Spellcrossed

by Barbara Ashford

  “But I’m not sure they’re going to make it. Or if I helped them.”

  “You opened the door, Maggie. Like I do when I call the Mackenzies. You can’t push them through it, any more than you can push your father.”

  “That’s not what you wrote in your journal the summer he was here: ‘If anyone can save Jack Sinclair from himself, his daughter can.’”

  “You can’t save someone who doesn’t want to be saved.”

  “I suppose that’s the lesson I had to learn this summer.”

  Rowan put his arm around my waist. “The summer’s not over yet.”

  CHAPTER 44

  YOU’LL NEVER BE ALONE

  JACK APPARENTLY WANDERED UP TO THE HOUSE after the rest of us left the theatre. He was gone by the time I returned, but Janet said that they had spent the afternoon sitting in the sunroom.

  “Just…sitting?”

  “He talked about the early days of his marriage. And when you were a little girl.”

  “Did it ever occur to him to share those memories with me?”

  “Maybe he needed a dress rehearsal.”

  “Don’t remind me of dress rehearsals.”

  “One thing I do know: he didn’t want to be alone. Every time I got up to do something, he trailed after me like a lost puppy.”

  “You must have loved that.”

  “Actually, it was rather sweet.” At my disbelieving look, she added, “Don’t worry. I’m immune to Jack Sinclair’s charm. But he’s adrift right now. And a little lonely.”

  If so, he was back on track by the Saturday matinee when he swore up and down he was ready to go on that night. I just nodded and made sure Bernie was on stand by. As soon as Jack headed down to the dressing room, I slipped upstairs to Rowan’s apartment.

  “How is he?” I asked.

  “He seems fine.”

  “He seemed fine before he bolted.”

  “He won’t bolt this time. He has something to prove—to himself, to Alison, and to you.”

  “That’s what it took? Mom daring him to screw up?”

  Rowan shrugged. “Stranger things have happened. Especially in this theatre.”

  When Jack reported to the green room for warm-ups, he seemed as calm as Rowan had claimed. And when Reinhard called places, he gave me a brisk nod.

  I did the same as I slid into my seat next to Mom. She shrugged, but her hands relaxed their death grip on her purse.

  The house lights began to dim. The murmur of conversation hushed. A program rustled. A seat squeaked. Someone coughed. I took a deep breath.

  The lights came up on the stage, and there was a smattering of applause at the storybook tableau. Then Jack walked onstage.

  I heard Mom catch her breath. Maybe it was the gray suit. Or the haircut he’d gotten in town that morning. He looked exactly like the nice, steady corporate type he had disdained—or the well-dressed English teacher he might have remained if luck or fate or faeries hadn’t changed his life.

  He strolled to his position. His gaze swept the darkened house. Then it returned to the center section where we were sitting. Maybe I only imagined that it lingered on Mom, but his smile was strangely wistful.

  “Once upon a time…”

  The orchestra launched into the opening number, the jaunty staccato beat of strings and piano driving the vocals of the cast and Jack’s narration. As the characters made their wishes, two of mine came true: my father was performing again and my mother was witnessing it.

  She chuckled at Cinderella’s diffident description of the ball, laughed at the self-centered “agony” of the princes, but when the Witch implored Rapunzel to give up her wish to see the world, she became very still.

  I knew “Stay with Me” would remind her of the years we had been estranged from each other, the eagerness with which I abandoned my childhood home for college. Each new job, each new role had been an adventure. I never thought about my mother returning to that empty house at the end of the day. When I thought of her at all, it was with a mingled sense of guilt and duty. She’d kept her fears and her doubts to herself and let me go my own way. I wasn’t sure I could be as strong if I ever had a child.

  Jack’s performance surprised me. He brought a sly humor to the role I had never seen in rehearsal, as if he and the audience were sharing an inside joke. It was utterly different from Bernie’s folksiness and made the Narrator’s death even scarier.

