Hex and Candy

by Ashlyn Kane

  BY the twenty-fifth, Cole hadn’t decided what to do about Samhain. He could observe it by himself, but it wouldn’t feel right. Or he could contact another coven and take part in their festivities. But then he wouldn’t be able to bring Leo—witches understandably felt strongly about being outed to mundanes who had no particular attachment to them—and he didn’t know that that would be any better. He’d probably spend the whole evening moping.

  At least he had work to distract him. Samhain was a celebration for more than just witches, and Danielle kept just as busy in the front of the shop as Cole did in the back, creating the usual Halloween favorites, caramels and vampire lips, gumballs shaped like eyes, and candy corn—good candy corn, fresh and soft and fragrant. Leo kept commenting that Cole smelled like candy floss, which so far had only led to good things for Cole.

  Until now. Waiting for the sugar to boil, he got lost in a reverie thinking about last night, when Leo set about testing whether Cole tasted as good as he smelled (Leo said yes; Cole suspected he was embellishing but appreciated the sentiment). The next thing he knew, the sugar was way too hot for what he wanted. He guessed he was making another batch of caramels. He adjusted the temperature to make sure the sugar didn’t burn and went to grab the cream and butter.

  He was watching the caramel set in the pan—a bit like watching paint dry, except a better experience for the nose—when the bell above the door in the front of the shop jingled. A moment later Danielle popped her head back. “Amy stopped in for a chat. You busy?”

  Cole was not, and was in fact becoming a danger to himself in the kitchen, so he hung his apron on the peg behind the door and decamped to the shopfront. “Candy emergency?” he asked.

  “Ugh.” Amy threw herself onto one of the stools at the counter and looked over at him. “Just finished organizing a last-minute Halloween party for this weekend. Do you have anything with caffeine in it?”

  Cole snorted but grabbed a jar of coffee candies from the shelf behind the register and used the tongs to pick out a few. “Why didn’t you just go to Andre’s?”

  Amy slid him a toonie. “I would have had to cross the street again. I wandered over to peek in the window at the new place on the corner. The things that man is doing to cocoa powder….” She shot him a guilty look as she paused with a coffee candy halfway to her mouth. “No offense.”

  Cole waved it off and put the toonie in the till. “None taken. I don’t do chocolate.”

  “Yes, as I’ve previously lamented.” She popped the candy in her mouth and made a pleased noise. “Now I can have the best of both worlds.”

  What a choice of words. “Wish I could do the same,” Cole said before he could stop himself.

  Amy straightened up and tilted her head. “What’s that mean?” Then her eyes widened. “You’re not having second thoughts about—”

  So Leo had updated her on his relationship status. Cole shook his head. “No, no, I’m…. That’s not it at all. I—” love Leo. Nope, too soon to be telling Amy if he hadn’t said it to Leo, and she’d probably think he was nuts anyway. They’d only known each other a few weeks.

  Amy raised an eyebrow.

  “My grandmother’s being kind of difficult,” he finally said. Even with the protections on the shop—he’d warded against scrying, partly out of habit and partly because Gran was a notorious busybody and Cole enjoyed the illusion of privacy—he avoided saying anything too negative out loud, lest she somehow overhear.

  “Difficult how?”

  Cole let out a long breath. Danielle had gone on break, presumably to give him some privacy, so he might as well tell the truth and get it off his chest. “I don’t, uh. I don’t know if she’s going to approve of me and Leo, and I don’t know what I’ll do if she doesn’t.”

  Amy’s face crumpled in sympathy. “Oh, Cole.”

  “It’s fine!” he told her quickly. “I’m almost thirty years old. I shouldn’t need my family’s approval to do something that makes me happy.”

  “No, but that doesn’t mean not having it doesn’t hurt.” They stared at each other for a moment, untangling the sentence. “Did I say that right? You know what I mean. Families are complicated.”

  “You have no idea.”

  “Have you talked to her about it?”

  Guilt squirmed in Cole’s gut. “Well… sort of.” When she looked skeptical, but apparently was too polite to call his bullshit to his face, he went on, “I tried last Friday, only everything went sort of pear-shaped.”

  “I can imagine,” she said. “What happened?”

