A Little Bit Stronger by Sara Evans blared through my right ear bud as I tiredly leaned my head against the bus seat window. Ryan sits next to me, asleep against the back of the seat with his mouth hanging open slightly. He had in my left ear bud which, since he was asleep, I was seriously thinking about stealing back. I’m not a very nice person when I’m tired.
This morning I was reminded how tiring magic is when you’re already exhausted. I had realized to my horror that I owned nothing of that same green color as the shirt I had worn yesterday. If I had known I’d have to wear a certain color for all times in the near future due to hiding from warlocks I would have worn blue. But alas. At least green is my second favorite color. It’s also good that I can pull this off as a legit eye color. Sometimes when I’m really not paying attention I’ll put on a purple shirt and have to make it seem like I’m wearing contacts. That’s just embarrassing. Anyway, discovering I had nothing green to wear I had put on a tie dye t-shirt (because those are my favorites especially when I can just let my eyes go tie dye and it’s super cool) that says Peace Love Hilton Head on it and some black sweatpants (because they’re just so comfy!). I then took one of my many pull over sweatshirts and it just happened to be blue. Seeing as that wouldn’t work I very carefully removed the dye from the fabric of the sweatshirt and left it a plain boring white color. After that I took the shirt I was wearing yesterday, drained it of dye and then dyed the sweatshirt with the t-shirt dye. It was probably the most I’ve thought about what I’m wearing to school in, like, ever.
Wait did I skip out on the how-the-heck-did-I-drain-the-dye-out-of-my-clothes part? Well like I said it’s magic and so, being a good witch, I’m not going to reveal my secrets to you…JK. Magic is not Cinderella’s bippity boppity boo (although that would be much easier) or Harry Potter’s Avada Kadavra (and yes I’m perfectly aware that one of those spells enchants pumpkins while the other kills people. Harry doesn’t need to mess up vegetables so there isn’t a spell for that). Magic is more like asking a friend to do something. Or frienemy. Me and my t-shirt are no longer on speaking terms. Every inanimate object has a sort of aura of personality so you just have to ask it to do what you want. Of course if you just start barking out orders, your pencil might be like, ‘What the heck? I ain’t drawin’ for you!’ and then in art class you’re screwed. It’s better to get to know your inanimate objects. I’m serious. My mom is BFF’s with the kitchen dishes and me and my school textbooks are tight. That’s why we just ask them to do what we want and most of the time they oblige. You know that part of the Disney Pocahontas song ‘Colors of the Wind’ or whatever it’s called where she says ‘every rock and tree and creature has a life and a spirit and a name’? Yeah. That’s basically it.
“Are we there yet?” Ryan groans, waking up. I open one eye to look out the window. We’re passing by an old barn with a couple of cows already out and cruising around. Every landmark on the way to school is basically a time marker for Ryan and I since we timed the bus ride which is on-the-dot punctual every day.
“One minute and thirty-four seconds until we pull into the parking space,” I predict. We both know that I’m right to the very second. Some things never change and you don’t want them to. Unless we’re two hours later for a two hour delay that we don’t have to make up. Then I say SLEEP IN!
One minute and thirty-four seconds later we pull into our parking space and I elbow Ryan in the ribs to wake him up from his dozing. He grumbles and casts me a don’t-cross-me-before-8 look as he gives me back my ear bud. He’s wearing a red t-shirt with some band on the front and black pants. I envy him for a second because I will never ever be able to wear a red shirt. I can get away with purple eyes but I’m not pushing my luck with red.
Ryan and I walk down to our lockers and I see Jaz sticking out like a sore thumb. She’s wearing a floor-length orange dress with a big black bow on the right shoulder and orange and clear sequins stuck on every inch of it. I know that she did it herself because I was there when she did it. She’s wearing two inch black heels and her hair is in a style to make it in the shape of a big black bow on the top of her head with shimmering orange streamers threaded through it. I think I need a moment for my eyes to adjust to her. Ryan rolls his eyes when he sees her but I just smile. Although we pick on each other’s style, I’m always happy to see Jaz.
“Hey-ey!” she says when she sees us.
“Jaz, if you want to be seen on the moon, just walk outside,” Ryan tells her. Jaz clenches her fists,
“Ryan, if you want to see your life flash before your eyes, keep talking,” Jaz threatens. Ryan’s mouth drops open without words from Jaz’s comeback.
