No, Really

[intheheart]

Title: No, Really
Rating: PG for one swear word.
Summary: Andy's moms are witches. No, really.
AU: Magic
Notes: This is basically just Andy rambling. And Ivy doing SCIENCE. Or MAGIC. It's the same approach either way.


So, my mom is a witch.

No, I mean that literally, not as a synonym for the b-word. My mom does magic. Both of them do, actually. Mama's a kitchen witch, with all these domestic spells and talents that make life so much easier. Like she can get all the spots out of anything, no matter what you stained it with-- and I totally didn't test that out a lot when I was a kid, no matter what my moms say. Nobody can prove it was me. I was really careful about that, so there. Anyway, Mama can also do this wicked cool thing where she can pick up liquid. No, really. It forms itself into this little ball for her, like a water balloon without the balloon. It's awesome. Leah and I used to spill stuff just to see her do it, except she caught us and made us clean it up with the sponge.

Mom's got this weird healing talent. I say it's weird because apparently normal healers just fix stuff. Mom knows what's wrong, but she can't do anything about it, and it only works about half the time on people. It works all the time on animals, so she went into veterinary science instead of doctoring like my aunt. Mom says she likes being a veterianarian better than she'd like being a doctor, because animals don't talk back to you like people do.

I wish Mom didn't have that talent, because it always worked when you were pretending to be sick so you didn't have to go to school. Leah and I had almost perfect attendance records in elementary school and let me tell you, we hated every minute of it.

Anyway. My moms, both of them, also make potions. Mama's really good at it, although she doesn’t do it very often. She says it just takes a calm soul and a clear head. Which I guess is why Mom is so bad at it, 'cause she's almost never calm. She's really restless all the time, and she fidgets a lot, like she has so much energy that it spills out over the top. Most of the time when she makes potions they blow up.

Which is why I was kinda less than thrilled when she decided it was time for me to learn to make potions.

I have some talent. Mom says everybody does, although some people have the right mindset to do magic and some people don't. I don't really understand that part, but whatever. Everyone has the potiential, not everybody can follow through. I'm one of the people who can follow through, like my moms and my sister, which is apparently one of the reasons my moms adopted me.

Don't freak out. Mom told me that and then she said right after real fast that they'd have adopted me anyway because I was meant to be their kid, or whatever. I don't really understand that either. Not like it matters because I've been their kid for ten years now so they can't really take it back, so she really didn't need to worry. I've been over that whole abandonment issues thing for years.

Anyway.

So I got home from school one day and right away Mom dragged me into the kitchen. Leah was already there, perched on a stool with her eyes all big the way they are when she's trying to get her own way, and she was whining about not getting to do something or whatever. I dunno, she's like six years younger than me so I wasn't really listening to her, or to Mom for that matter 'cause I was really tired and school had been really stupid and I really just wanted to go screw around on the internet for a while before I had to do homework.

Except then Mom looks at me and says, "When you're thirteen you can learn to do this too. Pay attention, Andy, we're going to make a potion today."

Okay, even if I hadn't been really tired, remember that whole explosions thing? So I was like "uhhh" and then I was all, "Mom, I don't think that's a good idea right now."

And Mom just rolled her eyes and was all, "Don't worry, I know what I'm doing."

I'm just sitting there like, that's what I'm worried about but what I actually said was, "Shouldn't Mama be here in case something goes wrong?"

Mom shook her head. "No, that's all right. We'll clean up before she gets home."

Which was so not what I asked and did not, at all, make me feel better.

She had a pot of water boiling already, and she started putting stuff in, lecturing me the whole time about concentrating and measuring carefully and knowing exactly what your ingredients were and being sure they were pure, and all that stuff. I guess I'd be kind of screwed if she asked me to make it again, because I don't know what half the stuff she was putting in there was. I mean, I know there was salt, and something that looked like Diet Coke, and something that looked like broccoli, whatever, I don't even know. There was also a bunch of random stuff that just looked weird.

Then Mom picked up something that looked like a grape stem and Leah piped up with, "I don't think you should put that in, Mom!"

I don't know if Mom heard her or not, but she put it in anyway and then the whole thing made this weird whumph noise and then there were a few really confusing moments and then I opened my eyes and I had this goo all over me. It was green and it glowed and I was pretty sure it was radioactive or at the very least something I shouldn't have on me.

Leah I guess had been behind Mom or something, 'cause she only had a few glops in her hair. Mom was covered in it, like she was doing a weird new spa treatment or something, not that Mom really does spas. The three of us kind of stared at each other for a minute.

Then Leah giggled and told me, "You look like Marvin the Martian!" And then we all started laughing, and she said a minute later, "I told you shouldn't have put that in, Mom."

Mom flapped her hand. "I meant to do that," she told us both, very solemnly.

Not like we believed her.

Anyway, we got it all cleaned up before Mama got home, and even got our clothes in the washer so the green glowy stains on them wouldn't give us away. Mom even made us pinkie swear not to tell her, not that I would have, 'cause what Mama doesn't know won't hurt her. I guess we all looked too innocent or something because Mama totally knew something was up, but she didn't say anything because she didn't have any proof, and we went on all evening like nothing happened. Leah and I did our homework, we all ate dinner, we all watched Jeopardy (I won, but only by like, three dollars, and only because I guessed right on the Final Jeopardy. Mama was kicking everybody's ass up until then), and then Leah and me went to bed. Or Leah did, anyway. I stayed up reading for a bit, 'cause I'm allowed 'cause I'm older.

Anyway, I was just about to turn my lamp off and go to sleep when I heard Mama say in this really dangerous tone of voice, "Ivy, why is the ceiling glowing?"

Then Mom said, "Um. Would you believe radioactive lichen?"

See, I told you it was radioactive or something. I guess we missed a bit when we were cleaning, but in our defense, who thinks about cleaning the ceiling? Mama wouldn't have noticed if it didn't glow.

Anyway, Mama didn't believe her and they had this 'discussion,' which is what Mama calls it when they fight, and it ended up with Mom promising not to teach me anything with potions without Mama around.

Which, you know, I'm totally okay with. Mom might like things blowing up but I really, really don't. I like my magic nice and safe and predictable and not, you know, explosive. But hey, that's just me, because Leah apparently loves it. She was going on and on about how cool the explosion looked and how much she wanted to learn how to do it. Of course, my sister is nuts. And so is my mom, because Leah told me later that the thing she made was supposed to explode, even if it wasn't supposed to glow.

Girls. Always wanting to blow things up. I'll never understand them.