beneath the moon - part IV.

Title: Beneath the Moon - part IV.

Genre: Fantasy, witchy-bitchy, kinda angst, kinda smut, maybe hurt/comfort 

What to know: I watched the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina series, okay, I binged it, and I just wanted to write a story of... being witchy-bitchy. Since I was inspired by the Sabrina series, it influenced me, but I also mixed all sorts of witch-interpretations from current pop culture, but if you want to, you can see it as a story from the expended universe of Sabrina. No characters from the show are present though. The story summary is available on the contents page. The previous parts are available on the blog.

Warning: maybe a bit of swearing so far, but there'll be others in the upcoming parts

Category: T (teen&up)
Length: 2918 words

BENEATH THE MOON - PART IV.

‘Can you believe that shit?!’ Blanche screamed, dropping down onto the sofa. ‘She’s such a snake.’

‘I guess even her familiar was a snake, like a couple of thousands of years ago,’ Danny commented, taking an armchair beside. He hadn’t had breakfast, he just got out of the bed for the council meeting and to go back to Blanche’s place. Leda, as the mother for anyone and everyone that entered her house, instantly went back to the kitchen to not only make some breakfast for Danny but also to make some snack for everyone, she felt like they needed that. Or they would have needed alcohol, but it was only ten in the morning.

Gen was somewhere else in mind when she settled at the kitchen table with Leda jumping around it, not accepting any help, and Darius pouring some orange juice for himself, and vigor for Gen. She heard as everyone was quietly chattering; the kids in the living room right across the kitchen, teasing each other and laughing together, while Darius and Leda were discussing the events as if they were talking about politics in public that nobody should be talking about.

‘Hey,’ Darius said to her, jogging her elbow, nearly making her spill the potion. ‘You’re somewhere else. You don’t get to be somewhere else after being away for seventy-seven years.’

‘Was it that much? It only felt like an eternity,’ she mumbled, irony still soaking from her words.

‘Seriously, though,’ Leda looked up at her between flipping two pancakes, ‘how did you survive in there? I sometimes feel like I’m going nuts in my own bedroom.’

‘You can always come out of your room, you know that, right?’ Darius laughed teasingly, while he stole a piece of the pancake she just put on a table. She laughed, rolled her eyes, and threw the said pancake into his face, while she put the rest on a plate for Danny. He appeared by the table within half a minute, or so it seemed. Blanche soon followed, hugging Darius from behind, and with that, she made Gen look at all of them from an outsider’s perspective because she was an outsider. Leda did welcome her with most of her urgent problems already solved out for her, and Darius did step up for her from the minute he found out she was still alive. Blanche and Danny did go back for her to the cell, risking everything, even though they knew nothing about her. But she was an outsider, she knew nothing about their lives. She didn’t even know who won World War II, she didn’t know how exactly Darius and Blanche ended up together or how they feel about each other. She knew nothing about Danny beside his name, and the same was true for Blanche, but as she sat there, watching them chat and live their lives, it seemed that they did this often. They knew each other, supported one another through lots of things, and were there whenever someone needed them. They were in that kitchen as a peculiar little family. And Gen didn’t fit the picture.

‘I’m sorry, dear, coming back to,’ Leda spoke up, shaking Gen back to her own body, ‘you know, the question of how you survived down in that cell.’

Gen smiled a tired smile.

‘I think I didn’t, really,’ she stuttered. ‘I feel like a part of me is missing now, you see.’

‘You’ll come around, Gen, don’t worry.’ Darius grabbed her hand and rubbed the back of her hand with his thumb. ‘It’s been a long time, you’ll need some more to readjust.’

‘You mean more than seventy-seven years? Because I don’t really think I have another eighty years before I go mad.’

‘Pancakes!’ Leda shouted, putting a plate full of pancakes to the middle of the table.

‘What a timing, Leda,’ Danny laughed to himself, receiving a smack on his head. He didn’t really feel like he should be part of that conversation, and neither did Blanche, but he wanted to be part of it. Blanche belonged to Darius and Leda, who both knew Guinevere from before, and she was the one to insist on getting her out of the cell, but Danny just went along with the events and found himself staring at Guinevere when he thought she didn’t see because he was having a crush on her. But he thought it would be strange to make a move on someone that’s been out of a cell after almost eighty years of isolation.

One week passed. Guinevere was sitting at the back porch of the house, wrapped up in a blanket, watching the sun go down over the woods, with a mug of vigor in her hand. She was still exhaustible, often trembling from the smallest effort, sleeping and eating a lot, like a baby. Blanche and Leda often told her about what had happened in those seventy years. They told her about the end of the World War, the decades after that, including the Civil Rights Movement, and they also told her about TVs, phones, laptops. Blanche went on and on about her and Darius’s relationship, while Darius and Gen talked about her trial each night, trying to build a strategy up. Danny often popped in to say hi to them all, and sometimes sat down with them to watch a film, because he was determined to make her catch up with everything that was part of pop culture. He even prepared a list with different films, series, and books to watch and read.

