Jinx Read online

  —just as a man on a ten-speed bicycle, wearing a messenger bag, came tearing down the street.

  That’s when a couple of things seemed to happen all at once.

  First, the bike messenger veered to avoid hitting the car’s open door, and would have sailed up onto the sidewalk and hit Zach…

  …if I hadn’t, at that exact second, thrown myself in its path to push Zach, who hadn’t noticed the car, the bike, or the blood-red of the geraniums, out of the way.

  Which was how I ended up getting hit by a bike messenger on my very first day in New York.

  Which, if you think about it, is just my luck.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “You can’t even see it,” Aunt Evelyn said. “Well, you can, but with a little makeup, no one will notice, I swear. And by Monday, when you start school, it’s sure to be gone.”

  I studied my reflection in a hand mirror. The bruise above my right eyebrow was only a few hours old, and it was already purpling. From experience, I knew that by Monday, the bruise would no longer be purple, but a lovely shade of greenish yellow.

  “Sure,” I said, to make Aunt Evelyn feel better. “Sure it will.”

  “Really,” Aunt Evelyn said. “I mean, if I didn’t know it was there, I wouldn’t notice it at all. Would you, Tory?”

  Tory, seated in one of the matching pink armchairs over by the nonworking marble fireplace, said, “I can’t see it.”

  I aimed a weak smile at her. So, it wasn’t my imagination after all. Tory really had started being nicer to me—amazingly nicer—since my head had hit the sidewalk. It had been Tory, I’d learned upon regaining consciousness, who’d dialed 911, after having seen the whole thing unfold from the living room window. It was Tory who’d ridden in the ambulance with me, while I was knocked out cold, since Petra still had to go pick up the younger kids. It was Tory who’d been holding my hand when I woke up, woozy and sore, in the emergency room.

  And it was Tory, joined by her parents, to whom I was released later that evening, once the hospital tests revealed that I had not, in fact, suffered a concussion, and would not have to be admitted for overnight observation (the bike messenger, it turned out, had escaped without a scrape—his bike hadn’t even gotten that messed up).

  I had no idea what had occurred to make my cousin so suddenly solicitous of my well-being. She certainly hadn’t seemed to care about me before the accident. Why, just because I’d been stupid enough to get myself knocked unconscious, Tory should decide she cared about me, I couldn’t imagine. If anything, I had only proved Tory’s point: I really am a country bumpkin.

  Of course, it might have had something to do with the fact that Zach had come along. To the hospital, I mean. With me. In the ambulance.

  They hadn’t let him into the emergency room to see me, though, on account of his not being family. And when he’d learned I’d be all right, he’d gone home.

  Still. If what Robert had said out in the gazebo was true—about Tory crushing on Zach—that was a good few hours of quality time they’d had together.

  But Zach wasn’t around now, and Tory was still being nice to me. So what was up with that?

  I put the mirror down and said, “Aunt Evelyn, I feel so bad. You and Uncle Ted really didn’t have to stay home from your party on my account. It is just a little bump, after all.”

  “Oh, please,” Aunt Evelyn said, waving her hand in a pooh-poohing gesture. “It wasn’t a party, it was a boring old benefit for a boring old museum. To tell you the truth, I’m delighted you provided us with such a good excuse not to have to go.”

  Aunt Evelyn is my mother’s younger sister, but it’s hard to see any resemblance between them at all, really. The blond hair is the same, but whereas my mom wears hers in one long braid that goes down to her hip, Evelyn’s is cropped into a stylish, flattering pageboy.

  I’ve never seen my mom, who considers cosmetics frivolous—much to my sister Courtney’s chagrin—wear makeup. But Aunt Evelyn had on lipstick, mascara, eye shadow—even some deliciously flowery perfume. She looked—and smelled—very glamorous and hardly old enough to have a sixteen-year-old daughter.

  Which, I supposed, proved that the makeup was working.

  Aunt Evelyn noticed the empty mug by the side of my bed. “You want a little more cocoa, Jean?”

  “No, thank you,” I said, with a laugh. “If I have any more cocoa, I’m going to float away. Really, Aunt Evelyn, you and Tory don’t have to sit here with me all night. The doctor said I’m fine. It’s just a bump, and believe me, I’ve had plenty of bumps before. I’ll be all right.”

