Chapter 4 #2
On Sundays, Talula and Sara had a tradition that Talula called “witch church.” Sometimes, witch church was a guided meditation session by a placid lake.
Sometimes, it was spring-cleaning the house top to bottom while blasting music from every era.
Sometimes, it was Sara opening a bottle of enchanted wine and gossiping with Talula about scandals from a thousand years ago until Talula laughed so hard she fell out of her chair.
Witch church was a lot of different things. But it was always time together.
The morning before Sara went on her world-saving trip, witch church was Sara tugging on her windbreaker while Talula packed a breakfast picnic. They laced up their walking shoes and headed out to the nearby forest trails.
“Where should we go, my heart?” Sara asked as they walked.
“West Ridge Trail.” It was arguably the best one, leading through green tangles of oaks and trickling creeks, then heading up to a gorgeous view.
It was also the one she knew Kristen liked to jog on.
Thankfully, it was early enough so Talula knew her ex would be doing her best seraphim impression at Pine Hollow Presbyterian’s morning service.
“Sounds beatific. Will we run into that former paramour of yours?”
Talula scowled at her mother. Sometimes, having an omniscient pseudo-celestial being for a mom could be a bit irritating. “No.”
“Good. You deserve a peaceful moment to just be amongst the green.” Sara took a sip of tea from the thermos Talula had packed. “Though, I haven’t heard you mention seeking out sexual fulfillment lately.”
“Yikes, Mom.” Suddenly, Talula’s mind conjured Dahlia’s face looking up at Talula from the café floor. Blushing, Talula kept her gaze on the trail. “I just…I want to focus on my magic. For now.”
“I’m so glad to hear that, my love. But you know, if you nourish one part of yourself, sometimes other aspects of your life feel rejuvenated as well.” Sara clasped a hand to her chest with a nostalgic sigh. “For instance, I was at an orgy festival in the BCEs—”
“Mom…”
“—and I had such a psychically and physically profound orgasm that I saw into the future—”
“Oh my god—”
“—I was able to prevent the extinction of an entire species of ectoplasmic jellyfish!” Sara finished proudly, oblivious to Talula’s distress.
Talula shook her head, exasperated but mildly entertained. “I didn’t need to know that!”
“But I saved the jellyfish!” Sara cried.
“I’m sure they were grateful.” Talula barely managed a straight face. “But I would be grateful for a subject change.”
Sara crossed her arms over her chest. “I don’t know why you never want to hear about your mother’s orgies.”
“I know, Mom.” Talula shook her head with an exasperated laugh.
Sara pouted. “I would let you talk about your orgies.”
“If I ever wind up in one, you’ll be the first to know.”
“I’d be honored.”
For a moment, Talula considered telling her mother about Dahlia. That she was becoming a friend. Or that Talula had been nursing a giant crush on the human since she first walked in the door. But when it came to romance, Talula was cautious around her mother.
As Talula knew far too well, Sara had enjoyed countless trysts with lovers of every gender and every inclination.
Talula had even joked that her mother had invented sex (“Just the one move!” Sara had clarified with a hint of pride.
“You know, the one where you—” Talula, fourteen at the time, had run from the room screaming).
To Sara, sex was a kind of conversation. But romantic love? That was another story.
Talula knew her mother had had paramours during her childhood.
Notably, they weren’t boyfriends or girlfriends or even significant others.
They were just people Sara was “spending time with” (to be clear, Sara was very open about how she was spending time with these people, but after much too much exposition, Talula had demanded the euphemism).
Sara’s lovers never came to the house or the café.
They never attended birthday parties or holiday gatherings.
Most of the time, Talula wouldn’t even learn their names.
One day, after her sixth-grade teacher had come to school with a shiny new ring that had made all the other girls squeal, Talula had asked, “Mom, will you ever get married?”
Sara had laughed and laughed and laughed.
When she finally saw that Talula didn’t get the joke, she had swallowed her giggles.
