Magical Spice - Part Fifteen
This episode is part of a larger story, Soft Touch. If you haven’t yet, you can go back and read it from the beginning right here.
I put my elbows on the kitchen island, rest my chin on my palm, and let my appreciative gaze wander over the kitchen while Aiden cooks breakfast.
I like this kitchen. I like the heavy green leaves that grow down to drape along the outside edges of the windows. They make it feel like the house is nestled into the earth, or maybe more like it grew right out of it. The gently rounded ceiling adds to that impression.
So does the snugness of the close quarters, because this kitchen is packed pretty tightly with stuff. Pots and pans hanging on the walls, plants all over the place, every shelf full of food or cookware or spice jars. Everything is so colorful, like the walls are. More than that, though, the kitchen just looks - lived in.
There’s a pair of reading glasses tossed aside on the counter. Two mugs with tea bags left by the sink, sticky with honey. Half-melted candles scattered around. A small glass jar with freshly-plucked wildflowers on the windowsill. The top of the kitchen island has all kinds of random stuff all over it; a work bag, a lighter, a half-smoked bowl beside an ashtray, a few loose papers which upon closer inspection turn out to be a half-written lesson plan for a science class about trilobites. A soccer ball with some grass stuck to it is on the floor near the back door.
The windows above the sink are open, and everything outside is a soft emerald and aquamarine, plants and sky, blurred softly together by the light rainfall. All of the windows are thrown open, actually. The kitchen seems to breathe with the breeze, the way the curtains stir as the plants outside do. The garlands of little lights hung up over the kitchen windows look cozy in the rain.
Aiden is keeping his back to me and his eyes firmly on what he’s doing. I’m not sure what he’s cooking for us, but a soft sizzling noise has joined the sound of the rain, and the kitchen is starting to smell really good. I have no idea how he’s managing to make that happen, because he’s obviously distracted, lost deep in his thoughts. He hasn’t said anything for a while.
I take another long, grateful sip of my coffee, watching him with curious eyes.
“Are you a warlock?” I ask.
Aiden hasn’t slowed down once since we came into the kitchen. I think he feels like he won’t start crying again so long as he keeps his hands busy. At this question, though, he finally stops and turns to look at me. He lets out a startled little laugh, blinking hard.
“What? A warlock? What makes you say that?”
“I don’t know. You can do magic, and…” I look around at the busy, cozy, messy little kitchen again. “I could see this being a nice house for a warlock. But like a young warlock, who doesn’t have his big grey beard and his dragon yet.”
“His dragon?”
“Or for an apprentice potion-maker, maybe.”
Aiden breathes out a soft laugh, holds up the cooking spoon to show me there’s some bits of potato stuck to the end. “I’m just making breakfast. Not brewing anything up over here. Definitely not magic.”
“You brewed up this coffee, didn’t you? That’s magic. Tastes that way, anyways. Did you put some in here? Do you use it like sugar, or…?”
“No,” Aiden says firmly. “I just know how you like your coffee, that’s all. Does anything about me really scream warlock to you?”
“Mmm…” I take an appraising look at him. “Maybe not in the traditional sense. But there’s no law says a man can’t do magic in a snapback, right? And - with biceps.”
I blush a little, wishing I hadn’t added that last part.
But I can’t totally bring myself to regret it, because the worried frown on Aiden’s face lightens again. He lets out a soft breath of laughter, a warm, huffing sound that makes my heartbeat stumble shyly in answer.
Then he looks startled at himself for laughing. He stares hard at me, his blue eyes misting up again.
“How do you always…?” he murmurs, laughing softly over his words, and trails off.
Something in his voice, about the way he looks at me when he says it, makes me blush again. My cheeks are really starting to ache, burning up this much.
Aiden’s expression keeps going through so many swift, subtle changes, with emotions changing too quickly for me to follow or understand any of them. I can only grasp that Aiden is feeling all of them at one hundred percent intensity, and that they all make my heart fill up with that feeling I can’t explain to myself.
It’s like he’s on a ship in a storm, powerless to stop himself from being thrown from one side of the deck to the other. One second he’s looking at me with such infinite warmth in his eyes, and the next he looks like he wants to sit down and cry again.
