The Last Spell in the Margins

The house at the end of Holy Cross Road looked like it had let out its final breath. The rooftop sagged slightly, and the shutters leaned off-kilter toward the soil. Even the fence, once pristine white, was now yellowed and peeling. Inside, the family picked through the remains of Eliza Bankop’s estate with hazy, tired eyes. Piles began to take shape as her adult children divided what was left. The younger grandchildren dashed around the mess, their energy unleashed after sitting still through the two-hour funeral. In the kitchen, the spouses chatted with beers in hand, unfazed by the solemn occasion.

Mira Lake quietly closed the bathroom door and turned to face the mirror. She winced.

The crimson abomination otherwise known as a "blouse" felt like a clown costume that hugged her in all the wrong places. Her mom hadn’t cared to mention while packing that everyone was wearing red for the funeral (her grandma's favorite color). This morning, Mira had panicked and borrowed something from deep in Aunt Judy’s closet. Big mistake. It wasn’t just that the color made the red bumps on her face stand out like targets, or that the frills on the sleeves made her feel like an awkward pirate with braces. It just didn’t feel like her.

She recalled her recent middle school graduation, for which she was forced to wear a dress. It was humiliating - just like this.

A knock at the door broke Mira’s train of thought.

"Coming," she called. She gave herself one last glance, sighed, and stepped out.

Her mother, Heidi, looked her over. “You okay?”

Mira nodded. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

Heidi studied her with that same worried look she always wore. Heidi was always worried about this or that, usually with Mira at the center of it.

Mira hated it.

“I’m actually fine,” she said again, smiling as she squeezed her mom’s arm. “I’m going to start on the attic.”

Heidi sighed, letting it go. “That’d be a big help, Meers. Thank you.” 

The tired lines surrounding her mother's eyes were more prominent than ever. Although Heidi's relationship with her late mother had been tense at times, Mira knew the loss weighed heavily upon her mother's shoulders.

Mira gave her a long hug. When they pulled apart, her mom was already halfway turned toward the living room and all the stuff left to sort through.

The attic stairs were hidden in Eliza’s walk-in closet. Mira tugged the string until the stairs dropped down like a trapdoor. She used to think that was the coolest thing. Memories of playing spy while Grandma pretended not to know where she was made her smile—then cough, as the stairs clanked to the floor and a cloud of dust rose.

She waited, fanning the air with her sleeve, before climbing the creaky steps.

Mira liked the attic—it was the one place in the home that wasn’t artfully decorated or arranged to look a certain way. Just a few exposed, dusty walls, plywood floors, a pile of old Christmas decorations, and a few plain boxes. She left the moth-bitten wreaths alone and went to the boxes.

The first box was filled with photo albums—Grandma at Mira’s age, a near clone of her. Wedding photos with Grandpa. School pictures of Mira’s mom and her siblings. Report cards. An old photo of Grandma when she was a couple years older than Mira, her arm slung over the shoulders of a smirking, dark-haired girl. Eliza’s mouth was half open in laughter, and her eyes danced with mirth.

Something about the photo made Mira’s chest ache.

Rubbing a hand over her chest absently, she set that box aside and grabbed the second, smaller one. It was noticeably taped shut. On top, in Sharpie: "do not open."

Her curiosity perked up like a dog’s ears at the sound of footsteps. What could her funny old grandma possibly have to hide?

Heidi would’ve scolded the way Mira used her teeth to tear the tape. You’ll break your braces, her mom would’ve crowed. But Mira was too impatient to find scissors.

Inside was a stack of old children’s books—Frog and Toad, Jiminy Cricket. Mira sat cross-legged, frowning. One after another, she pulled the contents out and stacked them beside her. Maybe they were sentimental, and Grandma didn’t want the kids messing with them. Then, at the very bottom, Mira found a leather-bound journal with a heart-shaped lock.

Goosebumps broke out on her arms as she picked it up. She tried the lock—but it wouldn’t budge. With a sigh, she ran her thumb over the cover.

The journal warmed in her hand, vibrating faintly like a purring cat.

Mira dropped it and stumbled backward into the stack of children’s books. She toppled and landed with a loud clatter.

