Page 30 of The Accidental Witch

Roberta Tisdale had a crappy memory no number of cute limericks and mnemonic devices could ever help. When everyone was learning the planets mnemonically, she was still trying to remember the sentence that should spark her memory.

The ladies had made up a silly phrase to teach her how to remember the order of initiating a spell.

SAP.Like what comes out of a tree, ya know?Nina had said.

Say it, Apply it, Point at it.

Robbie giggled every time she heard them shout the word at her. But she still couldn’t always remember what it stood for in the moment.

Either way, it was a struggle but Greer had assured her spells would soon become ingrained and she’d be on the path to Easy Street.

As she was thinking those warm thoughts, silly as they might be, and light snowflakes drifted to the ground and she admired the Halloween decorations Nina, her daughter Charley, and the whole gang had put up, Robbie found herself feeling happier than she had in a long time.

Until everything changed.

As in the landscape.

Gone was the twelve-foot mummy whose eyes blinked. The trio of blow-up pumpkins had completely disappeared, as had Nina’s castle and all the orange lights she’d literally leapt up to the roof as though on a trampoline to hang.

In the blink of an eye, she was in a sandy desert, wind kicking up tiny tornadoes of dust, dunes as big as a high-rise in Manhattan all around her.

At first, Robbie couldn’t believe it was real. She scrunched her eyes shut and opened them again, only to find she was still in the desert. And the desert washot, by the by.

God dangit, she hated the heat, but she peeled off her puffy vest and red knit cap, discarding them as the sun shined down on her and she basted like a rotisserie chicken. And Waffles—where was Waffles?

Nina would skin her alive if she lost Waffles!

Yet, she struggled to grasp the reality of where she’d landed.

So where in all of wherewasshe? And were there camels? Because while this was terrifying, camels would make this heat a whole lot better.

Was this really happening? One minute ago she’d been encouraging Waffles to do her potties while she waited for Greer and her next magic lesson, now she felt like a roasting marshmallow on a bonfire.

As she began to call for Waffles, whistling and shouting her name, panic started to set in. It figured. Just as she was adjusting to all the new madness in her life, warming up to the idea that she was going to have a hand possessed by a serial killer witch, she found herself in another situation she didn’t know how to handle.

And she was alone. All alone.

“Waffles! C’mere, baby! Where are you?” she called out, whistling, trying to cover her eyes to keep the stinging sand out of them.

Quite suddenly, everything went dark and the whipping wind stilled. So far, that always signaled something bad was going to happen.

What if she’d accidentally resurrected another poor soul? How would she handle it all alone? In the dark? With this ungodly heat?

Swallowing hard, Robbie fought for control of her thoughts and control of her behavior. If this was what she faced as a new witch, then bring it. She had a few spells under her belt, and she’d begun to really perfect a couple of them.

But was a spell necessary? Was apersonresponsible for this? Or had she run into some whackadoodle glitch in her magic and she’d done this to herself?

For sure, if she’d done this, she wouldn’t have landed in the desert. She’d be in Italy or Paris, eating lots of carbs.

There was only way to find out.

Taking a deep breath, Robbie called out, “Hello? Is anyone out there?”

Nothing but the pitch black answered back. That and the sand that managed to be hot beneath her booted feet even though the sun had taken its leave.

So she began to walk—albeit aimlessly. As she trudged through the hot sand, her hands out in front of her on the off chance she might run into someone, she called again, “Helloooo?”

A noise made her stop cold, a whirring noise, a droning that sounded in her ears, growing louder.

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