Spell Check (12 page)

We settled onto the cleaner of my two beds so Baby wouldn’t bother us, and pulled out our English notebooks. “We’re going to have to identify the Greek and Latin roots of the vocabulary words, so we need to know their origins as well as their meaning.”

Salem groaned.

“It gets worse. I think we are going to have to write a persuasive essay about one of the books from the summer reading list. Which ones did you read?”

“Gregory Macquire’s Wicked, and The Bell Jar. You?”

“Jane Austen, The Count of Monte Cristo, and All Quiet on the Western Front.” And four more, but I figured, why freak her out?

An hour flew by as we worked together. We both jumped when Mom stuck her head in the door. “Evie…?” She saw Salem and stopped.

“Mom, you remember Sarah.”

Mom had a dazed, it’s-three-days-until-deadline look. “Hi, Sarah. I was just about to ask Evie if she’d like pizza delivered. You’re welcome to join us.”

“Thanks.” Salem gave me a questioning look to see if I was okay with the invitation.

“Great,” I said.

Mom glanced down at the notebooks in our laps. If she was surprised to see me studying, she hid it well. “Double cheese with a thick crust?”

“Sounds great,” Salem said. “I’ll call my folks and let them know.”

“Tell them I’ll give you a ride home.”

“Thanks, Mrs. O’Reilly.” Salem pulled out her cell phone and punched the speed dial.

“You’re welcome.” Mom flexed her hands several times as she left.

My phone rang. I picked it up and answered it just as Salem started talking to her dad.

“Evie?”

“Hey, Parvani.” I strained to hear her over Salem.

“Who’s in the background?”

“Sarah Miller came over.”

There was a slight pause, where I swore I could hear the synapses sparking in Parvani’s busy brain. “Well, I was just calling to see what happened with Evan.”

“I got suspended.” I explained the whole thing.

Parvani sounded frosty. “If you can’t go to school, then why are you studying with Salem?”

I figured Salem wouldn’t want anyone to know about her struggles in English. But I also flashed on Parvani’s hurt expression when she had seen me with Jordan. Great. Another lose-lose situation.

“I still have to do the homework and I’ll have to make up the tests.” I glanced at Salem. She had hung up her cell, and watched me with a worried look on her face.

“So, how did things go with the pillows?” I asked Parvani.

“Fine. Look, I have to go. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Why don’t you join us…?” I started to say, but the phone went dead.

“Everything okay?” Salem asked.

“More or less.” Mostly less. I hated being stuck in the middle between Parvani and Jordan. And now what? Parvani’s mad because Salem came over?

Worry knotted my stomach. Thanks to Evan, I’d be stuck at home for the next two days and unable to counter the gossip mill. Of course, I had no good explanation for why Jordan had taken my hand. Actually, I had an excellent explanation, but Parvani wouldn’t like it.

Salem threw a bounty hunter squint again, then slid off the bed and stretched. Something in the hutch must have caught her eye, because she walked over to look at it. Her toe flipped the hidden spell book out from beneath the dirty clothes.

Salem kneeled on the floor and pulled out the grimoire. “Dude!” She brushed her hand across the plum-colored leather. “Where did you get this?”

“Well-Read Books.” I dropped to my knees beside her. Unbelievable. A raised, leafy, silver vine had sprouted at the bottom corner near the spine, and fanned out across the front cover.

“I didn’t know they had a rare books section.” She skimmed through it, stopping when she encountered yellow streaks. “You highlighted it?” She sounded horrified.

“I didn’t. Parvani did. But it was an ordinary book when she highlighted it.”

Oops.

Salem narrowed her eyes again. “What do you mean?”

I considered keeping quiet. But Salem’s pale, kohl-rimmed eyes bored into me like police spotlights. I broke. “It was a regular paperback book when I bought it, but it keeps changing.”

“Are you serious?”

“Dead serious.” I winced as the words left my mouth, and I glanced at Dad’s cap. “For instance, the silver part wasn’t here yesterday.”

“Holy Goddess. Any idea what’s making it change?”

Bad mojo? “I don’t know, but it creeps me out.”

Salem sat cross-legged and flipped through a few more pages, tracing her finger along several of the highlighted sentences. After a few minutes, she glanced up. “What are you and Parvani up to?”

I chewed my thumbnail, something I hadn’t done since I was ten.

“Look,” Salem said. “This is serious magick. You shouldn’t do anything until you’ve read the whole book. And then you shouldn’t do anything without consulting an experienced practitioner.”

