Winter of Discontent (Four Seasons Book 1)

by T. S. Harvey

  ‘How did you do that?’

  ‘It’s easy. I’m a Warlock.’

  I stood there in silence; I didn’t quite know what to say.

  ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ I replied, once I’d managed to get my breath.

  ‘You’re a Warlock; fine, let’s say I buy that. That doesn’t explain why I don’t remember those conversations?’

  He took a deep breath before he started to answer. This made me feel uncomfortable, I didn’t really think I could take much more, this was just too weird.

  ‘Erm … that is one of the abilities I have. I can alter … erm, remove memories. I told you not to remember it and you didn’t. I walked you back to the top of the lane and then went back inside. I went back in the house and then out onto the balcony. I’d told you that from the point at which you saw me up there you would remember nothing. That’s it. That’s the whole truth.’

  For a moment I think he actually thought everything was gonna be all right.

  Right up until the moment I slapped him hard across the side of the face.

  ‘You jerk. You complete and utter jerk. You took my memories. You went into my head and you just stole them. You had no right to do that. Stay away from me. Just stay right away from me. Seems to me, Kacey got off lightly.’

  He looked gutted but I didn’t care. As I headed off across the park I felt a huge sense of relief that he didn’t follow me this time. I couldn’t deal with him right now, I was too angry. I just needed to get back to the safety and normality of my own home.

  I spent the rest of the afternoon and most of the evening in my room. Aunt Suze had sensed something was wrong and tried to tempt me downstairs with the promise of Death by Chocolate and Sam Worthington in Terminator 5 but nothing worked. And trust me, there’s not much that a couple of hours with Sam Worthington couldn’t fix. This was different though. How many people can honestly say they know a Warlock, a real live Warlock? And of those who do, how many have smacked them in the mouth? He deserved it though. How dare he just dip into my head like that and mess with my thoughts, my memories! There was a part of me, however, that wanted to know more about him, about what he was. It was a lesser part of me than the one that was so angry with him, though, so any chance he had of making it up to me was slim.

  I dreaded going to back to school. Kacey was pissed with me for taking Erik’s side. She was gonna be unbearable when she found out how we’d dated and then fell out on the same day. It was almost worth making up with him just to stop her gloating, but of course I didn’t.

  Kacey, Britney, and the others were stood in the usual place by the parking lot, flirting with the usual guys. I took a deep breath and strode over to them as confidently as I could.

  ‘Hi. OK?’

  Kacey looked at me as if to say ‘who the fuck are you talking to’ and the girls just turned their backs to me. I had no idea what she had told them but I wasn’t gonna lose face entirely by walking off. I tried again.

  ‘Good to have you back, Kacey.’

  ‘Is that right?’

  ‘Yeah, awesome.’

  I was sure she would keep up the pressure, make me suffer. I felt somewhat guilty when she smiled back at me.

  ‘Yeah, it’s good to be back.’

  I’m sure my sigh of relief could have been heard from the science lab on the other side of campus.

  ‘Come on then, Trump, how are you feeling now?’ she grinned, poking me playfully in the ribs.

  I hated her calling me Trump. I had meant to talk to her about it but after our argument on Saturday I figured now was not the time. I was just pleased I wasn’t gonna spend the rest of eternity, or the next two years at least, sat all alone at recess all Jenny-no-mates and miserable. We’d started to get on really well and I think she must have thought the same as I did – friends fall out but they don’t have to stay fallen out.

  ‘A group of us are going to the rock concert over at Davis Field next weekend. You coming?’

  ‘That sounds great,’ I said enthusiastically.

  I had very eclectic tastes in music but I loved rock. Not the heavy metal type where you can barely understand what the singer is saying but the more popular kind. Jon Bon Jovi was one of my favourites; mind you he was pushed hard for first place a couple of years back. Dad and I were in the UK at the time and we went to a concert in Doncaster to see some guy called Jamie ‘Afro’ Archer. He’d been on one of those reality talent shows. I hadn’t seen the programme but I was hooked from the first song. He was amazing, kind of confirmed my love of that genre and I decided that night that if I didn’t marry Jon I would definitely marry Jamie. Well, I was only thirteen at the time!