  When Bernie played the role, I always felt disbelief when that moment arrived. How could anyone throw this nice old man to the giant? It was like murdering Mister Rogers. Or Santa Claus.

  This time, I shared all the Narrator’s emotions: nervousness escalating to desperation; the momentary relief when his tormentors backed off; and then the terror of being dragged across the stage and shoved into the wings where the giant awaited her sacrifice. I felt oddly betrayed because Jack had promised the happy ending we got in Act One. If the joke could turn so viciously on him, no one was safe.

  I shifted uneasily in my seat and heard others doing the same. It was as if the entire audience feared that something might emerge from the darkness to snatch us from our uncomfortable seats and our comfortable lives and drag us into the unknown.

  Was that Rowan’s magic or Jack’s performance or some strange amalgam of the two?

  The few light moments in Act Two shone brighter for that, but there was a nervous undercurrent to the laughter, as if the audience was still searching the shadows for danger. I floated in and out of the show, adrift in the shadows of memory:

  My mother’s pain throbbing through me as the Witch lamented Rapunzel’s death, the muted sadness of watching me drift away all those years ago made sharper by the fear that she might lose me again to the siren call of my father’s charm.

  The sour taste of bile filling my mouth as the characters hurled accusations at each other, their bitter voices replaced by Rowan’s and mine the night he revealed the truth about himself and about my father.

  Shock turning my body rigid when the Mysterious Man appeared, no longer Rowan in his tattered costume but that terrified Rip Van Winkle who had tottered out of the theatre and back into my life.

  No more visions.

  Rowan’s face, the unfeeling mask of Faerie. His voice, filled with familiar gentleness. As if the Mysterious Man’s resurrection had rendered him both more otherworldly and more human.

  Faery-green eyes weeping honey-sweet tears.

  Rowan’s face becoming my father’s, filled with the excitement of exchanging the ties that bind for the thrill of the unknown. Brian’s filled with my mother’s weariness as she confessed that all the pain and anger and love had been reduced to ashes.

  Once upon a time…

  My father spinning tales about fantastic worlds. My mother cautiously explaining why Daddy had to leave. While I listened and watched, looking to them to learn what to be, what to feel, where to turn.

  Careful what you say.

  My eight-year-old self, staring at the newspaper clippings of Daddy’s shows, wishing he would come back. My thirty-four-year-old self, staring at Jack’s name in the program, wishing he would stay.

  Careful what you wish for.

  And hidden in the shadowy wings, the one who had cast the spell that brought father and daughter to the Crossroads; cast another to erase a man’s memories of the magic that had touched him one Midsummer night; watched the unexpected consequences wrought by time and fate and human nature; and returned to restore order, only to discover that some spells are beyond Fae magic to repair.

  Oh, careful what spells you cast, my love. For even you with all your power cannot always tell where they will lead. And then it is left to us to untangle them. Stumbling along the path, guided only by the magic we humans possess: determination, instinct, love.

  Into the woods and out of the woods. And maybe—if we’re very lucky—we earn our happy ever after.

  The finale brought me back to the show. The audience clapped along with the music, as relieved
and happy as if they had survived a dangerous journey. But after the red velvet curtains closed, my mother remained in her seat, staring at the stage.

  I touched her arm lightly, and she started as if awakening from a dream.

  “It was like the night I saw Carousel. When it seemed like you were singing to me. Only this time, I saw my whole life flash before me. The handsome prince who is charming, but insincere. The witch whose daughter keeps pulling away. The crazy man darting in and out, in and out…”

  Clearly, whatever magic Rowan had worked had affected her, too.

  Impulsively, I blurted out, “You know you won’t lose me. No matter what happens with Jack.”

  Her eyes widened. “How did you…? All right, now you’re scaring me.”

  “I’m sorry. I just…that’s what came to me. When I was watching tonight.”

