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Mystic Hollow Community Page
New post from Anonymous: Stray dog seen wandering around Mystic Hollow. Brown. Looks like a retriever mix. Friendly, but easily spooked. Anyone know who the owner is?
I button my coat and keep my head down as I hurry home, wondering what will happen when Principal Aceste tries to call my mother and gets a stranger instead.
Maybe I can cast a spell that the stranger will play along, pay for the damages, and this will all be resolved without my parents finding out, so the party won’t be canceled, and Colton Croft will prove his love to me magically at midnight on Halloween?
Yeah, right. Even Harry isn’t that good of a witch.
She’ll probably laugh about it with my mom. It’s so embarrassing that my spell backfired so epically. The thought of Harry hearing about this makes my whole body tingle like a rash. I can feel a pit forming in my stomach.
As dusk starts to settle over the mountain behind our town, the sunset seems to highlight our house at the end of the street. For almost two hundred years, it’s been perched on the edge of the lake, the gables framed against our weeping willow.
The garden grabs me—it’s gotten unwieldy since Harry moved away to Boston for school—but I like the messy look of the ferns and trailing ivy.
Even the large oak tree in the center of our lawn seems to have grown wilder without her.
I feel that same pinch in my chest—the tire swing is starting to fray.
If we don’t do anything, it’ll fall into the yard soon.
I convinced Harry to cast a spell that would get the tire to swing without us pumping our legs, and the two of us would spend hours outside, taking turns, laughing, and talking.
Lately, we haven’t been doing either of those things. We used to work together so well. Harry was good at everything, and I was good at, well, Harry. I knew how to get her to loosen up, to take a break, to do something a little bit against the rules.
And while our parents would discipline us and tell us to get back to work, Dad would always give me a little smile. “You’re good for her Kitty Kat,” Dad told me once, patting me on the back.
That was the one thing that I could do. I couldn’t cast spells or win awards, and even my straight A’s weren’t worth a comment, since Harry was every teacher’s favorite. But I was good for her. We were good.
But it doesn’t feel that way anymore, and I don’t know why.
One minute Harry had my back, and the next she shut me out completely.
Ever since then, we’ve been like ships crossing in the night.
Pleasant to one another, but every conversation we have is surface level.
I feel like I’ve fallen behind and I can never catch up.
She’ll always be two years older, and I’ll always be just following in her footsteps down a path she already carved.
My phone beeps. My mom is asking why I’m still outside—she can sense where we are, I think, and she’s antsy for our weekly video call with Harry. It’s the worst part of my week. My parents and aunts basically spend an hour gushing over Harry and Boston College.
My parents are professors, and it’s like they’ve unlocked some secret language now that my sister is at college.
My mom compares my sister’s syllabi to the one she has for her class Witches and Witchcraft in the Early Modern World.
My dad gives her advice for talking to professors during office hours and complains about the TAs for his Folklore and the Fantastic class.
And they both spend at least ten minutes extolling my sister’s magic and spell work, even though my dad isn’t a witch and doesn’t have any magical blood.
All while I sit there with nothing to add.
And yeah, I know I sound jealous. Maybe I am. I just want someone to see me, and I’ve spent my entire life feeling invisible. With Harry three hours away in Boston, this year was my chance to stand out on my own. And now with one spell gone wrong, I might have gone and blown up everything.
Because chances are Principal Aceste has my dad’s number somewhere, and once he can’t get through to my mom, he’s going to call him. And then I’ll be grounded for the rest of my life.
Even walking as slowly as possible, I still reach the wraparound porch.
Small white candles flicker in the windows, giving the house a glow as I run up the steps, being careful to sidestep the one loose board.
I pause at the door, until it creaks open on its own—or, more likely, thanks to Mom’s intention.
I’m greeted by the smell of leaves and sage intermixed with apple and have to imagine Mom is smudging the house and Dad is making an apple pie, which he does every week in the fall.
Steeling myself with a deep breath, I follow the harmony of their low voices to the kitchen.
The floor creaks as I walk across oriental rugs scattered here and there for warmth.
Our home has always felt a bit like an antique shop.
