Witching 101

A Paranormal Romance Short Story by K.F. Breene

Jackie stared down at the starter pack spread across the living room floor. Her roommate, Eva, who thought that witchcraft was something made-up by J.K. Rowling, was away for the afternoon, thankfully leaving Jackie in peace to concoct her first potion.

Each item from the pack had a letter of the alphabet affixed to it, an absolute must for some of the ingredients. For example, how in the world would she be able to tell the difference between an eye of a newt and a fermented spider eye? Granted, the size should be a giveaway, but she wasn’t in the habit of staring at eyeballs displaced from the head in which they came.

She shivered. Ew.

The medium-sized cauldron was smaller than expected based on the photo online, and perched on an old, faded rug. Its legs ended in a semblance of iron claws. As if the whole situation wasn’t scary enough, they gave the cauldron claws.

“It’s not scary,” she reminded herself. “It’s new and different. Exciting. Yes, that’s the word.” She nodded. “Exciting.”

Eva had thought buying a starter kit online, entitled Witching 101, was weird. But where did she think true witches were supposed to start? A graveyard?

Jackie snorted. Preposterous. No, the kit made sense. All the ingredients were clearly labeled and in their right doses. The cauldron was the right size, apparently, and even had a plug so you didn’t have to light a fire under it. That was very handy.

She picked up the yellowed sheet of paper made to look like a page from an ancient spell book.

“That’s a little hokey,” she muttered.

Though, if she was being honest with herself, she’d admit that pretending she was reading from a page out of a real spell book was exciting. She could imagine going into her study (which she would certainly have some day), preparing her supplies, and then cracking open a dusty volume filled with advanced spells for only the most experienced witch. She’d be revered in the witching community, and have a line of people at her door, waving money at her, desperate for cures to ailments or wanting special potions to capture the eye of a handsome fellow.

Although she’d have to turn down the people asking for a love potion. Making someone feel something against their will was wrong. If she was going to be a witch, she’d have to be an honest one. Ethics in witchery—ooh, that is a good title for the book I will eventually write.

She’d known she was a witch since middle school, feeling a certain warmth in her middle that then flowed through her veins, often referred to as women’s intuition. But where did people think that intuition originated?

Magic. That’s where.

When she would sit in the classroom, listening to the history instructor, and suddenly get a premonition of something coming, she didn’t listen at first. Even after the first two times of the feeling manifesting in material proof, once getting a sweater in the mail, and another time seeing a very cute friend of her brother’s, she chalked it up to coincidence. Two-day delivery and that friend being over often was an easy explanation.

But it kept happening.

She’d get that warmth spreading through her body. The tingles. The knowledge that something was about to happen, or was coming, or wasn’t right, and finally she could deny it no more.

She had magic.

She also had an affinity for making people laugh when she told them she had magic. That part was annoying.

After years of wanting to explore this natural gift, but too embarrassed to hang out in the New Age store and ask questions as she ought to, she’d stumbled upon an ad online. Make your first potion in a matter of minutes, it boasted, showing a picture of a bubbling pot. Ever wondered if you have the divine power? Find out now with this witching starter kit, guaranteed to create a real potion or your money back!

Sure, the ad was a hard sell, targeted at a certain playacting crowd who waved wands and wore robes out in public, but the company had to make money, didn’t they? They had to appeal to the hobby-seeker as well as the true witch if they wanted to make a solid go at their enterprise. The company seemed like it was just starting out—they needed all the new customers they could get.

She gave a decisive nod. “Okay,” she said with a deep breath, feeling more comfortable talking herself through this process. “Let’s do this.”

The directions seemed pretty cut and dry and easy to follow. Add a set of ingredients, stir in a certain direction, add more, stir in another direction, add the rest, let it bubble, reap the rewards. Simple.

See? She was a natural. These things just came easy to her. When Eva got home, she’d get to sample the potion and benefit from good luck for one day.

Wait.

Jackie squinted at the box.

That’s right, they’d been out of the luck one. This kit was for the apathy-inducing potion.