All of it keeps giving me the sense that I should go wrap my arms around him, an instinct I’m having to actively battle.
“Goddamn,” Aiden breathes shakily, pushing a trembling hand through his hair. “What I would do for just one sip of Tennessee whiskey right now.”
“Oh, yeah? Well - it’s kind of early in the day for me, but…” I give him a friendly smile, fidgeting with a strand of my hair. “Yeah, pour me one, too. Just for the sake of having a drink with you.”
“No, no, I-” Aiden stops and looks up at me. He lets out a soft, pained laugh, then comes to stand on the other side of the kitchen island. He puts his elbows on it, drops his head into his hands. “God. What a sweet fucking thing to say. Jesus, Jamie, you’re gonna kill me.”
“I’m sorry,” I answer, starting to get confused. “Would having that drink help?”
“No,” Aiden says firmly, lifting his head to show me the determined expression in his blue eyes. “No, I’m clean, I’ve been clean for years now.”
I straighten up immediately, my eyes widening in alarm. “Oh, then you shouldn’t!”
“I won’t. Not gonna let you get your memories back only to find me here with whiskey on my breath. Trust me, that’s the last thing I’d let happen.”
His voice wavers with effort as he says it, but somehow he makes it sound like a certainty, a fact no one could possibly argue with. Warm, complete reassurance takes the place of the worry that was rushing through me.
I stare at Aiden, at a loss. How is it that I trust everything he says so implicitly, so easily? Maybe because every word he speaks in that deep, slow voice rings with heartfelt sincerity to my ears. Just the rich sound of it breathes real consolation into my heart, soothing everything.
And then my heart nearly pops as Aiden reaches across the kitchen island to gently ruffle my hair, adding in a preoccupied voice -
“Only got one drug left to me now. S’alright, though, I don’t mind. It’s far and away the best one.”
I’m seriously glad that he turned away to check on what he’s cooking as he finished up saying that. I don’t really know what he meant by it, but I’m having some kind of instinctive response, and there would be no way he could miss the scalding blush spreading across my face at this point.
I nervously twist the necklace between my fingers, then wander closer to the window by the kitchen sink. Pretending to look out at the fine, dense rain, but really just trying to get some cool air on my burning face.
This places me next to Aiden, who’s stirring something on the stove. From the corner of my eye, I see him shoot a quick, searching glance at me beneath his dark lashes.
We lapse into shy silence for a minute, and then Aiden lets out a heavy exhale, dropping his head.
“Shit, Jamie… I’m just - I’m so sorry,” he murmurs, his deep voice catching in his throat.
I turn to face him, taken by surprise. “What, for freezing up? That could happen to anybody!”
“For…” He trails off, shrugs miserably. “Letting you down. Letting this happen. You were really brave, and I - wasn’t.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Okay, why do you feel like you have to be braver than I am? Is it because you’re taller than me?”
“Wh-?” Aiden lets out a startled laugh, then tilts his head back helplessly. “No, dude, it’s because I’m the one who’s supposed to protect everybody, and instead you keep having to protect me!”
Again, I’m not sure what he means, but I answer without thinking.
“Well… somebody should, right? Someone has to.”
Aiden closes his eyes for a moment, leaning his palms against the kitchen counter, biting his lip. Again, I’m struck with the urge to move closer to him. My fingers are longing to gently brush that stray, shiny strand of chestnut back from his eyes.
“Quit making me feel better,” he mumbles raggedly, turning away to take down some plates. “You’re interrupting the meltdown I’m having.”
I let out a startled laugh, shyly twisting the necklace in my fingertips. “I won’t apologize for that.”
He hands me a plate, flashing me a small smile. “Nah. Won’t ask you to.”
I drop my gaze to the plate he gave me, taking deep breaths of the fragrant steam coming up from it. “What is this?”
“It’s a savory breakfast kunafa, with some yogurt dip on the side. Don’t worry, you like it.”
I set the plate on the kitchen island, then accept the fork he’s offering me. “Aiden… can I ask you something, man?”
He pauses in making himself a plate. Takes a swift glance at me over his shoulder.
“Okay?”
“Did you say that you don’t want to use your magic to try to fix my memory?”
