I had a restless night, I kept waking up. Daddy was next to me in bed, facing away from me, and I would curl up against his back and try to fall back to sleep.
I woke up and turned my head. He was on his back, eyes closed. I sat up and started to move to get out of bed, and he opened his eyes and grabbed my arm.
"What are you doing?" his voice sounded rough.
"I, uh, I hafta go pee," I said.
He let me go, and sat up when I got off of the bed. "I'm not leaving you alone right now. Someone needs to be with you at all times, and you need to tell me what you're doing."
"Wh- why?" I asked, confused.
"Because I can't trust you, little girl!" he barked, and I could see that he was still angry.
He sighed and stood up. "Let's go."
He followed me to the bathroom and stood outside while I did my business and washed my hands. I looked up at him when I opened the door.
"Downstairs," he said. "Let's get this show on the road, we've got a lot of ground to cover."
I followed him down to the kitchen. "Sit," he said, gesturing to the table. I sat down, and he went over to the coffeemaker and poured himself a mug of coffee.
Uncle Sam came out of the library, holding my bag with all my drawing supplies in it, and my 3DS. He put them on the table.
"What are you doing with my stuff?" I asked.
"You're not allowed in the library," Uncle Sam said.
Tears came to my eyes. "No fair!" I protested. "I love books!"
"You took a book out of the library, after you were told not to touch any of them. Not only did you take a book, you then lied because it was a book that Bobby needed, and you used that book to try and perform a spell!" Daddy's voice was sharp.
I shrank down in my chair. "I didn't lie!" I exclaimed, feeling nervous.
"You were in the room when he said he was looking for it," Uncle Sam said. "You knew you had it, and you didn't say anything. That is exactly what a lie of omission is."
I felt my face getting red. "It's not a real lie!" I blinked my tears back.
"It's close enough," Daddy said, coming over to stand in front of me.
Uncle Sam went over to the counter and got himself some coffee. "Are you hungry?" he asked me.
I shook my head.
"We need to deal with last night, food can wait," Daddy said in a hard voice.
Uncle Sam came over and sat at the table. Daddy put his mug on the counter and came back over to stand in front of me again.
"Charlie, do you have any idea how dangerous what you did last night was?" His green eyes were dark and intense.
"I—uh-I thought it would be like in Harry Potter, you know?" I said hesitantly.
"No more Harry Potter right now, if it's going to be giving you ideas like this," Daddy sighed, and pinched the bridge of his nose for a moment.
"That's not fair! Those are my favorites!" I stood up, clenching my fists. Angry tears came to my eyes now, and I swiped at my face.
"Sit your ass down, it's more than fair," Daddy growled. "Do you realize what you did? You were trying to perform a spell to raise someone from the dead, with absolutely NO knowledge of magic or witch-craft!" his voice got louder.
"I- I followed the directions-" I said.
"You just don't get it, do you? You CANNOT do things like that casually! You have to be a practitioner of that type of magic to even attempt a spell! And one little thing goes wrong, one sigil drawn incorrectly, one syllable of one word mispronounced, one of the herbs measured in the wrong quantity, and the spell could have gone awry, and something really bad could have happened," He was yelling now.
I flinched, and more tears came to my eyes and spilled over. "I'm sorry, Daddy, I-"
"Saying you're sorry means nothing, little girl. You have no idea of the magnitude of this screw-up. I am stunned that you would do this, stunned, and I feel like- like I can't trust you at all!" He walked back over to the counter and took a drink of coffee.
"I am sorry!" I said, looking at him and then Uncle Sam.
"You don't realize how big this is, Charlie," Uncle Sam said. "Raising someone from the dead is serious magic. Where did you even get the idea from?"
"When we were in the hotel room, and I was dreaming about Mommy. When you guys were talking about those witches, I had a dream that Mommy and Aunt Michelle were there, and a witch-lady, and she said I could find a special book called a grimmer and get a spell to bring Mommy back."
