by Jules Barker
“No. This is from someone else on the island.” She didn’t say who, because revealing someone’s gift was a personal right whenever it could be helped. “Their family does rune work. Not me.”
“Do types of magic run in families? Like a rune family?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes an affinity for certain types of magic runs in family lines, but sometimes it’s more random. It’s the same with having any sort of magical affinity at all. I’d say one in three people have the soul for magic, the natural affinity to use it that they were born with. But it’s not evenly spread and a lot of those people are in family lines so it kind of groups us together. But you do get people who are the only person in their family with an affinity. And then you have people and families who have the affinity, or ability, to use magic but have no idea so it stays dormant their whole lives.”
“Do I?” Nate didn’t look scared or excited, merely curious.
“No. Sorry. Plus the island tends to wake up these abilities in people, so if you’d had the gift, you’d have known about it.”
He chuckled. “Yeah. That’s what Simon said back then. But it was worth asking again. Maybe Simon’s just a dud at feeling it in others. That’s how you know right? Some sort of feeling?”
“Didn’t Simon explain this to you?”
“Yes. But Simon sucks at explaining things.”
Laurel laughed. Yeah. That sounded right. “We can tell we’re with someone else who has magic because of the goosebumps we get when we touch. It’s almost identical to that tingle you get when you hear a beautiful piece of music played live. Like something in you recognizes something in them.” She smiled at her overly poetic description. “That’s how it is for me, anyway. Everyone experiences it a little bit differently. Magic is a highly personal experience, and while many things are the same, there’s still a lot of variation. We don’t even all refer to magic in the same way.”
“Yeah. Simon definitely didn’t explain it that well.”
Laurel gauged his reaction. He’d clearly known about magic for years, like he said, even if he didn’t know the details. He wasn’t staring at her like a freak, or like someone he wanted to use. He had the same expression on his face that he did when he told her about astronomy and constellations as kids. Fascination and wonder and interest.
“So. Your magic,” Nate said, gently prodding. “Are you okay telling me about it? Satisfy my curiosity after all these years?”
Laurel nodded. “So. My dad--”
Nate interrupted. “Harvey was magical too? I mean, I knew about Diane because of that night she healed me. She knew I hadn’t fractured anything without any equipment. And, yeah, she was a fantastic doctor so it didn’t really surprise me that it had something to do with that. But Harvey? What was his?”
Laurel was constantly surprised by what she didn’t know he’d known. “Um. Yeah. Dad was magic, but his gift was pretty basic. More like an intuition than an outward magic that created any change. He could instinctively tell how any object worked and how the pieces fit together.”
“That was why he was always tinkering. And so good at repairs!” Nate nodded as the pieces clicked into place for him.
“Yeah. He was brilliant at it. We never had to pay anyone else for repairs. He used to say all the money he saved us should be his to buy his own man toys with.” It felt so good to share these parts of her family again.
“So—your Dad was a tinkering genius. Your mom could… heal people?”
“No. Not heal. But she could lay a hand on someone and read what was wrong with them. It took practice and medical training to be able to interpret the signals she picked up, but that combination is what made her so good. She always had to verify with the equipment at the clinic, of course, but it helped get accurate diagnoses faster.”
“Wow. Yeah. She was a great doctor.”
“Thanks.”
“And Simon is a wannabe cardshark.”
Laurel busted up. “Oh my gosh. I’m telling him you said that.” She wiped her eyes. “If he were any tougher or had a better poker face, I’m sure he’d have found a life as a card shark. As it is…” she held her hands up in the air.
“Amateur card magician it is,” Nate filled in. “But. You still haven’t told me about you.” He pivoted toward her, giving his full attention.