‘Hi there,’ Danny appeared on the patio out of nowhere. ‘Sorry to startle you.’ She almost spilt her potion out. ‘How’s it going? Feeling any stronger?’

She shrugged, sipping some from the weirdly blue liquid. ‘I guess.’

‘Wow, that sounded definite,’ he laughed, sitting down next to Gen, opening a can of beer. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Other than my obvious and continuous existential crisis?’

‘You already sound as if you’ve always lived in this century.’

‘So,’ she looked up at him, positioning herself on the bench, ‘what brings you here?’ She was staring up at him. Danny was partly of Hispanic origin, which gave his skin a soft brown hue. He had curly hair and deep brown eyes, with an overly confident smirk constantly appearing on his face.

‘I thought by now you should be up for a good Matrix marathon,’ he grinned, his mouth going around his entire head.

‘Ahh, sorry, but I think today I’d rather go to bed early.’ He frowned and turned his entire body towards Gen.

‘Is everything alright?’

‘You asked that already,’ she pointed out.

‘No, I asked what was wrong, and now I’m asking if everything’s alright,’ he teased, and when she didn’t reply just rolled her eyes, he started poking her upper arm. As he moved, the T-shirt’s sleeve moved a bit upwards, revealing the circular, nonfigurative tattoo he had on his left arm. ‘So? Will you finally tell me what’s bothering you?’

She shrugged again and tried to become one with her blanket. ‘I don’t know, I’m just… As I said, I don’t really feel like myself since I got out.’ Danny wanted to laugh for a second because he didn’t see her as an ex-con, but she, in fact, was imprisoned for more than most people live, so he decided not to.

‘You want to talk about it?’

Gen was never the one for emotional talk, but she did feel like she should let that all out. She just didn’t know how to start, so Danny didn’t say a word. He knew she would open up some time, she just needed time, he just wanted to support her. They felt a strange connection to one another, that neither of them could really put their fingers on.

But he would have had questions. A lot.

‘You know what? Come, let’s watch the movie. You’ll fall asleep either way,’ he suggested, helping her up from the bench. They settled on the couch as Danny put the film on. Blanche and Leda sat down from time to time to join them, said a couple of words and then left to come back a couple of minutes later. Danny couldn’t stop talking about the film and its influence on popular media, while Gen was contemplating her life choices; or lack thereof.

Seventy-seven years were more than she thought she spent in the basement, and just long enough to miss an entire lifetime from everything. History has happened, both for the mortals and the witches, on a grand and personal scale as well. And she was there, curled up on the couch, her fingers picking on the wounds on her thighs to make her feel her own body and that she was alive. She was out of the cell, she was welcomed in a home that wasn’t hers or her family’s. It was absurd, as if all things just landed in her lap; she didn’t get out of the basement on her own no matter how hard she thought about her options, she never found a place to live on her own, she didn’t even kill the Duke without help or without collapsing right after. She wasn’t herself, and she couldn’t get over the fact.

The film was already halfway through when Danny looked at her. She didn’t notice; she was resting her chin on her knee, staring in front of herself with dead eyes. He smoothly caressed her arm, careful not to startle her. She raised her gaze to him, trying to fake a smile, without much result.

‘You alright?’

‘Are you going to keep repeating this question?’ she teased. ‘You know you’re not responsible for me, do you?’ He gasped jokingly before going on:

‘You really seem disturbed.’

‘Wouldn’t you be, Danny?’ she asked him, turning serious. They were just sitting there, not watching the movie, but instead looking into each other’s eyes. ‘After being put to rest for that many years?’

‘I know it’s not ideal, but at least we met,’ he smirked, teasingly raising an eyebrow.

‘You smooth motherfucker,’ she laughed as she had to realize how quickly she adjusted her vocabulary when it came to swear words. He shrugged, winked, and paused the film.

‘You want to talk about it?’

‘I’ve never been the one to talk about such things,’ Gen admitted as she adjusted her blanket on her shoulders and put her mug down on the coffee table. ‘But I appreciate the effort.’

‘Well, you know where to find me if –‘ he started, but got interrupted:

‘If I feel like listening to more of your flattering worries or charming compliments?’ she asked so suave she almost fooled herself, and with that said she left Danny on the couch while she marched off to puff a cigarette on the front porch. Standing there she watched Darius approach the house, with a careworn look on his face. After a short small talk, he took a big, old book out of his backpack, and handed it to Gen.

‘This is yours, potato,’ he commented, with a slightly raised smile. ‘I kept it in my office.’

‘For so many years?’

