Witch's Almanac
Ellie woke up and quickly got ready while Joel was still busy doing things inside and outside around the house. Ellie dashed to the bathroom and took a quick hot bath washing up and prepared to go down to the school building. She could feel the tension in her skin as she got ready wondering if she and Luke would be held responsible for the recent events. The local folk have been good people over the years as they've managed to get rid of most of the trouble makers, but there were still those who were truly set in their ways. So far, not a whole lot had been said.
Ellie threw on a pair of black jeans and an unsoiled red suede jacket Joel had brought back from a hunt a few weeks ago. She always liked getting unsoiled stuff from stores that had merchandise that had not been touched. When Ellie got out, Joel was standing by the front window peeking out.
"Morning!" Joel turned around nodding.
"What's up?" Ellie asked already knowing the answer.
"Someone died last night…" Joel paused.
"They did!? How? Was it a hunter? Infected?" Ellie asked.
"That's the problem, we don't know" Joel ran hand through his hair racking his brain.
"So…." Ellie didn't know what to say.
"Are you sure there wasn't someone in there?" Joel suddenly spun around expecting Ellie to have an answer for him.
"I didn't see anyone…I just heard shit falling—I mean it could be possible there was" Ellie shrugged.
"Do me favor and talk to that boy…Luke. It seems like he still aint talkin'" Joel walked back to the window.
"I'll do what I can…" Ellie picked up her back pack filled with the couple text books she had.
"Ok, I gotta go, try to stay out of trouble, love ya!" Joel said quickly walking over to Ellie giving her a hug.
"I will, love ya too" Ellie nodded as Joel put on his baseball cap taking off walking.
Ellie locked up the house and dashed off to school house. The Professor sat at his desk as Dusty sat in the corner with his clique. Luke sat in the opposite corner alone quietly reading a book. The Professor sat quietly shifting papers back and forth into folders then got up and began writing on the chalkboard. Everyone looked up at the board anxious to see what today's activities would be. Strangely enough, today's activity was something completely unexpected. In addition to the normal lessons, an assignment to do a book report on Halloween was posted.
The Professor was a plain looking man. He had a little extra weight to him and had somewhat round clean shaven face with a pointy nose. He usually had his coal black hair combed over to the side and wore a beige sports jacket, pair of black trousers, and an old pair of penny loafers. Today was different as far as his sense of fashion was concerned. He turned around to address them after finishing the last punctuation mark with a loud thud of the chalk hitting the board.
"I am aware of the incidents involving the west side of the dam from yesterday…" the Professor said adjusting his coveralls which was not his usual dress.
"I'm disappointed in all of you, but I trust you will not disappoint again. So, since it's October and everyone is familiar with a holiday which is celebrated by eating countless tooth rotting sweets and dancing around in silly costumes parading around running amok…" the Professor paused putting on a ball cap.
"I want all of you to work in pairs and write a book report on Halloween. Luke, Ellie pair one. Dusty, Timmy, pair two. Mikey, Chris, you two will be the last pair" the Professor paused walking over to the back where there were several long book shelves.
"There are plenty of books here where between all of you should be enough. I want the report written NEATLY and turned in BEFORE Halloween" the Professor stressed his words.
"After you copy down your assignments for today, I want all of you to pick out a book each. I'm afraid I'm going to have to leave all of you again today so let's hustle it up please" the Professor finished going back to his office.
"Luke? What's up?" Ellie said joining him in the back of the classroom.
"I got in trouble yesterday" was all Luke would say as they got up to find books.
"How so?" Ellie asked.
"Luke! Puke! Luke! Puke!" the boys started chanting.
"Shut up!" Ellie said flipping them off.
"Professor! Ellie's giving us the bird again!" Timmy shouted.
"Good, you probably deserved it! Now shut up and get back to work!" the Professor shouted from his office.
Luke quickly found a book while Dusty and the other boys were still looking and giggling amongst each other.
"So what happened?" Ellie whispered as she scanned the far book shelf trying to find something other than using a twenty year-old encyclopedia.
"My dad yelled at me" Luke whispered.
"At least he's talking" Ellie thought.
"That's not too bad…my dad gave a shout or two at me as well. You want to do some archery after this?" Ellie asked sensing Luke's sedate mood.
"I can't my dad said I have to come straight home and watch my sister" Luke frowned.
"Ok…" Ellie sighed nodding.
"Here's a good book for you" Luke said pulling a book titled "The Witch's Almanac".
Ellie took the book in her hand and began flipping through it.
"What's this book doing here? This is…" Ellie suddenly realized how oddly placed this book was.
"Take it…maybe you can learn something not only about Halloween, but about…" Luke quietly whispered.
"Hey Luke Puke! Why don't you help us find a book!" Timmy shouted.
