A Witch In Winter

by Ruth Warburton

  After we all finished speaking there was a deep silence, broken only by the moan of the wind outside the window and the shift and crack of the logs in the grate. We loosed our sticky hands, and June bent and picked up the book.

  ‘Well, that’s that,’ she said, and shut it with a clap. Something shaped like a leaf fluttered out and we all bent down simultaneously to pick it up.

  It wasn’t a leaf. It was a hand – the skin of the palm and fingers, dried and pressed flat between the pages of the book like a cruel, misshapen flower.

  ‘Oh yuck, yuck!’ shrieked June and kicked it violently towards the fire in a sickened panic. She caught a log with the toe of her boot and the whole mass shifted and crashed into the centre of the grate with a shower of sparks that flew out into the room. We beat them out with our hands and feet – and when the flames subsided the thing, whatever it was, had gone.

  There was silence for a second then Prue vomited loudly into the coal scuttle, and the lights came on with a shocking suddenness.

  I felt very glad not to be sleeping alone that night. The house creaked and groaned as if there was a strong wind outside, though the night was still. I listened to the slow rhythm of Prue’s snores and tried not to hear the shrieks from the wood, or the rattling scratch of the things that stalked the attic.

  Instead I lay in the darkness and tried to think of ‘lovely things’, just as Dad had told me when I was small and had a nightmare. I thought of Dad, Suzie, Lauren. I thought of seeing all my friends, having them to visit. Summer in the big garden … swimming in the sea …

  My breathing slowed. I was almost asleep when my ear caught another sound, something fluttering against the window pane. The noise was stealthy, soft, persistent. I shut my eyes tighter and pulled the sheets to my chin, pushing away the vision of a dry, dead hand, pressed paper-thin, scrabbling against the window, trying to get in.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  On Monday morning I ran into Liz and Prue in the car park at school. They both looked a bit shamefaced. Prue was blushing.

  ‘Sorry about being sick, Anna. I totally meant to clean it up but…’

  ‘It’s fine, honestly. I wasn’t in such a bad shape as the rest of you, I think. Anyway I can’t imagine mucking out the stable with a hangover was much more fun.’

  ‘It wasn’t,’ Prue grimaced. ‘Well, soz and all that. Oh – and surprise surprise, we saw Philip Granger on the way back from the stables and he ignored June as per usual. No short cuts in love, I guess. Oh look, there she is. Hi, June!’

  June was sprinting across the car park. Her face was scarlet with exertion and she was wearing a very odd expression; a mixture of alarm and gleeful excitement.

  ‘Hey girls,’ she gasped. ‘Anna – I came to warn you, get your flak jacket on.’

  ‘What?’ I said, puzzled.

  June’s chest was still heaving, but she managed, ‘According to the grapevine—’

  She broke off, her eyes fixed on something over my shoulder.

  ‘Too late.’

  Caroline was marching across the car park towards us. Her face was so bitter that I looked behind me involuntarily to see if someone else could be the object of her fury, but there was no one there. There was however a large crowd in front and more people were gathering every second. There was an electric buzz in the air.

  When she reached us Caroline stopped. Her blue eyes were ice cold, and she leaned very close to me so that I could feel flecks of spit as she hissed into my face.

  ‘Listen, you boyfriend-stealing bitch, I bet you’re pleased with yourself at the moment, but I’m going to make sure that you don’t have a single friend left in Winter by the end of today. Oh—’ she paused in mock confusion and put a finger to her lips, ‘I forgot. You didn’t have any worth having to begin with. If you think some ugly skank can just swan down from London and start stealing the boyfriends of people who’ve lived here all their lives, you’ve got another think coming. We’d been going out for over a year, for God’s sake.’

  I saw with astonishment that there were tears in her eyes. One of her friends stepped forwards and said timidly, ‘Caroline, just leave it.’

  ‘Shut up!’ Caroline shouted. Then she turned back to me. ‘You are going to regret this for the rest of your life, bitch. In the meantime, here’s something to be going on with.’

  She drew her hand back and slapped me hard in the face.

  It hurt. A lot. I staggered with the force of the blow, my ears hummed and I saw stars – just like in the movies. As the dizziness subsided I could feel my face begin to flame with a stinging pain. Then she spat at my feet and turned to stalk away.