“What’s all that noise?” her mom called, starting to climb the stairs.

“Nothing!” Mira shouted, her voice a high squeak. Her mother’s footsteps slowed, then retreated.

The journal sat innocently. After a few seconds, Mira stood and approached it again. She was being silly—journals couldn’t purr. Plus, wasn’t Heidi always saying she had an overactive imagination? That’s why you have nightmares, her mom would say. Right—not because of the horror movie Mira’s friends forced her to watch at their last sleepover.

Mira chuckled at herself, got up awkwardly, and collected the scattered books to stack them neatly. Then she approached the journal again. It lay still and silent. She picked it up. This time, when she tried the lock, it popped open with a click.

She slowly opened the journal to crisp, aged pages filled top to bottom with looping script. The handwriting was unmistakably Eliza’s. Mira thumbed through a few pages and paused at an entry dated: May 8th, 1949.

I feel torn between two worlds. The one in which I am the perfect daughter, and the other in which I am true to myself. I thought that discovering my ancestry would be a fun distraction before college, but then I met her. She’s made me question everything I ever wanted.

—E

Mira chewed her bottom lip in thought. With what little information she knew about her grandmother’s youth, this felt like trying to piece together a puzzle she couldn’t quite see.

As Mira read on, she discovered that in between the scattered entries, her grandma had jotted down the occasional… recipe?

Mira stopped at one:

A bit of luck

one sprig of mint

two eyelashes from a wily cat

olive oil

Inhale while repeating:

“A lucky girl I am, through and through.

A lucky world I wish to enter into.”

Spell good for 2.5–3 hours

Mira raised her eyebrows. If she didn’t know better—and if she were silly like her baby cousins—she’d think Grandma was casting spells.

She pinched the pages and let them flutter by until she reached the end. On the final page, the following was written in a purple fountain pen:

True Love Protection

Hold each other’s hands at dusk, while you speak these words:

“My love is love,

No matter what they say,

And my heart is yours,

For now and all days.

Though there are many dangers,

Here & around every turn,

I know it is you—only you,

For whom my ”

The poem stopped there. Mira frowned. She couldn’t decide what was odder—that the poem was left unfinished, or that her grandma, who’d been single for thirty years and hissed at the mention of her ex-husband, had written a love poem.

Even in old photos, Eliza and her then-husband never looked particularly in love. They just looked... comfortable. Like Tempur-Pedic flip flops. This poem had the vibe of white gauzy stilettos worn on a wedding day.

Mira was stumped. She mouthed the last line of the poem, contemplating how to finish it. For a beat, there was no sound in the attic except her own breath. Then, the scent of lilies grew nauseatingly strong. She scrunched her nose. I’ll have to tell Mom something’s growing up here, she thought.

Just as she closed the journal and moved to put it back, the floor erupted in a very distinct creeeeak behind her.

Mira whipped around and cursed loudly.

A woman stood opposite her at the far attic wall. The frizzy cloud of black and purple hair framing her face would’ve been hilarious on anyone else—but on her, it was fitting. Attractive, even. She looked about twenty and wore a dark purple tunic that seemed straight off the set of Harry Potter. 

Somewhere in the back of her mind, Mira knew the woman couldn’t have come up the stairs quietly—they creaked like an old man’s bones—but she was too distracted by the look on the woman’s face to give it much thought.

“Eliza,” the woman breathed, so much emotion in that one word that Mira was momentarily stunned.

The woman glanced around, and a teasing tone colored her next words. “You had forty years to think up a romantic location for our reunion, Liza, and you chose a dusty old attic?”

To hear someone—this stranger—use her grandmother’s name so intimately snapped Mira out of her daze.

“I’m not Eliza. I’m Mira. Eliza was my grandmother.”

The woman’s face slowly fell. She looked Mira over as if seeing her for the first time. “Did you say... Eliza, was, your grandmother?”

Mira nodded.

The woman turned to the attic window, shoulders slumped. It was then that Mira noticed a ruby red hairpin tucked neatly into the woman's dark locks. Mira almost felt bad for interrupting such a vulnerable moment, but she quite literally couldn’t keep her mouth shut.

