dresser table and smiled at her eager expression. Her hands were carefully in her lap, anxious. I could have teased her about it, but seeing any happy emotion on her was precious. She actually sighed when I opened up the box and leaned to look in.
"It's my camp stuff!" I exclaimed, taking out my mom's handwritten note to see the accumulated bric-a-brac underneath.
"Oh look!" Ivy said brightly. "There is a book!"
My gaze lifted from my mom's letter, and I smirked at her as she reached for Nancy Drew, volume 52. "You opened it up already, didn't you!
Ivy wouldn't look at me. "Don't be ridiculous. Why would I open your mail?"
"Mmmm-hmmm." HI, RACHEL, I read as she flipped through the dog-eared pages as if it were a lost book from the Bible. I FOUND THIS WHILE MOVING IN WITH DONALD. IT WAS EITHER THROW IT AWAY OR SEND IT TO YOU. MISS YOU, MOM.
Setting the letter aside, I smiled. Most of what she'd been sending me had been junk, but this... I gazed into the box. Okay, this was junk, too, but it was my junk.
"Look at this," I said, bringing out a lopsided clay bowl painted in garish colors. "I made this for my dad. It's a pipe holder."
Ivy looked up from the book. "If you say so."
My fingers pressed into the dents that I'd made when I was twelve. They were really small. "I think it was the only reason he had a pipe," I said, setting it back in the box. The pressed-flower album I didn't even remember, but it was my scrawl on the pages. There was a badge from the cabin I was in, dated and covered in rainbow stickers. The pair of dusty sandals on top of it were so small it was scary.
"How old were you?" Ivy asked when I held them up.
"They kicked me out when I was twelve," I said, flushing. It hadn't been fun. I'd thrown Trent into a tree with a blast of ley-line energy because he'd been teasing Jasmine. I guess they figured if I was well enough to do that, then I wasn't dying anymore and should make room for someone who was. Trent had deserved it. I think. They had long-term memory blockers in the water and nothing was certain.
I smiled at the pair of freshwater clam shells Jasmine and I were going to make into earrings. A blue jay feather. Things that meant nothing to anyone but me.
"What is this?"
She was holding an antique-looking curved metal hook, and I reached for it as I warmed. "Uh, a hoof pick," I said, feeling the weight of it in my palm, heavy with the sensation of anxious excitement and guilt. Ivy's eyebrows rose, and I added, "They had horses, and you had to clean their hooves before you took them out. That's a hoof pick." A really fancy hoof pick, with an inlaid wooden handle and a silver hook, of all things.
Head cocked, Ivy leaned back and eyed me. "And your pulse just skyrocketed why?"
Grimacing, I set the pick back in the box. "It's Trent's. At least I think it is.
"And your pulse just skyrocketed why?" she asked again.
"I stole it!" I said, feeling myself become breathless. "At least I think I did. I'm pretty sure I meant to give it back..." I hesitated, confused. "Crap, I don't even remember why I have it."
Ivy had a weird smile on her face. I think Nancy Drew had reminded her of her own innocence. "You stole Trent's hoof pick? What is that, some witch-camp tradition?"
"Maybe I just borrowed it and forgot to give it back," I said, guilt coming from nowhere. I remember shoving it in my pocket with a feeling of vindication. Trent had been there... and I hadn't liked him. He was snotty.
Ivy picked up the book again. "No wonder he doesn't like you. You stole his hoof pick."
Exasperated, and trying to ignore the guilt coming from a memory I didn't entirely have, I closed the box and pushed it away. "The feeling is mutual," I said, tugging on my socks. "Trent is a lying, manipulative brat, and always has been."
She handed me the Nancy Drew, exhaling slowly. "So... you think this entire situation with the coven is one of his scams? That Trent told them about you?"
I looked at the cover and the furtive posture of Nancy as she held a tablet engraved with ley-line glyphs, treasure hunting. Oh, when it had looked that easy. "I don't