Waywood

by Sarah Goodwin

  “Could have made it a bit harder.”

  He squeezes his hand tightly around the stone, and mutters something, closing his eyes and frowning.

  I only just keep myself from running away, the guy is clearly a complete nutter.

  Cray opens his hand and shows me the pound coin that now rests in his palm.

  “It’ll stay like that for seven hours, and then it’ll change back into a stone,” he tells me.

  “That’s a trick.”

  “Well, yeah, but not the way you mean,” Cray grins, “we trick people, that’s what witches do. Trick them into giving us things, into leaving us alone, or anything really.”

  “You’re still bullshitting me,” I said. I mean, seriously, a coin trick? How rubbish could you get?

  He sighs. “Do you at least trust that I’m not a psycho?”

  I nod, and we start to walk back to the house. At the window Nara is waiting, looking out at us, and she steps back to let us in. She closes the boards behind us, and I don’t feel nearly as afraid as I did before.

  Chapter Five

  The three of us walk out of the dank front room in to what must be the lounge. I’m relieved to see a wood framed sofa with dusty pink cushions, and two green wing chairs at opposite ends of a table constructed from wooden crates. They’re normal enough to have actual furniture at least, not just mattresses on the floor. There are band posters taped to the wall, ripped from magazines, curly symbols painted in between. Against one wall are heaps of books and on top of the stacks, as on the table, white candles are melting onto mismatched plates.

  In the chairs are two of the coolest looking people I’ve ever seen.

  Both of them are wearing black: their boots, their shirts, his jeans, her skirt, right down to their fingerless gloves. The boy is pale with eyes like clear green marbles. The girl has long red hair and dark green nail polish.

  “Ilex, Chronicle, this is Michaela. I found her at the station,” Cray says politely, gesturing to each of the strangers as he says their names.

  They blink owlishly at me from their seats.

  “Welcome to Waywood House,” Ilex, the boy, says with a small smile.

  I glance at Cray questioningly.

  “It’s the name of a forest in some book. . . Sophia chose it,” Cray shrugs.

  “So,” Chronicle sits up a little straighter and looks at me, and I notice for the first time that both she and Ilex are wearing identical necklaces – brown leather strips with green crystal beads on them, “why did you run away?”

  “I didn’t. I got thrown out,” I tell her, feeling like I’m starting my first day at school all over again.

  Ilex nods slowly. “I was thrown out,” he says. “My parents were not enamoured with the idea of their son ‘turning’ gay.”

  Cray flops onto the sofa and lights up a cigarette. Nara takes a seat beside him. She looks up at me and pats the cushion beside her. Cray offers me a cigarette and the packet is passed around.

  “So, you do magic?” I ask.

  Ilex smiles lazily. “We’ve been known to.”

  “Like what?”

  Cray opens his mouth, looks at Ilex and Chronicle, then he closes it again. “We can’t tell you until you’re initiated.”

  “But you said you’d help me,” I point out.

  “And we will, but we can’t tell you how we’re going to do it,” Cray explains. “It’s one of the rules; to keep silent.”

  Every time I think things can’t get creepier, they do. The only thing that’s keeping me from leaving is the fact that they look so normal, sitting around and smoking, just like kids from school. So they believe in a load of fantasy bollocks? I’ve only been homeless for a few hours and already I can understand how it would help to believe in something, anything other than murderers and drug addicts.

  “I suppose Cray has regaled you with his story already?” Ilex says.

  “No, he hasn’t.” I glance at Cray and find him throwing an angry look at Ilex.

  “Well, don’t you think you should?” Ilex says.

  Cray glares at him, and I see that Nara’s getting agitated.

  “You don’t have to,” I say quickly.

  “No, it’s fine,” says Cray, making it sound like the least ‘fine’ thing in the world. “I ran away from home because my Dad wanted to send me away to school. . . in Switzerland.”

  Whatever I’d been expecting, it wasn’t that.

  “So. . . your family’s. . . ”

  “Rich,” Ilex says, “utterly loaded.”

  Cray flushes. “It’s not like you were poor.”

