Under a Spell uda-5 Read online

  “The book that you dropped in your scuffle with Fallon? This is it, right?” I unfolded one of the color copies of the book’s cover.

  Miranda gave it a cursory look, her shoulders rising a half inch. “Yeah, why?”

  “It’s a book of spells, Miranda.”

  “I know. You don’t think that I—I’m not some kind of witch. I just—some girls . . .” Her voice trailed off, her eyes focusing on her shoes.

  “It’s okay. I know what they are.”

  Miranda’s head snapped up, her eyes wide. “You do?”

  “Protection spells. I know what this is, too.” I unfolded the copy of the symbol carved into the desk in my classroom.

  Miranda took the page from me and studied it. “Is this in the book? I didn’t really read it.”

  “You don’t recognize this symbol?”

  Miranda swung her head. “Should I?”

  “You said you weren’t friends with Cathy Ledwith.”

  Miranda leaned against the alcove wall and yanked on the straps of her backpack. “Not really, no.”

  “You knew her from around school?”

  She nodded wordlessly, her eyes skittering to mine, then going back to her toes.

  “Did you know she had the same spell book that you have?”

  Miranda looked up, but the “oh my!” expression I was wanting wasn’t there. Instead, she shrugged again and said, “No. Was she one of the witches?”

  I swallowed hard. “No, I don’t think so. But the book is for protection. So is the symbol. Cathy had both and now you—you at least have the book. What—or who—are you afraid of, Miranda?”

  Miranda kicked at the ground, the toe of her sneaker grimy and well worn.

  I hunched so I was directly in her line of sight. “Miranda, this is important. You’re not going to get in trouble if you tell me.”

  Finally she looked up, her cheeks blazing red. “I bought it by mistake.”

  I felt my eyebrows arch up. “By mistake?”

  Miranda kicked at the floor again, checked her backpack straps a second time, and glanced at the ceiling—anything to avoid my gaze while the blush on her cheeks went all the way to the tops of her ears. “I thought it was a book on love spells.”

  “Love spells?” I said it out loud, then clapped a hand over my mouth. Then, in a whisper, “You wanted a book of love spells?”

  “Yeah.” It was barely a mumble.

  “What for?”

  Miranda looked up at me. “What do you think?”

  Now I felt myself blush.

  “Look at me, Ms. L.”

  “You’re beautiful.”

  “Because I’m smart, funny, and some day some amazing guy is going to come along and realize it, once guys are mature enough to see over my current idiocy? Thanks, I’ve heard it. I’m sixteen. I’ve never even held hands with a guy.”

  “Well, you are at an all-girls school.”

  “I know it’s stupid, but I don’t have any friends at school so it’s not like I can even go to one of the mixer dances. Like I’m just going to walk in there alone and stand there the whole night, waiting for Mr. Mature to throw someone like Fallon or Kayleigh aside and ask me to dance. Never. Going. To. Happen. Never! I thought maybe—I don’t really believe in the stuff—but I thought maybe I could get a little extra help.” Her smile was small, almost apologetic. “I figured, what could it hurt, right?”

  I sighed, wanting to hug her, wanting to gush about all the dances I sat at home through, how the last actual date I’d been on ended with a jaw-snapping werewolf and a zombie pub crawl. But I also wanted to give this kid hope.

  “You don’t need any book of spells to get a boy to notice you. Maybe just—” I put an index finger under her lowered chin and gently tilted her head up. “Maybe just look up once in a while. Make eye contact.”

  Miranda smiled, her cheeks still pink. “I was so embarrassed buying that book that I walked into the store, went straight to the book shelf, and assumed any book with a red binding must be about love. I guess I picked wrong. I hadn’t even opened it.”

  “So you didn’t buy a book of protection spells because you thought you were in any danger?”

  “Only in danger of being alone for the rest of my life.”

  “That won’t happen. But no more spells, okay?”

  “Okay.” Miranda turned and was halfway out of the alcove before I stopped her.

  “Hey—what do you know about Lock and Key Club?”

  She shrugged. “Only that I can’t get in. Ask one of the perfect girls.” She waved, made a point to look me in the eye, and disappeared down the hall.

