Back to the Beginning

by nofurylikewiccansscorned

Their road won't be easy, but a rising sun awaits their journey's end. The day of reckoning is both far off and very near, but they can't afford to be afraid. And who knows: maybe starting a new journey isn't so hard. Or maybe it has already begun.

31. Welcome Home

Disclaimer: Okay, since apparently no one got it, the thing at the end was Morgan talking to her mom (or her dad, doesn't matter) when she gets back. Picture it: the airport. Big "welcome home" balloons literally cover the landscape. Morgan's mom goes, all smiley, "Morgan! We missed you! How was your trip?" Morgan is sullen and depressed, but forces a smile on her face and says, "Fine. It was fine." Get it? Get it? No? Oh, well. I tried. The end for this one is kind of weird, and some of you might be wondering what Morgan is thinking about, but all will be explained soon, I promise! Okay, normal disclaimer stuff: Sweep belongs to Cate Tiernan, the song belongs to Lifehouse, and my brain, having been taken away from me, belongs to the US Government and is in the process of being slowly destroyed by conservatism, Republicans, and Tom DeLay. Arg! The only things I own are the German ClubT-shirt that I'm wearing right now (Deutsch Klub!) and my little guinea pig Cini-Mini. But no one really owns her. She owns us. … … Anyhoo, enough of my weirdness. Review when you're done!

Taintedpromises: I'm a member of your site :proud smile: Lol, it's awesome—the world definitely needs more Sweep fan sites. I was working on one a while ago, but FreeWebs isn't that good unless you pay for a membership (I'm pretty sure my parents wouldn't give me 20 so I could make a website about a book series about witchcraft). Lol, my friend burned her Buffy CD for me last May, and it was literally the only thing I listened to all summer. Definitely have to agree with the puppy line … I was laughing my head off the first time I saw that and my brother was staring at me … he was like, "Who are you and what have you done with my sister? What's wrong with you?" But they've come to cherish my weirdness and accept me as one of their own ;)

MIDNIGHT-PIXIE: If you were born in 1988, are you a sophomore or a junior? I was born in August of '89, but most other sophomores were born in '88. That sucks about your computer, though … the computer in our gameroom was clogged with spy-ware and myself, being too naïve to fix it, was away at a conference when it crashed :( The memory got totally erased, so all of my fanfiction was … :sniff: … gone! I almost cried, I swear. The moon ritual story sounds oddly enough like something I would do. Even if you didn't get the right night, at least you got to do it. I was in San Antonio on Ostara and we were in Dallas visiting friends on the full moon :growl: I want more holidays! How did it go, by the way? Lol … hey, do you have AOL instant messenger? Send me your screen name if you do! I'd love to talk to you sometime (my screen name is in my profile)!

VKC: Wow … I think you're the first anonymous reviewer who's ever reviewed more than once! At least on my story … you deserve an award! Now you're officially "The Anonymous Person Who Reviewed Twice" … CONGRATULATIONS :crowds cheer: Lol, um, not really, but thank you so much! I hate it when anonymous people review and they're like "Update now or I'll kill you!" and then they just disappear … :pause: Weird. Review again and you can have another honor: "The Anonymous Person Who Reviewed Thrice!"

Part XXXI: Welcome Home

What day is it?
And in what month?
This clock never seemed so alive
I can't keep up and I can't back down
I've been losing so much time

Hunter

Returning to New York was possibly one of the strangest experiences that I had ever gone through. Considering how many strange experiences I've had, that's saying a lot. It just felt so odd to sleep in my own bed again, to walk downstairs and see the living room in the house I shared with Sky. The disappearance of the elaborate foyer in the mansion in the middle of nowhere and the warm lobby of a lodge in a small Irish town with a fire crackling merrily seemed ominous and disconcerting.

The first thing that I did when Sky and I, after dropping everyone else off at home, finally got back to our house past midnight was drag my suitcase back upstairs and quite literally fall onto my bed. I didn't bother putting on pajamas or washing my face; the second that my head hit the pillow, I was dead to the world. I had slept for about fifteen straight hours, but for some reason, when I awoke, I felt just as tired as when I had gone to sleep. That, coupled with the fact that I had a headache and that my room was stiflingly hot—England was never this warm in August—made for a horrible start to the day.

"Morning," Sky said as I walked into the kitchen, rubbing my eyes and blinking to shield them from the harsh light pouring in through the kitchen windows. "Or, afternoon, more like."

"Bloody hell …" I muttered. "What time is it?"