  “Yes. Well. Let’s just say I was grateful when Cinderella began singing ‘No One is Alone.’”

  “You’re not alone,” Chris said.

  “I know,” she replied, her voice as quiet as his. “And I know I’ll never lose you, Maggie. I’m far too adept at hunting you down wherever you might go.” Her nod was as brisk as Jack’s before the show. “We’d better move along. Jack will expect to see us at the stage door.”

  Chris frowned, but followed us into the lobby. It took awhile to make our way through the crowd; people kept stopping to congratulate me. Their faces held a mixture of pleasure and uncertainty, as if they, too, were still feeling the effects of the show.

  Friends and family members of the actors gathered in small clusters near the stage door. Jack hovered in the doorway, scanning their faces. Then he spied us and began edging forward, his head turning this way and that to acknowledge the congratulations.

  His steps faltered as he approached us, his smile a little nervous.

  “So. What did you think?”

  “It’s funny,” Mom said. “I thought it would be a straightforward role. But you really held the whole show together, didn’t you? And the moment they threw you to the giant…that was terrifying.”

  Jack’s expression clouded. “Yeah. It was.”

  I wondered again how much Rowan had done to create the power of that moment. But Jack was watching me, clearly awaiting my reaction.

  “It was a great performance. You took the role—and the show—to a whole new level.”

  “Thank you. That really…it means a lot.” He shot a quick glance at Mom. “I guess you’ll be leaving in the morning.”

  “Yes. So I’ll say good-bye now.”

  She thrust out her hand. He clasped it gingerly. It was the first time they had touched and it lasted only a few seconds before both backed away. But they continued staring at each other, as if they recognized that this would be the last time they would ever meet.

  “Maggie says you plan to leave after the season’s over.”

  “Well…probably.”

  Mom blew out her breath impatiently. “What are you going to do with yourself, Jack? You’re not a kid anymore. You can’t just wander.”

  “I know, Allie. Maybe this time, I’ll figure out where I belong.”

  “Still searching for enlightenment?” Her voice held resignation rather than the bitterness I remembered from my youth.

  “Still searching, anyway.”

  “Well, someday I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

  “You, too.” He stepped closer. “Is he good to you?” he asked, ignoring the fact that Chris was standing a few feet away, glowering at him.

  “He’s very good to me. And very good for me.”

  Resentment tightened my father’s features. Then it was gone, replaced by that same wistful half-smile I’d seen at the top of the show.

  “I’m glad,” he said, almost to himself. “You did a good job with our girl. I knew you would. But…well…”

  “She’s temperamental,” my mother noted. “Like you.”

  “But she’s got her feet on the ground. That she gets from you.”

  Did they see only the strangers they had become as they gazed at each other? Or the parade of their younger selves? The college students caught up in the first throes of romance. The young couple trying to keep that romance alive as he flitted from gig to gig. The happy parents, united in the love of their child. The older ones, torn apart by bitter quarreling and an obsession neither could understand.

  For a moment, I thought they might embrace. Then Mom nodded and turned away. Chris tucked her hand into the crook of his elbow. My father watched them until they were lost in the crowd. Then he gave me a shaky smile and walked slowly back to the theatre.

  People ebbed and flowed around me, their noisy chatter punctuated by occasional bursts of laughter. I felt removed from all the excitement and suddenly, very alone.

  And then I felt them all around me. Reinhard’s power, as steady as the throb of a heartbeat. Janet’s as bracing as cold water on a hot day. Alex’s warmth. Lee’s protectiveness. Mei-Yin’s determination. The quiet strength that was Catherine. The brighter flash of concern that was Javier. And for the first time—very faint—a bubbly upwelling of sympathy and love that could only be Hal.

  And the center of all those separate powers and the source of most of them—Rowan.

  I felt him slipping past the clusters of people behind me, making his slow, steady way toward me. His hands came down on my shoulders. His love rippled through me.

  I leaned against him and closed my eyes.

