“What?” I say again, because it’s taking a long time for the facts to hit my brain. None of this makes sense. Mags said Granda’d heard from Mom after we all cast the spell in the tunnel. If anything, that could mean our spell worked, not theirs.
Their spell. “You cast the spell at the party.” I repeat Rose’s words. But even saying it aloud doesn’t make it sink in.
“Yes,” my brother says. He looks at Ivy. “Mags had brought a small bottle of poteen to give to someone and we both took a couple of sips when she wasn’t looking. There’s a grove of trees two fields over. That’s where we went. We thought . . . Ivy thought if—if we’d really lost our parents, then maybe the spell could help us find them again.”
“Wait. Wait. You knew? You knew what I did?” I’ve been coping and hiding and drinking and forgetting and fucking hallucinating and he knows what I did?
Rowan looks sad. “You told me, a few days after we ran away. I know you don’t remember. I’d never seen you that drunk before. You kept talking about this secret you had and how it was about Mom—”
“Why didn’t you say something the next morning, once I’d sobered up?” I ask, my voice faint.
Rowan shakes his head. “I didn’t know how,” he says. “For the first few days. Then we got here and I told Ivy what you said, and Ivy said she’d found this spellbook in the rubble of an old housing development. She said she’d found a spell. It was the only thing I could think to do. I didn’t imagine it would actually work. I didn’t think it would make us lose anything in exchange. I didn’t know how to tell you. I just wanted to be able to help. To do something. Anything.”
My mom’s on the couch with my silver lighter and a lit cigarette. I leave and lock the door. The cigarette sparks in the spilled vodka my mom had been drinking. The carpet catches fire. It goes up fast. My dad sleeps through. By the time my mother wakes up and tries the door, it’s too late. All that’s left is charred hair and bare feet, piles of ash in empty rooms.
“We wanted to undo it,” Ivy whispers. “Take that loss and change it. Find them again.”
My mom’s on the couch with my silver lighter and a lit cigarette. I leave and lock the door. At the sound of that last click, my mother opens her eyes.
Laurel
April 7, 2017; April 10, 2017
Found: Two letters
April 7, 2017
Dear Holly,
I fucked up. I know this won’t surprise you. I’ve been fucking up since the day I was born.
Mom’s dead and Dad’s as good as gone and now so are the twins. They hate me. I don’t blame them.
I can blame Jude all I want, but it won’t make what I’ve done better. It won’t change the fact that I always followed him. I’ve spent my whole life chasing him. Loving him, hating him. Keeping him away from you, from the twins. I’m ready to let him go.
There was a fire in the flat. It was like a wake-up call. I took Jude’s boots and broke the window. I don’t know if he was in the flat or not, but still it haunts me.
I’ve been wearing his boots ever since.
Holly, I need your help. I was never strong unless I was with the two of you. I know this is too much to ask, after all this time, after everything I’ve done. But I need you. I need you to keep me away from Jude, and Jude away from me. I need you to make me stay in this goddamn place until I’m better. Until I’m sober. Until I’m free of him.
Will you help me? Will you come?
All the love and hope in the world,
Ash
April 10, 2017
Dear Ash,
The twins are in Balmallen. They called Ivy to meet them there. It’s strange that they ended up in our old hometown, where everything began. I’ve asked Mags to watch over them all. She said she won’t interfere—you know how Mags is—but I know we can trust her. You don’t have to worry, you just have to get well.
I’m coming. I love you.
Your friend, always,
Holly
Olive
Monday, May 15th
Lost: A brother
The spell didn’t work. Emily isn’t home.
My mom is at the table with her head in her hands. My dad has just poured her a glass of wine and his hands are shaking. They aren’t saying anything. Even the dogs are silent. I’ve been trying to convince myself my sister’s just off with friends somewhere for so long that the sight of my parents like this hits me like a brick.
The others stand awkwardly at the door until Rose drops herself into a chair next to my mom. Mom slides her wineglass over to her and Rose takes a sip.
