K.D. Wentworth has sold more than seventy pieces of short fiction to such markets as The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, Realms of Fantasy, Weird Tales, and Return to the Twilight Zone. Three of her stories have been Finalists for the Nebula Award for Short Fiction. Currently, she has seven novels in print, the most recent being The Course of Empire, written with Eric Flint and published by Baen. She lives in Tulsa with her husband and a combined total of one hundred sixty pounds of dog (Akita + Siberian Husky) and is working on several new novels with Flint. Website: http://www.kdwentworth.com
Poppy's cell phone struck up the overwrought strains of the "William Tell Overture" as she was driving her son, Chase, to soccer practice. Obviously someone had been fooling with her settings again, and The Lone Ranger was Chase's favorite. Eyes narrowed, she glanced sideways at his eight-year-old snub-nosed face, but he remained focused on his hand-held Nintendo DS.
Annoyed, she flipped her cell phone open with one hand while scanning ahead for the turnoff to the practice field. "Hello?"
"Poppy, it's your mother," the phone said. "I have a bad feeling about your new neighborhood. Are you keeping your eyes open? You never did learn how to cast a decent circle."
A gust of chill autumn wind skittered red and gold leaf skeletons across the street. "Mom, you know I love you, but you've been dead now for three years," Poppy said, spotting her turn on the other side of the Quik Trip just ahead. "At some point, you're going to have to quit calling so much."
"So you're too grown up to listen to your mother now," the phone said mournfully.
"No, of course not," Poppy said. "I just want you to enjoy your Afterlife, take it easy, meet some new people, catch up with old friends. There's bound to be someone interesting—"
"Oh, ho, your father's dating again, isn't he?"
"Mom, he doesn't like me to discuss his private life with you, now that you're, you know, gone," Poppy said.
"Well, he won't take my calls anymore."
"And whose fault is that?" Poppy said. "You jinxed his neighbor, Mrs. Hanson, when she took him a green bean casserole the week after you died. The poor old soul's TV didn't get the Shopping Channel for months. She almost expired from boredom."
"The vixen!" her mother said. "That red hair is straight out of a bottle. The old bat has been after him for years!"
Poppy slowed and signalled for a left-hand turn. "Mom, I have to go," she said. "Why don't you sign up for a celestial seaweed wrap and try to relax?"
"But—"
"Bye!" Poppy folded the phone and tucked it in her purse. Beside her, Chase was rocking back and forth, muttering at the excruciatingly cute animated forest creatures on his tiny screen. "Die, Thumper, die, die!"
The road was clear of on-coming traffic so Poppy swung the steering wheel left.
The SUV, though, turned right. She braked, then parked on the side street, flustered. Someone had been mucking about with the Honda, even though she'd always been careful to not Wake it. "Chase," she said, "have you been practicing hexes in the car again?"
His thumbs flew over the control buttons. "Die, Bambi, die!"
She reached over and pulled out his earbuds. "Chase!"
"Jeeze, Mom, I almost made it to Level Fifty in Enchanted Forest Terminator!" His hazel eyes were resentful. "Now I'll have to start all over again."
"What have you been doing to this car?" she insisted.
"Nothing," he said and glanced at the dashboard clock. His eyes widened. "Hey, if I'm late, Coach Gibbs will make me run laps! He's already on my case all the time."
That was true. On his old soccer team, before they'd moved out to the suburbs, Chase had been a starter. These days he seemed to fumble every opportunity, warming the bench more and more each game. Sighing, she laid a hand on the dashboard, willing the Honda SUV to behave. "Okay, we're turning around. No funny stuff!" The car rattled once dramatically, then died.
Chase rolled his eyes. "Nothing we have ever works like other people's stuff!" he mumbled, not quite under his breath.
She punched the hazard lights on. "It's only half a mile," she told her son. "I'll walk you down, then call for a tow."
Scowling, he jerked his sports duffle from the back seat and slid out of the car. He slammed the door, then trudged at her side, head down, as though being conscripted into a chain gang.
