A Very Witchy Yuletide

by D. Lieber

  “Yeah, in a bit. I’m just going to sit out here with the cats for a little while longer.”

  “Okay.” She leaned over and pressed a kiss to her son’s head. “Goodnight.”

  “Night, Mom.”

  As he turned his attention back to the glowing embers, his phone vibrated in his pocket. The cats jumped up, looking at him with disdain at being disturbed. The deal was off. They went about their own cat business.

  He opened a text from Felicity. It read, “Hey, bud. I’ve been thinking about you all day, and I’m getting a really weird vibe. Everything okay?”

  Sawyer frowned. Even states away I set off her empath alarm, he thought. He texted her back. “Things are…pretty complicated over here. My mom and I are spending Yule with the old coven.”

  As he pressed the home button, Sawyer saw that he’d missed a text from Maria. “Hey, honey, call or text me when you get this. I know you said you were heading north for the holiday. I just saw on the news that a big storm is hitting up there. Just wanting to know you’re all right.”

  It’s too late to call her now, Sawyer thought. I hope she hasn’t been too worried. He sent Maria a reply. “No worries. All good here. Hope all is well on your end, too. See you next week.”

  His phone buzzed with another message from Felicity. “Oh. Eeva must be there then. Do you want to talk about it?”

  Sawyer’s chest twinged. I don’t have the energy to talk about this anymore right now, he thought. Even with Flick.

  He replied with a simple, “later,” and put his phone on the coffee table. With a sense of inevitability, he leaned to the side and let gravity flop him onto the couch. As he stared at the lights twinkling on the Yule tree, his eyes grew heavy, and he drifted off to sleep.

  Chapter 39

  Early the next morning, Evergreen was surprised to find that Sawyer was not in his sleeping bag. He can’t even stand to be near me now, she thought. The action only confirmed his lack of concern in her mind.

  After she made the daily offering of incense and lit the goddess candle at the altar, she went out into the sitting room. Sawyer lay on the couch, Muir curled up on his chest. Traitor, Evergreen thought, squinting at the cat. Though as soon as Muir saw her, he knew there was food in his bowl. He leapt off Sawyer and ran for the meditation room, the motion waking Sawyer from his sleep.

  He looked around the room, confused, and froze as his gaze landed on Evergreen.

  Her heart rate spiked, and there was an uncomfortably thick moment before she had the wherewithal to walk on through to the kitchen to make herself some tea. After sprinkling some cinnamon and sugar on her toast, the mundane task evening out her heartbeat, she moved to the dining room table to give him space to make coffee should he want it.

  The atmosphere eased a bit the more people woke and joined her at the table.

  “The next few days are going to be busy,” Wes said as they all ate breakfast. “I’m making cookies today to put in the baskets so we can take them to the women’s shelter tomorrow. And while we’re in town tomorrow, I need to get some odds and ends so I can start cooking the day after.”

  “What kind of cookies are you making for the baskets?” Hazel asked.

  “My grandmother’s chocolate chip with vanilla buttercream frosting.”

  Everyone made yummy sounds.

  “I’m going to need help decorating them if anyone is interested.”

  “Oh, me! Me!” Sol volunteered.

  Wes smiled and nodded. “Eeva, how about you?”

  “What?” Eeva said, her name pulling her out of her fuzzy-mindedness.

  “Would you like to help Sol and me decorate cookies for the women’s shelter?”

  “Sure, Dad.”

  Cassandra also said she would help.

  As Morrigan and Piper were talking about making the cards to put Sol’s coloring masterpieces in, Sawyer burst out laughing. Everyone turned to him. He looked up from his phone.

  “Speaking of holiday cards,” he said. “Maria just sent me an ecard. Check this out.”

  Shame and irritation flooded into Evergreen. Even hearing her name on Sawyer lips, the lips that had so recently been pressed to her naked flesh, made her stomach drop.

  Sawyer passed the phone to Tara, who giggled as she looked at it. Tara gave it to Devan, and so on until it reached Evergreen. She didn’t want to look, but as Hazel handed it to her, she couldn’t quell the compulsion.

