Finding magic in misfort.., p.2
Finding Magic in Misfortune, page 2
“Perfect. Then I’ll see you this afternoon.”
“See you—”
“Oh, also? Do not stop at the hamburger establishment. Drive safely!”
She hung up before I even thought about asking “What burger place?” but I’d learned to roll with it when she gave me vague predictions. Taking her word for it was better than getting food poisoning.
I listened to all the songs I’d had lined up for the first leg of the trip, but they were not enough of a distraction from the fact that my entire life had imploded in a matter of months.
Why did I have to go off on David like that? This thought plagued me often when I replayed all the dominoes that fell to land me here, but the answer I heard in my head every time was, “David was a dick.” Okay, maybe the answer was typically, “Because you needed to leave,” but I liked the first one better.
But I didn’t WANT to leave, I thought back sharply. The thing about my guides, though, was that they didn’t care. They were hilarious that way.
I chewed on my lip as I gave up trying to argue with my people. They were annoying me. The gas station up ahead beckoned for me to buy all the snacks for the four hours I had left. There was, in fact, a burger place next door, but I wasn’t interested in testing my aunt. Gas station pizza would be safer. There was a gap in parking spaces that perfectly fit the car and trailer combo I was rocking, so I said thanks to Pearla for that. She was the best at finding parking. I pictured her curled up and looking smug on top of my car.
It had warmed up since I’d left Rockford, and I tugged on my jean shorts to cover my thighs as they rubbed together. I grabbed candy at random, a slice of who-knows-how-old pizza, and enough iced tea to keep me appropriately caffeinated.
Back in my car, pleasantly surprised at the freshness of said pizza, I tried to envision what living in Emberwood would be like.
Correction, staying in Emberwood. ‘Living’ implies permanence.
Not too many years ago, the idea of living there had been my whole daydream... until it wasn’t. I hadn’t been back since just before senior year of high school. Visiting my great-aunt was my most favorite summer tradition, at least until the end of that summer.
With effort, I tried to remember all the warm, homey feelings from before that, and my heart lurched. I did miss Aunt Zin’s house and, even more so, her shop. I felt like I’d grown up in Books and Broomsticks. It was where I’d learned how to read tarot, read all kinds of books I shouldn’t have, both witchcraft-related and not (Zin liked her pirate romance books near the register). But that place had felt more like home to me than my actual home for a lot of years.
You should have just gotten the soda; fake sweetener be damned. Water with pizza was not hitting the spot. I sighed and chewed.
Not that there was anything wrong with my parents or where I grew up in Indiana. My mom and dad just didn’t quite get me. They loved me; I confused them. I was too strait-laced for my artist mother, who criticized my choice of graphic design instead of the “real arts.” As she put it, graphic design was just creativity for capitalists.
Sue me for wanting health insurance.
I rolled my eyes despite the fact that no one could see me and took the last bite of pizza before heading back out onto the highway.
Me losing my job was probably the highlight of my mother’s year. My dad was an accountant, and he didn’t get any of my witchy “woo-woo” shit. No, they weren’t still married, which was obviously shocking, but they were on friendly terms. Zinnia always acted as if everything I said and did made perfect sense.
I’m lucky to have her, I thought. There was some guilt creeping in about fighting so hard against moving to Emberwood. I could have been forced to crawl back home to one of my parents. Horrifying.
I rolled down all of my windows and let the humid air swirl around me, my curls threatening to abandon my ponytail. I didn’t care, I needed to clear out the negativity I’d brought to my car.
I decided that all of this reminiscing was serving a purpose; convincing me that I was doing the right thing by going there to lick my wounds. Start over.
Too late to second-guess now.
I PULLED INTO THE LONG gravel driveway of Aunt Zinnia’s cottage outside of Emberwood proper, only grabbing my suitcase from the back—unpacking was not happening today. A smile couldn’t help but appear at the jungle of a garden that overflowed onto the front walkway. The scent of the jasmine vines lifted my mood, and I knocked after traversing the terrain to the door.
“I’m offended that you knocked,” Zinnia said as a greeting, pulling me into a fierce hug. We’d seen each other since I last visited, of course, but it wasn’t the same as being together at her house. Tears sprang to my eyes when she didn’t let go. I tried to tell myself it was her Gold Dust Woman perfume, the lingering scent of incense, or the sheer number of plants surrounding her house, but I didn’t buy it.
“I missed you,” I said, stepping back.
“Of course you did. The people in Rockford are boring, and you didn’t belong there. Now come in already.”
She practically glided across her hardwood floors, looking like Stevie Nicks’ older sister, her collection of bangles chiming together, and I wondered if I’d ever be as effortlessly cool. Zinnia was one of those women whose age was difficult to determine. She had streaks of gray and silver that wove through her coarse, dark curls. She either had great skincare, or she was the sort of witch who stole youth from the town’s children on Halloween.
I followed her into the kitchen, marveling at how her normal decor and witchy shit blended throughout the house. Crystals next to family photos, decks of tarot cards stacked next to her unopened mail, runes in the bowl with her shop keys. It all existed harmoniously.
