Wish Weaver: Magical First Kiss Series, #2

By Annlyn Andrews

What's a girl to do when she discovers she has a magical gift, but no one will teach her how to use it? Teach herself, of course! The only problem is… apparently, wish weaving can kill you, and the cute guy next door can only save your life so many times . . .

13-year-old Hanna Weaver is a Wish Weaver—someone who can weave a situation to make a wish come true. But when Hanna wish weaves without knowing how, she destroys an entire town!

And . . . each time Hanna weaves incorrectly, she falls deeper into a dark family secret—one that is threatening her life.

Hanna must team up with Eric Dancer, a cute guy from her new school, to fix what she has done and restore her health.

But is it too late?

Has she gone too far?

Will the Darkness claim Hanna before Eric can help her?

• Language: English
• Publisher: L&M Multimedia, LLC
• Release date: Jun 28, 2021
• ISBN: 9798215960424

Annlyn Andrews

Annlyn Andrews writes light paranormal teen adventures. She started her writing career as a newspaper journalist, winning several awards for her feature stories. Annlyn has recently turned her talents toward fiction writing and is loving every minute of it! She is married to her childhood sweetheart with whom she shared her first kiss, and they live in Texas. The Magical First Kiss Series delivers fun, adventure, and just a touch of sweet romance to stories about ordinary teens with extraordinary gifts. She would love to hear from you at [e-mail].

Book preview

Chapter 1

Not Happy

Istared out the bus window as my life in Florida was sucked into the background. I was leaving everything behind.

My school.

My best friend.

My mom.

I was furious with my mom for sending me away—that’s why I kind of hated myself for missing her already, but it had been just the two of us for my entire thirteen years, so, I guess I should give myself a break.

I sighed. I didn’t want to be on this bus. The old dude sitting next to me had bad breath which he whistled at me through a missing front tooth.

I was being punished. Three weeks ago, I’d nearly drowned my best friend, Lucky MacBride. Mom was acting like I’d done it on purpose.

I’m not a psycho.

I’m a Wish Weaver.

Whatever that means.

Okay, maybe Mom had a right to freak out—but moving us all the way to Texas—come on!

And to make matters worse, she’s been a total paranoid-freakazoid about the whole Wish Weaver thing. She refuses to help me understand what’s happening. I know she knows more, or else she’d be taking me to a shrink by now. After all, I was claiming that I could make people’s wishes come true. I have so many questions.

Why do I have this gift?

Why does Mom call it a curse?

How did I even do this wish weaving thing?

Could I do it again?

Was there some kind of wish weaving crash course I could take? Apparently, I needed it. I’d weaved Lucky’s wish by complete accident. Without knowing what I was doing, I’d sent her back in time, where I dropped her into a lake.

That’s where the near-drowning comes in.

She can’t swim!

But still, my mom won’t tell me anything. I mean, seriously, I need to know stuff. Like, not only why I had screwed up the weave I’d done, but also, why I had felt physically sick afterward. I’d thought I was going to die. And the sickness had gotten worse and worse.

I’d spent two weeks in bed after weaving. My stomach had hurt so badly I’d thought it was going to twist inside out. And my head had spun so hard I’d passed out. There are whole days of those two weeks that I can’t even remember. My mom claimed I had the flu and insisted I stop thinking about wish weaving.

I’m not buying the flu story.

And I’m certainly not going to forget about wish weaving.

I’d wanted to be magical ever since my best friend Lucky told me that she was a Lucky Charm and could grant good luck with the touch of her finger. And now that I know I’m gifted I’m supposed to just forget about it?

I don’t think so.

If Mom thought shipping me off to Texas was going to do the trick, she had another think coming.

I was not happy, and I’d let her know. It hadn’t been pretty in our apartment when it all went down. . .

"Alone? I’d shouted. My eyes had bugged out at my mom, the person I thought I knew, the person who was supposed to make decisions in my best interest. You’re sending me to a state as big as Texas, alone?"

Hanna Jordyn Weaver, I’ll be there in a week. Calm down. She continued folding my clothes and placing them into a ratty old suitcase with knobby black wheels.

Yeah, that was going to roll just fine.

Calming down is for people who have no real reason to be upset, I said. This is big, Mom. Huge! I don’t want to go, much less go alone.

