I’d been surprised by this too. “I don’t think it’s because he didn’t want to walk down the aisle with you, Violet. William’s the caterer. He didn’t feel like he could both run the event and take part in it.”
“I don’t know. Personally, I think he ducked out of the wedding party to avoid me. No doubt he’ll hire a load of pretty young things as waitresses to giggle and flirt with in the kitchen while I’m standing out there alone watching my cousin”—and here she glared at me—“my younger cousin get married.”
I really did feel sorry for her, but this was getting old. I said, “I really think you should talk to him. You’ll never know until you do.”
Jennifer didn’t come down to the shop, so I assumed she’d fallen asleep upstairs. Violet’s mood had improved somewhat, so I felt safe leaving customers in her hands while I went to check on Jennifer. I went quietly up the stairs so as not to wake her and was surprised to find her sitting in my living room. “Jennifer? Everything okay?”
She glanced up at me with a funny look on her face. Then I looked around and understood her strange expression.
“Where did you get those?” I thought I’d hidden my witch paraphernalia so well. But she was sitting with my grimoire, my scrying mirror, and some black and white candles in front of her.
I had a cold, sick feeling in the pit of my stomach, probably what innocent young women in Salem felt when there was a certain knock on the door. I don’t know why I was so nervous. It wasn’t like they did terrible things to witches anymore, but I don’t know, my craft was private. A part of my life I didn’t readily share with people who didn’t have magic. Jennifer and I had been friends for so long, I didn’t know how she’d take this change in me. I couldn’t bear to think I might lose my best friend over magic.
She touched the scrying mirror with her fingers, and the surface rippled like the surface of a pond in a breeze. There was no way I could pretend it wasn’t what it was.
All she said was, “I wondered.”
Since she obviously wasn’t going to freak out and run screaming into Harrington Street, I walked closer and sat down beside her.
“What do you mean, you wondered? Did I act strange my whole life?” We seemed to be halfway into a conversation rather than beginning at the beginning.
“Remember when we used to play with the Ouija board?”
I’d almost forgotten. There’d been a stage when we were, I don’t know, ten, eleven, twelve, when we’d run home from school and get out this old cardboard Ouija board that her mom had in the back of the closet. We’d both put our fingertips on the plastic planchette, ask questions, and the disk would fly around the board. Some of the answers we got were frighteningly accurate. I nodded.
“Remember when we asked about my uncle Pat, who was having tests in the hospital? And it spelled out D-E-A-D?”
I could never forget that moment. Jennifer’s family didn’t get the news until later that day. I nodded mutely.
“Didn’t you ever wonder where we were getting that stuff from?”
I hadn’t until now. “You think I was using my powers and didn’t even know it?”
She smiled at me, put out her hand towards the grimoire, and to my absolute shock, as she raised her hand, the grimoire rose with it. She set it down and, with a practiced gesture, pointed at the candles, which immediately sprang into flame.
“You too? You’re a witch?”
She nodded. “I always thought of you as a sister. Now I know you really are one.”
I felt misty-eyed one more time. “How long have you known?”
“Not that long. I mean, I used to do things or think something might happen and then it would. But I didn’t know I was special until after you left. I guess I was bored and missing my best friend. For something to do, I took a class in healing plants. The woman who gave the class was a witch who recognized my gift and mentored me.”
“And you never said a word to me.”
“You never shared your special talents with me, either.”
Happiness rippled through me. Now I didn’t have to keep this huge secret from one of my favorite people in the world. Instead of separating us, our magic bonded us. “It was so hard because we were far away. If we’d still been living near each other, of course I would have told you.”
She looked at me seriously. “If we’d both been living the same lives, I bet we never would have discovered we were witches.”
I shivered, thinking of missing out on my gift.
“Do you think that’s why we were drawn together as kids?”
“Who knows? I’m glad we were, though.”
“Me too.”
I took her on the promised walking tour of Oxford, and then, that evening, we sat in my flat and talked for hours, catching up on old friends and reminiscing but mostly talking about magic. She got out her knitting, and I got back to work on my crocheted sweater. “Do you ever use magic to make your knitting go faster?” I asked her.
“No. It would take the fun away.” She glanced up at me. “Do you?”
I shook my head. “Feels like cheating. Though I do have a spell for untangling wool that’s very handy. Oh, and I’ve used a tidying-up spell in the shop.”
“Completely understandable. That’s like using a computer to write a letter instead of laboriously writing one by hand.”
“Exactly. There’s a time and place for everything.”
Glad we understood each other, I suggested she might like to come to our next gathering of the coven.
“First, when do I get to meet the mysterious Rafe?”
“Tomorrow. He’s invited us for lunch.”
Chapter 8
“About time. I finally get to meet this groom of yours.” And then she poked a finger at me, mock-serious. “And I’d better