Behind them, the SUV's engine rumbled to life. The dark-green car executed a perfect three-point turn, sans driver, and then rolled along at their heels like a good-natured hound.
"Oh, don't try to make up now," Poppy said to the SUV over her shoulder. "I'm really quite vexed. You can just darn well park yourself and stay here until I get back."
The SUV revved its engine. The windshield wipers flicked back and forth in what might have been interpreted as an apologetic manner.
"I think it's sorry, Mom," Chase said. "Can't we please give it another chance so I won't be late?"
The two front doors flew open invitingly. "All right," Poppy said against her better judgement. Someone Gifted had definitely had a hand in this and unfortunately she had more than a passing suspicion that it had been her husband. Dominick had a history of ineptitude with mechanical matters, culminating with his recent misadventures with her new smoothie-maker. In the end, they'd just had to repaint the kitchen. Well, she'd have to find out what he'd done to the SUV and see if she could then quietly reverse it without ruffling his masculine pride any more than necessary.
They climbed back in and drove to the practice field without further incident until the Honda absolutely insisted upon parking next to a massive white Lincoln Navigator, even though there were better spots closer in.
"Flirt!" she said as she clicked the door shut. The locks promptly engaged themselves. They walked to the sidelines, then she held Chase's duffle while he stuffed his shin guards down into his socks. "Now, remember: Even if Albert trips you again, even if there's blood, no hexes. I don't care if anyone is looking or not!"
He nodded solemnly, then trotted off to run down the field with his nonGifted teammates just like any eight-year-old boy. She'd been worried last spring when Dominick got a promotion that required them to move out here from Queens so that he could run a local grocery store distribution center, but so far they were fitting into the nonGifted scene with only occasional misfires.
She still missed her old coven, though, where spells and hexes were the subjects of everyday conversation and they shared recipes for Conjuring Peace and Curing Discord, rather than the intricacies of Raspberry Supreme Jello Icebox Cake.
She perched on the rickety wooden bleachers next to Mary-Ann McGovern, who was so slim and perfectly turned out with her freshly pressed jeans and lacy cuffs that she made Poppy's teeth ache. Several other matrons made room for her and then she did her best to participate in a tediously earnest conversation that ranged from school bake sales to "unreported stains."
None of it captured her interest, though, and she found herself speculating on what exactly her husband had done to the car. It was showing signs of self-awareness, which was never good news in a machine. Wakened devices were unpredictable and had unsettling senses of humor.
"Do you have Chase on vitamins?" Mary-Ann asked when Poppy's son lagged behind the other boys as they ran wind sprints. "The poor dear seems a bit peaked." Mary-Ann's son, Ethan, was bounding back and forth like a young gazelle without a bead of sweat, looking amazingly fit. On the surface, the woman's expression was concerned, but Poppy thought she detected a hint of smugness. Their sons played the same position: forward. Ethan was a starter, Chase, since moving here, second string.
"Why, yes," Poppy said, resisting the temptation to whisper a Reveal spell and make Mary-Ann confess her inner thoughts in front of all her friends. That wouldn't be nice, she told herself firmly, and everyone here in Windsor Heights Rancho Estates was nice—all the time—even if it killed them. "But maybe I should change brands."
Once practice was over, she discovered the dark-green Honda SUV was not parked next to the Navigator where she'd left it. "Gosh," Chase said, duffle in one hand, bottle of blue sports drink in the other. "Do you think someone stole it?"
"I wish!" she said under her breath as one by one the rest of the mothers loaded their sons into their cars and drove away in the fading light. Finally, she and Chase located the SUV at the far end of the parking lot where it had shamelessly crept off to cozy up to Mary-Ann McGovern's magnificent black Hummer.
"The car's acting funny," Chase said that night as the three of them sat down to roasted pork tenderloin.
His father, Dominick, looked up from his plate, then reached for the mustard sauce. "What's wrong with it?"
"Nothing, really," Poppy said, giving Chase her most deadly not-one-more-word look.
"It turns wherever it wants, not where Mom wants," Chase said, blithely oblivious. "What's for dessert?"
Dominick's brow furrowed. "But I just worked on it."
