She had only needed a couple of weeks to screw things up. She was such a mess.
Maybe if she blamed it on Eudora, they would be less harsh on her.
No. She couldn’t do that. She didn’t even believe that thought crossed her mind. Besides the anger and hastiness of her roommate, Anwen could tell that Eudora only had good intentions.
“You know we can get expelled?”
She ignored her. Not that she wasn’t aware of such a thing, though Eudora’s discouragement was too much to put up with.
“This might be the end …before it barely started.” She proceeded.
No response whatsoever.
"It will, therefore, be the end of our witch lives." She took on. "Not that it'd be a problem for you, 'cause you're not a real witch anyway."
The door behind them cracked open and made Anwen almost jumped with horror.
“Anwen?” her mother said.
Aw, she could see the disappointment in her eyes.
“So, I’ve made a decision,” the dean said to all of them. “As much as I hoped for this year to have started successfully, I cannot ignore the terrible turn of events that had decided to occur just at the beginning of this semester. From now on you won’t be attending the academy anymore. Or ever for that matter.”
“What?” they both asked.
Their parents seemed to be terrified by the decision. Somehow, it seemed like they didn’t expect it at all.
“But you didn’t mention something like this in your office,” Anwen’s mother said.
“Yes, I wanted to give you the news altogether.”
“Now you beggarly mean-spirited bitch.”
“Mom,” Anwen shouted, trying to get Rhiannon to calm her nerves.
“I should’ve turned you into a rat.”
Anwen tried to get her to calm down.
"You're making things worse." She mumbled. "Now we surely won’t have another chance to attend the academy again.”
Was Anwen okay? Didn’t she hear that they were both expelled for good?
Her mother tried to gather herself.
“I’m sorry it had to come to this,” the dean finally said and pulled the door close behind them.
Now the four witches remained speechless.
* * *
“You’re not angry with me?”
“Of course not, honey.”
“But, after what I did?”
“Well, we sort of expected your college life was going to be a little...different. Though when we imagined that, we didn’t know it’d be this much different.” She smiled.
“I’m sorry…” she looked at her, apologetically.
“No, you don’t get to apologize. I should.”
Anwen looked at her with uncertainty and expectation. What did she mean?
“I’m sorry that I kept the truth away from you. I thought I was protecting you. I was scared and didn’t know what to do. But now I know, keeping the truth away from someone just makes things worse.”
Wow.
Anwen was angry. Actually, she’d been angry all along. Mad at herself for not knowing who she was all these years, mad at her mother for not letting her know, mad at her life for keeping something this important away from her.
But this…
Sometimes before reprimanding someone, you should take a seat and listen to what they have to say. Surely, there must be some explanation for all the things they have done. And maybe that explanation would not seem too anger-invoking and cringe-worthy if you take a listen to their perspective.
"What do we do now?" Anwen asked after she'd heard her side of the story.
“We’ll figure it out,” she said so calmly as though nothing terrifying had just happened—something that had instantly put their lives upside down in the twinkling of an eye.
Chapter Twenty-Five
“I’m sorry,” Anwen said to her as soon as they were in front of the academy.
"Nah, don't be. I thought my college life would be cool and interesting. I never actually thought something like this would happen. But for what it's worth, I still think it was cool—well, for as long as it lasted," they both laughed. "I made a friend." She said in a mellow way. “Now surely, a rather quaint and fury-inciting, sluggish and somewhat deranged friend. But still, it's the best I could get so far"
“Aww,” she mumbled.
“Now don’t get like that,” she tried to push away from Anwen’s hug, frowning. “Or I might take back what I said.”
She was such a nutcase…
But she was fun.
And Anwen had gotten her figured out right off the bat.
She didn’t spend enough time on campus for it to feel like home, so she wouldn't have such a hard time getting apart, though there was only one thing that she knew she'd miss.
Eudora.
It was their last ride on campus. But then again, they’d spend just a limited time there.
* * *
Harvey and his friends were sitting on their favorite bench.
Something didn’t feel right.
Like, she couldn’t leave the academy with that feeling alongside her.
“Where are you going?” Eudora asked.
“I think there’s one final thing I need to do.”
“Here we go again…” she mumbled taking into account the direction her roommate was heading to.
The cat lingered right behind her.