  The rest of the week went by like nothing had ever happened. Kacey was on fine form, running down anyone and everyone. Not wanting to rock the boat, I said nothing, but I didn’t join in like the others did. One of the girls started to make fun of Erik on the Wednesday when he came into the canteen at lunch. Uncharacteristically, Kacey changed the subject and moved onto someone else. She hadn’t asked whether anything had gone on between him and me, and I didn’t mention anything. After all, what would I say? No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get what had gone on out of my head.

  On Friday afternoon I had a free period, so I decided to go to the library. I trawled through their online records, as well as books that had clearly not been read for years, hoping to find something about Warlocks that wasn’t entirely based in folklore. After two hours of searching, I realised that was two hours of my life I was never gonna get back. Nothing, not a thing. Oh, there was plenty about Merlin, about broomsticks and Hallowe’en ghouls, but nothing about actual real-life Warlocks. In the end, my head started to hurt with it so I got my things together and headed back to class. I’d just turned the corridor by the girls’ locker room when I saw Erik coming toward me. For a moment, just a moment mind you, I felt an overwhelming urge, the urge to kiss him. I don’t mean a soft, gentle, loving kiss. I wanted the type of kiss you see in the movies and read about in books, I wanted the kind of kiss you can lose yourself in. As he got closer I shook this thought off.

  ‘Hi,’ he said, with a kind of nervous smile.

  ‘Go to hell!’ I snapped sharply, then turned and walked into the girls’ locker room.

  I shut the door behind me; leaning against it to be sure he didn’t try to follow. “Go to hell!” – why on earth did I say that? I had every right to be angry with him but that was so childish. I wasn’t a child, I was sixteen, an adult; I should have handled that better.

  I went and sat down on the benches for a while. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to speak to him at all; I just didn’t want to speak to him yet. To be honest, I was embarrassed at how I’d reacted. You should have said hello, you stupid cow, I argued to myself. I gave it about thirty minutes and ventured back into the corridor. It was safe; unfortunately he was nowhere to be seen. I felt a bit deflated. I thought he would at least have waited for me to come out. I laughed at the thought of this. Poor bastard, he couldn’t have won no matter what. If he’d still been there, I’d have shut the door on him again and, having not still been there, I was pissed with him. Still it’s a girl’s right to decide to be indecisive.

  It had only been a couple of weeks since the accident, but I felt fit. I even felt fit enough to take part in the cross-country trials. I liked cross-country much more than track; for me there was nothing worse than running around and around the same ground again and again. Mind numbing! The trials were being held at a popular country park on Saturday morning. It was only six miles, so I figured I’d be home in plenty of time to get ready for the concert.

  ‘Do want me to come and cheer you on tomorrow?’ asked Aunt Suze that evening.

  ‘No. No point. You’d see me set off and then see me get in. You’d be bored stupid. You could drop me off, though, save me getting the bus.’

  ‘Sure, no worries.’

  I lay on the top of my bed for at least an hour before fa
lling asleep. I had a nice room. The bed was a double with the most comfortable mattress ever. The wallpaper was quite plain but Aunt Suze had a good eye and had hung some really great retro art on the walls. There was a large double wardrobe on one wall. On the other was a dressing table; it was very 50s in style, with one large mirror in the centre and a smaller mirror on each side. There was a bedside cabinet that had one of those weird lava lamps which was really quite hypnotic. I felt at home here. I missed my dad, I missed him a lot, but I was glad I was here. I wanted to put some roots down. I was sixteen and I could name you my favourite restaurant in at least two cities in at least ten countries around the world.

  Some would say that was a great life. They wouldn’t be wrong but I didn’t want it. This was my life now. I wanted this. And, rather annoyingly, I wanted Erik …

  Chapter Eleven – Hope!

