The Accidental Witch (6 page)

“It’s 10 a.m.”

“Yeah. Is that too early? I’m sorry I didn’t mean to bother you.”

“No. I just didn’t think you’d really call me,” I said.

“Why wouldn’t I?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. “How are you?”

“Good,” he said. “It’s my off day, so good.”

“Mine too,” I said.

“Really?” he said. “Would you like to grab lunch or something?”

Lunch. That was a bad sign. At least the numerous chick flicks I watched on a regular basis said it was a bad sign. The truth was I had no idea what it meant, but I liked to imagine that the screenwriters who wrote chick flicks knew more about dating than I did. Of course, they didn’t seem to be right about anything else, so who knew.

“Sure,” I said.

“Can I pick you up?” He seemed hesitant.

“Yeah.”

There was an uncomfortable silence.

“Where do you live?” he asked.

“Oh,” I said and then I gave him directions.

“Would noon be okay?” he asked.

“Sure,” I said.

“See you then,” he said.

“See you then,” I replied as the phone went dead. I stared at the phone for a minute. I certainly hadn’t seen that coming. He had asked me out, but I was under the impression that the likelihood of things like this actually coming to fruition was about one in a million. Maybe I was just bitter.

I looked down at my red dress. It was dusty and covered in muck. I had slept in it. I looked at my watch. I had two hours. I sprinted up the stairs and stripped down naked as I ran to the shower. I rinsed the funk off of me, did all the usual girly things women did to preserve their youth and make themselves pretty. I was never really sure any of these rituals worked, but they were like magic. The ritual felt good and the hope they provided created a relief to the daily anxiety of being a less than perfect woman.

Finally, I stood in front of my closet wrapped in a white towel. I stared vacantly at my disheveled wardrobe. There was nothing I had worn in the last year that would be even remotely appropriate for this date. I really had no idea what would be appropriate, but I knew my usual collection of baggy dresses wasn’t going to cut it. I dug around for a while until I came to a collection of clothes that were still in the wardrobe bag in the back of the closet. I unzipped the bag. Memories flooded over me. Shit. I knew there was a reason I hadn’t opened that bag.

Pressed suits and black evening gowns filled the bag. Bits of wreckage left over from the days when I had been full of potential. Remnants of a life that had gone up in smoke and fire. I looked through the bag and found what I was looking for. A delicate tank top and a pair of jeans that fit like a second skin. I squeezed myself into the pants and pulled on the loose shirt. I couldn’t believe the jeans still fit, but it was a very tight fit. I found matching jewelry and I put on a pair of sandals in time to realize I needed to paint my toes.

When I was done, I looked in the mirror. I wasn’t half bad when I took the time to care. I would never be a natural beauty, or even a beauty, but at least I didn’t look like a bag lady. The doorbell rang. I looked at my watch. He was ten minutes early. Really? My ex had never been early. I had spent most of my married life waiting and I hadn’t known there were real men in the world who didn’t expect you to wait thirty-five minutes for a date.

I opened the door and realized I had left my clothes on the stairs. Too late to fix that error in judgment. Aaron stepped over the threshold and looked around at my crumbling castle. He, of course, looked perfect. He had on shorts, so I could see his sculpted legs and I could see the outline of his perfect physique beneath his T-shirt. His T-shirt had an anatomical picture of a man with all of his parts labeled on it and the man was bent over as if waiting for something obscene to penetrate him from behind. The shirt said
Test time again
.

“That is quite a shirt,” I said.

“Yeah, the nurses love it,” he said. He smiled. His teeth were perfectly white and straight.

“I’ll bet,” I commented.

“You actually live here?” he asked. “I thought this place was abandoned.”

“Mostly abandoned,” I said.

“You’re doing a good job renovating it,” he said. “The inside looks great. You would never know it is so habitable inside by looking at the outside.”

“Yeah, one thing at a time,” I said. “I have a landscaper that’s done some work, but I need electricity and, you know, a toilet more than I need flowers.”

“I like the wallpaper. Are you trying to keep it historically accurate?” he asked.