  “But I am now,” Ilex says, a look of distaste passing over his features. “It’s not like I could go home tomorrow and get the whole lot back. Not like you,” he snorts, “but you’re not going to, because you like playing runaway so much.”

  Cray stands up without warning, looking down on Ilex menacingly. The other boy just looks up at him.

  “Who outranks you?” Ilex asks softly.

  Cray sits back down, but I can see that his hands are still curled into tight fists.

  As awkward and unsettling as it is to watch the two of them trade insults, it makes me feel a little better. They’re just like me after all, arguing like me and Tasha do over who’s got the book that I swear I lent her, and that she says she’s never seen.

  Chronicle catches my eye.

  “The rest of us aren’t as Paris Hilton as Cray and Ilex. I used to live over a chippy in Harlow,” she stubs out her cigarette, “classic really, Dad runs off, Step-Dad is way too loose with the boundaries – exit one daughter, stage right.”

  Their stories are so different to mine. I’d always thought that people ran away because of things like that: pregnancy, being gay, abuse. My story’s all wrong, mine started with me joining a new school, and only having Tasha and Chloe to pal around with. It had ended last night when my parents had thrown me out for doing the one thing I could do to keep in with my new friends.

  The door on the other side of the room opens and a girl dressed all in black, with black braids and white eyeliner steps into the room. She looks at me, and then at Ilex.

  “Who’s she?”

  Ilex rolls his eyes. “Michaela, this is Campion, another charming grunt.”

  “Well, she can see Sophia now, I suppose,” Campion says, ignoring the insult.

  “Looks like you’re going to meet our illustrious leader. Be careful, she eats the flesh of the weak.”

  Chronicle slaps Ilex on the arm.

  “I was joking,” he says.

  Cray touches my arm, smiling encouragingly. It shouldn’t make me feel better about going further into the strange house, to meet the leader of a group of witches, but it does.

  I stand up and mutter goodbye awkwardly, making my way to the door. The hallway beyond is dark, but there’s another plate of dripping candles on a shelf. I climb up the stairs, noticing more painted symbols here and there on the patchy plaster. On the landing I pause, disorientated, until I spot a door with the word, Sophia, written on it in glitter marker. I cross the creaking boards and tap on it lightly.

  “Yes?”

  I open the door and step into Marilyn Manson’s bedroom.

  Everything that isn’t draped in dusty bits of velvet or black sheets is covered in random junk: plates of candles, high heeled shoes, books, glass bottles, compacts and tubes of make-up, old ornaments and a stuffed owl which dominates the room. It’s kind of gross, like a musty old charity shop. Aside from the make-up and cool shoes I don’t rate it much. In the middle of the mess is an armchair facing a small coffee table, and in that chair sits a girl with long, tangled, blonde hair, huge green eyes, and the meanest little mouth I’ve ever seen.

  “You’re new. . . Cray brought you?”

  I nod. “He said I could. . . stay here, until I can call my Mum. Tomorrow.”

  “Well, of course it’s alright.” She frowns like it isn’t. “But he should have told me first, I need to be informed
of these things. Who’s here, who’s not. . . you can sleep in Nara and Campion’s room. It’s where all the girls sleep. Well. . . not me, but the others.”

  “Thanks.”

  Sophia’s starting to put my back up, the way Tasha did sometimes. She’s clearly taking the whole ‘grand high witch’ thing way too seriously. She’s even wearing the same kind of dusty velvet that’s all over the room, pinned into a cloak with a big rhinestone brooch. I have no idea how the others put up with her.

  “How much has Cray told you about us?” she asks.

  “Not much. . . that you’re all runaways, and you do magic.”

  Sophia stares at me intently. “You think it’s bullshit.”

  “I think. . . it’s about as bullshit as believing that Jesus can walk on water.”

  Sophia laughs, and I feel some of the tension in my spine subside.

  “Well, maybe we’ll change your mind,” she smiles. “When you see what we can do.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Your name’s Michaela, isn’t it?”

  “How did you. . . ”

  She rolls her eyes. “Thin floors.”

  “Oh,” I say, feeling a little deflated that the answer didn’t involve a crystal ball or ESP.

