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“Oh no, dear, I couldn’t tell you that. Your aunt may be ready to divulge all of her secrets, but I like to keep one or two up my sleeve,” she had said.
“Ah, yes, here it is.” Her muffled voice emerged from the purse a second before she did. She triumphantly held up a stack of Erma’s Pies boxes.
“You keep pie in there?” I asked.
“You never know when you’ll need some,” she said. “Impromptu dinner party, afternoon snack, an antidote to stop crazed knitters.”
Aunt Erma took the boxes from Lena and opened the lid. She took a deep breath.
“The triple berry. Yes, this one should work. The unaltered spices will counteract the altered spices they used.” She pulled a bottle out of her pocket. It was clear and plain, not like her other spice bottles, but it had green flakes in it. I recognized them as leaves from the tree but I didn’t know when she’d had a chance to crumble them up and put them in a bottle. She sprinkled a healthy dose on top of all the pies. “A little extra boost,” she explained.
“They’re not all going to eat willingly. We’re going to have to coax them,” Lena said.
Lena did some more digging in her purse and emerged with three forks and a knife. We each took a pie. I watched Aunt Erma approach a young man who was knitting and offer him a bite of pie. He shook his head vehemently, his sandy brown hair flopping across his face. Without missing a beat, Aunt Erma shoved a bite into his mouth. His eyes widened so much I thought they might pop out of his head. He chewed and swallowed, all the while making “Mmmm” noises. Then his face changed. His brow furrowed, and he looked around.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“Don’t worry about it,” Lena said. “You’re just having a strange dream. Go home.”
The man shrugged and shuffled off.
“All right, everyone, understand the plan?” Aunt Erma asked.
Lena and I nodded. Then we all set off, shoving small bites of pie into people’s mouths as we went. Some of the people I encountered eagerly opened their mouths when offered pie – they were probably hungry after all this knitting – while others proved to be a bit more challenging. I dodged a man who tried to jab me with a knitting needle. I snuck behind him and reached around to shove a forkful of pie into his mouth.
“Aren’t they all going to talk and figure out they had the same strange dream?” I asked Lena as I airplaned a bite into a young girl’s mouth. Lena did the same with the girl’s mother. The girl dropped the yarn ball she had been winding up and followed her mother out the door.
“Most of them will have forgotten about this completely by tomorrow. Only a few will have a distant memory of this strange dream,” she said. “It won’t be enough for them to put it together that it actually happened.”
“Some of them might be a little sore tomorrow from all the work,” Aunt Erma said as she ran past, chasing a man with gray hair and thick glasses. The man threw a ball of yarn at Aunt Erma, and she tackled him and shoved the bite of pie into his mouth before he could stop her.
I was bitten at least six times, but we finally cleared the church of all frantic knitters. I leaned against the wall and began planning which pajamas I was going to put on as soon as I got home – the footy pajamas with the turtle print – and what I was going to eat – pizza with three sides of pie.
“We have to get all this out of here.” Aunt Erma motioned to the giant knitted circle that had yet to take shape as the largest mitten in the world.
“Why?” I asked. I didn’t want to let anything keep me from that pizza any longer than necessary.
“It’s a lot harder to convince people it was a dream when they can come to the church and find two tons of yarn and a knitted circle as large as a parachute.
After we’d cleared everything, dispersing some of it to different shops and shoving the rest of it into the back of Lena’s car, we headed back to Hocus Hills.
“What are those?” I asked as we pulled into town, pointing at a light pole plastered with sheets of paper.
“I’m not sure.” Lena slowed the car down. Aunt Erma finished reading first and gasped.
In big bold letters, the signs said, “Tired of hiding? It’s time to work for the Improvement for Magical People. If you’re ready to step out of the shadows, stay tuned for more information from the IMPs.” The flyers were everywhere.
“It was all a circus. They just wanted to get you out of town, so you couldn’t stop them from doing this,” Lena practically yelled.
Aunt Erma let her head fall to the back of the seat. “I don’t know why we didn’t see that before.” She sighed.
A crew led by Violet was already pulling posters down.
“We were so focused on what you guys were doing that we didn’t even see this happen until it was too late,” she said. “They worked fast. It was done in a matter of seconds.”
Aunt Erma’s brow furrowed. “Their magic is getting stronger.”
“I know. The regular spells aren’t working to clean it up, so we’re doing it the non-magic way,” Violet said.
I grabbed a bag and went to work, quickly pulling signs off the light poles and the sides of buildings.
“Hey.” Holly appeared by my side. “I hear you saved the world from crazed knitters.”