"Oh?" Poppy said, her suspicions confirmed. Her husband had little talent for mechanical matters, which wasn't his fault. Different Gifts ran in different family bloodlines. Everyone knew that. Her father-in-law, a male witch who was strongly Gifted himself, had warned her on her wedding day to keep Dominick away from automotive and do-it-yourself projects.
"He has a good heart, our Dominick, but not the slightest idea what all those little bits inside an engine are for," her father-in-law had said. "Once, when he was thirteen, he accidently spelled the lawn mower into thinking it was a vacuum cleaner. We had shredded blue carpet everywhere."
Poppy shuddered at the mental image that conjured.
"Yes," Dominick said, "the engine seemed a bit rough when I drove to Home Depot Wednesday night, so I smoothed it out with an old Tuning incantation, my dad's favorite, never fails."
"Chase is exaggerating," Poppy said desperately. She shot her son a withering look, then spooned broccoli onto his plate despite his attempt to wave her off. "I'm sure the car is fine."
"I'll just take a look at it after dinner," Dominick said.
They ate in blessed silence then, the only sound silverware clinking against the white pottery plates, but her mind whirled. The last thing that car needed was for him to take another go at it. Maybe she could head him off with a request to help Chase with his homework. That was entirely plausible. School was another area where their son had done better before the move. These days, he struggled to bring home even C's.
"Grandma called again today," Chase said around an oversized bite of crescent roll. "When I told Brian at soccer practice, though, he didn't believe me. He said other kids' dead grandmas don't call them."
"I told you not to talk about that with outsiders!" Poppy said. Bats, rats, and snakes! She'd thought, or at least hoped, he was too preoccupied with his Nintendo to notice when Grandma had called. "Other people don't understand."
"Mom never lets me speak to her, though," Chase said thoughtfully, after swallowing a mouthful that would have choked a python. "How come?"
Dominick put down his fork and met Poppy's eyes. "Weren't you going to have a discussion about that with Grandma?"
"She's just having a little difficulty fitting in up there," Poppy said. The pork, painstakingly marinated for twenty-four hours, suddenly tasted like damp sawdust. "I'm sure any day now she'll join a celestial bowling league or take up angelic poetry slams and be having so much fun, she'll forget to call."
"When I get to the Afterlife, I'm going to be a NASCAR racer!" Chase said, ignoring his broccoli and reaching instead for a second helping of mashed potatoes.
Poppy excused herself and went to the kitchen to dish up the chocolate mousse. Just as she opened the refrigerator, though, the phone rang. Seconds later, she heard Chase in the living room exclaiming, "Grandma!"
* * *
She was almost finished loading the dishes into the dishwasher when Dominick came in. His dark hair was mussed and he had a manly smudge on one cheek from peering under the hood. "I drove the car around the block," he said. "It seems fine."
"Told you." She dried her hands. "Did Chase do his homework?"
Dominick leaned against the cabinet. "He talked to Grandma for twenty minutes, then claimed he didn't have any."
She sighed. Chase always said that. Asking about homework was the equivalent of starting a Third World haggling transaction. The "No Homework" statement was only an opening position. He didn't expect them to believe him.
Having fooled his father, no doubt the young rascal now intended to hex his teacher, Mrs. Gruber, into forgetting to collect homework tomorrow. The first time Chase had done that, soon after they'd moved to Windsor Heights Rancho Estates, the poor woman had forgotten where she lived and emigrated to Tibet. His class had suffered a substitute teacher for weeks until she and her memory had returned.
"I'd better double-check," she said. She found Chase on his knees, staring out the living room window. "About that nonexistent homework," she said.
"The car!" he said, turning to her. "It just sneaked out of the driveway."
"Right," she said, crossing her arms. "Like it could open the garage door on its own. Do you have Math or Language?"
His face was flushed. "No, really!"
She peeked out and saw red taillights as a car made a left-hand turn at the corner. It did look like their SUV.
"Should I get Daddy?" he said, standing up.
