Wisteria Witches (Witch Cozy Mystery and Paranormal Romance)

by Angela Pepper

  Grampa Don grabbed a handful of bacon and followed them. He gave me a pat on the arm.

  “You're a good neighbor,” Don said. “Winona is glad to have you in this house. I can feel it.” He glanced at his son, who was wrestling Corvin out the front door. “I'd tell you we Moores are usually on better behavior, but you strike me as the type who sees right through bullcrap.”

  I nodded knowingly. “This is as good as it gets, right?”

  He finished his bacon and licked his fingertips. “What you see is what you get. Thanks for the grub! You make this old house proud.”

  I tilted my head to the side. “I make the house proud? What do you mean?”

  He grinned mischievously, which erased about fifty years from his face.

  “You'll find out,” he said, and he left.

  Chapter 12

  After the disastrous brunch, I consoled myself with the remaining food. My excuse was that eating everything in sight would be an excellent opportunity to practice my new witchy levitation skills.

  “Wanna see something cool?” I asked my daughter.

  “Not really.” Zoey crossed her arms and slumped into a dining room chair. “Corvin is such a brat,” she said. “I can't believe I ever wanted a little brother. They're awful and rude, and they smell like goats.”

  “And that particular one can see spirits.”

  “No, he can't,” she scoffed. “You might not have noticed, because you were drooling over his father and shoving food onto people's plates the whole time, but Corvin was saying a ton of random crap that didn't mean anything.”

  “But he looked over my shoulder and talked to Winona Vander Zalm's ghost.”

  Zoey shifted her gaze to a spot above my shoulder and smiled sweetly. “Hello there, Spirit Lady. What a beautiful frock you're wearing today. What's that? You think I should get a raise in my allowance? I agree. Let's tell Mother.”

  “Fine,” I said, nodding. “I'll raise your allowance, since the Spirit Lady suggested it.”

  “She's not really there. I was making a point, Mom.”

  I played dumb. “Really?”

  She groaned and went limp, slumping crookedly in her chair. “You're the worst.”

  I made a mental note to raise her allowance anyway. She'd been a good sport about the move, and she'd probably be too busy with all the new witch stuff to get a part-time job.

  After a few minutes, she said, “The next time I see Corvin, I'm giving him a wedgie.”

  “Good,” I said. “The kid probably needs more social interaction to level him out. His mother must have been the weird one, because Chet seems normal enough.”

  She snorted. “Normal enough? Don't you mean dreamy? You love him. You have a super-big crush on him. Mom and Chet, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.”

  I knew how to change the topic instantly.

  With a flick of my wrist, I levitated an empty coffee cup using my magic. It danced merrily in the air between us.

  Zoey stopped her teasing and held very still, her gaze riveted to the cup.

  “You really are a witch,” she said with a wondrous sigh.

  “I feel like a kid with a new toy.”

  “Have you made any of those light sparkles that Auntie Z did?”

  “I tried, briefly, but I made a nectarine explode. We don't need fruit explosions, so I'm sticking to simple levitation until I know more about my powers.”

  She clapped her hands, her teen grumpiness completely forgotten. “Do some more tricks, Mom.”

  For the next ten minutes, I showed her how I could perform a myriad of small tasks hands-free. I shifted plates and poured liquids from cup to cup. For my grand finale, I floated a glob of chocolate-hazelnut spread from the container and smeared it onto a waffle, all without getting a knife dirty.

  She clapped her hands, squealing, “Do it again! Again!”

  I did, and then floated the waffle over to my mouth where I made the waffle disappear in the usual, not-so-magical manner.

  “You try,” I said.

  “You think I can move stuff with my mind? Auntie Z said all witches have different kinds of skills that come naturally. Levitation might be all yours.” She wrinkled her nose. “Meanwhile, I'll probably get the ability to talk to beavers.”

  In my most encouraging, motherly tone, I said, “Sweetie, you never know until you try.”

  “Okay.” Her face wrinkled in concentration as she stared at objects on the table, her gaze moving from spoon to cup to waffle. Nothing moved or even wiggled.

