Practical Magic

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1995

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Part 3Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 3 Summary: “Clairvoyance”

Things begin going wrong at Sally’s house, which Sally and Gillian attribute to bad luck. They both lose things, including Gillian’s favorite boots and Sally’s favorite earrings. Ben Frye pursues Gillian, calling her often and sitting outside waiting for her, but she puts him off because she feels she doesn’t deserve him. Ben practices stage magic, and he finds that his stage magic starts appearing when he least expects it.

Meanwhile, Antonia is losing interest in her appearance. At work, she meets an old schoolmate named Scott who’s come home from college. She confesses that she thought she was in love with Ben, and Scott disregards the concept of love. Antonia invites him to come back and see her again. Kylie is missing Gideon but refuses to make amends. She watches two women outside her window staring at the lilacs, able to sense their feelings and their pasts. She also watches Jimmy’s ghost, who is now causing havoc in the house. One day, Sally accosts Gillian and accuses her of stealing her earrings. They have an explosive argument, and Kylie tells them about the ghost. Sally realizes Kylie has a sensory gift, and Sally and Gillian tell her about Jimmy. While Sally and Gillian consider what to do next, a toad watches from the garden. Later, when Sally is alone in the house, she goes outside and cuts down all the lilacs.

The narrative moves to the past and to the Owenses’ ancestor, Maria, who arrived in New England at a time when suspicion of witchcraft was rampant. When Maria moved to their village with her baby daughter, she had her home custom built, which appeared resistant to bad luck. People were both drawn to her and put off by her. Three times a month, Maria would go to a nearby town to visit a respected man who was secretly her baby’s father. One day, a farmer shot a crow in his field; the next day, Maria’s arm was bandaged, drawing suspicious assumptions from the villagers. Unbeknownst to them, Maria was hurt banging on the door of her lover after he refused to see her. She lived the rest of her life cautiously and alone.

In the present day, the aunts have sent Kylie a painting of Maria for her birthday. Gillian detests it, but Kylie is adamant about putting it up in their room. The house begins to feel more peaceful, and Jimmy’s presence disappears. Gillian gives her relationship with Ben a chance, and they begin seeing each other. She compares him to Jimmy in her mind; Jimmy was violent, and Gillian would try to excite him sexually before he could become too angry with her. Ben, by contrast, is loving and kind. When Gillian wakes up, she meets Ben’s pet rabbit, Buddy. She is apprehensive and annoyed initially, but they sit together until Ben wakes. She and Ben become a couple and are deeply in love. He teaches her about biology, and Gillian begins learning independently. She even signs up for community college courses. However, Kylie becomes resentful that Gillian has shifted her attention away from her and starts playing pranks on Gillian; although she doesn’t stay angry, and they become friends again. Outside her home, Kylie becomes overwhelmed by her sensitivity to the emotions of others. She pulls away from others, and Sally is at a loss for how to help.

One day, Kylie experiences a renewal of energy and decides to make a cake. At the last moment, she realizes she’s accidentally baked Gideon’s favorite. While she debates what to do with it, she finds a toad sitting on the windowsill. It spits Jimmy’s ring into her hand, but Kylie doesn’t realize what it is; she leaves it on the counter and takes the cake to Gideon. To get to his house, she takes a shortcut across a large field. Two men begin following her and calling after her. She drops the cake and runs. One of the men pursues her, and she’s forced to double back to evade him. She runs to the ice cream parlor where Antonia works. Antonia is there with Scott, and when she sees Kylie’s fear, she understands what happened. They go into a storage area, where Antonia helps Kylie clean up and suddenly realizes how abusive she’s been toward her sister. Scott drives them home. From the next day onward, Kylie and Antonia are closer and more understanding of each other than ever before. Sally is both relieved and concerned, and Gillian suggests that the girls are growing up. Sally finds this possibility the most horrifying of all and falls into a deep depression. Ben asks Gillian to move in with him, and Gillian takes time to consider. She confronts Sally and forces her out of bed, thanking her for her help with Jimmy. She tells her about Ben’s question, and Sally encourages her to accept.

