Wishing Water Read Free Page B

coaxing, her smile bewitching. Aware he had a soft spot for her she knew she never got anything out of him by being miserable, for all he put on such a dour face himself. She leaned against the arm of Joe’s chair and gazed up into his face. ‘Tell me about the wishing.’  
    Joe regarded the child he’d come to think of as his granddaughter with a serious eye. ‘It’s not to be taken lightly,’ he warned.
    ‘Oh, no,’ Lissa assured him. ‘I wouldn’t.’  
    He glanced around, as if he was about to impart a great secret, or preferred Meg not to know what he said. ‘Water has special powers, tha knows. Whether it be beck or tarn, each has its own sprite or fairy and it don’t do to cross them.’  
    Lissa solemnly shook her head, not daring to speak. Would this be the answer she so badly needed?
    Satisfied he was not about to be mocked, Joe said, ‘When we was no more’n bairns we’d go every Maytime to the well or some other special watering place and fill our hands with water. Sometimes we’d use a bottle and add a drop of sugar or a twist of liquorice to drink, then give the rest back to the water sprite. Or we’d drink from us hands and give a gift instead, like a flower or a penny. You ask Meg about Luckpennies. Carry the luck for you they do.’  
    ‘Why do they?’  
    ‘Why?’ Joe looked confused. ‘Nay, lass, how should I know?’
    ‘But did you make a wish? And did it ever come true?’  
    Joe was anxious to return to the latest figures from the auction mart. ‘Course we did. But I’m too old to remember what we wished for, let alone if it ever come true. It’s all a lot of nonsense anyroad. You have to drink it up quick, afore it leaks out of your hand, and say your wish with your eyes closed.’ Then thinking of Meg’s possible reaction to these superstitions, he added for good measure, ‘But you must believe in the Good Lord and say your prayers every night.’ Nodding wisely and recklessly mixing Christian and pagan traditions. ‘Then you’ll get what’s good for you and no more.’  
    Lissa felt excited. She said her prayers every night already, but she thought she’d try the wishing as well, just in case. It could do no harm to try.
     
    Nick had one or two wishes of his own which he could do with having answered, concerning learning to play football and getting a new bicycle, so he was ready enough to share the experiment with Lissa. It seemed harmless enough.
    The beck was considered too mundane and the water too gushing for any sprite to survive in it. There was nothing for it but to try the tarn. Strictly forbidden, tucked darkly behind Brockbarrow wood, they chose an afternoon when Daniel had been taken, protesting, to the dentist, since they didn’t trust him to keep a secret. It was June, not May, but Lissa hoped the fairies wouldn’t mind, this being their first visit.
    ‘We mustn’t get wet or fall in this time,’ she warned and Nick gravely agreed. The tarn might be small and round, a sheet of water innocently sparkling in the sun on a beautiful day like this, but it was bitterly cold, had been trapped in this cup of land since the Ice Age and nobody knew quite how deep it was. It was not a place to mess with. Both children gazed on the ruffled waters and shuddered. They could well believe that sprites lurked beneath its glittering surface, perhaps even devils.
    The small ceremony took no more than moments to complete. There was no time to waste as they were fully aware they risked the wrath of their respective parents should their trip be discovered.
    ‘I’ll go first,’ Lissa said, dipping the small Tizer bottle in the clear water.
    As she drank the sweet liquorice water she closed her eyes and wished with all her might that one day soon her mother would come. She sent her thoughts winging far across water, mountains and sea to a distant, unknown mass of land painted red on her geography atlas and known as Canada.
    Send my mother home, her inner voice