“Need some ice for that burn, Ryan?” I ask and high-five Jaz for truly just being awesome. Ryan can’t help but smile too but shakes his head as he opens up his locker. Jaz follows me across the narrow hall to my locker where I gather my books and she starts up another rant about how amazing Dominico Redwind is.
“Wow, you really don’t like him do you?” Jaz says when she sees that I honestly don’t share her enthusiasm. I shrug,
“I don’t know him first of all but I don’t think I was very nice to him yesterday so I feel kind of bad. I’m going to try to be a little more friendly today, I think. He is new and all so it won’t help to have me giving him a hard time,” I tell her. Jaz just laughs,
“You have the most guilty conscience ever! I seriously doubt you were that mean but don’t take this the wrong way, it’s awesome that you’ve decided to be nice now! You have successfully become a Jedi you ex-Dark Sith Lord!” I laugh too. I’m not the only one who is always making nerdy references. I’ve rubbed off on my friends without them even knowing. Mwahahahaha!
By the time Jaz and I reach our Social Studies classroom we’re in a deep conversation about which Star Wars movie was the best. She says that the effects in the last one were the best but I think that when Anakin turns into Dark Vader in the third one was way better than the Death Star exploding. We both agree that the Wookies and Ewahs (if anyone doesn’t know ewahs are the awesome teddy bear dudes in the last one then I command you to go watch ALL the Star Wars movies again. Right now. Go on! Shoo!) are the most awesome characters although I think R2D2 is pretty amazing. We also both agree that Jar Jar Binks has an incredibly annoying voice. I’m so wrapped up in voicing my Star Wars views that neither me nor Jaz notices Dominico Redwind enter the classroom and sit down in the desk next to me until after the bell rings.
“Hi,” he says when I finally notice him and have a mini heart-attack because I hadn’t noticed him before.
“Hi, how was your first day?” I ask him politely. I’m still quite disgusted to be sitting right next to a warlock but I try to make myself be nice. He nods,
“Good. Well, good as in as good as school can be,” he says. I nod in sympathy.
“I know what you mean. I think ‘school good’ is equal to pretty awful though,” I tell him. He smiles,
“Yeah, I’m starting to believe that time actually slows down whenever you step foot in a school,” Dominico tells me.
“Exactly! That’s why they should shorten the school days so that we only have to go seven hours normal time instead of in microwave minutes!” I reason. Dominico chuckles. It is true that time is slower when you’re waiting on the microwave than at any other time of day. Mr. Bermuda comes in and both of us turn toward the front to hear the fascinating history of China. Fun. For someone who plans on being an engineer this is extremely irrelevant to me.
The bell finally rings thirty microwave minutes later. Both me and Jaz jump out of our seats. For me it’s because I just want to get on with this school day so it can be over with. For Jaz she wants to be the first girl to ask Dominico to walk to their next class. Like yesterday I call from the door,
“See you in fourth, Jaz!” without giving Dominico a second look. Fine, he’s not completely wretchedly awful but that doesn’t mean I want to strike up another conversation in this two class time span.
Without any warlocks in my other classes the day flies by until lunch hits. I’m actually in a rather good mood for a change. Ryan got the teacher to play with Siri on his iPhone for most of third period and you can bet your boots that it was hilarious. Lunch rolls around and I find that our table isn’t quite as vacant as it normally is. Ryan is sitting next to Jaz with a look of pure agony on his face as across from him sits Dominico and Izabella Redwind. I sit down next to Ryan and plaster a fake smile, identical to Ryan’s, on my face and give a friendly greeting.
“Hey, what’s up?” I ask casually. Jaz is practically drooling over Dominico which gives a rather uncomfortable feeling to everyone else here.
“The sky,” Ryan says. I roll my eyes,
“Oh, I’m Faye,” I say to Izabella and hold out my hand. She shakes it,
“Izabella,” she says. Jaz finally works up her confidence to begin a long winded small talk conversation with Dominico, acting as if the rest of us didn’t exist. Ryan butt into their conversation occasionally only to receive a murderous glare from Jaz.