  I went back to my classroom to gather my things and sat there, alone, until the school quieted as students filed out of the halls and into the parking lot. It was still early, but the fog had already rolled in, casting shadows through the large picture windows. I was in a silent, mourning stupor, which is why I nearly tossed my cell phone across the room when it started sputtering a jazz-heavy version of “God Save the Queen.”

  “You changed my ringtone again, didn’t you?”

  “And a good day to you, too,” Will chirped into my ear. “Where are you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Simple question, love. Where. Are. You. I, myself, am sitting at your kitchen table enjoying a spot of tea.”

  I hopped off the desk, offended. “Why are you at my house? How did you get into my house?”

  “A good Guardian shall always have access to his charge’s place.”

  “A good Guardian wouldn’t have to call to know where his charge is.”

  “Touché.”

  “I thought you’d come down here, to the school,” I said, pressing my fingers against my just-starting-to-ache forehead.

  “I have my every confidence in you. Besides, football’s on.”

  I could hear the rush of the crowd from his side of the phone. “Whatever. I’m going to grab a couple of those yearbooks, maybe poke around a bit, then I’m on my way home. Be ready to go by Alyssa’s house when I get there.” I glanced at the closed door. “And maybe Fallon’s. Okay?”

  “Aye aye, love.”

  I hung up the phone on a groan.

  I heard the clack-clack-clack of Heddy’s shoes before I saw her. Then suddenly she was in front of me, all pudges and grins.

  “Well, Sophie! I didn’t know you were still here.”

  “Um, just wrapping up a few things. Actually, though, it’s a good thing I ran into you. Does Mercy have a policy against bullying?”

  Heddy’s eyes were wide behind her big round glasses. “Oh my, yes. The bullying has gotten so bad nowadays.”

  I cocked an eyebrow. “So you’ve had bullying here on campus?”

  “Heavens, no! The girls here all get along. They’re just angels! Well, you remember that from your years here, don’t you?”

  I thought back to my cowering, terror-filled years, the overwhelming silence and screaming into my pillows at night. “Yeah, sure. It was a big ol’ love fest.”

  Heddy smiled at me and hiked up her bag, flipping up her collar as though she were heading into the Arctic. “I hope we get to see you around under better circumstances,” she said as she pushed open the door.

  I offered her a pressed-lipped smile and waved. The door snapped shut behind her and echoed through the silent hall.

  Chapter Twelve

  The semi-deserted parking lot shouldn’t have been scary. There were splashes of light from poles that dotted the concrete, and five hundred feet away cars honked, tires squeaked, and muddled bass thumped as traffic eked down Nineteenth. But either way I was a woman who was aware, who watched all the “it could happen to you” specials and who had been pummeled by everything from a sweaty book agent to a rabid vampire. I walked with purpose, making a zippy beeline toward my car with my keys threaded through my knuckles—a makeshift set of eyeball-gauging claws.

  It was these claws that tumbled from my hand when I awkwardly tried to
stab them into the door lock. I bent over to retrieve them and my shoulder bag walloped me in the chin while my backpack clipped the back of my head. I steadied myself against my car door and pressed myself back up slowly (lest I behead myself on a side view mirror). That was when an engine revved and the headlights from the car half a parking lot away clicked on and flooded me and mine in glaring white light. I was temporarily blinded, unable to see anything but the glowing white orbs. I squinted and the driver revved his engine again.

  “Big engine, small dick,” I mumbled, searching for my car key.

  I heard the faint crunch of gravel and then the unmistakable sound of rubber peeling over concrete. My head snapped back and the white orbs were growing bigger and bigger as the car came hurtling toward me, its engine throbbing so loudly that the sound pinged through my bones, made my teeth feel weird and achy.

  The driver saw me, I know he did. Or if by chance he didn’t, there was no mistaking my car beside me, my smashed-up, vampire-scrawled car. But he didn’t seem to care. The headlights didn’t waver, didn’t move a millimeter to either side. The driver knew where I was and was aiming right for me—quickly.

  My brain told me to move, to dive, to swerve, to run, but my feet weren’t mine. They wouldn’t respond, couldn’t respond, and kept me rooted to the vibrating concrete as the car closed the distance between us.