  No one is alone.

  CHAPTER 45

  TIME HEALS EVERYTHING

  MOM’S DEPARTURE WITH CHRIS seemed to cue a mass exodus from Dale. The professionals bolted after the matinee to audition for their next gigs. The Bough emptied as the Mackenzies embarked on day trips. The local actors and staff resumed their everyday lives.

  It was the natural order of a summer stock season, but my sense of loss was greater this year, knowing that my father would soon leave my life—and my world—forever. I’d hoped we could spend some of that time getting to know each other, but he left the apartment early every morning to walk in the woods and only returned as the light was waning.

  “He’ll come around,” Rowan assured me. “In his own time.”

  But there was little time left.

  Instead of using mine to research grants, I moped around the theatre. Alex, too, was moping, and I was certain it was because Debra had left for New York. When I found him drifting aimlessly around the garden Tuesday morning, I dragged him to the apartment for lunch.

  “Look at us,” I said. “We spend half the summer complaining about how overworked we are and we can’t even enjoy our freedom.”

  “You need to start thinking ahead,” Rowan said.

  “We are,” Alex replied gloomily.

  “Thinking about the theatre, I mean.”

  I inscribed another figure eight in my gazpacho. “Debra had this idea for a murder mystery series at the Bates mansion.”

  Alex poked at his salad. “She mentioned that to me, too.”

  “It’s not exactly part of our mission, but it might be fun. And it would bring in money. Do you think Janet would go for it?”

  Alex shrugged. “She’s always complaining that she’s bored during the off-season.”

  He sighed. I sighed.

  Rowan said, “What about that reading series you were telling me about? The one to showcase new works by Vermont playwrights.”

  “That’s not until the spring. The scripts have just started coming in. But there’s always the Christmas show.”

  “You’re doing a Christmas show?”

  “Do you even look at the program?” I complained. “There’s been a notice in every one! We’re doing A Christmas Carol. Long loves the story. Ghosts. Redemption. New beginnings.”

  The perfect summation of this season at the Crossroads.

  “He loves all the children’s roles even more: Cratchits and carolers and street urchins. He’s sure we’ll make a fortune. But so far,
Alex and I haven’t found a version we like.”

  Alex’s fork clattered onto his plate. “My God. I’m so stupid. There’s our version!”

  “You guys wrote a musical adaptation of A Christmas Carol?”

  Rowan nodded. “The first show we ever wrote together.”

  “Mostly as a lark,” Alex said. “We started talking and the next thing you know, Rowan presented me with a draft.”

  “Why didn’t you suggest it from the start?” I demanded.

  “It felt wrong to do it without Rowan,” Alex replied. “And once the season got underway, I was too busy to even think about Christmas.”

  “We’d probably want to make some changes,” Rowan said. “We’ve both learned a lot about putting a musical together since then.”

  “The plot’s not going to change,” Alex replied. “And most of the songs are done. The orchestrations will take a couple of weeks, but—”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” I exclaimed. “You’re starting school soon. When will you have time to—?”

  “I’ll make time! Besides, Rowan and I work fast.”

  “We wrote The Sea-Wife in six months,” Rowan added, catching Alex’s enthusiasm. “This is just polishing.”

  “If we put our minds to it, we could have the whole thing ready by mid-October.”

  “And begin rehearsals in early November,” Rowan said.

  They turned to me, a freckled face and a pale one, both alight with excitement.

  “I’ll need the completed script before the September board meeting,” I warned them.

  “But we’re a known commodity!” Alex protested.

  “A winning commodity,” Rowan added.

  “I still need to let them read it. If they want to.”

  Rowan shoved back his chair. “I must have a copy somewhere.”

  “I still have mine,” Alex said, following Rowan into the office. “If you can’t find yours, I’ll dig it out this afternoon and—”

  “Here it is!” Rowan crowed. “On the shelf with our other shows.”