I start talking to Izabella about how she likes Rockyglenn and where she used to live. Oh my gosh. This girl is a miniature version of me! Halfway through lunch we’re deep into a conversation that includes fangirl-ing over Legend of Korra, giving our highest reviews to the movie Now You See Me and completely ragging on the Beautiful Creatures movie because the book was a thousand times better. She likes skateboarding like me and we both make high grades and play piano. We both like math and fail at cooking, this girl is awesome! We could so be best friends. Although she’s two years younger than me she is very mature for her age and incredibly smart. I’m laughing as lunch ends and Ryan is trying to impress Izabella by blowing bubbles in his milk that’s coming out his nose! Izabella looks at me and we share the ‘boys,’ look. She laughs and heads down a hallway with Jaz to her next class while Ryan, Dominico and I head down to math.
“How much of my math homework do you need to copy?” I ask Ryan. Ryan pretends to look offended,
“You just assume that I didn’t do my work? I’ll have you know that I am both smart and capable to do my work by myself, thank you very much! Oh, and all of it please.” Dominico gives him a confused look,
“Do you ever do homework?” he asks.
“Sometimes,” Ryan replies. I shake my head behind his back and mouth the word ‘Never’. Ryan catches me and tries to knock my books away but I quickly snatch them away.
“Ah, ah, ah! Whose homework are you copying again?” I ask with an evil smile. Ryan sticks his tongue out at me and I childishly return the gesture. Halfway down the hall to math Ryan and I lose Dominico as he is swarmed by a herd of love struck high school girls. We don’t wait up.
Ryan copies my homework before the bell rings and we playfully bicker until Dominico runs in three seconds from being tardy. Math goes smoothly and uneventful and I notice that today Dominico is paying close attention to Ms. Kinder instead of being…distracted. As soon as the bell rings I notice how Dominico shoots out of his seat to keep up with Ryan and me as we hurry out of the classroom. Ryan talks about how lost he is with our current math and I try to explain it but he doesn’t try too hard to listen. He waves and heads off to band leaving me with Dominico.
I can feel his slight aura of magic as he tries to make everyone around us ignore him but there’s a hole in his shield as he tries to wrap it to the side of me so that I won’t be affected. Little does he know that I wouldn’t be affected anyway so this is just a waste of energy for him. Dominico awkwardly tries to start up a conversation and I can’t help feel bad for him because he seems to be so embarrassed with his attempts.
“Are you almost done with your New York City PowerPoint?” I ask him. He nods, unsure of what to say. “Umm…why do you want to go to the big apple?” I ask him. I know that it’s a stupid question, him being a warlock and all, but I don’t want to always avoid warlock topics because I’m supposed to be ignorant in that category. Dominico starts telling me everything about the Empire State Building and the Statue of Liberty and every other cool attraction there. It actually makes me want to go to NYC.
“You should be a relator or travel agent. You’re really good with this stuff,” I tell him. He blushes. Wow, who knew that icy pale skin could actually fill with color? I know he’s blushing because he was a natural from being a warlock but I still play dumb. It makes it less obvious I’m a witch this way.
“What do you want to be?” he asks me.
“An engineer, I like the robotic stuff,” I explain to him. Robots are awesome to talk to. It’s sort of like being good with computers but more…responsive.
“That would be cool. I’ve always thought about being a cop or someone in the forces,” he tells me. Ouch, a warlock cop. Talk about never getting away with anything again.
“You’d be a good cop,” I tell him as an understatement. Dominico smiles at me and I think three girls standing around me swoon. Get over yourselves! He’s not that cute! Although, smiling, he takes on a lighter air and much happier and carefree appearance.
He makes the ladies first gesture when we get to the computer lab and I give him a small smile and ‘thank you’ before stepping in front of him and taking my seat at our computer.
Computer science goes by uneventfully and so does every other class that week and the next. Dominico and Izabella are now honorary regulars at our lunch table and Ryan has begun to stop loathing Dominico. I’m still on the fence with him although my journal is now indicating ‘friend’ more than ‘fiend’. Izabella is definitely a friend. We get along flawlessly like super close sisters. The rest of the school has pretty much died down from the excitement of having a new kid but girls still constantly giggle every time Dominico walks by. I think it’s rather annoying but I don’t say anything about it and neither does anyone else except Ryan when he makes fun of Dominico’s ‘fan club.’ I have successfully worn the same shade of green for the past two weeks and only got a couple comments on it. I made up a lie that all my white clothes got dyed green in the washer so now I have a ton of green clothes so I might as well wear them.
