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Mystic Hollow Community Page
New post from Mystic Hollow Farms: Extended hours through Halloween weekend. Come get your apple fix with us. Mention your Mystic Hollow address and get a discount!
“Yes, we have a whole section on the supernatural and local history in this room,” I hear Laney’s mom tell a customer, and the two of us follow the sound of her voice into the next room.
“We don’t have any books on Mystic Hollow specifically.
I mean, there is the guide to town written by Mayor Croft, but he self-published it, so I’m not sure that’s what you’re looking for. ”
She’s talking to two teens around our age who are wearing coordinating fall outfits and filming the shop on their phones.
Laney and I look at each other. Influencers.
Mayor Croft must be thrilled.
“But the town is tied to magic too, right?” one girl asks, holding a ring light in her free hand. “Because we saw a video online that said this is the perfect New England town for leaf-peeping and tarot readings.”
Laney gives me a look. I stay mum. If this girl considers herself a witch, she isn’t the same sort of witch I am.
Which is fine, but I doubt she can actually feel the hum of magic here.
I mean, it’s not like I can either, but the aunts and now Harry are always talking about how much stronger their magic feels when they’re here.
I’ve never physically felt my magic, and I’m starting to doubt whether it’s inside me anywhere.
Although I shouldn’t complain—apparently the weight of it can almost be painful.
My aunts are always complaining about their knees, and I know my mom’s migraines are no joke.
Of course Harry would only feel hers in her cute button nose—which is why she sometimes twitches it when she casts a spell.
“Something about ley lines?” the influencer is continuing. She glances around, like she’s about to see a ghost right now at this very moment.
“Stop it!” the other girl says, nudging her. “I don’t want to mess with any ghosts or whatever.”
“If you don’t bother the spirits, they won’t bother you,” Laney’s mom says with a wink, her black bob swaying.
She pulls a Witchcraft of Connecticut book off one of her shelves and shows it to the girls.
“Mystic Hollow isn’t even listed in here, which is funny because legend has it this town is a conduit for the supernatural. ”
Laney gives me a pointed look, like she’s saying, See, those rituals are important and you shouldn’t risk all our safety over some guy who I saw picking his nose last week . . . and eating it.
Or something. It’s not like I can read her mind. I shake the tingling out of my fingers. I must be clenching my fists in stress and not realizing it.
“Great,” the girl is saying. “We’re doomed.”
Laney’s mom laughs. “No, no. It just means magic is stronger here, so you’re right about that. It’s an energy. Don’t be worried. This town is well protected by a long line of—” Her mom looks up and sees me. “Hi, girls!”
For the millionth time, I wonder if we’re as secret about being witches as my mom thinks.
We try to never cast out in the open, but I’ve been called “witch girl” at school for as long as I can remember.
After almost four hundred years of protecting the town, I guess we’re bound to have started some rumors.
“Hi!” I say, smiling brightly at the girls.
“Hi, Mom. Anything we can help with?” Laney asks. “We’ve got a few minutes”—I make a noise low in my throat—“An hour,” Laney amends.
“Wonderful!” Laney’s mom claps her hands together. “Two new fall romance book boxes we’ve been waiting on just came in, and I haven’t had a chance to shelve them yet. Think you could help me out?”
“I’ll help too,” I say. Something tells me that Colton is going to be at Witches Brew a little while longer.
As I follow Laney to the storage room, a shriek stops me. I whirl to a thunk—a book pops off the shelf, followed by another. They land, splayed out across the hardwood.
One girl covers her eyes, but the other holds up her phone, probably live streaming. “Is it a ghost? Is there a presence with us in this bookstore?”
“Nope!” Laney’s mom reaches into the stacks and pulls out a large gray tabby cat. “It’s just Jinx. There’s a crawl space behind some of the stacks, and he finds it funny to make more work for us.” She rubs the cat behind the ears, and the cat wriggles to get away.
The phone is lowered with a scowl.
Laney leans over and whispers in my ear, “Next time, she should just say it’s witchcraft.”
Fifteen minutes later, the shelving is done, and I can’t stall anymore.
By the time we get to the coffee shop, there is a crowd of people waiting to order and pick up drinks.
A group of middle schoolers stands off to the side by the hay bales taking selfies.
They each have a tiny pumpkin filled with iced coffee, topped with whipped cream, cinnamon, and fall sprinkles.
They laugh as they try to squeeze into the picture with their drinks, and I shake off a pang in my chest. Harry and I took a selfie here, after the fiasco with Ryan at the carnival and I puked up all my cotton candy.
She cut the POP wristband off my arm, and I stuffed it in my backpack.
It’s probably still there, but it reminds me more of her than of him.
I don’t remember the last time my sister and I hung out like that and just talked.
“You don’t need to get anything,” Laney says. “Principal Aceste is right over there.” She points to the familiar form in the corner, cheeks hollowing out as he sucks on a huge pumpkin drink.
My nerves are making my fingers tremble. “I could use some caffeine.”
