This last dig left Lucy wanting to scream, but she made herself speak calmly. “You know beer isn’t allowed. They’ll shut you up in one of the buses if you get caught." Lucy realized her remarks were ill considered as soon as the words were out of her mouth. She took another step back from him, wishing she had a spell that could stop Nate talking and change his false half-smile to a real one.
“Hey, girl,” Nate said nastily. “I’m talking to you.”
“Lucky me,” she shot back at him, remembering with chagrin that she had thought she would be lucky to have him to herself.
“Don’t be an uber-priss with me, Lucy,” he warned her, his face turning tight and mean. “I did you a favor, asking you to Ditch Day. You owe me. You have to be nice to me. Don’t forget that." He came up to her, standing so close that she could feel his breath on her face.
Doing her best not to wince, Lucy strove to keep from lashing out at him, for she suspected that was what he was hoping she would do. “I think we ought to go back and join the others.”
“Why? You got something better to do with those losers? You’re with me, aren’t you?" Nate asked as he took hold of her shoulder.
“Let go of me!" Lucy yelled as she looked about for somewhere safe to run. Out of the corner of her eye she caught sight of a clump of poison oak; she knew she was immune to it, but she hoped Nate wasn’t.
Suddenly Nate bent and kissed her roughly. “If you didn’t bring beer, we can do something else,” he muttered as he attempted to engulf her in his arms. “You won’t be a total waste.”
With a sudden welling of energy, Lucy did what her Grandmother Doris had taught her—she pulled her arms together in front of her, and in single thrust shoved them up between her and Nate, and spread them open as her fingers touched his jaw. His hold was broken, and Lucy took advantage of this to run into the poison oak. She could feel herself start to cry, not from fear but from anger. As she climbed into the tangle of branches, she shouted at him. “You dazer! You ruined EVERYTHING!" She could hear him running after her, so she moved deeper into the thicket, twigs tearing at her cut-offs and scoring her legs and arms. Her anger brought tears to her eyes.
“You’re the one ruining things,” Nate countered, his face darkening with frustration and fury. “Come out of there." He reached for her and snatched her magenta scarf and gathered it in as a trophy.
“Give it back,” Lucy snapped.
“When you come out,” he teased, pulling the length of silk through his hand.
“Well, I won’t, not while you’re here." Lucy wiped a tear off her cheek with stiff fingers. “Then you might as well leave me alone and find something better to do.”
Nate hesitated as he reached the poison oak, but his mettle was stung, so he started to pursue her, swearing with every move he made. “You’re gonna be so sorry you messed with me!”
“Go away!” she told him, and heard her voice tremble. In all her imaginings, the day she had envisioned this to be had never been the way it was turning out, spell or no spell.
“I can wait,” said Nate. “You can’t stay in there all day.”
“This is poison oak,” she reminded him, taking hold of the nearest spray of red-tinged green leaves.
“Yeah. You’re gonna itch everywhere." He began to back out of the thicket, for the first time looking concerned.
“No, you are!" Lucy was trying to think of something much more blighting to say that would drive him off when there was the strangled yelp of a bicycle horn behind him on the trail.
Nate turned in time to see three of his classmates coming along the track at a good clip.
“What’s the matter, Nate?” called the rider in the lead, a science nerd called Steve Hope. “Lose something?”
Nate hesitated, then turned away. “Nothing important,” he said, and backed out of the poison oak. “I think I’ll head back. Lunch will be ready in a little while. I’m kinda hungry." Saying that, he sauntered over to the trail, golden and confident once more, and started back the way he had come.
20
Lucy waited for several minutes in the shelter of the poison oak. She wanted to get out of the thicket, to return to the trail and head back to the trailhead and the safety of the picnic grove, but she worried that Nate might be waiting for her, prepared to waylay her and punish her in some awful way. She could feel the sun on her, getting hot. How could I have been so stupid? As she thought about it, she felt queasy, trying to face what might have happened. She forced her attention onto her current predicament. She needed to get back to the ranch house. She couldn’t stay here all day. The dinner bell would be ringing shortly, and she had to admit she was hungry, in spite of being queasy, but she couldn’t bring herself to move.
