“Got it,” Darla answered and made the motion of zipping her lips.

  “First, I broke a ton of potions, then I broke my laptop while hurting myself repeatedly and, finally, I nearly got taken out by a stray baseball.”

  Darla nodded, like she wasn’t surprised. “Sounds like that curse is hittin’ on all sixes.” She continued to nod and then shook her head. “You got you another seven years o’ this. I mean… that’s the goin’ time.”

  I spun around to put the sausages in the pan, only to watch a sudden column of fire spark out from the hot oil. It arced up in a wave of orange and yellow and nearly slapped me across the face.

  “Get back!” Libby suddenly appeared as if from nowhere, snatching my sleeve and yanking me away from the stove all within a second or so.

  “Get the pan away from the flames!” Marty yelled as he ran towards me. “And turn the burner off!”

  Astrid and Finn yelled something at the same time. Meanwhile, the flames climbed higher until they licked the ceiling and I was vaguely aware of Marty disappearing from beside me. But my attention was on the paint of the ceiling, which was starting to bubble as smoke began to fill the area, along with heat.

  Remembering what the cause was, I sprang to seize the panhandle, but it scorched my palm and I dropped it with a painful screech. The oil spilled out of the pan and all over the floor and the fire exploded into a plume of flames, igniting the spilled oil.

  “Flames and smoke, water do I now invoke! Rain thy liquid on this fire, such is what I desire!” Astrid yelled as she appeared beside me, holding out her hands towards the flames. Just as I was about to yell that water wasn’t going to help an oil fire and would only make it worse, a massive wave formed in the center of my kitchen—arcing up near the ceiling—and immediately doused everything, us included, in a deluge of water. The wave instantly killed the flames and then receding around all of our ankles, flooding my kitchen.

  Astrid looked down at the water, which was forming a sizable pool in the kitchen, then up at me with an apologetic smile. “Sorry?”

  “Quick thinking, Astrid.”

  “But, the water—”

  “Put out the fire,” I interrupted her.

  Darla let out a shaky breath. “Is everyone still alive?”

  My heart was galloping through my throat and instantly Finn was beside me and in my arms. I held him just as tightly as he held me.

  “Are you okay, buddy?” I asked as he asked me the same.

  “It doesn’t appear to have done any serious damage,” Marty said as he observed the black stains that covered the wall. Then he looked down at the water at his feet. “Well, the fire anyway.”

  Astrid faced the water and, holding up her hands, chanted a few times about ‘water retreating’ then ‘water rescinding’ but the water just sat there as if to say it couldn’t understand her. Strangely enough, the massive puddle seemed like it was caged in by the threshold of the kitchen and wasn’t leaking into the living room or the dining room. Thank God.

  I opened the windows in the kitchen (that had been newly replaced) and then walked over to my spice cabinet, where I kept my most important potions. Scanning the titles, I hovered over the Reversing Oil, which was a potion used to reverse a hex or spell. Grabbing it, I uncorked it and then dumped it into the water which, was still folding around my ankles.

  Then I faced Astrid again and nodded. She repeated her spell chant, this time settling on the word ‘rescinding’ and the water flew up from the floor, funneled itself into a long cord and then leapt up to the window sill closest to us, as if it were a curious snake straining to see the view. Then the water suddenly started hurtling itself out the window, as if an invisible rubber hose were wrapped around it and pumping it forward. After another few seconds, there was no water left in my kitchen at all.

  When I glanced outside, I noticed that all the water had promptly frozen as soon as it made contact with the icy tundra and now looked like a frozen water snake.

  Libby came walking in then with arms full of towels (how she knew where I kept them was beyond me) and each of us took a towel, doing our best to dry the remaining water from the kitchen floor. Then, I reached down and retrieved the frying pan from the floor, turning to place it in the sink.

  “Well, it’s a good thing we’re starting the remodel,” I said, trying to keep my tears at bay. Yes, this broken mirror curse was definitely a thing. And now I needed to figure out how to break it.