  On the screen was a picture of a woman and her cat. They wore matching elf hats with bells on the ends. They even had matching cuffs on their wrists. As Evergreen stared at the elderly woman grinning out at her, all the blood drained from her face. The room spun, and her toast felt like it was going to make a reappearance any second.

  Eeva passed the phone to her dad, who laughed like everyone else.

  “Who is this?” her mom asked when the phone had reached her.

  “Maria.” Sawyer answered. “She’s the admin where I work. She’s sort of like the mom of the whole place. Always looking out for everyone. She loves to dress her cat up, and we all get a big kick out of it.”

  Evergreen didn’t say anything, couldn’t have if she’d wanted to. She rose from her chair and left the dining room as quickly as she could without downright running. She could feel her heartbeat in her neck, her head, her fingertips as she made her way to the meditation room.

  “Oh gods,” she whispered, her voice strangled. “What have I done?”

  Tears clouded her already imperfect vision, and there was no stopping them from spilling down her face. Why didn’t I just talk to him? she thought. Why did I assume?

  She sucked in air, trying to breathe around her silent sobs. It was perfect. He was perfect. And I had to go and fuck it up. He doesn’t even know why I snubbed him. No wonder he can’t even look at me.

  She froze, her tears halting as a thought occurred to her. But if he really cared that much, why did he let go so easily? Because you told him it was a mistake, idiot, she argued with herself. But maybe…maybe it didn’t mean as much to him as it did to me.

  She shook her head. I can’t know that for sure, she thought. Maybe he’s just internalizing it like I was. Maybe he doesn’t care as much as I do, and maybe he does. But I can’t assume he doesn’t. And I can’t let my fear that he doesn’t stop me from telling him. Because…because if he does…this is truly my last chance. It may already be too late.

  Evergreen sighed, squeezing her eyes shut. “Cassandra was right,” she murmured. “It was a misunderstanding. If I let this stand without doing anything, I’m an even bigger coward than I was before. And anyway, no matter how it turns out, I can’t let him believe that I really thought it was a mistake. Even if he doesn’t care for me. That still would have hurt him.”

  Wiping her running nose on her sleeve, her head pounding from the tears she had shed, Evergreen crossed to the altar at the far end of the room. She dug through the cabinets underneath and pulled out three short sticks of incense.

  She lit the first one from the already flickering goddess candle. “Artemis, please give me strength.” She shook out the flame so that it could burn at a smolder and stuck it into the bucket of sand. Then, she lit the second. “Athena, please give me courage.” She shook out the flame and put it beside the others. She lit the third. “Aphrodite, please smile on us both.”

  After she’d put the last incense stick in its place, she closed her eyes and bowed her head. Then, Evergreen took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and let it out.

  Chapter 40

  As Ria, Hazel, and Cassandra used one side of the dining room table to start putting all the gifts into the baskets for the women’s and children’s shelter, Sawyer and Tara used the other end to cut circles of green cloth for the Yule charms everyone would be making.

  Another tingle ran up Sawyer’s spine, and he knew Eeva’s eyes were on him again as she stood at the kitchen island decorating cookies with Wes, Cassandra, and Sol. Sawyer’s heart squeezed in his already
tight chest, but he didn’t look over his shoulder at her.

  Why? he wondered. It feels like she has been looking at me constantly since breakfast. What does she want from me? Doesn’t she know how painful this all is?

  Sawyer sighed, hanging his head as he leaned heavily on his hands on the table.

  His mother patted his shoulder gently. “You all right?” she asked, her voice low.

  He nodded. “Fine,” he reassured, lifting his head and going back to his task.

  It went on like that for the rest of the day. Sawyer tried to stay occupied, helping anyone with anything he could. It didn’t matter if it was taking out the trash or changing Ella’s diaper. He just wanted to stay busy. And through it all, he could feel Eeva’s gaze following him.

  I’ve got to be imagining things, he thought as everyone sat in the common room that evening. I’m being paranoid.

