The snobby girl came back into the room, leading Hailey. “It has to be a mix-up,” she said. “With the amount of money that my father donates to this school, I’m sure he’d want to know that I’m comfortable here.”
Hailey pointed to her clipboard and the squirrel on her shoulder chittered with annoyance. “I don’t make the room assignments; I just hand them out. It says right here that 302 is assigned to Bridget Quinn-McAddams and Samantha Blackburn.”
Blackburn? Her rich daddy must be Josiah Blackburn—the CEO of Castr, an up-and-coming magitek company in Silicon Valley. That explained the entitled routine. I cleared my throat. “Maybe we could change the room assignments, though? I could just switch with her friend. I don’t mind trading rooms so everyone’s happy.”
Samantha leaned closer to look at the clipboard. “Yes, that’s a great idea. I requested Diana Carter or Kelsey Patton. Which rooms are they in?”
“Hmm.” Hailey skimmed the list. “Ah, I see what happened. Diana and Kelsey are in 310 together, on the other side of the dorms. All three of you girls must have requested each other, but there’s only two beds per room. Someone had to be the odd one out.”
“That’s not fair!” Samantha flipped her hair over her shoulder again.
Mama Ashleigh switched into counselor mode. “I’m sorry, dear, but those are the rules.”
Mama Rosa kneeled down and scratched Kitten on her scaly head. “It’s okay. I’m sure you and Bridget will become fast friends. She’s a good roommate, very clean and quiet.”
Hailey nodded and left the room like the matter was settled, and my parents started unpacking my things with friendly chatter. Samantha threw me a sidelong glare as she left the room. We would not get along at all.
Which was fine. I only needed one friend, and that was Damian. Hopefully, the rich bitch would ignore me, and I could stay out of her way while I got over the little crush. It was all part of my plan to get through this school with as little human interaction as possible.
2
My parents unpacked everything, squeezing all the stuff they’d brought into the tiny space. The trickiest part was finding a place for my surfboard because I couldn’t just leave it on top of the Beetle. The closet was out of the question, since it was barely big enough for all of Samantha’s clothes—some of which still had the tags attached. Mama Ashleigh raised her eyebrows at the prices and warned us not to touch anything.
In the end, Mama Rosa leaned the surfboard, still in its case, up against the wall behind the bedroom door. I’d have to warn Samantha not to open the door all the way, or it would knock down the board. If it slid even a few inches to the right, it would crash down on top of my dresser. With everything so close together, that could cascade into a domino effect and knock over most of the other furniture.
I helped half-heartedly, but I was more interested in snooping around for clues about my new roommate. Everything in the room looked totally new and unused. There were no mementos, not even a picture of her rich father or a cheerleading trophy. Either this girl had no personality, or she hid it behind her designer lifestyle. I was curious about getting to know her better, but that was the wrong impulse. I quashed any desire to get closer to Samantha.
Once we’d unloaded everything from the car, Mama Rosa handed me the keys.
“You can use it to get around, at least until you get the hang of flying,” she said with a wink.
I tried to hide my relief at not having to fly for transportation. Even though the beetle was technically my car, I didn’t know they’d be leaving it with me for the school year. “How will you guys get home?”
Mama Rosa grinned. “I can still ride a broom, and your other mama can hop on the back.” She nudged Mama Ashleigh. “And we’ll take a shortcut to see your godfather.”
I sighed. By “shortcut,” she meant the Gates to the Otherworld. Most people couldn’t cross through the Veil except on special days when it was thin, but Mama Rosa had special privileges as the gatekeeper to the Gate back home. And by my “godfather,” she meant the tricksy Fae who was her patron—the magical being who gave her powers for her oath. He was always changing his name and appearance, but since a certain movie franchise made the Norse gods popular several years ago, he’d been going by Loki.
At least I wasn’t going along for the visit. Loki liked to tease everyone, so he could be very tiresome. Getting away from his constant jokes was one more perk for living away from home.