“Ah. Me.” Laurel swallowed and shifted on the towel. “I can read the emotional energy of objects. It’s similar to what people call psychometry.” Gosh. She didn’t have a lot of practice explaining this to non-magical people. Or anyone. Other magicals on the island already knew what she did so there wasn’t a need to explain it again…
“It’s like this. Every object that’s man-made or man-molded picks up the energetic vibrations around it. They build up over time, kind of like rings of a tree. They capture energy in the form of emotion primarily, but also sound, images, even scents occasionally.” She looked up to read his reaction, but his face was mostly thoughtful.
She continued. “So something you keep in your house or on your person will have absorbed the emotion you put off. The longer it’s around you, the more it picks up. The more intense the emotion, the more it picks up.”
Nate nodded. “I can visualize that. So how do you read them? It? Do you just touch it?”
“Yes. And no. I read an object or its energy—I say it both ways—by touching it and by focusing. It’s mental and spiritual. Like when you meditate and take your mind within and focus on your breathing, your lungs expanding, your heart pumping. You center your mind within to begin that inner focus. Then, for me, I push my focus outward, through my touch, and into the object. It feels like mentally diving into thick water. Most recent energetic memories are the outer layer, and the further in I push, the further back in its timeline I go. I swim through emotion like water. And like rays of light filtering through the sea, memories come in sounds and images and scents and textures.”
“Wow. I’m just… mind-blown imagining the implications of that. Historically speaking, it’s like time travel through objects. But it's also like spying. You could learn so much about people that way.”
Laurel bristled at the mention of spying, but she tried to move past it. It was a personal issue for her. “I don’t spy. I don’t read objects of people I know unless there’s good reason.”
“Oh, hey. I didn’t mean it like that. I was thinking CIA FBI stuff. Spy movies. Special Agent Penwythe.” He laughed. “I guess I was being a dude. I know you wouldn’t abuse your powers.”
Laurel laughed it off. Her powers. Like she was a superhero or something. “I mostly use it to be helpful. Well, I make money off of it by verifying antiques for my friend Arturo in Portland. But other than that, I help lost items find owners, lost dogs find their masters. I help nudge tourists to the right shops and items to help them if they’re having a bad day or seem down on their luck. Things like that to help people.”
“So can you turn it off and on at will?”
“Hah!” Laurel couldn’t help the scoff that burst out of her. “I wish. No. It’s more like… I can filter it. When Mom and Gran taught me, they explained it like it was learning to squint in bright sunlight.”
“But doesn’t it take focus to read something? Can’t you just not focus on it?”
“Well, yeah. But it’s like having your eyes open. You see things all the time, get input all the time. Just because you learn to focus near or far or in different lighting, it doesn’t mean you can ever really stop seeing. Even when your eyes are closed, it’s still a kind of input. So when I don’t touch things, that obviously helps. Or touching things that get used a lot in highly public places, those are fine. They tend to absorb so much that it blurs it all together into background noise. But hospitals? Police stations? Cemeteries? I don’t go places that tend to have intensely sad or angry situations.”
“Ah. So not touching things helps, which is why you come off as a little bit of a germaphobe.”
“What? Wait, I do?” Laurel
touched Nate’s arm in surprise.
“Not in a bad way. Just a little.” Nate pinched two fingers very close together. He looked at her hand on his arm. “So touching people doesn’t let you read them, does it?”
Laurel removed her hand. “Nope. You’re safe.” She winked. “I can’t read living things. No dog whisperer for me. And natural objects, like stones or wood or gems, don’t pick up energy. If anything, nature is a cleanser. The elements wash away the accumulated human energy of objects. It’s why I love finding sea glass or random items washed ashore. They’ve been smoothed over and it’s harder to tell what they once were. Then I can dive in and it’s like a challenge, a mystery. And it’s a nice reminder, too, that everything can be cleansed.” She paused. “I do get sideswiped by surges sometimes.”
“Surges? Like a tidal surge, a rogue wave of emotion?”
Laurel was impressed. Nate was picking up on it quickly. “If there’s a really strong emotion that’s happened in, say, the last 24-36 hours, then it’s almost like it crackles with electricity. Sometimes I don’t even have to touch an object, just be near it, and it will surge out.”
