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It’s Marnie’s sophomore year of college when she walks into the little cafe at the edge of the town square and runs into someone she hasn’t thought about in years. She finds the members of her group project easily enough, clustered together at a table near the back of the cafe and already negotiating what to focus their project on. Marnie doesn’t have any strong feelings one way or the other, so she just drops her bag in an empty chair and heads for the counter to get a pumpkin spice latte and maybe a piece of pumpkin cake. It’s been a long semester, after all. She deserves it.
She smiles at the thought and looks up, but when she sees the person behind the counter staring back at her she freezes, eyes going wide with shock. “Luke?”
“Hey, Marnie,” he says, as though he’s not really surprised to see her. Which makes sense, she supposes, because the fact that Aggie Cromwell’s grandkids have come back to Halloweentown was pretty big news when she and Dylan first enrolled in Witch University. Honestly she’s surprised it’s taken her this long to run into Luke, especially if he’s been working at the cafe.
“It’s good to see you,” she says, and she’s surprised at how much she means it. “How long have you been working here? I mean, I come in here a lot and I’ve never seen you before.”
“I started a couple months ago,” he answers. “I tried the family business for a while, but it wasn’t really for me.”
“Family business?”
“My family’s in the bridge business,” he says, and she can’t be sure, but she thinks his cheeks flush a darker shade of green as he looks past her. “It didn’t work out. Anyway, did you want to order something?”
Marnie blinks, then she looks over her shoulder and realizes there’s a line forming. “Right, sorry. Just a pumpkin spice latte.”
He nods and moves away to make her drink, and Marnie frowns at the back of his head and wonders why she didn’t look him up when she moved to Halloweentown full time. Granted, they hadn’t done a good job of staying in touch during high school, but that was mostly because it was kind of awkward, especially after they decided a long-distance relationship wasn’t going to work when they lived in completely separate realms.
She keeps frowning as he slides her coffee across the counter and takes her money, then waves her off with a tight smile and a ‘nice to see you’. It feels like she’s being dismissed, and she can’t understand why it bothers her so much. Luke’s a friend, sure, but can she really call him that when they haven’t spoken in years? They kissed once, but they were just kids at the time, and she’s kissed other boys since then.
Still, Luke was the first boy she kissed, and she supposes he’ll always hold a special place in her memories because of it. Maybe that’s all this uneasy feeling is, just a sense of nostalgia for that time when magic was brand new and her world was expanding faster than she could keep up.
It’s not until Marnie’s back at the table with her group that she realizes she forgot to ask for her cake. She doesn’t go back to the counter, though. Instead she takes absent sips of coffee and pretends to pay attention to the discussion about their project, while trying not to be too obvious about the glances she keeps stealing of Luke.
By the time her group finishes and starts packing up their things Marnie looks around to see if she can talk to him again, to say goodbye and maybe ask if they can get together sometime. But there’s someone new behind the counter, a pretty wood sprite with sparkling green eyes and a crown of oak leaves ringing her hair. She looks vaguely familiar, and Marnie thinks she’s seen her around campus. But there’s no sign of Luke, so she sighs and follows her classmates out of the cafe and back to campus.
***
The next time Marnie sees Luke she's on her way to meet her grandmother for a meeting with the council. It’s just a check-in, mainly to make sure the portal is still stable and that there haven’t been any new threats from warlocks with vendettas against her family. She doesn’t have to be there, technically. Aggie’s still the head of the Cromwell clan, and she’ll keep handling diplomatic relations even after Marnie graduates.
But it’s a big deal to be invited, because it means the council is starting to take her seriously as the Cromwell heir, which is why she’s hurrying into town hall without looking where she’s going. She’s almost to the steps when she slams into something solid and taller than her, bouncing off and hitting the ground with a shocked gasp.
“Oh, sorry,” a familiar voice says, and she looks up to find a green hand extended to help her up. “Marnie.”
“Luke,” she says, sounding just as surprised as he is. “I’m so sorry, I’m late for a council meeting and I wasn’t paying attention. I didn’t mean to just barrel right into you that way.”
The corner of his lip curls up like he wants to smile, possibly make a joke about her working on her flying skills or something, but a second later his face goes blank and he nods toward the town hall steps. “Better not keep them waiting, then.”
