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On the first Saturday of October, a real-life witch walked into Bellamy Blake’s bookstore.
Of course, he did not know she was a witch. He assumed she was just another traveler who had damaged her car in one of the potholes that frequently appeared on Highway 7 and had taken the first exit she could find. Raven’s garage, which was located right next door, was almost exclusively used by people from the bigger cities who had unfortunate car troubles on their way to or from the Blue Ridge Mountains. It was why Bellamy had helped Raven place all those signs with her shop’s address and phone number along several miles of the highway.
The only people who ever entered his store were the locals, who knew Bellamy to be grumpy and pretty closed off (except to the few friends he had made in the town), and the travelers waiting for Raven to finish their repairs. They sometimes wandered through the stacks, usually buying a book or some sweets, before picking up their fixed vehicles and heading back toward bigger and more important places.
So when Clarke Griffin entered his shop, he took one look at the young woman with fashionable boots, golden hair, and a face he didn’t recognize, and went back to re-shelving books with a casual, “Let me know if you need help finding anything” tossed over his shoulder.
Bellamy had finished re-shelving the Vietnamese cookbooks that Murphy had insisted he order last week and had moved on to organizing the front desk when Clarke came up to him. On second glance, he realized that the unfamiliar woman was more beautiful than he realized, and that his first assumption, that she was some manicured and polished city girl, might have been inaccurate. Her golden hair fell in messy waves over her shoulders, with the front pieces haphazardly pulled back and out of her face. Her clothes were clearly nice but well-worn, and her jeans and flowy pastel t-shirt paired with the fashionable, yet lightly scuffed boots didn’t fit the standard attire of either a hiker or a young professional from the city.
Clarke placed a book on the counter, something she had clearly found buried deep in one of the stacks at the back of the shop, with a barely legible title.
“Do you have any books about witchcraft?” She asked, staring at him unflinchingly with eyes the gray blue of an incoming storm.
Bellamy furrowed his brow. “Do you mean like Harry Potter? Because I have new and used copies of the entire series.”
Clarke gave a slight laugh and said, “No, no I’m not looking for anything fictional. Plus, I already own copies of the entire Harry Potter series.”
Bellamy had dealt with some oddly specific requests from the residents of Arkadia before. There was Murphy, who was always asking him to find cookbooks from both mainstream regions and very obscure places around the world, and would sometimes only give him the name of one very specific dish that Bellamy then had to find a recipe for. Then there were the ladies who came in to the store and half whispered to Bellamy that they were looking for some “PG-13 romance” novels, which led to the creation of an entire shelf tucked in the back of the room that was very clearly labeled “Erotica,” and was organized based on content.
(This actually turned out to be a big hit, because apparently the idea that women could not be sexual beings was still ingrained in the older population of the town. Bellamy was just glad that he could at least provide some way for the women of Arkadia to explore their sexuality without having to feel embarrassed by it. This is also why he moved some of the reading chairs from the front of the store to the back, and why there was almost always someone using them to read whatever they wanted without any prying eyes.)
However, he had never had someone ask him for nonfiction books about fictional things.
“Well most of the books we have about anything occult or witchcraft related would be in the fiction section, but I might have some books about the history of witch trials. Maybe you could find something close to what you are looking for in there?” Bellamy asked, directing the woman to the small shelf tucked into a corner.
Clarke scanned the shelves quickly, before frowning and turning back to him. She marched back to the desk, picking up the book Bellamy had already scanned for her, and cocking her head.
“So, you don’t have any grimoires or old spell books, or even some suspicious old woman’s diary?” She asked over her shoulder, waiting for him to walk back to the desk.
“Uh, no, I can’t say I do.” Bellamy replied, and before he could stop himself, continued with a snarky, “I don’t think most bookstores that exist outside of a fictional world would have those types of books.” Internally, his mind was berating him for being sarcastic towards a new customer, but externally, he just raised a brow.
The woman narrowed her eyes, lifted her chin, and said, “Just because you’re too narrow-minded to recognize that there is more to the world than what you can see, doesn’t mean that there isn’t more out there. Maybe try actually opening your mind to the possibilities instead of shutting them down out of spite.”