"No!" She tried to think. The Honda had seemed bent on socializing today, first the Lincoln Navigator, then—the Hummer. The McGoverns lived just three streets over. "I have to find it before anyone notices it's trundling around the neighborhood on its own. You stay here and do your homework."
"But—"
"No arguments!" She snatched up her purse from the coffee table, then ducked into their home office where Dominick was seated before the computer. "I'm going to run to the store."
He nodded, focused on the latest wrenchingly bad You Tube American Idol audition.
Back in the living room, she shrugged into her jacket, kissed the top of Chase's head as he sorrowfully thumbed through his Science book, then dashed out the front door. Outside, the night was crisply chill, the half-moon visible behind a few wispy clouds, shedding a pale silvery radiance once her eyes adjusted.
She hiked through the darkness to the McGoverns' faux Victorian, fuming. She loved her husband, but Dominick had only made the car worse. Calling him on it, though, was sure to bring on masculine sulking. She got enough of that with Chase.
The Honda SUV was parked in the McGoverns' driveway next to the gleaming black Hummer, playing its radio softly, tuned to a station that specialized in romantic ballads. She tried the car door, but it was locked, so she dug in her purse for the key.
"Having a spot of trouble there?" someone said from the dark recesses of the broad porch.
Her heart thumped. "Mary-Ann?"
"I heard the car pull up," Mary-Ann McGovern said, walking down the path. She held something snuggled in her arms.
Inexplicably, the Hummer rumbled to life and turned on its headlights. "I—" Poppy started, but could think of no plausible explanation for her presence in their driveway. "Um, Chase—"
"Yes, poor sweet Chase." Mary-Ann was wearing a dazzling white ski jacket against the chill. In the darkness, it seemed to float toward Poppy. "Ethan says he used to be a starter."
"Yes," she said slowly. Chase had played much better before, often the game's top scorer. Now his passing was sloppy and he seemed to lose focus almost immediately when the coach did allow him into the game, which was less and less.
"Maybe you should take him back to his old team," Mary-Ann said, "so that he can play more at his own level." Her voice dripped with fake solicitude. "He's out of his depth here."
Poppy realized the bundle in the woman's arms was an overweight pug. It sniffed at her, then growled. "There's more to life than soccer," she said, her groping fingers finally encountering the cool metal of her keys. "I'm sure he'll adapt."
"As for this little car," Mary-Ann said. "It's so—compact, so—well, cramped. I don't know how on earth you manage."
"It gets good gas mileage." Poppy clicked her remote, but the Honda's locks didn't disengage.
"And that's an important consideration, isn't it?" Mary-Ann stopped a few feet away, fingers stroking the obese dog. "It is expensive living out here. The life-style is not for everyone. It might be cheaper if you moved back to the city and commuted."
Poppy's cell phone launched into the Lone Ranger theme (she'd forgotten to reset it) and Mary-Ann stifled a laugh with her well manicured hand. Irritated, Poppy pulled the phone out of her purse, flipped it open and checked the number. "Withheld," of course. "Mother?"
"I told you to keep your eyes open!"
"Not now, Mom, please!"
"Yes, now," her mother said. "Chase—"
"Later!" Poppy snapped the phone shut, then inserted her key into the lock. It wouldn't turn.
Mary-Ann laid a hand on the Honda's hood. "I'm afraid our Hummer has become rather fond of this quaint little car." She smiled and her teeth glimmered in the moonlight. "This model is practically an antique, though. I'm surprised it's still running. Automotive love—inexplicable isn't it?"
What was going on? "Cars don't—" Poppy began, then broke off as the stupid pug winked at her.
"Go home," it said in a growlly little voice. "This is our territory."
It was a familiar. Poppy had never possessed one, but she recognized the breed. She looked at Mary-Ann, finally understanding the situation. "You!"
"As Precious said, this is our family's territory," Mary-Ann said. "My great-grandparents claimed it long ago when the area was just farms and fields, and we have defended it since against all intruders." The woman's fingers formed a Repel sigil and Poppy could feel the sickening force of it driving her away. "The longer you stay here where you're not wanted, the worse things will get. I'm afraid you're hopelessly outclassed."