  “I’m Sophia, and while you’re here, you’re my guest. So, have fun, and don’t take any crap from Ilex.” She points at me semi-seriously. “He can be an arse sometimes. . . all the time, in fact.”

  “I’ll watch out for that.”

  “Then I’ll see you later.” She gets up and crosses the small space, putting her hand on my arm as she steers me towards the door. “And if you want to stay longer than today you only have to ask.”

  “Thanks.” I say again, politely, even though nothing could persuade me to stay with these freaks any longer than I have to. Well, almost nothing, I think as Sophia’s hand leaves my arm. If Mum didn’t let me come home, I might have no other choice.

  Chapter Six

  Downstairs, the others have spread sofa cushions on the floor and are in the process of arranging cans of lager and bottles of wine in the centre of the room. I sit down cross-legged on a cushion next to Cray.

  “Drink?” he asks, holding out an unopened can of Stella.

  “It’s morning,” I point out.

  “We don’t tend to notice things like that,” Cray says, with a half smile.

  I take it and snap the ring pull back. “Thanks. . . so, what do you guys do? For fun?”

  Cray shrugs. “Whatever we feel like.” He cracks open his own can. “How was it? Upstairs?”

  “Creepy, but. . . she seems OK. You had me worried.”

  “She’s alright, when she’s not in a mood,” Campion interjects. “You can really catch it if you piss her off. She threw a whole plate of candles at me once when I tried to look in the Grimoire.”

  “Grimoire?”

  “Magic book.” Campion rolls her eyes, “Sophia calls it that – some fucking French word that means exactly the same thing.”

  “You’re not a fan of all this witch stuff,” I say.

  “Magic? Yeah, course,” Campion takes a swig of Fosters, warming to her theme, “but why get all tight arsed and pretentious about it? That kind of thing made me drop out of uni.”

  “You were at uni?” I can’t help sounding surprised.

  Campion glares at me. “Yeah, I was. De Montfort, Psychology. Back when my name was... ” she breaks off.

  “Was?” I prompt.

  “It’s embarrassing,” she mutters.

  “Come on, tell me.”

  Cray, who’s been following the conversation, smirks into his can. “Go on Campion, tell her.”

  She sighs. “Margaret.”

  I try really hard not to laugh. Cray sputters into his fist.

  “Fuck you,” Campion says, but she’s fighting not to smile. “You’re next, ‘Cray’. Tell her.”

  “I don’t think I can beat ‘Margaret’,” he mutters, the tips of his ears turning red.

  “Really, ‘Byron’?” Ilex chips in.

  “Byron?” I can’t help sounding mean. “Oh my God.”

  “Byron Lacy, the second.” He clinks his can against mine, smiling shamefacedly.

  “Nice to meet you,” I say, miming tipping my hat.

  He sticks his tongue out. Chronicle pours herself another glass of rosé and leans back against one of the chairs, her long, red hair fanning out.

  “Nicole,” she says. “Your turn Ilex.”

  “Richard.” Ilex puts his empty glass on the floor and picks up the communal packet of cigarettes, lighting one and holding it like a Count in an old film. “Nara?”

  “Fahmida” Nara says, and hands me my second can.

  The stores of alcohol seem limitless, and I wonder where they get it all from. Chronicle and Ilex have first choice, taking the wine while the rest of us drink lager and beer. I switch to a can of Coke after my second drink, and by that point I feel less stressed out and a lot more comfortable. Nara and Campion strike up a conversation about the students at the campus, mostly complaining about the mess they create, and the way they sometimes make it out to the village late at night, causing trouble. I find that I’m leaning against Cray. When I get embarrassed and start to move, he puts his arm around me. It’s nice, warm and not quite so scary as it would have been a few hours ago.

  Nara passes round a large bag of crisps for breakfast, and after a while Chronicle drifts away and starts reading a magazine, draping herself over the cushion-less sofa. Cray takes out a deck of old cards with his free hand and starts to lay out a game on the floor.

  “Patience,” he tells me, even though I didn’t ask. “English solitaire.”

  He plays one handed, and I’m so tired that I close my eyes and drift for a bit. Drinking always makes me sleepy. I listen to Nara, who gets up and wanders off with Campion to turn on a radio. After a while I hear Lady Gaga playing in another room. Ilex sighs and mutters, “Ugh, not this again.”