They had been sitting on the front porch swing for a morning of witch church, drinking tea and watching hummingbirds flit around the feeders.
Sara cleared her throat of her last giggle, then explained. “I’m not the marrying type.”
“Why?”
“To me, marriage is documentation for an institution that doesn’t have people’s best interests at heart. It’s pretty words disguising property and ownership.” Sara had shuddered. “In my experience, marriage and true partnership rarely coincide.”
“Oh.” Talula had swung her legs out from the porch swing thoughtfully. “But do you think you’ll ever find someone to love?”
“I’ve had many loves in my life.” Sara had gotten a faraway look on her face just then, a strange smile Talula had never seen softening her celestial features.
“But what about one person to love, forever?”
“That would be you, my darling girl.” Sara had slung an arm around Talula’s shoulder and pulled her into her side.
“Here’s how I see the topic of romance. It’s about priorities.
I have only these two: you and the work I do serving our magical community.
These are the pillars of my world, my reason for living.
Though I have the occasional lust-driven excursion with a worthy individual or two or twelve—”
“Ew, Mom!”
“—which is fine and healthy and one day you’ll have them, too! But those trysts are never meant to last. Because no love is more important than you or my magical responsibilities. That’s a promise.”
Sara had sealed the oath with a kiss on her daughter’s temple. But Talula’s head had spun.
She’d thought of her current crush, a girl in her Spanish class with braces and a penchant for doodling anime characters in the margins of her notes.
If Talula’s mother, her magical, extraordinary mother, in all her power and glory, was sacrificing the pursuit of romantic love for their greater mission, how could Talula have the audacity to dream of holding hands while walking down the hall or stealing kisses at lockers?
Was Talula selfish for even thinking about that beautiful doodling girl?
What about friendship bracelets and sleepovers?
Was she allowed to have that, too? She had been too afraid to ask.
She hadn’t wanted to disappoint her mother—her best friend, her moral compass, her absolute hero—with something so small and insignificant as a middle school crush.
It was a moment that had stuck in Talula’s still-cooking adolescent mind, reinforced by years of Sara’s dedication to her daughter and Council work with only the occasional hedonistic escapade to remind Talula her mother still had the capacity for intimacy.
Following her mother’s example, Talula had kept her romances short and her friendships at arm’s length, telling herself she could have more when she could serve her magical community like her mother could.
But now there was Dahlia. And those questions seemed more pressing than ever.
“But if I did…” Talula started nervously. “If I did want something…”
“Like an orgy?”
“I don’t know if I’m an orgy person,” Talula said. “I was thinking, like a friendship or…a date. That’d be okay, right?”
“You have no reason to be hesitant about your sexual expression, my dear.” Sara smiled, gently stepping over an exposed root on the trail. “I would just ask that you prioritize yourself and your magical responsibilities, first and foremost.”
It wasn’t quite enough of an answer for the young sorceress. Talula bit her lip, pondering whether she should ask the question she really wanted answered: Can I deserve a chance with Dahlia if I’m not good enough for my Magical Destiny?
But she stayed quiet, eyes on the trail ahead.
They walked in silence for a while, taking in the wild world around them.
Fall had begun to burnish the leaves, reds and golds rustling like ball gowns at an autumnal fairy ball.
Eventually, they crested the ridge. Below them, mist-shrouded hills rolled on and on.
For a moment, mother and daughter looked out.
It was quiet and beautiful but—with her mother’s impending departure to hunt the hunters—a little bittersweet.
They watched a lone bird rise up from the tree line below, wings aloft.
Invisible currents carried it fast and far, until it was barely a speck on the horizon.
Talula let her head fall onto Sara’s shoulder. “Be safe, okay?”
“I will.” Sara ran a hand over her daughter’s mist-frizzed hair and kissed the top of Talula’s head. “My wonderful girl. My true-blue miracle. I love you more than you can ever know.”
“I love you too, Mom.”
And if Talula didn’t know anything else in the world, she at least knew that.