Shanna Swendson - Don't Hex with Texas

The grocery store across from the courthouse had closed for the night, so the parking spaces in front were empty. Owen would have been able to detect traces of residual magic, but I couldn’t sense anything. I decided it was time for the next-best weirdness detector in a small town: the Dairy Queen.

On a warm night like this one, odds were that a fair number of people would have gone out for a banana split or a malt, and if anything even slightly out of the ordinary had happened, they’d certainly be talking about it. Sure enough, the parking lot was nearly full, and there were people crowded around all the outdoor tables. I went inside and ordered a brownie Blizzard, then looked around for a place I could sit and overhear as many conversations as possible.

“Hey, Katie, over here!” a deep voice called out. I turned to see Steve Grant sitting with a couple of his buddies. For a second, I had a high school flashback. There’d been many a time I saw the same group of guys sitting at the same table in the Dairy Queen. Of course, back then they weren’t calling me over to join them. I’d have probably died on the spot if they had. In high school, guys like that didn’t talk to girls like me, unless they wanted help with their English homework.

The group looked a little different these days. We hadn’t been out of high school for ten years, but already the hairlines were starting to recede and the waistlines were starting to expand. I didn’t want to give Steve any false hopes, but their table was centrally located, and if anyone in town would have the scoop on anything going on, it would be these guys.

I wandered over to the table, pausing to take a bite of my Blizzard every few steps, so I’d look properly casual. “Hey,” I said. “Fancy meeting you here.”

“What are you up to?” he asked.

“Escaping from my parents. And eating ice cream.”

Steve patted the space next to him in the booth. “Care to join us? I saved you a seat.”

“That was sweet of you.” I perched on the end of the booth, as far from him as I could get, which wasn’t very far, as he made no effort to scoot over and give me room. I had a feeling that was more deliberate than inconsiderate of him. I took a bite of ice cream to stifle the giggle that threatened to come out. The last time I had men like him all over me like that, I’d been wearing enchanted shoes.

Somehow, I doubted my raggedy old tennis shoes had any kind of attraction spell on them. “So, guys, what’s the news in town tonight?” I asked.

“Nothin’,” the guy across the table from me grunted. I couldn’t remember his real name. In school, he’d been called Tank, and it looked like as an adult he was making every effort to live up to his nickname. His nearly monosyllabic response reminded me why I hadn’t been that impressed with the football studs in school.

“Wow, exciting,” I quipped, unable to hold back the sarcasm.

“Not really,” the third guy said. I wasn’t sure I’d figured out who he’d been in school—probably one of the interchangeable second-string jocks who’d flocked around Steve. Clearly, he didn’t quite grasp the concept of sarcasm.

“So I guess nothing much has changed while I’ve been away,” I said.

“Very, very little,” Steve said, stretching his arm along the back of the booth. “But you sure changed.”

I was fairly certain he was flirting with me, but I wasn’t sure how to respond. Part of me wanted to hear how he thought I’d changed, and part of me knew for sure that I’d changed in ways he’d never be able to see. “That does tend to happen as you grow up,” I said. Before he could come back with another attempt at flirtation, I added, “I suppose they still roll up the sidewalks pretty early around here. No dancing in the streets, or anything like that.”

They all looked blank, so I could only assume that either the parking-lot dance Mom had talked about hadn’t really happened, or if it had, it had been a good enough spell that nobody remembered it enough to be able to talk about it. That was the way those things tended to work. Since I’d found no other absolute evidence of magic thus far, I was leaning toward the former.

“I guess the big, bad city chewed you up and spit you out, huh?” Steve said, giving me a pitying look.

I nearly choked on a chunk of brownie. “What?”

“I mean, well, you came home awful quick. What was it, a year you spent up there?” He reached over and patted me on the thigh. “But don’t worry, nobody thinks badly of you. Some people just aren’t meant to go off like that. You’re a hometown girl. You belong back here with us.”

“I—no—not—what?” I was too stunned to form a coherent sentence, which was probably for the best. If I’d said something, it would have been to give him a tongue-lashing for the ages. By the time I formulated an appropriate response, I’d calmed down to the point I no longer wanted to scratch his eyes out. “Actually,” I said coldly, “the company I work for is doing some restructuring, which meant my position was put on hold temporarily. My dad needed a little help at the store, so instead of temping in New York until the company needs me again, I thought I’d come back here and help out.”

I’d told the cover story often enough that I almost believed it, though it was getting harder and harder to convince myself or anyone else about the “temporary” part.

“Whoa, hey, didn’t mean to get you all riled up. I’m just glad to have you back. We should get together sometime.”

“Sorry, I really don’t think I can fit it into my schedule.”

“What, you have a boyfriend or something?” The guys all laughed.

“As a matter of fact, I do.” Well, technically I didn’t, as I’d broken things off with him for the greater good, but I was still hung up on him, which sort of counted.

“And I guess he’s still in New York, huh? Well, what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

I gave him a smile with my teeth bared. “But it could hurt you.”

“Big, tough guy, huh?”

I gave Steve an enigmatic smile and finished my Blizzard quickly enough to give myself an ice cream headache, said a hasty good-bye to the guys, and headed home.

Things settled back to normal after a few days. The following Tuesday morning, Sherri was late, as usual, so I worked the front of the store for the first hour, before I even had a chance to check e-mail and get my office work started. When she finally showed up, I took the opportunity to sit down at the computer. I handled the work stuff first, checking the status of my supply orders and notifying customers who’d have deliveries.

A sudden commotion from the front of the store jolted me away from my work. I hurried out to see Mom leaning heavily on the front counter, shouting for help. Sherri, of course, was nowhere to be seen.

“Mom, what is it?” I asked, rushing to her side. She was deathly pale, and her face was beaded with sweat. She opened her mouth as if to speak, but then her eyes rolled back in her head and she went limp. I barely caught her as she fainted dead away.

Ilowered Mom to the floor as gently as I could, shouting, “Teddy? Sherri? Anyone? I need some help here!” Trying to remember everything I’d learned in the first-aid class I’d taken during Girl Scouts, I checked her pulse and her breathing. Both seemed to be fine, if a little rapid. I leaned over her and tried gently touching her face. “Mom? Mom, can you hear me?”

Sherri chose that moment to wander back in. She took one look at Mom lying there on the floor and screamed her head off. I thought for a moment she might faint, herself, and waited for her to hit the ground, but, unfortunately, she didn’t oblige me. Teddy then came running in. “What happened?” he asked, sinking immediately to his knees next to Mom.