  I hear Chronicle flick a page over idly. “Let them have some fun Ilex, Jesus.”

  “It’s shit.” He complains.

  “So’s Coldplay, but we still let you listen to it.”

  I tip my head up and open my eyes, only to find Cray looking down at me. There’s an awkward second where we’re so close that I can feel him breathing, and I have time to worry about my beer breath, before he kisses me.

  I hear Chronicle behind me saying, “Wow. . . that was fast.” Just as Ilex says, “I don’t believe this.”

  Cray moves back a little, blinks, then looks down at his cards.

  “Sorry,” he mutters.

  “S’ok.”

  Then we’re kissing again, and after a while, I forget that all my things are in a bag on the floor, that my parents have kicked me out.

  Just for a little while.

  Eventually, I’m too tired to sit up, and I say that I think I should get some sleep before I go and call my Mum. Cray goes shy and quiet, shuffling his cards and dealing out another game, but he smiles at me as I go upstairs with Nara and Campion. It makes my heart feel like someone’s tied a cord tightly round it.

  “You move fast,” Campion says, nudging me as we get to the landing.

  “It’s just been a weird night,” I mutter.

  Nara opens a door marked ‘Witches’ in glitter and we go into a room which has five mattresses on the floor, three of which are draped with blankets and sleeping bags. The window is covered in scraps of sari silk, and there are some pinned to the walls between band posters. There are also pictures cut from magazines; shoes, cool buildings, cocktails in bright glasses, the same sorts of things I stuck up on my wall at home.

  Campion drops down onto a mattress and picks up a book. Nara, who’s carrying my bag, takes me over to a bare mattress.

  “You can have this one, I’ll loan you some covers.”

  “Whose is that?” I point at the mattress next to mine, even though it’s bare there’s a small pile next to it, of cushion
s and a blanket, like someone’s just cleared the bed.

  “Oh, that was one of the other initiates – White Hart. She’s gone to stay in a squat in Bristol for a while.”

  “Why?”

  “That’s where the new coven is,” she says. “Everyone keeps finding new people, we can’t all live here. Cray especially, he gets lots of new people. I think he found her, White Hart? She’s great, you’ll meet her if you ever go to Bristol.”

  I’m too tired to really pay much attention, but I’m glad that Cray’d been there to find me. Even if it was only something he did all the time, nothing personal. Nara must see some of the fizzy happiness leave me, because she adds quickly,

  “He does like you. He doesn’t just try it on with everyone.”

  Campion snorts. “That’s Ilex’s job.”

  “That’s disrespectful” Nara frowns but it soon breaks into a sly grin. “. . . it’s true, but disrespectful.”

  “I thought Ilex was gay,” I say.

  Campion rolls her eyes. “He’s a slut when he’s had a few. Very, very uninterested in the ladies when sober.”

  Nara takes a sheet and a blanket out of a cardboard box on the floor. The sheet is still in its plastic wrapper, and the blanket has a price tag on it. She catches me looking and shrugs.

  “If stealing bothers you, you’re really in the wrong house.”

  “It doesn’t,” I tell her. “Especially when I’m this tired.”

  Together we put the sheet on the mattress and spread the blanket over it. Nara lends me a pink fuzzy pillow from her bed and I sit on the edge of the mattress to take my shoes off. From my bag I hear the pathetic noise of my mobile battery dying. And of course I don’t have my charger, even if the house had power, which I doubt.

  “My phone’s dead.”

  “I’ll take you over to the pay phone in the morning.” Nara promises as I lie down. “Right now, we’re going to go pick on Cray.”

  “Chatting up the newb, it comes with a price.” Campion says gleefully.

  They leave me with twin teasing grins, and I lie down on the mattress in the semi-darkness. I’m so unbelievably tired and it’s nice to finally be warm and comfy. I start to wonder what Tasha’s doing, right at this very minute. I wouldn’t be surprised if she was in bed with Joe, not giving me a second thought. My parents are probably still in bed, they will be until seven when my Dad gets up for work.