revenge is a bitch and so am I

“Right, well, you’re welcome to bring it up to the owner. Or my manager… or whoever. But I don’t make the rules, and I don’t decide who gets what hours, so… any complaints you have… trust me. I’ve said them a thousand times, myself.” Heather seemed to be just as much of a hot-head as Valerie was, and it wasn’t going to get either of them pretty much anywhere. “So you get it, then. How shitty it is. And how neither of us can do pretty much anything about it.” She took a deep breath and reminded herself that getting into an argument wouldn’t do either of them any good. “Why? It’s just a lake – it’s pretty much the same no matter what part you’re on. And it’s not anything that special, either, if you ask me. Just another lake, just like the rest of them.”

Heather snorted. “No, I’m not going to go speak to your manager.” Complaining about working conditions as an outsider would come off more as a Karen bitching than any actual desire to help workers. “Wow, so we’re twins!” she said sarcastically. “We can relate to each other about the shitty things most people go through.” But Heather was supposed to be different and not have to work a shitty job in her 30s. “Everything looks different from another angle. But how many lakes have you even seen? What Midwesterner doesn’t appreciate lakes with all of the glacial history?”

Valerie scoffed. “Gotta pay the bills somehow,” she replied. it wasn’t like she could get a job anywhere. It wasn’t like she was qualified for anything with a higher salary, and makeup artist jobs really were few and far between. “I don’t have much of a choice right now. I’m kinda… between things. But good for you, being able to pick your job’s great, isn’t it?” She could feel herself getting annoyed, and as much as she wanted to keep it inside herself, she was starting to feel it boil over. “Why’d you say you were in this sketchy parking lot, again?”

Heather scowled. She had been trying to agree and relate to her. “I meant that no one should run a business like this.” Oh, now the waitress had hit her sore spot. She had not been able to pick her ideal job, despite how hard she had worked on her degree. The chemist hated the rut she had been in for years. “Yeah, good for me, stuck in a position I am way too overqualified for where I stock aspirin at the whim of a man stuck in the 50′s.” Shit, now that they were fighting the other was remembering her suspicions. A part of her felt the urge to just run. “I was looking for a shortcut to the lake. But frankly this shortcut sucks and there’s not much to see this side of the lake.”

There was some nervous energy between them. Valerie could feel it, even if it was slowly fading away. There was something about the other woman that didn’t put them immediately at ease. She tried her best to push that feeling away and focus on what Heather was staying instead. “No worries. I should probably pay more attention, anyway. You never know what you’ll find in the parking lot after dark.” It wasn’t the most lit area. That would be Valerie’s next complaint she’d bring up to her manager. “It is what it is – gotta pay the bills, right? What about you? What do you do?”

“Yes, vigilance is important. One would hope for a less sketchy workplace, though.” Heather moved out from behind the car and looked around. She mentally noted all of the places someone could hide and all of the deep shadows. The Lake House was fairly nice inside, but the back lot was clearly overlooked. “I work at a pharmacy. I never have to work past dark, though. If anything, people bitch that we close too early.”

“Maybe,” Bridgette said, shrugging her shoulders. “But maybe that’s why we’ll be good friends,” she added with a smile. She ended up being friends with Sorcha even though they were both very different people and were even enemies years ago in high school. “Chicago?” Bridgette raised her eyebrows. “I went there years ago when I was younger for Christmas with my family. Never went to LA though.”

Bridgette raised her eyebrows at Heather. “Neither am I,” she said. While she did like getting back at exes, it wasn’t quite the kind of revenge she was thinking of. Then again, it seemed like the direction that Heather was going in was also pretty different. Her mischievous smile grew as Heather wiggled her fingers in the air. “Did you mean…?” Bridgette waved her fingers around too and the air shimmered around her fingertips. “I think I know what you’re talking about,” she said. “Who was the man?” she asked in a much more serious tone. Being a witch herself, she was very wary of hunters. 

Heather found herself smiling. She usually surrounded herself with like-minded people, but honestly Bridgette’s way of looking at the world was kind of fun--though still stressful. And they both were firm believers in the snarky comment. “Opposites attract, as they say.” Wow, Heather was so glad that she hadn’t been as geographically restricted as Bridgette clearly had. “There’s some cool stuff to see in Chicago if you have the time. Especially the museums. LA is just a-whole-nother world than the Midwest.” 

Heather also raised her eyebrow at how excited Bridgette was getting. Maybe they were on the same page. She couldn’t help but break out in a smile at Bridgette’s little display of magic. There was a time that seeing magic made Heather mad, reminding her how she was a freak. But now she needed allies and felt relief for every witch she knew wasn’t dead. To be fair, she was also proud to have been right about the other having magic. Another dot clicked into place on Heather’s mind map of the magic in Edgewood. After looking briefly around to confirm they were still alone, Heather returned the mischievous grin and waved her hand again, this time forming a small translucent purple shield.