“Yup, I’m a regular superhero,” I said. “What’s their deal anyway?” I held up the signs I’d just yanked off the front of the florist shop.
“There are some people who think that non-magical people should be hiding from us since we’re supposedly the more powerful ones,” she said. “Personally, I think they should just chill. Our life here is pretty great, and it could be really dangerous for magic to get out in the world.”
“How long have they been around?”
“I don’t know. A long time, but they haven’t really been active for the last several years. Everyone thought they disbanded and gave up. No one realized Alice was part of this bigger movement until the posters were plastered everywhere,” she said.
“How do we stop them?”
“We keep them from getting too much magic.”
It sounded so easy and so impossible at the same time. They had some of Aunt Erma’s spices, but they didn’t know about the tree. I saw a small group of people by the gazebo looking at one of the fliers and talking animatedly. I inched closer, pretending to be focused on my job of cleaning up.
“I was trying to do a spell to fix my roof last year, and the Magic Enforcers stopped me because the magic was too big.” The sarcasm was clear in his voice.
“It’s Violet. She’s out there squashing magic. Maybe if she’d let people practice more, we wouldn’t have people attacking our town and our neighbors. We’d be equipped to fight them off,” a woman said.
“The IMPs might bring a breath of fresh air. We’ve been stuck living like this for so long, we don’t even consider new ideas anymore,” another woman chimed in.
I quickly scooted away, stuffing another handful of fliers into my almost full bag. I had to go tell Aunt Erma what I’d heard.
I found her heading back toward the pie shop. A crowd had gathered outside, and people began to stir when they saw Aunt Erma approaching. I grabbed her and quickly told her what I’d overheard.
“How are we going to deal with this?” I asked.
“I’ll tell Violet.” Her forehead wrinkled. “This is exactly what they want.”
“The IMPs?” I asked.
She nodded. The clean-up was almost done so I headed to the pie shop to help.
“Come in, everyone,” she said as she shuffled between the grumbling crowd to unlock the front door. “Thanks for your patience. Coffee for everyone, on the house!”
“Someone was looking for you,” Nadine, one of our regulars, whose blonde curly hair was always gathered in a poof on top of her head, said to me. As far as I could tell, her job in town was to spread gossip.
“Oh yeah? Who?” I asked, following her through the door.
“I don’t know. Some guy.”
“Henry?” I asked, even though I figured he would call me if he was looking for me.
“No, some curly-haired guy I haven’t seen before.” She shrugged.
“I guess this mystery man will have to come back if he wants to talk to me.” I went back to the kitchen and stopped in my tracks.
“Mom,” I said.
“You recognize me. I’m so touched,” she said, barely looking up as she sliced a peppermint cream pie. My mom’s brown hair was just a shade lighter than mine. Unlike mine, it was smooth and perfectly styled. Instead of her usual business suit, she wore jeans and a dark green sweater.
My mother had gone back to the city a couple weeks after Aunt Erma had become human again after being a cat. We’d had a wonderful week where our days were full of baking and gossiping – we were a regular holiday special! – then the bickering had begun, and the comments under our breath, and my mother had decided she had to get back to her clients at home. I didn’t blame her. It was a lot of intense family time after a long separation.
“She’ll be back soon,” Aunt Erma had reassured me as I had watched her car drive away with a lump in my throat. I had been enjoying the gossiping and reminiscing. It had been so long since I’d seen my mother laugh that much.
That was less than two weeks ago, and here she was again. I guess I didn’t have anything to worry about.
“Erma called and asked me to come help at the pie shop while you guys went on some sort of mission.” My mother began cutting the next pie more forcefully than was actually necessary.
“We have to go—” I began.
“No,” my mother cut me off, still keeping her eyes on the pie. “I don’t want to know. I know it has to be dangerous. I could tell from Erma’s tone. It’s best if I just worry here instead of knowing the specifics. I’ll just serve pie and worry.”
Ah, my mother the martyr.
“How long are you here for?” I asked.
“I booked a room at the inn for three nights, but we’ll see,” she answered. My mother preferred to stay at the local inn instead of squishing into the apartment with us.
Aunt Erma had already fulfilled the orders of the crowd before sneaking to the back of the kitchen to make a phone call. She faced the corner and spoke in a low voice, probably talking to Violet. The angry grumbles out front had turned into happy chattering as people drank their free cups of coffee.
“I’m taking my cats to see Santa,” someone said.
“My sister is coming to visit with her four children, and they’re all staying in my one-bedroom apartment,” I heard someone else say as I filled an empty mug with more steaming coffee.