  As was expected, Eeva headed to bed early. While she was saying her goodnights, Sawyer felt it again: the tingle, the little irritating prod. He looked up at her purposely for the first time since they’d left the isolation cabin, just to be sure he wasn’t crazy. Her blue eyes were staring directly at him, intense despite her inability to see across the room in detail. His stomach wrenched, and he averted his gaze.

  What the hell was that? he wondered. What does she want from me? Is she messing with me? I never thought Eeva was someone who would play games.

  The strain that her attention caused eased as she went to bed, and Sawyer could breathe slightly better, though not freely.

  Sawyer had planned to sleep on the couch again as he had the night before. He hadn’t slept great, but he had slept. Still, his dreams had been full of vague feelings of impending doom, his anxiety filtering into his unconscious mind.

  After everyone else had called it a night, Sawyer lay on the couch. He looked at his phone as another text came through on the group message Maria had started with his coworkers. Tim had sent a picture of him helping his daughter put the star atop their Christmas tree.

  On one hand, Sawyer was grateful to Maria. She had given him the only bit of joy he’d felt that day by sharing the photo with her cat. And as everyone else had shared pictures of what they were up to in preparation of the holiday, it reminded Sawyer that there was a whole world outside of this retreat center, a whole world outside what he was feeling at the moment. Next week, he would be back at home in his one-bedroom apartment. He’d be back to work, taking care of all the injured and sick animals, covering the Christmas shift for his Christian coworkers.

  On the other hand, the joy his friends and colleagues were experiencing was far different from what he was feeling. In some ways it made him feel a lot lonelier than he had before. Their smiles were foreign to him as if he couldn’t figure out how to make his face look that way. And if he tried, it would be some grotesque mockery of the gesture that people would wince just looking at. Yes, next week he would be home. Eeva would be even further away than she was now, and he would be worse off than he was before he’d come, worse even than those days, months, years where he watched her live her life free of him via pictures on social media.

  He was the only one now who hadn’t added a picture to the group message. Sawyer placed his phone face down on the coffee table.

  He shifted his gaze to the only light in the room, his eyes staring unfocused at the sparkling lights of the Yule tree. It was almost a relief to be alone. He could wallow without worrying anyone. Then again, there wasn’t any pushing down his emotions when there was no one to pretend for.

  “Sawyer?”

  Sawyer flinched as he heard Eeva’s voice whisper his name. He closed his eyes, wincing at the pain in his heart. I’m hallucinating now. Great, he thought.

  But as he sighed deeply and reopened his eyes, Eeva really was standing there in the doorway. Well, that’s good. At least I’m not hearing things, he thought.

  He just stared at her, too tired to fight, his vision dull and unfocused. “What is it?” he muttered, his cheek misshapen against the couch as he hadn’t bothered to lift his head. Is that my voice? he wondered, unable to believe that lost and lifeless tone came from his lips.

  Eeva bit her lower lip, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “N-never mind,” she murmured. Then she turned around and headed back down the hall toward the meditation room.

  Sawyer sighed again, staring at the tree lights once more. “Whatever,” he muttered into the couch.

  Chapter 41

  Evergreen shook her head at herself as she stared at the ceiling of the meditation room the following morning.

  “I can’t believe you chickened out,” she scolded herself, her disgust apparent in her tone.

  But she could still hear the echo of Sawyer’s voice as he said, “What is it?” Hollow, defeated. She had done that to him. She’d crushed him like that.

  She’d thought perhaps he wasn’t so affected by what she had said to him that cold morning in the isolation cabin. But that was clearly not the case. She could feel his despair, deep and thorny through the hum of her own nerves as she’d called out to him.

  And just when she could put a stop to his sorrow, she fucking chickened out. What if he can’t forgive me? she had wondered. And her words had stuck in her throat. She barely choked out “never mind” before she had to retreat, chased by her own fear and shame.

  “Your fear got the better of you yesterday,” she told herself. “But not today. Today, you are going to apologize and explain.”

  She crawled out of her sleeping bag and got dressed. She knew she was always the first to get up. She was the only morning person in the house. “Now is my chance,” she said, trying to pump herself up. She opened the door to the meditation room and made her way to the living room.

