Safety is Relative

Chapter Twenty- The Effects of Too Much Sage

“Sage is for sleeping

Sedating them down

Garlic is for protection

Keeping them down-”

The doorbell rings, cutting through our chant. Jessica and Nina came round after training and are helping me set up for the party. To entertain ourselves, we have been singing the song we learnt in Slayer Biology on a loop for the whole afternoon, partly because we were told to learn it for homework, partly due to the annoying tune being stuck in our heads, and mostly due to Nina’s dance moves to it, which are keeping us in fits of giggles.

‘Okay, okay, shush!’ I laugh, collapsing again as Nina starts doing her zombie dance again.

‘Nina! Stop it!’ I try to control myself. ‘Stop it! That’ll be Nate, so you can’t sing that song anymore!’

Before I start laughing again, I rush out of the room, and open the door.

Nate grins. ‘Hello. I was beginning to think you had forgotten me.’

‘Sorry,’ I say, holding the door open as he enters. ‘Nina was being annoying.’

‘Hey Nate!’ Nina and Jessica chorus, sticking their heads round the door of the living room.

As soon as Nate turns his back to them, taking his coat off, Nina starts doing her dance again.

Jessica explodes into giggles.

I pull Nina through the doorway and frogmarch her into the kitchen, calling back, ‘You two do your music or something! We’re going to help Mum!’

In the kitchen, it smells gorgeous. Mum has been cooking non-stop all day, assisted by Ash, and a whole range of goodies in varying stages of preparation are stacked on every surface.

‘Wow,’

Even Nina seems sufficiently impressed enough to have stopped giggling hysterically.

‘Is there anything you want help with?’ I ask.

Mum turns around from the stove. ‘Have you stopped singing, finally?’

Nina bites her lip to keep from laughing again, which nearly sets me off.

‘Yes, sorry about that,’ I say quickly.

‘We didn’t mean to be annoying,’ says Nina.

Mum gives us a disbelieving look and continues to stir vigorously.

‘Nate’s here,’ I say.

Mum doesn’t even turn around, just tenses her shoulders. I sigh, inwardly. She doesn’t like him, for some reason.

It might be because I think in her mind, if I had to have a boyfriend, she would have preferred Lysander. And although apparently Poppy blames her son completely for their fight, Mum thinks it is an ‘utter disgrace’, and ‘there must have been some other inciting reason you don’t know about’.

‘Come on,’ I say to Nina, tugging her back down the corridor.

In the living room, we find Jessica and Nate arguing about the songs they are putting on the playlist for the party. Jessica is a radio listener- she likes pop and dub step, but Nate seems to know practically every song that ever existed, and his music taste is cooler. Well, in my eyes anyway.

‘Rue, Nate’s picked a load of songs that no-one’s ever heard of!’

‘No, there are only two of them, compared to the hundreds of generic pop songs you have,’ he says exasperatedly.