  “I just feel so awful,” Evelyn said. “If we had only known you were coming today, and not tomorrow, like we thought—”

  “You’d have what?” I asked. “Had all the bike messengers in the city locked up in advance?” Not that that would have worked. They’d still have found me. They always do.

  “It’s just not,” Evelyn said, shaking her head, “how I pictured your first night here. Petra was going to make filet mignons. We were going to have a nice dinner, the whole family together, not take-out in the kitchen after coming home from an emergency room….”

  I looked sympathetically at my aunt’s tilted head. Poor Aunt Evelyn. Now she was starting to know how my mother must feel all the time. About me.

  I said, with feeling, “I’m sorry.”

  Evelyn’s head popped up again. “What?” she said. “Sorry? What are you sorry for? It’s not your fault—”

  Except, of course, that it was. I’d known what I was doing. I’d known the bike would hit me, and not Zach.

  But I’d also known that the blow wouldn’t be nearly as bad as it would have been, if it had been Zach. Because I’d been expecting it, and he hadn’t.

  Why else had the geraniums looked so red?

  But of course I didn’t say that out loud. Because I’d learned a long time ago that saying things like that out loud only led to questions I was much better off not answering.

  “Knock-knock.” Uncle Ted’s voice came floating through the closed bedroom door. “Can we come in?”

  Tory got up and opened the door. In the hallway stood my uncle Ted, five-year-old Alice in his arms, and ten-year-old Teddy Jr. hiding shyly behind one of Ted’s legs.

  “I’ve got some people here,” Uncle Ted said, “who want to say good night to their cousin Jean before they go to bed.”

  “Well,” Evelyn said, looking worried. “I guess for just a minute. But—”

  Alice, the minute her father put her down, took a flying leap toward my bed, waving a sheet of white butcher paper. “Cousin Jinx, Cousin Jinx,” she lisped. “Look what I made you!”

  “Gently, Alice,” Aunt Evelyn cried. “Gently!”

  I said, “That’s all right,” and pulled Alice, who was wearing a flowered nightdress, into bed with me, the way I used to do with Courtney, back when she’d let me, and still do sometimes, with Sarabeth. “Let me see what you made for me.”

  Alice displayed her painting proudly. “Look,” she said. “It’s a picture of the day you were born. There’s the hospital, see, and there’s you, coming out of Aunt Charlotte.”

  “Wow,” I said, wondering just what they teach kindergartners in New York City. “That sure is…graphic.”

  “Their class guinea pig just had babies,” Uncle Ted explained apologetically.

  “And see there?” Alice pointed at a large black glob of paint. “That’s the cloud the lightning came out of, the lightning that blew out all the lights in the hospital right when you were born.” Alice leaned back against my arm, looking pleased with herself.

  I said, managing what I hoped was a convincingly encouraging smile, “It’s a very nice painting, Alice. I’ll hang it right there, above the fireplace.”

  “The fireplace doesn’t work,” Teddy informed me, loudly, from the end of the bed.

  “Jean knows that,” Uncle Ted said. “It’s getting too warm out for fires, anyway, Teddy.”

  “I told
’em this was the best room to put you in,” Teddy said to me. “On account of the fireplace already being busted. Because whenever you’re around, things get broken.”

  “Theodore Gardiner Junior!” Evelyn cried. “You apologize to your cousin right this minute!”

  “Why?” Teddy asked. “You said it yourself, Mom. That’s why everybody calls her Jinx.”

  “I know a certain young man,” Uncle Ted said, “who is going off to bed without dessert.”

  “Why?” Teddy looked perplexed. “You know it’s true. Look at what happened today. Her head got broken.”

  “Okay,” Uncle Ted said, taking hold of Teddy’s wrist and dragging him from the room. “That’s enough visiting with Cousin Jean. Come on, Alice. Let’s go see Petra. I think she’s got a bedtime story for you two.”

  Alice pressed her face up against mine. “I don’t care if things get broke when you’re around,” she whispered. “I like you, and I’m glad you’re here.” She kissed me, smelling of clean five-year-old. “Good night.”