  “Hey, it’s okay, Pops,” Marty said as he sloshed through the water and wrapped an arm around me. “Everything is going to be okay.”

  But, he didn’t know how badly I was cursed.

  “Everybody, get ready because we’re going to dinner tonight,” Marty announced as he turned around to face everyone. “On me.”

  “Yippee!” Darla called out.

  ***

  Even though I wasn’t keen on going to the Half-Moon Bar and Grill, mainly owing to the fact that my ex-boyfriend owned it, I got outvoted. But, figuring I’d have to get used to the fact that Marty and I were dating, I decided now was as good a time as any to announce as much to the rest of the world.

  As to whether Marty and I were actually dating, nothing had changed in that arena. Not that I expected us to have had ‘the conversation’ while my kitchen was first on fire and, next, submerged in water. So, no, we hadn’t had a talk about anything. Yet, there was definitely something… different between the two of us. We weren’t as chummy or palsy as we used to be. There was this weird, invisible sort of awkwardness that characterized us now—like neither of us knew how to act around the other.

  Talk about an elephant in the room—this elephant was like a behemoth.

  Of course, it only required a conversation, something that shouldn’t have been hard to have. But I also didn’t want to push things. I wanted to navigate this whole dating thing with Marty very carefully because he was one of my closest friends in Haven Hollow and no matter what, I didn’t want anything to hurt that friendship. So, for now, the two of us would just have to continue acting like awkward high school students for the time being.

  I mean, it wasn’t like I had a horrible curse on me that needed to be addressed first…

  “Right this way,” Shelby Stomper said as she led us to a big booth in the back of the restaurant. We slid into the booth and she handed us our menus. Once we were seated, I decided to tell everyone about my strange visitor and her even stranger mirror.

  “I’ve never heard of anything like that,” Marty said.

  “Neither had I until I saw it,” I answered as I pulled out my phone and clicking to a Google page, decided to search up haunted mirrors.

  “What are you looking at?” Libby asked.

  “I’m just researching possessed mirrors.”

  “See anything good?” Libby asked.

  “There’s not a whole lot about possessed mirrors, but there’s plenty about broken mirrors,” I answered as I swallowed hard and then looked at Darla, giving her the death eye which meant ‘don’t open your big mouth and tell Finn I’m cursed’. She gave me a nervous smile in response.

  As I returned my attention to the Google page, I learned that superstitions regarding broken mirrors dated to ancient times. People believed a person’s soul resided in their reflected image and if a mirror was damaged while the person was reflected in it, the soul would be trapped within the glass.

  “So, who was trapped inside that woman’s mirror?” Finn asked. “Was it a monster?”

  I looked over at him, where he was sitting between Astrid and Marty. “It appeared to be a woman from frontier times. She looked like she was trying to escape a fire or a burning building or something because she was covered in soot. She kept pounding the mirror with her fists like she wanted to get out.”

  Darla shuddered. “Oh, that just gives me the heebie-jeebies!”

  I nodded as I returned my attention to the article and read to myself: Later, in the 1800s, a broken mirror could foretell the death of a family member or a close friend. The first reference to seven years of bad luck appeared in print in 1851.

  “So, how do you break the spell and release that poor soul?” Libby asked.

  “I’m not sure.” I scrolled down the page. “I’m trying to figure that out now.”

  I bent over my phone when a different smell stung my nose. I looked up. “Does anyone smell something burning?”

  Finn sniffed. “I smell smoke.”

  At that moment, an unholy boom shook the room. A plume of dust, plaster, wood, and rotten stench erupted from the inside of the kitchen, knocking the power out, and we were instantly plunged into darkness.

  Immediately following, the wall nearest the kitchen erupted into flames.

  Darla, Libby, Finn, Astrid and I screamed and sprang from the booth. Roy appeared from the bar and immediately yelled for all the diners to evacuate the room. Luckily, there weren’t many of us seated inside, so we left through the back door without incident. We gathered outside, each of us trying to catch our breath, as the kitchen staff exited the back door and then Roy followed them, coughing and clearing his throat.