Laney gives my shaking hands a knowing look. I’m stalling and she knows it, but Colton and his football buddies are over in the corner, kicking around a pumpkin like a soccer ball. The line should take at least ten minutes. These are complicated drinks.
“Katherine Hadley,” a voice calls, and I step forward in confusion to the pickup section. Zach hands me a pumpkin heaped with whipped cream. “Pumpkin spice latte. Extra whip. Extra white chocolate. To go.”
He made me my drink? Did Laney text him? “What?”
“It’s a long line.”
“So?”
“Don’t want you getting bored and setting anything else on fire,” Zach says, cutting his dark eyes at me. I blink, my stomach lurching as I notice some whip caught in his curls. “What?” he asks, eyes softening.
Before I can stop myself, I reach over with a thumb and brush his hair clean. My cheeks burn. Why did I just do that?
“You should wear a hairnet,” I say quickly, trying to sound annoyed.
He only grins back at me, like he’s won an argument. “Wait.”
That same mitt-sized hand lands on my wrist. I freeze as he knocks a shaker over the cloudlike puff of whipped cream, depositing cinnamon. How did he know I wanted that? Before I can say anything, Zach’s brothers are calling him back to manage the line.
When I reach Laney, she’s shaking her head.
“What?” I ask. “He just wants me out of his hair.”
“His hair,” she repeats. “Looks like you were very much in his hair.”
“That’s what I said.”
She laughs again. “Whatever. You’ve both got it bad. I’m just curious who is going to admit their crush first.”
“The only crushing I’m doing on Zach Powell involves my GPA totally defeating his. And I’m sure he feels the same.”
“Then why didn’t you have to pay for your drink?” She leans forward and takes a long sip on the straw. “And why does he know your order?”
I roll my eyes. This is just Zach proving he’s better than me. That he has a near-perfect memory and pays attention, unlike me. That he’s serious and good at his job.
The one good thing about this terrible conversation is it makes me want to actually embarrass myself by sitting down at a table with our high school principal.
“Katherine,” he says, sounding surprised.
“I wanted to, um, apologize for the accident earlier today.”
He frowns. “It may have been an accident, but there was extensive damage.”
“Extensive?” My stomach rolls. “I’ll replace Zara’s notebook, and the fire wasn’t even that big—”
“The water damage, Katherine. From the sprinklers. I’m going to have to sit down with your parents tomorrow to discuss paying for damages.”
“Paying for damages?” My heart hammers in my chest. Despite the sweetness of the pumpkin latte, I think I might throw up.
“I was actually going to give your parents a call right now.”
“Don’t!” It comes out too urgent, too loud. “Um, my mom just got a new number. Can I give it to you?”
I glance over at Laney. Can I have him call her instead? She shakes her head, mouthing, “Don’t even think about it.” Who else, then?
Barking breaks through the lull of the café, and a dog comes barreling through the cozy space.
Principal Aceste flinches, his drink spilling spectacularly all over the floor, as Zach steps out from behind the counter just in time.
The pup jumps up and places his paws on Zach’s stomach, barking happily, and Zach actually smiles.
I’ve seen this dog before. He’s brown with a patch of black fur running along his back like a skunk, and he’s not wearing a collar.
“Ronald! There you are!” Zach rubs the dog on his head.
“Fred!” Laney runs over now too, and the dog turns to her and tries to lick her face. “Good to see you, buddy!”
“Fred? It’s Ronald,” Zach tells Laney.
“No, I call him Fred. He looks like a Fred,” Laney insists, and the two start arguing.
I bend over to help clean up the principal’s spilled drink. His phone has also fallen. My heart jumps into my throat.
“Whose dog is this?” Principal Aceste asks, his voice sharp.
“He’s a stray,” Zach says. “I’ve been trying to gain his trust for days. I left food out for him last night, but when I got too close, he ran off.”
“We did too, but we couldn’t get him into the shop,” Laney says, and starts cooing to the dog again. “Want a treat? Do you, boy?”
Zach pulls a dog bone out of his pocket. “Here you go, Ronald. It’s pumpkin!”
The dog sniffs the bone then grabs it and runs off. Of course Zach carries dog treats with him.
“It is a health violation to have dogs in here,” the principal is saying. I share a look with Laney, flashing his phone.
“Are you sure that’s true?” she asks, distracting the principal as I paw around in his phone. “Because I know Mayor Croft has reworked the town charter this Halloween season—”
Zach is glaring at me. He sidles closer, dropping his voice and his lips so they’re right by my ear. “What are you doing, Hadley?”
I scroll through his contacts to my mother’s number. Of course they’ve been texting about my sister, Harry, and how wonderful she is.
I go to change the number to Laney’s, but my fingers buzz and fumble across the screen. To my horror, a few numbers seem to magically change.
“Then I’ll talk to the mayor myself,” Principal Aceste is saying. As he stands, Zach and I wrestle for the phone.
“You dropped this,” Zach says, holding it out.
“Ah, thank you,” Principal Aceste says, glancing between the two of us. “Very kind of you.”
As he walks away, Zach yanks a hairnet over his curls. “You’d better be fixing this, Hadley.”