A while later she heard the distant clang of the dinner bell summoning the sophomores to lunch. While she waited her anger had faded and was now a mix of resentment and dread. She knew if she didn’t go down to eat, one of the chaperones would notice, and there would be a search for her. And that would be more embarrassing than she could endure. It was bad enough that she was scratched and had the beginnings of a sunburn, and the whole potential for questions and whispers. With these thoughts for company, she emerged from the poison oak and headed cautiously back to the trail, moving along it as slowly as she dared.
After half a mile, Lucy saw a couple of classmates making their way back toward the grove where lunch was being cooked: one was in her Environmental Science class, a wiry boy name Randy Chao; Lucy couldn’t remember his companion’s name. “You hungry?" Lucy asked, wanting to have some normal conversation. Ordinarily the odor of grilling meats wafting up from the stone hearth would have started her mouth watering, but now it only served to make her faintly queasy. She exchanged waves with the two ahead of her on the trail, and she walked a little faster to catch up with them.
“I am hungry,” Randy announced.
“So’m I,” said his companion.
“You okay?" Randy asked as he took a closer look at Lucy.
“I ... got into some poison oak,” Lucy admitted, and remembered Randy’s friend’s name: C. J. Foy. They’d been in English together the year before.
“Better ask at the ranch house if you can take a shower,” C. J. recommended, and took a step farther away from her. “You’ve probably got it all over you, including your clothes.”
“Probably,” she agreed, and continued along with them toward the promise of lunch and the safety of the assembled sophomore class.
* * *
Matt Bergeron took Lucy up to the ranch house when she told him she had been in poison oak. “You can shower—in fact you better. Give Missus Clement your clothes. She’ll bag ‘em for you and provide a set of sweats—nothing fancy, but enough to let you go about. You can send ‘em back to us when you get home." He shook his head. “Too bad you didn’t see what the bush was until you went through it." His expression said he wasn’t sure how Lucy had managed to do that. “It’s one of the reasons we want you kids to keep to the trails, where it’s clear.”
“I know,” said Lucy.
“I’ll make sure there’s some lunch for you,” Bergeron told her, his voice more sympathetic now. “Come on. We’ll get you taken care of.”
Showers at the ranch house were in the basement, and were reached by a door that opened onto the badminton courts. Lucy undressed in a curtained alcove, suddenly feeling wary and scared. To her chagrin, she began to tremble. For a couple of minutes she was afraid she might burst into tears. She showered quickly, washed herself thoroughly, wanting to get more than dust and poison oak off her; the water was stinging her scrapes and scratches. The soap and shampoo provided had a slightly linimenty smell, which Lucy welcomed. By the time she was clean, she could hear someone moving about near the alcove where she had undressed. She went cold.
“It’s Missus Clement,” called out a kindly voice. “I’ve got your clothes in a plastic bag, so you won’t get poison oak on you again. And I’m putting the sweats out on
the bench for you. If you get out of the shower now, I’ll make sure no one comes in in the next five minutes.”
“Sounds like you’ve done this before,” said Lucy. “Thanks.”
“We’ve had more than one guest end up in the poison oak,” said Missus Clement.
“I bet,” Lucy said with a shaky laugh; she turned the water up and rinsed off, grabbed a towel and hurried back to the alcove where she changed into the simple grey pants and white tank top that had been left for her. After a cursory running of a comb through her hair, she shoved the plastic sack into her magenta tote, and reached for her comb again to restore order to her hair.
* * *
“Anything wrong?” Kristen asked as she came over to sit next to Lucy who was just arriving for lunch, and had chosen a part of the picnic table that was almost empty.
“Poison oak,” said Lucy.
“Yuck,” said Kristen. She looked around. “I wondered what had happened.”
“Why? What do you mean?” Lucy asked, dreading the answer.