“We reckon she’s just nursing her first hangover,” Rose says gently. “And she’ll come home late and stinking of vodka, taking after her big sister.”
I can’t even find it in me to scowl.
Mom takes her wineglass back. “In that case,” she says to me, her voice faint, “I should ground you again for being a bad influence.” She drains the rest of her glass and Dad pours her another.
Hazel and Rowan move into the kitchen slowly; Hazel lowers herself into the chair next to Rose, and Rowan stands against the sink with me and slips an arm around my back. Ivy stays at the door.
Suddenly she looks behind her and says, “Oh?” in her permanently surprised voice. She moves aside and the back door opens.
Emily walks in.
Everybody stands up at the same time.
Chloe follows my sister into the kitchen. They are both pale and shaking, their hair—usually shiny and in identically straight styles—a mess. Their clothes are torn and there are scratches on their arms that make me think of rose thorns. Behind them, Mags Maguire stands at the threshold, wide and stout and solid, her arms folded across her chest.
“Emily!” My mom flies over to my sister and wraps her in her arms. Dad comes over, too, and covers the top of Emily’s head tenderly with the palm of his hand.
“It’s okay, Mom,” Emily says. “We’re okay.”
Chloe doesn’t say anything, her eyes downcast.
“Where were you?” I ask, worry and annoyance and love tumbling out of me in the form of words. “We’ve been looking bloody everywhere for you! We’ve been asking everyone about you! We’ve been worried sick! We’ve tried everything! I cut myself!” I hold my hand up to show her.
Mags looks at me sharply, at the cut on my palm. Something tells me she knows exactly what that means.
Mom takes Emily’s face in her hands. “Are you okay?” she asks her.
“We’re okay,” Emily says again. “Really.”
Mom looks over Emily’s shoulder at Chloe. “Are you okay, Chloe?” she asks.
Chloe nods but doesn’t lift her head.
“I’ll get her home,” Mags says roughly, but the hand she places on Chloe’s shoulder is kind.
“Wait,” Mom says, her palms still cupping Emily’s face. “Where were you?” She looks over at Mags. “How did you find them?”
“Lucky coincidence,” Mags says, and she turns Chloe firmly toward the door.
When they’ve left, there’s silence for a minute. It’s Rose that breaks it.
She doesn’t ask, Where were you? Instead, she says, “What happened?”
“Not what you’re thinking,” says Emily, her hands unconsciously going to the rips in her T-shirt, the scratches on her skin.
“You don’t know what we’re thinking,” I tell her, another little lick of anger spitting up from inside my chest. I’d pictured her hungover on a mattress in Chloe’s room so many times, I’d come to believe it. She does look okay, but her scratches are scaring me.
“Where were you, Emily?” Dad asks, leading her to the table.
“Gankilty,” Emily says in a small voice.
“What’s in Gankilty?” I ask at the same time as Mom says, “And what exactly were you doing in Gankilty?”
The village of Gankilty, population five hundred, on the other side of the lake to us, consists of a shop, a post office, and a couple of pubs, neither of which are as lenient about the minimum drinking age as Maguire’s. I can’t think why Emily and Chloe could have been there at all.
“So,” Emily says quickly. “Chloe said her mom was worried ’cause Cathal hadn’t come home, right? Chloe knew where he was, but she was sworn to secrecy. She wanted to get him to come home ’cause her mom was freaking out, but he wasn’t answering his phone, probably because of the party.”
Dad puts up his hands to slow Emily down. “What party?”
“Oh. They—Cathal told Chloe he was going to have a party on the lake. There’s a little pier in Gankilty that’s super secluded, so no one’d know.”
Then Emily goes very quiet and bites her lip. I steal a look at Rose. She isn’t moving. Her eyes haven’t left Emily’s face.
