The Other Woman

17 March 2007

John had been concerned about me ever since we returned from England, and I could hardly blame him. I was having trouble adjusting to the new connection I had with the flow of life around me and was still uncomfortable with what I’d learned about my family history. I tried to think of it in terms of the Hudsons, how it was this other group that was maintaining the Bride and using them like some kind of tool for personal power, but I couldn’t shake the knowledge that I was part of that heritage, that I had the Bride’s blood running through me sure as Michael did. And then the magic sitting there, just beneath the surface of my sense of self, crying out to connect with any living thing nearby, was making me tense and disrupting my sleep whenever John wasn’t there to quiet it. I needed help, I knew that, and didn’t want to rely on just constantly hanging on my boyfriend’s arm. The point of this, after all, was to help me handle the supernatural with or without him. So on St. Patrick’s Day, since we all had plans anyway, I arrived a bit early to talk to Jackie before we met up with everyone else. Sure enough, when I arrived, John was upstairs getting ready, and we had a little time.

I told her everything. I didn’t mean to, I was intending to just tell her about how I was sensing magic more now and needed help processing it, but I ended up telling her about the Bride and Roderick and my grandfather and what those spirits had done to me at my request, and she just listened. I realized near the end what I was doing, and made a point to ask her not to tell anyone, not even John, about some of this. She was reluctant, but she agreed. We heard the shower stop running, and Jackie took my hands and looked me in the eye.

“I’ll help you, as much as I can,” she said. “We’ll resume work on your meditation, and now that we know the nature of it we can really target the exercises we do with it, okay?” I nodded.

“Thank you,” I said.

“But look, I really feel like this is something that shouldn’t be a secret.”

“No, I know, I just. I’m not ready. Not yet.”

“Okay. Well, do you remember what we were working on before?”

“Yeah, I—” I started to answer, before there was a sound like a distant thunderclap, and a sudden crackle in the air that made both of us tense up. For a moment, it felt like the magic was gone again, and then it came boiling back up. Jackie’s eyes grew wide. “Did you feel that, too?”

“Yeah.” She let go of my hands and we both jumped to our feet as we heard John coming down the stairs. “Did you feel that?”

“No. But it was probably something I did,” he answered, rounding the banister at the bottom of the stairs. We both watched him, waiting for more explanation, as he made his way to the recliner and lit a cigarette. “Sit down, you’re freaking me out.”

“What did you do?” I demanded. He sighed, then took another drag before answering.

“It was nothing. Hecate came by, she stopped time so we could talk, I didn’t want to talk so I broke her spell, that’s it.”

“And we felt that all the way down here?”

“I’m surprised you felt it. But I mean, she is a goddess, breaking her spells probably sends some ripples.”

“Hecate was here? Now?” Jackie asked. John nodded, and she ran upstairs.

“That’s a Greek goddess, right? Of magic?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Was it really her?”

“Oh who knows?” he answered with a shrug.

“What does she want with you?”

“Nothing she’s getting.”

“John, this sounds serious!”

“Look, I can handle her, okay? You don’t need to worry about it.”

“You can’t handle her!” Jackie said, coming down the stairs. John groaned and threw his arms up like this was an old fight. I wondered why it wasn’t one I’d been involved in so far. “She is the very embodiment of magic! She is the liminal spaces!”

“Yeah, and I break magic and close liminal spaces! It’s not that big a deal!” He said, picking up his cigarette again. Jackie stormed across the room and nearly jammed her finger directly into his eye.

“You keep downplaying this and people are going to get hurt! She is far more dangerous than you realize! You know she was behind the whole Lori situation?”

“Wait, who’s Lori?” I asked. “What situation?”

“My ex,” John said. We heard footsteps on the porch. “I’ll tell you about it later, okay?” I nodded as Rick, Charles, Tony, and Bob opened the door and filed in. Jackie and I met eyes for a moment, and I knew we were both concerned, but we smiled and greeted the boys all the same. After all, tonight was supposed to be a time to relax and not think about magic, and dammit, that was just what I needed now.

---

Previous

Beginning

Next

---

< Back

Start Here

Next

---