Both Shade and Sun

I remember the way the air smelled that night. Like wet dirt and bonfires. The barn was in the middle of the field, surrounded by dense clusters of trees. There was a fog settling over the farm, rolling out from the woods all the way to the old rickety barn. Beneath our high top Converse, the red and gold leaves crackled, like an autumnal flame lighting our path. It felt like Mother Nature was setting the perfect scene.

“Don’t you think this is spooky? Should we turn back?” Anna asked. She was always the more worrisome of us, if not a little childish.

“No, don’t be silly,” I said. “You know we need to do this.” Besides, I preferred dark, spooky things. The fog and the gray gloom and that old fucked up barn that probably should have been torn down 50 years ago. I loved everything about it. And it was my favorite time of year.

There was something about Fall that made me feel seen. Like there was a place for the misfits among the overcast skies, evening mist, and falling leaves, clumped together in the dirt. It was messy, like me. Because not all of us were gilded princesses like Snotty Lindsay. Her father owned a beach house in Florida and she’d invited almost the whole class last year. Except us. But that’s okay, because fuck Lindsay. And her creepy handsy bull of a brother.

“Yeah,” said Maggie, looking over at Anna. “This is perfect. It’s like the Universe wants this to happen. It will make the magic more potent.” That was Maggie, always bending the world to her needs. “Besides, Anna, this is for your sister. And my cousin. And all the other girls he’s fucked with.”

Anna put her head down, probably saying a prayer for her sister, Robin. We were still waiting to find out if she would wake up. She’d been with Lawrence at a party, three nights before. We didn’t know what really happened, but a bunch of other people said that she came running out of a bedroom upstairs, screaming at him not to touch her. He’d grabbed her by the arm, hard enough to leave a whole hand print. He was calling her a cock tease and a bitch. When she tried to pull her arm away, he’d grabbed her face, spat in it, then pushed her. Unfortunately, she’d been too close to the stairs. The whole party watched as Robin fell. She hadn’t woken up since and the doctors were waiting for the swelling in her brain to go down.

As we got closer to the barn, Maggie stopped. "Do you have everything we’re supposed to have?” she asked, looking back at Anna.

“Everything Violet wrote down,” she said, tipping her head to me. She held up the brown shopping bag of ingredients.

“You made sure to get the waterproof matches, right?” I asked. She nodded.

A wave of musty, dank air hit us as we undid the rusted latch and opened the door. Inside, it was pitch dark. The air felt thicker, like walking through cobwebs. There was a small loft, straight ahead. I knew from my uncle that it was mostly chicken feed and egg crates up there. Along the left wall was old farm equipment: a big riding mower, a tiller, and a combine. The back wall had tools hanging from it, including a scythe.

“Let’s go over here,” Maggie said, pointing to an alcove between hay bales in the center of the barn.

We sat in a circle, each of us sitting on a bay of hale, the stuff Anna had brought in the middle. I pulled the bag of sea salt from my pocket, making a small circle between us, chanting the protection invocation.

“Salt of earth, guard us tonight. Help us in the darkness, guide us by the light. Give us the power to change things for the best. North, East, South, West.”

I reached over, pulling each of the items from the bag and setting them inside: two black candles, waterproof matches, scissors, white cotton, black cotton, frankincense and myrrh incense, and a black ribbon. And the watch he’d left at Anna’s house the night her sister got hurt. We had everything we needed for a binding spell for Lawrence Macon and the bad things he’d done.

“Are you ready, sisters?” I asked. They both looked at me solemnly and nodded their heads.

“Then let’s begin. As I perform the spell, we must all imagine Lawrence never doing anything else painful to anyone again.”

I started by lighting the black candles and putting them in the salt circle. Then the incense. I placed each candle and incense holder in the four directions. The flames flickered as I started the next part of the ritual. Taking Lawrence’s watch, I wrapped it in the white cotton and tied it.

“God and Goddess, see this as a representation of our enemy, Lawrence Macon. See this cotton as the flesh of the intended. See the watch as the soul of the intended. Hear the ticking as the beat of his heart.” Then the three of us repeated the mantra three times.

Maggie handed me the black cloth and I covered the watch with it. “God and Goddess, bind Lawrence Macon from doing harm to anyone again. Bind him and his kind from wreaking pain, sorrow, misery, and grief on others,” I said, as Maggie handed me the black ribbon.

