was much more colour in Brenda’s cheeks, thought Lucy, looking across at her friend. The antibiotics were doing their job and Dr Hopgood was happy with her progress. The community admissions avoidance team meant well but were simply not needed. It was almost as if the wandering incident had never taken place.
The girls sat together on Brenda’s pale green, squishy sofa, Jess having tried Lucy’s favourite chair but quickly hopping out and moving next to Lucy after being jabbed by an arm. They were sipping overly sweet blackberry and apple gin from Seventies sherry glasses; each decorated with a different-coloured geometric design. Brenda insisted it was late enough in the evening to have a little stiffener and the girls were happy to indulge her, especially Jess who was disappointed the bottle of wine she’d brought over was nearly gone and Lucy didn’t keep any in. Didn’t she know sleepovers were supposed to involve excessive amounts of alcohol and a cathartic session of truth or dare?
‘So how long have you known Lucy?’ Brenda asked. ‘I forget.’
‘Yonks, since we sat next to each other in year seven French,’ said Jess.
‘The clincher was you thumping that girl for tripping me up in the maths corridor.’ Lucy smiled, remembering how Jess stood up to the girls who teased Lucy because she was quiet, how she was kind to the nerdy kids, and how she spoke to boys as though they were ordinary human beings and not scary aliens from another planet.
‘Surely you girls would rather be catching up on gossip and giggling about dishy movie stars? Much more fun than sitting with a daft old lady,’ said Brenda, leaning over to top Jess up.
‘Nonsense, Mrs P,’ said Jess. ‘We see each other at work every day, and besides, I need your help. I want Lucy to take the locket seriously.’
‘You didn’t say it was a secret,’ Lucy gushed, glad she had at least brought the locket with her, having left it abandoned in a wooden bowl on the mantelpiece pretty much since Brenda had given it to her.
‘It’s not, my dear. But not everyone believes.’
‘Lucy doesn’t,’ said Jess flatly.
‘I didn’t say that exactly. I’m not sure I need a locket to make someone like me, that’s all.’
‘Quite right too,’ said Brenda. ‘But in Lucy’s case, I felt the locket calling to me.’
‘Wow. So you really are a spiritual person? Can you contact the dead and all that? I was a white witch once, you know.’
Brenda smiled at Jess who had shuffled so far forward to the edge of the sofa, her bottom was barely gripping the edge.
‘Interestingly, I was told later in life that my mother was a white witch, but I never really knew her. She was killed in a bombing raid in 1940. I was tucked safely in Aldwych tube station with my aunt and she was supposed to join us.’ There was a pause. ‘She never did.’
‘Bloody hell. What happened?’ Jess asked. Lucy knew the story – she had heard it a few times over the last two years, but she was conscious it was a painful subject for Brenda.
‘She was helping an elderly neighbour. The house collapsed on them both.’
No one said anything for a moment. By now even Jess was aware how difficult this was for Brenda, who had gathering tears.
Brenda rummaged up her sleeve and fished out a folded cotton handkerchief to gently blot her eyes. ‘I was only a child, but I remember her smile, and her kindness.’
‘So did she, like, pass on the locket and tell you its history and all its mystical properties?’ Jess asked, trying to move away from the memories she had unwittingly unleashed.
‘The locket was nothing to do with her. It was given to me by someone I met when I was a lovesick young groupie, trailing around after The Yellow Crows. It’s how I got my Jim. And he was the love of my life.’
‘Yellow Crows – like the Sixties band?’ she squealed.
‘The very same. Jim was the drummer.’
Jess’s eyes expanded faster than inflating balloons. ‘You married a pop star?’
‘They were more rock than pop, but yes, and I have so many fond memories of our years together.’ Brenda’s eyes were brighter now that the subject had changed to a happier topic – her life with Jim.
In fact, Brenda had crammed most of her escapades into one decade. Falling in love with the drummer of The Yellow Crows, and finally accepting that they would not be blessed with children; Jim and Brenda had spent several years on the road with the band and partied their way through the Sixties in glorious technicolour and a drug-induced haze. It was during this period of her life, helped by the chemically enhanced freedom of mind, that she discovered her unusual gifts and established a connection with Mother Earth.
‘Brenda has all his drum kits and sound equipment up on the third floor,’ said Lucy. ‘The whole floor is a bit like a studio, with posters and album covers on the wall.’
‘That’s awesome. You’re so cool for…’
‘For an old lady?’ Brenda volunteered.
‘Yeah.’ Jess smiled. ‘For an old lady. A white witch married to a pop star.’
‘I said my mother was a white witch. I don’t follow any particular doctrine. I am what I am and don’t label myself.’
You are certainly unique, thought Lucy to herself. She took a hasty sip of her gin and instantly regretted it. Her whole body tingled as the alcohol made its way down like a slow electric pulse.
‘So, everyone knows “London Lady” and “Give Me Some of your Lovin’”, but what happened to The Yellow Crows after that?’ Jess asked.
‘There were some minor hits in the late Sixties but they disbanded in… Oh, I forget.’
‘Seventy-two,’ reminded Lucy.
‘That’s right, and after the tragically early death of the lead singer there was never any chance of them reforming. Jim trained as a music teacher, albeit an unorthodox one. Although he was a drummer, he was competent on the keyboard and guitar.’
‘You never told me all this stuff,’ Jess said to Lucy. ‘You have a really funky neighbour.’
‘Friend,’ corrected Lucy and got a cheeky wink from Brenda in return.
‘Anyway, Luce said that the words inside the locket had changed,’ said Jess, swinging the conversation back to the locket.
‘Yes. They do that.’ It was said so matter-of-factly that Lucy felt herself physically jolt. Brenda was sitting there, telling them that the engraved words in a silver locket had said one thing the day she handed it over and another a few days later. Totally impossible. She must be stringing Jess along; after all, Jess was lapping all the white witch tales up like a thirsty cat.
‘So what happens now?’ Jess asked.
‘There are some simple spells for Lucy to follow. If she carries them out, she has the power of the universe on her side to get her man. And if she wears it…’ Brenda gave Lucy