“My husband is in a Christmas play, and he wants me to go watch all twelve performances,” another voice chimed in.
I heard a familiar voice say my name. I saw him in the crowd, but it didn’t register because he was a familiar face in an unfamiliar place. I was shocked and speechless for a moment.
“Josh,” I finally managed to croak, reaching out to hug him.
“Hey, Susie.” He was warm and smelled like sawdust. He held me for a second longer after I had let go.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, taking a step back to look at him. His dark curly hair had gotten a little long. He had dark circles under his brown eyes, and his usually rosy cheeks were pale. “Is everything okay?”
“Hal has me working at a big remodel in Mavisville,” he said. Mavisville was another nearby town. “It should take a couple of weeks.”
“That’s great. We’ll definitely have to get together to catch up,” I said.
“Someone gave me one of these.” He held up one of the IMP fliers, and I snatched it out of his hand.
“That’s for a holiday play the town is putting on. They’re very creative here.” I could hear my voice coming out a little too high-pitched as I crumpled the paper and stuffed it into my pocket.
“I need to talk to you,” he said.
At least four people in the store stopped their conversations to openly stare at us.
“Let’s go outside.” I grabbed the sleeve of his coat and led him towards the front door.
“Who is that?” I heard someone whisper loudly as I opened the door.
“Beats me. I’d bet an old boyfriend,” someone else said.
I glared over my shoulder in the general direction of the voices. Josh and I had been co-workers back home. We had grown to be good friends, but it was never anything more than that. Josh was the one I’d call when I was having trouble with a relationship, and I would give him insights on the people he dated whether he asked for it or not. I hadn’t really talked to him since I’d left – just a couple quick text messages that didn’t really say much.
I wrapped my gray sweater more tightly around myself and faced him. I thought longingly of my red coat hanging on the hook at the back of the kitchen. Why had I suggested going outside? The mid-December wind was biting against my skin. Oh yeah, outside was the only place we had a shot at not being eavesdropped on. However, if anyone could lip-read, we were in trouble as all of the customers in the shop were blatantly staring through the window. They practically had their noses pressed against the glass.
I took a couple of steps back toward the flower shop next door so we were at least a little out of sight, though I wasn’t sure there was anywhere completely out of sight in this town …
Josh stared at the ground for a minute.
“Is everything okay?” I asked again. I wanted this to hurry up, so I could get back to the toasty warm kitchen.
“So, you live here now?” he asked, looking up and down the street.
“I think so,” I said with a shrug. “I haven’t really figured it out long term yet. I live here for now, I guess.”
“I’m glad you got to reunite with your aunt,” he said. Josh had heard my sob story more than once about my long-lost Aunt Erma. Usually it was after a bad day at work or a fight with my mom and a few beers.
“Yeah, it’s been nice,” I said. It was silent for a minute, and I was about to tell him I had to go back inside.
“You didn’t even say goodbye to me,” he said suddenly, meeting my eyes for the first time since we’d stepped outside.
“What?”
“We were friends. Maybe more. At least I thought we were.” He said the last part more to himself than to me.
I opened my mouth. Nothing but air came out.
“Was I just imagining it? I kind of thought we were on track to get together. I thought you felt it too. Heck, I’ve loved you since I saw you fix that hole on the side of the Morrow’s house. You were fearless at the top of the ladder while the rest of us were too chicken to climb that high.”
I remembered that job. I had been terrified too, but I had been new at Hal’s Handyman Services, and I’d wanted to show off in front of my new co-workers. Afterwards I’d had to excuse myself to the side of the house where I’d promptly thrown up in a trash can. I thought back to my time with Josh. Had I missed the signs? Sure, we had been good friends. I would even consider him to be one of my best friends. I hadn’t meant to drop him when I came to Hocus Hills, but finding my long-lost aunt, discovering magic was real, and trying to squash an evil plot to take over the world all took up a lot of one’s free time.
“Josh, I …” I paused for a minute. “I’m sorry I didn’t say goodbye.” It sounded lame when I said it. He looked at me expectantly. “And I’m sorry I haven’t kept in touch better. It’s been so crazy around here.”
I didn’t even know where to begin with his other confessions. There had been a time a few years ago when I’d thought about him that way. I’d even tried to flirt with him and hang out with him more than usual, but shortly after I’d begun to have those feelings, he’d started dating a woman his sister had set him up with. It had been serious for a while, and I’d moved on too. I hadn’t really let myself think about it again since then.
