Page 109 of Impractical Magic

Just then, Luna breezed up to the front desk, her travel bag slung over her shoulder. “Ready to hit the road, Delilah? The world awaits!”

“Actually, I haven’t packed yet.”

“Delilah!” Luna shook her head. “How can you not have packed?! We’re leaving right after dinner, remember?”

“Well, there’s a lot to think about! I have a lot of responsibilities, you know. I can’t just throw two pairs of knickers in a bag and vanish like you do.”

Scarlett felt a sudden lump in her throat, the reality of her sister’s departure hitting her. “You’ll write, won’t you? Keep us updated on all your wild escapades?”

Delilah laughed, a rare but genuine sound. “Wild escapades? Who do you think I am, you?”

Luna grinned, winking at Scarlett. “Oh, I have a feeling Delilah’s got a few surprises up her sleeve.”

“Hang on, though . . .” Scarlett fidgeted with a pen, trying to find the right words. “Delilah, I . . . I just wanted to say—”

She held up a hand, cutting her off. “Don’t get all sentimental on me now.”

“I know, I know. But still, I need you to know how much I appreciate everything you’ve done. For me, for our family . . . just . . . taking care of everything. Staying here with Mama when Luna and I weren’t around. I just want to repay you for all that.”

Delilah shrugged. “You can repay me by making sure the Stargazer is still standing when I get home.”

“Yeah, I think I can manage that much.”

Luna wagged a finger at her sister. “No s’mores in the bedrooms.”

“Oh my God,” Scarlett groaned. “Six! Years! Old!”

Mama Melrose breezed past them at the desk. “Scarlett, join me in the office please.”

Scarlett’s heart skipped a beat. What’d I do now?! Her sisters laughed and made oooohh, uh-oh . . . faces. She sighed and followed her mother, bracing herself for a lecture.

Instead, Mama gestured to a large basket on her desk full of gift-wrapped boxes. “It’s high time you got all this junk out of the office.”

Confused, Scarlett peered into the basket. “What junk is this?”

“Well, not junk, exactly. A decade’s worth of your birthday presents.” Mama’s voice softened ever so slightly. “I never forgot your birthday, Scarlett. I always held on to hope that you’d come back to us. So every year, I’d get a little something, and put it away for your return.”

Tears welled in Scarlett’s eyes as she hugged her mother. Mama, ever the stoic, patted her back and cleared her throat. “Yes, yes, that’ll do. There are Christmas presents, too, but you can wait till next month for those. But do get these out of my way.”

Scarlett carried the basket out to the lobby, her heart full. Impulsively, she ripped open one of the gifts, finding a chef’s jacket with “Stargazer Inn” embroidered on the cuffs and “Melrose, Sous Chef” over the breast pocket. As she pulled it on, she thought, I gotta show Zahir.

In the kitchen, Zahir was a human tornado, putting the finishing touches on the inn’s Thanksgiving dinner while simultaneously beginning the prep for tonight’s festivities at his and Dayo’s place. But despite the frenzy, he looked happier than Scarlett had ever seen him.

“You better earn that jacket,” he said before she could get a word in. “Take these appetizers out to the scholars in the dining room.”

Scarlett entered the dining room where Conrad, the town selectman, was leading a trivia workshop.

It had been the ever-practical Delilah who’d realized that the witches should be using Maximillian’s trivia idea for their own ends. If the Forgetting Spell could truly be mastered through trivia exercises, Oak Haven could keep its anonymity without forcing the non-witches to remain eternally trapped in town. And so, the trivia workshops began. Nate and his father Twelve, Sam Chatterjee and his son-in-law Raj, and a handful of other Oak Haven men spent several hours a week engrossed in a lively exchange of pointless minutiae, their laughter filling the room.

“All right, gentlemen!” Conrad called out. “Time for a speed round. Let’s hear those unique collective nouns. We’ll go alphabetically, one at a time, starting with Twelve.”

“Aardvarks, armory of!” shouted Twelve.

“Bats, flutter of!” offered Nate.

“Cobras, quiver of!” Sam added.

And on it went. Once the group had achieved “zebras, dazzle of,” Conrad moved on to randomized questions. The men eagerly shouted out their answers.