I could have managed without them at that point, but they insisted on tagging along as I went through all the first day registration checklist. First, I had to take a picture for my student ID, which they printed on the spot and handed to me still warm. We picked up several school uniforms in my size, white blouses and plaid skirts in blue and purple. They marked me as a student so people would keep an eye on me if I ever tried to do magic off-campus. Then I was fitted with a magitek bracelet. Once I had powers, it would let me use the magic locks to enter all school buildings, but it also tracked my location. Big Brother was watching.
Mama Rosa pulled out her camera, winding the film that she still insisted on using instead of her smartphone. She made me pose for a million pictures, saying that she’d choose the best one for our family Christmas card in a few months.
I could feel that my parents were stalling, but eventually, visiting hours ended. Time for them to say goodbye.
Mama Rosa grabbed me in a bear hug, and moments later, Mama Ashleigh wrapped her arms around both of us. Kitten nuzzled against my cheek. Their scents smothered me—a riot of herbs from Rosa’s witch garden and Ashleigh’s apple blossom perfume. But despite the awkward embrace, I clung to them for a few minutes. I would miss them so much.
Mama Ashleigh stepped back first with tears in her eyes, and Mama Rosa sniffled as she released me. Ashleigh slipped an arm around Rosa’s waist, and they stood there looking at me like I was going to my first day of kindergarten.
“Make sure you call every day to tell us how you’re doing,” Mama Rosa said. “And send some selfies so I can see your pretty face.”
I suppressed a groan. “I’m not going to send you selfies.” I pointed at her camera. “You have a bunch of pictures already, and I’ll see you at Thanksgiving in, like, two months. My face won’t change.”
Mama Rosa sniffled again. “You don’t see how quickly you grow up. Every day, you look more beautiful and mature.”
“Mama,” I said in a warning tone, looking desperately at Mama Ashleigh for help.
Mama Ashleigh patted Mama Rosa’s arm. “It’s okay. We’ll be happy just to hear from you. But have fun, too. This is your first chance to be on your own.”
I looked down at the tracking bracelet. “Feels like I’m just getting a new set of parents to monitor me.”
“You’ll forget about it in a few days,” Mama Ashleigh reassured me. She nudged Mama Rosa toward the parking lot. “We’ve got to go. The faculty are giving us dirty looks.”
I glanced to make sure none of my teachers were actually glaring at my parents, but they all looked busy saying goodbye to other families. I gave my moms one more quick hug. “Have a safe flight home.”
Mama Rosa grabbed her broom from the bike-and-broom rack by the parking lot and hopped on. Kitten braced for the ride by digging her long nails into Rosa’s shoulder. Mama Ashleigh sat down behind her, tucking her long skirt carefully so it wouldn’t flash people on the ground, and blew me a kiss. I waved as they rose into the sky, circled above the school once, and flew away.
Flying made me nervous. Mama Rosa was always trying to get me to ride with her, but I usually came up with excuses. I hated heights. Maybe it was different if you were in control of the broom, but I didn’t think I would be flying much even when I got my powers.
My heart already ached from my parents’ absence, although I would never have admitted it. I was used to seeing them every day. Without them, the school felt big and unfamiliar, full of strangers I didn’t want to know.
Tim
e to go find Damian. He could always cheer me up.
As I made my way to the orientation in the quad, I scanned the crowds for a tall boy with dyed hair. I didn’t know what color he’d picked yet, since I’d turned down his invitation to a spa day earlier this week. But the sea of purple and blue uniforms blurred together. It was like trying to pick one zebra out of a herd.
“Hey, dyke!” a deep voice barked behind me.
I spun around, craning my neck to look for him. “‘Sup, queer?”
Damian and I liked to joke around with each other. Sometimes that got us in trouble for using “hate speech,” but we used the slurs as terms of affection. Since he was pansexual and I was a lesbian, that made it okay, right? We were reclaiming the bad words for us.