“I’m sorry, but… were you not at the funeral?” Mira asked, part-friendly, part-what-the-hell. There had to be a logical explanation. Maybe this woman was looking for a different Eliza—one who just happened to look eerily like Mira. That was possible… right?

The woman turned, tears falling slowly down her cheeks.

“Pardon me—these tears are so silly,” she said with a watery chuckle. Then she snapped her fingers. A handkerchief appeared out of thin air, floating downward. She caught it and dabbed her cheeks.

“How—did you—where—” Mira stammered.

The woman smirked. “A girl never reveals her spells.”

Something clicked. Mira had seen this woman before. It was impossible, illogical, absurd—and yet she had never been so sure of anything in her life.

Mira bent down and retrieved the photo of young Eliza with her arm around the smirking brunette. “This is you, isn’t it?”

The woman stepped forward and took the photo gently. A heartbreakingly sweet smile crept over her features as she traced Eliza’s cheek.

Mira hesitated, a question lodged in her throat - until she finally forced it free. “Was my grandmother—”

“A witch,” the woman confirmed.

“-gay?”

The woman’s eyes shot to hers, then softened. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised she never came out—not with a granddaughter and all.”

Mira’s mind reeled. “But... why didn’t she tell anyone?”

The woman turned in a slow circle, as if inspecting the wall cracks and dust motes. “Catholic parents. Conservative neighbors. Self-hatred. The usual suspects,” she said with a casual shrug. Mira could tell it was forced.

Mira looked down at her bright red blouse, feeling raw. She changed the subject.

“Was my grandma really a witch?” she asked, a wry smile tugging at her lips.

“She was the fiercest witch I’ve ever known,” the woman said. “Kind. Passionate. About life, laughter, adventure.”

Mira stayed quiet, absorbing this image of her grandmother.

“She drove me crazy, yet we were inseparable. We had plans—to travel, to help other queer witches step into their power. We were destined to do great things together, I could feel it,” she smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. “Then one day, she just left. No goodbye. Just a letter.”

“I’m sorry,” Mira said softly.

“She gave it all up—her powers, her immortality, and...” The woman paused. “All for the perfect life. Husband. Children. White picket fence. She became the daughter her parents wanted.”

“Fuck that,” Mira said, then automatically braced herself for reprimand.

The woman just smirked. “You remind me of her—of who she used to be.”

Mira blushed and scuffed her shoes against the floor. “I think I’m more like her than my mom wants me to be.”

The woman looked her over. “You look like someone brave enough to say ‘fuck what others think.’”

“I do?”

“Absolutely.”

Mira felt her shoulders square and her posture straighten. "Thanks."

The woman smiled and checked an old-fashioned watch. “I better —”

“Wait!” Mira stepped forward. “Sorry, but—do you know this spell? It looks unfinished.” She pointed to the last page of her grandmother's journal.

The woman glanced at the page, then smiled. “Maybe she wanted someone else to finish it.”

Mira nodded. “It was nice to meet you ...?”

“Calmira,” the woman said with a wink.

Mira inhaled sharply just as Calmira vanished.

She stood there for a moment, alone in the attic wearing that ridiculous frilly shirt, surrounded by fragments of her grandmother’s life: the parts she shared, and the parts she didn’t.

Mira was constantly trying to fit into clothes, expectations, and roles that weren’t hers. Finding her grandmother’s journal—then meeting Calmira—and learning the true extent of her grandmother’s silence… it all added up to one thing.

She marched to the opening in the floor and began to descend the rickety stairs.

A few minutes later, Mira returned in ripped jeans and her favorite sweatshirt. She felt more like herself than she had all day. Her mother raised an eyebrow as she walked past, but said nothing.

Mira knelt in front of the journal and pulled a pen from her pocket. She opened to the final page and wrote:

True Love Protection

Hold each other’s hands at dusk, while you speak these words:

“My love is love

No matter what they say

And my heart is yours

For now and all days

Though there are dangers

Round every turn,

I know it is you, only you,

For whom my heart burns.”