In the morning, I walked the children to the school. There wasn't really much to do around the house. I should have studied, but I wasn't completely into it. Every night since last Thursday I picked another silver flower and I was simply getting more and more worried. Three years I thought I cracked it, building a new life in the lovely market town of High Wycombe. It is not nice when your past is catching up with you.

Instead of studying I decided to go for a walk. It was relatively mild autumn and sun was shining. It was ironic, I didn't want to be a witch and I didn't want to have anything to do with the real world, yet every time I wanted to calm down and needed to think, I went out to the woods. But then, even normal psychologists suggest that being outdoors is good for our wellbeing. I don't think they mean witches in particular.

I decided to avoid the park and instead I walked towards to the little forest on the hill. It was not exactly wilderness, but it would do. I left the footpath that leads through it and found a nice oak in the middle. Usually, I prefer to chat to pines, but there are very few around here. What a shame. I think once I qualify as an accountant, I will move somewhere where there are more pines as I generally find them soothing. Instead, in the past three years, I became sort of friends with the oak that grew there. Oaks are usually down-to-earth, but let's face it , they are a bit of snobbish trees. Maybe it's the leaves.

I sat down with my back to it and let it sing a lullaby. The trees around at the edges of the clearing joined in. They felt a bit lonely - there were no witches here, no one to talk to. Of course, they could have played with the children, any children would do, but the children didn't wander alone too often. The parents, scared of what could have happened, were bringing up another scared generation of people and the trees were left alone.

I might have fallen asleep, or I simply left my mind drift, but I had to be there for some time.

"Wake up sleeping beauty, or are you waiting for your prince's kiss?" I heard a voice that sounded vaguely familiar.

I quickly opened my eyes, the wake up from the dreaming was almost painful. I was staring up at Jake's smiling face. He took me by a surprise - I didn't feel him coming, and none of the trees considered him important enough to let me know. He was here, but he didn't really feel like being here. As always, he felt a little in between the worlds. When he saw I woke up his smile broadened. He sat down next to me, his back to the oak, his body almost touching mine.

"I don't remember inviting you to join," I said without looking at him.

"I thought you might enjoy some company. You looked like a little lost girl, just waiting to be eaten by a big wolf. Didn't your parents warned you about being alone in the forest?"

I sharply looked at him and I saw now he was fully grinning. He was joking. The joke was rather lost on me, though.

"I wasn't alone," I pointed out sharply and he nodded as if to soothe me.

"I know, there is something about you witches and the forest... " I objected.

"I am not a witch." He nodded. It seemed he would have nodded to anything I said.

"I can see that. You clearly showed it so many times...." He said ironically waving his hands around. In a way, he did have a point. To a certain degree, of course. Suddenly he just looked into my eyes and said: "I just wanted to talk to you about yesterday. What you asked about was a lot."

He sounded serious.

"How did you find me? Did Jonathan send you?" I asked because I genuinely wanted to know. Plus it was a good way to change the topic.

"You don't think I have a mind of my own?" He sounded hurt. He caressed the side of my head. He tucked a lock behind my ear that strayed and his hand stayed close to me for a little longer than necessary. There was something very intimate in his touch and I felt it would be easy to give in.

I looked into his eyes and saw him - the real him. He had beautiful green eyes a girl could lose herself in. There was a little of brown around the edges of his irises as well. Deep in his eyes, he was a mixture of life and death, cold, and warmth. He felt present, yet it felt as he wasn't completely belonging to now. But whatever he was, he was his own entity. I looked away to break the connection and moved away a bit. Jake looked surprised as if he felt the connection too. It felt as if we touched somewhere deep inside and suddenly I was scared. I was sure that that shouldn't be happening. It should have been impossible.

He cleared his throat. “About yesterday…” I was waiting for him to continue.

“What do you need his blood for?” It was a fair question. I could have only imagined what possible scenarios he could have thought of, none of them really pretty.

“I don’t want him to turn me if that’s what you ask…” I said. I was not sure if he looked more surprised or relieved.

