Chapter 9 The Hunt
Midsummer is celebrated across lands and amongst the outstretched hands of many as they welcome in the long days and the blessings of light and growth.
For this coven of women, it would be the first Litha celebration, coming together to invite the prospect of harvest and bounty.
Crystal took charge of the festivities and delegated tasks for the evening to them all. There would be gathered herbs and plants for offering, flowers for crowns, food and drink for a communal meal.
Still, they hadn't spoken about the other night. They watched Crystal carefully, as though her secrets would be written on her skin or the threads of her flowing clothes, keeping them safe.
Crystal instructed Bess to invite her lovely blonde friend for a group of ten.
Bess worried that Tess would find their celebration trifling, but to her surprise, when she brought it up during a shift at The Black Cat, Tess got a thoughtful look on her face and told her she'd love to see what Litha was and how they would celebrate.
Eloise asked her to make a dessert to share for the evening.
"Something with flowers," she'd told her, to which Tess smiled and got a look Eloise knew well - creativity dawning.
June had the softest sunsets. This one left behind pink marshmallow clouds that Eloise said smelled like birthday cake and rose petals.
Once the sky darkened, they walked through the garden carrying baskets of food, pickings from the garden, and candles.
Ten women walked barefoot with linen dresses of sage green, trailing behind them like garden brides, each carrying a candle that had been made special for this night with beeswax, rosemary, and honeysuckle.
The night creatures watched as ten gentle souls ushered ten women through the forest, their candlelight bobbing along the path in a lackadaisical meandering as they laughed and hands brushed along trees reaching down for them, ferns rising to tickle their bare feet in wonder.
They brought with them the magic poured into the world during this time.
It fell from the rays of the sun during the day, filling the tender blades of green grass and the petals of the spray roses and daisies.
It gathered in the eucalyptus, wild onions, and rosemary, which pressed its scent into the world boldly.
Trees drank the magic in great gulps, filling each branch and stem to bursting in hopes that a new season of leaves would fill it out.
Even the souls who were no longer lost gathered it in their fingertips and felt themselves more whole.
A great bonfire was made and they shared carefully prepared food and Tilly's honey wine that she infused with violets and butterfly sweet peas coloring it the most lovely purple.
Flower crowns were sitting on heads of flowing hair making them look to outsiders like fairy princesses playing tea time.
And when Crystal invited the summer months of growth and prosperity into their land, they listened dreamily and cheered to the warm sky and the new season.
"I feel like I could conjure magic," Tess whispered to Bess and smiled widely at her.
Her blonde hair was nearly touching her shoulders now in a lovely mess of waves and with the crown of small roses, ferns, and daisies, she reminded Bess of a character in a book she once loved as a child, the name of which escaped her memory.
"I think I feel that way anytime I'm with them," Bess replied looking around where they all sat and talked and laughed.
Bess didn't know it, but something was weaving together inside of her friend as she sat next to her, braiding together flowers with long grass and green sprigs of fern.
Never before had she been invited into something like this; a gathering of women with intention, but without agenda or that sneaky thing that can often happen when women come together - comparison born of insecurity.
She wasn't sure that she could have named it before this night, but it was too often that she had felt weighed and measured by others, and in turn, she had learned to also weigh and measure.
To what purpose, she wondered now as she tucked a stark white daisy into a braid of fern and grass?
For here she felt simply, here. She might not have considered that a potent feeling before, but now having experienced it?
She sat among women who were different and interesting and cared for each other without pause or stipulation; there was an alchemy here.
She had been to The Lost Souls House for three movies, one bonfire, one dessert night (which she didn't know could be an event until these women), and now this Midsummer celebration.
Something that she had come to realize was that with them, she didn't feel the usual silent chaos inside of her that often accompanies those who are lonely.
There was a peace with them that she felt in her silence; a feeling she never experienced in the quiet on the many nights she sat in her large empty house.
She liked talking when she had the chance, like she was bursting to say all of the things no one bothered to stick around to hear. Coins in a dryer, her thoughts and ideas rattled around her loneliness.