She wasn’t sure why she’d want to promote apathy, unless maybe she needed to ask her parents for money. A little indifference as they handed over the needed amount sounded good, actually. She was tired of getting the lecture regarding her irresponsible purchases. If just once she didn’t have to defend why she needed to spend part of her weekly allowance on something other than books and food for college, it would be nice.

She bit her lip. This was dangerously close to making someone feel something against their will. Although antianxiety pills were similar, weren’t they? She bet they probably were.

No matter. This was just a trial run, anyway. She could get the luck potion later. Heck, she could create the luck one herself when she got the hang of this.

“Add three gallons of distilled water,” she read aloud.

There was no distilled water among the items in the kit. Shoot.

Tap water would be fine. That was probably what they meant anyway. Why else would they leave it out of the kit?

The water filled a little over half of the cauldron, which made sense, because there were a lot more ingredients to come and bubbling to do. There needed to be plenty of space for everything. She didn’t want the mixture overflowing, soaking the rug, and getting on the hardwood floor. Eva would kill her if Jackie messed up the apartment. Eva had paid the deposit.

“Add the blood of three bats, item A.” Jackie eyed the blood in the little vial. It certainly didn’t seem like three bats’ worth of blood.

Maybe they were just small bats. With watery blood.

She dug her fingernail into the crack between the stopper and the plastic vial, trying to pry the stopper loose. The sucker was on there good and tight. She squeezed, twisted, and pried at the same time. The rubber stopper popped out. A few drops splashed out onto the hardwood floor. She probably should’ve been standing on the rug for that.

Jackie rubbed the droplets with her socked foot, soaking them up. Then shivered, because she hadn’t thought that through, and now had bat blood on her white socks. Whatever; if she expected to be a witch, she’d have to get comfortable with some gross things.

She dumped the blood into the cauldron and watched to see what would happen. Nothing did. Not like it would start bubbling right away—it was just blood and tap water at the moment—but still, a little sizzle might’ve been nice.

“Carefully shake the eye of a newt, item B, out of the package and into the mixture,” she read. “Take care not to physically touch the item.”

Grimacing, she did as instructed, then followed up with the lovely smelling lavender. Next went in the hemlock root, which didn’t look at all like the root she saw online, and finally for this round, the sandalwood.

“Okay, time to stir.” She grabbed the large wooden spoon off the ground as she read on. “Using the provided wooden spoon, stir the mixture counterclockwise five times.”

It took her a moment of visualizing a clock before she pushed the spoon right. “Oh, wait, no. That’s clockwise.” Quickly, she reversed directions.

That half stir wouldn’t matter. She was still right on track. Besides, it wasn’t like she could start over. Buying bat blood and eyes of newts, or any other eyes for that matter, wasn’t just a matter of logging onto Amazon. And forget about doing those herself. That sounded as horrible, not to mention it would be extremely hard to find the critters. Yuck.

She paused, because she’d forgotten to keep count of her stirs.

It was probably five by now. Or maybe four.

She did one more stir to be sure.

“Okay, next set of ingredients.” She slid her finger down the list. Then started dumping in items as she verbally checked them off. “Spider eye…check. Snakeskin, yuck. Check. Spotted owl feather—aw, pretty. In it goes. Ground-up bones of a tiger.” She tsked. “That’s just environmentally irresponsible. Those animals are endangered. Hopefully the tiger was already dead.”

When the white powder hit the mixture, Jackie finally got her reaction. It fizzled along the surface like a carbonated beverage. The water darkened, now almost the color of the cauldron. A grin spread across her face as she watched, her middle warming and her gut starting to swirl. Tingles spread across her skin.

Her smile slipped.

She was familiar with all the different feelings of her premonitions, and this one was…not great. The sinking feeling generally meant something bad was coming, like a bad grade on a test, or worse, her favorite restaurant was out of meatloaf on Meatloaf Mondays.

Plunk. Plunk. Plunk.

She felt her brow wrinkle as she cocked her head to the side to listen.

Plunk. Plunk. Plunk.

What the heck was that?

The sizzle was starting to dissipate, so she leaned closer to hear.

There was that sound again, like droplets of water hitting a hard surface.

