Chapter Twenty-One Nora
Chapter Twenty-One
Nora
Your power is waiting for you. You have to be ready to meet it.
—Rules for Witches
On the night of Daisy’s play, the air was filled with electricity. The mural outside the Holly was three-quarters of the way finished and looked great, if Nora said so herself. It was fun to stand outside the theater and watch people’s reactions to it as they filed in.
Though she knew a lot of the electricity in town was still happening in response to what had happened Sunday.
A few days later, the buzz of what had happened at church with Soraya’s husband hadn’t worn off. It was hard to believe his karma had been quite so public. Intense and obvious.
It was magic. Or at least it seemed that way. It was hard to attribute it to anything else. It felt like karma was a golden thread unspooling before them, winding itself around them.
Soraya seemed to be handling the whole thing well. Nora had a feeling that if she’d been confronted with an actual pornographic movie of Ben having sex with that Instagram girl, she would’ve had a total meltdown.
Soraya was already inside saving seats for her and Sam, and Nora just had to wait for Sam to arrive.
Daisy had been at the theater all day doing rehearsal, and Zach had been with her every step of the way making sure the set was immaculate.
It looked so much more professional than anything Nora had ever seen in their small town, and she had a feeling Zach had gone way over the reasonable budget for a community children’s theater production.
A testament to his feelings for Daisy. Maybe Zach was Daisy’s karma.
Nora was still waiting for hers.
She saw Sam walking down the sidewalk then, taller than the crowd around him. She waved. He tilted his head upward.
“It was nice of you to come,” she said.
“Of course. I have to see my electrical work in action.” He stood next to her and looked up at the mural—at the mountains, trees, and flowers she had painted. “It looks really good.”
“Thank you,” she said.
“Doesn’t it start in five minutes?”
“Yeah. We’d better go in.”
She walked next to him, her knuckles brushing against his, and she ignored the zip of electricity inside her.
She became very aware that people were looking at them.
If people knew who they were, then they knew that she and Sam were friends.
Or maybe they didn’t. People who knew her from the art center and as Ben Clarke’s wife might not know Sam was her best friend and that by being with him in a public space like this—at a place where many people would probably bring a date—well, maybe it seemed like an announcement.
She swallowed hard, suddenly uncertain of what to do. Whether to lean in or lean away. Maybe somebody would text Ben. Maybe somebody would start a rumor about it. Maybe that would be her karma.
It felt strange and sat uncomfortably in her stomach, but she couldn’t say she was repulsed by the thought.
There was something invigorating about the idea of being a surprise.
Of being a rebel again. She had been squished into this box she had made for herself for so many years now.
She had wanted that. She would never have pushed out of it on purpose, but now . . .
Ben had broken something in her. He had broken them.
She wanted to get back at him.
She and Sam walked into the theater, and she saw the back of Soraya’s head, her blond bun unmistakable.
“Over there.” Nora grabbed his hand, not in an intimate way, but a familiar one, and dragged him toward the seats. She ignored the way the contact with his skin made her feel. It was just this moment. This moment that felt wild and reckless and like anything was possible.
The feeling of imminent magic in the midst of triumph that had been lingering around them all for days.
This strange excitement that had covered what had been the worst couple of months for the three of them and had turned it all into something brilliant.
Nora met Soraya’s gaze and saw a question in her eyes she ignored.
Soraya looked back down quickly, and Nora noticed there were messages flashing on her phone in rapid succession.
“What’s that?”
Soraya made an exasperated sound. “It’s getting kind of insane. Pastor John got my number, probably from Kristi. He’s been calling me since Sunday. And now he’s texting. Nonstop. He’s supposed to be here tonight. His and Stephanie’s kids are in the play. Of course, they’re not together right now.”
“Why is he trying to get in touch with you?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t wanted to talk to them. It’s all . . . I don’t have anything to do with it.”
“Except I heard your magic created the situation.” Sam didn’t sound skeptical, exactly, but he also didn’t sound fully sincere.
Nora elbowed him, and he made a gruff sound. “Don’t make fun of it. I’ll hex you.”
“I wasn’t making fun,” he said.
Soraya looked uncomfortable. “You told him?”
“She tells me everything.”
Nora’s stomach did another uncomfortable flip. “He doesn’t believe us anyway.”
“It’s pretty undeniable.” Soraya looked more woeful than excited about that. “I mean, it would be awfully coincidental for that particular video to play at that time without something behind it.”
“Agreed.” Sam clearly saw no point in arguing.
Soraya looked up, and Nora followed her gaze. She vaguely recognized Pastor John Pruitt standing in the aisles, scanning the crowd.
“I’ll go talk to him,” Soraya muttered, and got up out of her seat and scooted past Sam and Nora.
“I think we’re making waves,” Nora said, looking around.
Sam frowned. “Really?”
“Hey.” She took her phone out, holding it in front of them, and flipped the camera around to face them. “Smile.”
He looked handsome and uncomfortable in the photo, giving her side-eye that could never have been called affectionate. She rolled her eyes. And then, without overthinking it, she opened her text chain with Ben. Going to Daisy’s play tonight. Then she popped the photo in the text and sent it.