“As much as I can,” I answered. “It is a large undertaking.”

“You’ve done an amazing job,” he said with genuine admiration. “The house is beautiful.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“Do you like Mexican?” Aaron asked.

“I love it,” I said.

It wasn’t a long drive to the little chain Mexican restaurant that was one of the five sit down restaurants in Dismal. It was a cute little place with all the usual faux Mexican paraphernalia an American would associate with Mexico without having actually been there. There were paintings of stereotypical Mexicans on the walls. The little place was hopping because it was Sunday and everyone liked to eat out on Sunday. Aaron and I got a table by the window. Since Dismal was a small town, I recognized almost half of the people in the restaurant. I was used to this, but I hated the whispers that followed us as we were seated. A few of the nurses from the hospital glared at me in jealousy and one of my father’s friends winked at me as I walked by. Everyone would know about this within twenty-four hours, including my heinous step-bitch. That would mean a phone call and a conversation. I hated talking to her.

We sat down and Aaron ordered a beer and I ordered a margarita. There is nothing that lowers social inhibition and loosens the tongue like alcohol. The entire meal seemed more than a little unreal. My observations of Aaron up until that point had led me to believe he enjoyed talking about himself more than just about anything else in the world. Our conversation, however, felt more like an interrogation than a dialogue.

“So, are you a counselor?” he asked.

“I’m a clinical psychologist,” I said as I shoved chips into my mouth.

“I thought they had to have doctorates,” he said.

“I do have a doctorate,” I said.

“Why the hell are you working as a therapist at Columbia Health?”

“I never said I was a licensed clinical psychologist,” I said as I finished my margarita. “I can’t get my license.”

“Why?” he asked.

I waved to the waitress. “I think I’m going to need another one of these,” I said to her as I signaled to my empty margarita glass.

The waitress left and I ate another chip. “It’s a long story,” I answered.

“I’ve got time,” he said. He was staring at me so intensely, I began to perspire. I really didn’t want to answer his question, but there was no way to avoid it. What was the worst thing that could happen? He would tell everyone what I’d done and the entire town would think I was a slut, but I didn’t really care what they thought either way and there were certainly worse sluts than me in Dismal. If there was one thing the peace of small town life provided for, it was sexual promiscuity.

“I was married before,” I said. “It wasn’t a good marriage. He was in residency when we married and I was still in school. We met in Chicago. I loved him very much, but I was never really sure why he married me. I don’t think he ever loved me. He cheated on me whenever he could and I kept my mouth shut.”

“I’m sorry,” he said and he put his hand on mine. My second margarita arrived.

“I didn’t mind the affairs, but he began wanting to run every aspect of my life. He told me who my friends should be and how I should dress. He picked my hairstyles and my shoes. He told me where to do my internship. I guess it began to wear me down. His constant nagging and nitpicking. I was never good enough. I had to run five miles every morning and he only let me eat salad. I hadn’t had chocolate in five years when we got a divorce. I stopped having my period, I got so thin, but I was still too fat. I was too ugly. I was too honest. Everything I did was wrong. It was like I married my father.”

“After my internship, I had this client. His name was Blake. He was a recovering alcoholic and he was everything John wasn’t. He worshipped me. Every session he told me how beautiful I was and how smart I was. I was a goddess to him. I slept with him. I slept with him a lot. I slept with him every chance I could get and when I was caught, I was banned by the board. I could never get my license or practice psychology again. John left me, of course, and made it look like I was this broken slut of an Alabama hick loser. All my friends in Chicago stopped talking to me because he had chosen them and they preferred him to me. Blake wanted me to stay with him, but I couldn’t stay in Chicago. I was going to go crazy if I stayed. ”

“So I left,” I said. “I left and I came back here and got whatever job I could. I came back just in time to watch my father die of lung cancer, and now here I am. I bought the house after Daddy died.”

“That’s terrible,” Aaron said.

“Yeah,” I answered.

“Your ex sounds like a terrible person.”

“He was an ass hat.”

“At least you’re free now,” Aaron said. “You’re free of your ex and your father and you can do whatever the hell you want and the job at the hospital isn’t that bad.”