  ‘Stop it, Caroline!’ someone shouted, and I looked to see Seth striding across the quad. His face was livid and for the first time I could see where some of his reputation came from – I’d had trouble believing the gossip June had passed on, but now, seeing his face dark with fury, the muscles in his shoulders taut and hard, I could imagine him hitting someone. Maybe even hitting them hard enough to cause considerable damage.

  ‘Stop it.’ His voice was quiet, but deadly angry. ‘I told you, it’s not her fault.’

  ‘Of course it’s her fault,’ Caroline spat. ‘We were completely happy until she turned up. She’s a total witch and I hate her.’ She tried again to leave and Seth gripped her shoulder so hard I felt sympathetic, even in spite of the burning pain in my cheek.

  ‘For God’s sake,’ Seth hissed through his teeth, ‘just shut up, you’re only embarrassing yourself. I suggest you apologize now for hitting her or you’re going to be the one regretting this.’

  ‘Get off me, Seth, you’re hurting me!’ She winced away from his grip on her shoulder and he released his hand, but shook his head.

  ‘You hurt Anna first.’

  ‘Good.’

  She pushed past him without another word and was gone.

  Seth turned to me and took my face tenderly in both his hands, turning my flaming cheek to the light.

  ‘Oh, Anna, I’m so sorry.’ He touched the swelling bruise gently. I winced, and his face reflected my pain like a mirror. ‘I should have warned you. I knew she was on the war-path but I never guessed she’d stoop to this … Oh Christ.’ He touched my lip. ‘It’s bleeding.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ I said thickly. It was hard to speak and the side of my mouth felt swollen. Seth looked strange – there were dark circles under his eyes as if he hadn’t slept, and his clothes were even scruffier and more dishevelled than usual. ‘Are you OK?’ I asked, through the blood, but he ignored my question.

  ‘We’d better get you to the nurse’s office.’

  He put an arm around my shoulder, leading me across the car park, through the throng of whispering, gawping spectators, who parted like the Red Sea to let us through. Their faces were alive with shock and, in more than a few cases, envy. I guessed many of them would have swapped with me, burning face and all, in order to be beside Seth’s side. I’d rather have been almost anywhere else.

  ‘What on earth!’ exclaimed Mrs Carlisle as she unlocked the first aid cupboard. ‘Who did this?’

  Seth opened his mouth to speak, but I got there first.

  ‘No one, I walked into a lamp-post.’

  Mrs Carlisle turned back and raised one eyebrow sarcastically. ‘Really.’

  ‘Yes.’ Except it came out more like ‘yesh’.

  ‘A hand-shaped lamp-post?’

  I shrugged and she rolled her eyes.

  ‘Well, I can’t make you tell me, but there’s a stringent anti-bullying policy at this school and if I see you in this office again I’m going to be asking some questions – and I won’t be asking you, Missy.’

  I shrugged again, and then winced as she dabbed some TCP on to my split lip. Seth stood next to me holding my hand with his head bowed. He looked the picture of guilt and I got the impression that Mrs Carlisle thought he was probably responsible. It would have helped if I had the first idea what was going on, but I had no intention of d
obbing on Caroline. There was obviously some major misunderstanding and I didn’t really want to turn scab in my second week at Winter High.

  When Mrs Carlisle had finished dressing the cut she gave me an icepack to hold to my cheek and said, ‘I’m taking you to your first period, Anna. What is it?’

  ‘Classhics,’ I slurred.

  ‘Right. Seth, where are you supposed to be?’

  ‘Chemistry, but Mrs Carlisle, could I please walk Anna—’

  ‘No,’ said Mrs Carlisle so forcefully even Seth’s obvious determination quailed a little. ‘I want a word with Anna. Alone.’

  As we walked across the quad she tried to get more information out of me by casual chit-chat, plainly not satisfied with the story she had so far. But I wasn’t talking – for one thing it hurt too much – and my short yes-or-no answers weren’t getting her anywhere. Eventually she had to leave it with my story of a lamp-post and a flat-out assertion that Seth was not involved in anCP volved y way. She dropped me at the door of my Classics class, where June and Liz were goggling at me from their table, waiting for the story.