"What?" Daddy turned and stared at me.
"And- and she said that everything I needed would be in the back of your car."
"What did the witch lady look like?" Uncle Sam asked.
"She had blonde hair and she wore a suit kinda like Aunt Michelle's but not as fancy, it was tan colored."
"Son of a bitch," Daddy said under his breath.
"Dean, do you think-" Uncle Sam said.
Daddy leaned on the counter. "Yeah, I do. Son of a bitch," he repeated. "Screwing with things even after she's gone."
"What do you mean?" I looked at Daddy and then Uncle Sam.
"Nothing, Charlie," Uncle Sam said. "You don't need to-"
"If it's about me, yeah, I do need to know!" I yelled, suddenly angry. I was tired of them always telling me I didn't need to know things! I clenched my fist and pounded the table.
"Excuse me, little girl, you are in no position to be making demands here!" Daddy snapped. "Lose the attitude!"
"It's not fair—"
"You still aren't getting it, are you?" Daddy said. "You think that because you've read a couple of kid's books about magic and you had a dream, you can open a book of magic and perform one of the most powerful spells there is? You are a child, a little girl, and things could have gone horribly wrong! You could have summoned a demon! You could have died, or caused one of us to if we tried to stop things in the middle of it!"
I burst into tears and shrank down in my chair, covering my face with my hands. "I'm sorry!" I wailed. "I'm sorry I did it, I didn't know! I didn't know!"
"Why didn't you talk to us?" Uncle Sam asked. "Why didn't you tell us about that dream?"
"I don't know!" I sobbed. "I guess I thought- I thought you might stop me," I said quietly.
"So you were thinking about it even back then?" Daddy asked tightly. "And you knew that if you told us we might try and stop you?" he closed his eyes and shook his head. "This is unbelievable."
"Charlie, you mom is gone, and you can't bring her back. I know it hurts, but you've got to face up to that," Uncle Sam said. "You can't do anything to really bring her back."
"SHUT UP!" I screamed, jumping off the chair and running at him. I swung my fists at him, and he caught my wrists, and pulled me into a tight hug. I squirmed against him, still trying to hit him, but it didn't do anything, because he was a brick wall just like Daddy.
"She's gone, and you have to let the idea go that you can bring her back."
"NOOOOO!" I howled, bursting into tears. I sagged against Uncle Sam, suddenly feeling the pain well up in my chest, that pain that I'd been trying to keep down all this time. He kept his arms around me and rocked me a little bit as I bawled. She was gone, my mommy was gone, and all that was left was a plastic box filled with ashes. I cried and cried into Uncle Sam's flannel.
"We're here with you," Uncle Sam said, when my crying had finally slowed down. "We're here with you and you're not alone, and we're going to take care of you. You still have a family, and it's going to be okay."
He handed me a napkin, and I blew my nose. I went through a couple more napkins, and then I leaned on his chest, feeling worn out.
"I think you've been holding that in for a long time," Uncle Sam said.
Daddy was sitting in the chair next to him. "Come here, baby girl," he said, and I went over to him, and he pulled me onto his lap and hugged me. "I'm sorry you've had to go through this. Losing your mom is a really hard thing to deal with."
I remembered then that he had lost his mommy too. "Do you still feel sad?" I asked him. "Do you still miss your mom?"
"Sometimes," Daddy said. "I think there will always be a part of me that feels sad about it, but you learn to deal with it as you get older."
"I'm sorry," I said. "I shouldn't have tried to do a spell, I understand it was wrong now," I looked up at Daddy. "Am I still in trouble?"
"Yes, Charlie," Daddy said. "Besides the spell, you broke several rules."
I swallowed, feeling my stomach flip nervously. "Oh, yeah," I said in a small voice. I had done a lot of stuff I wasn't supposed to.
"Why don't you tell me which rules you broke," he said.
"Do I have to?" I squirmed with embarrassment.
"Yes, Charlie," he said. "I want to make sure you know exactly what you did wrong."
