The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches

by Sangu Mandanna

“Look at us. Even with the best of intentions, we can’t give the girls everything they need. I’m eighty-two years old. I know what it is to hide who I am. I know what it’s like to live on the edges of society. The girls may always have to keep a part of themselves secret, but I still want them to be able to go out there and live. They need someone who knows what that’s like, what it is to look like they do and feel like they do, and who can show them how to bravely and safely chart a course across the rest of their lives.”

“I don’t pretend to know much about people,” she offered, fixing her eyes on the road ahead, “but one thing I’ve noticed over the years is that some people are nice and some people are kind. Lillian sounds like she’s more nice than she is kind. Does that make sense? Niceness is good manners, and stopping to give someone directions, and smiling at the overworked cashier at the supermarket. These are all good things, but they have nothing to do with what’s underneath. Niceness is all about what we do when other people are looking. Kindness, on the other hand, runs deep. Kindness is what happens when no one’s looking.”

“It’s not a bad thing at all, except when it’s all there is. A lot of nice people stop being nice when they don’t get exactly what they want.” She got back up and walked a couple of steps ahead of him, so he couldn’t see her expression as she added: “When I’m around people like that, I feel like curling up into a little ball, like a hedgehog. I’ve been taught all my life not to draw attention to myself, not to make people angry, not to let anyone notice how peculiar I am. Sometimes, even now, I have to remind myself that I’m stronger than they think. That I have power.” She turned her head and smiled over her shoulder at him. “You can’t see it, but there’s gold dust curling like smoke all around us. It’s a constant reminder that even when I’m alone and afraid, I always have magic.”

“I’m afraid.” “Of what?” “Of the heartbreak when I fail,” she said simply. “Of rejection. Of wanting too much. Of discovering again and again that I’m unlovable. All those nannies came and went, and not one of them loved me. And, thanks to Primrose, not one of them remembers me, either. People are usually like the sea, a constant, unerasable part of something bigger, but I’m more like a single wave that washes over the shore, ebbs away, and doesn’t leave a trace behind.” He swallowed, his knuckles almost white on the wheel. Mika looked away. “I’m afraid I’ll never leave a mark on anybody.”

“It’s not always enough to go looking for the place we belong,” Jamie said, his eyes on the house ahead. “Sometimes we need to make that place.”

It was a bit like that old philosophical question about a tree falling in the woods, wasn’t it? If no one remembered her, and she didn’t matter to anyone, did she really exist?