Bellamy felt his face go cold, and even though he didn’t really want to fight with this random woman he had never met, he couldn’t help himself. She thought that she could accuse him of being closed minded? Where did this woman get the audacity to walk into his town and his store, and presume to know him?
“Or maybe you’re just too naïve to see that the world isn’t as special as Disney made it out to be, Princess.” He shot back, feeling smug and shitty at the same time. “Now, do you want to buy this book or not?” He asked, holding up the barely together book she had brought to the counter.
Clarke scoffed and dug into her purse for her wallet. “Now I see what everyone else was talking about. You are pretty difficult to like.” She threw out casually, slamming a twenty-dollar bill on the counter and grabbing the book. “Keep the change asshole.” The woman glared at him before stomping out the door.
Bellamy felt terrible. Why had he said those things? He always made a point not to judge anyone for their taste in books, and he was always encouraging people with different beliefs to be open to finding common ground. In fact, outside of the gruff and off-putting façade he was known for, the entire town usually seemed to appreciate his acceptance and understanding of people. It was a point of pride for him. So why did talking to this one woman make him forget all of that in favor of trying to be right?
Bellamy felt nauseous and guilty for the rest of the day. He didn’t even think about the fact that she had apparently been discussing him and his store with the locals, which short term visitors never did. He also didn’t notice, for several days at least, that one of the bookends on the nonfiction history shelf had disappeared, and a frog had suddenly been hopping around the store.
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On the second Saturday in October, a real-life witch showed up to hang out with Bellamy Blake and his friends.
Every three to four weeks or so, Bellamy’s friends forced him to leave the comforts of his store and his apartment and socialize with them. He was generally pretty social during the week, spending lunch breaks with Raven and playing video games with Miller every few days. He usually spent at least one evening every weekend trying whatever new recipe Murphy was testing, and that almost always turned into getting drunk and catching up with Emori while her boyfriend was in the kitchen. But about once a month, he made a point to spend time with the rest of their extended friend group.
Jasper worked at a laboratory located just outside of the city, so he lived a bit outside of Arkadia and wasn’t close enough to hang out casually during most weeks. Plus, he was a lot to handle, and sometimes a little bit of Jasper went a long way. Both Monty and Harper lived pretty close to Bellamy, but they were typically too busy to hang out very often. Monty spent a majority of his time as a consultant for local farms and orchards, while also working part-time at the same laboratory that Jasper worked at. Harper held classes for all manner of things, including yoga, sharpshooting, self-defense, and herb gardening. Her classes started at all hours of the day and were held in three different towns nearby, so she was constantly on the run.
Bellamy’s younger sister, Octavia, lived in the city, which was only about an hour away, but she was usually too busy with her gym and her boyfriend to come visit often. She only came to family game nights occasionally, whenever the plans had been made pretty far in advance and she could work it out with Diyoza, her business partner.
Bellamy had only moved to the town about seven or eight years ago, when he decided to sell his mother’s house and found a bunch of old paperwork in her attic. Apparently, Arkadia was where his mom grew up, and her father built Andromeda’s when she was young. His mother had grown up in the store, and when her father died, she had inherited the place. However, when Bellamy was very young, one of her many toxic boyfriends had convinced her to stop hiring people to run the place while she was away, and to sell the place and use the money for them. The sale was not made through the proper channels, and the man who had bought the place had essentially run it into the ground. When Bellamy found out about his inheritance, he made a deal to let the owner keep whatever profits he had earned over the years, if he would relinquish his claim of ownership. Bellamy had been living in town ever since.
His friends had all known each other for a while before he had met them. Some, like Jasper, Monty, and Raven, had grown up in Arkadia or one of the neighboring towns, and were already acquainted, if not close friends. They connected with some of the others, including Octavia, in college, and picked up others along the way. All of their friends moved to the same general area after graduation, and it worked out pretty well, since Bellamy had already been settled in Arkadia for a few years.
Once a month, everyone that could get out of working would come into town and have family game night at someone’s apartment. The host switched every time, and this month it was at Raven’s apartment. On Wednesday, she had mentioned that a friend of hers would probably join them for game night, since she was new to the area and had only met a couple of people so far. Bellamy hadn’t been paying attention, too busy going down the rabbit hole of guilt over the interaction with the customer from the week before. But he was determined not to let his guilt keep him from having fun with his friends.
