“As far as toads, I’m sure that you could have a toad that’s a familiar, but I have to say I’m pretty happy with Gunner. I don’t think I’d like carrying around a toad as much as I like hanging out with Gunner.”
Gunner rolls onto his side, wagging his tail. “Damn right.”
“Eye of newt is actually just mustard seed, so yes, I do use mustard seed if I’m trying to make a potion that calls for it, but I don’t really make potions very often unless we’re sick or needing a boost. Sometimes it’s better than caffeine, but all of that kind of comes with a cost. It takes a lot of energy to do that sort of work and, you know, as boring as it sounds, most of the things that you can get from the drug store are just as good as some of the magical remedies that we have.” I pause. “Although I have a really killer cure for a hangover that Hazel and I came up with right before her twenty-first birthday.”
“When you say killer…” he trails off. “You don’t really mean killer, do you?”
That really gets me. I let out a long laugh.
“No, of course not. I just mean that it helps with the headache and the nausea. A little goes a long way though, as Hazel found out on her twenty-second birthday.” I sigh, shaking my head.
“I worry about her.” It’s more of an aside, and I didn’t really mean to say it out loud because I never want to talk bad about my sisters. Not to anybody outside the family at least. I know the rest of us all talk about each other, but we’re only trying to help. I don’t want Caleb to think that there’s something wrong with Hazel. I’m not sure. I think there’s something wrong with Hazel, but I do worry about her.
“I understand that,” Caleb says slowly, nodding as he rotates his mug around on top of the wooden table. “She’s not a teenager anymore, though, Ivy. She might be your little sister, and she’ll always be your little sister, but she’s a grown woman. And she’s making her own path.”
I let out a slow exhalation, pursing my lips. His words tumbling around in my mind like unpolished rocks.
“I know, I know she’s not a kid anymore and I know she’ll always be my baby sister. I think it’s just that I miss her. I miss her being home with us and being in Silverlight Shore, and I want her to be happy. And when she’s so far away and we never hear from her, I don’t know if she’s happy. And maybe that’s controlling and maybe it’s the older sister in me, but I don’t know. I can’t do anything about it. All I can do is love her and hope she’s alright.”
Caleb grabs my hand from across the table, and I’m struck again by how strong they are. Such a small change, really, in the grand scheme of things, but it feels important. Another reminder that he’s not the boy I knew, this man sitting across from me. But that doesn’t mean I don’t know him at all.
“The fact that that’s the way you think about Hazel, Ivy, tells me that you’re doing exactly what you need to do for her. She knows that you love her. She knows that you’re there for her. She’s figuring out who she is still. She’s still young. Younger than we are, at least.”
Caleb laughs at that, and I can’t help but laugh too. Because she is. She’s almost ten years younger than me, which is probably why I still see her as a baby.
“Thank you,” I tell him, and I squeeze the hand that’s still holding mine. “Thank you for helping her tonight and making sure I didn’t get soaking wet by carrying me into the front of the house.”
I pause, realizing how that sounds.
He quirks an eyebrow, and for a minute the tension between us is so thick it practically crackles.
“From the rain,” I say loudly, obnoxiously so.
And then we both burst out laughing. And my God, it’s just so easy with him. So easy.
But for a second I don’t want to take it slow. I want to see exactly what I’ve been missing. But I don’t. I squeeze his hand one more time then I let it go to cup my hot chocolate and sip it. Because sometimes slow is so much sweeter than fast, and I have a feeling that taking our time getting to know each other again will be just as sweet as I hope it will be.
“What are you going to do about the lighthouse?” I ask—and then I gasp, my eyes going wide because I realize I need to tell him about the rune on the lighthouse.
“Well, that’s weird,” Caleb says. And he doesn’t laugh because he knows that’s something that’s deeply wrong. And I know that if I try to tell him it’s fine, pretend like there’s nothing on that light up those stairs, that he’ll know I’m lying and I don’t want to lie to him anymore.
“And the reason I ran out of here,” I say, carefully lowering the mug, watching what’s left of the marshmallows slowly descend, degrade into the chocolatey brown, “is because there was a rune or something on top of your light upstairs.”
“The lighthouse light?” Caleb clarifies. “A rune? I don’t know what that means.”
“Honestly, I don’t know what it means either. It’s like a big glowing symbol up there. It’s definitely magical. I could feel it. That’s why I went upstairs when you went to go turn the generator on. I don’t know what it means, though."
Gunner puts a paw on my thigh, and I scratch behind his ears absentmindedly, trying to collect my thoughts.
That, and not freak him out, though, I have to admit, he’s handling it all pretty damn well.
"Caleb, I’ve been trying to figure it out all day, and my sisters have been helping me and we’re scared that something’s happening." I stop scratching for a moment, making Gunner whine before I pick it back up. "You know, all the weird things that have been happening. The coffee makers not working. That has something to do with magic and Silverlight Shore and the four of us, and we don’t know?—”
“Calm down. Ivy, take a breath.”
I do as he asks, which feels a little strange because typically I’d fight. But I take that breath, and I breathe out slowly.
“I can help you,” he says. “I might not know magic, but I know Silverlight Shore and I know this coast. And I’m good at solving problems.”
