Lexi

I opened my eyes as the feeling of being on a roller coaster subsided. Propping myself up, I recognized the ceiling and everything under it as my bedroom. "Oh, holy crap," I said as I felt a huge bump on my forehead. Looking over at the window, there was a small crack in the glass. Wait a sec. Hope crept its way into my mind. "A concussion. It was just a concussion. Hallelujah!”

After a few seconds, my bedroom door sprang open as mom came barreling in looking like she had just woken up since only one of her eyes was open. "Lexi, sweetheart, what's the-" She didn't notice my vanity bench and took a swift tumble to the carpeted floor.

"Mom," I exclaimed moving to her side. "Are you okay?"

Mom groaned as she sat up. "In case you ever wondered why you are so clumsy, it's genetic." She shook her head and blinked a few times. "I'm definitely awake now. Why were you—Oh, my god sweetheart, what happened to your head?" She grabbed me by the chin while eyeing the bump on my forehead.

"Well, you see, the thing is,” I started sheepishly. “I couldn't sleep last night, so I went over to the window to watch the city and," I finished by pointing at the crack in the window.

"You thought knocking yourself out was the best option? Lexi, sweet pea, I have teas that do the same thing without the brain damage."

I rolled my eyes as I pulled my chin out of mom’s fingers. "No, I didn't knock myself out. I was looking down at the street and I saw something weird, and must've thought the window was farther than it was when I tried to get a better look."

Mom studied the crack for a moment before looking back at my face and just for an instant, she made her patented look of concern but then quickly changed it. "I wish I could say that surprises me, but I've seen some pretty weird stuff myself." Mom looked over at the door for a second before leaning closer and dropping her voice down to a whisper. "Don't tell your father this but the other night, I got up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and saw a man making out with a light pole. Lexi, honey, I watched it for ten straight minutes. It was revolting but I couldn't look away."

I grimaced as I imagined what it must have looked like. "Are we talking like a little lite kissing?" As mom started to form an answer, a knock came from the bedroom door, startling the both of us.

Dad stood at the entrance with an eyebrow raised at mom and me sitting on the floor. "Sorry for the jump," he said stepping into the bedroom. "Gloria, the painters are coming in around noon and why is Lexi's forehead three times bigger than it was yesterday?"

I pushed mom out of the way as I bolted over to my vanity mirror. "Oh, my god. I look like the freaking elephant man."

From across the room, mom hurled a slipper at dad. He caught it before tossing it over his shoulder. "Honey, that’s spousal abuse."

Mom took her other slipper off, readying it for another throw. "Joe, the girl is already bludgeoning herself to sleep. She doesn’t need you reminding her of her deformities."

I stood up and looked at them with fire in my eyes. "Keep it up and I will call grandma on the both of you."

Mom immediately stood up with her hands raised in surrender. "Lexi, sweet pea, there is no need to be irrational about this."

I walked over to my bed, picked up my phone, and turned back to them. They had already run out of the room and closed the door behind them.

Uh-huh. That's what I thought.

***

After getting dressed for the day, I headed down to the dining room where mom already had breakfast waiting for me. I sat down next to dad, who was caught up in his normal routine of combing through the news on his tablet. "How's it looking, dad? Is the stock market going to crash?" I asked while pulling the plate of waffles, pancakes, and powdered sugar drizzled fruit to myself.

"More than likely, but not today, sweet pea." He put his tablet down and picked up the syrup to pour over my pancakes and waffles. "A little-known fact is that the economy is always one wrong move away from collapsing."

Mom strolled into the dining room carrying a platter of bacon and eggs. My mouth immediately started producing an unhealthy amount of saliva. "Mom, as much as I love the starchy goodness, I can't eat all of this. I mean, I want to, I really, really want to, but we both know I'll end up needing bigger clothes. And then you won’t be able to go in my closet while I'm at school and try them on."

Mom sat down on the other side of dad and smiled sweetly at me. "Let's not forget who bought all of those beautiful clothes for you, darling." Dad stopped eating to look directly at mom. She put a finger up to him but kept her eyes on me. "Yes, Joe. You may have paid for them but I am the one who spent hours picking them out, making sure you, little missy,” she said pointing her butter knife at me, "would have outfits I never got the chance to even dream about. So, do I go into your bedroom to see if I can still pull off those little sundresses and shorts? You're frickin’ right I do. And you know what?" Mom had crazy eyes. "I still got it!"

I dropped my fork and knife as food nearly fell out of my wide-open mouth. "I was seriously joking."

Mom froze for a moment as she searched for something to say. "Well, I guess that makes two of us."