He pushed passed a group of girls and stopped in front of me with a dramatic pose, one hand on his hip and the other straight up with a flourish. Talk about standing out! Despite being over six feet tall, he wore a plaid skirt, feminine-cut blazer and blouse, white knee socks, and black patent leather Mary Janes. Everything was tailored to fit his broad figure. His shoulder-length hair was dyed bright blue with a purple streak and pulled into two pigtails with purple bows. He’d done tasteful makeup, and he even had a monogrammed handkerchief folded in his breast pocket. He elevated the school girl aesthetic to a whole new level.
He pursed his lips and frowned at me. “I thought we agreed if I wore a skirt the first day, you would wear pants.”
I folded my arms over my chest. “My parents were there when I changed into the uniform, and Mama Rosa wanted a picture of me in the skirt.” I glanced around. “Besides, almost all the girls are wearing skirts. I didn’t want to stand out.”
“That’s the whole point,” Damian groaned. “We don’t know anyone else here, so we have to make a big first impression.”
“You’re doing enough of that for both of us.” I looked down. “You even shaved your legs?”
“Waxed.” Damian twirled around, showing off his smooth skin. “All part of the spa treatment, which you could have had, too.”
The skirt lifted a little too far as he twirled, and I threw up my hands to block my vision before I got an eyeful. “Whoa, dude, no one wants to see that.”
A group of boys whistled. Damian winked and blew them a kiss.
“Someone likes how I look,” he taunted me. He linked his arm through mine and tugged me along with the others. “It’s too late for you to change, so you’ll have to make it up to me later. C’mon, let’s hurry before all the good seats are taken.”
Oh, no. “Making it up” would probably involve something even wilder than gender-swapping our uniforms. I’d have to talk to him about my plan to stay invisible this year.
The orientation was above the quad in the Quarry Amphitheater. The campus tour we’d taken a few months ago had bragged about how it used to be a limestone quarry in the nineteenth century. Now it was a big slope of dirt with wooden steps and benches built into the hillside, surrounding a rock slab stage. One side of the stage ended abruptly in jagged boulders.
There was enough seating for the entire school, so our class of a hundred students barely filled the first two rows. I steered Damian to sit in the very back where we could avoid the crowd and look down at everyone else.
He pouted. “No one will see my outfit all the way up here.”
“We can play Name That Clique.” I nodded at the groups which were already forming in the other kids. Many were locals, so they knew each other, while others were naturally gravitating to those who looked like them.
He brightened up. “Deal!” He brushed a spot on the bench clean, then sat and crossed his ankles like he was having High Tea with the Queen. He pointed a French-manicured nail at the group of boys who had whistled at him. “They look like Jocks.”
“Too easy,” I said with a shake of my head. “You can’t use normal high school groupings. There has to be some sort of magical element.”
Damian leaned forward and watched as the boys took turns jumping off the steps to see who could leap the highest. “Broom Jockeys, then. They’ll be the ones doing all the flying tricks.”
“Better.” I pointed to Samantha Blackburn and two other girls who hovered around her like servants. They must be the so-called friends she’d wanted to room with. “The Queen of the Bitches and her coven of hot airheads.”
Damian snorted. “I’m not sure if that qualifies as magical. What about the Credit Card Coven? I’m sure their parents give them generous allowances.”
I told him about the roommate incident from when I first arrived, and he quizzed me on every detail, eager to catch up on the gossip. My face grew hot all again as I described it.
He smirked. “You have a crush on her? Oh, Brie, you always pick the absolute worst girls.”
I sighed. “I know, I can’t help it.” I gestured at Samantha. She and her friends had hiked up their uniform skirts to be extra-short and left several buttons on their blouse unbuttoned. “I mean, look at her.”
Damian licked his lips. “Yeah, I’d hit that.”
I punched him in the arm. “Shut up, slut. You’d sleep with almost anyone.”
“At least I put myself out there. You’re all wound up because you’ve never even kissed a girl. Trust me, once you’ve hooked up with a few of those hot bitches, you’ll get it out of your system. Then you can move onto someone with more emotional depth, like…” He looked around the crowd and pointed at a group of kids who mostly had dyed-black hair and thick eyeliner. “The Craft Reboot!”