He gives his shoulders a slow shrug, watching me uneasily. “Definitely prefer not to go that route if we can avoid it.”
“But - didn’t I take the hit from the Witch because I thought you’d need to fix the problem with magic? If the solution was as simple as jogging someone’s memory, I probably could have done that for you, right?”
“I mean…” Aiden nibbles his lip anxiously, sets his plate down, and fidgets with the brim of his snapback. “Yeah, dude, that must be what you thought. But we don’t know that it’s actually true.”
It’s really obvious in everything about the way Aiden says it that he doesn’t want it to be true.
I hesitate, but I can’t help myself, so I just ask. “Why are you so against using your magic on me?”
Aiden returns my curious, searching look with a stressed-out frown.
“Because I’m not like the Witch. My magic isn’t restricted to illusions, I actually can do things that are irreversible. I’ve already permanently altered your vision. Totally by accident.”
I draw back in surprise. “You made my vision worse?”
“Oh, no,” Aiden rushes to clarify. “You - consider it an upgrade, I guess. Long story.”
“Oh.” I tilt my head to the side, increasingly confused. “Then that’s a good thing you did, isn’t it?”
“Maybe, but that’s not the point. The point is it’s totally possible for me to do things by accident, and the last thing I want to do is make a mistake and permanently mess up your memory.”
“Don’t you just have to use the right spell?”
“That’s not really how it works. There’s no spell, it’s more about, um - intention.”
“Okay… but your intention wouldn’t be to mess up my memories. It would be the opposite of that.”
“Yeah, of course, but - but…”
Aiden winces and trails off, struggling for words. I give him a long moment to answer, but he doesn’t take it.
“Is it just that you don’t trust yourself to do it right, Aiden?”
“I don’t…” He winces again, twisting his wrist in his hand, a faint blush darkening his cheeks. “Okay, look… you’ve helped me out a ridiculous amount with the confidence I have in my abilities. Way more than you know, like, more than you’d know even if you had your memories. I’ve got a lot more faith in myself than I had before. But it’s a whole different thing when it comes to doing magic on you.”
“Why?”
“Because…” Aiden takes a shaky, uneven breath. “Because you don’t put something irreplaceable in the hands of an amateur, okay? That’s basically what I am when it comes to magic, an amateur, and I couldn’t live with myself if I did literally anything that - that-”
He cuts himself off, swallowing the last of his words, and lapses into anxious silence, looking anywhere but at me. I blush again, staring at him in bewilderment, then protest quickly -
“But I had faith in you to get it right, Aiden! Isn’t that why I made sure the Witch’s magic came my way instead of yours?”
“That was before you saw me freeze up in front of her. I’m sure that would’ve rocked your willingness to put yourself in the care of my magic.”
I blink hard at him, taken by surprise. “No, it wasn’t before. I saw that happen, and I still did it. That’s what you said, isn’t it?”
“Guess…” Aiden pauses, staring at me with wide eyes, his brows knitted. “That’s right, you did… what’s wrong with you, dude? Why would you still trust me to take care of everything after that? You’ve got more freckles than sense, I’ve always said so.”
“Wow, that’s a very negative take on things! I can see many other, much better ways to look at it!”
I fix Aiden with an indignant pout as I say this, and for some reason that draws a warm little smile onto his face.
It slips away quickly, though. He closes his eyes for a second, trying to take a breath. I can see how scared he is, and my heart aches for him again.
“Aiden,” I murmur, much more softly. “I totally get it, if your confidence is shaken after everything that happened. All I’m saying is that clearly it didn’t shake my faith in you. In case that factors into whether or not you trust yourself enough to do this.”
Aiden tilts his head to the side, some mixture of warmth and anguish revealing itself in his blue eyes.
“Why are you making a case for me to use my magic on you? You can’t even remember the magic I’ve done before. All you know about is the time I fucked up. Your confidence in me should be at exactly zero.”
“I - don’t know.” I shrug my shoulders helplessly. “I’m just going with my instincts. They’re kind of all I have, right now.”
Aiden just looks at me for a long moment, the expression on his face too complicated for me to read.
“Guess that's the whole reason it went south with the Witch. Didn’t trust myself.” He blows out a sigh of self-directed frustration. “Really thought I’d built up more confidence than that. Must have way overestimated myself. It all goes away right when I fucking need it.”