Mary-Ann was Gifted. Poppy felt so incredibly stupid. She should have seen it weeks ago. No wonder poor Chase fell over his own feet every time he took the field. He'd been hexed.
Her phone rang again. She flipped it open without taking her eyes off Mary-Ann's smug face.
"Poppy, you have to listen to me! Chase has been—"
"Yes, Mom, I just figured that out."
"I could tell when I talked to him earlier," her mother said. "What are you going to do about it?"
"Later, Mom!" She closed the phone and shoved it back into her purse. With a chill, Poppy had not the slightest doubt what was wrong with her car either. Dominick, with all his well intentioned bumbling, hadn't Wakened it. He didn't have the talent. Mary-Ann had done it just to make trouble. As for Chase, whatever her neighbor's feelings about a new Gifted family intruding into what she considered to be her "territory," no one had the right to take it out on her kid!
Her hands clenched so that the car keys bit into her fingers. "You hexed an eight-year-old boy!"
"Actually, it didn't take much," Mary-Ann said, nuzzling the pug's head. "The child is inherently clumsy. He must have gotten that from you, dear." She smiled poisonously. "I only heightened his innate tendency to fall on his face."
Poppy's cheeks flushed, the heat of her anger rushing through her all the way down to her toes. "Take it off!"
"No." Mary-Ann's eyes were bright with satisfaction. "I won't—ever. You might as well crawl back to where you came from—Queens, wasn't it? Then you can do cute little Cleansing rituals with basil, bake Love crumpets out of coriander, and dance in broomstick skirts under the moon with all the other kitchen-witches. We do things with a little more class here."
A car turned and drove down the street, blinding her for a moment with its headlights. Poppy put her hand on the Honda and, summoning all her will, murmured, "Open!" The locks disengaged, the door opened. She glared at Mary-Ann. "This isn't finished!"
"On the contrary, little mouse," Mary-Ann said, stroking the pug. "I think you'll find that it never even got started."
Poppy climbed into the Honda and drove back to her garage, seething. There, she closed the door and disengaged the automatic opener to keep her wandering vehicle home.
Dominick was in the living room when she came in, still prickly with outrage. "Do you need me to carry stuff in from the car?" he said, eyes on the TV.
Belatedly, she remembered that she'd supposedly been "going to the store," but she didn't want to tell him about the McGovern woman. If he tried to intervene, he would likely only make matters worse. "They—were out," she said, dropping her purse.
"Of what?" He was watching Dance Idol Countdown, a competition with scantily costumed female dancers who twirled and arched their backs most fetchingly.
"Um, everything." She went to hang her jacket up.
"Oh," he said, leaning forward as a lithe young thing, clad in little more than a thong and a pair of bandanas, performed a magnificent handspring into the splits. "That's—odd."
She ran fingers through her wind-tossed hair and tried to think through her anger what she should do. "Where's Chase?"
"I sent him to brush his teeth and go to bed."
She found her son sitting in the middle of his bedroom rug, playing with his Nintendo again. His thumbs flew over the tiny buttons. "Die, Flower! Die, Faline! Die, Bambi! Die, die!"
"Put that up for now, please," she said, then settled cross-legged beside him as he reluctantly set it aside. Smoothing ash-blond hair back from his forehead, she said, "Did Ethan or his mother give you something?"
He shook his head, looking longingly at the Nintendo.
"Think hard," she insisted. "Anything at all, even something really small like a piece of gum. This is important."
"No, Mom," he said. "Ethan hates me." He knuckled his sleepy eyes. Can I finish my Nintendo level?"
"Tomorrow," she said. "It's time for bed."
"Coach said I can't play in the next game unless I do better in Friday's scrimmage," he said, slipping under the covers.
"It's all right," she said, kissing his forehead. "I can just about guarantee things are going to improve."
"I want to go home," he said. Tears welled in his hazel eyes. "Everything was easier, and I miss my friends. No one believes me here about anything. They all just think I'm weird."
"Well, you can't talk about Grandma's calls." She smiled. "Even I have trouble believing that!" She tickled him until he laughed with her. "Good night."