"Three o'clock. I just got up thirty minutes ago." Her light blonde hair was tousled, and she was sipping a cup of warm tea in an attempt to wake herself up. She looked just as tired as I felt.

"Where's Alexis?" I asked, looking back through the kitchen door to the living room. There was a rumpled blanket and a few pillows on the couch.

"She's asleep," Sky said, pulling a box of wheat cereal out of the cabinet. "I took the couch so she could sleep in a bed."

I stared at her. "Are you mad? You heard what Dr. Wick said. It's risky enough, us being on our feet so much. Bed rest, remember?"

"Hunter, I feel fine," she said firmly. "Well, not fine. I mean, there's still some stiffness in my neck and sometimes my back just gives this odd little spasm or something –" She broke off, seeing the horrified look on my face. "He told me it was normal! Would you stop worrying?" I just sighed and grabbed the cereal box, pouring myself a bowl as Sky spooned some sugar onto hers.

"I tried calling Bree, Robbie, and Raven, but their parents all said they were still sleeping," she said thoughtfully. "It must be jet lag."

"One would figure we'd be used to it by now," I said with a wry smile as I poured myself a cup of milk. "What with the number of transatlantic flights we've taken in our lives." I took a huge swallow of warm lemon tea and almost instantly felt a little better. "Did you, um … did you call Morgan, as well?"

Sky looked a little guilty. "I didn't want to bother her. She seemed disconnected enough yesterday and the past couple of days. I had assumed that we should just let her be for a bit … unless, I mean, you want to call her."

"No," I said quickly. "No, I think you're right. She needs some time to herself. Maybe I'll stop by later and see how she's doing. Just to be sure she's all right."

"Hunter, of course she's not all right," Sky said flatly. "Her brother just died. Do you expect her to be all right?"

I sighed internally. I had felt so separate from Morgan in the last few days; ever since we had talked in the hospital, I hadn't spoken to her with more than eleven words at a time. "Do you have your suitcase? You're sure you picked up everything?"

I couldn't help but wonder, though … this distant attitude, the withdrawing … the others had to have noticed it. It couldn't be healthy for Morgan, that's for certain. After Linden died, I know I would have been in an even worse place than I already was if I hadn't had Sky, Uncle Beck, Aunt Shelagh, my cousins, and Alwyn to turn to for comfort.

"She could really use someone to talk to, huh?" Bree asked me later. Her father had obviously relayed the message that Sky had left at the Warren residence, which instructed her to call as soon as she woke up.

"Most likely," I sighed, holding the phone between my shoulder and my ear as I flipped through the television channels in the living room. "But she doesn't seem to want help, does she?"

"I just wish there was something more I could do for her than …" Her voice dropped. "Than just sitting here and feeling sorry for myself. For all of us, I mean."

"When does school start up again?" I asked. "It's sometime next week, isn't it? That ought to get your mind off things."

"Next Tuesday," Bree said, her voice growing increasingly depressed.

"Oh," I said, surprised. "That's the same day as our hearing with Judge McGilvray."

I could sense the smile behind Bree's next words. "That's great. I mean, it's so great that you guys are doing this for Alexis. I can tell how much it means to her." Her voice lowered. "I mean, do you think it'll go through? Do you think they'll do it? Let you and Sky be her legal guardians?"

I sighed deeply. "I hope so. It'd be better than sending her back to Ireland to the hospital. There's not a reason for her to even be there; it was sort of a holding pen, I suppose. While the doctors figured out just what to do with her."

"Judge McGilvray is cool," Bree said thoughtfully. "I had to go in front of her for a speeding ticket once. I bet she'll give you guys guardianship. I mean, you're great people and Alexis really needs that in her life."

I nodded, just thinking as Bree continued talking.

"I still can't believe we're going to be seniors next week. But I guess it'll give us an opportunity to talk to Morgan, won't it? We signed up for, like, almost the same schedule. We're bound to have some classes together."

"Yes, that …" I shrugged. "Or it'll be an opportunity for her to delve even deeper into the denial that she's thrown herself into. She'll bury herself in her schoolwork to try to forget what she's feeling inside."

"You sound like someone who knows from experience," Bree said calmly.

"I know," I said softly. "I am speaking from experience. We can't let her do that. Otherwise …" I deliberately pushed aside some unhappy memories from my last year of school in England. I had been acting quite like Morgan was now, but that's another story. "Otherwise I don't want to think about what will happen. She'll shut down emotionally, and –"

"We have to nip this in the bud before it comes to that?"