  There was an audible hum as I slid into my place, and my cheeks began to burn again, not just with the sting of Caroline’s slap. All heads turned to look at me until Mrs Finch barked, ‘Back to the board, please.’

  It was a class discussion of the homework essay, so we had no time to talk, but at the end of the lesson June dragged me aside.

  ‘What did Seth say?’

  ‘Nothing,’ I said with difficulty, trying to move my mouth as little as possible. My lip had started to clot and every word cracked the scab painfully. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You mean he didn’t ask you out?’

  ‘No! What on earth do you mean?’ I was so surprised I forgot to speak cautiously and winced as fresh blood came into my mouth.

  ‘The story going round, and it’s pretty convincing, is that Seth dumped Caroline on Sunday. For you.’

  ‘What!’

  ‘So you don’t know? You’re not going out with him?’

  ‘No! Of course not.’ My cheeks flamed. ‘It’s complete rubbish; I’m telling you.’

  ‘Well, rubbish or not, he really has dumped Caroline, and she obviously thinks you had something to do with it.’

  ‘I didn’t. There must be some misunderstanding.’

  ‘Anna.’ June narrowed her eyes. ‘Who exactly did you think about when we did that spell?’

  Fear curled in my stomach and I felt my face become hard.

  ‘I didn’t think of anyone. Anyway, what we did on Saturday had nothing to do with anything. It was just a silly schoolgirl game.’

  ‘Hmm. Well, I hate to tell you, but your lip’s bleeding on your shirt.’

  ‘Oh crap.’ I looked down and sure enough my shirt was stained with drops of blood.

  I made my way to the loos, ignoring the stares of people in the corridor. It seemed that from being nobody at Winter High I was suddenly somebody, in a very big way indeed, and I was fast deciding that I’d much preferred being a nobody. I locked myself in a cubicle with a handful of wet loo paper and tried to dab off the worst of the blood, but I just ended up with a wet bloodstained shirt.

  I hid in the loos for as long as I could but at lastifd but at the third bell rang and I knew I had to get to Maths. The corridors were almost empty and I slipped into my seat at the back next to Seth, unnoticed by the rest of the class.

  Except, of course, Seth. At my arrival his face lit with a mixture of fury and relief.

  ‘Your face,’ he said as I sat down. His expression was stricken and he reached out a hand to touch me. My heart started thudding, even as I flinched away. ‘Sorry, sorry, is it very painful?’

  ‘Pretty much, yes.’

  ‘Anna, I’m so, so sorry. If I’d known—’

  ‘Quiet everyone,’ called Mr Henderson. ‘Now, any problems with the homework?’

  ‘Known what?’ I whispered under cover of rustling papers. ‘It’s not your fault, Seth.’

  ‘But it is,’ Seth began.

  ‘Silence!’ roared Mr Henderson. ‘Unless you have a comment about the homework, I don’t want to hear from you.’

  Seth waited until Mr Henderson was busy answering a question then carried on, under his breath. ‘I wanted to speak to you before you saw Caroline; I didn’t have the chance to explain, you see—’

  ‘Seth Waters.’ We both jumped. Mr Henderson stood an inch away from our desk, tapping his board ruler menacingly on his open palm. ‘Do you, or do you not have a problem with the homework?’

  ‘No, Mr Henderson.’

  ‘Then if I hear from you again, you will be spending the rest of this lesson in the quad. Do you understand me?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Henderson.’

  He turned away, and Seth wrote on a piece of paper: Meet me at the harbour at lunchtime?

  Reluctantly I nodded. I didn’t really want to add fuel to whatever imaginary fire Caroline had concocted by sneaking off with Seth, but I very much wanted to know what was going on.

  When I arrived at the harbour Seth was already there, sitting on a small sailing boat tethered to the quayside. He was looking down at something on his lap, and I watched him as I walked along the quay.

  His profile was sharp against the grey of the water, his curly dark hair tousled by the sea wind gusting across the bay. Somehow he looked different from the boy I sat next to in Maths – older, more serious, more capable. He belonged with a crew of fishermen hauling oyster pots home in some Greek port, or gutting sardines on a Portuguese quayside. Lots of things about him – his deep tan, his calloused hands, the lean strength of his arms lm.of his and shoulders – suddenly made sense.