" 'Night, Mom," he said and turned over.
She sighed and went to pick up discarded clothes scattered like fallen leaves across the carpet, then noticed that the Nintendo was still on. Tiny animated rabbits and fawns were dashing through the forest, fleeing a lumbering rifleman. Why had Dominick ever bought him such a violent game? She certainly wouldn't have.
She picked up the device to turn it off and a tingle ran through her fingers, up her arm, deep into her brain. She dropped the plastic case back to the carpet, suddenly lost in a forest with looming, closely spaced trees, hearing footsteps and echoing gunshots. "Chase," she said, staring at her prickling hand, "where did you get this game module?"
He rolled over sleepily. "Enchanted Forest Terminator? I swapped one of my old games with Lonny." He sat up. "I was tired of Street Car Rally and this one is really rad. Even when it's not on, I can see the forest and the rifleman and the animals in my head all the time. It's like I'm always playing."
Always playing—when he was at school, supposedly listening to his lessons, and at soccer practice, during games, and even at night when he was doing his homework. The poor kid probably even dreamed about it. No wonder A's were a thing of the past and he couldn't focus! "Who—is Lonny's best friend?"
"Ethan."
Right. She'd known that the second she'd asked. "Okay, go to sleep, kiddo. Like I said, tomorrow should be a much better day." She used his discarded T-shirt to scoop up the Nintendo without touching the case again, then turned off the light and shut the door.
Her heart thudded as she walked down the hall. This malevolence had breached their home on her watch. It was up to her to take care of it. She regarded the Nintendo balefully.
The phone rang. "I'll get it!" she called to Dominick who was still lost before the TV in the wispy-costumed wonders of Dance Idol Countdown. She snatched up the kitchen handset.
"Poppy, darling, I'm so sorry," her mother said.
"Can you tell me how to fix this?" Poppy said.
"Not allowed," her mother said. "They're very strict about such things Up Here. I could lose my phone privileges."
Poppy sank onto a chair at the kitchen's breakfast bar. "It's Chase's game," she said. "Mary-Ann McGovern hexed it."
"Think, Poppy," her mother said. "In your heart, you already know what to do."
Her fingers gripped the plastic handset so tightly, they were going numb. Mom had always taught her that bad magic could be reflected back on its originator, even sometimes magnified in the process, if one were skillful enough, but she didn't want to hurt Ethan. He was only a child.
Mary-Ann must have another weakness. Everyone did. "Mom, I can't talk right now," she said. "Call me back later." She hung up, then examined the Nintendo. It wasn't the device that was hexed. Chase had been fine until he traded game modules with Lonny. It had to be the game itself. Using the T-shirt, she pushed the button to eject the slim square.
This had come from Mary-Ann, she thought grimly, and it was only polite to return borrowed items. She swathed it in the T-shirt and then put on her jacket again.
They were just presenting the night's voting results for the dance contest. "I'm—going to a different store—where they're not out of, you know, stuff," she said to Dominick whose eyes only flickered sideways at her. "Back before bedtime."
"Mmmm," he said as the live studio audience burst into cheers for a practically nude red-haired favorite.
She slipped outside. The wind had come up since she'd been out earlier and chased the clouds away. Stars glittered down, hard and bright, but she could still see the ghostly overlay of the game-forest as she walked. And that was after only touching the module for a second. She thought of the hours Chase had devoted to that stupid game. It would be days, perhaps even weeks, before the effects dissipated.
The T-shirt bundled against her chest, she tramped the three blocks to the McGoverns' house. As she'd hoped, the black Hummer was still in the driveway. It really was a monster and she doubted that it fit in the two-car garage with their other vehicle.
She tried the passenger door, but it was of course locked. "Open!" she whispered, her hand on the freezing metal.
Instead, the horn beeped. Drat, it was probably warded against interference, as she should have done with her Honda.
The porch light winked on and the front door opened. Mary-Ann and the pug appeared on the threshold. The dog was wearing a silly black-and-orange Halloween coat. Poppy flattened to the driveway's cold pavement using the Hummer's bulk to hide.