  “Oh, dear,” Evelyn said, when the door had closed again. “I don’t know quite what to say.”

  “It’s okay,” I said, looking down at Alice’s picture. “It’s all true.”

  “Oh, don’t be ridiculous, Jinx,” my aunt said. “Er, Jean. Things do not get broken when you’re around. That thing the night you were born was a whaddayoucallit. A tornado, or supercell, or something. And today was just an accident.”

  “It’s okay, Aunt Evelyn,” I said. “I don’t mind. I really don’t.”

  “Well, I do.” Evelyn took the empty mug and stood up. “I’m going to tell the children not to call you Jinx anymore. It’s a ridiculous nickname, anyway. After all, you’re practically grown up. Now, if you’re sure you don’t need anything, Tory and I should go away and let you sleep. And you’re not to get out of bed until at least ten tomorrow morning, do you understand? The doctor said plenty of rest. Come on, Tory.”

  But Tory didn’t stir from her chair. “I’ll be there in a minute, Mom.”

  Evelyn didn’t seem to have heard her. “I guess I better go and call your mother,” she muttered, as she went out of the room. “God only knows how I’m going to explain all this to her. She’s going to kill me.”

  When she was sure her mother was out of earshot, Tory softly closed the bedroom door, then leaned on it, and looked at me with those big, kohl-rimmed blue eyes of hers.

  “So,” she said. “How long have you known?”

  I put down the picture Alice had painted for me. It was past nine o’clock, and I really was tired…even though I was still on Iowa time, so it was actually earlier than nine. Physically, I was fine, just as I’d assured Aunt Evelyn. The bump on my head hardly even hurt—except to the touch.

  But the truth was, I felt exhausted. All I wanted to do was go into that beautiful marble bathroom and wash up, then crawl back into my big comfy bed and sleep. That’s all. Just sleep.

  But now it appeared I was going to have to wait. Because Tory seemed to want to talk.

  “How long have I known what?” I asked, hoping my tiredness didn’t show in my voice.

  “Well, that you’re a witch, of course,” she said.

  CHAPTER SIX

  I blinked at her. Tory looked perfectly serious, leaning against the door. She still had on the black minidress, and her makeup was still perfectly arranged. Four hours of sitting in a hard plastic chair in a hospital emergency waiting room had done nothing to mar her perfect beauty.

  “A what?” My voice broke on the word what.

  “A witch, of course.” Tory smiled tolerantly. “I know you’re one, there’s no use denying it. One witch always knows another.”

  I began to believe, not so much from what Tory had said, but from the curiously tense way in which she was holding her body—like our cat Stanley always does back home, when he’s getting ready to pounce—that Tory was serious.

  Just my luck. It would have been nice if she’d just been joking around.

  I said, choosing my words with care, “Tory, I’m sorry, but I’m tired, and I really want to go to sleep. Maybe we could talk about this some other time…?”

  It was the wrong thing to say. All of a sudden, Tory was mad.

  “Oh,” she said, straightening up. “Oh, that’s how it is, is it? You think you’re better than me, because you’ve been practicing longer, or something? Is that it? Well, let me tell you something, Jinx. I happen to be the most powerful witch in my coven. Gretchen and Lindsey? Yeah, they’ve got nothing on me. They’re still doing stupid little love spells—that don’t work, by the way. There are people at school who are afraid of me, I’m so powerful. What do you have to say to that, Miss High-and-Mighty?”

  My mouth fell open.

  The thing is, I should have known. I don’t know why, when Mom had told Aunt Evelyn about what was happening, and Aunt Evelyn had suggested I come stay in New York for a while, I thought I’d be safe here.

  I should have known. I really should have.

  “Is this because of what happened this afternoon?” Tory demanded. “The thing with the pot? Are you mad at me because you found out I do drugs?”

  I said, still feeling bewildered—betrayed, even, though I don’t know why. It’s not like Aunt Evelyn could have any idea what her daughter was up to, or surely she’d have put a stop to it—“No, Tory. Honest. I don’t care what you do. Well, I mean, I care. And I think it’s stupid of you to mess around with medication that wasn’t prescribed to you—”

  “The Ritalin’s just to get me through midterms,” Tory interrupted. “And the Valium is just…well, sometimes I have trouble sleeping. That’s all.” Tory had crossed the room, and now she sank down onto the bed. “I’m not, like, hard-core into them, or anything. I don’t do ecstasy, or cocaine, or anything like that. What, does your coven frown on drug use, or something? God, that is so quaint.”