“You seriously thought I am some sort of a groupie? I see a vampire and I start to beg for his blood? And here you come saying you know that I am a witch. But hey, what do you actually know? In any case, it’s not your business, and certainly not your problem.” I was winding myself up. I didn’t want to discuss it - after all, the whole situation was really absurd. I would not let anyone own me and drinking the blood would result in that. Not to mention, Jonathan was not telling the truth, or at least not the whole truth. These things can be dangerous and it’s no easy task, yet he asked me. Not understanding all the details, all there is to understand could be very dangerous.

“Anyway, he is not saying the truth.” I continued.

“That’s not true, he told you everything.” I had the feeling that Jake would always defend Jonathan. Yet another secret.

“Really? There are always three sides to the truth: his story, her story and the truth, kiddo.” I said in my best Hollywood accent. It was meant to be funny, but clearly, it wasn’t. Instead, it was as if I just exactly described the situation. I sighted, witches simply don’t do irony, it’s against our nature. I was no good at that - it simply always ended up sounding as if I said some kind of prophecy.

“So tell me more. Why the hell does he need a witch?” I asked instead. I wasn’t sure it was the point to disclose I am not exactly a witch. After all, I was training to be an accountant, not to talk with the deads. I was pretty sure that was not part of an accountant's job description. I wasn’t even sure I could help.

“Why do you need his blood?” He insisted instead.

I was tempted to say: “You first.” I realised, though, that the truth about why I needed it would not tell him anything so I just said out loud.

“For a spell.” Here it was. He still had no clue what was going on. “Now it’s your turn.”

“I can’t tell you everything, it’s up to Jonathan.” He started, but before I could object anything, he continued:

“The girl is someone from Jonathan’s past. I think before he was actually a vampire. I am not sure what is the story exactly, but I know she has been a problem for a long time.”

“If she has been a problem for a long time, why now?”

“Well, I guess in the beginning he didn’t care. All the blood lust, in the beginning, doesn’t really leave you with much space for thinking.” He explained after giving it a thought and I nodded to show that I understood. I didn’t really. I was always trying to stay away from these things, which meant I was in no way an expert on vampires. I was beginning to think that if there were an expert on vampires, he was sitting next to me. I decided to simply look like I know what he was talking about - I had no doubt he would share any information I needed to make me understand. I felt it was a great relieve for Jake to be able to talk about these things.

“But it was certainly a problem in my lifetime. He tried different things, talking to mediums, trying to forget, but it’s not easy. And then some medium told him that things have to be put right. I guess there is some ritual or something - you are the expert.” He looked at me hopefully and I smiled. I wasn’t an expert but I considered it another detail he didn’t need to know.

“So why me?” It was an obvious question. I would have thought the ritual or whatever would have to be performed by someone who would have been involved in the situation. I was not sure how old Jonathan was, though.

“It should be someone living in the area, having the same type of magic. Ideally similar age and type I think.” It was supposed to be her mirror image, he meant to say. There was a possibility that he didn’t know that. I doubted that I was the girl’s mirror image. I would have thought that being English or something like that might have helped.

“I don’t think you got the right person.” I thought the best policy would be, to be honest. There is nothing worse than magic gone wrong. He looked at me thoughtfully.

“You are living here. Jonathan is from here. She lived here. I guess that’s enough?” He looked at me almost hopefully. There had to be more, but I knew Jake told me more or less what he knew.

“OK. We will have to talk about it. But I will still ask for the blood in exchange. I don’t need much - and I am certainly not going to turn myself into a vampire, nor enslave myself. Tell him to think about it.”

“What do you need to talk about more?” He looked a bit annoyed.

“Well, for starters, what we are going to do. It looks like Jonathan has an idea. Because frankly, I have no clue.” For once, he was speechless.

I stood up. “I have to run now. See you later.”

He followed me. “Why not today?” There was a bit too much of eagerness in his voice to my liking.

I looked into his beautiful green eyes: “Because tonight I am going to the cinema, and it’s a date. No vampire business. And because we agreed that yesterday.” I left before he could say anything.