He’s already a few feet away when she realizes he’s just planning to walk away from her, and Marnie dusts off her robe and hurried after him. “Luke, wait!”
“I’m late for work, Marnie,” he says without breaking his stride. “And the council doesn’t like to wait, even for a Cromwell. I’ll see you around.”
She thinks about blowing off the meeting and running after him. He’s already halfway across the square, but it’s not like she doesn’t know where he’s going. Still, she told her grandmother she’d be at the meeting, and Luke is right that the council doesn’t like to wait.
Marnie lets out a sigh and turns back to the stairs, footsteps heavy as she wonders why Luke seems so determined to avoid her.
***
The third time Marnie sees Luke, it’s on purpose. She knows where he works, after all, so it’s simple enough to set up her scrying mirror and watch the cafe until she knows he’s on shift and won’t be able to escape. It’s a little creepy, maybe, but it’s Halloweentown. Creepy kind of goes with the territory.
It takes a little while for him to be on shift while she’s not in class and in her room to keep an eye on her mirror, it she finally catches him on a Tuesday afternoon. The cafe doesn’t look busy, so she grabs her broom and flies over to town square before he can disappear again. When she gets there Luke’s out from behind the counter, cleaning up the bar where they keep the sugar and cinnamon and pumpkin-shaped sprinkles.
“Hi,” Marnie says, smiling brightly when he startles and spills the sugar. Luke scowls at her for a minute before he turns to clean up his mess, but she doesn’t let it bother her.
“What are you doing here?” Luke asks when she doesn’t move out of his space, stepping around her back to the counter. Once there’s a solid surface between them he seems to relax a little, and Marnie has no idea why, but she’s determined to find out.
“Well, it’s a coffee shop, isn’t it?” she says, smirking when he rolls his eyes. “Isn’t that enough of a reason to be here?”
“You never come in on Tuesday afternoons,” Luke says, squinting at her.
Marnie shrugs, because it’s not like she’s going to admit to stalking the cafe until she was sure he was working. “I felt like getting off campus for a little while.”
“Fine. What’ll it be?” he asks, reaching for a cup without even waiting for her to say what size she wants.
“Are you mad at me?”
Luke loses his grip on the cup, and it hits the floor and bounces once before it rolls off behind the pastry case. “What?”
“I’m just wondering,” Marnie presses on, because the only way to find out the truth is to ask. “I mean, I know we didn’t stay in touch, but I thought we were friends. Only you don’t seem very happy to see me.”
He rolls his eyes and reaches for another cup, then he moves away to start making a drink she didn’t order. “We were barely friends, and it was a long time ago.”
“Luke, we saved the world together. Two worlds,” she reminds him, leaning over the counter to watch as he reaches into the fridge for the milk. “That creates a bond.”
When he looks up again she flashes him a bright smile, the one that usually gets her out of trouble with everyone except her mom. It seems to work on him, too, because he sighs and his shoulders slump a little in defeat.
“Right. And then you went on to take your place as the heir to the Cromwell power, and I went back to the bog with the rest of the goblins. Face it, Marnie. We just come from different worlds.”
“What? No we don’t,” she says, but her smile falters, because she can tell he actually believes that. “I mean, I know I grew up in the mortal world, but I live in Halloweentown now. I belong here, just like you.”
Luke shakes his head, and she can tell she’s missing something, but all he does is push the finished coffee across the counter toward her. “On the house. See you around, Marnie.”
Before she can answer he slips into the back, and a minute later the wood sprite appears again, tying an apron around her waist and eyeing Marnie like she’s something dangerous. She frowns and picks up the coffee Luke made for her, turning and heading out of the cafe. Once she’s outside she pauses and takes a sip, warmth shooting through her at the delicious taste of a perfect pumpkin spice latte.
It doesn’t mean anything, other than Luke trying to get rid of her, apparently, but she really wishes it did.
***
Instead of flying back to campus, Marnie points her broom toward her grandmother’s house. With school taking up most of her time she doesn’t get to visit nearly as often as she’d like, but Aggie’s house is still her very favorite place in Halloweentown. There’s just something so inviting about the way the Cromwell magic reaches out to greet her when she steps past the gate, the way it recognizes her as part of itself and welcomes her home. No matter how sad or angry or confused she is, she always feels safe in her grandmother’s home.