“I wondered because Nate showed up here half an hour ago. He said he didn’t know where you were, but he had your scarf in his back pocket. He’s gone off with Tim to get bikes.”
Lucy stifled the sharp retort that she wanted to use, and said only, “Thank goodness.”
Kiristen’s eyes widened. “Something happened, didn’t it?”
Lucy waved her question away as one of the cooks came up to her with a platter. “Chicken. Beef. Pork. Salmon. You can have any or all of them. There’s cornbread and a salad, as well. And if you have room for it, fresh-churned ice cream and hot fudge.”
Lucy gulped to keep from retching, and reluctantly helped herself, choosing chicken and salmon, sliding them from the platter onto the plastic plate the ranch provided. “Thanks,” she said listlessly, realizing that what she really wanted was a nap. “I don’t think I’ll have any ice cream.”
Kristen took some of the pork and some chicken, and went to get the salad bowl. She set it down between them and handed the tongs to Lucy. “It’s a pretty standard salad: oil-and-vinegar dressing. Not bad. You want cornbread? It’s New Orleans style, with syrup.”
“No, thanks,” said Lucy.
“Okay." Kristen sat down again and waited until Lucy had served herself to take some. She used her fork to indicate the table nearest the hearth where the chaperones were sitting. “Mister Ott is on patrol. The rest are taking their time, now that most of the kids have done.”
“Mister Ott’s probably off taking pictures of bugs,” said Lucy, recalling his lecture on the importance of insects at the last school assembly. She didn’t want to tell Kristen about her bad time with Nate—it was still too fresh in her mind.
Kristen snorted a laugh. “Probably.”
Their conversation lagged, and they filled the silence with eating, Lucy picking at her food, Kristen eating enthusiastically. By the time they finished their meal, only two of the chaperones and a couple of cook’s assistants remained at the picnic tables.
“I guess I’ll see you on the bus later,” said Lucy.
“You okay?" Kristen asked, a line of worry forming between her brows. “You look like you went through the brambles.”
“Just tired, and the poison oak thing." Lucy managed a ghost of a smile.
Kristen’s worried expression didn’t change. “Okay. I’ll see you on the bus. Okay?”
Lucy waved, but remained at the table for another half hour, working up the courage to try to find something to do on her own that wouldn’t expose her to any more attention than she already had. She wanted a good reason to be alone. Finally she took her tote and wandered off toward the ranch house, where Missus Clement recommended that she try fishing.
“There’s a hole at James Creek, just beyond the little log-jamb." She offered her a sympathetic smile. “No poison oak there.”
“Thanks." Lucy took a pole and spent the next two hours sitting on a shaded rock at the western end of the lake; she was content to be alone, working out her feelings and planning her revenge.
* * *
At five o’clock the bray of a klaxon summoned the sophomores back to their buses; for the next twenty minutes sophomore straggled in, gave their names to Ms. Baxter, and got into the buses.
Lucy turned in her rod, checked in with Ms. Baxter, and climbed aboard the third bus and took the same seat as she had occupied that morning. After she shoved her tote under the seat, she slumped against the window and paid little attention to the other students around her while she reviewed her Ditch Day and her decision about it: she was sorry now that she hadn’t taken something from Nate that she could use for a sending — she would have to improvise. There were yearbook pictures she could use if she had to, or maybe something from the school website — there were lots of photos of sports’ teams. Tomorrow night, she promised herself, she would get even with Nathaniel McLaughlan Evers as soon as she found the instructions in A Witch’s Hornbook.
“Do you mind if I join you?”
Startled, Lucy looked up and saw Niki Martinu standing in the aisle. After a moment of hesitation, Lucy patted the empty seat. “Sure. Sit down." What happened to Kristen?
Niki had the beginning of a sunburn, and for once she was dressed not in Gothic black but in army fatigues — Lucy thought this must be why she hadn’t realized she was attending Ditch Day—and wore almost no makeup, which made her look younger and less world-weary. “Thanks." She shoved her tote under the seat and made herself as comfortable as the benches would allow. As if reading Lucy’s thoughts, she added, “Kristen’s in the rear with the Chorale. She said you needed some rest.”