“So that could be good emotions,” Nate said, “or the really dark ones.” His brow creased.
“Yeah. You got it.”
“Laurel, that must be so hard. Does it happen often?”
His concern washed over her, like a wave of warmth. “It’s not too bad. I’m better at filtering and usually remember to do it when I’m in a crowd and more likely to be surprised by one. And if I do get hit by one, I’m better at swimming through it and shaking it off. It helps if I wear gloves if I’m travelling or going into highly populated places. It does get exhausting having to filter, or ‘squint’ so much, though.”
Nate was looking at her in a way that made her uncomfortable, but she didn’t know why. Maybe this was getting a little heavy. “Although, there was this one time that I nearly ruined a gender reveal for a friend. She was so dang excited to be having a girl that it permeated nearly everything in the house. I couldn’t touch any of the furniture without getting hit with it. It was the hardest hour of my life to keep my mouth shut and not give it away!”
Nate laughed. Laurel’s mood lightener had worked.
“So. As much as I love being studied like a history project, it’s getting a little late. Want to head back up?”
Nate immediately stood and began grabbing her things for her.
He reached out to help her stand, but didn’t immediately let go of her hands. He stared at them for a moment instead. His eyes roamed her face, like he still had something to say or ask. Then he shook it off, grabbed his shoes, and led the way barefoot up the dirt path.
They didn’t talk as they ascended and, instead of heading straight for his truck, Nate walked Laurel to her back porch.
He reached out as she took the first step up. “Hey. Thanks for trusting me with all of that, Laurel.”
“You’re welcome, Nate.” He seemed to be hesitating for some reason, so she continued, “Did you have another question?”
“No. It’s just… that’s why you avoided me, isn’t it?” He looked at her, even height with each other now that she was on the step. His green eyes were like moons of their own. “Back when we were teenagers.”
Laurel started to respond, to find some way to ease the hurt in his eyes, but he stopped her.
“No. I know it must have been.”
“Nate, I’m sorry. I––” She knew it had to have hurt him a little when she pulled away, but she honestly hadn’t thought he noticed all that much. She was just the kid sister and two years is a big difference at that age; she’d figured she was probably an annoyance to him like she was to Simon and that he wouldn’t mind being rid of her. “I never thought…”
“No, Laurel. I’m sorry. I thought you decided you didn’t like me, but it was worse. I brought my baggage around and made your life harder. When it was already tough on you. I made you hide in your own home every time I came by, didn’t I?”
His hand fisted and tapped the railing. “I’m sorry,” he said again.
“Nate. No. I never thought of it like that.”
He looked up at her, disbelief written across his face.
“No. I mean it,” Laurel said. “It was hard anyway. I had to learn to manage it anyway. I didn’t mind you coming around. You were like part of the family. I always felt so bad that I couldn’t be there for you. That I had to abandon you when you needed people around you to support you.” Laurel bit her lips before she could go too far in describing her feelings for him, feelings she hadn’t even fully explored back then. Or now.
Nate stared at her a long moment, eyes roving her face. “You always were the kindest one of all.”
His sad smile tore something in Laurel. She didn’t know what to say.
“Thanks, Butterfly,” he said. He reached out, his fingers barely grazing her arm. “See ya.”
He was halfway across the lawn before Laurel’s brain sputtered back to life along with her mouth. “Nate!” she hollered.
“Yeah?” he asked, turning.
“Why did you go down to the beach tonight?”
Nate laughed. “Because your Gran told me that’s where I’d find you. I figured out how to get you that master suite you wanted.”
“What?” Laurel reflexively bounced up and down. “Seriously?”
“Seriously. I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow.”
And then that infernal man walked away as if he hadn’t just given her the biggest tease ever.
Laurel watched him leave, waving back when he stuck his hand out his window as he pulled away. She might have been the one with the secret magical abilities, but he was proving to be a surprise, too. With one of her biggest secrets out of the way (and a master suite in her future, too) the world was suddenly full of possibility.
