Page 4 of Witchful Thinking

Ugh, an annoyed voice said. Could you be any more boring?

She wished she had a life worth writing about, worth being celebrated, but it was so ordinary. Her twenty-ninth birthday last month meant the return of Saturn, the time of great growth. Scrying into water bowls and reading tea leaves left her with more questions than answers. How was she going to grow where she was planted?

How was she going to create a life that made her excited? A lucky paper fortune from Madame Zora would give her the answers she sought. She walked over to the familiar burgundy booth by the Ferris wheel. The machine, wheeled in from the local arcade and hooked up to a small generator, was a popular attraction. Her heart lifted seeing the finely dressed fortune-teller figure with the painted smile.

It was magic time.

Madame Zora never let her down, and this machine was rumored to be blessed by her great-granddaughter. Lucy got in line behind two others, her foot mindlessly tapping as she waited for her turn. More people got in line behind her. It took five minutes before it was her turn. She stood in front of the electric light sign proclaiming MADAME ZORA’S MYSTIC FORTUNE BOOTH. If she didn’t know what the future held, Madame Zora always had the answer for her.

She fed the money slot and pressed the button to start the reading. Bells chimed and the machine emitted an eerie light. Energy buzzed from inside and sparked against her skin. It was happening. The crystal ball glowed, and the robot-puppet waved her bejeweled hand over said ball. The machinery whirled. Lucy rubbed her hands together and cupped them to receive her fortune. Come on, Madame Zora. Show me what you got.

The machine grunted, then beeped. She watched the fortune dispenser slot for the yellow paper. Nothing appeared. Lucy took in a deep breath and calmed her nerves. It grunted and beeped twice again. No fortune popped out of the slot. She leaned down and reached into the slot with her fingers. The paper fortune was there—she could feel it with her fingertips—but it wasn’t moving. No. No. No. Despite all the tugging, the fortune wasn’t going anywhere.

A line was forming behind her. There were a few disappointed sighs.

She couldn’t be the person who broke the Madame Zora machine!

Well, at least that would give her something to write about in the class notes.

“Is everything okay?” a male voice asked behind her.

She froze, her senses tingling. Why did that voice sound familiar?

“No.” Lucy sighed. “My fortune got stuck.”

“Hold on. I got you.” The mystery man came to her rescue. Lucy stepped back as he stood in front of the machine. Whoa. He was a big, broad man who looked as if he could lift and shake the fortunes out of Madame Zora’s machine without breaking a sweat. She studied his side profile. Her heart jumped in her throat. From where she was standing, with his high-top fade and strong chin, he looked a lot like Alex. Her spirit practically leaped out of her body.

She shoved away that idea. No, that wasn’t possible. According to Alex’s social media posts, he was cliff jumping into clear blue water with gorgeous models cheering him on from the sidelines. No one—absolutely no one—gave up Hawaii for the Jersey Shore. But with every passing moment, her tingling senses weren’t tingling anymore. She had full-on goose bumps. Her eyes drank him in greedily, as if he were that last glass of iced tea and she’d just finished a long summer run. His presence cooled her inside. The thirsty parts of her rejoiced. She pressed her hand to her chest to make sure her heart hadn’t floated away from her like a lost balloon.

Lucy stepped away. She was too close. The last time she’d seen Alex, he’d turned his back on the Grove and her. What in Earth’s oceans could’ve possibly brought him home?

Chapter Two

There was nothing in Freya Grove that surprised Alexander “Alex” Owen Dwyer anymore.

He’d been back in town less than two days, and nothing had changed. As families oohed and aahed at the electric display, he merely blinked. A wave of recollection washed over him as he watched neon make the air sizzle with light. It was the same thing year in and year out. The tightness in his chest eased a fraction. He reluctantly embraced this feeling, as if he’d been given a heavy coat to wear in the middle of a rainstorm, to shield him from the cold. The feeling kept him in the moment. The town was predictable. Though a tiny part of him was comforted by the ebb and flow of the Grove, his family kept him checking his phone for random text messages detailing another Dwyer misadventure. The Dwyer merfolk were known for their…uh…interesting pursuits. Some relatives blamed the merfolk blood in their veins for influencing them to “go hard on all that weird whimsical shit,” as his college-age cousin Mariah would say in their family text chain.

Alex thought it was just the risk merfolk took when they made the journey from ocean to land. It was hard to be human, and Dwyer folk were doing their best to find their rhythm on solid ground. If it wasn’t his cousin Tony searching for lost treasure off the Florida Keys, it was his aunt Maggie investing her retirement money in a pirate-themed bed-and-breakfast. His parents, Kia and Nathan Dwyer, weren’t immune to the Dwyer whims. His childhood, while stable in some parts, wasn’t without the controlled chaotic moments.

It wasn’t unusual to wake up and have Mom and Pop declare at breakfast that they were moving to Alaska, then at dinnertime decide that they didn’t want to buy bear repellent. Their careers in the tourism and hospitality industry allowed them to move wherever the people and adventures were with ease. He’d lived in half of the country before his fourteenth birthday and had the T-shirts and mugs to prove it. Every school year, he was the new kid in town, until his family found a little bungalow apartment in Freya Grove. His last first day of school, he sat next to a girl wearing an overloaded charm bracelet, big brown eyes, and a sense of innate magic about her.

He shook off the memory, not wanting to go there yet.

Once he graduated from high school, he left Freya Grove and traveled the world, earning respect for his award-winning photography and social media posts. In the last decade, Alex made his biannual trip home like the good son he tried to be but then promptly left town before he could let the water dry off his scales. It wasn’t good to get too invested. He really didn’t want to get caught up in whatever his parents planned, but Mom could be very persistent. She used her exclamation key with reckless abandon. There wasn’t an emoji Mom didn’t use, conveying her bubbly personality through the phone. Mom kept sending cheerful messages closer to his birthday to get him to come home. With every incoming ping-ping, his nerves jumped up.

It’s your 29th birthday! Let’s celebrate!

It’s the end of a great chapter in your life! We have to honor your Saturn year!

We got you something special. It’s too large to mail! You have to come home for it!

It’ll be fun! We’ll go to Ad Astra. We’ll order a cake, the fancy one with the chocolate ganache.

He was here for chocolate cake.

Alex responded, I’ll be there.

Mom immediately replied, Wooooo!!

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