Part 3 Analysis

This section takes a closer look at existing relationships in the story and develops new ones, such as those between Gillian and Ben and between Antonia and Scott. While Gillian and Antonia navigate the pitfalls of new love, Kylie becomes occupied by her unwilling connection with Jimmy. It’s this connection that, ironically, brings her family back together when the tension between Sally and Gillian comes close to pulling them all apart. Sally and Gillian are unraveling independently in their relationship with each other; the misfortunes they experience as a result of Jimmy’s ghost shake away the last of their self-composure, even if they don’t know its root. Gillian in particular begins to lose her sense of identity, seeing herself through the filter of her mistakes: “From certain angles, in certain sorts of light, she saw what she imagined Jimmy must have seen” (116). This causes her to shut herself off from Ben and from the notion that she could deserve happiness.

As the novel takes a deeper look at Ben’s character, it presents him as a positive foil to the Owens family. He is a scientist, concerned and experienced with the physical reality of the world on its most fundamental level. He also practices predictable stage magic, juxtaposing the chaotic nature of the Owenses’ connection with the world. He represents an inversion of what Gillian has grown up with. However, these elements aren’t presented as mutually exclusive, but rather a broadening of a previously narrow life.

Meanwhile, Kylie navigates two very different relationships: the one she has growing with Jimmy’s ghost and her broken friendship with Gideon. Initially one-sided, Kylie’s connection with Jimmy begins to manifest mutually as he becomes aware of her. This is a side of the world she is utterly unprepared for, and even in its passive state, it forces her to grow up quickly. This dynamic takes a more active and sinister turn when Kylie encounters the attackers on her way to Gideon’s. Notably, this attack happens at the axis of one damaged relationship and another. It violently disrupts Kylie’s plan to make amends with Gideon, causing her to discard her offering and protect herself rather than repairing her friendship. However, the crisis also pushes her and Antonia into a new chapter of their lives together. Since Kylie is on the cusp of adulthood, their rupture would have only grown wider in the passing years. They needed a state of violent upheaval to reassess their priorities and examine each other with new eyes. In this way, the attack becomes something of a violent baptism for them both, and particularly Kylie as she leaves behind the child she was.

This section also deviates from the narrative to explore the history of the Owens house, designed by their ancestor Maria. Despite their distance in time, Maria follows many of the same patterns in which her descendants would later be rooted. She is beautiful and confident, with perceived supernatural abilities; she is also driven by love and allows herself to be controlled by it. After Maria’s death, stories arise about her ghost and the positive effect it can have on the fortunes of others. This parallels the ideas that come up later in the novel about the patio over Jimmy’s grave: Something frightening is twisted into something hopeful.

This deviation to the past is used to transition to the aunts’ gift of Maria’s portrait to Kylie and the slow process of healing that’s beginning in the house. One way this manifests is through Gillian’s decision to chance a relationship with Ben. Their love escalates quickly, and soon they’re a locally famous item. There is an intense sensuality to their relationship, but also an intellectualism that is equally new and exciting to Gillian: “He’s so smart, but that’s not the only thing that gets to Gillian—he acts like she is, too. He assumes she can understand what the hell he’s talking about, and just like a miracle, she does” (157). Unlike Gillian’s previous relationships, they truly bring the best out of each other.

Throughout all this growth, Sally encounters a period of personal crisis when she realizes that those she loves are moving on without her. Gillian, Antonia, and Kylie are all transcending the people they were when they needed Sally the most, leaving Sally feeling unmoored and without purpose. This leads Sally and Gillian to have a heart-to-heart talk, with Gillian taking the nurturing lead between the two of them for the first time. In this moment, Sally allows herself to be cared for, and Gillian rises to the challenge of being a sister to someone in need. In return, Sally encourages Gillian to accept Ben’s offer to move in. This exchange repairs their damaged relationship and helps them both grow and to enter into the final act of the novel without fear.