Almonds and Cherries
For Wisdom and Divination
Just to have it said, Charmed had a cast for their show, and so do I. There are really five characters of my cast that you need to know, for the original will never change. Prue, Phoebe and Coop's daughter, is Kat Dennings, for I love her so much, she's such a beautiful actress and just amazing. Emilie De Ravin as the second daughter, Penny 'Loopy', and Josie is the youngest, so Chloe Grace Moretz. My favorite actress, besides Twilight wise, Kristen Stewart as Melinda, and Tom Sturridge as Sam, Paige and Henry's son.
Please, no grief, I did cast to personal preference but so would you.
"I could floss with that girl – I could floss with you – Little stick bimbos."
"Ugh!" I scream, shutting my door behind me, locking the lock without turning around, and I walk forward, take a CD out of my collection randomly and start playing it on the highest volume I can find, and then I flop onto my wild and unmade bed, and take a pillow from under me and scream into the zebra printed fabric. "Ahh!"
"Prudence?" My father asks, screaming from behind the door as he knocks, not pounding, yet. "Prudence, get out here, your mother and I need to talk to you."
"I have nothing to say to you!" I scream and then turn onto my side, facing the wall, and I end up laying on the remote for my CD player, and that turns it off, so I fish out my iPod out of my jeans pocket and blast The Clash music into my ears. I close my eyes, but that's not enough, so I take apart a hot pink pillow case for the melatonin and aspirin bottles I have stashed in there, I'm all out of adderall, and I take two melatonin and one aspirin, then turn on my side for my tin water bottle and take down three gulps.
Thrice is charmed.
I don't dream, I never do, which is weird, being psychic and all. When I turn over on my side, still not under my covers and in my blue jeans and my silk black tank top, but I feel weird – watched. At first I think my eyes are still closed, but I see my wall, right across from me, covered from top to bottom of posters of my favorite bands, mostly The Temptations, The Flaming Lips, The Clash, Joshua Radin, The Cure, The Ramones, David Bowie and Joe Strummer. Posters of colorful Wiccan symbols that me and Penny have mad – Gah! Not her, again.
I hear a rustling near me, and hushed whispers that I can make out, but the voices take time to be as clear to me.
"Shush, don't try to wake her."
"That's why we're here, dumbass."
"Don't call me a dumbass – you're the dumbass."
"Mel?" I ask, turning onto my side, and see my little sister Josie on the floor, her curly blond locks in pigtails, and I'm guessing she's dressed in her regular pajamas, the only pair of pajamas pants she has, rolled up pink and white plaid and a white crewneck shirt, her medium sized lips pouting, as it is her natural expression. She's fifteen, and a hit with the guys, unlike me and Penny at her age. She got the charm.
"Hey, sweetie," Melinda says sweetly as I try to sit up straight, and then Melinda sticks out her arm, handing me a bag of Doritos. "How are you doing?"
"What is she doing in here?" I ask, my eyes glaring at my little sister. Buffy Josie, as I like to call her. What? She reminds me of Buffy, except, I like her voice better, it's deeper than Sarah Michelle Gellar's.
Josie shrinks back, her shoulders slumping.
"Eh, we're here for mental support and back up," Melinda tells me and offers me her hand. "Ice cream?"
Now, who wouldn't get out of their refuge for ice cream? Especially for Cherry Garcia, which is mine, and forever mine, no matter how much Josie and I fight over it. Melinda brought a few cartons with her, the girl is a super mega chick, she brought pizza to make, cookie dough batter, microwavable popcorn, and three different flavors of Ben & Jerry's. She knew of everything, especially to not bring a second Cherry Garcia. That is mine, and mine only, not just the carton, but the flavor.
We're as quiet as can be, and Josie manages only to piss me off only a few times during the night, but I'm her older sister, isn't it my job to be pissed? Well, we watch a movie, finish our cartons quickly enough, and then get the Ouija board out, because, the true witching hour is at three a.m.
We fall asleep on the couch, I don't know when I wake up, but I do, and it's seven in the morning, I wake up to the sound of the front door closing, so I'm guessing Phoebe has left, and yes, I don't call my mother mom, because she's… she's more like our doctor, our psychiatrist, than our mother. I think she's spent too much time trying to help people than really be there for them.
My aunts always tell me of stories of how she was in high school, specifically Aunt Piper, Melinda's mom. They tell me about her wild days, days of high school and quirkiness, but she's rarely like that. She's never like that now. But I roll onto my side, and I see Josie on the floor, her head on Melinda's lap, and Melinda, looking like the surfer chic she is with her brown hair all tousled and curly, in her light brown sweats that looked pretty thin and a peach racer back. Well, I guess the fact that she is a surfer chick, helps with the allusion.