"Reveal!" Mary-Ann called.
An electric tingle of power pushed at her to stand, but Poppy formed a Conceal sigil with shaking fingers. It was only blowing leaves! she thought desperately. All around her, the night hung cold and still with a pregnant edge as though something might precipitate out of sheer starlight. Poppy's gloveless fingers ached with the strain of holding the sigil. She couldn't breathe.
The pug-familiar shivered, then licked its mistress's face. "I'm cold!"
"Sorry, Precious," Mary-Ann said and closed the door.
Poppy waited five minutes, then started again, hunkering by the massive car, cheek pressed to the door. "Open!" she told it.
No response.
It had been Wakened, like her Honda, and had at least some will of its own. She'd seen that earlier when it turned on its headlights and engine. "Don't you get bored out here in the dark by yourself?" she said, fingers spread on the chill metal. "Wouldn't you like something to pass the time?"
The dome light flashed on, indicating, she hoped, interest. She unwrapped the hexed module and pressed it to the door, using the T-shirt like a potholder. "My son loves this game," she said, "but it belongs to your family. Just unlock your door and I'll leave it with you. That's fair, isn't it?"
The lock snapped up. She moved aside and the door opened. She peered into the gleaming black leather interior. Cars didn't have Nintendo consoles, of course, but this operated by magic. Contact was the key element. She reached far back under the passenger seat to wedge the slim square beneath the floor mat.
"Welcome to the Enchanted Forest," she said to the Hummer. "Now you'll never be bored again." Then she eased the door shut, shoved her freezing hands in her pockets, and hurried home.
Chase came to her at breakfast the next day, Nintendo in hand. "Mom, where's Enchanted Forest Terminator?"
"I got rid of it," she said, setting a steaming plate of pancakes in front of him.
"But it's my favorite!" His lower lip protruded dangerously.
"I know," she said, "but I'll buy you a better one that won't be in your head all the time so that you can't concentrate in school or at soccer. Decide what you want and we'll go to the game shop at the mall after school."
That mollified him somewhat.
Two days later, Chase was still seeing the forest game sometimes, especially in his dreams, but seemed more able to focus. When he brought home a B on his Spelling test for the first time in weeks, she knew the hex was wearing off.
As for the Honda, she burned angelica in the garage, salted the Four Quarters, and sprinkled basil under the car mats. It was, if not back to being Unwakened, at least more cooperative, though still clearly fascinated by Lincoln Navigators.
At Friday's soccer scrimmage, Mary-Ann and Ethan McGovern arrived in the black Hummer, which was driving erratically, dodging nonexistent trees, stopping abruptly every few feet, and honking at invisible deer and rabbits to get out of its way.
"What happened to your car?" Chase asked Ethan as the boy clambered out. "It looked like it was doing the Cha-Cha."
Ethan just ducked his head and scowled. Then Coach blew his whistle so the team fell in for a quick warm-up. Smiling, Poppy settled on the bleachers and watched the boys go through their stretches. Mary-Ann shoved in beside her and gave Poppy a malevolent look. "I know you're responsible!"
Poppy put her sunglasses on. The day was very bright with a fine sharp wind. She watched as the boys finished their warm-up, then split into two teams. Coach waved and the scrimmage started with a flurry of passes. "For what?" she said finally.
"Hexing my car!"
"Me?" Poppy said. "A mere `kitchen-witch?' Don't be silly. It probably just needs a good tune-up." Her cell phone rang, still the Lone Ranger trumpets. Poppy sighed and flipped it open.
"Dear," her mother said, "do you remember Uncle Vernon?"
Vernon Melton had been a family friend, not really a relative at all, just a big bluff balding guy with a ready smile. He'd loved playing cards and boating, she recalled, but had passed away about—what was it—five years ago? "Sure," she said.
"We ran into each other at the Wings and Things Bingo Palace and now he's taking me sailing!" her mother said. "I may not be able to check on you so much. Will you be all right without me?"
Her throat tightened. "Mom, I'll never be without you."
Cheers erupted and she looked up just in time to see Chase score a goal.