AllFreeNovel
Share Us
That’s the price I paid to work at a café in Brooksville.
Nobody liked me because I was poor, and an orphan, and I couldn’t do magic.
All of those elements combined to make me one of the most disliked people in town. Despite trying to have a charming personality and showing kindness to the people around me, I somehow still managed to catch the eye of every magic-user within shouting distance, and not in a good way.
I glanced down at my work clothes. My once-white blouse was now splattered with coffee, no thanks to Maggie and Justine for their “assistance” at work. My jeans had fared just as poorly. They had a few new stains, a new tear, and smelled slightly questionable. I sighed. Mémère was definitely going to notice something was wrong.
I hated to make her worry.
I hated to make her sad.
She worked so hard to raise me, to take care of me, that the idea of letting her down again filled me with stress and anxiety. I wished for the millionth time that I could use magic. I wished that I had a wand, that I knew spells, or that I had, you know,powers. I wished that I could whisper a few carefully practiced words and somehow whip up an appearance she could be proud of.
But I couldn’t.
In my case, practice hadn’t made perfect.
I stared at the front door of our home for a long minute. My breathing finally began to stabilize and I began to feel like everything was going to be okay. Maybe it would. Maybe everything would be fine. One bad day at work wouldn’t kill me.
A hundred bad days at work wouldn’t kill me.
Besides, I owed Mémère everything. Without her, I wouldn’t exist. I would have died when my parents did. I would have been killed or lost or starved. No one else in this place was about to take in a little orphan kid who couldn’t do spells. Nobody. Yet my grandmother was ready.
My grandmother was brave.
I reached for the door and pressed my hand against it, but I didn’t turn the knob. Not yet. I needed a few more minutes to be alone with my thoughts, to focus on the fact that today had been the worst day yet. Today seemed different somehow. Part of me thought that after awhile, things at work would get easier. I thought that they’d improve and that I would finally begin to connect with people who understood me.
I was so wrong.
I’m not understood now, just like I wasn’t understood before.
A tear slid down my cheek and I brushed it away. I look around wildly, like someone could see me, even though I was completely alone.
“I know you’re out there,” I heard her voice through the door. “Come on in, love. I won’t bite.”
I gulped.
Yeah, my grandmother definitely knew something was up. She didn’t want me working in town, anyway, but I had convinced her that I needed to. The reality was that I knew she didn’t have a lot of money and I felt bad for not contributing to our family. The café didn’t bring in a lot of money, but I was finished with school and wasn’t really doing anything else with my time.
There weren’t a lot of job prospects in Brookville, but the café was something. It enabled me to make some money, spend time socializing, and get to know people who lived near me. It meant I could be around other people, for once. It meant I could explore the world, if only just a little.
The front door opened before I could turn the knob, and there stood my grandmother: tall, lean, and silvery.
Fierce.
My grandma was fierce.
Everything about her screamed strong. She was taller than me, which was sometimes hard for me to grasp since at 5’7”, I wasn’t a tiny girl. Although she was getting older, she still had strong muscles that were clearly defined. Whether it was from being a witch or from years of exercise and hard work, I wasn’t sure. I just knew that my grandma wasn’t the type of person anyone messed with.
Not if they knew what was good for them.
“You’re late,” she said simply, but she glared when she did. Her eyes narrowed a little: not too much. She didn’t quite look mad. It was more like, a cautious sort of look, as though she was waiting for me to say something first. I knew exactly what she wanted from me. She wanted me to admit that working in the shop was a bad choice and that I was ready to stay home with her.
After all, even if I couldn’t use magic, I could still learn about it, and my grandmother loved it when I studied.
“Not by much,” I responded, but I knew instantly it was the wrong thing to say. My grandmother didn’t yell at me or raise her voice. She never had. We didn’t have that kind of relationship. Besides, disappointment was so much worse than yelling, anyway. If I wanted to trick Gram, I should have acted stupid. I should have pretended like I didn’t know just how late it was. Then I could have pretended that I was lollygagging or chatting with someone and just completely lost track of the time.
My answer let her know that I knew I was late, and that there was a reason for it.