  Erik

  I couldn't believe how stupid I’d been. I’d had no choice but to watch the best thing that had ever happened to me walk across the park and out of my life. I’ll be honest; on the walk home I couldn’t help but consider going through the whole memory wiping process again. It would’ve been so easy to plant another thought in her mind; make her think we had had a great first date, that everything was fine – but how could I do that to her again? I had to work this out as a normal boy, not a Warlock. After all, it was the geek she agreed to date, not the sorcerer. It was a schoolboy error and I could have kicked myself. Yeah, I know I was still a schoolboy but, at almost seventeen, I really should have known better. I spent the rest of the week cursing my stupidity, avoiding her at school one moment and looking for her the next. By the time Friday came around, I decided the damage was already done, so I had to make a choice; either forget her and move on, or find a way of making her listen, making her see I wasn’t all bad. In the end, it was an easy decision. I couldn’t perform a memory wipe on myself and there was no way I was likely to forget her any time soon!

  I had to perform a small notion, nothing major, but nevertheless it was still magic. I knew she had a free period that afternoon but had no idea where she was gonna spend it. I took myself off to the boys’ toilets to lock myself in a cubicle. Yeah, I know it sounds a bit seedy but I needed to be sure no one walked in on me! I managed to find a cubicle that still had the toilet seat intact and sat down and started to concentrate.

  Now I know most people think that spell-casting is full of weird, crazy language expressed with a lot of arm-waving but, in truth, for Warlocks at least, it’s nothing like that. All we need to do is hold our hands palms out and visualize what we want to happen. We call our spells ‘notions’. I guess in days gone by, it was just another way of separating ourselves from ordinary wizards and witches. Centuries ago when there were wars between rival covens, the losing parties were often subject to having both hands cut off at the wrist. It was seen as a sign of great strength if your line could live within the boundaries of another coven with them powerless to stop you.

  I sat there for just a few minutes; it didn’t take long before I knew what she was doing and where she was going next. I left quickly when I realised she’d be passing the girls’ locker room in just a few moments. I didn’t have time to decide what I’d say, so when she turned the corner I just blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

  ‘Hi.’

  Could I have been any more pathetic? I just stood looking at her, waiting and hoping she’d respond well.

  Hope was pretty overrated really. I worked that out when she snapped, ‘Go to hell!’ and stormed off into the locker room.

  I wouldn’t be deterred though. When I’d looked to ‘see’ where she was going, I also learnt where she’d be tomorrow morning; the cross-country trials.

  The following morning I was up and out early. I didn’t want to have to lie to Dad and Jared about where I was going so figured it was best to get out before they got up. I’d decided to sign up for the trials and just follow her around the course until she relented. She’d have to talk to me – I was determined she would.

  When I got there Coach Allen was more than a little surprised to see me.

  ‘You’re kidding me, Zauber. You know this is six miles, over rough ground?’

  ‘Yeah I … erm … I figured I should do more exercise.’

  Coach just shook his head in disbelief and pointed me to registration.

  Sarah arrived about ten minutes later. Dressed in gray leggings and a blue-gray T-shirt, hair tied in a plait, with just a hint of make-up. She looked fantastic. Boy, did I have it bad.

  I was determined to say something a little more than ‘hi’ this time. I would be clear, confident and charming. As she got closer, I moved into view. I steadied my nerves; I wasn’t used to feeling unsure of myself. I took a deep breath and spoke my well-rehearsed lines.

  ‘Hi.’

  Shit. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit! Well, you fucked that up good and proper, Erik, I cursed to myself.

  Sarah stopped just short of me. I braced myself for another slap. I deserved it after what I’d done so I wouldn’t react.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  This threw me for a moment. Her tone wasn’t warm and friendly but it was a huge improvement on “Go to hell”.

  ‘We need to talk,’ I said, when I finally found my voice.

  ‘Yeah? Well, not here, we don’t,’ she said firmly, as she walked past me and over to registration.

  ‘OK, then where?’

  ‘I’ll wait for you at the finish line. We can go and talk then.’