"Well, I, uh, took a book out of the library, and I'm not s'posed to touch anything in there. And, I, uh, I went in the trunk of the car and got stuff out of there, and I'm not allowed in the trunk." I looked down at my hands.
"You also took a weapon out," Uncle Sam said. "You had a knife, and you're not allowed to touch any weapons, are you?"
I blushed. "No," I sighed. "I, uh, lit candles, and I'm not s'posed to play with matches."
"Where did you get the candles?" Daddy asked. "And the matches?"
"Um, the candles were from Uncle Bobby's dining room, and I found the matches in the kitchen."
"How did you find them?" Uncle Sam asked.
I felt my blush deepen. "I was, uh, looking around in drawers and stuff," I said.
"What else?" Daddy prompted.
"I, uh, went into the salvage yard, and I, uh, snuck out in the middle of the night to do the spell."
"What else?" Uncle Sam looked at me.
"Umm..." I couldn't think of anything else.
"You stole a book from a store," he reminded me. "I cannot believe you did that, Charlie," he shook his head.
Tears came to my eyes. "I know it was wrong," I said, and my voice shook.
"Then why did you do it?" Daddy asked.
" 'Cause I wanted to find that spell," I said in a quiet voice.
"You hid all this from us," Daddy said. "Which is like lying."
The tears spilled over. "I'm sorry, Daddy," I said.
"You're going to be writing lines as part of your punishment," Uncle Sam told me. "I'll get that set up later today."
"O—okay," I wiped my face with my hand. "Uh—part of—my punishment?"
"You're also getting a spanking," Daddy said. "Do you want to get it over with now, or wait until after breakfast?"
My stomach twisted into an anxious knot. "I don't think I could eat anything right now," I told him.
"All right then, let's go," he patted the side of my leg, and I stood up. "Up to your room," he said.
I dragged my feet as I went up the stairs. I didn't want a spanking, but I knew that I deserved it.
My room was messy, like someone had gone through it.
"Grandpa John and Uncle Bobby were looking for the grimoire, remember?" Daddy said. "You need to clean everything up. I told you I wanted you to put your toys away every day, didn't I? Grandpa John told me that there were a bunch of your toys just shoved under the bed."
I blushed. "Sorry, Daddy," I said quietly.
"Well, if you're not going do what I tell you and clean up after yourself, then maybe I should take them away."
"No, I'll clean up, I will," I said.
Daddy sat down on the edge of the bed and beckoned to me. "Come here," he said. I walked slowly over to him, and then he pulled me over to his side. He turned me over his lap, and his hand began to fall. I started crying right away and trying to get off his lap.
"Settle down, you're not going anywhere," he told me, and he moved his leg over top of mine as the swats continued.
"I'm sorry, Daddy! I'm sorry!" I pleaded as I sobbed. It felt like he had spanked every inch of my butt, and then I felt him pulling my pajama bottoms down.
I tried to push my body up off of the bed. "No, Daddy, what are you—" I exclaimed.
He pulled me closer to him and put his arm over my back to hold me still.
"You will not go into the salvage yard ever again," he said sternly. He swatted my panty-clad bottom twice, and I flinched and cried out, because it hurt more without my p.j. pants.
"You will not go into the trunk of the car," another swat landed, "or touch a weapon unless you've been trained," two more stinging swats fell, and I kicked my feet and cried out again.
"You will not take books out of the library," he spanked me again, "And you will not take things that do not belong to you." Two more smacks landed, and I flinched again.
Then he slid my panties off of my stinging butt, and shifted me slightly.
I wailed in panic. "Daddyyy, noooo-" and then I gasped as he spanked my bare butt. It hurt a lot more, and I struggled on his lap.
"You will NOT play with MATCHES," he said in a firm, loud voice, and he swatted me three more times.
"You will NEVER steal from a store, EVER AGAIN," and his hand fell three times again, on the lower part of my butt, and I wailed again.