“What the hell are you doing?” Sam asked.
“Nothing.” She tried to sound innocent, but she wasn’t innocent, so that made it tough.
Sam frowned, a deep groove between his brows. “Are you . . . are you trying to make him jealous?”
“He has a problem with you.” Her voice was small, the confidence she felt a moment ago drained away by his anger.
“Yeah, I know.” Sam looked legitimately disgruntled. “Jesus, at least ask me before you bring me into your drama.”
“Sam, you’re my best friend. You’re permanently in my drama.”
Her phone rang. Ben.
“Oh, look at that. He called your bluff,” Sam said.
“I’m not answering it. He said he didn’t want to speak to me. And anyway, he’s cheating on me. Last time he called, it was to give me an audio-erotic experience that made me want to die. Let him wonder.”
“Yeah. Great. Let him wonder.”
Soraya
“John, hi,” she whispered. “Is Stephanie here?”
She looked around and didn’t like the fact that she had an audience for this interaction.
“Somewhere,” he said. “I need to know what you know.”
“I didn’t know anything about their affair. I didn’t leave him because of Stephanie.”
She had issues with John.
He’d been one of the people who had absolutely thought she needed to go back to David.
He hadn’t been on her side.
But if she’d known his wife was cheating on him with David, regardless of how he’d treated her, she would’ve made sure he knew.
She was glad David had been embarrassed on the level he’d been. She didn’t feel as triumphant about other people being dragged into it. She knew her husband wasn’t faithful. She genuinely felt bad that John had discovered his wife wasn’t in a room full of his congregants.
Her own baggage with the church aside.
“He’s your husband,” he said.
The words made it clear he didn’t truly believe she hadn’t known. Made it clear he still felt she was responsible in some way.
Anger spiked inside her, hot and fast. It didn’t matter that he was the senior pastor of the church she’d gone to for years. It didn’t matter that she’d once seen him as a spiritual leader.
She didn’t need him to tell her what was right and wrong, not now. Not anymore.
“I didn’t know. But I did know he wasn’t faithful to me, and I knew I couldn’t stand to be with a man who didn’t honor me the way I did him.
” She took a deep breath. “You didn’t support me.
No one in the church did. I already knew he wasn’t a good man.
Now you see it, but only now that it affects you.
And you’re still trying to blame me. Still.
Why don’t you lay blame on the person who deserves it for once?
Because it isn’t me. I am not taking the weight of his sins. ”
She felt alive. Filled with righteous fury.
Filled with certainty. “He’s not my problem anymore.
I left him. I’m not going to be your example of sacrificial love.
I’m not going to be at fault for all his transgressions.
How does any of this make sense? That women are at fault for everything and yet in charge of nothing.
That women are expected to have the greater ability to forgive, to carry the weight of men’s sins, and yet we’re supposed to be weaker than them.
I feel sorry for you right now, but you are part of this.
Put the blame where it belongs. Not on me. ”
She turned and walked away, shaking. She’d really done it now. She had blown up at her pastor. She would never be welcome back again.
The truly wonderful thing she realized as she walked back to Sam and Nora was that she didn’t care.
Daisy
The play felt like a triumph.
For the past couple of months, Daisy had felt like she’d been treading water wearing a life jacket made of lead. Like she was going to sink to the bottom completely, and there would be no way she could do it all.
But she had.
The kids had been amazing, including her own. The sets were fantastic. And when the play closed and the curtain dropped, Marjorie, the director of the theater board, called her up to take a bow.
She saw Jonathan, mainly because Amberly was standing and clapping and hopping. She pointed at Daisy’s dress—she had worn the emerald one—and gave her a thumbs-up. Jonathan, meanwhile, didn’t seem to notice at all.
Daisy scanned the crowd for Zach.
Marjorie handed her a giant bouquet of flowers, and she looked down at them, then up at Zach. Because she knew they were actually from him, and he wasn’t giving them to her in public out of respect.
But she knew they were from him all the same.
She felt like she was standing on top of a summit. It wasn’t everything. Her whole life wasn’t sorted out. But she had managed to do this. For the kids. For Alexandra, who should’ve been there helping, but was still in the hospital, unable to.
She’d done it. She wasn’t defeated by this. By the hideous, awful thing she’d gone through.
She was still standing.
Then she looked and saw her friends. Soraya was standing up and clapping, with Nora next to her, and Sam on the other side of Nora.
It meant so much to have friends.
She’d been so sure her life was over when Jonathan walked out the door. Her life had shrunk down to him. Him and the kids and their house.
Over the years, she hadn’t kept up with all her friendships, hadn’t kept up with herself. And yet, there were all these people here for her. And she felt like herself. Her friends had waited for her, and so had Daisy. The girl she’d been. The one she’d lost touch with all that time ago.
Who used to sing but didn’t now.
But had, in Soraya’s kitchen.
Who had been desperately in love with Zachary Woods on the TV screen, and who now got to go to bed with him pretty much every night. Her dreams weren’t over. Her dreams were just starting.
Daisy felt magic. Right then, she felt absolutely magic.