I paused. "Something to that effect. Actually, I think I'm going to drop by her place now, see if she's awake. … And if she'll talk to me, of course."

"She'll open up to you, Hunter. She trusts you. Maybe time really is the best medicine here."

I sighed with a grim expression on my face. "Let's hope you're right."

Because it's you and me
And all of the people
Nothing to do
Nothing to lose
And it's you and me and all of the people
And I don't know why
I can't keep my eyes off of you

Bree

After I hung up the phone, I let out a deep sigh and reclined back on my bed, resting my back against the headboard, and just sat there for a long time. It felt so good after the chaos and the panic and the disorder of the last few weeks to have a moment to just do nothing. To just sit. Invariably, my mind began to wander.

As a general rule, I was a live-in-the-present type of person, but sometimes I still thought about how life once was for us. Before Cal and Selene, before Hunter and Sky … before those four people had introduced us to the world of magick and witchcraft. Things had been simple back then. The only things that Morgan, Robbie, and I had worried about was making good grades in school, getting our driver's licenses, keeping our social lives in check—I guess that was mostly me—and basically just being teenagers.

But things were so different, so fast, starting with that first day of our junior year. The day that Cal came to Widow's Vale and consequently changed our lives forever. I remember how hard Morgan and I fought over him. We both wanted something that we could never have. I was surprised—just as much as she was, I think—at how quickly our friendship fell apart over him. It made me wonder just how much of one we really had in the first place.

Cal seemed like the perfect guy. Handsome, smart, charming … a witch. That first night outside of town seems like so long ago, the night where all of us gathered in that desolate circle for a Mabon ritual. Even though it hasn't even been a year, it feels like forever ago. Those of us that stayed when he asked who wanted to participate? We willingly agreed to be part of the most incredible and frightening experiences of our lives.

For most of us, anyway. Some people who stayed that night didn't come again. Those of us that did, though … it was like we had signed some sort of pact. Suddenly I was hanging out with people that I had never spoken to in my life. Like, I maybe never would have even spoken to Raven if we hadn't met through Wicca; we came from completely different worlds. Likewise, I doubt that Raven would have ever foreseen having me, the Teen Fashion Queen, as a friend.

But things moved so quickly. I remember how mad I was at Morgan for kissing Cal that night at the cemetery on Samhain. I guess it was the first time I hadn't gotten something that I wanted, and I couldn't believe that Morgan, of all people, had been the one to get it. Morgan, my loser best friend, had gotten the hottest guy in school.

Weird.

I sort of pulled away after that, I guess. Raven and I recruited a few other people to join a new coven, and for a while, that was all we were concerned with. Wicca seemed all good, all the time. But I knew that something else was happening. Morgan was acting differently, and the presence of two new witches in Widow's Vale, a town that had never seen anything out of the ordinary in all its history, was a surprise to say the least. Hunter and Sky were something that none of us had ever seen before. Maybe it was the fact that they were so young and yet so in control of their lives. I mean, they moved oversees the year after they finished school. That's pretty major, if you ask me.

Things still weren't all that complicated, really. Sky told Raven and me and the rest of the original Kithic some amazing things about the witch world, incredible spells that she had seen her parents' coven do and the sorts of spells and rituals she and her coven back in England had used to do. We wanted to be a part of it; we jumped in headfirst … the mistakes we knew we were making, I suppose. We weren't prepared for some of the things we saw in the future.

I don't really remember much about the night that Robbie and I saved Morgan from being burnt alive in Cal's magick room … maybe I wasn't really thinking that night. The fact that my friend was in danger was all that was on my mind. It sort of hurt, you know? I had figured that maybe, by some freak of nature, Cal didn't want me and wanted Morgan instead. Sure. Maybe she and I could work past that eventually. I had never even thought of him being evil or a dark magic practitioner.

I almost quit Wicca then and there. I saw Morgan lying on the floor of the shed and I wanted to run away, quit studying something that I loved so much. I mean, the guy who introduced us to Wicca turned out to be this creepy dark magick guy with a psycho mom hell-bent on sucking power from other witches. It sort of shed a new, disturbing light on the whole thing, you know?

When Kithic and Cirrus became one coven, things were a little easier again, and not just because Kithic is such a cooler name than Cirrus. Hunter and Sky wanted to help Morgan and the rest of us recover from Cal's betrayal, which we all felt as a personal injury. And they did. Help us, that is.