  “Wh-wh-wh-wh… what just happened?” Libby quavered.

  “The fire is out!” Roy yelled at the exact moment the fire department pulled up.

  That was when Darla turned to look at me. “You have to do something about your curse, Poppy.”

  “Your curse?” Finn repeated as he looked up at me. “What is she talking about, Mom?”

  Understanding that the cat was now wayyyy out of the bag, I realized I was going to have to explain everything that had happened since I’d broken my mirror this morning. And, dammit all, but I was going to have to pay a visit to Roy to let him know I was the reason his kitchen had exploded. I’m sure that little talk was going to go over well.

  It’s not something you have to worry about now, I told myself. The fire is out, so no one’s in danger.

  “You have GOT to find a way to break this curse,” Darla insisted after I’d finished explaining everything that had happened from early this morning until this moment.

  “Yeah, this takes bad luck to an all new high,” Marty said.

  “So, what are you going to do about it?” Libby asked.

  I inhaled deeply. “I think… I need to talk to Wanda.” Clearly, this curse was too big for me to face on my own.

  “But you already tried to break the curse with Wanda,” Finn said.

  I looked down at his worried expression and tried to smile. “Well, we didn’t try everything.” At least, I hoped we hadn’t tried everything because then we’d be in serious trouble.

  “This is why Wanda needs to form a coven,” Astrid said, nodding. “Then you wouldn’t just have Wanda, you’d have a full coven of sisters who could help you.”

  Finn looked up at me and murmured in a low tone, “I believe in you, Mom. You’ll find a way to break this curse.”

  “Thanks, sweetie.” I took a deep breath and then looked up at Marty. “Can you drive us home?”

  “Of course,” he answered.

  “Maybe stop for drive-thru along the way?” I asked, realizing we were all still hungry. Marty nodded as something else occurred to me. I turned to face Finn. “Buddy, I think it’s unsafe for you to be around me while this curse is in effect, so I’m going to ask Wanda if you can stay with Astrid and her for a little bit, okay?”

  “Sure, Mom,” Finn said and nodded as we both looked at Astrid.

  “Could you keep an eye on him for me?” I asked her.

  “You bet.”

  I then turned to face Libby and Darla. “And I think it’s best if you both head home, since I’m basically a walking train wreck.” They both nodded. Clearly, no one wanted to be around me after witnessing the strength of the darkness on my tail.

  “I know this isn’t like our usual cases,” Marty started as he looked at me with concern in his blue eyes. “But if the boys and I can possibly dust off our ghost equipment, we’d jump at the chance.”

  “I don’t think this bad luck has anything to do with a ghost,” I answered, shaking my head. “It’s something else.”

  “McFly, will you stay with Mom?” Finn asked, calling Marty by the nickname we’d given him when we’d first met him.

  I smiled at my little guy, who was looking at Marty with a very serious expression on his face. Marty reached over and ruffled his hair.

  “You know I will.” Then he looked at me. “Whatever you’re going through, I’m going through it with you.”

  ***

  Marty reclined on my couch and propped his feet on a cushion. “So how do we deactivate seven years of bad luck?”

  “That’s the question. I don’t know how to break the curse.”

  We both looked at Wanda, who shrugged. “Why are you looking at me?”

  “Um, you’re the only witch in the room?”

  “That doesn’t mean I know how to break a bad luck curse.”

  “Speaking of,” Marty started, frowning at her. “Why are you the only witch here?” Then he turned to look at me. “Shouldn’t you call Betanya and Olga?”

  It was a question I’d posed to Wanda, as well, but one she hadn’t thought was a good idea.

  “We can’t keep relying on them,” she said, sighing as she shook her head and played the part of dramatic as she was wont to do. “It’s just… it’s not right, considering I haven’t formed a coven yet.”

  “Why are you waiting on forming a coven?” I asked her, frowning.