  “Tory,” I said. I couldn’t quite believe this was happening. “I do not belong to a coven, okay? All I want is to be left alone. No offense, but I’m really tired.”

  Now it was Tory’s turn to blink, and she did so owlishly, staring at me as though I were one of those swan faucets in the bathroom that had suddenly begun to speak. Finally, she said, “You really don’t know, do you?”

  I shook my head. “Know what?”

  “That you’re one of us,” Tory said. “You must have suspected. After all, they call you Jinx.”

  “Yeah, they call me Jinx,” I said, with a bitterness I didn’t attempt to disguise, “because, like your little brother said, everything I touch gets messed up.”

  But Tory was shaking her head. “No. No, it doesn’t. Not today, it didn’t. Jinx, I watched you. I was on the phone with my mom, and I came inside, and I saw the whole thing from the living room.” Tory’s eyes were so bright, they seemed to glow in the soft light from the bedside lamp. “It was like you knew what was going to happen before anybody even did anything. You shoved Zach out of the way BEFORE that bike hit the sidewalk. You couldn’t have known that’s the direction that messenger was going to turn. But you did. Some part of you did know—”

  “Of course part of me knew,” I said frustratedly. “I’ve had plenty of experience. If I’m around, whatever is the worst possible thing that can happen, will happen. Story of my life. I can’t not mess something up, if there’s anything there to mess up.”

  “You didn’t mess anything up, Jinx,” Tory said. “You saved someone’s life. Zach’s life.”

  I shook my head again. This was unbelievable. This was what I had come here to get away from. And now it was starting up all over again. My cousin Tory—the last person in the world I would have suspected of such a thing—was trying to start it up.

  “Look, Tor,” I said. “You’re making a big deal out of nothing. I didn’t—”

  “Yes, Jinx. Yes, you did. Zach says so. If you hadn’t done what you did, Zach would have been a pavement pancake.”

  Suddenly, my stomach
was hurting more than my head. I said, “Maybe—”

  “Jinx, you’re just going to have to face it. You have the gift.”

  My breath froze in my throat. “The…the what?”

  “The gift,” Tory repeated. “Didn’t Grandma ever tell you about Branwen?”

  I let out a nervous laugh. What else could I do?

  “You mean that crazy story about her great-great-grandmother, or whoever?” I tried to sound as scornful as possible. “Come on, Tory. Don’t tell me you believe that baloney. That’s just a crazy story Grams pulls out when things get dull in her bridge group down in Boca….”

  “It’s not baloney,” Tory said, looking angry. “And it’s not a crazy story. Our great-great-great-great-grandmother Branwen was a practicing witch, back in Wales. And Branwen told her daughter, who told her daughter, who told her daughter, who told Grandma, that her daughter’s first daughter—it’s only the oldest daughters, not the younger ones—would have the gift. The gift of magic. Sometimes it skips a few generations, I guess. Like you have Grandma’s red hair, but neither of our moms has it.”

  My hand went defensively up to my hair, the way it always did when someone mentioned it.

  “Tory,” I said. “I really don’t—”

  “Don’t you see? Our great-great-great-whatever-grandmother Branwen was talking about us. We’re our grandmother’s daughters’ first daughter. Or whatever. We’re the next generation of witches in the family.”

  Oh, boy. I took a deep breath. The knot in my stomach had turned into a full-fledged bowling ball.

  “No offense, Tory,” I said. “But I think you’ve seen one too many episodes of Charmed. Either that, or you’re still high from the gazebo.”

  Tory sighed. “I guess I’ll have to prove it to you, won’t I?”

  I eyed her nervously. “How are you going to do that?”

  “Don’t worry,” she said with a laugh. “I’m not going to make the mattress levitate or anything.” She slipped off the bed and went to the door. “It doesn’t work like that. Stay here.” She stepped out into the hallway.