“Are those margaritas?” I asked, looking at the full blender on the counter.
“Yes. Glasses are in the hutch.”
“It’s 3:30 in the afternoon.”
“And time is a construct, so I don’t care. The last time you visited, you were eighteen and couldn’t drink, so consider this a makeup for lost fun.” She arched a brow at me, daring me to argue, but I just shook my head and went to get the glasses.
She poured, and I relaxed. I was glad we’d already hashed out everything that had happened with work, so I didn’t need to talk about it again. Zinnia had gone on a campaign to get me to come stay with her as soon as I told her about losing my job. I’d pushed back. Hard. It had already knocked the wind out of me to admit to my mother that I couldn’t cut it in corporate America, or the “capitalist hellscape,” as she called it. I’d tried to explain to my aunt that I wanted to fix my own mistakes, but she simply continued to act as if it were an irrefutable fact that I’d be staying with her. I couldn’t decide if me being there now was a testament to her psychic abilities, her manifestation abilities, or a little of both.
“Who’s manning the shop if you’re here?” I asked, noting the time.
“No one. It’s closed. Closing periodically without warning only adds to the mystique of the store.”
I laughed through my nose at that. Her shop didn’t need any more mystique, but that’s what kept the tourists coming, so I guessed she knew what she was doing. “Well, whenever you want to put me to work, I’m ready. I need to unpack and return the U-Haul, but other than that.” I was going to at least be useful while I stayed there and attempted to figure out the rest of my life.
“Oh yes, actually, I asked Shelly, you know my neighbor? To send her sons over to bring your boxes to the guest house around five. So don’t worry about that.”
“Aunt Zin, that’s not necessary—”
She interrupted me with a wave. “I told her the same, but I took care of an... issue, we’ll call it, with her now ex-husband a few months back. She’s been intent on repaying me since then.”
I raised an eyebrow at her this time. “Do I even want to know? Or is this like a ‘he-was-never-seen-again’ situation?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, he’s in Columbus. I just helped get him there faster. And with less money than he wanted.” I had to laugh at that.
“Fine, fine, they can unload the U-Haul.”
“Good. Glad that’s settled. We can talk about the shop later. After more margaritas. Go check out the guest house; it’s changed a bit since you were last here. Relax, change, and then we’ll have dinner. I know you said you decided against hexing your former employer, but we can at least put him in the freezer, no?” She gave me an innocent smile before shooing me out the back door toward the tiny guest house.
I shuffled down the gravel path with my suitcase. I tamped down the little spark of comfort I got at being taken care of. Getting too comfortable was the opposite of the purpose of my time here. Recover and move on— that was the only goal.
Chapter 4: Jesse
Icouldn’t decide if it annoyed me that my therapist’s waiting room had such cliché elements, like an essential oil diffuser, watercolor landscapes, and a white noise machine, or if it annoyed me that they actually did make me feel calmer.
It was only my fourth or fifth session since my mom coerced me into coming to therapy. For my mental state rather than my knee, that is. I had been considering it anyway, but seeing my mom cry because she was worried about me was enough to make me do just about whatever she wanted. The armor of anger that had been so prevalent in the past year was starting to come down. I was scared shitless to think about what would be left once all of it was gone.
In the middle of that uplifting thought, Dr. Merrill came to get me. I sank into the pale green armchair across from her and accepted a water bottle.
“Did you do your homework?” she asked.
“Ah, so we’re jumping right in then.” My throat became suddenly in need of that water.
“Would you rather talk about the weather first? It is unseasonably warm, even for the end of July, yes?”
“Point taken. Yeah, I did my homework.” I pulled out some sheets of paper I had folded in my pocket and smoothed them out. “This was...a lot harder than I thought it would be.”
Dr. Merrill nodded. She had asked me to write out four versions of my future. The best-case and worst-case scenarios of each possibility: being able to go back to baseball and, well, not.
“It had seemed like getting back to my team was the only good outcome for so long that I couldn't think about what might be bad about it. But when I had to write it down, it was... difficult.”
“How so? What is the worst thing that could come out of returning to baseball?”
I took a purposeful inhale. The essential oil diffuser was going to have its work cut out for it today.
“I guess I always assumed I’d return because I would recover completely. I never thought about returning if I just recovered partially. I could re-injure my knee to where I’d never walk without a cane or some other support again. I could keep playing but never get back to the same level and never move on from Triple-A ball. I could be second string or lower and rarely even see the field. I—I don’t know how to explain it. But the worst-case scenario would be going back, but it being like an alternate universe where I’m not the same.”
“So, it sounds like the sport itself isn’t the thing you want to get back to. It’s the version of you from a year ago, at the top of your game, that you miss.”
The sound of her pen sliding along her notepad used to make me anxious, but I’d gotten over it. I didn’t particularly care what she was writing anymore as long as I was feeling better.
“Yeah. It wouldn’t feel like home if I’m not the same player. Writing it all down was helpful, even though I thought this whole exercise was kind of ridiculous before I started. Ridiculous because I don’t think I’m going to have a choice. Not really, anyway.”