“You mean someone like Miss Ravenwood?”

“You better stay clear of her. Did you ever find your parents’ yearbooks?”

“I haven’t had a chance to look.” Miss Ravenwood and her broomstick had flown off my radar with all the other things going on. I glanced at the troll and tiara. “I read some of the first part. It looks pretty harmless.”

“It can be harmless, if you do it right and take certain precautions. If you ignore the warnings or forget a step, there could be serious consequences. Karmic consequences.”

The worry knot in my stomach grew like a population of rats without inhibitors.

“For instance,” Salem said. “Look at this.”

The book fell open to a section on love spells. My heart stopped. No yellow highlights. Clearly, Parvani hadn’t read this far yet. “Love Spells. Perform during the new moon to full moon, or on the full moon.” I made a mental note to check the calendar.

Salem skimmed her finger down the spidery list of correspondences. “Colors: red and white.” Gee, what a surprise. “Herbs and plants: apple, barley, Brazil nuts, ginger. Planets: Venus. Day of the week: Friday.” Figures. “Flowers: coltsfoot, daffodil, daisy, lavender, rose, etc.”

Salem’s finger, with its chipped black nail polish, halted. She read aloud, “‘Warning. Never try to bind someone to you through magick. Such misuse of the Craft will have dire consequences in this life and beyond. A love attained through magick is no love.’”

“Why tell someone how to perform a love spell if it is going to curse them for all eternity? And what about people like Parvani? She believes in reincarnation.”

Baby, who was quite fond of Parvani, whimpered from the doorway.

“The book is trying to warn you how you should and shouldn’t perform a love spell. Look at this part.” She pointed to another line. “’Do not direct your spell at a specific person. Instead, write down the qualities you seek in a true love.’” My heart somersaulted.

I read further. “‘Do no harm.’” I was not getting a warm, fuzzy feeling about this.

“The Wicca creed includes ‘Be silent’, but I’ll break it just this once,” Salem said. “I’ve been studying the Craft for a year now. So if you need any help…”

“Thanks. But I’m going to try and talk Parvani out of it. This time I’ll make her listen.”

“Then this isn’t about trying to contact your dad?”

I reeled back on my heels, shocked. “No, of course not. I hadn’t even thought of such a thing.”

“Good, because you need to take heed before you try to contact the Other Side. Especially this time of year.” I must have appeared as confused as I felt. Salem explained, “Samhain. You know, Halloween. The veil between this world and the spirit world becomes thin.”

“Oh.” I reached for Dad’s cap and anchored it on my head. It reeked of sweat and shampoo, but I imagined it also smelled of all the dangerous countries Dad had photographed.

The doorbell rang, startling me out of my reverie. “Must be the pizza,” I said over Baby’s barking.

“Maybe it’s Parvani.” Salem stashed the spell book beneath the discarded clothes.

Rattled, I led the way toward the entry.

Chapter Nineteen

It wasn’t Parvani at the door. It was Jordan. My stomach did a rollercoaster climb toward my ribcage, then freefell.

Jordan did a double take when he saw Salem. “Hey,” he said to both of us.

“Hey,” Salem and I said at the same time. She arched her over-plucked brows and slid me a what’s-up-with-the-jock glance.

I felt my face turn dodge ball red. “Jordan sits behind me in Bio,” I explained. “We’ve known each other since preschool.”

“He sits in front of me in History.” Salem assumed a reproachful tone. “And totally blocks my view of the board.”

“Sorry about that.” Jordan tousled her hair like she was a five-year old. Salem knocked his hand away. I held my breath, waiting for her to smite him or something. Jordan just grinned and puffed out his chest. “Evie let me do the perp walk to the office with her. She needed a bodyguard, like, in case Evan was waiting to whack her with his crutches.”

I swatted his shoulder. My pulse skittered when my hand made contact with his solid bicep.

The pizza guy drove up in a little white truck. “Come in,” I told Jordan. Then, to the delivery guy, “Be right back.”

Mom emerged from the kitchen with her bulging red wallet in hand. I winced when I noticed all the discount coupons sticking out. “Hi Jordan,” she said as she handed the pizza man some cash. “Want to stay for dinner?”

Jordan breathed in the garlicky pizza smell and breathed out the word, “Yes.”

Hoping Parvani wouldn’t discover us, I rushed everyone to the kitchen. Mom said, “Can you get…?”

“Got it.” I pulled another placemat from the drawer. The dark green mats cover a lot of scratches on the table. Mom should stick to the studio, or be more careful when she works on her greeting cards in the kitchen.