  She sighed, “It's no use. Let's go out to the park and find some beavers for me to talk with.”

  “Keep trying. Maybe we just need privacy.”

  I got up and drew shut the sheers across the window. The dining room was on the east side of the house, facing away from the Moores' blue house. We were the corner lot of the block, so the dining room offered a quaint view over a side hedge and down the cross-street. Unfortunately, our open outlook meant that any people walking along the sidewalk could get an equally quaint view of two novice witches performing magic.

  “Don't get too adventurous,” I warned Zoey. “These sheers won't entirely block us from the street.” I thought of Dorothy Tibbits and her binoculars. I peeked around the sheers and looked around for the odd, pigtailed woman but didn't see her.

  Behind me, Zoey let out an exasperated sigh. “Forget being adventurous. I can't even budge the smallest crumb.” She crossed her arms and thrust out her lower lip.

  “Don't pout,” I said, returning to sit across from her.

  She kept pouting. If anything, she pouted harder.

  With a flick of my finger, I pulled up a dollop of custard, floated it across the table, and dropped it straight down on her pouting lower lip.

  Her eyes bulged in surprise.

  My mouth twisted into a wicked grin. After so many years of me warning her what might happen to little girls who pouted, it had finally happened. Sort of.

  Zoey didn't find my new trick quite so magnificent. From the look on her face, you would have thought an actual bird flew into the room and pooped on her.

  “Evil!” She rubbed the custard away with a napkin and pointed at me with an accusing finger. “Witch!”

  I shrugged. “Tell me something I don't know.”

  She spluttered, “You're not supposed to do things to other witches!”

  “It must have been a bird,” I said, craning my neck to search the room's upper corners. “Didn't you see it flying around?”

  “Witch.” She glowered at me, her accusing finger pointed at my face.

  While she was distracted, I used my magic to fold a napkin into an origami bird. Then I covered my hand with my mouth and said, “Caw! Caw!” The white napkin bird fluttered up from the table and flew around the room.

  “Evil,” she said, crossing her arms. “And you won't even show me how you're doing all these cool tricks, so that makes you double evil.”

  “I swear I'm not trying to keep anything from you. I don't know how I'm doing these things, and I'm sorry if I'm making it look easy, but it is. I simply look at something, imagine the motions needed, and it starts happening.” I shrugged as a miniature scone topped with peach jam sailed through the air toward my mouth. I made it disappear to where the waffles had gone.

  Zoey's arms were still crossed. “You're going to gain a million pounds,” she said.

  “Nope.” I shook my head. “This sort of thing burns a ton of calories. I can sense it. I can feel the calories burning away inside me.”

  She narrowed her eyes. I'd been joking about the calories, but suddenly I started to believe myself. It took energy to move physical things, and the energy had to come from somewhere. If I was burning calories just by floating things into my mouth, it would cancel out the calories from the food.

  If the calorie thing was true, then becoming a witch was the greatest thing that had ever happened to anyone, anywhere!

  Zoey said, “I've got homework,” and she got u
p to leave the dining room.

  “On Saturday? But what about this mess? You think these dishes are going to wash themselves.”

  She patted me on the shoulder on her way past. “Yes, Mom. I think the dishes are going to wash themselves.” She let out a delighted cackle. “I guess you're going to have to think up a whole new line for guilt-tripping me!”

  I clenched my fist and swung my arm theatrically. “Curses!”

  “No curses,” she said. “Not until we know more about this whole thing.”

  “It was just an expression,” I said, but she was already gone.

  For the next two hours, I used nothing but my witch powers to clean the house. Small objects were easy, but I struggled with the coffee pot. I wasn't that surprised heavy things were beyond my skill level. The power had to be like a muscle, needing repeated practice and concentration to get stronger. Unfortunately, my concentration skills were lacking. If my mind wandered, the dishes would stop washing themselves.

  Even moving small objects, I kept surprising myself. For example, wringing out a kitchen sponge was utterly delightful. I could squeeze it the same way I would non-magically, with one hand squishing the sponge into a ball, or I could stretch and wring it in a perfect twist. If I accidentally wrung the sponge too well, it became bone-dry and unable to wipe up anything.

