“Such a pretty girl, yes you are.” Aunt Betty leans over to give my cat lots of chin scratches.
Aunt Irene follows suit, loving all over Princess Buttercup. “And so talkative. I swear she thinks she’s speaking to us.”
“You’re not wrong.” I grin. If only she knew the truth of her words! But neither of my aunts has mentioned being able to see any of the magical things happening around town, so I haven’t tried to have the “I’m a witch” conversation yet.
There’s still so much we don’t know about how being a witch works. It seems to run in families, probably because of a fae ancestor lurking in the family tree, but it’s clearly not every member of a family, or Aunt Betty would have magic. Unless I get my powers from my father’s side? Also, can men be witches? Jared and some of the other men in town can see magic. Does that mean they can also do it? And if so, are they witches or warlocks or wizards? I like to think of witch as gender-neutral, but there might be an established terminology to follow, which means we need a non-binary term as well. When all of this is over, I hope Luke lets me continue to do research in his witch collection. There’s somuch more I want to learn than simply controlling my own powers.
Aunt Irene pulls several canvas shopping bags out of the car. “Are you ready to get baking?”
“You know it.” I take two of them from her and carry them into the kitchen, where Aunt Betty slides a stack of covered casserole dishes into the fridge.
“Did you bring grandma’s recipe card?” I ask Aunt Irene. Grandma Summers each left us one. I got vanilla cupcakes, Aunt Betty got pumpkin spice, and Aunt Irene got the red-hot cinnamon ones, which are perfect for Valentine’s.
“I did.” She pats her purse.
The morning flies by as we work side by side, baking my vanilla cupcakes for them to enjoy while I make a batch of red-hot cinnamon ones for tonight’s Witch Bitch Spicy Book Club meeting. I’ve already coordinated with Autumn to bring her matching cinnamon cocktails.
Which is good, because I no longer have a phone, and I need to do something about that.
Once the cupcakes are in the oven, I leave the aunts cooing over Princess Buttercup and giving her far too many treats.
In the living room, I power up my laptop, log into the website for my cell phone provider, and report my phone as lost. It’s not even a lie. But I bet no one’s ever had “because my magic left it inside a book with the rest of my clothes” as an excuse before. Thank god I’ve got the kind of phone insurance that covers everything, even owner mistakes, so I don’t have to give an excuse. A pop-up window tells me I can pick up my new phone today at the store out by the highway.
Then I shoot an email to Hannah and Autumn, explaining why I’m currently out of contact and that I’ll see them at the town meeting.
I close my laptop and look up only to find Aunt Irene standing in the doorway, studying me, her brown face scrunched in concentration. “You still haven’t said what’s wrong.”
“What makes you think anything’s wrong?” I chirp, giving her my best smile.
“No. You don’t do that with me.” She shakes her head, setting her curls bouncing. “I’ve lived with you Summers women for decades now. I know when your squishy jelly hearts are hurt. You can’t fool me with your happy-happy.”
“Funny that it works so well on Aunt Betty,” I mutter.
“It works because you two are a lot alike, and Bettywantsto see only the happy.” She sits beside me on the couch. “But sometimes you have to deal with the less-pleasant stuff to find your way back to true happiness.”
“That’s why I’m so lucky to have you.” Aunt Betty bustles into the room and plops down on my other side, her light face flushed pink from the heat of the oven. She reaches across me to squeeze her wife’s knee. “You keep me truly happy.” Then she looks at me. “So talk.”
“It’s… it’s complicated.” I play with the hem of my structured skirt, fingers tracing across the bright purple fabric. I paired it with a brilliant teal top and matching pumps, needing the extra armor of pretty clothes today.
“So it’s a man?” Aunt Irene asks.
Aunt Betty adds, “Just because we don’t do dick doesn’t mean we don’t understand relationships.”
Her words startle a laugh out of me, exactly as she wanted.
“Women can be just as bad.” Aunt Irene snorts in amusement and shakes her head. “Remember that girl I went out with right before we met, Betty?”
“Or my non-binary partner from college?” Aunt Betty chuckles. “Let’s just say humans in general can be a real pain in the butt to date.”
It’s my turn to laugh. If they think humans are hard, what would they say about super-grumpy, three-hundred-year-old, I’m-clearly-superior-to-everyone fae dragons?
“It’s Luke. I really like him.” Understatement much? “And I can’t tell what he thinks of me. He’s really hard to read.” I might be able to rate his various grumpy faces, but I don’t have any idea what love or affection would look like on him.
One minute he seems to want me, the next he’s cool and aloof. It’s enough to make a girl’s head spin. Added onto that, all of our spicy encounters either happened inside the book or were instigated by sexiness in the book. Does he actually want me here in the real world? Can I ever be more than a research project to him?
“Is it because he’s a demon?” Aunt Irene asks.
Aunt Betty nods. “I imagine those are tricky.”
