Chapter 2 - the link

“So, how did the Salem witch trials change America?” asked Jane’s professor to the class.

Jane raised her hand and gave her considered response. This had been the class she had most been looking forward to all semester. She could hear Miriam sigh in her chair next to her, thinking what a nerd she was sometimes. She tried not to laugh. “For my family, the Salem witch trials were completely devastating,” Jane went on, excited to share the one interesting fact about herself. “My ancestor was one of the first women to be accused and hanged for witchcraft. That’s why the rest of my family moved across the country and ended up here.”

The professor smiled keenly and delighted in Jane’s personal link with the subject matter. Jane was his favourite student, and she knew it. “So I think we’d best be careful around Jane,” he joked to the class. “She’s descended from witches!” he laughed. “Who knows what she will do to us all if we don’t play nice!”

“I’ll expect an ‘A’ on my next paper then!” Jane joked back.

The professor laughed emphatically at the lame joke. But inside Jane, her fantasies suddenly flared and bounced into life. Somehow, the idea perfectly played into her dreams of seducing Tommy.

“Is that really true about the Salem thing?” asked Miriam as they left the class that day. “You’re really descended from the first to be accused?”

“One of the first,” Jane corrected her, but nodded in confirmation.

“Wow!” Miriam smiled. “How did I not know that?” she chuckled, looking at Jane a little differently.

They both joked and laughed about the link, but Jane found herself enjoying the conversation more and more. Miriam really was seeing her through fresh eyes. She felt like something had changed; as if she really did have some sort of inherited power coursing through her veins.

She spied Tommy on the way in to the dorm. He was wearing a t-shirt that she especially liked. It clung to his broad shoulders just right, and emphasised the bulk of his perfect pecs. But Tommy didn’t even know their names and didn’t care so much as to give either of them a second glance.

Jane wanted him so much. But she didn’t need a super power to make that happen. She needed magic.