Season of the Witch by Mariah Fredericks

white boxes. Most of them have tiny graffiti notes on the walls.
    As I sit down at one, I see a little tiny scribble. It says, “Ban all sluts!”
    I lick my thumb, try to rub it out. It leaves an ugly blue smear. I get up and move.
    Then I hear, “Hey.”
    Oliver is standing by my seat.
    “Hi.” I keep it neutral. “How are you?”
    “Okay.” His voice is still thin and scratchy. “My dad said you called. When I was—” He looks down, seems in fact to lose the power of speech.
    I can’t resist. “Did the doctors say what it was?”
    He nods. “They said stress. That maybe the whole thing with the interview—like, I put too much pressure on myself and my body had this weird reaction.”
    “Oh.”
    “They said maybe it was just as well I didn’t get the internship. That I need to learn to take it easy. I’ve been thinking a lot about that. How hard I take stuff. I have to not do that.” He actually looks me in the eye to say this: “Not blame myself for every little thing.”
    Wow, I think. Medical permission to be a jerk. Nice.
    “Well, glad you’re better,” I say, and turn back to my work.
    Oliver perches on the edge of the next seat over, says, “Just—when I was sick? When I couldn’t talk? I kept thinking—”
    He strangles on his own words. I say, “Yeah?”
    “I don’t know. I had this huge feeling that there was something I needed to say to you. When my dad said you called, I somehow felt like you knew that. I know that sounds totally insane.”
    Not entirely, I think. “What’d you feel like you had to say?”
    He sighs, stares into the white cube like it has answers. “Just … you’ve been nice to me. With everything that happened, you could have been harsh, but you weren’t. Like, you even called to see how I was doing. That was really cool.”
    This makes me feel slightly guilty. “Well …”
    Oliver takes this as an apology. Nodding eagerly, he says, “Imean, maybe you were a
little
harsh that one time when you were upset about Chloe—”
    Upset, I think. Is that what I was? How about totally freaking out?
    Then Oliver says, “But I get why that happened.”
    This is meant to be a big fat gift. Oliver “gets it.” Only he so doesn’t. I feel a surge of anger and I look down at the floor. The hate is running through my body like an electric current.
    Even Oliver clues in. He stammers, “Well, anyway, I—I …”
    My head snaps up. “What, Oliver?
What?
”
    His lips move, but nothing comes out. Guess the curse is still working.
    But then he blurts out, “I miss you. I’d really like us to be …”
    At this point, I don’t care what Oliver wants.
    I’m about to shove back my chair and get up. Then I see Zeena standing at the door to the computer lab. Oliver half rises in a panic. From Zeena’s expression, there’s no question that she heard what he said.
    Oliver blithers, “Uh, oh, hey, Zeena …”
    Zeena’s hostile eyes are fixed on me. She advances, saying, “Don’t … even … think …”
    But you have to have some wit to finish that sentence, and Zeena has none. Pushing back my chair, I say, “Excuse me. I think this is my cue to split.”
    As I go, I hear Zeena call, “Yeah, you better run. Run fast. But don’t think we won’t find you. Don’t even think—”
    I wave my fingers in the air à la Cassandra. Over my shoulder, I say, “Ciao, Oliver. Nice talking to you.”

    That afternoon, Ella rushes up to me. She’s all excited and pop-eyed. I swear, I can feel her vibe like a million tiny tentacles reaching out to suck up other people’s energy.
    “Hey!” she says, breathless. “Are you okay?”
    “Sure, yeah. Why?”
    “Uh, um …” Ella bobs like a beach ball. Then she cries, “Zeena’s telling the whole world she saw you and Oliver together. Like
together
together.”
    “Oh, for—”
    “Is it true?”
    “
No
, it’s not true. We talked for like a minute.”
    She bites her lip. “Well, you might want to let Chloe