Eva
“Come over after work! We can watch garbage TV and order sushi,” Riley says the following evening as she flips over the open sign in the front window.
Her invitation sounds way better than what I’ve got planned.
I’d much rather spend the evening with my best friend eating overpriced sushi and ragging on reality TV.
It’s the distraction we need from stressing about the fog that showed up yesterday.
“I wish I could. I have to go to my mom’s, and then I’m meeting Grant for dinner.”
“Wo-o-o-w,” she drags the word out into four syllables. “You’re going to ditch me to have dinner with Grant?” She doesn’t bother hiding the disdain in her voice.
Recently, Riley has made it crystal clear that she does not like my boyfriend.
I won’t admit it out loud, but it’s hard to deny some of the points she makes.
Our relationship worked a lot better when he was a ranger at the state park, before he took that job at a software company as an Account Executive.
The slow descent into his new career and corporate life has become his obsession.
All of this bothers her on my behalf. But Grant and I have so much history, even if this rocky patch has gone on a little longer than I thought it would.
Riley’s negative opinion is only informed by my need to vent and a few unfortunate interactions when he wasn’t at his best. I feel the need to defend him, “Grant has his redeeming qualities.”
“Ew. If this is about what happens in the bedroom, I don’t want to know.” She shoves her index fingers in her ears and sings la-la-la before I can correct her.
Admittedly, I’m not in a hurry to close up the café for the night.
The longer it takes, the longer Riley and I have to hang out.
She doesn’t appear to be in any hurry either, pausing here and there to chat and check her phone.
Only half the chairs have been turned upside down and placed on the tables.
She holds up her phone, tilts her head to the side, puckers her pouty lips, and snaps a selfie. Her sleek black hair cut, parted down the middle, still looks as good as it did this morning.
I, on the other hand, look and feel haggard. My denim coveralls are coffee stained and the humidity in the café made my hair frizz, turning it into a bird’s nest halfway through the lunch rush.
Riley takes off her apron, revealing a gray concert T-shirt with the grainy picture of a 90s rock band.
“Is that a new one?”
“It is! Good on you for noticing.” She beams at her phone and snaps another picture of herself.
I grab the watering can and fill it up. I’ve been cultivating a giant wall of plants, and it’s my favorite thing at the coffee shop. The pothos’ long, bushy vines frame the giant window that casts the perfect amount of light over the café.
“Are you sure you aren’t a green witch? Look at this place, the plants are eventually going to reclaim the entire building.”
She’s right, they are thriving here. Although I think it has more to do with the warm sunlight than me.
“Nope, my aunt’s magick test came back inconclusive. My calling has no desire to come out.” It’s a sore subject, and I cringe every time someone brings it up.
“It’ll show up someday, Eva. Meanwhile, I’ll just sit around and play with words and write silly incantations. Why couldn’t I have gotten a better brand? Word witches are all such nerds.”
Oh boy, here we go. She hates that her inclination is toward words, but it does make sense. She’s obsessed with music and lyrics, hence her massive collection of music festival shirts. She also loves storytelling and can derive meaning and significance from any lore or tale.
Riley huffs loudly while she scrubs a table top. My best-friend-sixth-sense tells me the sticky dried coffee isn’t what is bothering her.
“It won’t kill you to watch TV without me for a night,” I say, climbing up onto a stepladder to pour water into the highest pots, working my way down.
“It’s not as fun, and you know it.”
She finishes up with the tables and moves onto sweeping the floor. Impatiently, she waves her hand directing the broom to finish the job on its own.
“Hey! No magick—someone could see.” I glance out the window to see if anyone is around.
“Oh no, Raincrest’s worst-kept secret could be confirmed by a broom, of all things!” Her tone drips with sarcasm.
“Rumors are one thing, but none of us are ready for Raincrest to be the next Salem.”
“They don’t hang witches anymore,” Riley says, pursing her lips together.
“I’m not talking about the witch trials. I’m talking about tourists!”
She chuckles and reluctantly nods, “Well, you could always just use an Oblivia spell.”
“Low blow.” I playfully toss the cleaning towel down at her from the stool. She’ll never let me live down the fact that I struggled to learn the basic memory wiping spell as a young witch.
“It’s not too late. You could tell Grant there was an emergency at the café and reschedule for next week,” Riley suggests.