  I could have spent an hour practicing my sponge-twisting technique, but I was interrupted by a knock at the door. My heart pounded guiltily as my mind raced with paranoia. It was the witch police! They could tell I was practicing magic without their authorization and without half a clue!

  The knocking came again, heavier this time. Urgent. Authoritative.

  Why weren't they using the doorbell? I couldn't yell doorbell at my daughter if there was no ding-dong.

  I untied my spotless apron, left it on the gleaming-clean kitchen island, and went to open the front door.

  Nobody was there. The porch was empty. I leaned out and glanced up and down the street. A white-haired neighbor walking his brown Labradoodle across the street saw me. He gave me a friendly wave. People in Wisteria were so friendly.

  I waved back and called out, “Was someone at my door just a minute ago?”

  He held one hand to his ear and started crossing toward me. “What's that?”

  “Never mind,” I said. “I thought I heard someone knocking on my door, but it must have been my teenage daughter playing a joke on me.”

  He reached my steps and stopped at the bottom. His Labradoodle, which was one of the taller ones I'd seen, launched itself up the stairs toward me. I stretched out my hand and let it be sniffed and licked by the happy pooch.

  The man said, “Teenage daughter? You're too young to have a teenager.” He waggled his fluffy eyebrows. “Maybe you're imagining things. The Red Witch House has that effect on people.”

  My ears began to ring, as if an internal alarm had been triggered inside me.

  “I'm sorry, but what did you say?” The dog continued to nose my hand, and then tried to sneak past me into my house.

  The man chuckled. “All the kids in the neighborhood call this the Red Witch House.”

  “Because a Red Witch lives here?”

  “It's the Gothic Revival architecture,” he said. “Many of the other heritage houses around here are in the Craftsman style.” He looked up at the facade and the gingerbread trim that I'd loved from the minute I'd seen it. He continued, “Personally, I've always loved this home. I found its previous owner eccentric, but in a good way. Winona was a lovely woman. It's such a shame she killed herself that way.”

  I kept petting the dog, but I couldn't feel my hands. The friendly Labradoodle could have been eating my thumbs and I wouldn't have noticed.

  “The owner killed herself?”

  “That didn't come out right,” he said. “I meant that she killed herself in the same way people who drive dangerously kill themselves by their own carelessness.”

  “How did she die?”

  He tugged on the dog's leash. “Doodles, leave the nice lady alone. Let's go home, girl.”

  I gave the dog one more pat before walking down my steps. I met the man on the sidewalk and extended my hand. “Zara Riddle,” I said.

  He shook my hand. “I'm Arden, and that's Doodles. Zara, you and I are now dog-spit bonded.” He wrinkled his nose and glanced down at our hands, which were both slick from his dog's affection.

  I couldn't care less about the dog spittle. I only wiped my hand on my hip to conform to social norms.

  With a casual tone, I said, “Arden, I don't mean to be morbid, but nobody will say how Winona passed away.” I batted my eyelashes in a manner I hoped was charming. “Since we're dog-spit buddies now, you'll tell me, right?”

  Arden's gray eyes got a faraway look. “The woman loved Pop Tarts,” he said. “She could whip up a five-course meal fit for a king, but when it came to comfort food, she loved her Pop Tarts. She told me all about her habits whenever we met up at the dog park down the street.” He smiled wistfully, his eyes still unfocused. “She brought home-made dog treats for Doodles. That's why my dog's trying to get into your house. Poor girl doesn't know the old lady's gone.”

  Right on cue, Doodles hopped down the stairs and sat by her master's feet with a sad whimper.

  We still weren't any closer to the method of my ghost's demise. I ventured a guess. “Did she stick a fork in the toaster and electrocute herself in the kitchen?”

  “Winona didn't make Pop Tarts in the kitchen,” he said. “She made them in the bathroom, while she took long baths in the clawfoot tub.”

  A cloud of chilly air whooshed up my back and blew right through me. Now I understood the sleeptoasting. The woman's spirit had been trying to tell me about her accident.

  “She dropped the toaster in the bathtub,” I said.

