Weird.
Too weird.
Gran was gonna disown me.
Addison seemed to remember himself, let me go and introduced us to Darling.
She bobbed her head in a distracted way whilst looking around the restaurant with an attitude and posture that clearly stated she felt she was slumming.
She had little to no interest in me.
Which I thought was super-weird.
I, on the other hand, found her fascinating.
The Institute’s picture of her didn’t do her justice, at all. (She should sue.)
Even though she was average height (and had an unfortunate nose), she was still an imposing and handsome woman. Her clothes were a bit dowdy but of good quality that screamed money.
And the bitch had ‘tude.
She wasn’t scary in a Wicked Witch of the West kind of way. She was scary in a Nicole Kidman in The Others kind of way – uppity and spooky.
Hmm.
“I hate to interrupt you but our party is here,” Darling said impatiently.
She nodded to a table across the restaurant that was filled with three suited men.
“Yes, yes, of course,” Addison replied, distracted. “I’m in Bristol for an important meeting…” he told Aidan and then went on about getting together for a drink, yadda, yadda, yadda.
I looked at the men.
I looked at Darling.
I looked back at the men.
I looked at Addison.
Shit.
Addison was the devil that Darling had made the deal with. They were in cahoots.
I looked at him, at his supposed genuine friendship with Aidan and his quick, polite glances at me.
What a poser.
I felt cheated.
I felt betrayed.
Why all of this emotion in the expanse of two minutes of knowing the guy?
Yikes!
He left saying something about hoping to see me again and took off for his table.
I felt like I was having a heart attack.
“How do you know him?” I asked Aidan once we were seated again.
“Long time family acquaintance. We go skiing together at Gstaad at Christmas, have for years.”
Ack!
“But, he’s…” I started then stopped.
“Yes?” Aidan prompted.
“He’s, a…” I started again and stopped again.
“Yes?” Aidan prompted again.
“He’s a Republican!”
Aidan stared at me and made no reply.
I excused myself after the starters and ran to the bathroom and called Ash.
This was our conversation:
“Yes?” (Ash answering the phone.)
(Who answers the phone like that?)
“It’s me.” (Me)
(I think I detected a sigh over the line.)
“Mathilda!” (Me)
“I know.” (Ash)
“Agatha Darling is here!” (Me)
Silence.
“With Douglas Addison!” (Me again)
More silence.
“Well?” (Me)
“Yes?” (Ash)
“Here, now, in the restaurant.” (Me)
Silence.
“Well!?” (Me, getting impatient)
“And?”
“And what? She’s the bad guy! Aren’t you going to do something?”
“Did she cast an evil spell on you?”
“No.”
“Shoot at you with a gun?”
“No.”
“Throw food at you in a menacing way?”
“You aren’t taking me seriously,” I noted irritably.
No answer.
“Ash?” I called.
“It’s very American of you to ask for a pre-emptive strike.”
Ack! How mean!
“Keep an eye on her and get back to me,” he ordered and then he hung up.
Can you believe?
I went back to dinner.
“You okay with Darling being here?” Aidan asked.
“Sure, yeah, no problem,” I lied.
No way was I okay.
I was freaking out.
Not freaking out enough not to enjoy my fab halibut.
But still freaking.
Freaking so much I didn’t even process it when Aidan told me his family held a title (Earl of something-or-other, it’ll go to his older brother).
Freaking so much I didn’t react at all when he told me about the house he’ll inherit from his mother and how, “We let the National Trust open it to the public but… ”
Freaking so much I didn’t pay a lot of attention when he mentioned Eton, as in, “My years at…”
Too preoccupied to grill Aidan about The Prophesies.
Too preoccupied to think about what came next.
So when he walked me to the door of The Gables and we stopped and, with a gentle hand, he lifted up my chin, just like they do in the movies, I blinked.
“Hi,” he said quietly.
It all came rushing back to me. It was end-of-date-would-you-like-to-come-up-for-a-drink-time.
“Hi,” I said back.
And I knew he was going to kiss me.
Yay!
As his head descended, I whispered, “About those Prophesies and you and me and…” (I was teasing, I am Glamour Girl and we’re allowed to be a little coquettish).
Then his lips hit mine and I leaned forward while Aidan leaned into me, putting one arm around me to pull me closer and the other out bracing us against the doorjamb.
It was a nice kiss, a professorial kiss, a kiss one might expect from, say, Stephen Hawkings (before he got really sick, of course).
I was standing there, slightly disappointed, expecting something more…
Then his lips opened, my lips opened, his tongue touched mine and…
Yowza!
Super-shivers!
Yay!
Then he really leaned into me and…
Yayayayayay!
Yay!
“Wow,” I breathed after he lifted his head.
He grinned.
“Wow,” I breathed, this time for the sexy grin.
Then the door opened.
It was, of course, Ash.
Aidan didn’t move, didn’t let me go, just looked over his shoulder at Ash.
I didn’t move either, just peeked over Aidan’s arm at Ash.
“Curfew?” Aidan asked.