“A coffee emergency?” Ridiculous. He’ll see through that right away.”
“People have coffee emergencies all the time! Haven’t you seen the look on people’s faces as they stumble in every morning?”
It’s true, most of them are either hardly awake or are dressed for the office, already working away on their phones while they wait for their triple americanos.
Plants watered and back on solid ground, I turn up the music and sway to the rhythm while I sanitize the steam wands on the espresso machine.
Riley grabs the mop and uses the handle like a microphone singing along to the rock ballad that we save for closing up.
We share a love for old love songs, the ones that always come at the end of some campy rom-com.
“Anything I do, I do it for you,” she belts out, completely off key.
Together, we restock the condiment station. Wood stir sticks, white sugar, raw sugar, sugar substitute. “I don’t know why we keep this stuff in stock,” Riley says, shoving pink packets into a jar.
“Don’t yuck someone else’s yum.” I throw one at her, hitting her square in the chest. I refill the cinnamon shaker and restock the cardboard cup sleeves.
“Hey! Don’t mess up my new shirt,” she says and checks to make sure nothing stuck to her faded tee.
“By definition, vintage does not mean new.”
“It’s new to me. Also, don’t let your mom hear you call it vintage—I think she actually saw them in concert.”
Riley is always asking my mom about the 90s, which she calls the golden age of alternative rock and pop.
“So where are you meeting Grant for dinner?” she asks, wiping up stray sugar granules.
“Papa Di Marcos.”
“At least you’ll get some handmade pasta!” she says, like it’s the only positive thing about having dinner with Grant.
Good memories with Grant go hand-in-hand with the mouthwatering pasta since it was where we had our first date. If I went back in time and told him that current-day Grant would be driving a BMW to work at his corporate job, he would call me a liar.
“I hope it never turns into one of those swanky restaurants with tiny serving sizes and rude waiters,” Riley continues. “Like all of the other places Grant drags you.”
“The worst, right? Although, I do look forward to the drive-thru tacos afterward. Also, you act like Grant invented the concept of fine dining. Give the guy a break.”
“Fine. But isn’t it every best friend’s job to think no man is ever good enough?”
“True,” I admit. I’ve been guilty of the same with her past partners.
“You’re more forgiving than I would be. Grant essentially turned into a finance bro overnight. And don’t pretend it doesn’t bug you.”
Maybe it’s a bit of conflict avoidance or simply not having the energy to keep defending my life choices. I change the subject to something I know she’ll latch onto.
“Do you think Drake, which is a ridiculous name by the way, is going to finally admit he kissed Sofia in the hammock?” I dangle our favorite reality show, Bikini Island.
I’m starting to regret suggesting that she watch it without me.
I really want to see Drake’s smarmy ass get what’s coming to him live.
“Don’t worry, I’ll wait, and we can watch it tomorrow,” she says, noticing my sour expression, and grabs her purse and raincoat. “Hey, don’t forget to break up with Grant tonight!” she jokes with a wry smile before closing the door behind her, always the one to get the last word.
I grab my things as well and flip off the lights. I like this peaceful moment when everything is dark and quiet, a beat to reset before I step back out into the real world where everything I have to deal with is out there waiting for me.
As I approach the door, a face peering through the front window startles me. My heart is in my throat before I make out the shape of a middle-aged woman with her hands framing her face pressed against the glass, looking around the café. I step outside and lock the deadbolt behind me.
“Sorry, we’re closed for the night,” I inform her kindly. From the look of desperation on her face, it looks like someone is having a coffee emergency after all.
“Oh, sure, thanks!” she says and hurries back into her jet black car before I can assure her that we will be open in the morning. The woman peels out, the deafening squeal of her tires out of place in our quiet, sleepy little town.
“Seriously, Mom? This one?” She sets the beginners’ cauldron on the table in front of me. It’s small, the kind usually given to a novice. I turn it over and etched in the bottom are my initials ES. My first cauldron, given to me when I turned nine.
“I’m tired of you ruining mine,” she says, joining me at the kitchen table.
She slides over a plate of sliced apples with a big dab of peanut butter right in the center.
It makes me feel like a kid again—coddled, somewhere between patronizing and comforting.
Same old dusty cauldron, same afterschool snack.
“It’s for a good cause,” I mumble between bites of the tart apple.
“How does your magick feel these days?”