Fear coated her insides as she dropped to the ground. Sure enough, the cauldron was leaking out of the place where the cord attached, near the bottom.

“Shoddy engineering,” she said, tearing into the kitchen. “If they would’ve spent less money on the silly clawed feet, and more on that cord connection, this wouldn’t be an issue.”

She grabbed a bowl and hurried back before shoving it under the drips. Thankfully, the escaping potion wasn’t a fast leak. If she could finish quickly, get it boiling, and bottle it up without delay, she could save the situation.

That explained her bad premonition. She always knew.

“Seven stirs, clockwise this time.” She pushed the spoon around left. “Dang it!”

Why were clockwise and counterclockwise such a problem for her?

“Five, six…seven. Okay, quickly. Let’s see, yarrow root, toadstool— Is the toadstool supposed to be dried? Doesn’t say. Whatever. They would know, since they put together the kit. A blue rock? Just…a rock? Weird.” The rock plunked as it hit the water. “Thyme. Bay leaves. What am I making, a stew? Oh here we go, frog leg. That does not look like a frog leg. And this definitely doesn’t look like a pig’s foot. Hmm.”

She dropped it in before picking up the final ingredient. The blood of an albino alligator.

“Is that even a thing? I’ve never heard of an albino alligator.” The dripping below the cauldron slowly picked up speed. Feeling the urgency, she dumped the slightly pink blood in, trusting in the potion creators. After all, when she read the instructions out of an old, dusty volume, she’d have to trust the original creators, wouldn’t she?

Focusing, she stirred the correct way, the correct number of times, and even reversed when she was supposed to. “I’m getting good at this.”

The drips fell faster, one after the other. The leak was getting worse much too quickly.

“I need to get this show on the road.” She grabbed the plug and reached toward the outlet. It went taut, pulling on the already loose cauldron connection. A large drop escaped into the waiting bowl below, inky black.

“Donkey crackers, I’m too far away.”

No time to lose, Jackie grabbed the rug and pulled. Luckily the pot couldn’t have been real iron, because it didn’t seem nearly heavy enough. Unluckily, that meant she’d applied way too much strength.

The whole setup jostled her way. Upset potion slopped out the other side, then rolled toward her, hitting the lip and spilling over. She flinched and looked at her arm. An eye looked back.

“Cripes on a cracker, gross!” She flicked it off. Her aim was true, shooting the eye back into the mixture.

Not waiting for all the ingredients to get back into the pot, she plugged the cauldron in. That done, she ran around to the other side to see what escaped. Her foot hit a patch of water and slid away from her.

Mouth rounded in a soundless yell of surprise, she went sideways before crashing onto the ground. Pieces of plant lay next to her face. Wetness soaked into her leggings. Struggling to her feet, she scooped up the soggy foliage and dumped it back into the cauldron before hunting for more.

How had the pig’s foot made it out? Did pig feet float?

She had no idea, but the thing was on the ground, not in the bowl. That was bad. She was sure she needed it.

A continuous stream of liquid beat against the rug. The bowl!

“Oh gross, oh gross, oh gross,” she said as she grabbed the leathery item and threw it into the cauldron before running around to the other side. She pushed the bowl under the cauldron and rolled her eyes. She’d forgotten to turn the thing on!

“Stupid,” she said, flicking the switch next to the leaky connection. The whole system seemed a bit unstable, but it started to hum, a distinctly electronic sound. That was good. It might leak, but at least it would heat. Everyone knew that heat was a necessity for a good potion.

She ran to the kitchen for a towel, limping slightly. Her hip hurt something fierce. Back in the living room and the mixture had changed to a sort of purple color. That was cool. It was sizzling again, too. Also cool.

“Now we’re cooking,” she said, noticing the drips had turned into a thin stream of water falling from the cauldron.

“Keep it together, Martha,” she said. She hadn’t planned on naming the cauldron, but Martha seemed to fit. She’d go with it. “We’re nearly there.”