  He tried to laugh, but it hurt coming out. “Oh, you know how these things go. You start being real for two seconds and suddenly you can’t stop and the next thing you know you’re running away to your car, holding back tears like any mature adult.”

  “I’m so sorry. That sounds awful.”

  “I mean, it directly led to me making up my mind to finally kiss Leo, so it wasn’t all bad.” Cole didn’t regret standing up for himself, but maybe he could have found a way that didn’t involve storming out on his grandmother and potentially damaging their relationship.

  “Still. You’ve always been close with your grandmother.”

  And he would be again, maybe. If one of them ever apologized.

  “Cole?” Amy prompted.

  He shook his head. “Sorry. I guess I’m not very good company today.”

  “Meh. Everyone has off days.” She smiled sympathetically, then glanced at the clock and heaved a sigh. “I’d better get home or my cat will give me the cold shoulder.”

  “Can’t have that.” Cole followed her gaze, realizing that his own house wouldn’t be empty except for Niamh. Leo would be home by now, expecting him, maybe even with dinner on. Amazing how quickly Cole had gotten used to that, and to throwing Leo’s clothes in with his when he did laundry.

  Amazing how thinking about it immediately made him feel better. “I think I’ll follow you out.”

  “That’s the spirit,” Amy said, with the sort of cleverly camouflaged smirk that said she guessed at the reason for his sudden lighter mood. “I’ll see you later, then. Have a good night!”

  Cheeky, Cole thought. But he let it pass with a wave. “I will.” And he was pretty sure he would.

  LEO got home half an hour later than he’d expected due to an accident on the main highway that he didn’t yet know how to navigate around. One of these days he’d get Cole to teach him how to get around on the back roads, or break down and buy an aftermarket navigation system. But he’d done too many ER rotations to dare trying to program his cell phone GPS while he was behind the wheel.

  When he pulled into the driveway, he noticed a pristine Cadillac he’d never seen before parked at the curb in front of the neighbor’s house—a late-fifties or early-sixties model, in that distinctive midcentury aqua. He was so busy checking it out on the way up to the house that he didn’t notice the woman standing on the doorstep until he nearly ran into her.

  She stood about five and a half feet, though her slight hunch told Leo she’d once been taller. She was built as sturdily as the car, and though wrinkles lined her face and age spots dotted her skin, Leo could tell she’d been beautiful in her youth—was beautiful still. She had her grandson’s eyes, and when she smiled at him, he could see that she still had all of her teeth, and he kind of wanted to make the sign of the cross.

  But he didn’t even know if that worked on vampires, never mind witches, and maybe it was culturally insensitive. Instead he just said, “Uh, hi.”

  What was she doing here? Was this some kind of weird Alpin family thing Leo was just going to have to get used to?

  “You must be Leon,” she said in an even, sure tone. Her piercing gaze seemed to go right through him, as though she were trying to judge the quality of his internal organs. For a second he tried to remember if he’d had anything more nutritious than coffee and a granola bar, in case she decided to pick on his stomach contents.

  “That’s me.” Automatical
ly, he held out his hand. “But everyone calls me Leo.”

  “Hmm,” said Gran, extending her own. “You can call me Irene, for now.”

  They shook. Irene’s hand was warm, a little leathery but strong. “Nice to meet you, Irene.”

  She held on for slightly too long and maintained eye contact until Leo felt uncomfortable. But he didn’t dare look away first.

  “I’m afraid Cole’s not here, though, if you’re looking for him,” he went on. His voice held a definite note of so you can grovel an apology and beg him for mercy for whatever you did to him, even though she scared the bejeezus out of him. Something about her felt familiar, like they’d met before, but no. He’d definitely remember.

  “Actually, I came to speak with you.” She withdrew her hand and broke eye contact, though Leo somehow didn’t feel as if he’d won that contest. “May I come in?”

  Ever since the whole vampire ex-boyfriend thing, Leo was wary of inviting people into homes, but he didn’t see a way to refuse politely, and from what Cole had said, Irene could turn him into a frog on a whim. “Of course.” He unlocked the door and allowed her to step past him into the house. “Would you like something to drink? Tea?”