“I’m lucky to have it,” I said honestly. “Hospitals are the only places that don’t require licenses anymore. I’m really lucky I’m not working at a fast food restaurant.”

When our food arrived, I briefly thought about eating small portions so I wouldn’t look like too much of a pig, but if he didn’t like me the way I was, he was just out of luck. I had already spent too much of my life pretending to be someone I wasn’t for men.

“You have a good appetite,” he said as he watched me eat.

“It’s the secret to my girlish figure,” I said.

“You’re from here originally?” he asked.

“Yep,” I said. “Where are you from? Are you from Ireland or something?” I said trying to get the spotlight off of myself. I wasn’t really used to talking about myself. It just wasn’t what therapists do.

“Wales,” he said. “But we moved to the States when I was seven. My mother married an American.”

“Do you miss Wales?” I asked.

“It’s not so different from here,” he said. “I lived in a very small town. Honestly, I don’t remember it much.”

“You still have a little of the accent,” I commented.

“I know. I can’t get rid of it. I try. I guess it’s my mom. Every time I hear her talk, it comes back,” he said. “I really don’t have any ties to Wales anymore. I feel like an American.”

“Does your mom live close?” I asked.

“She lives in Haysville,” he said. “What do you want to do now?” he asked as he paid the bill.

“You aren’t bored of me yet?” I asked with an impish grin.

“It is impossible to be bored with you,” he said.

“I find that hard to believe,” I said.

“I would love to see your house,” he said.

I got it. I was slow, but I got it. He wanted to sleep with me. I considered the options. Aaron had a bit of a reputation and he would probably just use me for a bit of Sunday fun and dump me on my butt. I knew I should be afraid of that, but at the time it seemed like a small price to pay to see Aaron naked.

“Sure,” I said. “I can show you my cemeteries.”

“You have cemeteries?” he asked.

“I have three,” I said.

I don’t think that was the answer he was looking for, but it got us going in the direction of the bed, so I didn’t think he would complain too much. He drove me home and we both went inside. We never got to the cemeteries. As soon as the door closed, and we were in the house, his mouth was on mine kissing me with the kind of hunger men have for porn stars and super models. I reciprocated.

He pushed me up against the wall and kissed me on my neck. His hands explored my body over my clothes.

“I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you,” he whispered as he pulled at my shirt.

I wanted to say something, but his mouth was on mine, smothering me. I was breathless. Before I knew it, he had my pants off, which was no easy feat considering how tight they were. He didn’t bother to look for the bed. We collapsed onto the floor and he was inside of me. I moaned. It had been too long.

* * *

It was night by the time we came up for air. Eventually, we had made it upstairs to the bedroom and we lay tangled in each other’s naked limbs. I was drenched with sweat and so was he. There was a sheet over us and the moonlight drifted in through the open window.

“You are the most amazing woman I’ve ever met,” he whispered in my ear. “I think I love you.”

I kissed his forehead and stroked his hair. “That’s just the afterglow talking. You hardly know me.”

“You’re different. You’re not like all the others. Since I met you, I haven’t been able to even look at any other women. I love you,” he said.

“Would you like to see my cemeteries now?” I asked.

He looked a little wounded. He wanted me to say I loved him, too. He was waiting for me to promise myself to him forever, but I didn’t know him. I didn’t know him at all and I wasn’t sure I even knew what love was. I hadn’t seen anything resembling real love in my lifetime. I saw couples fight and I saw divorce and anguish, but I’d never known love. How could I tell a man I first talked to two days ago I loved him? I was old enough to think with my head and not my loins and I knew infatuation when it smoldered through me. I was also mostly convinced it was the spell talking and not the man.

We both got dressed and we strolled through the woods past the old slave cemetery. We walked deep into the woods where the Yankee soldiers had buried their dead when they burned their way through the South. We didn’t talk much. I think we were both lost in thought, but we held hands and that was nice. John had never liked holding hands and Blake and I had always been trying to hide our relationship. Periodically, Aaron would kiss my head. The moonlight poured out over the small white stones.