She pulled the bowl away, accidentally slopped dark liquid onto the already saturated rug, and threw the towel under the stream. Hurrying, because whatever was going to happen with the potion would happen soon, she could feel it, she dumped the contents of the bowl into the sink. Before turning away, she paused, staring down at the liquid oozing in the sink basin. Did it seem thicker?

It did. She was sure of it. The heat was thickening the liquid into a real potion!

Grinning like a lunatic, she raced back to the cauldron. The towel was saturated now and the rug around it sopping. The floor beneath would definitely be wet.

That wasn’t good. The warning on the label said the potion might stain.

Nervous flutters tickled her stomach. She replaced the bowl and felt the side of the cauldron. Hot. The potion couldn’t be far from bubbling. And look how thick it was!

Her split-second decision was to press on. If the floor was already wet, another few minutes wouldn’t make a difference. Besides, something would surely take out a stain. Another potion, perhaps.

She snatched up the spoon and ran it through the liquid. A dark purple layer clung to the wood. The first bubble popped on the surface. Another followed. The thin stream of liquid coming out the connection enlarged, the leak getting worse.

“C’mon, c’mon,” she said, antsy. The bowl was filling up already. She should’ve gotten a bigger one. In fact, she should’ve gotten a whole bunch of storage containers to scoop the potion out as soon as it was done.

Speaking of, how would she know it was done?

She tried to read the jiggling instructions as she ran back to the kitchen. The potion would start bubbling, each popping bubble getting more severe, until they sounded like mini firecrackers.

That sounded exciting.

She was to then turn off the heat, let it cool, and her potion would be ready.

After jamming the directions into her back pocket and loading her arms with containers, she turned back toward the living room.

Crack!

Jackie jumped in alarm. The containers rattled in her arms. One broke away and tumbled toward the ground.

Choosing to leave that fallen solider behind for now, she hurried toward the living room.

Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack!

It was happening!

CRACK!

“That one didn’t sound so mini,” she said with suddenly harried breath, back on scene.

The bubbles weren’t acting like that of a normally boiling liquid. Each one rising to the top was abnormally large, almost covering a quarter of the surface area. When it popped it spat potion out of the cauldron, splashing deep purple across the rug and floor.

“Time to shut it off,” she mumbled, grabbing the cord and yanking. The plug ripped from the wall. The connection ripped from the bottom of the cauldron.

A deluge of liquid poured from the new hole, overrunning the bowl and quickly soaking the rug.

CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!

The whole cauldron shook. Huge splashes burst from the pot.

CRACK!

Deep purple splattered the closest wall. A spray of liquid slapped the ceiling. A glob landed on the couch.

“Oh my gosh, what is happening?” With one hand she grabbed a container and tried to catch the liquid streaming from the bottom. With another container she tried to scoop liquid out of the top, ducking along the side so none of the exploding potion attacked her.

CRACK. CRACK.

Those not-so-mini explosions were calming down a little, thank heavens.

A glob hit the TV and slid down the surface before falling to the floor, leaving a streak on the screen. More potion splatter raked the wall.

“Just stop already, please.”

She switched out a container on the bottom, moving the full one next to the bowl. In her effort, her face strayed too high.

Crack!

A small burst of potion smacked the side of her face.

“Oh no, my eyes!” She clawed at the stuff, smearing it down her cheek and away from her eyes. Staggering like a drunk at Mardi Gras, she accidentally bumped the bowl and stepped on the full container. Potion slopped over her foot and onto the floor.

Crack.

The volatile potion (what was left in the cauldron) was definitely calming down as it cooled.

Eyes okay, Jackie worked to right the container—not that that helped much—and get another going.

Keys jingled in the door.

A thrill of fear shot through her. Half paralyzed with what was about to happen, she straightened up slowly.

Eva walked in carrying a canvas bag with celery leaves sticking out the top. The door closed before Eva glanced up and froze. Her wide-eyed gaze roamed the living room, hitting the still oozing potion now coating half the floor, the ceiling decorated in purple sprays and splats, the TV, the couch…

Eva’s stare hit Jackie.

“I can explain everything,” Jackie said like a deer caught in the headlights. Suddenly she remembered that she’d gotten the apathy potion. “But first, you have to try this incredible potion.”

The End