Cara Shultz - Spellcaster

“Cutting it close, Connor,” my friend Jenn Hynes whispered, turning around in her desk in front of me to wink at me as Mrs. Urbealis walked into the room, calling the class to attention. This would be an easy class today—we were watching old news footage of U.S. protests of the Vietnam War. I tried to focus on the grainy black-and-white telecast—sticking to my earlier vow to just treat today like a normal day—but sitting there, with time to think, the spell I’d done with Angelique began rattling around in my head. Finally I resolved to tell Brendan on the bus ride to the Cloisters instead of waiting until school was over. He had a right to know.

I had math immediately after history, so I stayed in my seat and chatted with Jenn as other students filed in. Jenn was a little bleary-eyed from staying out too late last night, and was filling me in on her weekend plans—she was going to crash with her sister at the NYU dorms. Suddenly she stopped talking and grabbed my forearm, twisting around even farther in her seat.

“Call me crazy, but why does it feel like everyone’s whispering and looking at you?” she hissed, pulling her honey-brown hair in front of her face to hide what she was saying. She might as well have cupped her hands around her mouth—she was as obvious as if she’d been doing semaphore.

“Because they usually are,” I replied, nonplussed. I didn’t even bother lowering my voice; it’s not like it was a secret.

“No, I mean—” Jenn flipped her hair back, glanced around then pulled her curtain of hair back “—it’s different this time. It’s not the usual ‘Ooh, there goes Emma, I heard Anthony was in Monaco’ or some crap. They’re really staring and whispering.”

The serious look on Jenn’s face made me pull my eyes from her (slightly bloodshot) ones. I pretended to scratch an itch on my chin, rubbing it on my shoulder as I stole a look around the classroom.

Madison Wefald and Rebecca Curry were speaking in animated, hushed tones. Nicole McAllister leaned so far over in her desk to murmur in Paul Cuevas’s ear, she was practically lying on the top of the desk, her butt sticking in the air and giving Marcus Colby a first-class ticket to Hineytown. And they were all casting furtive glances my way.

“What did you do now?” Jenn asked, her expertly made-up eyes wide. I shrugged, slinking a little lower into my desk self-consciously.

Mr. Agneta, the math teacher, strode into the room and took one look at the chattering students. He grabbed the large wooden compass, which he used to draw arcs on the blackboard, and pressed the chalk end on the board, causing it to screech uncomfortably—and the low buzz of voices stopped. Nicole flopped in her seat, and Marcus visibly frowned at the end of his free show.

“Yes, yes, so exciting. Well, math is exciting, too,” he said, and I knew I wasn’t imagining him shifting his eyes to glance my way. And I definitely didn’t imagine hearing Marcus Colby whisper, “Salinger, really?” to Nicole before bending over in his seat to check out her butt again.

My hand twitched to pull out my cell phone and text Brendan. Immediately the spell Angelique and I did assaulted my mind. What if Brendan was the target, not me? Was he hurt? Sick?

I thought about leaving the classroom to use the bathroom and text Brendan, but the expression on Mr. Agneta’s face every time he scanned the classroom and saw me craning my head to look out the door told me that wasn’t going to fly. I don’t know what I expected to see out there—it’s not like Brendan was going to be holding up a big neon sign in the hallway spelling out what happened. But it was clear that something had happened—something big. I nervously spun the Claddagh ring Brendan had given me around my finger, my stomach twisting into knots like it was trying to win a Boy Scout badge.

At the end of the class, Mr. Agneta screeched the chalk end of the compass against the blackboard again—he just loved doing that—shouting, “Just a reminder, all art history students need to report downstairs for the trip to the Cloisters.”

And then, my fears were confirmed when he looked straight at me. “That means you, too, Miss Connor. The bus leaves in fifteen.”

I grabbed Jenn’s sleeve as I pulled my backpack on.

“What the hell is going on?” I asked her, worried.

“I’ll see what I can find out,” she promised. “Drop your books off and I’ll meet you at the bus.”

I scrambled down the stairs to my basement locker—a chill coming over me as it did every time I stepped into the room where Anthony first confronted me. As a latecomer to the school, my locker was in the highly undesirable, out-of-the-way basement. After last year’s winter formal, the school had tried to find me another locker, but considering the main building was actually an old mansion, it wasn’t exactly built with a locker room in mind. There just weren’t any free ones—even in the annex. And I was not about to take over Anthony’s now-vacant locker. I was way too much of a magical novice to tackle whatever exorcism that would entail. So Brendan let me leave whatever I wanted in his fourth-floor locker, which admittedly had become jam-packed with more and more of my stuff.

I threw my books in, grabbed a spare notebook and slung my bag on my shoulders as I raced back upstairs, finding Jenn talking to our friend Cisco Fernandez in front of the bus. And for once, Cisco wasn’t smiling. And Jenn’s eyes were open so wide I could practically see inside her skull.

“Okay, Em, what have you heard so far?” Cisco asked, his dark brows knotted in worry.

“Nothing, other than overhearing Brendan’s name. What’s going on? Is he okay?” I fretted. Cisco jerked his head toward the bus.

“Let’s get on and I’ll tell you all that I know,” he said, his voice low. I followed him onto the bus, guilt eating away my insides like I’d just drank battery acid. The spell foretold something about Brendan, not you. And you didn’t warn him. Your fault. After he begged you to always tell him if something concerns you. “Just please don’t worry so much that you don’t talk to me,” he’d said. And you didn’t talk to him. Your fault.

Cisco led me and Jenn to the highly undesirable three-seater in the back of the bus, right on top of the engine. They sat on either side of me on top of the very loud, rumbling engine that would mask what we were about to talk about.

“Cisco, what is going on? Please tell me,” I implored, grabbing his hand.

“Okay, so I was in chem this morning, and I got there early because it was Brendan’s turn to do the lab report and I needed to copy it.” Cisco and Brendan were lab partners and had worked out a little schedule where they alternated doing homework. It was brilliantly sneaky and meant they each did half the work. “He gets there early, he’s his usual self—I mean, he’s fine, Emma. He’s not acting sneaky or weird about anything.”

“Sneaky? Why would he act sneaky?” I asked, confused.

“Let me finish. Mr. D walks in, class begins, the usual.” And then Cisco frowned.

“And then what?”

“About twenty minutes into class, Principal Casey comes storming in, interrupting Mr. D’s lecture, and says, ‘Brendan Salinger, come with me immediately.’” I groaned internally as Cisco mimicked our principal’s aggressive swagger. Casey, with her orange lipstick and “power suits” was about as cuddly as a rusty chainsaw.

“What did he do this time?” I asked, my thoughts running to a basketball team prank on a rival school to a saucy remark in class to countless uniform violations. All had landed Brendan in Casey’s crosshairs before.

“I don’t know. I didn’t think anything. He looked surprised, to be honest. He even pointed at himself and went, ‘Me? You sure?’ And here’s where it gets weird,” Cisco added, leaning forward, his fingers nervously curling around the base of his black tie.