Aunt Faye— she started.

—is freaky! I said, finishing her sentence. I threw a pair of shoes into the suitcase. One shoe bounced out of the case and tumbled to the floor.

Be nice. She used her motherly tone—the one reserved for scolding. When her voice was low like that, I usually backed off, but this was too important. She was shipping me off to the land of cow patties and ten-gallon hats!

But Mom, Aunt Faye is so weird. All the talk about aliens. And that crazy house she lives in . . . it’s too much.

I grew up in that house, she said like that was supposed to make everything better.

Not in its current condition! I gave her a look that said, and you know it. The strange rooms and the. . .  Don’t make me say it.

My mom looked at me, rolled her eyes, and sighed.

Tinfoil hat! I shouted. The woman wears a tinfoil hat!

Only sometimes, Mom said and kept folding my things into the large suitcase.

I’m pretty sure any amount of time looking like a baked potato head is unacceptable.

The sigh she gave me this time wobbled out of her, and I knew I was headed for Texas on the 9:45 bus tomorrow morning. I huffed my own sigh then snipped off one last ugly remark before Mom shut me down for good.

If she calls me Hanna Banana, I’m gonna throw up.

No, you’ll simply tell her you’re all grown up now, and that name doesn’t suit you anymore. You can say you’re so grown up that you came to Texas all by yourself.

How could you possibly put a positive spin on that? Maybe you have magical powers, too. At that comment, my mom’s face turned beet red. Huh-oh. She was really mad now.

"Hanna Weaver.  .  ."

What? I raised my hands and shrugged. I gave her my most innocent look. I didn’t ask you to explain anything to me about magical gifts. I didn’t beg you to tell me about the Wish Weavers, or how wish weaving works. I didn’t—

That’s enough! she said, her voice harder than I’d ever heard it.

Not nearly, I’d mumbled under my breath and tossed another pair of shoes into the ugly old suitcase, with the ugly old wheels, headed for an ugly old house in Texas.

Like I said, it hadn’t been pretty.

But nothing had come of my whining. Mom hadn’t budged with the no explaining bit. I’m still completely in the dark about the gift I have. Forbidden to even think about it. Well, she can’t stop me from thinking about it, but that’s what it feels like. Like she has a vice tightened down on the understanding of who I truly am.

At least Lucky had told me that Wish Weavers could weave a person into a situation to make their wish come true. That’s what I’d done for Lucky even though she’d nearly drowned because of me. It sounded really cool to wish weave, but since I had no clue how I had done this awesome thing, and my mom wasn’t talking, I’d resorted to daydreaming about what being a Wish Weaver meant.

Maybe when I turn fourteen next month, I’ll get a magical letter explaining the whole Wish Weaver thing, or my full powers will come in and I’ll automatically know everything I need to know, or. . .

Well, daydreaming was overrated.

I wanted hard facts. But apparently, I wasn’t going to get them. Because here I sat on this cold January morning, next to a soggy old man with stale breath on a bus headed for Texas. My stomach tightened, knowing I was destined to spend the next week alone with my weird aunt, in her weird house, in a weird small town.

I didn’t really know if the town was weird. I did know that it was small. Mom said New Settlement had a population of 920 people, well, 922 once we were in place. My school back in Florida had that many people on campus.

I’m a city girl. And even though I grew up in the Sunshine State, I’m pale like the sun has never touched my skin. I wear dark clothes and my jet-black hair is cut in a rockin’ pixie style. I’m pretty sure nothing about me screams yeehaw or ride ‘em cowboy.

Why then, was my butt jostling along on this bus seat? My mom says she wants to explore a ‘new job opportunity’ in her hometown, but I know it has something to do with the wish weaving thing I did. She hustled me away from Lucky as soon as I was well enough to travel. And she’d spent most of our savings to buy out our apartment lease and get me a bus ticket to Texas. So, life as I’ve always known it has come to an end.

And more bad news, our phones and internet service were part of my mom’s last job benefits, so my social media life is DOA until Mom gets to Texas to buy us new phones and get us reconnected. Just before I got on the bus, she’d handed me a small black object.

