Page 29 of Everything She Does Is Magic

There’s a sense of completion when I succeed. It’s the same satisfaction I get when I answer the last question on a test, and I know the work is done.

Opening my eyes, the little gnome greets me, looking the same as he did when we first met.

I scrape up the pieces of the broken mug next, making it into a pile. It’s best to have my materials close together so the magic doesn’t have to stretch too far to find what I need. I learned that the hard way while training with my cousin Graham. We were working on the distance of my magic, exploring how far my mending could go to repair something. We’d already figured out I could gather materials that weren’t in immediate view. That day we wanted to see if I could repair things for which I had no supply, like patching a gap in his roof without having extra shingles.

Graham stood behind me as I squatted down, my hands atop the missing shingle. I focused my breathing. Imagined the ceiling below free of a drip. Envisioned the piece of roof folding over itself to be fixed.

Next thing I knew, Graham was doubled over. I’d conjured a shingle out of thin air, and it had hit him in the head on its way to me. He was inches from falling off the roof altogether.

“That wasawesome,” he’d said, blood trickling down his forehead. “Your power is amazing.”

This ceramic mug has most of its pieces, but some are so fine, they are nearly powder. I make the mountain of fragments as contained as possible, and my hand catches on a particularly sharp piece, slicing the skin between my thumb and forefinger.

“Shit,” I say, louder than I mean to, startling backward as I put the cut to my mouth to nurse it. There is a wall of ceramics behind me, waiting to be glazed. My abrupt movement makes them wobble in dramatic fashion—loud, sharp clanks that anyone in the shop can hear.

The door handle turns.

13

Darcy

I’ve always thought our supply closet was small. Now it’stoosmall.Smell the oils on Anya’s skinsmall. Hear her short, interrupted intake of breath as I readjust myself to approach her. She’s all stormy eyes and intense energy, working very hard to back away even when there’s nowhere to go.

“What are you doing in here?” I ask.

She has her lips cupped over the inside of her palm. “I cut myself.”

My worry overrides my suspicion, and I push forward. “Let me see.”

Once my hand is on her wrist, she relents without hesitation. The cut is long, stretching over the delicate skin between her thumb and finger.

“This is a tricky spot,” I say. It’s hard to focus with that heady, herbal scent that emanates off her body every time we’re this close.

I release her hand to move to the other side of the supplycloset, where we keep a small first aid kit. Every movement is a dance, clumsy and urgently close, an unchoreographed tango where one of us needs to take the lead.

“Take a seat,” I tell her, letting it be me.

She follows my directions without resistance, settling down in the chair I’d placed in front of the table to work on fixing my ceramics. I’m still not used to the pressure of her attention, the way it makes me so aware of myself, wondering what it is she thinks of my every hand movement and hair flick.

The wound isn’t deep, but the paper-thin skin in this part of her hand makes the cut look worse than it is. I have to use up the last of the gauze to staunch the blood flow, wrapping and wrapping until there is no visible red. My work looks excessive, like she’s a boxer getting ready for a match, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.

“You’re very good at taking care of things,” she says.

“Someone has to be,” I tell her, keeping my eyes on the bandages. “Now, can you explain how you got this?”

“I fell.”

“You fell?” I repeat.

“Yes.”

The silence swells. Suffocating. Close. I have no choice but to look at her. To lock into my determination to know what’s actually happening.

The longer we look at each other, the less I remember what I’m wondering about. Her eyes, keen, focused, are such a crystallized color. Syrup-on-pancakes brown. And her lips have this permanent quirk to them, forever skeptical. I’d like to wipe that expression off her face. I’d like to see who else she could become with me around.

I lean closer, possessed by a need that’s greater than all my other senses.

“Do you want to come to a dinner with my parents and me next week?” she blurts out, my mouth inches from hers.