11
I’d Rather Stay Un-Enlightened
Six days later, Laurel waited outside Mangelsson’s Hardware for Nate to arrive. She was supposed to meet him to pick out paint. Not only had he found a way to turn her three separate rooms––bedroom, bathroom, and storage-turned-office-soon-to-be-walk-in-closet––into a master suite, he was doing it within their budget. Apparently all it would take was knocking down parts of a few walls, walling up a door, and slapping some pretty paint on it. Well, and giving up the office that she didn’t really use for anything other than shoving paperwork and mail she didn’t want to deal with. Not a sacrifice at all.
Memorial Day weekend had been busy. Tourists swarmed the island eager for the first sales of summer and the special feeling that came with a trip to Moonrise Cove. The island somehow managed to take the patriotic holiday and connect it back to historical Americana and then to the original colonies and then to witches. They always managed to pull in the magic theme one way or another.
Laurel had extended her store outside to join in the sidewalk sales that were famous along the pedestrian-only Historic Main. The work of it all kept her too busy to meet Nate to discuss renovation plans. So instead, he’d taken to coming by before she opened up for the day. Best of all, he’d figured out from Heidi one morning at the store that hot chocolate was Laurel’s favorite brand of stress relief. He made sure to come bearing that dark delight whenever he popped by with a design approval or a suggestion for trim or hardware placement or any number of decisions that now needed to be made.
He couldn’t start the project officially for another few days, but today they were going to look through the paint chips and see if she liked what they had or if they’d need to special order anything.
The sun was just starting to get a little warm on her shoulders around the straps of her tiered, yellow sundress when Nate pulled up in his truck. As he approached, Laurel shaded her eyes. “Don’t you get hot in jeans all the time? It’s not too bad right now, but come July I’d die if I had to wear pants every day.”
Nate smiled. “Then it’s good you don’t work construction or live in the
desert, Ms. Flowy Flower Dress Person.” He waved his hand at her as he said it, gesturing at all of her.
Laurel only smiled and walked through the door he held open. It wasn’t an insult.
She had a pretty clear vision of the colors she wanted in the bathroom, champagne pink and cream with gold hardware, and luckily the store could mix what she wanted. But she wasn’t sure if she liked the yellow for the bedroom. She wanted it to feel like soft lemon chiffon, but the yellow felt a tad too daffodil clown. And of course, it was Vicki who stepped in to help them choose.
No matter how many times Laurel reminded Vicki that it was her house being renovated, Vicki still looked to Nate for all the opinions. And surely she didn’t have to lean in that close to check the number on the paint label. By the time they came to a satisfactory decision and Vicki assured them the special-order paint would be ready in time, Laurel was feeling pique-ey and she didn’t even know why. It was probably because girls like Vicki were willing to defer to the men and betray their own feminism or something.
She leaned against the counter while Nate paid from the funds Gran had given him in advance. Eyeballing the odd doodads that every hardware store seemed to have lined up for sale near the cash registers, she spotted one that made her laugh.
“What’s funny?” Nate said, handing his card over to Vicki.
“This. It’s a pencil on the end of a retractable cord thing, like a measuring tape. I think it’s supposed to hook on your keys or belt. Is this the handyman version of the nerd’s pocket-protector? Who would use this?”
Nate smiled. “I would. I’m always losing my pencil on jobs when I need to mark wood or take notes. I end up using my phone for the notes, but I’ve dropped and cracked two screens already.”
“Ohhh.” Laurel nodded. “So you’re the handy-nerd this was made for.” She grabbed it from the little display and slid it onto the counter. “You should get it.”
Nate shrugged. “Already paid.”
Laurel decided to buy it for him, but before she could act, Vicki reached out and took it. She handed Nate back his card and then pressed the pencil holder into his hand with both of hers. “My treat,” she said. “I have to keep our best client happy.”