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This is for you Lorin

Arturo’s Abode of Atypical Acts

July 23, 1812

One month after the day France invaded Russia, Gisèle Villiers gazed upon Arturo’s for the first time. Her cramped carriage bobbed and swerved up the steep incline of the bridge, bouncing Gisèle against the walls on occasion. The explosive roar of rushing rapids bludgeoned her ears as she stepped from the cab.

The estate was half castle design, half victorian and was settled precariously on the edge of a cliff, a river running right through the foundation. A few of the corridors and stairwells traveled outside, and she could see people in bright, flamboyant clothing rushing through.  

Doyle, her family’s long time servant, jumped down from his perch by the mules. He straightened stiffly, no doubt feeling the ache of long healed war wounds. “Welcome to Wales, Mademoiselle.” 

A Suffering Witch

**Well ladies and aliens, here's my first post, and it's a short story! If you like witches and escaped convicts, read on good people of the internet.

“. . . And in other breaking news: today marks the two year anniversary of the Exodus Doctrine. Since its induction into law, there have been over three-hundred arrests made for the crime of witchcraft alone. Hard to believe, Diana.”

The female news anchor next to him with the artificial nose nodded. “Yes it is, Tom. To think that just a couple of years ago hundreds of these people were among us--”

I clicked off the TV with a decisive press of my thumb, then turned to my children seated around the disorderly kitchen table and said, “I don’t want you two watching that dribble.”

The boy kept horsing down his soggy cereal, not caring because he hadn’t been paying attention to the news anyway. The younger girl with a floppy, purple ribbon in her hair whined, but she was too excited to get to school for show and tell to make a big fuss.

I walked them out to the car and began my daily battle with the rusty, old engine in my mini van. It was a vile color somewhere between puke and burnt oatmeal, chunky and smelly looking. Twisting and turning the key viciously, thoughts of sports cars and motorcycles danced through my head. The piece of junk started, more’s the pity. Those dreams would have wait until tomorrow. Or the next day.

Pulling up to the school, I treated the screaming kids like neon cones, weaving through them with the utmost care, protecting a paint job I hated. My own two rugrats bid me a lackluster goodbye as the hoped out of the still moving van to see their friends. It made me sigh, but I wasn’t one to waste oxygen by telling them not to unbuckle until I had hit the brakes. At least not for the second time that morning.

Calling my husband on the way to the grocery store, I put her foot to the floorboard, crushing a candy bar wrapper under the gas pedal.

“You’ve reached Kevin--”

“Obviously, I haven’t,” I muttered into the disconnected line.

The local grocery was filled with people like me--moms like me. They wore their elastic waisted jeans up to their navels and wandered around the store with a bad perm, buying anything fatty or sugary that got in the way of their shopping cart. I watched them with a mixed pallet of disgust and self loathing.

My cell phone rang, an awful little tune from some Disney movie--my daughter’s doing, and I picked up on the first ring without glancing at the screen. “Kevin, I’m at the store. Do you need....”

A woman’s voice was on the other line. “Is this Melissa Bradley?”

“It’s Shaw now,” I said slowly. For the moment, anyway.

“Oh, right. Of course. You’d think I’d remember that; I was at your wedding, after all.”

“Who is this?”

“This is Victoria Lang,” she said as if it should mean the world to me.

It did mean something, however. “Tori? From high school?”

I could picture her turning her beak like nose up. “I prefer Victoria now.”

“Oh, right. Of course.” My lips twitched a bit, then I remembered my manners. “How have you been?”

“Everyday is a blessing,” she said, and I wondered if that was how other people really felt. “But I called to ask if you were coming home for the funeral.”

“Who died?” I asked, not at all sure I was interested in knowing. I hadn’t spoken to anyone I’d grown up with since graduation. I didn’t call, write, or attend reunions--come to think of it, I didn’t know how Tori had gotten my number.

“Well, nobody. Yet,” Victoria said, laughing as if she had uttered something extremely clever. “Are you coming to the execution, then?”

I stopped my cart in the middle of the aisle, and some lady bumped into my rear end. I barely noticed. “Execution?”