Page 73 of The HalloQueen

ANNABEL

My moms were witches - fuck,Iwas a witch. That’s a lot to put on someone at almost 30. Like, wasn’t this a conversation we should have had when I was in puberty?Oh, you’re at the special age where your body is changing, you’ll grow boobs, and get your period, and by the way, you’re a witch, here’s an American Girl book that will tell you everything you need to know.I didn’t think there was an American Girl book on being a Green Witch, but if there was it was going in my cart the second I found it.

I was in the hospital for several days recovering from the injuries sustained by Monique, which left loads of time for my moms to sit in the uncomfortable pleather chairs and tell me our family story while I was high enough to not question a word they said. I came from a long line of Green Witches, descended from a coven in France that specialized in plants or plant products. We were like…crunchy organic witches or something like that, which probably meant I should apologize to all the essential oil ladies I’d yelled at at those home parties. Our family was a part of “The Coalition,” which I briefly remembered Thomas talking about, and our job was to make sure that creatures paid dues (what the fuck), followed the rules, and distributed correspondence as needed. My moms swore that the Coalition was pretty hands-off in our area, but with Monique going off the deep end, I was going to learn all about them really quick. So actually, I was totally right when I accused Thomas of having an army of caped vampires hiding in the shadows. There was a fucking United Nations for Others, and I was to be a part of it.

I hadn’t spoken to him. My moms brought me to their home to do some kind of Harry Potter potion thing on my elbow to allow the bones to heal quickly, and I hadn’t gotten a new phone to replace the one that was ruined at the beach. I was thankful to be out of the sling in less than a week instead of the six weeks the doctors had estimated, but I still didn’t have full use of it and wanted to cry whenever I bent the joint. Hiding with my moms and having the distance from the real world was good for healing, but horrible for my mind.

I found that I was torn between missing Tommy desperately, wanting to talk to him and be with him, and being wounded that his exes came back and I hadn’t spoken to him since. It felt like he walked away entirely and I was sulking, licking my wounds, knowing in my heart that I wouldn’t have walked away. Not from him. I wanted to have him talk to me about all the blank spots in my moms’ stories and I wanted his experience alongside me on this journey. We left off on a miscommunication and that alone was pissing me off. If there was one thing that would make me put a romance book down immediately it was the miscommunication trope, and yet here I was, living in one with a fucking vampire who was my…subordinate in a weird way. But the few times I’d found myself standing at my mothers’ front door, the idea of leaving the safety of their warded home had completely freaked me out and I had gone back to bothering one of them about some random magic question I’d pulled out of my ass.

My moms seemed to recognize my hesitancy in leaving, so they parked me in the solarium every morning with a stack of books and diaries to read and learn about what it meant to be a Williams. They’d bring me cups of tea they claimed would “open my mind” or “soothe my soul” - like they were fucking witches or something, and I’d drink them without question. Sure, as a result of my hiding, I was learning a lot about the different uses of plants, but I was also dying to get back to work and help Shannon with the fall launch. I was a boutique owner, not a plant whisperer. I was itching to go ship orders, make thirst traps and pretend like none of this had happened.

Within a month I’d gone from planning on flirting with the previous owner of the Halloween store to having been bit and almost murdered by a fucking vampire on my favorite beach, while also somehow wanting desperately to fuck a different vampire, who was also involved with the murderous one. It was…unnerving and confusing to say the least. Somehow, viral fat chick Annabel had been turned into a hot trauma sundae topped in sexual frustration and unused magic, who also peed a lot from my days hooked up to an IV and the consuming of said teas.

The solarium was my Mom’s domain, overflowing with plants and flowers that could delight in the sun and grow. Mama had built it for her one year so she could continue growing things over the New England winters and the warm bright space was good for all of us. It was a place you could go any time of the year and inhale the scent of fresh herbs and bask in the three walls and ceiling of glass. It was my favorite place in high school when I was feeling particularly emo as I could lie in there and read shit likeJane Eyreand Poe while watching the rain fall. Mom said I was to study among the growing things to grow as a green witch, but I’m pretty sure she just wanted me to bring in some vitamin D to counteract the crippling anxiety I was suffering from without my feelings eating not-boyfriend. What I’d wanted to do was yell ‘fuck anxiety’, go dance in a black lace bra and get serotonin hits from people liking and following my ass jiggles on social media. Where there’s jiggles there will be giggles and where there’s giggles there is bound to be at least a singular hit of serotonin. I wasn’t picky - storebought would be fine.