The first movie night she spent with Bess and her crazy aunts had been uncomfortable. She didn't know what to do with their wide welcome. She was unsure about their questions aimed to get to know her; aimed to invite her to exist a little bit more with witnesses.
But when Eloise had pulled her into the most natural hug, like time and chance had written that moment, and handed her a mug of apple cider with charming homemade maple marshmallows and said to her, "It's about time you came around," as if they were waiting for her?
And how lovely is that? To feel like someone is waiting for you.
Tilly felt a kind of kinship with her. She understood the battle that waged inside of her young mind, though she hadn't spoken of it.
Tilly's mind recognized it as a familiar reminiscence.
How often had she felt like an empty chamber of echoing thoughts and fears growing up, not knowing how to quiet the voices or how to feel seen?
She, too, recognized the wide look of uncertainty on Tess's face every time she came around. How did one go from trying to dig out parts of themselves to find their worth to this, where there was no digging only enjoying the flowers?
They turned the most mundane parts of life into meaning because they took the time to celebrate more often than usual.
When she arrived at that first movie night they had glass dishes full of fresh marshmallows that they used cat, moon, and bird-shaped cookie cutters on.
And now she was here, in the graveyard soaking in this odd but lovely celebration.
The two youngest women joined Kelsea and Jen in a conversation, as the constellations above them watched knowing they would understand when they were older just how precious a gift it is to breathe so easily with other women. To be told with action and peace that they were important.
It was late, and while Crystal and Kelsea sang a song from the sixties, Tilly was curled up with Jen, looking up at the sky.
She felt safe. The past few days had been turbulent, her mind not a place she wanted to settle. But right now she was where she had worked hard to get herself. Peace.
But there was something niggling at the edge that she needed to hand to her friend.
"Jen?""Hmm?"
"Ronnie asked me to dinner."
Jen snorted. Tilly remained silent.
Jen shifted so that she was looming over where Tilly lay in her lap, unable to escape her expression.
"It's just dinner. And it's platonic."
Another snort accompanied her look of skepticism. She looked ethereal with her black hair braided into a crown and ferns and roses.
Tilly felt her friend's worry, her sadness, a pinch of anger. It washed over the space between them and circled Tilly. The combination felt like looking forward to something only to have it taken away, that sharp and then lingering disappointment of feeling let down.
Tilly reached toward Jen and put her hand on Jen's cheek, looking up into her friend's eyes, those feelings pulsing and strong.
"Hey, you don't need to worry. I promise."
A moment passed, tense and calculating. But then she nodded, an ease now finding its way to ebb around the fear and sadness. "If he finds another way to hurt you, I'm hexing him."
Tilly laughed, feeling Jen's smile under her palm. She felt lighter having this out there with her protective friend. Too many weights had been laid on their shoulders lately.
"That seems only fair. How would you hex him?"
"I'd go for his hairline."
Her smile stretched. "He loves his hair."
Another hour passed easily until yawns and stretches took over the circle, and lazy goodbyes started going around.
Tilly felt overwhelmed with energy, whether from the magical night or her friends, or maybe from the drastic pivots and turns her life had suddenly taken.
She left The Lost Souls graveyard with the rest of them, but as she was leaving the wooded path about to make the walk to her lonely apartment, she veered off into the woods.
All women know the danger here, going into a thick patch of trees alone, suddenly putting themselves in the seat of prey.
It was an unfair part of life that bathing alone in nature was a danger to one's life. But tonight she felt full of power, and perhaps a smidgeon of rebellion against a world that would keep her hidden.
She wound through the woods, humming a song stuck in her head, thinking about everything but nothing sticking. She liked singing and imagined the moon gathering the notes in her skirts to sprinkle across the sky in melodious stars.
There was something about the forest that made her glad. There wasn't a rush to become anything here or to unbecome. The trees did not spend their years looking for ways not to age and she felt that in their roots and the magic the ground soaked up from it and she thought it must be contentment.