Would-Be Witch Read Online Free PDF

sweetest Southern belle drawl. “Except I’ll burn it to the ground and collect the insurance money before I sell it to you.”
    “Then you’ll go to jail when I report you to the sheriff.”
    “At least I’ll have a place to live rent free, with my house gone.”
    She rolled her eyes, but I just smiled as she strutted off. Okay, so I wouldn’t really burn down a house, but I couldn’t let her walk all over me in her flowered, freaking Keds. And no normal people were going to live in my house. It was strictly for witches and women obsessed with spun-sugar sculptures.
    Home was a couple of blocks away, and I headed there on foot. It was a nice sunny day, and the big Texas sky stretched out above me like a beach blanket. I waved absently at neighbors as I walked.
    “Hello, Red!” Doc Barnaby called.
    “Hi,” I called back.
    “Come sit a spell,” he said.
    I hesitated. Dr. Barnaby was our hearty seventy-two-year-old retired psychiatrist. He’d lost his wife in March and had been pretty lonely since. He had an excellent selection of Chinese teas, so I sometimes made pastries and dropped in to see him, although I hadn’t been by lately. A year ago, I’d paid him five dollars and a strawberry cream torte to get my head shrunk for an hour. He’d have listened to me for free, of course, but I’d paid to get the doctor-patient confidentiality so I could tell him about my life. I felt like I was a disappointment to my family of witches for lacking the gift, and asked him whether he agreed that it was unfair that they didn’t appreciate me for my cherries jubilee and my chocolate lava cake. Halfway through a plate of chocolate coconut drops he’d agreed completely with me. I had a rare and valuable gift he’d assured me.
    “What are you doing? Come on in,” he called.
    I thought maybe a few minutes on his sofa and some tea might help me feel better, so I went.
    Inside the sunroom, I nestled into the cream-and-yellow cushions and felt more cheerful. He had a nice tape of chirping birds playing in the background, and as I sipped tea I began to feel very relaxed. And then I began to feel sleepy. And then I began to feel dizzy.
    He smiled at me and murmured some comforting words, which were so distorted that all I heard was wa, wawas, wama wa.
    “Somethin’s wrong,” I slurred. Then I slumped over.
    He got up and patted my head, still smiling. I tried to speak, but my jaw was stuck shut as if super-sticky peanut butter had glued my tongue to the roof of my mouth.
    It turned dark. I struggled to get up, but my body stayed limp. What was happening? I tried to keep my eyes open, but the lids felt like they weighed twenty pounds each.
    Help me. I’m schick. I’m sick.
    Something bit my finger. I heard a faint garbled moan. My heart pounded, and a mosquito bit my head.
    Oh, Dr. Banaslee. You poishinned me. Evilin. If I live, I’m telling Zash on you.
     
     
     
    It was dusk when I woke up with a monstrous headache and found myself in a hammock in Doc Barnaby’s backyard. I pushed the crocheted afghan off me and tried to get up. I fell out of the hammock, banging my knee.
    “Kiss my behind,” I said to the rotten universe.
    I stumbled to my feet and wove my way to the wrought-iron gate. I didn’t know why Dr. Barnaby had poisoned me, and I didn’t care. I was pissed off, and it was making my head hurt worse. The gate was unlocked, and I staggered forward, stopping to get my balance. I turned toward the house for a moment and shook my fist.
    “You son of a gun.” It was the best I could do. I was too sick to confront him.
    I marched—well, shuffled—home. I stopped near the hedge to have some dry heaves, feeling like someone was hammering “I Wish I Was in Dixie” on my skull.
    I couldn’t manage the three steps to my door. I didn’t remember them being so steep. So I crawled up them, grabbing the door handle to hoist myself to a standing position. I panted from the exertion and fought another wave of