  Then I tripped over a coil of rope and he looked up, and his expression changed to one of open delight.

  ‘Anna! You came.’

  ‘Of course.’

  He folded up the chart he’d been reading and leapt easily off the boat onto the quay.

  ‘Have you already got lunch? I should have warned you there aren’t any cafés open yet, they don’t open up until a bit later in the season.’

  I shook my head.

  ‘I’m not very hungry, I don’t really want to eat much with my mouth like this.’

  ‘Of course.’ He looked stricken. ‘Here.’ He threw down a parcel of rolled up sails. ‘Sit on this. It’ll be a bit cleaner than the quay.’

  ‘Seth, what’s going on?’

  Seth bit his lip and looked out to sea. For the first time I noticed that his eyes were not brown, as I’d thought, but very dark grey, like the chalky channel sea on a thundery day. There was silence for a while and then he sighed.

  ‘Well, you know I broke up with Caroline.’

  ‘I heard. I’m really sorry.’

  ‘I’m not. But I am sorry that I said something stupid to her.’

  I waited and he continued slowly, ‘I said it was because of you.’

  ‘I see,’ I said. My throat suddenly closed and I found it impossible to say any more. I wanted to say, ‘Don’t be silly, it doesn’t matter if you used me as an excuse, you don’t have to apologize for anything, just set everything straight’. But I couldn’t seem to get the words out.

  ‘And Caroline got hold of the wrong end of the stick,’ he continued heavily. ‘She thought there was something going on between us.’

  ‘Which there’s not, obviously,’ I said painfully. My lip had cracked again and I tasted blood.

  Seth shook his head. ‘No.’ Then he reached and took both my hands in his. I felt the shocking warmth of his skin and the roughness of his fingers and palms. There was a deep welt, like a rope burn, along the underside of his wrist, and I had to fight the urge to run my thumb along the scar. His face was pale, in spite of his deep tan, and there were shadows under his eyes. He looked exhausted yet wired, and there was a frightening intensity in his expression that I couldn’t understand. Then he took a breath. ‘But I would like it if there was.’

  ‘What?’ I was
so surprised that I stood up, pulling my hands away. He stood too, his words tumbling over one another.

  ‘I know, I know this is sudden and we’ve only just met, and I don’t want to freak you out – but Anna, I’ve never met anyone like you. You’re wonderful, and amazing, and clever and witty and beautiful. I woke up on Sunday and – I can’t explain it – I suddenly realized that you were what’s been missing in my life. I don’t know how it took me so long.’

  ‘So long!’ I gasped. ‘You’ve only known me a week!’

  ‘I feel like I’ve known you all my life – I’m completely obsessed with you – with the way you look, the way you move, the way your skin smells, the way the sun brings out the little red glints in your hair. I’ve thought about nothing else since.’ I was so shocked I couldn’t speak, and he pressed on, ‘I know this is probably all too much, too soon, but I couldn’t carry on with Caroline feeling the way I do about you. Please, I’m not expecting anything in return, but I had to say something. I’ve never felt like this before. The girls in Winter – they’re just so, so ordinary, and then you came along and it was like, like nothing else mattered any more.’

  He stopped, touched my lip with his warm, calloused thumb, and swallowed.

  ‘Anna, I know this sounds crazy but – I love you.’

  For a minute I was mesmerized by it all – the sound of the sea crashing on the quay, the feel of his touch, the intensity of his slate-grey eyes. Then sanity broke through and I pushed his hand away violently.

  ‘Seth, stop it! This is ridiculous.’ My voice was shaking.

  ‘I know.’ He looked bewildered. ‘I know it is, and I don’t expect you to feel the way I do. I don’t expect anything of you. I just want … I don’t know. I want you to know I love you, and I always will.’

  ‘Stop it!’ I cried, putting my hands over my ears and closing my eyes. This was terrible – it was so right and yet so, so wrong.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Seth said. There was a catch in his voice. ‘I know this is ridiculously sudden. I won’t say any more if it’s upsetting you.’