  I could smell the exhaust from the car, the fast burn of gas on the chilled night air. I knew it couldn’t have been more than a few seconds—five at the most—but it felt like a lifetime, me rooted to that spot, my meager offering of skin and bones and muscle and flesh against two thousand pounds of rocketing steel. Adrenaline shot through me in fiery waves and my legs gave out. I felt my hair whip across the flying car and I clenched my eyes shut, crushing my palms against my ears as the sound of metal pulverizing metal deafened me. I heard the pop of glass, saw the shards fall in delicate slow motion—like snowflakes, I thought—as they danced to the ground, glistening in the weakening light. I felt my flesh breaking, hot against the concrete.

  And suddenly it was quiet. Dead quiet.

  I couldn’t feel anything. My heart wasn’t beating, the blood that had been coursing through my veins was stiff and oddly silent. I dropped my head and felt the concrete grating into my cheek.

  Then there was pain, and noise.

  Cars honking, tires squeaking, the muddled bass of cars on Nineteenth.

  Blood pulsed from my bottom lip, now swollen and tasting like dirt. I edged myself out from under my car, amazed that I had gotten there. My arms and palms looked like someone had taken a cheese grater to them and bloomed with fresh heat.

  My heart started to thunder. The blood started to pulse. Suddenly, I was gasping, crying, coughing, doubled over with my arms wrapped around my stomach, hugging myself while fresh tears rolled over my nose and fell onto the ground in front of my shoes.

  “Ms. Lawson? Ms. L, is that you?”

  I heard Miranda’s voice over the din of traffic. I inched my eyes up, and when hers met mine, she vaulted out of the doorway and sprinted toward me.

  “Oh my gosh, Ms. Lawson, what happened to you? Are you okay? Should I call someone? The police or 9-1-1?”

  I sucked in a deep, steadying breath and pushed myself to standing. Miranda’s cheeks were flushed—whether from the short run from the school or her concern for me, I wasn’t sure—and her eyes were glassy and wide.

  “No, thanks, Miranda,” I said, shaking my head slowly. “I’m okay. Really.”

  She shifted her weight and a shard of glass from my smashed side-view mirror popped under her foot. She jumped. “What was that? What happened?”

  “That”—I used the toe of my shoe to nudge some errant glass aside—“is what remains of my mirror.”

  “Your car mirror?”

  “Someone tried—” I paused, biting my bottom lip. I could feel the lump tightening in my throat, but I couldn’t cry in front of Miranda, in front of my student. And I couldn’t drag her into this. “Someone just cut a little too close to my car while they were leaving the lot.” I felt my heart thunder, remembering the brush of metal against my hair even as I lied about it. “They must not have seen me.” I managed a small smile.

  Miranda studied me suspiciously. “You look like you were crying.”

  My hand flew to my face. “Oh, do I? Probably because I was thinking of how much my insurance was going to go up. You know, hit and run and all.”

  I saw Miranda’s gaze go over my shoulder and examine my shit heap of a car. “You have insurance?”

  “Um, what are you doing out here? It’s late. Can’t possibly have been in detention.”

  “I stay late a lot.” She thumbed over her shoulder. “Heddy—Ms. Gaines—lets me do some administration stuff for her while I wait for the bus so I don’t have to hang outside the whole time.”

  “You stay until”—I glanced down at my watch—“after six every day?”

  “Oh, no. Not every day. Today I talked to you, and that made me a little bit late so I missed the earlier bus.”

  My near-death-experience emotional rush was replaced by an apologetic blush. “Oh, no. I’m really sorry.”

  Miranda yawned, then shrugged. “No big deal. Not the first time I missed it,” she grinned, wide and genuinely. “Won’t be the last.”

  “Why don’t you let me drive you home?”

  She shook her head with a sweet smile. “That’s okay. It’s probably out of your way.”

  “It’s the least I can do for making you miss the first bus. And you may have saved me from a potential mow-down. I kind of owe you.”

  Miranda opened her mouth just as the Muni bus wailed to a stop at the curb. “That’s my bus,” she said, taking a step back.

  She gave me a tight wave before turning around on her heel and sprinting toward the bus, backpack bobbing behind her. I watched until she boarded. She turned and glanced back at me, her whole body illuminated by the heavy yellow glow of the bus lights.

