Tilly dove down and placed a hand on the dark shiny leaves feeling a shot of aggravation and protection. She frowned, unsure of what she was feeling, but trying to soothe the plant, rubbing her thumb over the waxy leaves and whispering kind words of comfort. "It's okay. Shhh."
"What are you doing?! Cut it!"
Finally, the vine let her go, unwinding and slinking back until it was again wrapped around the white picket fence and up around the cattle arch with the twinkle lights where the jasmine would later bloom.
"All good!" Tilly stood straight and smiled at her sister who examined her ankle carefully.
"What happened?" Bess asked as she and Ursula came back with a tray of coffee, coffee mugs, and a small casserole dish of what looked like crisp.
By the cinnamon and clove smell, Tilly would bet apple.
"Your weed vine wrapped around my ankle while I was just sitting here."
Ursula looked at Tilly, Jen and Eloise wide-eyed but silent.
"Oh, must not like you."
"Bess," Ursula groaned, her patience having found its limit.
Bess raised her hands in the air with a look of what?
"Would you like coffee or tea, Fae?" Ursula asked brightly.
"No. This, this place is," she shook her head, her eyes looking a little wild. "There's a rodent acting like a human in the kitchenand you have a tree growing in the bathroom and a vine that-" she held up both hands and caught her breath. "None of this is okay. You are all insane. You're just as crazy as the town claims! God, Tilly, and you're part of this, this...coven? Or whatever the hell you freaks are?" Her eyes were now more than a little wild and her voice was high and scared.
"Fae, we're not, like bad witches. We're," she looked to her friends for help and Jen stepped forward.
"Why don't you sit down? Have some tea?"
"No," a firm shake of her head as she was backing away from them, her hands out in front of her like they were a threat.
"We're not going to hurt you," Tilly said, her eyes imploring. "And we're not doing any of the things that the town is accusing us of."
Fear was replaced by a diferent look in Fae's eyes. Tilly recognized it because it had cut her for years, had tried to tell her who she should be or shouldn't be. Disgust.
"You're a freak, Tilly. You always have been. Mom and Dad put up with how weird you are in the name of family, but we have bent over backwards to make you feel a part of us for you to be ungrateful and now, what, a creepy cosplay witch?"
Oh, the rage. Where it came from, Tilly could not discern because in this moment she felt it churn in her own belly. A rage that must have been there for years.
When she was five and her mother told her not to cry because they had to move and crying was selfish.
When she was twelve and Fae switched their rooms in a weekend because she liked Tilly's window lighting better and their mother did nothing.
Twenty-seven and her mom telling her that husbands don't always treat their wives well.
"Bent over backwards?" she asked, stepping toward Fae. Her voice was controlled, words slow, anger deep. "You guys bentover backwards for me?" Fae's eyebrows dipped when Tilly let out a shrill laugh.
Her friends looked to Jen who watched Tilly with raised eyebrows and hope.
"You guys bullied me. Mom raised me to suppress my emotions so that all of yours could go unchecked. My anxiety was born in my purple bedroom where it was the only safe place for me to cry and my anxiety took on a voice that sounded like yours because you treated me like I was vermin in our own house. You spent our childhood scaring me and our adulthood shaming me." Tilly walked toward Fae who took a few more steps back but then was stopped abruptly pulling out a gasp by something standing behind her and when she looked, a dog the size of a small pony stood against her back making her look twice until Tilly's voice pulled her attention back.
"You are a narcissist who only cares about yourself and your own interests and I have been the one bending over backwards to make sure you have been taken care of. Even now, you come to my town, my inn, my magical home and into my coven of friends and accuse me of being a creepy witch?" She smiled and Fae shrunk back. "Fine," she leaned in. "I'm no longer an anxiety-ridden little Nguyen, Fae. And while I'm nothing like you, you need to leave and face the consequences of your sad excuse for a marriage that failed. I'm not your safe place. You didn't spend the collateral to create a safe space with me over my thirty-seven years, Fae. What the hell makes you think I'm a place for you to park your shit now? Leave," she said pointing a strong finger over Fae's shoulder. "Go to my inn, pack and then leave. And my marriage?" Tilly closed the distance between them, her voice lowered but powerful. "You're right. He didn't hit me. Not with his fists. But he did with his words and his silence and control. And when I finally worked up the courage to run away with the tiny amount of money I had squirreled awaybecause he liked to take my money too, there was a moment in my car when I thought I wish I could run to my sister." Her eyes filled with tears and Fae's eyes wavered for a moment. "I wish that you had been a safe place for me to run. But you weren't. You aren't. I created my own family and you will not harm them the way that you harmed me." She lifted her hand again. "Leave."
All at once the doors and windows of The Lost Souls House whipped open, then slammed shut drawing a scream from Fae as she jumped and toppled over the high back of Casper. Three raccoons grabbed at her hair as she lay shocked on the ground trying to get her bearings and she flailed her arms wildly when she realized what little hands were touching her, her shrieks loud enough to reach the town center.
"Should we help her?" Eloise asked, head tilted and watching next to the rest of them.
"The coffee is getting cold," Jen replied.