No two pieces of furniture seem to go together, and yet somehow the place works.
There are the hurricane lamps from a trip to Salem last Thanksgiving, the leather armchair my parents got on an anniversary trip to Portland, and the deep blue velvet couch from their St. Augustine trip to Grampa and Grams’s for a solstice celebration.
The fireplace crackles away, staying lit even when no one is there to restock the wood, and the ticking of the grandfather clock passed down from generations past steadies my racing heart.
From her croissant shape on the sofa, our cat, Phoebe, taps her fluffy gray tail, yellow eyes following me through the room like Great-Aunt Aida’s portrait.
“Kitty Kat? Is that you?” Dad calls.
“Of course it’s Kat,” I hear Mom tell him as I walk tentatively into the kitchen. “She’s been loitering in the garden for some reason.”
So she definitely felt my presence. I try to arrange my face somewhere near neutral as I step into the kitchen.
My parents flank the massive oak table built by my great-great-grandparents that anchors the whole room.
Bright, shiny white subway tile surrounds cabinets, some open, revealing apothecary jars next to things like peanut butter.
A pendant light hangs over the island, providing lots of light, but it’s the little lamps on most counters and shelves that give all the warmth.
Well, the lamps and my dad, who beams at me like I just hung the moon.
Next to my mother’s glower, it almost feels sarcastic.
“Kitty Kat!” he says. When he pulls me in for a hug, he smells like cinnamon; the gesture surfaces a cloud from the flour dusted on his sweater, one of a dozen of the Halloween-themed ones he’s bought over the years.
He is trying hard to make Ugly Halloween sweaters become a thing like Ugly Christmas sweaters are.
It hasn’t happened yet. When he pulls back, he looks at me as if seeing me for the first time, his brown eyes warm, his short reddish hair, so similar to mine, smelling like grapes thanks to some homemade pomade he’s been working on forever. “How was your day?”
I pause, feeling my body go taut as a bowstring as I look from Dad to Mom. “Good,” I say cautiously, bracing for impact. “How was yours? Talk to anyone?” Any calls?
“No. Just your aunts. I’ve been busy getting ready for this trip.”
I silently cheer. Maybe I can cast a spell without them seeing and fix this whole thing.
“We’ve just been packing,” Mom says. “It’s taking forever, though. I’ve had a migraine all day. But that always happens this close to Samhain.”
She lets down her slick blond bun, just as smooth and Barbie-doll perfect as Harry’s hair, and massages her temples. “How about you? Any . . . symptoms?” Mom and Dad stare at me, waiting for an answer about magic. I might have a cough from setting the chem lab on fire. Does that count?
“Why are you favoring your left hand?” my mom pushes, reaching out.
I glance down, unsure. “Oh, I got a paper cut while reshelving books with Laney. It’s nothing.”
She inspects the minuscule red line. “Does it hurt? That could be a symptom. I’ve never heard of a Hadley needing to bleed, but feeling your magic in your fingers could be possible—”
“It’s a paper cut,” I say, a little sharper than intended. “Just a paper cut.”
It hurts how disappointed they both are.
“Would you like a Band-Aid?” my dad offers. “I’ll get you a Band-Aid.”
I sigh. As my mother looks around, probably trying not to let her crushing disappointment play across her face, I reach for the glass jar of candy corn and candy pumpkins we leave on the counter all fall.
By the end of October, there are only candy corn left.
I have a thing for the candy pumpkins. I know they’re the exact same candy and, sure, they taste like wax, but I love them.
I start fishing out a pumpkin. My fingers close around two at the same time.
“Don’t worry. Peter and I have gone over the rituals, and we’re ready for Samhain.
I’m going to nail the ritual this year, I promise. ”
Peter. As in Parker. My imaginary boyfriend. I’ve never been so happy that my parents hate comics.
“We can’t wait to meet Peter,” Dad says, hustling back into the room with an entire first-aid kit. “Do you think he’ll be free before we leave for Grams and Grampa’s?”
“I don’t know,” I mumble. “He’s got that big science project due. It’s about . . . spiders. He’s big into science. Which is why he’s the perfect person to help me with the Samhain rituals.”