Ash didn’t respond.
He also didn’t move.
Thus began a weird display of testosterone as both men held their positions.
One beat.
Two beats.
Yikes!
I held my breath.
Then Aidan looked at me. “I’ll be in touch,” he said softly then he kissed my nose and then he was gone.
That was it. He got in his Roadster and took off.
Dinner and a kiss.
Okay, so it was halibut in lobster, brandy cream sauce and a fucking great kiss but still!
Ash grabbed my arm and pulled me inside, closing the door behind me. Then he started walking away, brushing past me.
Uh, what?
Interrupt a kiss like that and then walk away?
I don’t think so!
“Hey!” I snapped at his back.
He turned. “Yes?”
Erm.
“Uh… nothing,” I muttered.
Okay, maybe he scares me. Just a little.
I started to walk forward.
“You smell…” he muttered when I came abreast of him and I stopped, “good.”
“Good?”
Wha?
“Yes, good.”
“What does that mean?” I asked, hands on hips.
He just looked down at me.
“Well?” I pressed.
“You smell like sex,” he answered.
Ack!
What does sex smell like?
And, is that good?
Yikes.
I mean, I know what sex smells like but how did I smell like that?
Maybe I shouldn’t ask.
He was walking away.
“What does that mean, I smell like sex? I didn’t have sex,” I informed him.
Okay, perhaps I should have let it alone.
He turned, his lips were twitching now.
He didn’t spend the night running his frustrations off on the treadmill.
He didn’t spend it slowly getting drunk and pining after me.
He found me amusing.
I amused him.
Now I know how Joe Pesci felt!
“You don’t smell like you’ve had it, you smell like you want it.”
My mouth dropped open.
“Don’t worry,” his voice had dipped low, “that’s a good thing,” he assured me.
Then he fucking winked at me.
Fucking, fucking Sebastian!
And I still didn’t know a thing about The Prophesies.
22 March
Had to sort Rory out.
I was up in the Tower Room, cleansing my magickal implements as Nerissa taught me to when the phone rang.
And rang.
And rang.
A house full of people and nobody answers the phone.
I grabbed it and it was Rory’s headmaster.
Rory had been suspended for three days, fighting in school.
Our little Rory, fighting!
Thank goddess Josie was holed up somewhere joining the Labour Party or Rory would have been in for it.
As I was on Josie’s list to pick up Rory when she was unavailable, they told me to come and get him.
He had a busted lip and a face like thunder and said nothing throughout the entire meeting with the headmaster.
On the way home, I tried to get it out of him but he was having none of it. The minute we got back to The Gables, he thumped through the house toward the Trunk Room like he’d been taking Snotty Kid Lessons from a Disney movie.
Problem is, as he was thumping, he hit one of Mavis’s tables and knocked over and broke a Waterford vase.
Mm.
Not good.
“Best pick that up and then go tell Mavis,” I advised and Rory turned on me, little kid face in full scowl.
Then he grunted with feeling, “Nuh!”
“Nuh?” I asked.
“Yeah! Nuh!”
I know this seems like a weird conversation but I figure it’s normal going with a moody eight year old.
“What’s your problem?” I asked. I could go snotty with the best of them.
“I don’t have a problem.” Rory trying to out-snot me (no way, I was a master).
“You do have a problem and a busted lip to prove it,” I told him.
“Nuh.”
“Nuh right back at ‘cha!” I snapped.
This is when Su walked in.
“What gives?” she asked.
“You’re a hippy,” Rory said it like he would say, “You’re a loser,” to someone he actually thought was a loser.
Su looked at me and then walked out.
I guess I was on my own.
“You better tell me what’s going on,” I said to Rory.
“And you’re a witch.”
And he said the word “witch” like it started with a different letter.
Uh-oh.
Then Rory thumped away.
I gave him awhile to sulk, it’s always good to have awhile to sulk, and cleaned up the vase. Then I knocked on the door to the Trunk Room and ignored the “Go away!”
Rory was bouncing a soccer ball against the wall. Mavis would have a conniption.
I caught the ball.
“Rory, honey –”
“I said, go away!”
“Let’s talk.”
“Doan wanna.”
“Well, I don’t care if you ‘doan wanna’, we’re gonna talk.”
Rory glared at me with arms crossed on his chest.
Okay… here goes.
“Rory, I’m a witch,” I announced.
His glare didn’t waiver.
I kept going. “And Mavis is a witch, so is Su, Viv, Mom, Gran… we’re all witches.”
No response.
I continued, “And so are most of the ladies at the café, except Lucy.”
Not even a blink of an eye.
I kept speaking. “Real, honest-to-goodness Sabrinas.”
Still no reaction.
I took my wand out of my back pocket, centered myself, focused, took a deep breath and threw up the football.
Then I let fly my magic.
Hot pink pixie dust shot out and shattered against the ball with sparks flying here, there and everywhere, changing the ball to a frog which fell – splat (ack!) – onto the floor and started croaking and jumping around.