There’s enough minutes on there to keep us in touch until you get safely to Texas. She’d said that like it was a privilege to have the flip-o-rama, throwback-reject, pay-per-minute embarrassment that was now shoved deep into my pocket.

And get this . . . my Aunt Faye doesn’t have a phone or a computer! I wasn’t only going to Texas—I was being transported back to the Stone Age.

My lungs deflated with a huge sigh, but there was still a small spark of hope left in me—the one happy thought that would carry me through this awful bus ride, the one good thing about moving to Texas. But I wasn’t going to think about it. I didn’t want to jinx it.

Chapter 2

New Settlement

At hour number twelve of the bus ride, I wiggled in my seat. If there was such a thing as bus-butt, I had it. I was numb from the waist down.

I’d blown through a novel I’d purchased especially for the trip. The plot was a total cliché, and the characters were two dimensional, so now my brain was as numb as my bottom.

I’d eaten all the snacks my mom had packed, except for a box of raisins. I dug in my pocket and pulled out the flip phone. I dialed my mom. It connected.

Really Mom? Raisins?

Hanna Jordyn Weaver you better not be wasting your minutes complaining about a healthy snack.

I didn’t say anything because that’s exactly what I was doing.

Is everything okay? she asked.

Yeah. Everything’s great, I said, sarcasm edging my words. I glanced sideways. The old dude was breathing at me again.

Then we better get off the phone and save our minutes. Call me when you get to Texas, or before then if you really need something. I love you.

Yeah. Okay, I love you too, Mom.

Hanna, she said and my heart knocked a little. I’ll be there before you know it. Just try to do as your aunt says and everything will be fine.

I said I would and then I clicked off.  

I put the phone away. The old guy beside me was snoring now, forcing his stale breath in my direction. Hit-after-hit, my nose took the onslaught of what had to be a mixture of pickles and cheese until I couldn’t stand it. I turned and stared out the window.

I wish to be in Texas, I whispered, my warm breath fogging the cold windowpane. I waited, hoping I’d wish weaved.

Nothing happened.

I guess it didn’t work that way.

I sighed making sure not to take in too deep a breath. I didn’t want to suck up any of the old guy’s tainted carbon dioxide.

After thirty-two hours and eighteen calls to my mom, the bus pulled up to a depot the size of a portable potty in New Settlement, Texas. A woman sat at a counter inside the cube. She was sleeping, chin propped on her palm, ear leaning against her shoulder. She looked like she was pretty good at sleeping this way. I kind of hated to wake her, but the bus pulled away, and I didn’t see my aunt anywhere.

I reached for the phone to call my mom but then I remembered I’d used the last of the minutes calling and telling her I’d made it safely to Texas. Still, I patted my pockets. No phone. I must have left it on the seat when I had to wake up the old guy with bad breath. He’d been blocking my way off the bus.

I shivered and wrapped myself in arms already chilled by the damp air. I slipped on my black zip-up hoodie and hoped I was right about the being safe part. Having no phone was weird. Even the crappy flip phone had given me a feeling of security.

It had recently rained, and water was running off the small awning where I stood. A steady thin stream fell onto an old cracked cement walkway and splashed onto my black sneakers.

While the woman in the depot slept, I slowly turned a full circle, taking in New Settlement. So, this was it—the place I was going to live. I had to admit the town didn’t look weird at first glance. Small? Yes, very small. I could see from one end to the other of the downtown.

A row of shops lined each side of the short straight street. At the end of the shops farthest from me, the paved road continued and opened up to houses with large trees and well-manicured lawns. I could see a couple of kids wearing puffy jackets and riding bikes.

The end of the street nearest me, however, branched out in two directions. The highway that continued to the Dallas/Fort Worth area many miles down the road as I was told by the stinky-breath dude on the bus, and a dirt road that shortly disappeared into a thickly wooded area. The trees and underbrush were so dense it looked like the landscape was nothing but a giant black hole.

I looked back at the Disney version side of town where the birds floated in a pre-dusk sky backlit by orange fingers of light fanning out from a setting sun. The last time I’d visited Aunt Faye, I was only eight years old, so I couldn’t remember where she lived. I hoped with everything inside me that my aunt lived over there in Wholesomeville, but somehow, I couldn’t see her funky house being part of that particular splendor.