I wrinkle my nose at Aiden. He lifts an eyebrow when he notices.
“You don’t think much of what I just said, huh?” he asks affectionately.
“No, I don’t!” I answer heatedly, a stern frown coming over my face. “You’re thinking of it like a final verdict, and to me it sounds more like a little setback.”
Aiden was observing my disapproving expression with some quiet warmth in his eyes, but when he hears what I said his gaze snaps back to mine, his eyebrows flying up.
“A little setback? You losing your whole entire goddamn fucking memory, Jamie?”
“A little setback to your confidence, I mean!” I explain earnestly, hoping he can see the sincerity in my eyes. “It was one difficult moment, and it got too hard for you to trust yourself. It’s okay, it happens! But you have a second chance to trust yourself, right now. By getting my memories back. By doing your magic on me.”
Aiden stands frozen, then slowly lifts his snapback and slowly pushes a trembling hand through his hair.
“That’s scarier to me than facing down the Witch again, man,” he says quietly.
“Yeah, I’m - reaching that conclusion on my own,” I tell him, my heart stumbling again under that intensely blue gaze. “But clearly I thought you could do it.”
Aiden bites his lip, then hangs his head. “What if I erase your memory, Jamie?”
“Didn’t you say it’s about intention?” I ask softly. “You don’t intend that. I can tell. I trust you not to, so… if you trust yourself not to, we should try.”
Aiden lifts his head slowly. Across the counter, his strained blue eyes find mine and hold them, gazing deeply into them.
He holds up one hand and looks down at it. A few seconds pass in silence, but nothing happens. Aiden lets out a heavy breath, looking up at me again.
“Fuck… I don’t have any magic right now,” he realizes out loud, wincing apologetically at me. “I burned it up trying to keep you warm in the rain on the way back… actually spent most of my energy without using magic. Just on regular stuff. It was a long hike back to the car.”
He looks and sounds exhausted, but what he’s saying fills me with hope.
“Wait, so - you’ll try?” My hands grip the counter tightly, a relieved, grateful smile coming over my face. “With your magic? Really, Aiden?”
Aiden is obviously nervous to the point of going to pieces. But he nods, then takes a deep breath.
“You’re always giving me second chances, Keane,” he murmurs, his deep voice full of worry and warmth.
“Am I?” I ask brightly, picking my fork back up. “Hm. Then I must think you deserve them.”
Aiden lifts his gaze to me, an unconscious little smile turning up his lips for a fleeting moment.
He takes a bite of his food, which reminds me about mine. It looks hot and crunchy and yummy, and I’m starving.
I take a big bite of the kunafa, then stop, staring down at my plate. Aiden catches my bewildered expression immediately.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbles tiredly. “Is it not good? I’m distracted, I might not have gotten it perfect.”
“Oh, no, it’s not that! It’s really good, I just…”
I fade off, not sure how to explain.
The taste of Aiden’s cooking sent the strangest sensation sweeping through me. Like a full-body sigh of peaceful bliss, followed by a sensory rush that I can’t explain. Images, tastes, emotions, all flashing by too fast and too hopelessly jumbled to mean anything clear to me.
All I know is that every bite of this food he made fills me up with a deep sense of instinctive peace and relief. The last traces of fear I had left over from waking up how I did melt away.
Safety, some voice in my heart reassures me, with total confidence. You’re safe here. With him.
Aiden is watching me curiously, obviously aware that I’m having some kind of unusual response to the food he made me. I’m not sure how to explain what happened. My best attempt comes out as:
“I like it here.”
Aiden blinks in surprise. A small smile turns up his lips. He picks quietly at his kunafa, suddenly shy again.
We eat in silence for a little, but eventually I get the urge to fill it.
“Hey, why is there a bowl on your windowsill, by the way? Is it for the cat?”
Aiden glances over his shoulder at it, then flashes me a warm look as he turns back.
“No. We’ve been trying to lure in a spirit by leaving out a bowl of buttermilk as an offering. It hasn’t worked, but you insisted that we should keep trying. So now every night I’m putting together dinner for us, a cat, a bird, and a spirit who has yet to show itself.”