Mom and I both turned our attention back to our plates, simultaneously pretending that the conversation hadn’t happened. Dad, on the other hand, cleared his throat much louder than necessary. "Maybe next time you can take a couple of pictures with your pho-"

Mom and I both groaned at the man as we tried to eat before mom narrowed her eyes at him. "Joe, learn to read the room."

When the awkwardness from breakfast finally subsided, I kissed both of my parents goodbye. “Okay, I’m heading over to Christian’s to meet Cameron and then hang out with Fox after.”

Mom gave me a knowing look as she picked up the leftovers. “Fox huh? Has someone made a male friend, already?”

I couldn’t help but laugh as I took one more bite of bacon. “I sure did. But I wouldn’t get my hopes up if I were you. He has a crush on the assistant baseball coach, Mr. James.”

Mom let out a loud and overly dramatic squeal. “Oh, my god. Your first gay best friend! Oh, sweet pea, that’s way better than finding a guy that’ll probably be an hour late to pick you up for prom.”

Dad stood up from the table to pour himself some more coffee. “For the last time, I got a flat tire. But I still remember your gay best friend from college. He was two metric tons of crazy under a Diana Ross wig, and could make one hell of a drink.”

The sweetness in the air fizzled as mom sank into a chair and frowned. “Oh, Séjean. I miss him every day now that he’s gone.”

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My heart felt a little heavier as I saw the sadness in mom’s eyes. “What happened? Did he get cancer or something?”

Mom grimaced as she whipped her head in my direction. “Cancer? Why would—Séjean isn’t dead! He moved to Paris a few years before you were born.”

I threw my head back with a groan and headed for the front doors.

From the dining room, I could still hear dad. “You know, Gloria, we could always visit. The two of you still keep in touch on social media.”

My hand was on the doorknob when I heard mom. “Joe, you know I can't stand the French.”

***

When I was just a few blocks from Christian’s building, I got a weird feeling like someone was watching me. Stay cool, girl. Don’t get paranoid. The next thing I felt was a hand on my shoulder and I completely dropped my cool. My arm swung around, but I completely missed and almost smacked a complete stranger in the back of the head.

Fox wiggled his eyebrows and smirked. "It might be my imagination, but you seem to be on edge, princ—holy shit! What happened to your face?"

My shoulders slumped as I remembered the goose egg growing on my head. "Ugh, it was the dumbest thing. I was up in my room last night and thought I saw something through my window, so I went to take a closer look with a little bit too much enthusiasm."

Fox pursed his lips to keep from laughing. "Ouch. That couldn't have felt great, or been good for your ego."

I tried to check the swelling but winced as soon as I touched the bump. "You're not wrong. Pretty sure I need to get my depth perception checked. The ironic part is that I was looking out of my window because I couldn't sleep and ended up knocking myself out."

Fox scanned over the area for a second before leading me over to a vacant alley. "I'm not surprised you had trouble sleeping. I didn't sleep right for a week after my first night."

Wait, what are we talking about? First night in New York?

"Alright,” he said looking around again. "This shouldn't make too much of a light show, but if you feel some tingling, that's totally normal." Fox rubbed his hands together and before I could ask what he was doing, he had his palm to my bump.

A warm tickling sensation moved from Fox's hand through the surface of my bump, down to its center. After a few more seconds, Fox removed his hand and gave the spot a light tap. "There we go. Now, you don't look like you're growing another head anymore."

I felt around the spot on my forehead but the bump was completely gone. "What’d you do? Use a cream? I didn't see you pull any out but you did rub your hands together."

Fox looked at me like he wasn't sure if I was joking. However, the sound of footsteps heading in our direction made us both turn to see Sabine. "She thinks hitting her head last night led to a concussion and that she dreamt the 13th Hour."

A look of clarity spread across Fox’s face. "Got it. Sorry, princess. Wasn't a dream and no, you are not hallucinating this either."

Sabine stepped closer and crossed her arms while studying me. "Hallucinations are a real issue with you, huh?”

I threw my hands up at her. "Why are you even here? You say I'm always everywhere annoying you but I'm pretty sure it's the other way around. You’re always right around the corner of wherever I am."

Sabine turned to Fox who had chosen to stare at his shoes rather than offer her any help. "I'm not doing this again. Every time I try to have a normal conversation with your new bestie, she goes schizo on me. You explain it." With that, Sabine turned on a dime and walked away.

I ran my fingers down my face to calm myself. "Seriously, what is that chick's deal?"

Fox took a deep breath and turned me away from looking at Sabine. "It's not entirely her fault. Sabine's affinity is for the present. She can know where someone is in the moment. Sometimes, if she thinks about someone too much, she'll unknowingly make her way toward them. And to be honest, you’ve been on all of our minds since last night.”