  ‘But the boys leave first. I’ll wait for you.’ I grinned.

  ‘Yeah? We’ll see.’

  I swear I saw a hint of a smile. In fact, I prayed I saw a hint of a smile.

  As I set off on the six-mile hike, it hit me. If I finish this course before any of the boys, or many of the girls for that matter, it would destroy my ‘geek status’. The problem was though, after what Sarah had said about waiting for me at the finish line, I’d started to feel really competitive. I know it was stupid, I know I shouldn’t have done it, but just this once I listened to what I wanted to do instead of what I should do.

  I’d started off slowly behind the pack of main runners; we’d covered less than a quarter of a mile when I heard the klaxon go for the girls to start. I knew Sarah was a strong runner and would catch up with the back markers in the boys’ pack, so I held back and waited. Crazy really.

  I knew that, if I wanted to, I could not only beat the whole lot of them but also be home in time for breakfast with Dad and Jared. But that wasn’t a good idea. Good ideas, however, were not making an appearance this morning.

  It would be about halfway round when Sarah caught up to me. She glanced sideways at me and smiled but said nothing.

  I wanted to say something clever, something witty but for the life of me all I could think of was ‘hi’ so I kept my mouth shut.

  About a mile from home, she picked up the pace. There were a half dozen or so boys and a couple of girls in front of us. As her stride quickened, so did mine. I knew it would take nothing for me to overtake and leave her for dead but I just didn’t have the heart for it. I didn’t want to beat her, I wanted to impress her. I wanted to show I wasn’t the geek everyone thought I was. As we approached the finish line, I looked up and could see the look on the faces of the coach and the jocks that had already finished. I could hear them talking; they couldn’t believe I’d covered six miles and that they had only just beaten me back. I started to panic, I’d been the geek for too long to change it now; it would raise too many questions. I hated what I was about to do but I felt I had no choice. As we came within a few feet of the line, I started to hold on to my side, to look pained. For good measure, I started to wheeze and, just as Sarah crossed the line, ‘caught’ a stone with my left foot and went face first into the mud. Laughter from the onlookers could still be heard as I picked myself up and walked over to where Sarah was waiting.

  She looked confused, annoyed even.

&n
bsp; ‘Why did you do that? We both know you could have won.’

  ‘But I couldn’t have won fairly. I just wanted you to see there is more to me than just an idiot who doesn’t know when he has a good thing.’

  ‘OK then,’ she said half smiling, half scowling. ‘Let’s talk.’

  We walked, in silence, down to the main road. From there we took the bus into town, still in silence. It was really the most uncomfortable forty-five minutes I’ve ever had.

  ‘So where do you want to go?’ I asked as we left the bus. ‘There’s a coffee shop over on Jamieson. It has booths that are quite private, if you’d like?’ I said tentatively.

  ‘Sure. Sounds OK.’

  She seemed quite relaxed. I felt the most positive I had in what had been a very long week.

  When we got to the coffee shop I ordered two lattes and we sat over the far side of the room. It was quite dark in there, the music wasn’t too loud, and most of the customers were quite old; mid-thirties to forties, I’d guess. There was another coffee shop a few streets down but that was aimed at young people – it would have been noisy and impossible to hold a conversation without shouting. This might have been the last place on earth I’d have taken a date but it was ideal for what we had to do.

  ‘So go on then,’ she said, somewhat impatiently.

  ‘OK. Before we start, though, I am so sorry about the whole memory-wipe thing. I didn’t think about it from your point of view but I really was just trying to protect you. And to protect my family.’

  She said nothing. Her face remained totally unreadable, impassive.

  ‘So what do you want to know first?’ I asked nervously.

  She took a deep breath. Clearly and slowly. Her chest heaved slightly from underneath her damp T-shirt. I was a Warlock, not a robot, and she looked less than impressed when she saw me notice that. I coloured up immediately. I rarely blushed. Blushing wasn’t the usual Warlock thing; but then this wasn’t a usual situation.