"Yea Puke! Help us!" Dusty agreed.
"Find your own books dweebs!" Ellie dismissed them.
"Use the encyclopedia…" Luke shook waved them off as they glared at him.
"That's a good idea!" Dusty said running over to it.
"Why didn't we think of that before?" Timmy laughed.
Ellie and Luke looked at each other and put the palm of their hand on their forehead sighing at the ignorance. At that moment the Professor came out carrying a good sized toolbox.
"Did everyone find a book?" the Professor asked.
Everyone nodded silently.
"Are you sure? Once I lock up here you won't be able to get back in until tomorrow. Oh yea we are having class if tomorrow to make up for the missed days if nothing else goes awry" the Professor announced.
"Ok then, out you go!" the Professor said shooing everyone out the door and locking it up.
"I'll walk you home" Ellie offered.
"Yea, if you don't mind…" Luke nodded as Dusty and his friends disappeared around a couple buildings and stuck their heads out watching them as they passed not daring to come out and cause trouble with Ellie around.
"You should really just turn around and pop him in the face one good time, and maybe he'll leave you alone" Ellie suggested.
"Yea right! Then I'll get squashed" Luke shrugged.
"You can't let a bully have their way" Ellie explained.
"It's kind of hard when their twice your size" Luke disagreed.
"I've dealt with men who were three times my size, and I'm a girl" Ellie pointed out.
"If you're going to put me down I'd rather just go home by myself" Luke looked at her with watery eyes.
"I-I didn't mean it like that…I just don't want to see you get pushed around" Ellie explained realizing Luke was bit more fragile than she thought.
"My dad didn't teach me how to survive like yours did; and now every time I go to sleep I…last night I had…" Luke shook his head in much frustration stopping.
"You what?" Ellie motioned for him to continue.
"Na…it's nothing…let's just go…I don't want to talk about…" Luke threw his hands up.
"Luke you know you can tell me anything" Ellie reminded him.
"I know Big Sis, but…" Luke was about to say but his younger sister come running toward them.
"Luke you're home!" a young girl with long blond hair came running out dressed in a long white linen dress that came almost down to her ankles wearing a small pair of leather boots.
"Yea the teacher has other stuff to do Nora, where's dad?" Luke smiled at his younger sister.
"He's busy in his shed working on something, he said for you to come see him as soon I saw you" Nora replied.
"Excuse me a minute" Luke said disappearing toward his dad's workshop.
"Hi Big Sis!" Nora smiled.
"Hi Nora" Ellie smiled.
"When are we going to play again?" she asked innocently.
"Soon, I promise" Ellie smiled receiving a hug from her.
"I can't wait, I got a new doll I found I have to show you" Nora said with much enthusiasm.
"Next time you show me ok?" Ellie said as Luke slowly came walking back up.
"I have to stay and help dad, we'll have to start working on our report tomorrow afternoon" Luke said with a bit of disappointment.
"Oh ok…well I'll just read up on our book" Ellie nodded.
"Yea me too, sorry…we'll talk later…I promise!" Luke nodded returning back to his dad's workshop.
"Bye big sis!" Nora waved as she followed her brother.
"Bye Nora!" Ellie said as she returned back home.
When Ellie returned home, she saw that her pumpkins were growing quite rapidly. The patch looked quite lively with flowers and long green vines with different sized pumpkins lying around. The patch was well cultivated and had quite a few pumpkins of various sizes there. At least six were ready to be picked.
"Good!" Ellie thought beginning to carefully pick them and bring them into the house so she could wash them. Maria would be happy to see some good sized pumpkins. Then Ellie thought how she and Joel would enjoy the pumpkin pie Maria would make, perhaps that would smooth things over?
The day was long leaving her with a lot of time to think, so she took out the Witch's Almanac and began flipping through it. There was a lot of information on astrological signs, horoscopes, and about the positioning of different heavenly bodies. Ellie turned the booklet over and looked at the date. It was twenty-one years old. Near the present date on the calendar in the almanac, there were reminders of what the origins of Halloween were and what it means to the practicing witch.
"Hmmm…" Ellie thought as she read knowing some of the information coincided with what she had been told by Marlene growing up. Something else soon caught her attention. There were pages that were titled "A Spell a Day". From old remedies to deal with a headache to spells of protection for one's home, Ellie spent a lot of time reading the recipes and incantations.
This made Ellie particularly curious because she had never run across anything like this before. She wondered if the professor realized he even had anything like this in his overstuffed bookcases. Then Ellie wondered what Luke was going to tell her, and if it was related to what happened to them. She knew her dad wouldn't be much help with his practicality and down to earth attitude. So she decided it was time to start her own investigation and use this project as an excuse for her to start asking questions. The most logical thing to do she thought would be to ask the professor. She smiled closing the book looking at it with much interest.