When she was nearby the bench, all his friends looked at her creepily. She tried to gather the words, but her mouth wouldn’t open.
“Can I talk to you for a moment?”
“Would you care to petrify him again?” his girlfriend mocked her.
She ignored it.
He was almost about to crack into laughter until he noticed her staring at him expectantly.
“Hmm,” he hesitated. But Anwen had a convincing look on her face for the first time. “Okay,” he looked excusably at his friends, who clearly must’ve been shocked to hear him oblige.
“First off,” she proceeded. “I didn’t mean to do any of this. I didn’t plan for my life here to be so…intense.” She meant crazy. “But I just want you to know that I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’ve been so obsessed with you and I’m sorry I caused all this trouble for you…and me. But from now on, I want you to know that I’ll get free of anything that has to do with you. And I won’t ever get in your way again. I choose to relinquish you from my obsession.”
He looked speechless.
The cat lingered nearby.
He cringed back.
What was with these people? Apricot was nothing but adorable, and…well, conniving sometimes but he was mostly adorable, unless you messed with his owner.
* * *
“So, what happens now? Eudora asked as they grabbed their luggage, preparing to get out of that place.
“Meow,” the cat waddled around.
“One thing I’m not gonna miss…that cat.”
“Don’t talk to him like this.”
“I’m serious.”
Anwen kept trying to organize her belongings, though there were a lot of questions that muddled her mind.
What would happen next?
She was not a witch…
Would she stay in the witches' world?
What happened if Brayden’s parents found out that she was missing?
Would people keep finding Apricot off-putting?
She meant, how could they? He was nothing but adorable.
"Meow," the cat approached as if he read her thoughts.
She rubbed his head.
* * *
Later on, they found themselves in front of the academy. Rhiannon was her ride.
She was waiting to say goodbye to Eudora, who obviously had managed to mess up even their last day. She’d used the wrong spell to transmigrate their luggage and an irreversible mess had captivated the whole room.
“What took yo
u so long?” she asked as soon as she came out of the hall.
“You’ll never believe this.” Eudora opened her eyes with shock.
Epilogue
“What do you mean, we didn’t petrify him? I was there when it happened. I gave him the ointment.”
“Well, we thought so, but it turns out the ointment I created didn’t cause petrification after all.”
“What?’
Eudora looked at her proudly.
Sure she did. She was taking pride in her witch skills. After all, she wasn’t the one that turned him to stone.
“What makes you say that? How could you know?” Anwen proceeded.
“Well, I tried the ointment.”
“On yourself?” she asked, shocked.
“On your cat.”
“You did what?” Anwen could almost lose it.
“I’m sorry, but he was standing there all cute, without you around to go all cuckoo on me and I couldn’t help myself. I had to find out.”
Cuckoo? She could almost burst out with anger.
But on the other hand, the cat was fine. He was the most precious thing.
Oh, she loved the cat more than anything, but she was interested to learn more details about this.
“So what do you say?”
“I don’t know,” she wrinkled her face. “Isn’t it good enough we’re not the ones that turned him to stone?”
“Yeah, but no one believes that. And you only saved one sample and you used it on the cat.”
She made a good point.
“There must be someone who wanted us to get expelled.”
“But who?”
Eudora shrugged.
This could be a good thing. If she wasn’t the one who petrified him, then there was still hope for her.
That was awesome.
How didn’t she think of it before?
“We need to find proof.”
“How?” Eudora asked.
“We have a whole year to find out. After all, what other better thing do we have to do?”
Apricot waddled around her legs and she felt so happy to have him nearby her.
“What’s up, gals?” her mother interfered.
“I’ll explain later,” she said and grabbed hold of her luggage and got ready to leave.
Eudora gave her a warm hug.
“There’s still hope,” she whispered in her ear.
“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” she replied.
Her cat didn’t seem to move.
“Apricot?” she called him as soon as she was about to hop inside the car.
He ignored her.
“Apricot?” she called again, more angrily.
This time the cat moved out of his reposeful composition and got inside the car.
The end of Book 1.
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What a Witch Wants
Also by D.L. Auberry
A Witch in Progress Cozy Mysteries
An Academy for Witches (Book 1)
What a Witch Wants (Book 2)
The Witchlist (Book 3)
An Academy for Witches (A Witch in Progress Book 1) Page 14