“But?” Mom says. I remember, suddenly, for the first time since we got home, that Mom is Laurel. She wrote that diary. She cast that spell. It’s difficult to believe, seeing her here, in our kitchen, with her short, graying hair and her ears full of tiny hoops, the big silver rings on her fingers, the sensible sandals on her feet. There is still so much I don’t know about her.
“But,” Emily says, wincing slightly. “When we got there . . . it was . . . strange. I don’t really know how to explain.”
“Try,” says Dad.
“We got . . . lost,” Emily says slowly. “It was stormy and we knew we were close to the lake, but there was all this smoke, or mist, and these noises . . .” She breaks off again, chews on her bottom lip some more.
“Howling,” Ivy says softly. “Howling and screams.”
Emily continues as if she’s half asleep, as if part of her is still back there, seeing it. “We could hear the music from the road, but we couldn’t find it. There was . . . stuff . . . on all the trees. Blood and . . . things. There were eyes, too. People maybe.” She tries to shake herself a little. “People from the party probably, but they looked like . . .”
“Did you take anything, Emily?” Dad asks gently. “Drink anything?”
Emily shakes her head. “I told you, we never got to the party. We just got lost in the woods.”
Mom’s eyes are narrowed. We’re probably thinking the same thing: There are no woods on the other side of the lake. Just the fields and the shore and the houses outside the village, their boats tied to tiny wooden jetties and bobbing in the water.
“The people,” Emily says. “The . . . I know this sounds crazy, but they didn’t look real. But I told Chloe they were probably just her brother’s friends, so we followed them down to the lake.”
She’s quiet for so long then that Dad touches her wrist and says, “Emily?” and my heart makes loud noises in my chest. Howling and smoke and faces between the trees.
“It’s like the branches didn’t want us to go down there,” Emily says, her fingers pulling at the tears in her clothes. “But Chloe thought she saw her brother, so we pushed through and everything was loud and weird and we thought we saw . . . But it couldn’t have been . . .”
“What?” Ivy whispers.
Emily blinks. “We thought we saw him go into the water and not come back up again.” She shakes her head. “But then we were just back on the road right where we’d been before and everything was normal except there was no one around.” Emily frowns. “And it was . . . a lot later than we’d thought.”
“And Cathal?” Hazel asks.
Emily shakes her head. “I don’t think the party ever happened,” she says. “Or maybe it did and then he went home.”
“He didn’t go home,” I tell her. Emily pales.
“Do you think . . .”
“It sounds like you and Emily must have dozed off,” says Dad firmly. “Or tripped and bumped your heads. We should bring you over to Dr. Driscoll.”
Emily’s expression clears a little, like she’s relieved.
“Why didn’t you call us to come get you?” Mom asks.
“Both our phones had died,” Emily says, her expression apologetic. “And anyway, Mags Maguire just showed up right then and took us home.”
Mom stares vaguely out of the window to where Mags’s car disappeared from our driveway. “Lucky coincidence indeed,” she murmurs.
“We didn’t mean to worry anyone,” Emily says pleadingly. “When I stay over at Chloe’s, I don’t always call, and I thought we’d be back by dinner last night, I swear.”
“It’s okay,” Dad says, because Mom is still staring out of the window, her thoughts far away. “Why don’t you go upstairs and grab some clean clothes, and we’ll nip down to Dr. Driscoll and make sure you’re all right.”
When Emily has gone upstairs to change, Dad goes over to Mom and strokes her hair. She doesn’t even notice.
“There was a boy,” she says in a strange, distant voice. “I don’t remember his name. He was blond; he had a pierced eyebrow, I think. He drowned in that lake, maybe twenty-five years ago. Mags Maguire was the last to see him. She said it was by the lake.”
My skin prickles. How old is Mags Maguire and how long has she had that pub?
Where did that thought just come from?
“They thought it was suicide,” Mom half whispers. “But no one ever knew for sure. I just know he went missing. Lost.”
“The girls must have fallen,” Dad says in the same gentle tone he used for Emily. “They must have bumped their heads and seen a bunch of kids at a party messing about in the lake and thought it was something sinister. They’re okay, Laura. They’re okay.”