Serotonin was what I wanted, but apparently, my mothers’ comfrey poultice did such a good job extracting the venom from my bloodstream that I was to study and prepare myself to be on comfrey tending duty. It was decided that “we” - since apparently, I was part of the coven now - needed to make full stores of the comfrey poultice in case Monique couldn’t be located quickly and other Others were injured. Terrifyingly enough, Undead could infect anything other than a green witch, but instead of them looking like blood-sucking zombie demons, to mortals it often looked similar to rabies. With Others that weren’t already vampires, it was far more terrifying and dangerous. Rabid venomous werewolves were not to be trifled with, so learning about poultices was what I was doing all day, and typically since I wasn’t sleeping well, all night.

“Bels?” My mom entered the glass room off the back of the house and I looked up from the book that I hadn’t been reading or retaining, “You good?”

“No, I’m not good, Mom.” My haven of a town had been stolen away by my lover’s ex-wife and I was lost in a sea of emotions. Not knowing what happened to Monique kept me happily smashing comfrey and hiding in the comfort of my mothers’ cooking and cliché midnight margaritas, which they’d begun after watching Practical Magic and decided to adopt the practice as their own. I couldn’t say that I was mad about the cliché since I was being spoiled by their Jimmy Buffet frozen margarita maker and top-shelf tequila. Like they’d said, if they were going to live their best witch lives, they were going to go all out, and as a new baby witch, I was going to join them.

Mom sighed and plopped onto the white wicker couch beside me and gave me a sympathetic smile, “I know, it’s a lot, isn’t it?”

I glared over the book at her, “You know, if you guys had told me about this shit years ago I would have been better prepared to handle the whole blood-sucking vampire thing.”

“I know, but just because we have gifts from the earth doesn’t mean I can see the future, sweetie. I would never have seen this coming. I never would have thought you’d get bit by an Undead in Quaker’s Wharf, let alone you falling in love with an Other. Call me naive but I figured we had time for this to come to light by itself.”

I hissed, embarrassment coursing through me at the knowledge that I spilled my guts while wasted on said top-shelf tequila and told them everything. Because obviously, every mother wanted to know about their daughter’s fridge sexcipades with the supernatural. “I don’t know that I’m in love with-”

She interrupted me with an arched brow, “don’t lie to me, Bels. Lie to yourself, but don’t lie to me. If you’re not in love with him, drunk you certainly is.” She leaned forward and lifted the tome I was perusing and flinched, “Ugh, I hate that one. Though I suppose I’m not the bookish one in the family. I swear the trees talk to your Mama about what was written on their pages. I would so much rather her just tell me what to do and come out here and get my hands dirty.”

“That’s why you guys make such a good team, right?”

Mom smiled, “we are best friends. It makes everything easier.”

I bit my lip and spat out the question that had been bothering me since they’d told me, “you guys told me I came from a sperm donor and IVF when I was a kid. I’m not actually like a nymph or a changeling or something ridiculous like that where I grew out of the ground like a daisy?”

Snorting, she shook her head, “of course not! You’re a perfect test tube baby. Just the way we wanted you. Though you have been horrifically expensive from the moment we thought about having you…you’re lucky you’re worth it.”

“So…Witches. It’s a maternal line thing? Is the daughter of a witch guaranteed to be a witch herself? How did you know I’d be a witch if you used some rando off the street? Am I part warlock?”

“No, it’s a maternal line,” she drank from the giant blue water bottle that was always at her side, “though the amount of power and disposition toward magic depends on the child. As I’m sure you’ve figured out, your Mama and I are very different witches, but every witch contributes to her coven to make a perfect puzzle. You’ve always been a missing piece while we waited for you to come into your magic. Everyone was shocked when you didn’t manifest in your teens.”

Everyone. Like I needed to grasp there was a whole fucking gaggle of witches hanging around. “Wait, you mean I was supposed to have a Sabrina moment and wake up to a talking cat or something?”

“I accidentally grew my mom’s bonsai tree into a full-size tree when I was 9. I was so worried she was going to be mad at me, not knowing what we were. It cracked the ceiling. All I’d wanted was to play with the little rake in the sand and there I was, exploding my mother’s tree because my Grandma made me mad,” She chuckled at the memory.

“Yeah, but the whole green witch thing is so weird. Grandma couldn’t even keep a cactus alive.” I shriveled my face in disgust, “that awful woman didn’t have a nurturing bone in her body.”

“Hey. May I remind you that she’s your Mama’s mother?”

I laughed, “and you fucking hated her too!”

She shuddered, “Yeah, you’re right, I did.”

“So what were their powers?” I asked, “I don’t know what I’ll lean towards. Mom has paper, you have plants, I’m assuming your mom had plants too?” She nodded, “What about Grandma?”

“Oh, your Grandma liked poisonous plants. She was a real peach.”

---