Bookshop Witch by T. Thorn Coyle

Author:T. Thorn Coyle
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: T. Thorn Coyle

19

While everyone cleaned up, I went to my bedroom, plugged my phone into a speaker, and Stevie Nicks’s voice filled the room, singing about poetry and drowning in the sea of love. It was a song my father sang to me all the time when I was little. He used to tell me that I was named for that song, even though they spelled my name differently.

And even though I was their beloved child and not the source of heartbreak that almost broke up the band.

Then, on my bruised and battered knees, I dug into the big closet. Singing along with Stevie, I shoved aside boots and shoes and a couple of fallen scarves.

This particular song was to me what a pot of macaroni and cheese was to someone else: comfort food. It brought both of my parents back to me for the few minutes that Fleetwood Mac sang and played.

“What are you looking for, babe?”

I hadn’t heard Stefon come in. Whatever noise he’d made was drowned out by my warbling, and the song currently on repeat. But I had found what I was looking for. A handmade wooden jewelry box with a false bottom.

My mother’s magic box. It used to hold pride of place in my father’s bedroom, but I put it away when he got sick.

I couldn’t stand to think of losing her and him at the same time. It was easier to act as if she was just a distant memory instead of an active presence in Dad’s life. It hurt too much, his love for her.

Just like my love for him hurt. But it was time to change that now, too.

I backed out of the closet and levered myself up to my feet, the smallish, heavy box cradled in my arms.

I wiped a thin film of dust from the box with my sweatshirt sleeve and carefully set it on top of my dresser.

“I was looking for this.”

Stefon came to stand beside me, but he didn’t touch me and he didn’t speak. I could feel him all the same, radiating warmth the way he always did. I stretched my toes out in my sheepskin-lined slippers, planting myself as firmly on the floor as I could. Then, fingers lightly touching the dark wood, I lifted the lid. There was a shallow box set just beneath the lid, which held my mother’s ritual jewelry. Silver. Amethyst. Moonstone.

But that wasn’t what I was looking for. I carefully lifted out the box tray and beneath it, set in a padded depression in the purple velvet above what I knew was a false bottom, lay her crystal ball.

“Wow,” Stefon whistled. “That was your mom’s?”

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. Sitting next to the ball was a small silver ring stand with three feet. Carved on each foot were the three phases of the moon: crescent, full, and half. I lifted out the stand and set it on my dresser top and then cradled the heavy ball. It was cool to the

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