"You will NOT lie to me," he said sternly, and three more hard smacks fell.
"And you will NEVER, EVER, do ANYTHING with magic or spells, EVER AGAIN." Four very hard swats landed right on the lowest part of my butt where you sit down. I cried out with each swat.
"IS- THAT- CLEAR?" His voice was loud in the little room.
"Yes! Yes, Daddy! I'm sorry, I'm sorryyyy!" I sobbed, and then his hand began to fall again, peppering my already hot rear end with more hard swats, until it felt like my butt was on fire. I kicked my feet and howled and struggled, but it did no good. I buried my head in the quilt and cried.
It took a few moments to realize that the spanking was over, because of how much my bottom stung. He let me cry there over his knees for a few more moments, then he pulled my panties up, and lifted me to stand up in front of him. He gathered me into his arms and held me as I bawled into his flannel, and I felt him rubbing my back up and down as my shoulders shook.
"I don't want to have to spank you like that again," he said quietly. "Don't you ever do something like that ever again."
"No, Daddy, I w-won't." I sniffled. "I'm s-sorry I was so b-bad-" my breath hitched in my chest.
"Shh," he murmured. "I know. It's over now, you're okay, sweetheart." I felt safe in his arms right then.
I was exhausted after all the crying I'd done, and I yawned, resting my head on his shoulder.
"Do you want to lay down for a while?" Daddy asked.
"Mm-hmm." I murmured. He helped me lay down in bed, on my tummy, and then he sat next to me and kept rubbing my back until I fell asleep.
When I woke up, my stomach was growling with hunger. I rolled over and sat up, and winced a little. Daddy was sitting in the armchair with a laptop on his lap. He closed it and stood up, putting it on the dresser.
"How are you feeling?" he asked, coming over to the bed.
"I'm hungry," I said.
"We missed breakfast, but it's lunch time. I hear people downstairs, let's go see what they're making," he said. "Get dressed," He handed me a shirt and shorts.
I stood up, and put the clothes on, easing the shorts over my slightly sore butt, and he said, "Charlie, I want you to apologize to Uncle Bobby for breaking his rules."
"Aww, do I have to?" I whined.
"Yes, you do," he said sternly.
"Okaaay." I said. We went downstairs together.
Uncle Bobby was standing at the stove, stirring a pot. Daddy put his hand on my shoulder and steered me over to him.
"Uh, Uncle Bobby, I want to apologize for, um, taking the book out of the library and, uh, going in the salvage yard and umm...taking your candles and matches. I'm sorry," I said, and my eyes filled with tears.
He looked down at me. "Make sure none a' that happens again," he said gruffly. "I need to know you're gonna be safe in my house. You're too damn smart for your own good, kid," he reached out and ruffled my hair.
Uncle Sam was sitting at the kitchen table with his laptop open. I went over to him and he put his arm around me and hugged me.
"Sorry I was hitting you before," I said quietly.
"It's all right, honey," he said. "I know you were upset. We'll go over your lines after lunch."
"Do I have to?" I whined.
"Yes, you do," Uncle Sam said firmly.
Grandpa John came into the room. "Well, it's all set up. I think it will take us 2 or 3 days to get there, when do you want to go?" He was looking at Daddy.
I turned to look at Daddy too. "You- you're leaving again?" I asked. Tears came to my eyes. "Where-"
"No, Charlie, we're all going," Grandpa John said. He sat down at the table and beckoned me over to him. He put his arm around my shoulders and looked at me. "We're going to go on a road trip to visit my friend Missouri, and she's going to help you with your- what you can do. And we're going to see if we can find some interesting places to stop while we're traveling."
"Okay," I said. I looked up at him, feeling uncertain. "Are you- are you mad at me 'cause of last night?"
"No, sweetheart, I was more worried about you. I know better than anyone that grief can—can make a person do bad things, or things that they would never have done before. And if it's not dealt with, grief can make things—very hard. You can always come talk to me, about anything, you know that?" He hugged me, and said, "I don't want anything bad to happen to my only grand-daughter."