  “Because doing so and becoming a High Witch aren’t things you just jump into, Poppy!” she answered, sounding like an old school marm reprimanding a truant student. “I haven’t fully wrapped my brain around it yet, but what I can say is that it’s not fair to Betanya and Olga to keep involving them in our situations…”

  “If they aren’t going to be allowed to stay here,” I finished for her, even though I hoped Wanda would allow them both to stay. Unfortunately, though, the only way they could stay is if Wanda agreed to form a coven. Otherwise, the laws of claiming sanctum said that Wanda was the only witch who could live in Haven Hollow.

  “Right,” Wanda said.

  I cocked my head to the side as I considered it. “Well, as far as I’m concerned, Betanya still owes me one considering I nearly died while we were defeating Roscoe.”

  “And Olga?” Wanda asked, eyeing me with an elevated brow.

  “Would a fruit basket suffice?”

  Wanda laughed and then shook her head. “Between the two of us and our powerful mojo, we should be able to reverse this curse ourselves.”

  “Yeah, well, our own powerful mojo didn’t get very far,” I answered.

  “We just need to try some other potions and spells,” she answered with an unconcerned expression.

  I nodded, because I’d been thinking along the same lines. “Something like X-Hex Oil, Uncrossing Oil, Tipareth Oil or Reversing Oil?”

  “Something stronger. Witchbane Oil,” Wanda answered.

  “Only a witch can brew Witchbane Oil.”

  “And you suck at brewing potions,” Marty pointed out as he looked at Wanda.

  “Remind me why you’re here again?” she asked while glaring at him. Then she looked back at me. “Anyway, I was thinking we could brew the Witchbane together so that way it gets my witchiness, but also your… nerdiness.”

  I decided to ignore the part about my nerdiness, mostly because it was true. “I don’t even know if I have the required ingredients. What are they again?”

  “Palma Christi, Verbena, Pine, Frankincense and Saint John’s Wort,” Wanda answered.

  I nodded. “Yeah, I’ve got them.”

  “And that’s it?” Marty asked as he speared us both with the intensity of his expression. “You’re just going to rely on another potion after the ones you tried failed?”

  Wanda looked from him to me. “Remind me what he’s doing here again?”

  I frowned. “Actually, he’s got a point.”

  “I do?” Marty asked as his eyebrows reached for the ceiling.

  “Yeah,” I nodded. “What if the Witchbane doesn’t work?”

  “Well, haven’t you done any research on the topic? There must be a million websites which tell you how to reverse a broken mirror curse,” Wanda said, sounding frustrated.

  I shrugged. “Sure, there are a ton of sites that discuss the curse itself, but the hard part is finding out how to break it. All of them treat it as if it’s unbreakable and you just have to deal with it.”

  “So let’s look at a resource besides the internet,” Wanda started.

  “What options do we have?” Marty asked.

  I looked up from my phone. “The Crescent Circle Coven?”

  “Don’t even joke about that,” Wanda responded, frowning at me. “If I never speak to the woman who birthed me ever again, it will be too soon.”

  I went back to squinting into my phone as Marty sank into the cushions again. “Phew! I didn’t want to have to deal with those witches ever again.”

  “Neither does anyone else,” Wanda said.

  “Here’s something,” I started.

  I sat down on the couch as Marty pulled his knees up to make space for me, then scanned down the page. “What is it?” he asked.

  “A solution.”

  “Well, don’t leave us in suspense, Poppy,” Wanda muttered.

  “This page lists a potential spell for breaking the curse. It says you have to grind the broken mirror glass to a fine powder and bury it under a tree.”

  “Ah, that’s right,” Wanda said, nodding.

  I looked up at her in question, so she explained. “I forgot about that one.” Then she sighed as she inspected her fingernails. “That’s the problem with spells, you know?”

  “No, I don’t know,” I answered.

  “The less you use them, the more you forget how to use them.” Then she looked up at me. “Now, that particular reversal spell I do recall using. It was the summer of… 1923 I believe it was. Or maybe it was the winter of 1900,” she frowned and then rolled her eyes up to the ceiling as if it had an answer for her. “Or the winter of 1910?”