I covered a burst of giggles with my hand. “Perfect name. But what makes you think I’d go for a girl like that?”
He batted his eyelashes at me. “Oh, please. You could listen to Tori Amos and read Sandman comics until your little goth hearts melt.”
I hit him again. “That was just a phase in middle school.” Although I still had a few Tori albums downloaded on my phone. Us redheads had to stick together.
To distract him from my lack of a dating life, I pointed out another group of kids who wore star-themed jewelry. “Astrology Nerds. Don’t talk to them unless you want to hear all about Mercury in retrograde and the Venus Gate opening up next month.”
“Not to be confused with the Techno Geek witches.” Damian found another group who were comparing smartphones.
“If you’re looking for a tabletop role-playing group, try the Wannabe Magikins.” That was a bunch of kids who wore furry animal tails and glittery fairy wings, like they were imitating one of the magical races. Some people had a hard time accepting that they were ordinary humans in a world with so many cool creatures.
Damian was really getting into the game now. “If you need a rose quartz, ask the Crystal Unicorn Girls.” That was a group of girls with pastel-colored hair and gem-encrusted fake nails.
“Ha, ha.” I scanned for another obvious stereotype. “I bet they offend the tree-hugging nature lovers, who say that mining crystals is harming Mother Earth.”
He nodded. “And they both offend the traditionalists, who will only perform spells that are at least two hundred years old.” He looked at me sidelong. “You might get along with that group, too, since you’re a third-generation.”
I shook my head vehemently. “I don’t want to talk to anyone about my family. As soon as I turn eighteen, I’m changing my last name to something else.” I hadn’t settled on one yet, but I knew McAddams had too much baggage. Still had a year and a half before I needed to decide.
“At least you have a magical family. These kids are all going to look down on me because my parents are ‘normal.’”
"I thought you had a sorcerer great uncle on your mom's side."
"Who lived and died in obscurity."
"Obscurity is better than—”
“I know, I know.” Damian knew my whole family’s history and my complaints. He nudged me. “I think we’re going to get in trouble if we keep talking.”
Several teachers were on the stage in formal black robes and poi
nted hats with the school emblem. They all had familiar animals, from the traditional cats to birds and reptiles. They just repeated things I’d already read in the handbook, but I leaned forward so I looked like I was listening.
“Magic is heavily restricted and there are many rules you must observe,” said the head of the academy, Dean Sparrowhawk. They were a non-binary person in their late sixties, with gray hair and wrinkles but a straight spine and sharp eyes. Surprisingly, Sparrowhawk’s familiar wasn’t a bird of prey, but a tiny quail peeking out of a pocket. When they swept their gaze across the group of students, everyone settled down and paid closer attention.
The dean held up a finger. “You will be tempted to practice the things you learn, but you can’t use any magic without a teacher’s supervision. That includes flying on your broom.” They shot a look at the Broom Jockeys. “Also, you may not choose a familiar until your second year. If you work hard and graduate, you will receive a license to practice magic for personal use only. This is called your first degree. If you want to use magic in a professional setting, you must enter our university program and earn your second degree. Finally, post-graduates can earn a third degree for the ability to research and teach magic.”
I sighed. Two years for the first degree, then four years for the second before magic could actually help me earn a living. It seemed like such a waste of time. And if I wanted to be a teacher like Mama Rosa, another three to seven years for a third degree. She didn’t make nearly enough money to justify that much education. My parents had only finished paying off their students loans a few years ago, and now they had new ones for me.
“I want to remind everyone about the dress code,” a stiff-necked older man added. His stern expression matched the stare of the frog on his shoulder. “Since it’s the first day, we will be a little lax. But starting tomorrow, anyone who is found wearing the uniform improperly will receive a written warning.”
The Reluctant Witch: Year One (Santa Cruz Witch Academy Book 1) Page 2