  The bus belched out a puff of black air as it groaned away from the curb; I watched the illuminated trip board blaring HUNTERS POINT/ BAYVIEW and sighed. Hunters Point was the most undesirable place to live in the whole city. Miranda wouldn’t let me drive her home because she didn’t want me to know where she lived.

  “It never changes,” I mumbled to myself.

  I had almost managed to forget I that I had been a half-inch away from being a hood ornament until I opened my apartment door. Nina immediately jumped off the couch and slammed her pale hands against her open mouth.

  “Ohmigod, Soph, what happened?” Her coal-black eyes were huge and saucer wide. She was on me in a heartbeat, and the second she slid her ice-cold arms around me, I crumbled.

  “Someone tried to kill me!” I wailed into the crook of her neck.

  Nina stiffened. “Again?”

  I pulled back and attempted an indignant huff, then fell back against my best friend. “Yeeeeeeees!” I hiccupped, then burrowed my face into Nina’s neck. “I got run over!”

  Nina took a few careful steps back, keeping one hand splayed against me while the other pressed against her perfect little ski-jump nose. “By a manure truck?”

  I started. “Wha—?” Then I snaked a hand under my shirt and pulled off Lorraine’s fetid “charm,” tossing it across the room. “That was supposed to protect me.” I fell into another heap of tears, this one due both to my recent dance with a Goodyear and the fact that I smelled like a giant cow pie.

  “Oh, Sophs, it’s going to be okay. No one’s going to kill you, I promise. I mean, look how many times people have tried.”

  “But why do people keep trying? It sucks so much! I never try and kill anyone.”

  Nina cocked an eyebrow and I frowned.

  “Okay, okay. But they were all really bad people.” I clapped a hand to my chest. “I’m a good person and yet people keep trying to pummel the crap out of me.” I pressed the pads of my fingers to my swollen bottom lip. “And they
keep getting closer and closer.”

  Nina went to the kitchen while I settled myself on the couch. ChaCha circled me, looking concerned, and I cuddled her to me until Nina returned with an ice cube wrapped in a dishcloth. She pressed it gently to my lip. “You have a swollen lip and a couple of scratches. That’s so not a big deal. Remember when you almost got staked? And you got stabbed in the leg? Those were way closer. And you escaped a fire! Goodness, Adam was hell bent on taking you out and you survived that.”

  “For some reason, none of that makes me feel any better.”

  ChaCha whined on my behalf and shoved her little dog muzzle in my armpit.

  The door clicked open and Vlad walked in, shaking off his duster and narrowly missing hanging it up. “Hey, what’s going on?”

  “Sophie’s upset that people keep trying to kill her.”

  “Still?” Vlad’s lip curled.

  “Again.”

  Vlad shrugged and picked up the mail on the table. “Try being a vampire. They make movies about all the people who want to kill us.”

  I peeked over the edge of the couch, my eyes narrowed. “Yeah, but you’re immortal. It really has much more weight when you’re full of blood and can actually die from being pummeled by a car.”

  “Potato, potah-to. Do we have anymore O neg?” Proof positive that even at a hundred and thirteen, a sixteen-year-old never changes.

  I stepped into the shower and scrubbed every inch of myself until my skin hurt, trying in earnest to get rid of the feelings of parking lot and imminent death. When I was nice and pink and warm, I slipped into my bathrobe and padded into my bedroom, ChaCha trotting happily on my tail.

  I yanked open my top drawer and frowned, poking around at what should have been a sea of silk and lace. Or, more accurately, cotton and elastic stretched to the hilt.

  Either I was woefully behind on laundry duty or there was a panty prowler afoot.

  “Um, Neens?”

  Nina came floating into my bedroom trailed by a cloud of pale pink silk and marabou. She was also wearing kitten heels, and her eyes were made up with thick swaths of black liner that winged at the sides, fringed with the most enviably long eyelashes I’d even seen—boxed or otherwise. The heavily lined lashes and lids only served to make the flat red color on her lips even more dramatic. She blinked at me and gingerly patted her hair—a spectacular waterfall of glossy waves the size of juice cans.