“Marnie dear, I didn’t expect you,” Aggie says when she lets herself in, and she manages a weak smile.
“Hey, Grandma.”
“Whatever’s the matter? Is it school?” Aggie asks, already fussing over her as she steers Marnie toward the kitchen to make some tea. Marnie’s still got half a pumpkin spice latte going cold in her hand, and she frowns down at it before she waves her hand and blinks it into nothingness.
“No, school’s fine,” Marnie says, and she knows she’s pouting, but she feels like she has the right, considering Luke keeps ditching her. “I ran into Luke at the cafe the other day.”
“Oh, yes, I’d heard he started working there,” Aggie says, smiling and patting Marnie’s shoulder before she waves at the kettle and sends it toward the sink to fill itself with water. “Not every goblin is cut out for bridge work, and there’s no shame in that.”
“What does that mean, ‘bridge work’?” Marnie asks, her features scrunched up in confusion instead of self-pity this time.
“Why, Luke’s family has been guarding the same bridge for generations, dear,” Aggie says. She levitates a couple mugs out of a cupboard and sends them sailing toward the table where a teabag is waiting to float into each one. “It’s a very prestigious position, particularly considering most bridges are considered the domain of the trolls. Four lanes of traffic, so I hear. But Luke’s older brother got most of the glory, of course, being firstborn. It’s no surprise Luke tried to prove himself with Kalabar before he realized the error of his ways.”
“And now he’s a barista?”
“Well, everyone needs a purpose,” Aggie answers with a shrug. “There’s certainly no shame in contributing to the community that way.”
“Grandma, I'm not judging him,” Marnie says on a frustrated sigh. “I just mean, if it’s a family business, why didn’t it work out?”
“Luke’s always wanted more than to be a bridge goblin, dear,” Aggie says. She floats the kettle across the room when it starts to whistle, pouring hot water into each mug before she sends it sailing back to the stove again. “I think he tried for a while, to please his family, but he’s much more suited for town life than lurking under a bridge out on the edge of the realm, no matter how impressive the bridge.”
Marnie scowls some more as she watches her teabag dunk itself into the steaming mug. “He’s mad at me, but he won’t tell me why.”
“Ah,” Aggie says, as though she’d been expecting as much, and Marnie snaps her gaze up to glare at her grandmother.
“You know why?”
Aggie reaches over to pat her hand before her magic gets away from her and she manages to upset her tea. “I don’t know anything for certain. All I do know is that Luke was still in town when you came back to attend college, and he didn’t leave for his family’s land until you’d been here a few months.”
“So?” Marnie says, her frown confused now, because she can’t figure out why it matters what she was doing when Luke left town.
But Aggie just shrugs, and Marnie knows she’s not getting anything else out of her grandmother, at least not about Luke.
“Have a cookie, dear,” she says instead, a plate of sugar cookies floating down onto the table to settle between them. “You’ll feel better.”
Marnie doesn’t feel better, but she eats two cookies all the same.
***
It takes three days to realize why Luke’s mad at her. It takes another week to convince herself she’s not just suffering a severe case of wishful thinking, then two more days to work up the courage to go looking for him again.
This time she doesn’t confront him in the cafe. Instead she hangs around the town square, keeping an eye on the cafe until she sees him leave after his shift, then she hops on her broom and follows at a safe enough distance to keep him from noticing. He heads out of town, past her grandmother’s house and through the woods, where Marnie almost loses sight of him in the dense trees. Finally she spots him again coming out the other side, his feet squelching as he walks through a bog to stop in front of a giant tree.
She pulls her broom up short, watching as Luke reaches out to the tree and touches something. A second later an arched door swings open, and Luke climbs through and disappears. There’s no one else around, and as far as she can tell Luke doesn’t have any neighbors. Still, she’s careful as she points her broom down toward his tree, pulling to a stop just outside the door and stepping carefully in an effort to keep as much silt as possible off her shoes.
There’s a chance that he won't be happy about her following him, but at least he can't run away from her when he's in his house. Marnie takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders, then she reaches up and knocks on the door.
For a second after Luke opens it he just stares at her, eyes wide with surprise, then he just sort of deflates and lets out a groan. “Did you seriously follow me home?”