When Bellamy got to Raven’s apartment, Jasper was already halfway through the joint he was sharing with Monty, and Murphy was already mixing drinks in the kitchen while Emori and Raven debated the pros and cons of artificial intelligence by the fridge. Miller and Harper were setting up Cards Against Humanity and discussing a new rifle that Harper had bought for her sharpshooting class.
He was barely in the door when Jasper and Monty tackled him in a giant hug, and he had to take care not to let the chips he was carrying get crushed underneath. Octavia happened to walk in as this was happening. She didn’t even stop to help them up before she was laughing and stepping over their tangled limbs to get to the living room. Typical.
Once everyone had more or less congregated in the living room, and Murphy had passed out drinks, Raven held up her hand to get everyone’s attention.
“Clarke is on her way, and I know most of you haven’t met her yet, so please try not to scare her away!” Raven pleaded, pointing directly at Jasper and then Murphy. “She’s pretty cool and she’s new to the area, so be nice.”
“Yeah actually she’s pretty awesome.” Murphy chimed in.
No one spoke. Everyone just stared at him.
“What?” Murphy frowned and pretended to pout. “I can make friends and be nice!”
From her position on the couch arm next to Bellamy, Octavia grinned and exclaimed, “Okay so we’re all thinking it: this girl must be a psychopath if Murphy actually likes her.”
Murphy groaned, throwing his arm over his eyes. Emori rubbed his arm placatingly, trying and failing to hide her grin. Raven opened her mouth to defend her new friend, but then there was a knock and Clarke was walking into the room and Bellamy was trying to wrap his head around what he was seeing.
The woman from the store, the woman he insulted for no reason, was here.
Raven was hugging her and Murphy was already joking with her about something, and Bellamy was just trying to hide his face behind a pillow.
Raven introduced Clarke, and when Bellamy heard his name, he dropped the pillow and made eye contact with the blonde. When their gazes locked, her eyes only widened slightly before moving to look at the next person being introduced.
Well, Bellamy thought, if she is going to pretend like we never met, then so will I.
The rest of the night went smoothly, up until the last game. Clarke fit in well, blending with the varied personalities like she had always been in the group. Her snark and dark wit came out of nowhere and it soon became clear to everyone why Murphy liked her. She was easy to talk to and genuinely kind but was also able to joke around with everyone. She even got the very quiet Miller to laugh and open up. The only person she didn’t seem to talk to was Bellamy. Which later turned out to be a good thing.
The last game of the night was Trivial Pursuit, something that the others always vowed to ban but never got around to before it was Bellamy’s turn to choose. He was always the most competitive with this game, and the others loved to make fun of him for it. He overheard Raven whispering a preemptive apology to Clarke when Bellamy held up Trivial Pursuit and everyone else audibly groaned.
It turned out that Raven had nothing to apologize for.
Clarke was just as bad as Bellamy when it came to competition and random trivia. It got to the point where even Murphy, who had immediately declared himself to be on Clarke’s team, much to Bellamy’s chagrin, and who usually just wanted to watch the world burn, was trying to break up the arguing.
It started when they disagreed over a history question, and everyone, including Murphy, told Clarke that Bellamy was always right on those. He wasn’t. Clarke gloated, which made Bellamy furious.
Several questions and a couple more arguments later, there was a science question that Clarke was confident she knew the answer to, but Bellamy (somehow) got it right, which led to shouting and some not so nice words.
The game ended when they faced a question about Harry Potter. Both Clarke and Bellamy were convinced they were correct. They spend twenty minutes arguing, first about the question, and then about the traits of each of the Hogwarts Houses.
Bellamy called Clarke a Slytherin, arguing that that meant that she was self-centered and evil, and Clarke responded by high-fiving Murphy and shouting, “You’re damn right I’m a Slytherin.”
Then she made some choice comments comparing Gryffindor to a fraternity house, and all hell broke loose from there. In the end, both of them got the question wrong.
