Free The Bridge by Rachel Lou

scare me silly.”
    “Excellent choice. You should read my online reviews. I’m really good.” Bryce shook Everett’s hand.
    Bryce’s knuckles were bruised and scabbed, as if he had taken bare fists to a punching bag. Everett brushed his thumb on one scab. It was thin and fresh.
    “I have dry hands,” Bryce said.
    Everett could see though the lie. Bryce had the hands you found on someone who was extremely hands-on and took care of their skin. His hands were rough, but moisturized. Those scabs weren’t from dry skin.
    Bryce gently pulled his hand back. He smiled, but it wasn’t confident. He rubbed his knuckles, watching Everett with uncertain eyes.
    “When do you want to start?” Ann asked.
    “He’s free all weekdays, and after three on weekends,” Everett’s grandfather said.
    “Private lessons are five to seven on weekdays and three to eight on weekends. Choose any time you like. Bryce is free for them all.”
    “Is there a limit?” Everett asked.
    “Only with space reservation. Our policy is first come, first serve. Make sure you schedule a free time on the online calendar.” Ann pointed at the link on an informational sheet. “Your login is your student ID and last name. We can have two private lessons at a time, so feel free to sign up if someone is already signed on.”
    “Try not to sign when Antonio’s there. He might borrow you as a practice target for his student,” Bryce said.
    “Bryce and Antonio aren’t on the best terms,” Ann said, as if that explained everything.
    “What are you talking about? We’re best friends with a great rivalry.”
    The dojang’s doors opened and voices drifted into the office.
    “I’ll greet ’em. Call me later.” Bryce slipped a hand under Everett’s bangs and brushed them over his head.
    Everett fixed his hair and blushed under his grandfather’s scrutiny.
     
     
    “HOW CLOSE are you to Bryce?” Everett’s grandfather asked during the drive home.
    “I don’t really know him.”
    “How much does he know about you?”
    The atmosphere shifted in seconds. The air was tense, and it tightened Everett’s breaths.
    “He doesn’t know I’m a witch,” Everett said, trying to keep his bitterness low.
    “He knows you carry salt with you. He knows you do ‘experiments.’ He knows you want to keep these ‘experiments’ to yourself because they’d make you sound crazy.”
    Bryce also knew he was moving to Sundale, but that didn’t scream anything about Everett’s nature. Maybe Everett really was a crazy teenager who loved salt and experiments with salt. Nobody knew witches used salt for focuses anyway. Everyone believed they used caldrons, wands, broomsticks, pointed hats…. If Bryce suspected anything paranormal of Everett, it would be hunting creatures.
    “That’s hardly enough to even hint that I’m a witch. If anything, he thinks I’m weird.”
    “One secret will lead to another.”
    Everett hissed and shifted his attention to the houses they passed. “Then why did you let me take private lessons with him? If you don’t have faith in my secrecy, why didn’t you stop me?”
    His grandfather lowered his voice to a resigned murmur. “You need time to be a teenager.”
    “I may not be a regular teenager, but that doesn’t mean I’m missing out on anything.”
    Normalcy was foreign to him. He was the son of two witches, the grandson of four witches, and the great-grandson of eight witches. He had been guaranteed a life of witching the moment he was born.
    He didn’t have a stolen childhood to cry over. His childhood hadn’t been normal, even in comparison to other witch children, but it existed.
    “You need to experience life as a normal teen,” his grandfather said.
    “That’s ironic,” he couldn’t help but say because private lessons with Bryce gave him an opening to further investigate the dojang’s paranormal haunting. “Normal teens don’t take private lessons with their crushes.”
    His grandfather chuckled. “You