Enter Three Witches by Kate Gilmore

but the spell was broken now, and a good three feet separated them. “Are you going to be all right? What do you do for them?”
    “I’ve got some pills at home,” Bren lied. “It goes away very fast. Don’t worry. Really. It’s disappearing now.” He took a step forward, but the mood was not to be recaptured.
    “Go home,” Erika said. “It might come back. You really had me worried, Bren. Call me tomorrow and tell me how you feel.”
    “Don’t mother me!” Bren cried, suddenly furious with the whole world of women. “I’ve got one mother too many now.”
    “And that’s a pointless remark, if I ever heard one,” Erika said.
    “Yes, it is. I know it is, and I’m sorry. What a disgusting end to a marvelous evening. I’d better go before I make it worse.” He turned and blundered out of the courtyard.
    “See you…” Erika said in a small, forlorn voice that trailed away into the now-dreary splashing of the fountains.

Chapter Nine
    Bren stopped at the corner of Seventy-ninth and Broadway. I won’t go home, he thought. If I do, I’ll kill her, and besides, it would mean that I came when I was called. It was eleven o’clock. The thought of a long walk either up or down the familiar length of Broadway held small appeal, and it was too late to visit Eli. I’ll go see Dad, Bren said to himself. Maybe I’ll even stay. He’s always asking me to, and that’ll teach her a lesson. He set off at a brisk pace toward Central Park.
    Bren had never been in the park this late, never, in fact, after dark except when a stream of people from some event filled the now deserted walks. The way was as well lighted as ever, but the heavy trees seemed to crowd closer to the path and hang their shaggy heads over the lamps, casting deep shadows between the pools of light. It’s only about three blocks wide, he told himself (three long crosstown blocks), and plunging his hands into his pockets, he strode eastward through the park.
    The worst places were the dark underpasses. At the end of the last one a huge figure loomed against the lamplight on the path. Bren’s heart thundered in his chest; he tried to whistle, but found he had lost the knack. “Peace, brother,” said a soft voice as he came out of the tunnel, and he saw a tall black man in a sweat suit waiting while an absurdly tiny, moplike dog snuffled in the dry leaves.
    “Peace,” Bren said, and hurried on.
    The streets of the East Side were deserted at this hour—clean, empty, devoid of life. It was possible to think of something besides being jumped on from behind a tree. Inevitably Bren thought of Erika and was surprised at the sharp stab of pain that went through him at the image of her small, bewildered face. She had been hurt by his abrupt departure. He should have stayed, letting the force of his mother’s call fade from his mind.
    So I had a sudden headache, he said to himself, and it went away. So I could have said, Sorry! and gone back to hugging her. She wasn’t mad; she was worried about me. The idea of himself as a heroic sufferer from some obscure malady—perhaps a brain tumor—was appealing. But I had to blow it, he concluded angrily, and wondered if he would be given another chance. The thought of Erika’s fragile rib-cage within the circle of his arm as they sat in the theater drove him to such despair that he walked half a block past his father’s building.
    In spite of having visited his father many times, Bren always had trouble finding the right buzzer for the apartment. There were at least a hundred of them, and they were in no discernible order. 4-F followed 7-C, which followed 16-G. As he searched, the doorman, privately christened “Smirky Sammy” by Bob West, came up behind him and watched his struggles.
    “Your dad’s got company,” Sammy observed just as Bren finally located the buzzer.
    Bren jumped and lost his place on the bell panel. “What kind of company?” he asked.
    “The kind of company you don’t want to be