A Special Place for Women, Laura Hankin [brene brown rising strong .txt] 📗

the other women piled out with their luggage and their chatter. “This is going to be an excellent Samhain.”

FORTY

There were enough bedrooms for us to each have our own. Mine had a comfortable queen bed covered in a flannel goose-feather comforter, topped with more pillows than I’d ever seen in one place before. There was just enough of a rustic feel to the decor that you couldn’t forget you were in a “cabin”—exposed beams, the paint on the walls distressed in a very intentional way, a little wood-burning stove in the corner. Had Margot gotten some fancy interior designer from the city to drive all the way out here, down these winding roads, to consult?

After we all put our luggage in our rooms, some of the women went on a nature walk. Others decided to cast some individual spells, to work on their own magic before we all came back together for our nighttime rituals.

“I don’t really know any spells. Besides the egg one. Which was great. Loved that egg spell,” I said to Margot as we stood in her living room, which somehow managed to feel gigantic and cozy at the same time. Its ceiling was two stories high, and all the windows were hung with gauzy curtains. In addition to a couple of large midcentury modern couches, throw pillows and poufs littered the floor, which was covered by an artfully faded woven rug. A huge fireplace lined almost the entirety of one wall.

“I can teach you.” She opened up a chest of shabby-chic drawers to reveal a variety of candles, herbs, and other supplies. I’d have felt like I was in an apothecary in Shakespeare’s time, if not for the clean Avenir Next labels on everything. More of an apothecary designed by Gwyneth Paltrow. Herb by herb, candle by candle, Margot went through the supplies with me, explaining the types of spells you might do with each one. She radiated authority, standing up taller and taller as she went, even though what she was saying didn’t make any sense to me, as if I’d signed up for a course with a respected college professor without realizing that it would be taught in a foreign language.

“What’s your favorite spell?” I asked at one point.

“Hmm,” she said, giving me a strange look. “I’ve had good luck with a summoning one, to find someone that you’ve been looking for. You take one of these candles”—here she pointed to a thin white taper—“and carve some representation of the person into it. So for example, a heart, if you were trying to summon a lover. Then you scatter sea salt in a circle around the candle, light it, and say a prayer to call that person into your life. It can be very effective.” She smiled a private, small smile. “But there are so many others too.” And she went on to explain spells for prosperity, for protection, and more.

“That was the one Caroline and I did, the first time we came up here,” she said at the end of one explanation, her tone lapsing a bit into melancholy.

“I hope you don’t mind me saying this, but you and Caroline are a . . . funny match. To have started a coven together, I mean.”

She smiled. “Well. Some of it was our family history. And some, I suppose, is that a big goal can make strange bedfellows. When we started out, what we wanted to do was so strong that our differences didn’t matter.”

Caroline and Margot had both alluded to a goal now, a goal that didn’t seem to be Caroline’s driving force anymore. “What you wanted to do?” I asked. “Boosting your careers and such, you mean?”

“Not that,” she said, her expression stormy. “It was supposed to be more than just helping each other and ourselves, and maybe bringing down the occasional bad man. We had something bigger in mind.”

“What was it?”

She hesitated. Then she looked me straight in the eye and said, almost against her better judgment, “We wanted to elect the first female president.”

Well, shit. Way to set achievable objectives.

Margot went on. “We didn’t know if we could do it, of course. But we wanted to try. We’d seen how a woman could be far more qualified, far more intelligent, and still be passed over, time and again. And we were done being helpless about it. We had influence and we had magic, so why couldn’t we be the queen-makers?” She shrugged. “And sure, we thought it would be nice to have the ear of the person in charge, particularly since Caroline always had such great policy ideas—her thoughts on parental leave were transformative—but more than that, we wanted to do it for equality, for all the girls out there.”

“Was that why you all worked so hard for Nicole Woo-Martin?” She hesitated, so I leaned forward and continued, in a low voice, “What happened there? You can tell me.”

“Why do you want to know?”

“Because I’m a curious little bitch.” She smiled, just slightly, so I went on. “And because I’m a member of the Coven now. Shouldn’t I be up to date on the history? The good, the bad, and the ugly?”

“I’ve probably said too much already. I like you, Jillian, but not even the other members know the full story. The details are between me and Caroline, and she asked me not to get into it with anyone new, which I understand,” she said. “I’m sorry.” She turned and headed toward the door. “Now, I have some things I want to work on myself, but go ahead, use whatever supplies you need.”

I watched her disappear into the yard. That had been . . . informative? Supremely frustrating? If the details needed to be kept just between her and Caroline, that certainly made it sound like something sketchy had gone on.

To pass the time more than anything else, I took one of the white candles, a matchbook, and a pinch of sea salt,