Friday morning of the second week for the Redwind’s presence at Rockyglenn and Dominico catches up with Jaz and me on our way to first period social studies. Jaz has pretty much gotten over her crush on him and is now getting dewy eyed over the football team captain Vance Fredrick. His name is the part that turned me off to him before I even met him. It’s too…formal. On top of that he’s a total jerk. He acts like he rules the school (and then proceeds to do so). If I thought that Dominico was most wanted by the girls at my school I would have been kidding myself. Warlock or not Dominico Redwind was no match for the popularity of Vance Fredrick.
Jaz had once sworn with me to hate him for his snobbish attitude and tendency to date no less than two girls at a time but apparently Jaz had short term memory loss when it came to cute boys. I rolled my eyes as Jaz quickly grabbed my arm when we walked by him and his band of bone heads.
“Oh my gosh there he is!” Jaz whispers loudly to me and Dominico. Way to be subtle, Jaz. “Do you think he saw me? OMG do you think he noticed me? He’s so cute! He’s amazing! Did you see the last game? He was so great!” Dominico raises an eyebrow as he turns to me,
“Do you like him?” he asks.
“What?! NO! He’s a total jerk!” I exclaim. Luckily the hallways of our school are loud enough for him not to hear me or I might have ended up on the bad side of the most popular person in school. Dominico seems to think that my reaction was funny and I see him smiling. I glare at him. Although we’re friends now technically, he can be so infuriating!
“Alright then, who do you like?” I ask him, fuming over his laughter at my loathing. That seems to take him by surprise and he stumbles to find the right words,
“What? Like? Umm…I don’t like anyone like that,” he finally spits out. The color rising in his cheeks say otherwise though.
“You do!” both me and Jaz burst out.
“Tell!”
“Spill!”
“Who is it?”
“You have to tell us!”
“We can keep a secret!”
“We promise!” My inner girliness is released as I beg Dominico to reveal his secret crush. Who is it? Why hasn’t he told us by now? We’ve been friends for, like, two microwave minute weeks! That’s like two months normal time! He should so tell us! The shade of Dominico’s cheeks put the ripest tomato to shame. He looks so embarrassed! Is it that bad?
“I don’t like anyone,” Dominico lies again. I feel a surprisingly strong feeling like I walked through a brick wall somehow without falling over. I blink a couple times to shake off the feeling before continuing by saying,
“Come on or I’m going to get Izabella into this!”
“What are you talking about, Faye?” Jaz asks. She looks completely lost like she doesn’t know what I’m talking about. She doesn’t actually have short term memory loss does she? Then I remember the odd feeling only a few moments before. Dominico is giving me a confused look too but not because he doesn’t know what I’m talking about. Crap. He just used magic on me. Wait a minute…HE USED MAGIC ON ME! That jerk! It’s so offensive to use magic on another W-member (Wizard Warlock Witch ‘W’ get it?) that it’s not even funny. How rude! Oh wait…he doesn’t know I’m a W-member. Crap!
“Umm…I can’t remember…never mind…” I say awkwardly pretending to just have been affected by the aftershock of his spell. Jaz just shakes it off and Dominico looks guilty beyond belief. I’m glad. It’s not nice to avoid subjects by Jell-O-fying people’s minds. Not cool, man. Not cool.
We enter Social Studies to find a particularly excited Mr. Bermuda. He’s practically bouncing around the classroom, beaming at everyone to the point of concern. Did someone slip a double shot of caffeine in his tea? The bell rings and Mr. Bermuda looks like he’s about to break out in some sugary, overly optimistic song.
“Alright girls and guys, who wants to guess what we’re doing today?” Mr. Bermuda asks with a goofy smile still plastered on his features. No one answers. “We’re doing skits!” he exclaims. Skits? That’s what he’s so happy about? Some people really don’t have a life. Mr. Bermuda randomly hands out our parts and we all gather in a swarm at the door to walk down to the auditeria to use the stage.
“Who do you have?” Dominico asks me as he comes up from behind.
“Citizen #4, you?”
“Citizen #6. I’m just happy it’s a guy,” Dominico says noting Mr. Bermuda’s overlook to assign according to gender. I’m a girl so I’m good too.
