Free Bewitched by Daisy Prescott Page B

started to turn around. Smiling, I search for Andrew in the doorway or on the steps behind me, but he’s disappeared.  

Two

    Inside the campus cafe, Sam sits at our usual table. Today, her long blond hair is woven into two braids, which wrap around the crown of her head. She looks like a milkmaid with the figure of a German beer garden girl. She’s the blonde yin to my dark yang. The tall to my short. The fun to my serious. The nutty peanut butter to my sweet jam.  
    “I bought your favorite pumpkin spice latte.” She points at a steaming white cup on the table in front of my chair.  
    I inhale the steam from my cup. “Thanks. I need this.” The rainy day calls for the warmth of fall in a cup. I shake out my damp hoodie and run my fingers through my newly bobbed hair.  
    “Rough day with the Puritans?” she asks.
    “Rough day with Hamilton.”
    “He’s a flaming toadstool.” Sam never uses typical curse words, but the intent is the same.  
    “He really is.”
    “What did newt brain do now?”
    I explain his comments in class and we laugh over the karma of his fall.
    “Maybe it wasn’t karma. You wished for him to shut up and it came true.”
    I give her a sidelong glance. “Sam.”
    “Maddy.”
    “I’m not a witch. No magical powers.” I wiggle my fingers in front of her face.
    “You don’t know that. You’ve never tried.”
    “My ancestors might have been from Salem, but we all know those witches weren’t witches.”
    “Maybe not the innocents who were killed, but that doesn’t mean magic doesn’t exist here.”
    I roll my eyes. “I think you’ve spent too much time downtown at the tourist shops.”
    Sam mimics my eye roll. “Such the skeptic. Where’s your sense of imagination and wonder?”
    “I must have lost them when I stopped watching Disney princess movies.”
    “My mom never let me watch those.”
    “Ah, that explains it all then. More Snow White and less Wicca would have done you good.”
    “Speaking of Wicca, will you come with me to The Spelling B after classes? I need to buy a new set of Tarot cards.”
    “What’s wrong with the set you have?”
    “I think Lucy’s bad energy ruined their mojo.”
    “Lucy Lucy?” I stare at my roommate in shock.
    “I know, I know. Yes, that Lucy, but she paid me twenty bucks for a reading.”
    Lucy is Hamilton’s girlfriend. She swims in the same shallow pool he does, and believe me, they deserve each other. I frown at the thought of the two of them procreating and breeding more obnoxious humans.  
    “Her reading was terrible, just so you know.”
    “That’s some comfort.”
    “Maddy, would you still want to date Hamilton?” She teases.
    I shudder. “We never dated. I wouldn’t call what happened freshman year dating. What was I thinking?” I never dated Hamilton, but we did hook up a couple of times before I realized what a toad he really was.
    “You weren’t. You were a horny freshman.” Sam’s laughter sounds like delicate wind chimes, until she snorts. “I still can’t believe you kneed him in his crotch in the middle of the dorm lounge.”
    “He grabbed my boob in front of everyone.” I cross my arms to protect my chest from the memory.
    “I still don’t know what you saw in him. He doesn’t even fill out the front of his jeans.”
    “Neither do I. Yuck.” I stick out my tongue. “Let’s chalk it up to hormones. Can we talk about something besides Too Much Tongue Hamilton?”
    “Maybe you need some sort of cleansing. We can get you smudged! Or maybe find you a love spell.” She wiggles her eyebrows.
    “Smudged?” My skepticism rears its head.
    “With sage. We can buy some downtown.”
    “Uh huh.” I furrow my brows. “Won’t I smell like a roasted chicken? I’m sure that will attract all of the boys. At least the stoned or hungry ones.”
    “Some of those stoners are kind of cute. At this point, what do you have to lose?”
    Nothing. It’s the beginning of junior year and there isn’t an