Page 18 of The Woodsmoke Women's Book of Spells
—Tabitha Morgan, July 19, 1929
Iwake to a world turned white overnight. Rubbing my sleeve over the caravan window, I laugh softly as a snowflake catches on the other side of the glass. It shivers there in the corner, waiting. Waiting as more and more join it, icing the glass until there is nothing but frost. It’s Halloween. The world should be full of crunchy russet leaves and pumpkins and toffee apples, yet it’s white and cold. Full of frost.
The air is sharp as I trudge to the cottage, and I burrow deeper into my coat, pulling the hood low over my forehead. A set of boot prints is already leading to Ivy’s cottage, all the way from the mountain path. I bristle, checking the time on my phone. It’s just after nine, and I’m sure that, on our call, Matthieu said he’d be here at ten. I want a bit of time to myself, to prepare, but now I feel wrong-footed, flustered. My breath catches at the thought of him there in Ivy’s cottage. He’s gorgeous and rugged and has a soulful tilt to his mouth and eyes that my mind keeps straying to... I give myself a shake. This is absolutely not the time to bethinking about anything other than this renovation. I knock the snow off my boots and close the door against the crisp tug of all that white outside.
“Hello? Matthieu?”
“In here.”
I follow his voice through to the kitchen, where he has already set up a makeshift tea station: two cups, a heap of teaspoons, a jar of instant coffee far nicer than the stuff I have been drinking, and a tin caddy stuffed with tea bags. It’s quite an improvement on my scattered box of tea bags, used teaspoons, and small bottle of milk I decant each time I walk over from the caravan. The electricity is working now, thanks to Cora and the electrician, but there’s no fridge yet. Only my small travel kettle, which is already on, rattling away on its tiny stand.
“I didn’t expect you...” A blush flares across my cheeks as I picture the disarray he must have walked into.
Matthieu runs a hand over the back of his neck. “Sorry. I’m early, aren’t I?” He glances at the tea station, then back at me as the kettle clicks off the boil. “And I’m meddling. You only wanted a quote, and I just let myself in—”
“It’s all right,” I say, moving toward the kettle. I swallow, avoiding looking at him directly. Now that I’m standing close to him in Ivy’s old kitchen, I can smell woodsmoke. Citrus and loam and the sharp scent of snow. He smells like the mountains and I want to breathe it in. I give myself another mental shake. “Tea? Coffee?” I ask, my words coming out a little strangled.
“Coffee would be great, thanks.” He darts me a look, and I’m sure I catch a suppressed smile, like he can see I’m flustered and finds it... amusing? I will my cheeks to cool as I fuss with the teaspoons and straighten the solitary tea towel on the oven rail.
“I should set it up properly, shouldn’t I? Get a microwave, a few essentials... should we start in here first?” I turn to surveythe kitchen and glance up at him. His head is slightly bowed, and I notice a slight blush tingeing his cheeks, the twin to my own. Is he...nervous? Surely I can’t be making him nervous? I thaw slightly, checking myself. Perhaps I’m not the only one who feels anxious this morning, who wants this to go well. “I don’t know when Ivy installed the kitchen, but I’m fairly sure it’s considered retro now.”
The cabinets are so old that they’re yellowing on the inside. The worktops are chipped Formica, stained black around the sink. Ivy may have kept the kitchen ruthlessly clean to prolong its life span, but now, if I’m honest, it’s aged past the point of retro. There’s nothing to salvage here.
“We need to rip it all out, Carrie,” he says quietly. I glance up at him. He’s got a watchful look, as though testing what he should say. How far am I willing to go with this renovation? He’s being careful around me, I realize. Considerate.
“You’re worried I’m attached to all this, aren’t you? That I won’t throw it all out because it was Ivy’s?”
He shrugs, burying his hands in his pockets. “She wouldn’t throw away anything. Makes sense you’d feel the same way. And—and this place isn’t mine. I don’t have any memories attached to it.”
I take a deep breath and frown down at the worktop. There’s an old mug stain there, a perfect ring where the tea or coffee left an indelible mark. I rub my index finger over it absently. It’s appeared since I left. I knew every quirk of this cottage a decade ago, just as you do with family homes. The doors that squeak on their hinges, the places where the wallpaper curls slightly, where you can dig a finger in and peel away another centimeter.
He’s right, in a way. If it were possible, I would keep it all. Everything Ivy touched, everything she used. The ceramic pot with the collection of wooden spoons and spatulas still sits besidethe range, coated in dust. I remember her using them, humming as she stirred pots of soup, flipped griddle cakes on the stovetop. I remember the scent of scones, the blackberry jam she made every autumn. I remember her sitting, glasses perched on the end of her nose, to scrawl on each label before sticking it carefully on another jar full of the sticky sweetness. I remember it all, and I swallow it all down. Because the memories are laced with bitter guilt that I left all this behind.
“I’ll phone for a dumpster,” I say, not meeting his eyes. “I agree, it all has to go.”
He nods and makes for the lounge. I sniff, blinking back a fog of memories, and busy myself with the kettle and the mugs. I rattle the teaspoons around, my thoughts elsewhere—on Cora, on the dumpster I need to order, on the conversation I never had with Jess. On Tom’s face, gaunt and aged compared to the one I hold in my head. On the little girl standing beside him, a perfect replica of them both, like the ghost of winters to come.
Then I gather it all inside and hook my fingers around the mugs.
Matthieu is tapping the wall that divides the kitchen and lounge, frowning as a clot of plaster crumbles away to the floor.
“Thanks.” He accepts the mug, wraps his fingers around it. “This is just a partition wall. It’s not holding anything up. How far do you want to go with this renovation?”
I sweep my eyes across the lounge, then step back to look through the doorway to the kitchen. “I guess we could take it down? Open this space up?”
“It could do with more light,” Matthieu says, sipping his coffee. “And if we’re ripping out carpet, wallpaper, stripping it all back... that is, if you want to—”
“Makes sense.”
“All right,” he says, reaching out to tap his knuckles againstthe wall again. “All right. Shall we start with an hourly rate? Or would you rather I quote for the whole job?”
“Do you want to see upstairs first?”
He smiles into his coffee. “I know what I’ll find—more of the same.”
“Okay. Well, I guess the whole job, then.”
He gives me a figure, and I quickly calculate what that leaves in my savings, how much I’ll have left to live on until the spring. It’s just enough to buy some furniture to stage the cottage for selling, buy building materials we’ll need, and pay for any specialist tradespeople. “Done.”
