Free literal leigh 05.7 - mission impawsible by Melanie James Page A

Until September rolled around. Now I’m back here, teaching. Yippee!” My sarcasm was not lost on Randy.
    “I’m stuck in Chicago and he’s up north in the woods. I’m barely surviving traffic and teaching English to kids who are more interested in texting than learning the mechanics of grammar. Gabe’s catching poachers and being all sorts of super masculine at his log cabin. I bet, right now, he’s chopping firewood and whatever.”
    A nearly X-rated video of a shirtless, sweaty Gabe played in my mind. His muscles flexed under glistening coppery skin as he lifted an axe above his head. The axe came down in a powerful and very satisfying stroke. I could actually feel the axe finding its mark. The strike caused something inside me to twitch with excitement, like an electric shock.
    “Hello? Kelly? You’re drooling. Are you all right?”
    “Uh… yeah. I’m fine.”
    “Ha! I see what’s going on here. You’re fantasizing about Gabe. You are such a little pervert. Seriously, sis, he was a summer fling. Don’t get your panties in a bunch. Go over to the LL Bean store and pick up one of those lumbersexuals. I’m sure you can find a short-term substitute for Gabe. It’ll help you to get over him.”
    “What? Wait a second. First of all, I never said I wanted to get over him. Secondly, that’s the dumbest advice I’ve heard from you. And that says a lot.”
    Randy didn’t even have a comeback because he knew he hit a nerve. I’ve never once had even the slightest bit of desire to “get over him,” as Randy’s unsolicited and poorly thought-out advice suggested. In fact, I secretly hoped for much more of a future with Gabe than I let on. Since I came home, Gabe and I talked on the phone nearly every day. And as each day passed, I began to dream about the possibility of a happy ending.
    For now, it was time to change the subject. Halloween was only a week away, and it made the perfect topic.  
    “Randy, what are your memories of Halloween when we were kids? All of mine are tinted with orange and black. I always remember making construction paper jack-o-lanterns with too much glue and those goofy legs our teacher made us put on them.”
    “Yeah. I remember making those. Legs and arms made with black paper, folded accordion style. Wasn’t that stupid? I used to wonder why. I mean, jack-o-lanterns do not have legs and arms. They just don’t.”
    “Stupid? Maybe. Guess what? I force my students to make those. Every damn one of them. I love it.”
    “You would. Torturer. When I remember Halloween, I recall trick-or-treating around our block. You were always a witch. I was always a vampire. We’d run everywhere. Plastic pumpkins full of candy and swinging by our sides. And remember, there was always that one house… the one where they pretended not to be home, but we always saw someone peeking from behind a curtain?”
    “How could I forget? One year, I stood in the driveway and waved a little plastic wand at the house, like I was hexing them. Little did I know, one day I might actually cast a spell. For real.”
    “I have an idea. Maybe we should dress up and take the nieces and nephews around the block this year. Maybe throw some real magic around. Wouldn’t that be something? It’d give the kids something to brag about. We’d be the coolest auntie and uncle of all time.”
    “No freaking way, Randy. The problem is the witchcraft itself. I’m not good enough. You’re not good enough. Forget it, buddy. I’d like to hone my skills first before I start doing drive-by spells, with a pack of little trick-or-treaters tagging along. I have no desire to go back to that damn Witches Court.”
    “Pffft. You know what the problem is? We’re not taking any risks. We should be cracking open the old grimoire we found, trying a few spells. Practicing, like we all said we would do, with our Spell Club meetings. Or am I the only one committed to perfecting our craft? Can we at least give it a shot before we