By the end of the night, Clarke was firmly accepted as a member of the friend group, with the added clause that her and Bellamy were never allowed to play Trivial Pursuit again. Bellamy was on thin ice for being mean to Raven’s new friend, and Murphy was insufferably smug for an entire week because he wasn’t the one causing problems.
It wasn’t until later that night that Bellamy realized that his socks were green. He could have sworn that he was wearing white socks earlier that day and that he didn’t even own any green socks. He came to the conclusion that he must have been exhausted and put the sock question out of his mind.
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On the third Saturday in October, a real-life witch knocked Bellamy Blake on the ground.
The temperature had only just dropped into temperatures cool enough to require sweaters and jackets, and the leaves had already started falling off the trees that lined the streets. Bellamy had just walked out of Andromeda’s and turned left, on his way to deliver a stack of books to the owner of the café three doors down.
The wind picked up, tossing leaves into the air around his feet. Bellamy tried to tug his jacket closed without dropping the books and stopped watching where he was walking.
Slam!
Something smaller than him, but still pretty sturdy, slammed into his left side, sending the books flying and him to his knees. When he turned to see what he had run into, Bellamy just saw a mess of blonde hair reaching for an overturned takeout container.
Bellamy got to his feet and gathered the books off the ground, which luckily did not get too dirty. He turned around with the intention of helping the other person up, but narrowed his eyes when he saw Clarke staring at him.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” She exclaimed angrily, getting to her feet and leaving her purse and the (thankfully intact) takeout containers in the street.
“Me?! What’s wrong with you? I’m not the one running into people on the sidewalk.” He retorted, glaring down at her.
“You ran into me, jackass. I was just bringing Raven lunch and then you slammed into me.”
Bellamy rolled his eyes and responded, “I wasn’t paying attention to where I was walking. In the interest of actually ending this conversation, I’m sorry if I unintentionally ran into you.”
Clarke wrinkled her nose and looked down, before quietly saying, “I guess I should have been paying attention too. My bad.”
Bellamy took a moment to actually look at her. She was wearing a black dress with a green and silver striped scarf around her neck. Despite the brisk weather, Clarke wasn’t wearing any tights, and he was surprised to notice that she also wasn’t wearing any shoes. Both of her hands were behind her back, and he wasn’t sure if she was holding something or just feeling shy.
After realizing that he had been silently staring at her for a beat too long, Bellamy cleared his throat and tried to get back to their usual snarky rapport, saying, “I knew you were a Slytherin.” He smirked down at her and gestured to her scarf.
Clarke narrowed her eyes up at him and Bellamy was waiting for her witty retort when she surprised him by doing the one thing he didn’t expect: she stuck out her tongue. It was weirdly endearing, and it made him start to dislike her a little bit less.
At that exact moment, a strong wind seemed to come out of nowhere and cause all the leaves around their feet to dance into the air. Bellamy shivered at the sudden sharp chill, and watched Clarke’s lips start to turn purple as goosebumps appeared all over her chest and arms. (Not that he was looking at her lips… or her chest.)
Sighing, Bellamy set the stack of books down and took off his jacket. Clarke watched him quizzically until he tried to put his jacket around her shoulders.
“What are you doing?” She asked him, ducking out of the way of his arms.
“What does it look like? I’m trying to make sure you don’t freeze to death since you have no pants or shoes on.” He sighed and held out the jacket towards her, looking half chivalrous and half like a child being forced to share their toys.
Clarke’s gaze softened, and she reached out with one hand to grab the jacket from him. She bent down and dropped whatever had been in her hand into her purse before pulling on the jacket. It was a little big on her, and the sleeves went past her hands. Bellamy just stared for a second, wondering why he suddenly liked the idea of her wearing his clothes, before shaking his head and grabbing his books.
He had already started to turn away when he heard a quiet and firm, “Thank you,” coming from Clarke.
When he turned back around, she was rolling up the sleeves on the jacket and grabbing her things from where they had tumbled off the curb.
Bellamy started walking again, but when he peeked over his shoulder one more time, to make sure she was still heading toward Raven’s garage, Clarke had vanished.
Oh well, he thought, I guess I’ll see what next Saturday brings.
Bellamy smiled to himself, wondering if maybe there was a little magic in the world.