I began wrapping the ribbon tightly around the cloth-covered watch. “Bind him as tightly as this ribbon and keep others from his toxic touch. Bind him, God and Goddess, so that others may live in his presence in peace.” I finished wrapping the ribbon, tying it tightly.

As I chanted, I kept picturing him immobile, mute, unable to speak or do anything to anyone. Locked in his body, scared the same way Anna’s sister had been. I knew revenge was seeping into my thoughts, and I tried heavily to curb it. Witchcraft didn’t discriminate against intentions. It simply channeled feelings, words, thoughts into actions and events.

As I tied the last knot, I held it over the flames. “God and Goddess, we thank you for hearing us tonight. We seek to do no harm and live only in the light. Grant us only what we ask for the greater good. So mote it be.”

“So mote it be,” Maggie and Anna echoed. We sat in silence, letting our work wash over us. The candles had burned halfway down and the incense was almost out.

“Do you think it will work?” Anna whispered. She’d been a little bit afraid of witchcraft when we initiated her last year. But after years of religious bullshit being spewed from the sinners and liars in her family, she’d finally had enough. She’d gone out and bought a tarot deck. When she’d brought it to school, Maggie and I had been shocked. Good girl Anna was coming to the other side. After that, the three of us had bonded over our love of Converse, New York Style pizza, and writing love-hate poetry about boys.

Maggie grabbed Anna’s hand. “Of course it will. And the one we did for your sister will work, too. Just watch. She’ll be up in no time, making us pizza rolls and doing her cheers. And dickhead will hopefully get some nasty karma.” She snickered loudly.

“It will,” I echoed. Then I licked my fingers and put both the flames out. Anna held up her phone’s flashlight as we gathered everything and put it back in the bag. I put the wrapped watch in a mason jar and screwed the lid shut tight.

We walked back the way we came, crunching over the same flame-colored leaves. The fog had lifted a bit and the sun was setting in cotton candy hues of pink and orange. My stomach rumbled. Being a witch was hungry work. I couldn’t wait to go home and eat pizza.

When we got to the gate at my property, I hugged Anna. “We love you, A. No one’s gonna hurt you or Robin or any of us as long as I can help it. And I can.”

“Yeah, listen to the 3rd generation witch. If anyone can make magic happen, it’s Violet.” I blew a kiss to Maggie and watched them walk towards the street. Then I went home, ate pizza, and fell into a sleep that was void of dreams.

The next morning, my phone was buzzing incessantly as the sun shone through the blinds. I squinted, trying to get my eyes to work right so I could read the screen.

“Hello?”

“Vi…oh my god. Vi, it worked. It worked too well.” Maggie was practically yelling. I could hear Anna on the line, sniffling.

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“The spell…”

“Yeah, what about it?” I felt my skin prickle.

“Robin woke up this morning. Perfectly healthy. And she didn’t remember anything!”

“Oh, that’s great. That’s awesome.”

“Yeah, the doctors said she’s lucky. They’re keeping her for observation, but they said aside from some bruising, she’s good. She can come home tomorrow.”

“Oh, I thought you were going to tell me something else.”

“There is something else,” Maggie said, taking a deep breath. “My mom told me this morning. Lawrence. Lindsay. A few other people. They, uh, went out on their boat yesterday. There was a storm or something. They were trying to make it back to shore. But something happened. I guess there was lightning or a wave. Lawrence hit his head and fell overboard. Some of the guys saved him. They all made it back to shore. But he hasn’t woken up this morning. I think they’re saying he might be brain dead.”

“Did…did we kill him?” Anna asked, sobbing.

“What? No.”

I knew what we put out into the world. I knew what it seemed like. There’s a fine line between good and evil. Between love and hate. Some even think they are the same. And maybe they are. Maybe we all are. Maybe I am. Both shade and sun. Pain and glory. But I know that even when I’m the darkness, even when I’m the shadow, I’m still full of light. I am both and cannot be one without the other. And what we did may have been done in the dark, but it was conceived in the light. It was born from love. And like the Witches' Creed, that is all that matters.

“And do what you will be the challenge,

So be it in Love that harms none,

For this is the only commandment,

By Magick of old, be it done.

Eight words the Witches’ Creed fulfill:

If it harms none, do what you will.”