I turned and studied the depot again. A clock hung inside against the back wall. It was 5:45 p.m. Judging from the sky, I needed to get a move on. Nighttime was not only falling fast, but the sky was getting cloudy. From somewhere in the distance thunder rumbled, promising a second round of showers. I knew I’d be walking to Aunt Faye’s house—she’d forgotten me. It wasn’t the first time.

I tapped on the glass. Lady?

The woman inside the depot jumped and slammed her hand down on the countertop in front of her. The loud popping noise rang in my ears. Sun and age had made the woman’s skin leathery, puckering it at the corners of her eyes and around her mouth. Her nose dipped long and low, almost touching her upper lip.

Sorry, I said.

You lookin’ to get a bus ticket? The woman's voice wasn’t much nicer than her face.

No ma’am. I just got off the bus.

Her eyes, squinty and piercing, took me in and judged my crazy black hair and my dark clothes. She didn’t say anything, but I could tell she knew I wasn’t from around here and that alone seemed to set me up for scrutiny.

Someone was supposed to pick me up, I went on. But I don’t see her.

Who’s that you’re lookin’ for? The woman grabbed a stack of papers and rifled through them.

Faye Weaver, I said.

The woman froze. Then she stacked her hands on top of the papers, leaned closer to the window, and peered down at my shoes. Slowly, she worked her eyes upward, taking in everything about me.

You kin?

No, I’m Hanna.

No, the woman snapped. "Kin. Related. You family? That strange Weaver woman somethin’ to you?"

Oh, sorry. Yes, she’s my aunt, I said but wished I didn’t have to. The woman’s curious stare turned wary. I didn’t want to be lumped into what people thought of my aunt, but that’s exactly what was happening. If this lady hadn’t liked the looks of me before, she sure didn’t now.

She ain’t here, the woman said.

Duh.

The woman’s eyes widened then narrowed into angry slits. Mind your tongue, she snapped again.

Oh, sorry, I said, suddenly feeling like I was five years old. Can you tell me how to get to No. 2 Pecan Lane?

The woman pointed to the dirt road about two hundred feet from the tiny bus depot. Of course, it was the opposite direction of the nice-looking neighborhood. She aimed me down the dark road and into the dense forest.

Take that road. When you come to a cattle guard in about a mile, go over it and take the first left. Follow that road ‘til it dead ends. Your aunt’s house is the—

I know which one it is, I said, cutting her off before she could say the weird one. I remembered that much about it. Thanks. I zipped up my black hoodie before stepping from beneath the awning, but still, the cold January breeze swept through me.

I hoped the rain would hold off, but judging by the sky, round two was getting closer. I didn’t have time to waste. I needed to get to Aunt Faye’s house.

I drug the wobbly luggage over the gravel pit the depot lady called a road. The suitcase bounced along behind me, splashing muddy water out to the sides. One of the wheels got caught on a rock, and the case twisted in my hand, wrenching my arm sideways.

Ugh!

Thunder grumbled like a cranky old man, low and long. I tried not to think about the approaching storm, but the soggy ground beneath my feet and the smell of rain in the air kept it close in mind.

Walk faster.

Trees lined one side of the road. The heavy branches dripped leftover rain from the last shower. The rainwater tip-tapped against fallen leaves below, making a liquid song that tried to lull me into a false sense of security. It didn’t work. I knew I was alone on a creepy country road with a thunderstorm approaching.

The other side of the road flanked an open field that looked like it was growing something edible, but heck if I knew what. It also looked like someplace a wild animal might hide, waiting to pounce on an unsuspecting city girl.

After a while, I’d made it to the cattle guard. The sun was starting to drop behind the trees. My shoulders tightened. I wasn’t nearly close enough to my aunt’s house. The temperature was dropping too, but I shivered more from fear than cold. I didn’t know what to expect when it got dark in the woods. My mind conjured up crazy scenarios of how I was going to die. . .

Hypothermia?

Snakebite?

Axe murderer?

I was just about to cross the small metal-piping bridge when I heard a hissing noise.

No. . .

More like a swishing noise. Like someone running through tall dry grass. But the grass was wet.

I jerked around. Still anchored to my suitcase, my arm twisted, and I