“Lucky! I’m Traveling Man #2!” Jaz pouts, coming up on my other side. We get to the auditeria and we all sit down in front of the stage while Mr. Bermuda climbs up on it and pulls a large cardboard box out from behind one of the curtains.
“Surprise! We have costumes too!” Noooo!!!! Not costumes! I hate costumes. Except on Halloween. On Halloween it should be a law for everyone to wear a costume. There is a chorus of groans from our tired and not at all amused high schoolers. Mr. Bermuda casts us all a look that says if we ruin this for him we can expect homework rate to rise by at least 500%. We all shut up.
Everyone mumbles and groans as we all tackle each other to pull our own labeled costumes out of the box. Mine is a blue old-fashioned dress complete with white frills. I shouldn’t complain though. There is an identical one in pink that Josh Augusta has to wear. We all slip our costumes on over our clothes and prepare to read our lines. I find Jaz and Dominico and stand by them. Dominico stares at me like I had just grown horns. What’s up with him?
“Know your part?” I ask him and Jaz. Jaz groans and replies yes. Dominico is still staring at me like an alien. Jaz walks away to join her group of Traveling Men and Dominico leans in and whispers to me,
“Nice dress,” I think he’s teasing me for a second and I turn to make a face at him but he continues, “it matches your eyes.” No. Freakin’. Way. How could I have been so stupid? But then again, I don’t think I could have gotten out of this one. Unless I went to the nurse. I should have gone to the nurse. “Witch,” he hisses at me.
“Leave me alone, Warlock,” I growl back. His glare is intense on me and I meet it and return it tenfold. If looks could kill, I have the nuclear bomb of glares. Mr. Bermuda interrupts our staring showdown when he announces that the skit is starting. The skit starts out going along with the script but when there’s an angry warlock around, things don’t always go with the script. First plot change happened when the Emperor of China, Missy Lance, suddenly realized that Marco Polo, Matt Zuca was cheating on her and started trying to punch him in the face right there on stage. After that I might have had slight part in the curtains malfunctioning to split them up and accidently decked Rodney Sulley, one of the Citizens, who thought that Zane Cropford had done it and turned around to return the favor. Within ten minutes of the skit, the stage was total and complete chaos. I can tell that Dominico isn’t really trying to make everyone do this but his anger is bubbling over, releasing waves of violent magic. I use telepathy with the stage and costumes to try to keep things semi-controlled and stop anyone from actually getting hurt but I know that without the elimination of the source, these ignorant kids won’t stop. Even Jaz is in a brawl with Medla Stevenson over some minor fashion contradiction. Dominico stands right in the middle of it all with his silver eyes gleaming brighter than usual and a murderous look of rage on his face. He closed his eyes and I know he’s trying to calm himself. I don’t have time for him to find his ‘inner peace’ before someone gets hurt. I duck punches and kicks from hypnotized students and I race to the center of the stage. I grab Dominico by the collar of his shirt, jerking him forward, and growl at him,
“Redwind! Stop it! You’re mad at me not them!” Dominico casts me a look of rage.
“Fine. You’re right. I am mad at you!” he says and makes a grab for me. I ask his shirt to please hold him back along with his shoes, both who oblige. “What did you-“ Dominico starts, unable to move any closer to me.
“I’m not going to fight you here!” I exclaim.
“Why not? Scared witch?”
“We’re in public, stupid warlock! But later I couldn’t be happier to,” I tell him. Dominico still looks flaming mad but spits,
“Fine.” He stomps off, leaving everyone else to slowly come to their own senses. I look around the chaotic stage. I’ve never really liked the game Marco Polo but Marco Polo: Magic Edition is awful.
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Hey guys! It's only been 2 days since I updated last so I think I'm doing pretty good! What did I tell you, huh? More action than the last one? It's still picking up! And Faye didn't find any heart-stopping secrets yet....Mwahahaha! Tell me what you think of this next chapter! PLEASE COMMENT! I want to hear from you guys what you think! Or just tell me who is better: Witches or Warlocks? Who would you be? I'd put down Wizards too but they're like witches plus warlocks so that's not fair. Anyway, I hope you guys like it and I'll talk to you soon!
Yours Magically,
Rosewood7