Mom’s lips purse. The woman is a human lie detector, but this time she doesn’t say anything.
“I still feel so guilty leaving you to deal with this on Samhain. I know you have your aunts to help you, but this is a big responsibility.” She wrings the kitchen towel in her hands.
“You need to have a real . . . connection.” She seems to struggle to find the right word, which is a rarity for the brainiac witch professor that she is. She looks to my dad for help.
He, too, seems a bit unsure. “What your mother is trying to say is we don’t want you feeling pressured to do this. Your aunts are happy to give their husbands a call.”
I’m not sure they remember their numbers, but I’m not saying that.
“Dad’s right, though.” Mom drains a bowl of pasta into a colander in the kitchen island sink, and steam fills the air, fogging her face.
“If you and Peter don’t feel ready, Aunt Viv and Aunt Diane can manage.
The rituals need to be done by people with a strong bond, and they’ve been married for, um, well, I think it’s been at least a year. A decade?”
“These ones, it was . . . did they have a fall wedding?” my dad asks.
“What we mean to say is you and Peter have only been dating a few months, right? It’s early. No shame in having the aunts step in—”
“I’m ready,” I insist, even if I do need to finalize things with my supposed other half.
“I’m not going to let you down. Haven’t I proven myself around the house?
Taking out the trash? Trimming the herbs in the greenhouse?
I even sang to the Venus flytrap the other day to get it to eat every insect and it listened. ”
Mom brightens. “Really? Victor usually only opens up when Harry sings to him.”
I ignore the Harry mention. “Well, Victor and I are besties now. I sang ‘Monster Mash’ to him and he loved it.” I squeeze Mom’s hand.
“I am not going to let you down. I know the protection spells by heart, and I’ll follow them exactly that night.
” And this I truly mean. “The last thing I want to do is mess up the veil between Mystic Hollow and the supernatural world.”
Mom smiles, her shoulders relaxing. A pot of homemade marinara sauce stirs itself with a large wooden spoon on the stove while she shakes out the pasta noodles. “It’s just such an important night. I feel bad we’ll be with Grampa and Grams.”
“Nic, our daughter’s got it,” Dad says, placing a comforting hand on my right shoulder. “This girl was prepared coming out of the womb. Remember that time I knocked over a candle during our dance lesson in the dining room? This girl was the first one to get to the fire extinguisher.”
I can tell my mom isn’t impressed, though. Because I didn’t use magic.
Just another reason I can’t let her find out about this morning.
Dad beams at me. “Kitty Kat always gets things done.” He looks at me proudly. “You don’t have to worry about her protecting Mystic Hollow.”
My heart warms. “Of course I will! The Halloween party is not going to get in the way of that.” I open the candy jar again and reach for another pumpkin.
Mom’s wooden spoon flies over and swats my wrist. “Kat, we’re about to eat!”
“I have room,” I mumble. “And that hurt.”
“Sorry. But the party, is that still happening?” Mom asks as the napkins next to her leap into her hand. She hands them to me to put on the table. “I haven’t heard you mention it in a while.”
I feel a twinge of panic that she’s suddenly questioning this. “Because everything is already set and I know the rules. We’ll stay on the first floor. I’ll keep people out of the greenhouse and have the whole house cleaned up before midnight.”
Mom’s eyes widen. “Midnight?”
“I meant ten thirty,” I say hastily, feeling the waxy pumpkin get caught in my teeth. “Which leaves plenty of time to do the rituals at the house right before midnight. Laney will help me prep long before moonrise.”
Mom purses her lips and I fear she’s going to say something I will not want to hear, but then her face lights up.
“Oh! That’s your sister! She’s about to call!
” She stands the iPad up against the pasta bowl.
I guess we’re having cold pasta tonight.
Because Harry has to call right now. “Everyone, gather round. I think she’s just getting back to her dorm room in three . . . two . . .”
I know better than to question my mom’s premonition skills.
Dad and I cram in, and I try to relax. Principal Aceste hasn’t called.
Harry is away at school. My Halloween plan is still very much on track.
But all my fears come roaring back as the video call connects and Harry’s perfect face lights up the screen.