Tim looked at me in shock, and Tina had an angry look on her face as she followed him out the door. We could hear them arguing in the hallway, and when it quieted down, Tina came back with tears in her eyes.

“He’s very angry. He feels that you’ve deceived him, and that you have corrupted both Tim and I. He plans to expose you for the ‘evil temptresses’ that he says you are.”

“What will you do?” I asked. What had I done? How would this affect Tim and I?

“He’s waiting outside. As soon as Tim is released, he expects us to go out and leave with him. He is forbidding either of us to have any further contact with you or any member of your family.” She was shaking with anger. “I think the best thing to do right now is for Tim and I to go home and see what we can do. We need to find out where this anger comes from.”

My heart was breaking. I looked at Tim, and saw the sadness in his eyes. “Oh, okay, I guess, if that’s how it has to be.” Then I teleported home, and spent the next couple of hours crying. I tried to look into the future, but it seemed jumbled, and nothing was clear. I realized that my future must have changed, making my previous visions wrong.

I decided that I would try to concentrate on my lessons, both with Elisabette and with school. If Jack tried to expose us, I had to show that I was only what I seemed, a normal high school student. That meant my cast had to stay on for the next several days, at least.

I didn’t care. Nothing really made any difference. I either just kind of drifted along through life, or rushed around with a fake smile. I really didn’t get anything done except cry, and I did that a lot. Mom and Debbie tried to cheer me up, but I was starting to enjoy being miserable, I think. I wanted to talk to Tim, but I couldn’t call him.

Elisabette watched me, concerned and confused. Still, we tried to continue my lessons as though there was nothing wrong. I got used to the cast, and continued to sulk. I thought I was going to spend the next couple of centuries as a sad and lonely witch, until one day Tim showed up at my house in a black Wrangler. I wasn’t sure what to do. I wanted to rush to him, and be in his arms, but what if...

He pushed his crutches out ahead of him, and then made his way to me. “Please, Emily, I love you, and I need you, forgive me please?” He said, sadly. “You don’t need to worry about my Dad.”

I rushed to him with tears of happiness, and then I carefully hugged him. “What happened?”

“Mom’s in the hospital, and Dad’s in jail for putting her there. It’s all a huge mess”

You could have knocked me down with a light breeze. “Oh, my God! What happened?”

“My Dad has been pushing this strange version of God in every sentence lately. He’s been an absolute monster, quoting scripture, demanding ridiculous changes and throwing huge fits...it’s been awful, Emily. On top of all that, trying to live without you has made my life a living hell.

It was a strain, but I tried to make peace with him. I took him car shopping with me, and we even had fun picking this out, and I thought things were going to settle down a bit, but he blew his top and had a tantrum because a light changed before we got to it! He said he had these huge ‘headaches’, and they were driving everyone crazy. It got so bad I wanted to just leave, but I couldn’t abandon Mom, and she wouldn’t leave him.

Last night, they finally got into a huge argument. Mom says that Dad read some part of the Bible that said women should be silent in church and he felt that his home was a church, so she should just do her work and “perform her duties” without complaint. It totally sent Mom over the edge. She got on him about you, and his craziness and everything.

Suddenly it was like he had gone insane! He began slapping her and that became punching and kicking, all the while screaming. I called 911 and then jumped in to defend Mom. I had been out in the garage and their screaming brought me inside. I finally punched him and knocked him down, then tackled him and kept him down until the police got there.

Mom told the officers what had happened, and I explained what I had done. Dad ranted and demanded to be released. As far as I know, he’s still yelling. A paramedic said Mom had some ribs that were at least bruised and a broken arm, along with possible internal bleeding. They took her in to the hospital immediately. I checked on her this morning, and she’s doing pretty well, there was no internal bleeding, just a lot of bruising all over, along with her arm and the bruised ribs. She told me not to worry about her, and to see you as soon as I could.

I’m sorry I couldn’t call or anything, honey. I’ve been missing you so bad. I hoped you would use your telepathy or something to get a hold of me, but I’ll bet you were too upset to even think of it, weren’t you?”

I stood there with my mouth open. It had never even popped into my mind! He must have felt like I had abandoned him!

“Tim, I-“

“I know, honey. Not being together just hurt so bad, I had problems thinking too. I wish I could have kept that pain from you, and I’m so sorry for what my Dad did. Emily is it possible that he’s under a spell?”

I smacked my forehead. Why hadn’t I thought of that? It’s so obvious, the sudden, unexpected and atypical change...why wasn’t I thinking?

Perhaps because part of me has been expecting that reaction?

“C’mon, we have to go see your Dad.” I said.

We got into Tim’s Wrangler and headed for town. I gotta say, compared to any Jeep I’ve ever been in before, this thing is a limousine! Very nice...but then, I’m used to an old
Chevy truck!

He parked the Jeep in front of our little police station. At the front desk we identified ourselves and asked about Jack Davies.

“He was loud and out of control for hours! Was he on any kind of medication that could do this?”

“No sir. He’s been acting kind of strange, then last night he went crazy!” Tim told him.

“He’s been sleeping for the last few hours, probably wore himself out. I can take you back to see how he’s doing, if you’d like?”

“Yes, please, we would appreciate it.”

I think I was expecting something a little more high tech, but the set up could have come almost straight out of the 1800’s. Brick walls and bars. Throw in a couple of cots and a toilet in each cell, with a brick wall between them. Almost a motel room.

Jack was laying on a cot, curled up and asleep. The phone rang, and the Officer asked if we would be alright, and we assured him we would. I sort of “encouraged the Officer to leave us alone for a few minutes, which should be all I need.

The first thing I did was throw up a strong shield around the room, including us and both cells. That should interfere with any manipulative forces. Next, we tried to wake Jack. I expected a relieved soon to be Father in law. What we got was a madman. He screamed and yelled, but he was almost incoherent. He kept trying to rush the bars, as if he could break them. I reached in and telepathically knocked him out. He fell against the bars, so I made sure no one me for a few seconds.

I reached through the bars and touched Jack’s arm. I went in to see what I could find, if there was another one of those “horcrux” things. Yes, I have read the books, but I haven’t seen the movie.

Surprisingly, there was nothing like that. I kept checking things out until I found the problem. I wasn’t able to completely fix things, but I did remove the large tumor that I found in his head, putting pressure on his brain. To do more without really knowing how to fix it might have caused more problems. I thought that perhaps Mom and Grandma could help me.

I came back to myself, and restored things to normal, and then I carefully woke Jack, who was much calmer. He seemed glad to see us, and had no idea why he was in Jail. When the officer finally came back, he was surprised to see Jack acting almost normally.

The problem came when he tried to stand. His legs moved, but he couldn’t stand up. I broke into tears when I realized to my horror that I had messed up somehow. Somehow I had crippled Jack.