“So what happened?” Jordan asked as I handed him four sage-colored plates. For the third time, I told about my suspension. “And Evan got a week? Harsh.”

Salem came to my defense. “He’s a jerk. Besides, he should pay for all the things they didn’t catch him at.”

“Amen.” Mom placed a big glass salad bowl on the table and began tossing mixed greens and feta.

We ate in silence. Baby watched us with bright eyes, no doubt willing us to drop something. After a while, Salem cleared her throat. “Mrs. O’Reilly, I heard you grew up around here.”

Mom nodded. “In this house.”

“I think my parents were a year ahead of you in school. Maybe you remember them. Mitch Miller and Kimberly Cain?”

Mom lowered her wedge of pizza. “Is your mom a pretty blonde? Petite?”

“Yeah.”

Mom broke into a smile. “Now I see the resemblance.” Salem blushed.

“Cool.” Jordan reached for his third slice of pizza.

Salem stabbed a piece of butter lettuce. “I saw your picture in their yearbook, and Miss Ravenwood’s.”

Mom’s smile vanished.

“No way!” Jordan said. “My math teacher went to Jefferson?”

“Oh, yes.” Mom’s voice dripped venom. “She had quite a crush on Evie’s father.”

I almost choked. Mom must have inhaled too much glue while she worked on the cards. Salem and I exchanged sideways glances.

“Wretched,” Jordan said. “Did they, like, date or anything?”

Mom’s face scrunched like she had an unpleasant taste in her mouth. “I think they went to a Halloween dance during our junior year.”

This time I did choke. No one had to do the Heimlich on me, but Salem thumped my back between my shoulder blades, which hurt. When I could breathe again, she nudged me with her foot.

“I heard she’s Wiccan or something,” Salem said when I stopped coughing. “I wonder if she was practicing back then?”

“Wicca is white magick.” Mom’s tone suggested Miss Ravenwood dabbled in something quite the opposite.

Every poisoned apple, boiling cauldron, turn-the-world-into-perpetual-winter scene I’d ever read, or watched at the multiplex, flashed before my eyes. Salem nudged me harder. Jordan just blinked several times.

Mom wiped her hands on a paper napkin. “Enough ancient history. I better get back to work.” Her chair scraped against the wood floor as she stood. “Sarah, let me know when you’re ready for a ride home. I can give you one too, Jordan.”

Salem nodded, her mouth full of salad.

Jordan said, “Thanks, Mrs. O.”

After Mom headed up to her studio, Salem leaned toward me.

“Can you believe it? Miss Ravenwood had a crush on your dad.”

“Gross,” Jordan said. “What if you were Miss Ravenwood’s daughter?”

“Eww.” Salem shuddered.

I could think of one advantage—I might have been good at math. So not worth it.

Jordan used his fork to chase a piece of arugula around his plate. “Speaking of Halloween dances, either of you planning on going?”

“Not my thing,” Salem proclaimed. Given her earlier revelation, I wondered what she did do on Halloween. Wasn’t it a witch’s major holiday?

“Evie?” Jordan drew out my name in a funny way. Before I could answer, he captured a lock of my hair and twirled it around his finger. “Think you can avoid further suspensions so you can go to the dance?”

It almost sounded like Jordan was asking me to the dance. I couldn’t tell for sure, so I played it cool. “Well, I don’t know, Kent. It depends on whether or not Tommy Deitch stays clear of me.”

Salem snorted. Jordan blinked at her, as if he’d forgotten she was there. He released my hair and leaned back in his chair. His hand dropped to the table, about an inch from mine. If either of us moved our pinkies, we’d touch.

“I hate to eat and run,” Salem said while carrying her plate to the sink, “but I better go home and feed Einstein.”

“Einstein?” Jordan asked. I swear his hand slid a heartbeat closer to mine. “I thought he was, like, way dead.”

“Einstein is her dog.”

“My sister’s dog. Amy is away at college. MIT. So I’m stuck with dog duty.”

“Wretched,” Jordan said.

I tried to focus on their banter, but it was difficult with my hand tingling.

“I hate to interrupt your mom when she’s working.”

I dragged my attention up to Salem. Little worry lines creased her forehead. “Better to interrupt her now than later when she’s immersed. I’ll help you gather up your stuff.” I rose and reached for my water glass, accidentally on purpose brushing Jordan’s hand. He was eyeing the last piece of pizza, but his fingers twitched as if he were trying to catch me.