I might have been skipping major parts of the stories of our lives, but rehashing it would, quite frankly, take hours that I didn't have. What happened can be summed up in one sentence: when we went to Ireland, everything was destroyed. We went to Ireland looking for a vacation, six teens just wanting to relax over their summer vacation before heading back to school. We left with more psychological and emotional baggage than any of us had ever carried in our lives.

I wondered just how Morgan and Hunter were doing. As far as I know, they're still not on the best of terms. I don't think that Morgan ever quite recovered from their blowout in the lodge lobby that one night. I guess that was the turning point of our time in Ireland; things went from bad to worse to even worse to holy-crap-can-things-get-any-worse. Hunter's comment still haunts her, I know. He still claims that it was accidental and he didn't mean to say such a thing, but I think that something said off the top of one's head is often more truthful than something premeditated and thought-out. I think he knows it, too.

Morgan and Hunter weren't the only ones affected by Ireland, though. Sky and Raven came back changed people, too, I guess. I mean, we all did, but them more so than Robbie and I, maybe. Hunter had remarked offhandedly after we had returned to Portrush that the unusually strong psychic link between them was indicative of the possibility that they were … whatever that fancy witch word is for soulmates. I think it's muirn beatha dans or something weird like that. I had never before thought of Raven as the committed type before she and Sky had started going out, but considering that I hadn't seen one without the other since that night in the cemetery, I'm guessing that they're in it for the long haul. I'm so happy for them, but it makes me wonder about Robbie and I.

I used to watch Morgan and Hunter and wonder if Robbie cares about me the way that Hunter obviously cares about Morgan. They were my hope, my hope that maybe, sometimes, once in a blue moon, love does turn out okay for some people. Now that they're split, or at least temporarily while Morgan works her feelings out, that hope has diminished slightly. I still see Raven and Sky, though. At least for them things are moving in the right direction. I see the looks they exchange, the little smiles, and I remember how Morgan and Hunter used to be the same way before everything was destroyed for them. Will the same thing happen to Sky and Raven?

Will the same thing happen to me and Robbie?

Sometimes I wonder if we're strong enough to face the challenges that Wicca will present to us. Hell, that life will present to us. God, I hope we are. I don't think I could survive if something tore us apart like that.

All of the things that I want to say
Just aren't coming out right
I'm tripping on words
You got my head spinning
I don't know where to go from here

Hunter

My heart pounded painfully in my chest as I climbed up the steps leading up the wrap-around porch on Morgan's house. The late afternoon had cooled, and it was no longer the eighty degrees it had been before. A warm breeze blew past me as I rang the doorbell once, forcing myself to stay as calm and collected as possible. I looked toward the driveway quickly; I couldn't see Das Boot and briefly wondered if Morgan was even home, but shook my head. She had been away for weeks. Her parents had probably kept it shacked up in the garage.

The door swung open after a minute, and I was greeted with the cheerful, smiling face of Mary K, Morgan's younger sister. Dressed in a pale yellow flowery tank top and a flared pink miniskirt, she looked like she belonged on the beach instead of in a sleepy town in upstate New York.

"Hey, Hunter!" she said, grinning. "Welcome back!"

I smiled. Mary K was certainly charismatic. "Hey, Mary K. I was just stopping by to see if Morgan was here."

Mary K's smile faded slightly. "Um, actually, she's not. She took Das Boot out about half an hour ago. Maybe she went to that weird witch store you guys all hang out at sometimes."

I nodded, unable to help the feeling of disappointment that rose within me. At least, I thought, Mary K seemed to have come to terms—at least somewhat—with the fact that Morgan and I were witches. She hadn't even had a look of disgust on her face when she mentioned "that weird witch store."

"Well, thank you, I suppose," I said after a moment. "I'll just come back later."

"Oh, hello, Hunter!" Mrs. Rowlands said, appearing at the door behind Mary K. "We were just about to have dinner. Would you like to stay? Sean made burgers on the grill in the back."

"More like, tried to make burgers on the grill in the back," Mary K amended. "Dad's never been much of a barbeque master."

"I do just fine, thank you very much," I heard Mr. Rowlands say from inside the house. I smiled, but shook my head.

"That's all right. I have to get back home anyway. You'll tell Morgan I stopped by?"

"Of course," Mrs. Rowlands said warmly. "I'll have her call you."

It was with a heavy heart that I started up my car engine again and pulled back out of the Rowlands' driveway. Where had Morgan disappeared to? Why wouldn't she talk to me? I sighed as I turned onto the road that would lead me back towards the main part of town. Widow's Vale seemed like an entirely different place now, but at least I still remembered my way home.

