Vicki was dressed in a way that reflected her mood. Black sweats frayed at her ankles, the hood of her sweater covered her wet hair, and her socks had grip in the shape of kitten paws.

How depressing.

She went downstairs into her store and found it empty.

Not this again.

The front door was locked. At least Selene did that.

She took a deep breath and tucked herself in the chair in her knitting nook. She picked up an animal she had been working on: a teddy bear. It was a basic pattern, one she didn't have to pay much attention to. She grabbed a fresh skein of gold yarn instead of the brown the head had been made of.

Tears dotted the yarn, but with every loop and turn, loop and turn, the bear's paw got drier. Vicki wiped the tears still lingering in her vision.

She could see the individual threads that made up the yarn, she could see the dye was not consistent throughout, that the fuzz around the fibers had the slightest bit of glitter in them, and in some areas, she could see the bare wool that all of the yarn once was.

She finished one paw, tied a knot, and cut the yarn away. She picked up another ball of yarn, this one in teal, her favorite color. Within a few minutes, she had fashioned it into a leg. Another arm was violet. The last leg was the same green color that made up the letters on the sign above her store. All of the appendages were done. All that was left was to make the body.

She looked into her basket and picked through the yarn.

She remembered doing this before.

Over ten years ago when she was a slight bit thinner but dressed much the same, a toddler was hanging to her leg, still crying, doing what she wished she could.

Zenia was dead.

The funeral was in a few hours. The chapel was filled with mourners and busy adults who had no time to coddle the orphan children who had lost the closest thing they had to a mother. In just a week, Vicki had assumed the role, and how could she not?

She wasn't the oldest, that title belonged to her friend Jasmine, but Jasmine was nearly eighteen. She had enough on her plate and never spent as much time with them as Vicki did.

"Sorry Connie, I'm a little busy right now. Can you get cuddles from Lily? She's the best hugger, remember?"

The girl's snot was hanging from her chin in a resilient drip.

"She...she...said she was busy too."

Vicki took her hands away from the basket of scrap yarn and took out a hankie from her pocket. She wiped Connie's nose and chin.

"It's okay. Mind helping me? I'm working on something."

"Is it for Mother Zenia?"

She nodded. The little girl picked herself up.

"Yeah!"

Vicki hugged her gently in thanks.

"I want to crochet her something to take with her, you remember how cold she always was, even in summer? I want her to be warm when they take her away."

"She was like ice," Connie said, her stare going dark and vacant.

Vicki frowned. It was Connie who had found Zenia's body before anyone else.

"Right, we just need to find some yarn, think you can help?"

The little girl nodded and took off down the attic ladder. After they both tore the orphanage and even the chapel, to shreds, looking under pews and worn couch cushions, all they managed to find was a foot of red yarn. It lay pitifully in a tiny mound in Connie's hands.

Vicki slumped on the floor of the bunk room.

She had hardly any time to make anything anyway. They'd both have to say goodbye just like everyone else. They'd see her disappear in the dirt by the meadow and know it was cold bones lying under the frozen earth.

"Can it be a blanket?" Connie asked.

"No, it's too short to make anything with."

She and Connie stared at the red lump again.

"It can be a heart."

Vicki glanced up at those big pondering eyes.

"That's warm, see?" she said and put one small hand on her chest.

Vicki smiled. "Great idea, Connie, come on, let's get a hook and put it together."

When they were finished, instead of a lump, the yarn was now a half-dollar-sized heart. Connie had fallen asleep while Vicki had put it together, so she covered her in a blanket and slipped away.

She found Jasmine in the bathroom smoothing her hair and putting on smuggled-in blush on her cheeks. Ten years of being raised in the home meant she knew which parishioners would leave their purses open after the donation basket went around.

"Is that what you're wearing, Vicki?"

She looked down at her worn clothes.

"It's all black, that's the only requirement, right?"

Jasmine shrugged and went back to looking at herself in the mirror.

"Don't look so sad, you'll give it to the other kids. We should be happy for Zenia, she always wanted to die in this place. God knows why."

Vicki bristled and stuffed the heart in her hands in her pocket.