He’s grumbling about it, but I sense that he likes having so many mouths to feed. I also definitely didn’t miss that he said he makes dinner for us every night. I guess - he might not have meant me, though? He did mention someone else named Kasey.
“A warlock?” he laughs suddenly, helplessly. “You little nerd.”
“Wh-?” I blush again, startled into laughter, too. “You said you were gonna battle a witch, doesn’t that sound like something a warlock does?”
Aiden only looks at me in answer, with a smile so sweet and disarming that my fork almost slips right through my fingers. I tighten my grasp on it, trying my hardest to get my heartbeat under control.
Aiden takes the empty plate from me and puts it in the sink, then rubs his eyes.
“Fuck,” he murmurs, his deep voice even slower than it was before. “I just want to fix this right now, but I think I have to sleep before I try. I don’t have enough magic to do anything, way it is.”
“Well - that’s okay.” I take a closer look at the dark bruises of exhaustion around his eyes. “I think you need some sleep regardless of whether or not you want to attempt some magic. How long have you gone without?”
Aiden gives his shoulders a slight shrug. He doesn’t know.
“Okay, yeah,” I answer firmly. “Go get some sleep, it’s okay.”
All the exhaustion held off by adrenaline must be hitting Aiden hard. He doesn’t attempt to argue, even though he looks like he wants to. He quietly fills up the cat food bowl on the ground, then leads the way out of the kitchen.
I’m not sure what to do, so I follow him upstairs, back to the bedroom where I woke up. Aiden takes the muddy sheets from the bed and spreads out a new set of soft, colorful linens where they were. Definitely moving on autopilot at this point, because he can barely keep his beautiful blue eyes open.
He sinks down to sit on the end of the bed, takes off his snapback. Lets out a long, slow breath. He lifts his tired eyes to me, and I instinctively come closer, to stand in front of him. He looks like he barely knows what’s going on through the exhaustion anymore, fighting to stay upright. I have to suppress the urge to gently push him down, to make him rest.
“Is there someone else we should call to help us?” I ask, fidgeting with my necklace. “Kasey, or…?”
“No,” Aiden insists, his deep voice growing rough and sleep-slurred. “Let me fix this one… I can do it… I’ll show you I can do it on my own.”
I can’t help but smile, hearing the undercurrent of newfound determination in his voice. I nod in silent agreement, folding my arms over my chest in an effort to keep my hands to myself.
“Okay, sounds good. Get some sleep. I’ll wait.”
“You won’t go anywhere, though, will you?” Aiden rumbles, gazing up at me imploringly. “Please just promise me you won’t leave the house while I’m asleep.”
I glance at the windows uncertainly. “Is it… dangerous out there, or something?”
“Dangerous?” Aiden breathes out an exhausted laugh. “No, it’s just about the opposite. You’re friends with like half of this whole town. Anyone you run into is gonna wonder why you don’t remember them. I need to fix you before you can go back out there.”
“Oh.” I brighten up considerably. “That’s a nice reason to not be allowed outside, as far as those go.”
“Jamie.”
“No, I won’t leave, I promise.”
Aiden’s powerful shoulders sink with relief. He climbs further up onto the bed, collapses into it, and stretches out on his back.
“You’ll do it, though?” I sit down beside him on the bed, watching him hopefully. “Once you have enough magic? You’ll try?”
Silence from Aiden for a second, and then - “Soon as I wake up. I promise.”
He reaches up to gently mess up my hair. There’s something protective about the subtle movement of his fingertips. They linger for a second before he lets his hand fall again.
“Just let me listen to you…” he murmurs, even though I haven’t said anything.
And then he’s out, just like that. As if he reached a point of such exhaustion that sleep forcibly pulled him over the edge. His head falls slowly to the side until his cheek rests against the pillow. His breaths grow slow and deep, his fingers curling up in the bedding.
I sit there gazing down at him for a long time, a wild, raging river crashing through me.
I’m relieved to have some uninterrupted time to just look at Aiden. I’ve needed this so badly ever since I woke up, and first got struck with the same sensation overwhelming me now.
My eyes wander slowly over him in the rainy, dusty-golden sunlight. The lock of soft chestnut hair falling into his face, over his closed eyes. I want to look into the angelic blue of them again.
