Free The Language of Spells by Sarah Painter

his plate.
    Gwen hesitated. She wanted to walk straight past, but if he looked up she didn’t want to get caught ignoring him. So he hated her. So what? She swallowed, feeling sick. If she was serious about staying in this town, she was going to have to get used to seeing him. She straightened her shoulders and tried to arrange her face into a relaxed expression.
    He looked up.
    Gwen forced herself forward.
Breezy. Just breeze past. Breezily.
    ‘
Hello.’
    ‘I just had lunch.’ Gwen motioned to the back room.
    Cam nodded, his expression unreadable.
    ‘I’m just going,’ Gwen said.
    ‘So I see.’ Cam looked like a spectacularly bad day had just got worse. Well, she’d just walk on out of there and relieve his stress.
    ‘Where are you running off to?’ Cam said, his face perfectly still.
    ‘I’m not running,’ Gwen said with dignity. ‘I’m leaving you in peace.’ This cold politeness was unnerving. She hadn’t expected much after their last meeting, but there wasn’t so much as a flicker of warmth. Gwen blinked. Her insides suddenly felt hollow.
    ‘Nice to see you,’ he said. Then, as if they were perfect strangers, ‘Welcome to Pendleford, again. Do call my office if you need anything.’
    Gwen got the hell out before she pushed his cool, calm, collected face into his lunch.
    On the way home, she called into the big chemist to stock up on essentials. She was filling her basket with three-for-two offers and trying to block out the Christmas music, when she spotted a familiar face. Marilyn Dixon. Lurking behind the perfume counter. There were dark circles under her eyes; purple shadows visible through the mask of pale beige make-up. Gwen felt a stab of guilt. She shouldn’t have left things the way she did. She should’ve been nicer. More sympathetic.
    Gwen waited for the queue to empty, then took her basket up to Marilyn’s till.
    For a moment she thought Marilyn wouldn’t recognise her, but then she said, ‘Iris used to make all her own stuff. Body lotion and toothpaste. She said you couldn’t trust the chemicals.’
    ‘Won’t you get in trouble for saying that here?’ Gwen was aiming for humour, but Marilyn didn’t smile. ‘Watch out for the botanical range. It brought me out in a rash.’
    ‘Right. Thank you.’
    There was a pause, punctuated by the beep of the scanner.
    ‘I’m sorry if I was rude last night,’ Gwen said.
    ‘That’s all right,’ Marilyn said stiffly. ‘It must’ve seemed very odd, my coming to you like that.’
    ‘Well—’
    ‘I don’t know what I was thinking. I don’t know what I’m doing any more.’ Marilyn rammed a tube of hand cream deep into a carrier bag. ‘It’s not been an easy time for me.’
    ‘I’m sorry.’
    Marilyn added the cotton buds, lip balm and moisturiser to the bag.
    ‘If you want to talk—’ Gwen began awkwardly.
    ‘I have friends,’ Marilyn said defensively. A furtive look crossed her face. ‘And I went to see your neighbour instead.
She
was very helpful.’
    ‘Oh. Good,’ Gwen said. ‘My neighbour?’
    ‘She said it’ll make Brian come to his senses.’
    ‘What will?’
    Marilyn bagged the last item – a lipstick Gwen had picked up on impulse – and gave Gwen a sickly smile. ‘Thank you for shopping with us today.’
    Gwen braved the cold to spend some time sorting through her stock in the back of Nanette. She knew she ought to be making plans; working out what she was going to do about her business, money, her future. Instead, Cam’s carefully polite expression and Marilyn-bloody-Dixon’s voice kept popping into her mind. What did she mean by ‘come to his senses’? And why had she looked so tired and sad? With fingers that were too numb to open any more boxes, Gwen headed into the house. She ate some bread and jam and drank a glass of wine. Perhaps it was her imagination, but the house seemed just as cold as the van. Trying not to think about Cam or the business or Marilyn or anything at all, Gwen retreated