Marnie pastes on her best smile, even though her heart’s beating too fast and she’s half expecting him to order her out of his bog. Not that he can technically banish her, since she’s a Cromwell and they’re still in Halloweentown, but if he really doesn’t want her here, she’s not going to stay.
“Are you going to invite me in?”
He sighs, but he steps aside to let her brush past him into the center of his treehouse. The walls are curved, making everything feel close and cozy, and there’s a window just across from the door letting in afternoon light. A curved couch sits in the center of the room, and Marnie can see a kitchen and a spiral staircase through an arched doorway. She crosses the living room to sit down on the couch, looking around at the pictures and books and stray pieces of clothing that make up Luke’s life.
“So?” he says, impatient, as he picks up a stray sock and what looks like a hoodie and shoves them behind the couch. “What do you want?”
“To know why we stopped being friends,” she answers, and when he freezes and looks up at her, she just smiles back innocently. “I’m serious, Luke. I know we were kids when I left, but you knew when I came back to town, didn’t you? Why didn’t you look me up?”
“Right, I was just supposed to stroll over to campus and ask around until somebody pointed out your dorm,” he says, his cheeks flushing a deeper shade of green at the thought. “That’s not exactly my crowd.”
“What are you talking about? There are goblins at Witch University now, Luke. There are all kinds of creatures there. No one would have minded if you’d come to visit me.”
“That’s not...I meant I don’t fit in with a bunch of college students.”
“Why not?” Marnie asks, frowning now, because that’s just silly.
“Whatever,” Luke says, shaking his head and avoiding the question. “You didn’t look me up either.”
“I should have,” Marnie says, inching a little closer to Luke where he’s sort of collapsed onto the couch. “You were one of my first friends here. I should have tried harder to keep in touch.”
Luke shrugs and looks away, but he doesn’t stand up again when she gets close enough for their knees to touch. “Yeah, well, I heard you were dating that Dalloway kid anyway.”
She knows she shouldn’t be happy that he’s jealous, but Marnie smiles down at her knees anyway, because it means at least she has a chance of fixing things. “I only dated Ethan for like five minutes my freshman year, and honestly I don’t think either of us ever felt anything more than friendship anyway. I’m not dating anyone at all now.”
He looks up at that, eyes bright with what she thinks is hope, maybe, but then he scowls and looks away again. “Yeah? Good for you, I guess.”
Marnie leans in to nudge her shoulder against his, smiling when he frowns and scoots away without actually putting any space between them. “You didn’t seem that surprised to see me when I came into the cafe that day.”
Another shrug, but this time it brings them close enough that their arms are pressed together from shoulder to elbow. “I knew you were in town. It was a big deal when you and Dylan enrolled at Witch U. People talked about it for months.”
“So...what? You avoided me every time I came in for the first two months you worked there?”
“You only came in twice while I was working,” he says, glancing up at her with a barely there smile. “It wasn’t that hard until you came in while Terri was on break.”
Marnie smirks and leans a little harder against him. He doesn’t push her away, doesn’t even seem like he wants to anymore. And maybe it shouldn’t feel as comfortable as it does, sitting shoulder to shoulder with Luke after all these years apart, but somehow it just feels right.
“Can we start again?” she asks, stealing a glance up at him through her eyelashes. “Maybe go get coffee together sometime?”
“As friends, or...?”
He trails off, almost as though he’s afraid to say the words, just in case it sends Marnie running back to school to ignore him for another few years. But she doesn’t want to run, and she’s pretty sure she doesn’t want to stay ‘just friends’, either.
“Or,” she says, smiling when he rolls his eyes, “we could call it a date and see what happens.”
“Yeah?” he says, and now he definitely sounds hopeful.
“Yeah,” Marnie echoes as she reaches for his hand and slides their fingers together. It’s tempting to lean in for a kiss, just to make her point, but she wants to do things right this time, and that means taking things slow. “Besides, I want to hear about this goblin bridge business. Grandma said it was a big deal.”
He huffs an exasperated breath and starts in on a story about his older brother and his amazing bridge guarding skills, and Marnie stays pressed against his side, a soft smile on her face as she listens to him. Their reunion is a year and a half later than it should have been, but as she laughs at Luke’s description of his own failure to guard the bridge, she figures it was worth the wait.