“That’s what I want to know,” she said in exasperation. “But he is a skilled hunter who has been in Edgewood for a few years. I tracked him here, but am honestly having trouble pinning him down. Scrying works so weird sometimes.” 

At this point in the day, Valerie really just wanted to get in her car, go home, and pour herself a glass of wine. Her day hadn’t been particularly stressful… not any more so than any other day, anyway. But the monotony of it all was starting to get to her. Edgewood was a much smaller town than what she’d become accustomed to. It was going to take some time for her to start to feel like this was home again.  As she opened the door to her car, she saw something move out of the corner of her eye. Her hand closed around the set of keys, positioning them so that she could use them as a weapon if she absolutely had to. Valerie had seen that in videos before – women using keys between their knuckles as a form of self defense. Whether it worked in real life or not was a question that she didn’t have the answer, to, though. Luckily for her, it wasn’t some wild animal or big, scary man that was on the other side of her car. It was Heather. “No worries,” Valerie smiled, trying her best to calm her racing heartbeat. “Yeah, it is. Everything okay, though? I didn’t mean to scare you – honest.”

Heather tried for a disarming smile, hoping it didn’t come out awkward or creepy. “You didn’t scare me, honest. Sorry if I scared you, though.” She took in the person in from of her. Heather didn’t recognize the person, but she was quite attractive and well put-together for a simple waitress. She noticed the keys clinched in the waitress’s hand and was glad and a bit proud to see a woman quickly reacting and improving a potential weapon. She felt a bit of guilt though for being the figure in the parking lot to startle her. Not wanting to have to back up her quick excuse for crouching behind the other’s car, Heather turned the conversation to them. “It must suck having to leave work so late.”

“Well, if you don’t plan everything out, you don’t have any expectations and sometimes really good things come out of that,” she explained to Heather. “Sometimes bad, but it’s all unexpected and usually you’re pleasantly surprised.” Bridgette snorted and then laughed about Heather’s comment that she had more problems than time management. “That’s an understatement,” she said. “But I guess I’ll give it a try.” She was open to anything now before she had to resort to other options. “Where are you from?” Bridgette never wanted to be that person that was born and raised and died in the same place. That wasn’t her style and it definitely wouldn’t have been this way if she’d gotten to leave Edgewood for school and move elsewhere. She hated to admit it, but a thought of a timeline changing spell crossed her mind. Sure, it was dangerous and sure to cause her trouble, but would it fix the things she was robbed of and lost in her life? “Oooh? Revenge? I love talking about revenge,” Bridgette said, perking up at the mention of revenge. Suddenly, things were getting more interesting with Heather. “What kind of revenge are we talking about here?”

“I think, Bridgette, that we may have very different philosophies regarding life,” Heather concluded. She herself was just too much of a Type A person, and she needed structure and planning. And in her experience, not much good has come out of unexpected developments. She raised her water bottle in a salute. “Good luck.” She hoped that Bridgette took her advice and applied it well. “I’m from Chicagoland,” Heather answered, “but then I went to school in the Rockies then in LA. I definitely recommend it.” 

“Okay I’ll be right back!”  Willow said shortly before going up to the counter and asking for some ice in a baggie.  Once it was given to her she immediately went back and handed it over. “Oh god no, I only drink iced coffee - even in the winter.”  The only thing worse than having coffee on your shoes would be having hot coffee on your shoes.  Willow couldn’t help but laugh at the next question.  “Well I work around a lot of motor oil so sadly stained shoes just automatically come with the job.”

“Dang, I’ve never even heard of that before. I love that, you must be like, super smart. But no, not off the top of my head, sorry.” She answered with a laugh. “However–I do know some people, I’ll put some feelers out there and see what I can find. Between that and my number, it’s the least I could do for my hero.” She added, wiggling her eyebrows. She did take the opportunity, while Heather’s phone was still in her possession, to quickly create a new contact for herself and fire off a quick message (consisting of the superhero emoji) to herself.  

“Oh, nothing, just–scolding myself.” It wasn’t…. wholly untrue; she now had many regrets getting involved in this project. At least it was almost over. “I know, right? God, these were the dumbest fad, I can’t believe she got one. Here, I’ll trade you for your phone back.” But, given the puff’s current grimy state, maybe it might finally see its end. Charlotte could always hope. “Round en–? Oh, hah, I get it. Seriously though, thank you so much, you were awesome. I’m glad I ran into you.”

