After dinner, Karen and I both took our baths and she lent me a set of pajamas. She laid down a mattress on the floor for me, and gave me a pillow and a blanket.

“Do you have a spare uniform?” I asked her, once we were getting ready to turn in. “For school tomorrow,” I explained.

“Of course,” said Karen. “Just ask me tomorrow.”

“I’ll make sure to wash it and return it to you next week,” I told her.

We remained in silence for a little while.

“Hey, Isabelle,” Karen called me. She was laying sideways on her bed, in order to face me while talking. I turned to look at her as well.

“What is it?” I asked.

“What rumors did you heard about me?”

I’m sure I must have blushed then. It was probably visible even with just the light from the bedside lamp.

“You don’t wanna know that,” I said, hiding my face in the pillow.

“I do, really,” she said, smiling when she saw my embarrassment. “Come on, tell me!”

“You won’t like this,” I told her.

“Probably,” she admitted. “But I still wanna know. Spill.”

“Alright…” I felt my cheeks burn again. “I heard that witches do… things with other women for their spells.”

“Things?” she inquired, furrowing her brow.

“Sex,” I admitted, blushing even more fiercely than before. I burrowed my face in the pillow again.

“Really?” Karen asked me, sounding amused. She laughed. “Well, I haven’t heard that one before.” She stopped for a moment, seeming to think about it. “Hey,” she called, “is that why you were scared of me, earlier? Because you thought I wanted to bang you?”

“Yes?” I said. “No? Maybe. A little.” Karen started laughing. “Stop that!” I complained, feeling myself blush from ear to ear.

“But it’s so silly,” I heard her say. “You know I’d never do something like that.”

“Like what?” I asked, looking at her again. “Sex with women?”

“I meant using people for a spell,” she explained. “I don’t know if I’d have sex with another woman. Maybe, I guess. If I ever felt like it.”

I was shocked to hear that. But Karen seemed to be completely honest about it, too, and she didn’t seem the least bit bothered by it. Was it because she was a witch? Or a foreigner? Hearing Karen speak about that so nonchalantly shocked me, but also amazed me. I guess she saw the world a bit differently from the rest of us. My mom would probably throw a fit if I ever said something like that at home.

Karen was saying something, but I failed to register most of it. When I snapped back to reality, I realized that she had just asked me a question.

“Uh, sorry… what did you say?” I asked.

“Do you think you would ever date another woman?”

Before that day, I had a preprogrammed answer for questions like that. Living in the city I did, with the friends and family I had, being able to quickly dismiss topics like those was a matter of survival. I would have just said “no way”, and left it at that.

But after everything that had happened that day, and with Karen looking at me with eyes filled with expectation, I began to feel that I couldn’t be dishonest with her, or with myself, when she was beside me.

“I don’t know,” is what I told her.