‘Stop with that “so many years” bullshit already.’ His frustrated sigh burst out of him with unexpected passion. ‘I mean –‘ he halted for a minute before he continued and observed her face with agitated worry, leaning against a pillar, ‘I wouldn’t want to underestimate what you’ve been through, but you’ve been repeating this since you’ve come around. You should try to find a way out of this, or you’ll go madder out here than you did back in there.’

With an ironic smile on her face, she looked up to him and had another puff from the cigarette. Darius, although as Gen learnt Blanche didn’t like the smell of smoke, looked at the little roll of tobacco so longingly that without a word, she offered him the rest.

‘I don’t think you know how crazy I did get.’

‘No, because you don’t talk about it.’ He let out a deep breath, letting out a smaller cloud of smoke. ‘I know you remember a different time, but it’s become fashionable to talk about how we feel and express them.’

‘Ah, yes, and I’ve always been the one for fashion, that’s why I’m running around  a giant, living-breathing burrito wrapped in a dark blue blanket,’ she commented swirling to demonstrate her point.

‘I’m just saying that you have to talk about it at some point,’ he shrugged, pressing a small little kiss on her forehead. He left her out on the porch after he’d thrown the butt of the cigarette away, and Gen was left on the porch again.

‘I need you to help me,’ she told Danny as she vehemently dropped herself down onto the couch next to him. They were in a pub, located in the basement of the temple. Danny had been there for a couple of hours with his friends, drinking and playing cards and he wasn’t prepared for Gen to randomly land beside him, already with her legs up. He had to realize that he never saw her sitting in any other way but her legs up, and that he had never seen her outside of the house. Danny considered this a major step towards her living a normal life and he was genuinely happy for her. His obvious crush on her was only additional. ‘Only you’re reckless enough to help me.’

‘That’s not the greatest start, but I’m definitely interested,’ he admitted, leaving his cards on the table, turning his entire body towards Gen, ‘do go on.’

‘I’ve been going through our old family grimoire and I’ve found a ritual that could actually help me.’

‘So, one of your ancestors, that you are not depending on anymore, wrote a ritual for your strangely specific situation?’ he asked sarcastically, raising an eyebrow, but as he put his elbow on the back of the couch and leaned in on the conversation, he lost all interests for anything else, so the game went on without him.

‘No, not like that,’ she shook her head, and crawled a little closer, and she didn’t realized that for the rest of the guests they seemed like a couple sharing their most intimate thoughts with one another. And many people noticed them. ‘But there had been memory troubles in my family, and my aunt came up with this ritual. And I…’

‘Please don’t tell me that you rewrote it,’ he grimaced what he would hear. ‘Please don’t.’

‘I did. And I think we could use it to catch me up with the history that I missed out on,’ she argued and was ready to defend her ritual to him. There was a smile crawling on Danny’s face created a grin on her face as well. ‘If it works, then I should be all caught up on the last seventy years.’

‘And if it doesn’t work, you’ll lose all the sanity you have left,’ he noted carefully squinting his eyes. ‘And we all know that’s not left,’ he added, trying to smooth his last comment.

‘Exactly, I don’t have much at stake!’ she exclaimed, faking all the cheerfulness she could. Danny laughed along with her, but he was worried about her wellbeing and the ritual going south really quick. He had no good experience with rewritten rituals, they always go bad, especially if it’s complex.

‘So, what do you need for the ritual?’ Gen smiled and cheered and jumped in her seat because she took as an agreement from him. She dragged an old and torn piece of paper from the pocket of her way too big raincoat. It was yellow and wrinkled, and it was covered in ink of several colours, with spells and drawings and descriptions. He observed it thoroughly, but there were sections that were way too faded to decipher what it said. He frowned as he was looking at the paper, but Gen put a whiter, neater sheet on top of it.

‘I mostly need what you can find in nature. Like a lake or pond, leaves of an Oaktree and such things, but I need a potion that I started to prepare back home, and I need someone who would do the ritual with me.’

‘That would be me.’

‘That would be you,’ she repeated, nodding along, raising her gaze to his that never left her face. ‘You are aware of all the things that I need to know. I don’t really care about the personal stuff of those I knew, if I would need it, Leda or Darius could tell me. But all the movies that you’re so keen on showing me, all the events of historical significance, and cultural habits and whatnot, you can give it to me.’

Danny laughed out loud, even bending his head back. A bunch of tiny wrinkles appeared around his eyes. ‘And you honestly think that I would be the best option for this? You are seriously mistaken, Guinevere.’

‘Gen,’ she repeated for the thousandth time. ‘Call me Gen, please.’

‘It just… Guinevere suits you,’ he shrugged, ‘I like the sound of it.’ She sighed, realizing that she could never get him to call her Gen, so she left it at that. ‘Anyway, this could really backfire, Guinevere, and you know that.’

‘I know, and I’m willing to take that risk.’

‘But what makes you think I’m willing too?’

‘You still haven’t said no.’