Heather beamed, always happy for compliments to her intelligence. “Yes I am,” she said, with enough joking tone to not sound completely conceited. “Oh, seriously? Thank you so much! I’m way overqualified for my current gig.” She often dreamed of a different job while at work, but she didn’t let herself devote a search as any actual priority. She still planned to leave town once she finished her mission, though there were some people here she might actually miss.

“This was a fad? It must have been very local.” But damn there were so many silly little fads that kids went through. There were lots of things that other kids did that Heather didn’t realize until her friends mentioned it like years later because she just didn’t pay attention. After she took her phone back, she chuckled at the message Charlotte had sent. She was relieved that Charlotte had gotten her joke. She was not too proud to admit that puns were top notch humor. “You’re welcome. I’m glad I ran into you, too. I’ve been wanting to say hi one-on-one since we’ve had multiple parties in common.”

“Doesn’t really seem like living to have everything scheduled out,” Bridgette said, even though she didn’t quite feel like she was really living now in this town. “Does it really help?” She asked in a much more serious tone. She turned her head to look at Heather and set her bottle of alcohol down. “Like, does it really work? What if there’s just some shit like holding me back from doing better?” Bridgette furrowed her brow and pursed her lips. She really wanted to fix herself, but how was she supposed to do that? Maybe she wasn’t as strong as she thought. She wanted to get better, but she wasn’t about to check herself into a facility or spill her guts to her siblings about her problems. They were close, but not that way. “What kind of goals?” she asked. She leaned back on the bench and stared up at the evening sky. “I think I just need to leave Edgewood. Like maybe the problem is me being here, you know? I never got to travel when I went to college. Maybe that’s how I move on…” she said, mostly speaking to herself.

Heather pursed her lips and blew out slowly. “Well is it living to have everything you ever planned for blown off of the tracks?” Bridgette was clearly asking for advice for her life, but Heather was feeling defensive and her mind kept going to her own past. “Dude, it sounds like you might have some more problems than time management. But I suggest at least giving it a try.” She wondered if Bridgette was referring to internal or external impediments. Either way, therapy probably wouldn’t hurt. “Take it from me, leaving your hometown is such a relief. There’s so much shit out there.” She pitied the people who never left their hometowns and just married their high school sweetheart then pumped out babies. It sounded like a nightmare to her. Heather snorted. Bridgette was drunk and they were talking deep shit, so she went for sarcastically giving the truth. “I’m here to get revenge on the man who killed my family.”

Bridgette laughed and at the mention of Heather being a lightweight. She used to be a lightweight ages ago when she was in high school. I can’t believe you just used the term ‘ages ago’, she thought, hating how she was getting older. Sure, being twenty seven wasn’t actually that bad and she probably wasn’t going to join the Twenty Seven Club, but it all just seemed like it’d be going down hill from here. Until she could kick some bad habits, nothing was going to get better. The worst part was that she knew it wasn’t going to get better and she probably needed help, but she also couldn’t bring herself to asking for help and admitting her problems. She rolled her eyes at the thought of making a schedule. Where was the spontaneity in that? Why bother living by a schedule? “Did you follow that schedule? What happened if you strayed away from the schedule?” she asked, figuring maybe it really was worth a shot to take Heather’s advice. “Like, how do you schedule your life and still make sure you’re living and not like…just living by rules and times and whatever?”

Heather scowled slightly at Bridgette’s laugh, but it seemed in good fun. If she was a decade younger though and a lot less confident in herself, it probably would have stung. It was interesting to think about how the type of people you like to spend time with changes over time. “Yes, I actually follow the schedule. Most of the time.” At least she had been on schedule until her mom’s death threw everything off. She thought with a pang about how she should be married to Danny and working with a large manufacturing company now. “I have started building in little allowances for like social events, but limiting the number. A schedule is always adapting to things that come up.” Heather frowned at her comment, feeling a weight in her chest. “I guess that most people wouldn’t call my current life ‘living’. But I have goals, important ones, and I have to follow through no matter what,” she declared, trying to steel her resolve. Three years with barely any progress was starting to wear on her.

Willow frowned as soon as the other brunette said she had hurt herself.  “Shit, I’m so sorry.  Do you want me to go ask for some ice or something?  I’m sure they have some sort of bag they can put it in for a make-shift ice pack.”  Willow cursed herself for being so careless.  “Or at the very least let me buy you a muffin or something to make it up to you, I feel absolutely terrible.”

“Yeah, some ice would be great.” After the initial shock, Heather fully grasped that yes the other woman had ruined her own shoes as well. “I hope that wasn’t hot. Wait, how is that your last good pair? Do you only have one pair of shoes, or does this happen often?” She carefully walked the few steps to the trashcan to finally throw away her empty cup. Thankfully walking didn’t hurt any more than standing, so she had bruised her hip but not damaged the muscle.