Page 21 of Summer Solstice

Either way, it probably wasn’t a great idea to waste my valuable time on a dinner date with a magician, no matter how handsome he was. Or how his accent made my toes curl.

There was a knock on my bedroom door.

“Mom? Are you ready?”

The tense, unhappy coil of misery in my gut eased a little. No matter what else was going on, I still had Finn. He was the best thing in my life, and always had been. No matter what, we still had each other and that was something worth feeling beyond grateful about.

“Not quite, sweetheart. I’m just picking out what I’m going to wear.”

The door swung open and Finn bounded into the room. He looked over the options on my bed and his nose wrinkled up. “You’re not wearing any of those things, are you?”

“What’s wrong with them?” I asked, bewildered.

Finn snatched up one of the hangers and shook it at me. “A cardigan? Mom. You’re going on a date, not… not stepping out with your big cheese to go and do the jitterbug.”

“Big cheese?” I tugged the hanger back, laughing. “Okay, you’ve been hanging out with Darla too much.” Though, I guess if someone had to be a bad influence on my son’s language, an ex-ghost flapper from the nineteen twenties was a better option than some. “What’s wrong with a cardigan, anyway?”

Finn rolled his eyes and flopped back onto my bed. “You’re a mom. Not a grandma.”

“Okay, okay.” I looked over the options again, but nothing was really grabbing me anyway. “What do you think I should wear, then?”

Finn jumped to his feet, a determined look in his eyes. He headed into my closet, and I watched, a bit bemused, as he went through hanger after hanger, examining some clothes, doubling back, searching all the way to the very edges.

“This one, for sure,” he said, voice triumphant as he pulled out a partially zipped up garment bag from the far-flung depths of my closet.

The dress he’d chosen had actually been a Yule present from Wanda, and I’d been saving it for a special occasion. I didn’t go out much, other than work and the occasional cocktail night with the girls, so the dress had languished unworn for months.

I took the hanger from Finn, and opened the bag the rest of the way, letting the deep blue fabric show. It shimmered, very faintly in the lights, feeling like cool water when I smoothed a thumb across the bodice. Well, surely a first date was worthy of being a special occasion.

“Yeah? You think?”

Finn nodded firmly. “Definitely.”

I ducked into the bathroom to shimmy the dress up over my hips. It took a bit of work to reach the zipper in the back, but I managed to do it without dislocating my shoulders. I smoothed the skirt down carefully with my hands, enjoying the smooth feel of the fabric. Finally, I glanced up to look at myself in the mirror, and stared.

Wanda sure knew her stuff.

The dress fit like it was made for me, which I supposed it had been—Wanda had chosen the color and the cut according to my coloring and figure. And the enchantments had been woven for me too. The rich blue made my eyes shine and my hair look like gold. The skirt hit me a couple inches above the knee, the perfect height to be flirty, but still no chance of accidentally flashing people as I walked.

I gave a slow spin in front of the bathroom mirror, grinning at my reflection. Wanda had a way of designing a dress that highlighted a person’s best features, and minimized any of their flaws. A dress like this, well, it was meant to make the wearer feel good about themselves, confident, like they could take on the world and everything in it.

The careful enchantments woven into the fabric certainly helped, too.

I did a twirl when I came out of the bathroom, grinning. “What do you think?”

Finn smiled, bouncing on the bed a little. “You look great, Mom. I’m sure Andre’s not going to know what hit him.”

He settled back, propping himself up on his hands as I grabbed my makeup. Meanwhile, Finn chatted away like he used to when he was younger. I listened, trying not to smile, as I carefully brushed mascara onto my lashes as he rambled on about a video game he and Marty had beat.

“So, you had fun with Marty?” I tried to keep my voice neutral while I decided whether or not to bother with blush. My cheeks were still a bit pasty from my lack of sleep, so I blended a little bit of rosy pink onto my skin.

“Yeah, it was really good. He told me about a house he and Henner and RJ checked out. No ghosts, but it was still cool. And we had pizza. And then Lacey dropped in, and that was kind of weird.”

I smoothed a little gloss onto my lips, pressing them together. “Weird how?”

Finn’s face scrunched up. “I don’t know. She was just really weird around him. And she called him ‘neighbor’, but I thought she said she lived up near us?”

“Yeah, she does.”

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