My eyebrows furrowed as I studied Fox’s face for any hint of joking. “Just so we’re on the same page, when you say last night, you’re referring to what exactly?”

Fox let out a small laugh as a smile spread across his face. “Oh, I don’t know? Maybe the giant monster that nearly ate you. Or maybe you’re talking about how you used magic to chain Sabine to a light pole.”

My eyes widened before blinking uncontrollably. “S—s--so, that wasn’t a halluci—oh, god.” I grabbed Fox’s shoulder as my breathing came in fast and short. Staring down the end of the alley, everything was blurry and my knees felt like they were going to give out at any second. My head was full of fog and when the haze finally passed, I was sitting down against a building with Fox staring into my eyes.

He was rubbing my head while demonstrating breaths like we were in a Lamaze class. “Just in and out. Oh, there she is.” His smile returned. “Hey there, princess. You feeling better?”

I went back and forth nodding as well as shaking my head. It probably looked like I was having a seizure. Fox placed a hand on my cheek and locked his eyes with mine before his irises took on a golden glow. In my state of shock, I just sat there staring into his eyes.

The feeling that passed through me was similar to how I processed one of my really bad episodes. I had already been in a state of shock, but then moved through sadness, then anger, and finally acceptance. It was all familiar to me but happening much faster than normal. As the calm settled in, my entire body relaxed.

Fox stood up and reached his hand down for me to take. With one quick motion, I was on my feet and no longer felt like I was falling to pieces. Even while thinking again about the previous night, I still remained calm.

I cleared my throat, wiped the tears from my cheek, and turned to Fox. “Magic?”

He moved his head from side to side as he contemplated. “Kind of. That was a mix of guardian stuff and magic. My affinity is for the future. Gold light is my magic indicator but affinities are tied to innate abilities that don’t put on a light show. So, basically, I just sped up how you process trauma and reinforced it with some magic. The only reason it worked is because you were eventually going to calm down on your own. I just hit fast-forward. Like, by hours. That’s also how I healed your bump. Oh, and I got a premonition this morning that you were going to go hang out with some new kid. Thought I'd tag along.”

“Cause you can see the future. Right.” I scrunched my nose and nodded my head. “Guardians. Magic. A 13th Hour slash supernatural prison. And I’m somehow a witch. Did I get everything?”

Fox raised his eyebrows as he smiled. “I mean, there’s definitely way more, but that about covers it.”

I turned down towards the end of the alley and started my walk again to Christian’s apartment. “I don’t know if I should be relieved that I’m not crazy or disturbed that everything that happened last night actually happened.”

Fox quickly caught up to me with a little more pep in his step. “Yeah. Like Dorian said last night, it’s not exactly the easiest thing to deal with.”

I ran my fingers through my hair to pull it into a ponytail. “I can wrap my head around the guardian and the 13th Hour thing. It’s extreme, but I have a pretty open mind. What I’m having an issue with is me being a witch thing. Also, maybe we shouldn’t talk about this in the open.”

Fox bit his lip while keeping his eyes forward. “It’s New York. No one gives a shit. But, as for the witch thing, I’m right there with you. I mean, it’s rare, but there have been some witches who don’t develop their abilities till they hit puberty, but those are usually witches with low-level magic. Very basic stuff.”

I checked the street signs as we crossed an intersection to see how much further we were from Christian’s place. “Basic? I’m going to need you to get with the specifics.”

Fox nodded his head and sucked at his teeth. “Right. Specifics. Well, witches come in a variety of forms and cultures. Most of every, if not all, depictions you’ve seen in movies and tv or read in books are real. By low level and basic, I’m talking about things like tarot cards, or even a little mind-reading. Parlor tricks. Really simple stuff that passes unnoticed by humans. They never make much of a stir. The more powerful the witch, the more they can do. Like someone who works with herbs and potions. Depending on their level, they can make anything from an instant sleep aid to the Black Plague. Now--.”

I stopped in my tracks and grabbed his shoulder. “The Black Plague?!”

Fox shrugged his shoulders and nodded his head. “Oh, yeah. Not all witches are good. My point, though, is that it depends on the strength of their magic. But at the very top are the kind like me, Dorian, Sabine, and now you. Witches with strong magic will put on a light show and the color depends on their aura which is tied to their personality. Like how yours is purple. So, for you to have that kind of magic and for it to just now show up is a level of bizarre that I’m not used to. And that’s coming from a guy that has been around for, well, ever.”

Finally, at Christian’s high-rise apartment building, I took a step towards the glass doors but stopped as I processed Fox’s last sentence. “Wait. Been around forever? What--.”

Fox pushed me forward. “We can talk about that later, princess. Let’s go meet the hot new kid.”