Because it's you and me
And all of the people
With nothing to do
Nothing to prove
And it's you and me and all of the people
And I don't know why
I can't keep my eyes off of you

Morgan

The week that passed between the time that we got back to New York and that school started was one of the longest of my life. My parents threw a welcome home bash for me when I got back with Aunt Eileen and Paula. I put on a happy face for all of them, pretending that I had missed them all over the summer as I handed out the tiny souvenirs I had gotten at the airport in Dublin when all I really wanted to do was run out the door and disappear. The fake smile I had on my face all night was literally killing me inside. They weren't supposed to be asking me about Ireland and what had happened. Those were two separate worlds that weren't supposed to meet.

I had a ton of summer reading to finish for AP Literature, which I would start on Tuesday, so I spent most of the next few days at the park by the elementary school, sitting on the swings or at a picnic table, surrounded by laughing kids enjoying their last week of summer break while I immersed myself in The Grapes of Wrath.

I avoided my house like the plague. Mom and Dad were forever questioning me, asking "What did you see in England? Did you go to Piccadilly Circus? What did you see in Ireland? Did you spend much time in Dublin? Did you visit Trinity University? You know, it's quite a good school, I bet you could get in if you applied as an international student …" Mary K wasn't much better. The whole time, she kept pestering me for details about if I met any hot European guys and, if I had, what Hunter's reaction was—which, evidently, she's sure was hilarious.

Eventually I got so tired of their constant questions and happy faces that the only time I spent in the house at all was sleeping and eating. I took Das Boot out for the rest of the day, reading at the park for hours at a time and sometimes just driving around. I hadn't seen Hunter or any of my friends since we had gotten back, nor had I talked to any of them. I finally decided to stop by Bree's house late on Sunday afternoon, but her dad said that she was out with Robbie and Sky, who were helping Raven move her stuff to her new dorm at the NYU campus near Red Kill.

I sighed as I pulled Das Boot out of the Warren's winding driveway. Mom had expressly forbidden me to miss dinner again, but somehow the thought of driving back home didn't quite appeal to me. I called the house and Mary K picked up the phone. Pretending I had run out of gas near the Exxon station, I told her that I'd be home as soon as I could.

"Oh, by the way," she said just before she hung up, "Hunter called earlier. He was looking for you … again. Have you even seen him since you got back?"

I didn't answer her question. "Thanks for telling me. I'll call him back as soon as I can." Of course I wouldn't. But I knew that unless I said I was going to, Mary K would start lecturing me about how lucky I was to have a boyfriend as hot as Hunter and about how I was taking advantage of how much he obviously cares about me. I just hung up and looked up at the sky. It was starting to get dark.

I pulled Das Boot off to the side of the road and opened up the trunk to look at the various things I had assembled in there. It was almost dark enough to head to the cemetery.

Something about you now
I can't quite figure out
Everything she does is beautiful
Everything she does is right

Because it's you and me
And all of the people
With nothing to do
Nothing to lose
And it's you and me
And all of the people
And I don't know why
I can't keep my eyes off of you

Hunter

As night descended outside the living room windows, I sat on the couch. The television was making noise in the distance, but I wasn't listening to it. Alexis was upstairs meditating and I was flipping absentmindedly through an old issue of Pointe, one of the many dance magazines that Sky subscribes to. She had thrown out all of the issues of Newsweek that had arrived since we had been gone, claiming that world news nowadays was too depressing to keep lying about the house for more than a week anyway. I tossed the magazine aside, not really caring that they had managed to hook an interview with Washington Ballet's Elizabeth Gaither—"An exclusive interview reveals wonderful tips!"—and looked at the phone on the table next to me sadly.

I heaved a sigh and wandered back upstairs. I supposed Morgan wasn't planning on calling me back tonight. Sadly enough, I had grown used to it in the past week.

You and me and all of the people
With nothing to do
Nothing to prove
And it's you and me
And all of the people
And I don't know why
I can't keep my eyes off of you

Morgan

The last day of summer break disappeared quickly, morning melting into day and day disappearing into night as I bought new school supplies, realized with a gasp that I was signed up for three AP classes in the same semester, and finally unpacked my backpack so I could put my new binders in it.

Unfortunately for the first day of my senior year, though, my alarm clock refused to go off in the morning. Mary K ran into my room, waving her hair straightener around like a maniac and yelling that we would be late if I didn't get my butt into motion.

I sighed. It was time to face the world.

And of all the people
I don't know why
I can't keep my eyes off of you