Literature

For a dance in the school gymnasium, the Spring Fling wasn’t bad. The walls were camouflaged with cheerful decorations and multicolored streamers. Twinkling lights hung from the ceiling like shooting…

“I know we said this would be our evening alone, but Raj has been suffering from some major separation anxiety lately.” Adam was on Cassie’s doorstep with a pizza box…

It was the middle of the night, dark and quiet, when Cassie unlocked the gunmetal chest and reached inside for her father’s Book of Shadows. She held the book close…

Cassie’s mother appeared at the top of the stairs the moment Cassie stepped through the door. “Good, it’s you,” she said. “I’m glad you’re home.””Were you expecting somebody else?” “No…

Pink and white banners advertising the spring dance hung on all four walls of the school cafeteria. On a different day, or maybe in a different life, Cassie would have…

Cassie was sitting in third-period history debating between (a) the Continental Congress and (b) the House of Representatives on her pop quiz, when a hall monitor came to the door…

Cassie held her father’s Book of Shadows in her hands and shivered. There would be no going back, her mother had said, but now she watched Cassie expectantly.The book’s gold…

From her front porch, Cassie could see the flickering blue of the television flashing like a strobe light in a haunted house. Her mother must be waiting up for her.”I…

They all recovered from the morning’s battle miraculously well. A little soap and water, and a change of clothes, and each of them were mostly back to their old selves.Diana…

The flames roared and crackled with evil intent, as if the fire had a will of its own. Its scorching heat brought Cassie, blistering, to her knees. She was coughing…

“Come have a seat by the fire,” Scarlett said. She was smiling, in a twisted kind of way.Cassie tried to run back out the door, but she found her feet…

Cassie woke up at five the next morning, on the dot, without her alarm. It was like her body was so attuned to the day’s mission that manmade technologies of…

Some would say sneaking around outside Faye Chamberlain’s house in the middle of the night was a death wish, and they would be correct. But Cassie had come too far…

The next morning, Cassie arrived at Diana’s house with coffee and fresh muffins. Diana looked a little unsteady accepting the bag of baked goods from Cassie, unsure of what to…

Darkness for miles, that was all Cassie could see. A red-toned darkness like the insides of her own eyelids, but her eyes were wide open. She sensed the ramshackle house…

Cassie lay awake staring up at the canopy cascading down from her four-poster bed. She observed the sun reflecting off the pewter candlesticks upon the mantel and off the china…

Cassie went home during lunch to go over all her notes on the locator spell Constance had taught them. Since she’d never actually performed the spell, the details of how…

Faye, Deborah, and Suzan were the last to arrive on the bluff. They staggered toward the others, bleary-eyed and disheveled, and severely underdressed for the pre-dawn chill. “They were out…

“Do you want a latte or a cappuccino?” Adam asked from the head of the line at the coffee shop counter.”Surprise me,” Cassie said, and then watched him interact with…

Cassie always dreamed of having a sister, of having someone to confide in and share secrets with, someone who would always stick by her no matter what. Cassie and Diana…