Free Seaspun Magic by Christine Hella Cott Page A

headaches suddenly and conveniently all gone? When he left, she didn't want him walking away with a part of her…
    Thank heavens they were both going away for a few days. They would both need the break to put things back in their proper perspective. Somehow or other, the situation had got out of hand. She should never have let him stay…
    ***
    The rest of the weekend in Seattle passed quickly. It was wonderful to be home. Her mother forced her to loaf while she cooked and cleaned and played with Rae. Friends and neighbors crowded the dining-room table for the turkey on Thanksgiving Monday. Her cousin, the cookie mogul, was there, and she had an entertaining time laughing with him over the latest episode in his rise to fame and fortune. Twenty-five, black-haired, blue-eyed and gorgeous, he was a favorite friend of hers.
    "You whip up better cookies than seances, Mikey. That's for sure!" she said, chuckling.
    "Arianne, Reggie came to see me last week."
    "Oh?" She was silent for a moment. The news sent only the faintest tremor through her. "What did he want?"
    "You, of course. He's started looking for you once more."
    "By now he's probably forgotten all about me again."
    "You should tell him about Rae."
    "Yeah." She sighed. "I guess I'd better...."
    "I told him you were still in New York."
    "And he believed you? You know, I never thought I'd be so happy he didn't get to know any of my friends!"
    "Hm. You know I don't agree with what you're doing. Going into hiding was the same thing as admitting you were guilty! You should have stayed in town. You should have reopened your business in back of the shop, just like before you married the, the—"
    "Don't say it, Mikey. Anyway, it's all past. There's nothing to worry about—" she thought instantly about Leo and her heart constricted in her breast"—and one of these days I'll surprise everybody and come out of my cocoon."
    "I'll be there, cheering. So tell me about your B and B..."
    "Come on, you two," her mother interrupted at what Arianne considered a timely moment. "The turkey's on the table, and you, Mikey, have the honor of carving it, since you're the only man in the family!" Rianna Sawyer, plump and dimpled, looked the furthest thing from a being of the spirit world as was possible. Rae hung from one of her hands and in the other she had a huge basket of piping-hot crusty buns.
    "Let's go, Mikey!" Arianne said enthusiastically, sniffing all the delicious aromas.
    "I wish you'd get married, Arianne," Mikey said grouchily but good-naturedly, waiting for the women-folk to go into the dining room where everybody else was already seated. "Then somebody else would carve the turkey for a change!''
    "That's a wonderful idea!" Rianna exclaimed. "If you two would only get married to each other all our problems would be over!"
    "How do you figure that?" Arianne laughed.
    "I'd still be carving the turkey!" Mikey pointed out.
    "Yes, and I know just how to solv? that difficulty, for Christmas I'm sending you to gourmet carving school! Now get at it, and try not to eat all of it in the process!"
    Rianna took her place at the head of the oval table. Mikey, at the foot, started doing his duty on the magnificent Thanksgiving bird, which was nestled in a bed of glistening California grapes and autumn leaves Arianne had cut from colored paper.
    Arianne was wedged in beside her Aunt May, Mikey's mother, and one of the neighbors, Mrs. Edith Drew, a librarian at the nearby university. Mr. Drew was an architect. Arianne had known them practically all her life and had grown up with their youngest daughter, Judy. Judy sat across the table from her with her husband, Darwin. Beside them were two more of Arianne's friends. Completing the twelve were Mr. and Mrs. Tony Caravetti, who owned the Italian delicatessen right next door to the magic shop below. It was a noisy, jolly gathering, and Rae thoroughly enjoyed being the center of so much attention.
    "He's growing so fast!" Judy exclaimed.
    "Soon he'll