I flipped out my wand again – and bam! – the frog was a ball again.
That got a response.
And that response was, “Crickey!”
He jumped up and plastered himself against the wall and stared at me like he’d never seen me before.
“This is the story,” I said. “I’m a witch and I have power. I use it carefully, for good only and only for people who ask me to help them. Your Mom needed my help and asked for it. I’m bound to her by her request, bound to help her and keep her… and you… safe through magic and anything else I dream up. You got that?”
He nodded.
“You got a problem with that?” I asked.
“They say at school you’re all lesbians.”
“They’re all stupid at school. No one’s a lesbian and who cares if they are? What’s wrong with lesbians?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, this is my advice, instead of hitting someone who says something stupid like that, just say, ‘So?’ or adopt the Pee Wee Defense and say, ‘I know you are but what am I?’”
This cracked the snotty-kid-guard and he started to smile.
“‘I know you are but what am I?’” he repeated then asked, “Who’s Pee Wee?”
He didn’t know Pee Wee!?
“Oh Dude, you don’t know Pee Wee? Well, we’ll have to rectify that,” I announced.
And that was me sorting Rory out.
Of course later, Josie sorted him out more.
And even later, I smuggled in Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. I know I shouldn’t have but I’m Cool Mathilda and I have to keep that up.
Chapter Six
The Month of April
April 2
It started out as the perfect day.
I should have known it wouldn’t last.
* * * * *
I woke up early and got on eBay right away and, sometime in the night, I won those Jimmy Choo shoes I’d been bidding on.
(Yay!).
I never, ever win.
(Yay! Yay!)
Since I was so excited to find out about my Jimmy Choos, I had time to do yoga before breakie… so after yoga I felt relaxed and energetic and ready to face the day.
Lunchtime proved my new pizza offering at the Café was a hit.
(Take that Lucy.)
Side note: Sun-dried tomatoes may just be the ambrosia of the gods and if you put them in the crust and in the sauce and on the pizza, it can’t be beat.
After work, had errands to run. As Ash is still sticking to me like glue (except in that way), he had to drive me.
This is not a plus.
Ash is nice to look at (very) and gives me that special feeling (very, very special feeling) but having that all the time is not-so-special (especially since nothing has come of it except a kiss in the library about two gazillion years ago).
So now, Ash-as-bodyguard is sort of Mathilda Torture.
Oh well.
The sacrifices one makes to be Savior of the World.
I do get a reprieve, when in or around The Gables or The Witches Dozen, Ash will leave me alone. Both places have protection spells and pretty strong broomsticks covering their front and rear, so
I’m safe.
So…
Off we went on my errands, Ash and I, first to the tip to get rid of the recycling. Then to Brockley Farm Shop so I could buy my lavender (they have the best – they also have pretty great sausages too, so got some of those and some nice, chubby baby carrots and…)
I digress.
And on the way home from Brockley’s, I saw Cadbury Garden Centre.
Now, garden centres in England are like little shopping nirvanas tucked here and there all over the country. They have invisible tractor beams that could rival the Death Star. Even if you don’t garden or aren’t craftsy (like me), you get sucked in and find yourself spending hours flipping through books on perennials and testing knee mats and listening with rapt attention to people explaining the pros and cons of different types of trowels, etcetera.
Ash and I were coming up to Cadbury Garden Centre, otherwise known as Granddaddy of All Garden Centres so I shouted, “Turn up there!”
“Where?”
“There!” I pointed.
Ash slowed.
“Why?” he asked and I think I detected a hint of suspicion.
“I need something.” I cast around in my head for an excuse he would buy. “Witch stuff… magickal implements.” That sounded good. “It’s important!” I added, just in case me shouting wasn’t getting through.
“This is an unscheduled stop.”
“What? Do you have to report back or something, turn, turn, turn!!!”
So he turned.
Some time later, as we were walking back to the car, he asked, “You needed pink pots?”
“They aren’t pink,” I said, changing the subject because I knew I wouldn’t ever convince him I needed pots – pink pots, no less.
He looked at me in a way that said he thought I was fibbing.
Then we got into the car.
Not, it is important to mention, the Lush Jag, no.
We were in my car.
We were recycling at the tip and it is far easier to recycle in a hatchback (not to mention Su had kinda borrowed the Lush Jag, long story). So we were in my fourth hand Nissan Micra that used to be the wet dream of a boy racer and now was my daytime nightmare.
* * * * *
Story on how I came to be the not-so-proud owner of the Purple People Eater:
Boy Racer had run out of money and had to unload his Micra.
I was (even then) bidding on Jimmy Choos rather than saving for a decent car.
So.
Boy Racer and I made an unholy alliance that ended up with me owning a partially suped-up Micra and Boy Racer having, well, nothing but a bit of my money.
To the credit of Boy Racer, he did give the Micra a kickass iridescent green knob on the stick shift and some lights on the undercarriage that would make me hip with all the homeys in the ‘hood (ack!). The car also had a paint job that was metallic purple with platinum and green opalescent effects.