  Sawyer sat on the couch, rocking baby Ella in his arms.

  “Thanks so much for holding her while I got her bottle ready,” Dorian said, entering the room.

  “No problem.” Sawyer handed the baby back to her daddy, who sat in a nearby chair to feed her.

  “You’re up early,” Evergreen murmured when Dorian’s gaze fell on her.

  “Yeah, Miss Ella here let us know she was hungry before her usual feeding time,” Dorian explained.

  Ella sucked happily at her breakfast.

  Don’t worry about it, Evergreen thought, soothing the disappointment that swirled in her gut. You have time. You have the whole day. You got this.

  The baskets for the shelter were finished. They were stuffed full of hats, mittens, soap, shampoo, washcloths, cookies, and hand-colored pictures from Sol. It was finally time to deliver them. Evergreen got into her mom’s car along with Tara, Hazel, and Piper. Wes had taken Devan and Sawyer with him to the grocery.

  As Ria parked on the side of the road in front of the shelter, Evergreen took her cane from her bag and made her way to the front door. She pushed the buzzer as everyone else went to the trunk for the baskets.

  “Yes?” the box crackled at her.

  “We have some donations,” Evergreen explained to the woman on the other side.

  The door unlocked with a loud bzzzt, and Evergreen held it open for everyone, their hands full. She followed them inside, stopping behind them at the reception desk. The receptionist pointed them down the hall to where they could deliver the donations.

  Evergreen could already feel a shadow falling over her heart, the pain and fear palpable in the air. “I think I’ll just wait here,” she told her mom. She reached her hand into her coat pocket and cursed when she realized she hadn’t brought her hematite with her.

  “We won’t be long,” Ria promised.

  Evergreen turned to sit on a couch near the entrance but veered toward the water cooler nearby. She took a paper cone of water then went to her initial destination. As she sat down, clasping her white cane between her knees, a woman in a yellow parka came down a set of stairs and got herself a cone of water as well.

  She smiled at Evergreen and sat beside her on the couch.


  “Good day, sister,” the woman greeted Evergreen.

  “Good morning,” Evergreen said politely.

  “Your expression says you’ve seen better days,” the woman said.

  Evergreen’s eyebrows pulled together. She’d never been good at schooling her expressions, but she wasn’t used to getting called out for it either. On the other hand, she was quite used to people approaching her and telling her their life stories. She steeled herself for the tale she knew was coming.

  “You know what always makes me feel better when I’m feeling out of sorts?” the woman asked.

  “What?” Evergreen knew she didn’t really have to ask, but she didn’t want to be rude.

  “The Word. Have you heard the Word, sister?”

  Here we go, Evergreen thought, internalizing her sigh. “Yes,” she told the woman. “I’ve heard the word.”

  The woman smiled openly, and Evergreen found it hard to be irritated in the face of such friendliness. “Then you know. I’m sorry you’re having a rough time right now. Would you like to pray for strength with me?”

  “No, thank you. No offense, but I’m not Christian.”

  The woman tilted her head at her, her brow crinkled. “But you said you knew the Word…”

  Evergreen had met with this sort of confusion before, someone who thought that if you understood what Jesus was saying, you surely would follow him. If you didn’t follow him, then you must not understand. “You asked if I’d heard the word. Yes, I have heard the word, and I understand it. But that doesn’t mean I agree with it. That doesn’t mean it speaks to me.”

  Her confusion still palpable, the woman offered herself an explanation. “Perhaps, it just hasn’t been expressed to you properly.”

  Evergreen shook her head gently. “Let me put it to you this way: you know that feeling you get when you go to church or read the bible? That feeling of belonging, of light, of hope, of peace?”

  She nodded.

  “I get that feeling, too. But I don’t get it from going to church or reading the bible. I get it from walking in the woods, from beating a drum. The old gods give me that feeling. I don’t even know you, but as one human being to another, I know how special that feeling is. I would never try to take that feeling away from you. And as a woman who clearly cares for others, I would expect you to have enough empathy to not try to take that feeling away from me.”