Mom nods. She seems to come back to herself under his touch.
“We found your diaries,” I find myself saying, loud in the silence. “From when you were our age.”
Mom finally snaps out of her trance and turns to me.
“You found—” She still looks shocked. “I was looking everywhere for those,” she says. “That’s why I agreed to move those boxes out of your nana’s house. I’ve spent the last week looking through things from twenty years ago, trying to find them.”
She spent two entire mornings searching through papers on the countertop. Papers spilling onto the floor in the study. Papers fluttering out of the recycling bin. Who’s to say those pages didn’t just get lost? Thrown into the bin with the rest of the bills. Not really magic spells at all.
“It’s always so surprising to teenagers,” Dad says with a slight twinkle in his eye, “that their parents ever had lives as exciting as theirs.”
Rose and I exchange a look.
“So what happened in the end?” Hazel asks, her voice strange after everything we’ve heard. “With my mom. And Holly.”
Mom allows herself a small smile, even though it looks like she’s still processing the idea of us having read her old diaries. “Holly’s real name is Noelle,” she says, and Ivy nods. “She picked her nickname because there’s holly at Christmas. Holly and Ivy.” She nods toward Ivy. “I hadn’t even realized we’d given you all tree names.”
I decide not to mention that they also inadvertently named us after the ingredients in a spell.
“You actually named me Olivia,” I remind her. “And ivy’s a plant, not a tree.”
“Indeed.” Mom picks her wineglass back up again and raises it at me.
“But what happened to you all?” Hazel asks, and I know she’s really asking what happened to Ash.
“After we finished school?” Mom says. “I left town. I wanted to find myself, travel the world. Amy left, too, soon after, with Jude.”
Hazel closes her eyes like she’s in pain.
“I mean Jack,” Mom says. “Jack Kyle. Or Caill, I think he said it was, although I don’t know that that’s a real surname. It’s the Irish for to lose. He used to get people to call him Jude.” She shak
es her head. “The patron saint of lost souls and pretentious young men with big ideas and narrow minds.”
My mom shakes her head. “We were so young,” she says. “We knew he was . . .” She looks at Hazel and Rowan, then seems to choose her words carefully. “We knew he was trouble, at the time. It was easy to get carried away. Amy said it was the only way—her leaving with him, I mean. Noelle seemed almost relieved.”
“Wait, what?” says Rose. “You’re saying the guy you all tied up and threatened to set on fire—the guy who went for your throats—ended up marrying Ash? He’s Hazel and Rowan’s dad?”
Mom shrugs. “I never understood it myself,” she says, with the truthfulness of someone who has had three glasses of wine in quick succession. “But love is love, in its myriad forms.”
“Love, strong as Death, is dead,” my dad quotes. “Come, let us make his bed / Among the dying flowers.”
Mom looks into her wineglass like a fortune-teller into tea leaves. She says softly, “Who knows what would have happened if Noelle had stayed with him? She was so much frailer than Amy; so much more delicate . . .”
What was it she wrote in the diary? He kissed her, he hit her, he snapped her skinny neck. She went back to the forest and climbed the tree one final time only to throw herself down with a rope around her throat. She swung between the branches.
Stay away from him, or you’ll lose everything.
I stare at my mother. You knew what would have happened if he’d stayed with her, I think at her.
And so did Ash.
“We must protect Holly,” Ash said.
Maybe by following him Ash was just saving Holly all along.
Hazel
Monday, May 15th
Lost: Old red leather-bound notebook, thin and worn, secured by a black rubber band
When we get back home from Olive’s, the house is ransacked. Our stuff’s all over the floor in the kitchen like somebody’s thrown the boxes away from the counters to check behind them, not caring about the snapped spaghetti, the dented cans, the cookies broken to crumbs, the bread smushed underfoot. There are boot marks up the stairs and in every room.
Spellbook of the Lost and Found Page 24