Page 100 of Big Little Spells

If I had to grade myself, it would be A+ for effort across the board.

At the high school, however, I continue to fail all the practicums no matter what I do. Emerson aces them. One week she throws one, though it about kills her, and still aces it. That makes it clear to us that this is one more example of the Joywood’s divide and conquer policy. They want to make sure we feel as much like the teen versions of ourselves as possible. And they really want to drive a wedge between us.

So we pretend they do. We don’t walk to school together anymore. If we all have to be together for an event or another assembly, we make a show of not quite looking at each other. I stick to Ellowyn’s side and Emerson sticks to Jacob’s. We’re scrupulously polite to each other in public, but I always make sure to roll my eyes the minute my sister turns away and someone could be watching.

Anyone observing us would think we’re at odds, but pretending not to be, which feels a lot like the more adult version of our adolescent dynamic. When the truth is, we’re closer than we’ve ever been. We speak in our old language, together and apart. I even name my next theme of planner stickers after her: The Confluence Warrior Collection.

And then I break all my old rules and show them to her.

She’s suitably amazed and, being Emerson, orders an entire set of all my planner-friendly items. Then starts brainstorming ways to incorporate my work into as many local businesses as possible. Including stocking Confluence Books with my art.

Which feels more full circle than I can even fully describe.

I try my hand at some painting, something I haven’t done since I took art classes at the high school. I paint the confluence on a bright June morning, because Aunt Zelda hasn’t been texting much. Every few days, if that. And because I know she loved to walk down to observe the place where the three rivers meet every morning when she was well. When it’s done, I hand it off to Uncle Zack with a collection of books from Emerson.

“Until we can come and give her a hug ourselves,” I say.

My uncle swallows hard, and won’t quite meet my gaze. “Until then.”

I come back home feeling empty, but I don’t know what else there is to do for Zelda and the illness that’s killing her.

Or the test I’m going to fail that’s certain to kill me too.

So, in addition to all the studying and practicing, I also spend time with that book I hate so much.

Nicholas gave it to me and I know it’s given us some answers, but shouldn’t I be able to find a few more? Because we’re running out of time. And the particular sick genius of the Joywood is that they’ve made certain that the lives of everyone I care about hang on me passing that unpassable test.

They’ve had a long time to perfect their Mean Girl approach to...well, pretty much everything.

At first I hole up in my room and give myself headaches trying to decipher the long passages of ancient text.

Remember when there was going to be less lone-wolf nonsense around here? Smudge asks testily one afternoon, when my muttering interrupts her beady-eyed concentration on the June birds singing in the trees outside.

“You’re a terrible hunter,” I tell her, because I don’t have claws. “The birds are making fun of you.”

She flattens her ears at me. They’re probably talking about you, Backdraft.

As usual, her claws are sharper.

But I take her point. Reluctantly. Sitting around driving myself crazy, alone in my room, is giving the Joywood what they want. I can’t have that. So I heave the big book into my arms and take it up to Georgie’s third-floor rooms to ask for help.

Georgie sits in her attic bedroom, down the hall from her own overcrowded library, surrounded by books and crystals and lace. I have the immediate urge to sketch her space, because it’s so romantically witchy. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anyone with an aesthetic quite like hers.

But I’m not here to sketch and daydream a product line to suit a bohemian witch surrounded by crystals who only pretends to be airy as it suits her. Not today. I stand in the doorway with the book clutched to my chest and hope the expression on my face is imploring.

Georgie is sitting cross-legged on her hardwood floor, surrounded by all kinds of books in stacks and many opened before her. Others hang in the air. Octavius opens one eye, notes my presence, and then wiggles onto his back in the middle of Georgie’s four-poster bed.

I force myself to actually say the word. “Help?”

And I watch as Georgie breaks into a wide smile. “I was hoping you’d ask!”

But by day three of operation figure something out, all I’ve learned is that I get grumpier with each session. Georgie, by contrast, remains unruffled.

Today, like every day, we sit on a bench in front of one of her long tables filled with crystals and lit candles and altars and go through every page. Inch by inch. Word by word—which involves spells, other books, consultations with spirit guides, and translations worked out by hand on a pad. Which looks like a lot of hieroglyphics and math to me.

“Maybe we’re going at this wrong,” Georgie muses. She piles her red curls on her head and jabs a pencil into the knot she makes to hold it in place. “Maybe this isn’t about reading and translating. Maybe you have to do something.”

At our feet, Smudge and Octavius, who have spent the last two hours curled up together, begin hissing at each other. I look down and Smudge jumps into my lap. Then onto the book open before us with another hiss.

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