  It was strange, navigating the waters between you hurt Cole and I’m not going to let you do it again and please like me, it’s important to him. He didn’t like it.

  “That herbal one Cole keeps in the old Twinings tin.” She didn’t take off her shoes, but if ninetysomethings didn’t get a pass from unnecessary bending, Leo didn’t know who did.

  “Sure.” He busied himself with the tea routine. Was this a witch thing, he wondered, or a Cole’s family thing? Maybe in a few weeks he’d be a convert himself. Certainly it had helped the night Jimmy was attacked. Perhaps the British were on to something. “What did you want to talk about?”

  “I’d like you to come to Friday dinner tomorrow.”

  Leo almost dropped the tea tin. Cole had made it pretty clear that Friday dinner was a sacred ritual as far as his grandmother was concerned. “Oh?” he said, hoping to buy time to come up with a response that wasn’t an endless string of question marks.

  Irene made a noise then, a long, deep, pitchless exhale through the nose. Leo poured the hot water and set the teapot on its trivet on the table to steep, then sat across from her and waited.

  Finally she raised her eyes from the teapot. “When Cole was a boy,” she began, but then she faltered and started again. “Cole was never like my other grandchildren.”

  Yeah, Leo knew all about that. “So I’ve been told.”

  Irene shook her head. “He was always more sensitive. More inquisitive. More in tune with his cousins than the rest.”

  Leo blinked off his surprise—not at what she’d said, but that she was the one who said it. “That sounds about right.” He hoped she wasn’t going to ruin the goodwill she’d earned by implying any of that was due to Cole being gay.

  “That’s still true of him today. Even now, of all my grandchildren, Cole is the most centered, the least capricious. He grew from a good boy—don’t get me wrong, he got into plenty of trouble, but never because he was cruel—into a good man.” She pulled the mug Leo had placed on the table toward her and peered into it as though inspecting for dust, but she didn’t reach for the teapot yet. Instead she met Leo’s eyes and said, “And I’ve been afraid of losing him.”

  “Losing him?”

  “I thought, when he was a boy, that he would be the perfect heir if only he could practice magic. I’d half made up my mind to name him anyway. And then when he was a teenager….” She shook her head. “Of course his power is cursebreaking. I don’t know why I ever thought it would be any different.”

  Something didn’t add up, though. If Irene was afraid of losing Cole, what had happened two weeks ago to make him leave her place early? “Is this about why Cole has been avoiding you?”

  “In a way.” Irene put the mug down and rubbed her hands together, massaging the palm of one hand down to the fingers and repeating with the other. “Has he told you much about us? Witches, magic, our beliefs?”

  “Some.” Leo had read the book on hedge magic, and he’d taken in as much as he could about magic, energy, water, life. He knew he’d only scratched the surface. “I know about the Sabbaths and about the lakes. His candies.”

  She nodded. “Has he explained the balance of the universe?”

  Sometimes the universe likes things a certain way. “A little bit,” Leo hedged. “I didn’t really understand.”

  “For witches, it’s very important to keep the universe in balance. The smallest action can have unforeseen consequences. And the universe has been clear with Cole that as much as he might love any of his previous boyfriends—or the idea of them—they weren’t for him.”

  Leo would have gone batshit in half a second. He stared. “Seriously?” Hadn’t Cole said he once got strep throat when he was supposed to break up with someone? “‘The universe,’ though? You guys have kind of high opinions of yourselves. No offense, but that sounds like some New Age bullshit.”

  To his surprise, Irene laughed, a short, sharp bark of sound. “We’re witches, dear. ‘Some New Age bullshit’ covers a lot of sins. Eventually we all learn how to want something badly enough to tell the universe to shove it. It’s a rite of passage. Until then, it’s a good exercise in mindfulness.”

  She sobered again. “I have the Sight, as I’m sure Cole has told you. He’s always craved reassurance that he wouldn’t be alone forever, and I haven’t been able to give it to him. We clairvoyants, we’re not supposed to interfere directly.” Her lips thinned and she looked down at her mug. “But that’s not easy to stick to, or to accept.”