Watching him sleeping quietly and motionlessly - visibly worried even now, with an anxious little crease between his brows - I don’t know why, but the sight fills me with a flood of red-hot tenderness. With the barely-suppressed urge to take Aiden’s hand, to gently stroke his cheek.
Sprawled out like this in the sunlight, the sheer beauty of him is almost painfully undeniable, but…
This feeling, the one that hit me the second I laid eyes on him and stayed with me ever since - it’s not about how he looks. It went fathoms deeper than that. It came from the very core of me, took place right at the center of my heart. It demanded attention the way a meteor shower that filled up the entire sky would demand attention.
I knew him. Right away.
Not his name, but the sight of him struck me so deeply and powerfully that his name wouldn’t have mattered. The knowledge I had of him was something lightyears beyond the surface level. I felt that recognition in the essence of myself, at the core of my heart, which was delirious with pure, indescribable joy and delight as soon as I laid eyes on him. It was like my very soul leapt towards him.
It’s you!!!!!!! It’s you it’s you it’s you it’s you…
That eager, breathless, giddy thought was the only thing going through my head when I opened my eyes and saw Aiden.
I have no idea what it means, but it’s running through my head right now, too.
I take a few long, deep breaths. I sincerely hope that I’m not being unforgivably gullible and naive, believing everything that Aiden tells me. Placing myself in his power, trusting him to reach into my mind and remove the barrier keeping me from my memories. Technically he is a stranger to me right now, but…
No… I think to myself, watching Aiden’s sleeping face. Not him. You and him could never be strangers.
Oh, god. Why am I just so sure?
And why do I have real confidence that Aiden can help me with his magic? I don’t know, but it’s there. A deeply-felt sense of conviction in my heart, another thing I can’t explain to myself. I know he’s afraid that he can’t handle things, and I know how scary that feeling is, but… I feel like he can handle this.
I rest my chin on my arms, thinking about the way he speaks to me and looks at me. The powerful impulses and intuitions I’ve had around him ever since I woke up. The way watching him break down made me break down, too, like watching him suffer and not being able to do anything about it is the worst thing that can happen to me.
The perfect taste of the kunafa he made for me. The little bowl of buttermilk he left out for the spirit. The house, with all the strange little things about it that inexplicably pluck at my heart.
Most of all, that recognition glowing in my chest. Making my soul light up with radiant happiness just to have Aiden here, sleeping close to me. It keeps trying to push me into his arms.
I know that I should feel completely lost, with no memories to tether me to anything. I don’t, though, because… I’m with him.
It’s the easiest thing in the world to lay down and curl up right next to him. The bed is soft and cozy. The gentle sunlight is dancing in the rain, rippling in slow-moving waves across Aiden’s face.
I know that I was unconscious for at least a little while. I’m not actually sure that I was asleep, though, or getting any real rest. A bone-deep tiredness descends over me as soon as I snuggle down into the blankets.
I roll onto my side, facing Aiden, fighting to keep my tired eyes open. That feeling he gives me… I’m turning it around, over and over, the way someone might turn a precious jewel over in their hands. Marveling at every subtle, shining beauty of it.
Unable to stop myself, I reach across the space between us and fold my fingers around Aiden’s.
I give a startled little jolt when I realize what I’ve done, blushing hard. I hurriedly begin to pull my hand back, but Aiden has already turned his hand over in his sleep. His fingers lock tightly around mine.
The worried little crease between his brows lightens as soon as he has my hand in his grasp. His breaths grow deeper, his jaw more relaxed.
The swollen puffiness that the tears left around his eyes only makes him look even sweeter, somehow.
I lay with my cheek on my forearm, watching him until my eyes won’t stay open anymore. I want so badly to understand what any of this means. I want to know how it is that I know him.
Guess I’ll remember when he wakes up.
A smile flickers across my mouth as I fall asleep. Cozy, tired, calm. Sure in my heart that in Aiden’s hands, I’m safe.
I’ll show you I can do it on my own…
I can tell how much he wants to. And I believe him, when he says he will.
Want to leave a comment? I would love it if you did, and you can do so on the Tapas episode!