My voice grew thick, and I willed my throat to relax and let me just get through this without breaking down.
“Sorry, I haven’t said this part out loud to anyone yet.”
“You know the only rule I have. No apologizing for having emotions. Take your time.”
God, why is this so hard? Just spit it out.
“I’m not going back. My rehab has been stalled for a while, no matter how hard I work. My doctor says it’s likely that this is as healed as it will get. While I’m a lot stronger than I was after surgery, it’s nowhere near where I was, and definitely not good enough to play professionally. So. I’m out. I am no longer a shortstop, baseball player, athlete, whatever.”
Dr. Merrill was quiet for a moment, which felt appropriate. Those words were like lead coming out of my mouth. I sucked down what was left of the water, welcoming the cold sensation along my throat.
“Okay. It sounds like you’ve accepted this as the outcome. Before we get into some of that, can I ask about your best and worst cases for this path? For not returning?” Her eyes were soft, and I knew I didn’t have to share them if I didn’t want to.
What else is therapy for?
“Can I just give you the highlights?” I asked, knowing I wouldn’t get through reading what I’d written without losing it.
She just nodded again and waited.
“The best thing I could think of would be to find something that makes me feel even half as good as being on the field, like I’m where I’m supposed to be. Having people in my life that support the new version of me instead of people who only saw me as a player, or people who are waiting for me to go back to ‘normal,’ whatever that is.”
“I think those are both really important things to find for yourself.”
I nodded, almost embarrassed at being complimented on the pretend life I’d created. The other details would have been even harder to share, though.
She doesn’t need to hear about how your girlfriend and your teammates stopped answering your calls and texts once you were off the roster.
“And the worst thing would be to just continue on where I am now. I am... floating down a river without a paddle, and it feels like people are just watching me and rolling their eyes, asking why I can’t steer the damn boat. Not everyone, obviously. I’ve got my parents and my sister and a couple of friends. Maybe I should be more grateful than I am. I just... I feel like I’m not me, and that’s something I’ve never felt before.”
I ran a hand over the stubble that was threatening to turn into more of a beard from the last week of me not caring enough to shave.
“The craziest thing is that I’ve been doing well running my dad’s business. A lot of it sort of came intuitively for me, and maybe I should feel good about it and lean into it. But that sound’s awful.”
“There’s nothing wrong with you for feeling like you do. You’re allowed to be angry and grieve the loss of the life you thought you’d have. It doesn’t matter if other people have it worse. Because your life and your experiences are yours, and theirs are theirs. You don’t have to fit your loss or disappointment on some sort of scale to see where it fits with everyone else’s.”
I breathed out, some of the weight leaving my chest. A lot of well-meaning people would remind me I still had my family, still had my health, or at least I got to live my dream for a little while. And absolutely none of that shit made me feel better at all.
“Okay. That helps. So, where do I go from here?”
Chapter 5: Sam
She wasn’t kidding when she said the guest house had changed, but the feeling that I could do anything, be anything in that space hadn’t changed at all. I couldn’t remember its exact origin story, but I thought my Great-Uncle Linden built it for her to use as an apothecary slash library. Years later, she’d have herbs harvested from her garden all somewhere in the drying process, tons of books and journals, art supplies, easels, whatever. It was magical to be allowed in there as a kid. Once she had the shop, it became more of just an art studio. Zin was not an artist the way my mother was—Zin’s art was whimsical and fun and maybe not technically great, but that’s what made the energy of her space more fun.
But now... it was light and airy with soft white bedding and a beautiful rug full of pinks and golden yellows. She’d put in a chandelier where each bulb sat in a different vintage teacup and saucer. The bookshelves were mostly empty for my own things, though there was a brand-new set of notebooks and fancy pens waiting for me on the nightstand. The small bathroom smelled like handmade soap, and I couldn’t wait to shower off the road trip later. There was never a reason for a kitchenette before, but Zinnia had put in a mini-fridge, a toaster oven, and an electric kettle on a little cart along the back wall.
How has she made this space feel more like me than my own apartment?
I put my suitcase next to the little wardrobe cabinet and started hanging up my clothes. I’d changed into a soft, oversized pink t-shirt and a pair of wide-leg pants when I saw two high-school-aged kids carrying boxes toward the room.
“Go on up to the house, Samantha. I’ll make sure they get everything settled,” Zinnia assured me.
I nodded, thanked the two kids, and made my way back toward the main house.
Tacos.
A giant platter of tacos and rice and beans and chips and salsa sat in the middle of the butcher block island, and my mouth watered. There was almost nothing in this world that couldn’t be improved by adding tacos. I hesitated an entire three seconds before deciding that my loving aunt would not want me to wait when all I’d eaten was a piece of gas station pizza.
I took one bite of delicious fried tortilla when my phone buzzed in my pocket. I tried to take it out without getting grease everywhere, but sometimes sacrifices were necessary. I pressed the answer-call button with my pinky and put it on speaker.
“Hey, Laur!” I said, trying to sound like I did not have a mouth full of food.