Ms. Baxter stuck her head in the door to tell the driver he could leave. “See you back at Cosmo Bender.”
The bus grumbled into life, the doors closed and the long drive through the lengthening shadows began, taking them back to Palo Alto Hills. For the first half hour, Lucy kept silent, staring out the window as if seeing far away; Niki waited until they were rolling onto Highway 1 to speak.
“Any trouble with Nate?”
Lucy shook her head.
Niki paid no attention. “Because he’s been boasting that he had to run into the poison oak to get away from you." She didn’t give Lucy chance to speak, hurrying on to add, “He’s saying you were all over him. He said Catherine would know how to deal with you.”
Lucy sat up, her jaw tightening. “That’s not true. He came after me,” She could feel color mount in her face. Again she wondered how she could have been so stupid.
“I know he’s not telling the truth. He said the same thing about me after we attended the Winter Wonderland Fair. Catherine was out of town." Niki sighed. “He does this. He invites girls that aren’t all that popular, and then says they were so poppers about him that they couldn’t keep off him."
“So that’s what you were talking about in the cafeteria,” Lucy said, recalling the oblique warning Niki had given her. “I didn’t realize ... ”
“I know. No reason you should. It’s a game with him." Niki took a deep breath, then rushed ahead. “He did something like that to Emily Oldani last summer, and to Stephanie Taylor at the Easter break.”
“I remember some gossip from then,” Lucy admitted. To her chagrin, she had believed the rumors because she could understand wanting to attract his attention when she had the chance.
“Nate likes gossip about his prowess”—she made air-quotes—“with girls. He says they can’t resist him.”
“And Catherine doesn’t mind?" Lucy marveled, a hint of disgust in her tone. “That doesn’t sound like her.”
“She doesn’t mind, not the way you mean. She thinks it’s funny—at least, that’s what she said when she ordered me to leave him alone,” said Niki.
“Why didn’t you tell me this before?" Lucy demanded, keeping her voice low.
“I didn’t know if he’d try anything with you. You’re smart and you know the uber-popular girls. I thought he might leave you alone. No re
ason to scare you, or take the fun out of Ditch Day for no reason." Niki shrugged. “Guess that wasn’t the best idea.”
“Maybe not,” said Lucy. She reviewed her plans for a sending and changed her mind about what it would do. If Nate had done this before, he had more girls to answer to than her. She glanced at Niki. “Thanks.”
Niki looked puzzled. “Why?”
Lucy’s eyes glittered. “You’ll see.”
21
Saturday morning Lucy got up early and went out to buy candles, ribbon, modeling clay, laundry markers, and more salt. She was glad that the rest of the family wasn’t up yet, since she’d been avoiding questions about Ditch Day since Melinda picked her up at six-thirty the night before; she wanted time to herself, and so hurried out before Jason and Jacob could waylay her and pelter her with questions.
She did her shopping as quickly as possible, feeling strangely vulnerable by herself. As she hurried home, she figured out when it would be best to perform the sending, and decided upon midnight. She had been working on her sending for most of the previous evening, continuing into the night, and she thought she had come up with wording that wouldn’t backfire on her as the first spell she had tried had done. She planned to review it a couple more times before she actually tried anything.
She had surprised herself last night by calling Isadora and making an extra appointment—she wouldn’t call it an emergency one—for Monday afternoon. She had two finals on Monday, and she had used that as her excuse for asking to see the psychologist. As she turned the corner onto her street, she tried to make up her mind if she was going to tell Isadora about the sending. She finally concluded that covering the catastrophe of Ditch Day would take the whole hour. Opening the back door, she called out “I’m home,” and was greeted by silence. For the better part of a minute, Lucy felt disconcerted, but then told herself to calm down. There was a rational explanation to the house being empty.
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