"We can leave in a day or so, what do you think, Charlie?" Daddy asked.
"Can we go to a 'musement park?" I asked.
"Sure, we can look for one on the way," Grandpa John said.
Uncle Bobby had made beef stew for lunch, and we all sat down at the table to eat. Looking at them, I realized that being here with them was the first time that I had ever sat down for meals with a 'real' family. Before it had been just me and mom, and then when she got sick, we didn't really eat together anymore because she was either too sick to eat or asleep, and I just ate something by myself. It was nice to have a dad and uncles and grandfather.
After we ate, Daddy said I should clean up my room, and that we should do laundry and pack if we were going on a road trip. Uncle Sam went upstairs with me to "supervise", he said. He checked under my bed to make sure there weren't any toys under there.
"Decide what you want to bring with you, I don't know if you need to bring that whole backpack full of toys," he said.
"But they're all little, and I can take them anywhere in my pockets and stuff!" I explained.
"Well, all right, but just remember, you're going to have to clean up everything after you play with it. Our Dad had a strict rule on the road, that there were no messes left in motel rooms. Our bags had to be packed and ready at all times, and we couldn't leave clothes or toys laying around. We got in trouble if we weren't neat." Uncle Sam told me.
"Is- is he gonna do that this time?" I asked hesitantly.
Uncle Sam chuckled. "I think he's mellowed some since then, but it is a good idea not to have all your stuff spread all over a motel room."
Daddy came to the door of my room. "Charlie, I don't want you bringing that whole backpack full of all those little toys. Too much risk of those things getting lost on the road or left behind."
"We were just talking about that," Uncle Sam told him with a grin. "I was telling her about Dad's 'rules of the road'."
Daddy rolled his eyes. "Well, I'm not going to be that strict, I don't care of you make your bed, but I don't want your toys to be scattered all over."
"Okaaay," I said. "I'll only bring some of them."
"Give me your dirty clothes so I can wash them," Daddy said, and I picked up the pile I had gathered and handed it to him. Then I sat down and sorted through the little toys. I decided to take some of the Polly Pocket toys and of course, my Hello Kitty figurines.
When I was finished putting all my stuff away, Uncle Sam said, "Let's go back downstairs and you can work on your lines."
"Aww, do I have to?" I complained.
"Yes, you do," he said firmly. I followed him into the kitchen, and sat down at the table. He put a pencil and a couple pieces of paper in front of me.
"I want you to write each of these, 20 times." he told me. He brought his laptop into the kitchen and sat down across from me, opening it and turning it on.
"Well?" he said. "Get started."
"That's a lot of lines," I said sourly. "I'll be here for hours 'n' hours!"
"You got into a lot of trouble," he replied. "The sooner you start, the sooner you'll finish."
I sighed and picked up my pencil.
I will not take things that do not belong to me or steal.
I will not go into the salvage yard.
I will not play with matches.
I will not touch any weapons
I will not go into the trunk of the car.
I will not hide things from my family or lie to them.
As I wrote, I thought about what I had done. I knew I wasn't supposed to play with matches, that was something that Mommy had ingrained in me when I was little. Fire was dangerous. And Mommy had taught me that stealing was wrong too.
Daddy had made rules for me, to keep me safe, and I had broken those rules. I had gone through the stuff in the trunk like it was no big deal, and I had taken a big knife out even though Daddy had warned me more than once about not touching weapons. I had taken out herbs that could be dangerous. I had tried to do a spell- I thought about Harry Potter, and realized that doing something like raising someone from the dead was 'black magic', which was bad!
I put my head down on the table and sobbed.
I heard a chair scrape the floor, and then felt a hand on the back of my head.
"Charlie? What's wrong?" Uncle Sam asked.
"I'm bad!" I wailed. "I did so many bad things and it was very dangerous and I could've gotten hurt! I was tryin' to do bad magic, that means I'm bad!"
