book and curled up for a night of rest when the phone rang. I saw a name on the caller ID I didn’t think I’d ever see again. John Forest. Johnny Boy. My ex-husband was calling me.

“Hello,” I said reluctantly.

“Hello, Phae?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said.

“You sound different,” he said.

“It’s been over a year. I probably am different. What do you want?”

“I want to make amends,” he said.

I couldn’t think of anything to say, so I didn’t.

“I know I was terrible to you. Oh, hell, let’s just say it, I was a fucking asshole. I cheated on you and I made you hate yourself. I yelled all the time. I was an asshole and I’m sorry.”

I was floored. I didn’t believe people ever said they were sorry. I thought an asshole was an asshole and they never knew they were assholes.

“Are you in AA or something?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “I’m just starting and I’ve got a long way to go, but I’m trying to clean myself up.”