  He nodded in agreement. “That's what we figure happened,” he said.

  “But that shouldn't kill a person,” I said. “The toaster thing was on that TV show where they try things from movies. It would short out the circuit or something, blow the electrical breaker long before it delivered enough electricity to kill someone.”

  Arden blinked and stared at me, forehead wrinkled. “Are you calling me a liar?”

  “Of course not,” I said quickly. “Just wondering if the toaster thing is a rumor. Maybe something the pesky local children made up.” I was thinking of one pesky local child in particular. He had big eyes, blue-black hair, and would probably be a huge obstacle to my romance with Chet.

  Doodles whimpered again, and her owner glanced up at the highest peak of my roof. “We're being watched,” he said.

  I followed his gaze to a bluejay. A really big bluejay. The bird ruffled its dark blue head crest and stared back at us.

  I waved at the bird. “Hello, bluejay.”

  Arden was shifting away from me. “Nice to meet you, Zara. You have a good day, and I'll see you around.” He gave the dog's leash a tug, and they were on their way.

  “Nice meeting you,” I called after them. “And I'll have you know my house is just a regular house. I'm going to paint it a different color, so it won't be red anymore and stupid kids can't call it the Red Witch House!”

  Change the paint from Wisconsin Barn Red? I could do that. I could do anything I wanted to.

  I put my hands on my hips and stared at the house. Blue? No, I wouldn't copy the Moore house next door. Green? I'd have to get a shade that complimented the hedge, but not too matchy-matchy, or the house would feel drab. Purple? No way! Purple would look divine, but purple's the most witchy color of all. I might as well write Witch House on the mailbox. Yellow? Sure. Everybody loves a yellow house.

  My daughter darkened the open doorway. “What are you doing out there on the sidewalk? Don't be a show-off, Mom. Don't you dare lift this whole house, or I'll scream, and you'll break all the pipes and stuff.”

  “Shush!” I ran up the stairs toward the door, shushing her the whole way. Something dark zipped across my
path. I tripped and fell into Zoey's arms. We both tumbled into the house and landed in a tangle of limbs and cursing.

  “You've gone off the deep end,” Zoey howled, wriggling out from under me. “I'll be more discreet from now on, but there's no need to tackle me. We're not a tackling family.”

  “It was an accident,” I groaned. “Something tripped me.”

  “Like a cord?” she asked.

  “Maybe.”

  She got up and stepped out onto the porch, where she retrieved something I'd thrown into the trash earlier that day.

  The evil toaster.

  It gleamed maliciously.

  I clamped my hand over my mouth and muffled my scream.

  Chapter 13

  By Monday morning, my levitation skills were strong enough for me to lift and shelve a heavy book. Theoretically, anyway.

  The library wasn't a safe place to practice magic since it was a popular public space, never empty during open hours. If I wasn't in visual range of a patron, I was being watched by Kathy Carmichael, her golden-brown eyes ever alert behind her round glasses. She watched me the way an owl watches a mouse who threw out the owl's weird acorn jelly on her first day at work, completely by accident and with no malice whatsoever!

  I got through the morning without using magic or getting into other trouble, and went outside for my lunch break with another coworker who was running some errands. His name was Frank Wonder, and he did a hilarious impression of Kathy.

  “Whooooo stamped all these books?” Frank demanded in Kathy's voice. “They're crooked!” Frank accessorized his Kathy impression by using his thumbs and forefingers to form the circles of her glasses frames. “Whooooo doesn't know how to hold a rectangular stamp parallel to a rectangular book?”

  We walked down the sidewalk and I cuffed Frank on the arm, laughing. “Stop! You're hurting my sides. And Kathy really is nice, despite her obsession with stamps being parallel or orthogonal but not diagonal.”

  Frank pressed the button for the crosswalk light and sighed. “You're right. Kathy is the best, actually. She's just been down in the dumperoo lately. Bit of an empty nest situation for the ol' bird, with her youngest son off doing whatever it is he does.” He made a vague flipping gesture with one hand. “Baseball or soccer or whatever. Is it football? What season does football run?”