"You must be looking forward to leaving then. Four months and counting, right?"

She watched Jasmine's hand clench around the stolen blush brush.

"Just forget it."

Vicki didn't. She was angry and sad, and it was times like that when she would speak to Zenia and let her braid flowers into her hair. She went to the meadow where the perfect six-foot hole was waiting for her. There, she searched for flowers for her casket and came up empty of everything but dandelions and mustard weeds.

She stuffed the heart in the bouquet.

Then she made a wish.

And the heart and enchanted flowers made it into Zenia's grave.

For some reason, a vampire attended the funeral and, for some reason, he was interested in Jasmine. Vicki and Jasmine didn't get along much after that day. Four months later, Jasmine was gone, and Vicki spent the moments she had to herself thinking about her future at Zenia's grave.

"It smells nice here," a voice behind her said through the rain.

She turned around and found a girl, older, maybe the age Jasmine would have been.

"Who are you?" Vicki asked.

"No one important. That smell, did you do that?"

"I guess, I don't know. I haven't been able to do it since."

The stranger kneeled next to her and touched the muddied headstone.

"This is Zenia, so you, you're Vicki?"

"How do you know that?"

She shrugged. "I guess you can call it magic. It's not so different from yours."

"You think I have magic?"

"Sure. Vampires, ogres, and werewolves live in this world, why not witches? That's what you call them, right?"

Vicki took a step backward. First, a vampire takes Jasmine and now this weird lady appears out of nowhere. She needed to go tell someone about this. No one was allowed to wander the grounds like this, in the pouring rain, and with no umbrella, she had to—

She couldn't move. She felt like she was anchored to the ground. The stranger still held her hand up, but her eyes were closed.

"I'm just trying to get home, but I thought I'd help you first. I probably shouldn't but...I want to. At least a little. Powers like ours kinda suck if you don't learn to use them right."

Vicki took a breath and looked at the stranger again. She seemed honest enough and the fact that Vicki couldn't move proved to her that she really was a witch. If she could learn to use magic like that...maybe life would be easier.

Vicki nodded her head.

"Great," the girl put her hand down and Vicki felt her body unfreeze. "Real magic lies in the bonds that hold the universe together. I didn't know scents could be one of those strings, but obviously, I have a lot more to learn. As long as you stay calm and focus on your intent, you'll be just fine."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"You'll get it, eventually. It's kind of a rite of passage to get unhelpful advice. Just remember: instinct and intent. Alright, I gotta go."

She began looking around the air as if she could see the space between the falling drops of rain.

"Why tell me anything? You didn't even tell me your name!"

"Students have a habit of calling me Lizzy, so you can call me that if we ever meet again, but you'd have to get really powerful for that to ever happen."

Her eyes widened.

"There it is, well, good luck Vicki!"

She reached an arm forward and then she was gone.

Vicki was pissed at the time, but the words that 'Lizzy' had told her did eventually make sense, and her life did eventually get better.

Even now, as she dug through the yarn basket of Scented Sticks, she felt it. She could see magic in each small strand that made up the yarn. She could see herself reflected back in all of the small parts that would eventually be the bear.

She picked up the ball of blood-red yarn.

Hearts have strings too, that's what the witch would have said. She looped the yarn around her hook and began to crochet. She couldn't help but think about Evan.

Maybe forgetting would be harder than she thought.

The yarn moved over the hook, creating more knots, and ties, until she had a form ready to be stuffed. This bear was going to be a real mess.

None of the colors matched, and because she had been lost in her memories and forgotten to count, the limbs were all different lengths. This wasn't something she could sell. Not a chance.

But she stuffed it anyway and when it was time to put the eyes on, she used the gifted thimble so she didn't prick herself. She looked up at the painting hanging over her mantle.

Witches were the product of the combination of all underdweller DNA and mortal blood. Maybe some did look like the woman in the painting. The bear she placed under the painting was an amalgamation too, but, it was still cute in an odd sort of way. The yarn of each piece faded into the others, just like Vicki intended. It was no franken-bear. It was just another stuffed bear in odd colors.

It was just another Vicki.

And she wondered, without drops of blood on it, if Evan would ever want it.