Page 35 of A Spell of Midlife Mayhem
Chapter 13
THE NEXT DAY I HAD the day off, as I was due to collect Aunt Ruth from the hospital. Before I went downstairs, I hovered outside Raven’s room for a few seconds, listening. It was silent. No light seeped under the door. I went downstairs to eat breakfast. Would Raven appear?
He didn’t. Maybe he was avoiding me.
I put that out of my mind. What I needed to do was figure out how to get Aunt Ruth home from the hospital. Her car might do, if a nurse could show me how to transfer her from the wheelchair into the passenger seat.
At ten o’clock, I set off for the hospital, then remembered about the exorbitant parking fees. For Aunt Ruth’s sake, I’d park there anyway. I wouldn’t be long.
I strolled into the hospital and went to Aunt Ruth’s room.
‘You’re here! Wonderful!’ She beamed, reaching out of her wheelchair for a hug with such enthusiasm that I burst out with, ‘Don’t fall out, Aunt Ruth!’
She chuckled. ‘No chance. I’m so happy you’re here.’
‘I’m so glad you’re ready to leave this place,’ I said, returning her hug with equal passion. I checked around the room. Her packed bag was sitting on the bed.
I found a nurse and received the discharge forms. Aunt Ruth was almost bouncing in her wheelchair, unable to contain her excitement about going home. That wasn’t surprising. She’d been in the hospital for several weeks.
We didn’t talk about whether she could ever walk again. The medical consensus was that she might be wheelchair bound for the rest of her life, but it wasn’t certain.
Anyway, it was time to go home.
Getting Aunt Ruth in the car was awkward, but between us, we managed it without me dropping her into the gutter. On the ten-minute drive home, she brought up the topic that had been burning my curiosity ever since my ghost mother introduced it weeks before.
‘I need to teach you what I know about witchy things. There’s a lot for you to pick up. You told me your mother’s ghost appeared to you. Anything else supernatural happening for you yet?’ She stared at me with a curious expression. ‘If you’re like I was, it’ll happen quickly now the process has started.’
Thank goodness she’s mentioned this. ‘Nothing like that comes to mind at home, but I’m uneasy at work. There’s a presence there.’
‘I should hope so. You’re not working in that big house on your own, are you?’ Aunt Ruth cackled.
‘No. I didn’t mean the other guides. I meant... they’ve all told me the place is haunted. At the moment, it’s only a vague sensitivity, but—’
‘Trust your instincts and open yourself up to it, girl. That’s one of the first witchy things you need to know. If your gut tells you something, it’s almost always right.’
I risked a glance sideways, not wanting to take my eyes off the traffic for too long. ‘Why do you say “witchy things”, Aunt Ruth? Don’t you mean “witchcraft”?’
‘Witchcraft, witchy things, same thing. There was a lot of crafting in the old days when people had to collect their own toads and herbs and stuff. Nowadays, we get most of it by internet shopping.’