  Leo watched her for a second more. He didn’t know her, but she seemed genuinely upset, distraught at the idea that she’d hurt her relationship with her only grandson. Gently, he retrieved the mug and filled it with tea before setting it back down. “And now you want to make it right.”

  “Well, as I said, sometimes we have to tell the universe to shove it. My reticence on the subject was… shortsighted,” she admitted with a wry twist of her mouth.

  Leo found himself laughing helplessly, knowing her gifts as he did. “Oh God. Cole gets his sense of humor from you.”

  Irene laughed too, easier this time, putting one hand over her mouth. “He does. I’m sorry. Those T-shirts—they are wonderful. Every time I see a good one, I have to buy it for him.”

  “Don’t apologize!” Leo said, scandalized. “I love them!”

  Oh. Oh, his ears were turning red. His whole body was turning red, because it wasn’t just the puns he’d admitted to loving.

  He was trying to think of something else to say when Irene reached across the table and patted his hand. “I can see that, dear. I wouldn’t have invited you for dinner otherwise.”

  Leo gave up trying to decide whether he ought to be embarrassed. If Irene thought he should be, she would let him know. That much he felt sure of. “Well,” he said, still a little awkward. “Just as long as I know where I stand.”

  “As long as you’re standing with my grandson, I think we’ll get along fine.”

  Leo couldn’t help the blush this time either.

  Irene didn’t stick around long after that. She didn’t even finish her tea, just thanked Leo for the hospitality and kissed his cheek as she left. Part of Leo wondered if that was some kind of spell, and he guessed he wouldn’t know until Cole came home. Irene gave a jaunty wave from her aquamarine Cadillac and drove off with a dainty toot of her horn.

  Leo waved too, frankly mystified, and then went back inside. There was still enough tea in the teapot for another mug, so he poured one for himself and sat inhaling the steam, relaxing as the warmth seeped through him.

  Damn. That was some good shit. Leo needed more tea in his life. Maybe it would even taste good? He raised it to his lips and tested it.

  Hmm. Not bad. Not too sweet, a little fruity, a little… leafy. It was still tea. But ju
st like the tea the night after Jimmy had been attacked, this soothed him. And he needed soothing. Meeting Cole’s nutty, overbearing witch of a grandmother on the fly, on his own, had him pretty tense.

  The tea, though. The tea loosened his shoulders and made his legs sprawl. It made his head lean to the side. This shit was magic.

  Oh shit, it was magic. Leo drank magic tea.

  His lips twitched involuntarily, and then a little sound escaped them. Then another one, louder. He giggled for a handful of seconds, then tried to take another sip of tea but only managed to sputter because he was still laughing.

  After a minute or so the giggles passed. He should get up and clean the pot, put the dishes in the dishwasher, start dinner. But what if he just sat at the kitchen table and stared at the ceiling?

  Huh. Now that he was looking, it could use a coat of paint.

  He didn’t know how long he’d been sitting there, but the tea was gone when the front door opened. “Leo?”

  “In the kitchen.” Oops. Hopefully Leo wasn’t in trouble for drinking the special tea.

  Cole walked in a second later, wearing the Fruitier Than a Nutcake shirt and smelling like fresh caramel. Yum. “Hey, have you—youuuuu have had visitors.”

  Maybe he was in trouble for letting Irene in the house instead. “Your grandmother is either not as scary as you think she is,” Leo said, then paused for several seconds while he considered. “Or else she’s way scarier than you think she is.”

  “The latter,” Cole said, sliding into the seat Irene had vacated a few moments before. “What did she want? Other than to get you stoned on my special blend.”

  “She invited me to dinner tomorrow.” Leo heard his voice as though someone else were speaking. He sounded dreamy. But—wait. He looked up sharply. “I didn’t start drinking it until she left! How was I supposed to know your gran partakes in… special blend!”

  “It’s good for her hypertension,” Cole said, defensive. Then: “She really invited you for dinner?”

  Leo nodded, then realized when the room spun that he needed to stop nodding. “She misses you, she was wrong to be a dickweed, she is sorry not sorry for buying you all those punny T-shirts, and she hopes we’ll give her a lot of fat great-grandbabies.” He lolled his head to the side and then raised it to look at Cole. “I’m paraphrasing.”