Uncle Sam pulled my chair out and picked me up and held me as I cried for a few minutes.
"No, it doesn't mean that you're bad," he said. "You weren't thinking clearly, I think, you only had one thought on your mind, which was that you wanted your mom to come back. Grief can make people act differently."
"Grief sucks, I hate it," I said.
It sounded like Uncle Sam chuckled, and then turned it into a cough. "Don't talk like that, Charlie, you shouldn't be saying things like that. But yes, it does, unfortunately you need to work through it, because it's part of life."
He pulled back and looked at me. "And you're not bad, you hear me? You did some bad things, and you know it was wrong. And you're not going to do any of that again, are you?"
"Uh-uh," I said, shaking my head.
"Right, because you're a good girl who knows right from wrong." He set me back on the chair. "Keep working," he said.
I wiped my face with my shirt and picked up the pencil again.
Daddy came into the kitchen with a laundry basket, and went upstairs. When he came back down, he said, "How about a break, Charlie?"
"Okay!" I dropped the pencil and rubbed my hand.
"You want to go outside and I'll push you on the tire swing?" he asked.
I smiled up at him. "Yeah!"
We went to the back yard and looked at the plants I had picked to plant in the patch that I had dug up before. I had picked lots of different flowers. There was a butterfly bush that was already blooming. I sat on the swing, and Daddy pushed me. It was very hot, though, so we didn't stay outside for very long. When we went back inside, Daddy told me that we needed to pack, so we went upstairs to my room. There was a pink duffle bag on my bed.
"I got a duffle bag for you a while ago, I forgot to give it to you," he said.
I hugged him. "Thanks, Daddy!" I said. He helped me pack my clothes, and then he told me to come with him to his room, so he could pack.
"Why do I have to?" I asked. "I want to stay in here and play."
"Bring something with you, but I told you, you're not going to be alone right now, because I can't trust you."
Tears filled my eyes. "But- how will you trust me? What do I have to do?"
"You do what you're told, and you be honest with me, and you let me know what you're doing, and that will start earning my trust back."
"Okay," I sighed, and grabbed a couple of my Polly Pocket dolls and took them with me. I sat on his bed while he packed his duffle. When he was finished, we went back downstairs, and I had to keep working on my lines. I was almost finished by dinnertime. After dinner, Daddy got a phone call from Miss June, and he went to meet her for coffee, because he said she sounded really upset.
I was sitting at the kitchen table, finishing my lines, and Grandpa John and Uncle Sam had a map spread out and were looking at it, when Daddy walked in.
"That was fast, what happened?" Grandpa John asked.
Daddy had an odd look on his face. "Well, uh, she, uh...admitted that she had feelings for me. And I...had to tell her that I don't feel the same way," he looked uncomfortable now.
"What does that mean?" I asked. "You mean she wanted to be your girlfriend and do all that kissing stuff?"
Daddy gave a little chuckle. "Yeah, and it really upset her when I told her no."
"You're always breaking hearts, Dean," Uncle Sam said.
"Well, this is complicated because of her ex, and her kids- I've tried to be there as a shoulder for her to cry on, but she took it as something more, because she's having a rough time, but that's the last thing she needs, she needs to get a handle on the situation with Cole first." Daddy rubbed his hand over his face. "And now I feel like a heel."
"You've come a long way, Dean," Grandpa John said. "I remember when you used to be the 'love 'em and leave 'em' kid in high school."
"Back then it was kinda fun. Being an adult and dealing with this kind of stuff is not so fun," Daddy put his hand on my back. "Take your time growing up, Charlie. Enjoy being a kid for now."
The next morning, Daddy woke me up early so we could get on the road. Uncle Sam had gotten me a book with word searches and crossword puzzles in it and a coloring book, and I had my drawing stuff and my 3DS in the back seat. We followed Grandpa John in his giant truck, and we were on the road to meet with Missouri.