Bewitched

I filter the results to just international flights and begin looking again.

Reykjavík—don’t they have natural hot springs? Sounds nice.

Venice—I don’t know. It seems magical, but not in any sort of wild, natural way.

London. Paris. Athens.

I rub my head. All these are faraway destinations, but none of them fit the bill.

I take another swig of wine. Perhaps tonight is not the night.

I’ll sleep on it and hopefully come up with something tomorrow.

“Great Goddess’s left tit.”

I stare at the receipt for the nonrefundable plane tickets and the nonrefundable cruise I booked to the Galapagos Islands.

I mean, high-five drunk Selene for finding a destination I would legitimately love to visit.

But also, what in the actual fuck, drunk Selene?

A cruise? How did we even afford this?

One look at my credit card alerts me that we did not, in fact, afford this. Drunk Selene simply decided that future Selene would have to figure it out.

I spend a good ten minutes trying not to hyperventilate.

Maybe I can work overtime until kingdom come so I can pay this off. Or I could try to find more magical odd jobs. Those helped pay the bills this past year when money from my restaurant work didn’t quite cover it.

I take in the trip itinerary again.

This is what I get for drunkenly buying myself a magical quest.

It’ll be all right—I’ll fly to Ecuador, board the boat, enjoy the hell out of the cruise, try desperately to bond with some creature—any creature—willing to be my familiar, and then return to the States, where I’ll present my magic quest and my newly acquired familiar to the coven. Wham, bam, thank you, ma’am.

I write all this information down in my journal and blow out a breath.

South America, here I come.

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