It takes me a second, a few stretches and breathes before I realize that a quilt has been put on me, and I wonder for a second if my mom put it there, but then I guess it was my dad, because he usually wakes up at five forty five to get ready for Magic School, where he works, teaching… teaching something that Cupids know about.
Sighing, I pull the quilt off and sit up straight, taking my time, and just… sitting there, looking at things differently.
I'm leaving soon, I'm going to be graduating in May, and it's February. Yeah, my mother just found out that I haven't, really, decided on college, because in her mind, I had decided for college just by getting into Brown, NYU, UCLA, and a dozen community colleges and two years, but I made my decision to not go, and that made her… mad, to say the least.
That's what the screaming and locking doors behind me was about yesterday, Phoebe and I got in this fight about how I'm still a minor and still her daughter, and how I'll always be apart in this family, and I'll always be Charmed. But what? Am I supposed to live with my sisters until my thirties? Wyatt, the eldest of our second generation, had a kid when he was seventeen, okay, the mother was eighteen and a heroin junkie, in rehab for the entire pregnancy and birth, but he has custody now, he's twenty two, living with a new girlfriend right now, someone who cooks.
He's lucky, and Chris! Chris, he met Bianca, his soul mate and love of his life when he was seventeen, okay, again she was older, nineteen and already with child, a three year old child, but that's what made Chris love her, that and she was an ex Phoenix assassin at the time. Now, okay, he's twenty, he's healthy, about to graduate from Stanford, of all places, and can't decide if he wants to be a doctor, teacher, or counselor, though he's edging toward doctor. He's having a hard time making choices, because he has too many, I just… I don't know where to go from here.
Doesn't mean I'm going to break into song.
Well, it's Saturday, and after my hell bent week, almost literally, I just want some peace and quiet; to sleep. Let's see, Monday, after Penny being possessed for two days, we were trying to save her, it took us until Tuesday, or, technically it was Wednesday at the time, because it was like three or four in the morning.
Charmed and Teenagers.
Yeah, it definitely works for us, de-possessing our sister in the underworld just a few hours before school and a calculus test. Yeah… Good times.
Thursday, well, that was Valentine's Day, and we're half Cupid, we love Valentine's Day, right? No, Penny likes it, because she likes making heart shaped ornaments, it's the only kind she can make, really, and she likes getting people presents, we always share presents on Valentine's Day. Dad always takes Phoebe out on a date, being all special and romantic, the little sap he is, and Penny likes to make cards for us, and give us little coupons, stuff like free foot massages, helping with groceries, shoulder massage, and the thing is, Loopy is pretty messed up, she sometimes doesn't give us free coupons, sometimes it's free foot massages for two liters of Lemonade, Pink or Raspberry, help with groceries, as long as I don't have to go along or actually put them away, just carry and my favorite – I'll clean your room if you clean mine.
Yeah, Thursday was a blast.
And every other Friday is family night, and that's an all night event, sometimes starting with a movie or karaoke or some embarrassment harassment our parents have cooked up for us Charmed children, and then dinner and dessert, usually ending with us at a book shop or browsing for music or DVDs or shoes, either way, it's like a nice little break, but at the same time, as much as it can be calming, it can be a thunder storm. My mother as the lightning, and Josie, Loopy, Dad, or even me as the clouds – the warning, the cause, the reason.
Of course, I've been a senior in high school since August, and mom has had every opportunity to ask about college, hell, I was applying last year, and she asks me now, what the hell? And we start talking about it, and our voices raise over everyone else's as they try to get a say or calm us down, but we just… clash.
Like my favorite band.
Now it's going to be a good day, and I'm not going to have to deal with anything, no bickering sisters, smothering mothers, homicidal, sometimes suicidal demons, I mean, after all, we are the Charmed ones. Thought not as strong as Phoebe, Piper and Paige, I don't think so, not until they die.
Which is ludicrous, because, if they haven't died in the past, then they never will, and well… I don't want them to die or anything, and I don't need it, I just want to be free, to not be compared, or to even be lesser Charmed because they are the greats and greatest.
It's like a Greatest Hits album, when the songs on there aren't always the ones you like.
But this will be a good day, and I'm looking nice in a pale green shirt, usually not my style, but today it is, that cinches in the middle, where, if you put your finger there, you feel the texture of flowers. It looks kind of weird, with one side being loner than the other and my breasts looking like they are bulging out, but that's just them, since the shirt is just my size. I think someone got it for me… I don't remember who. In my comfy blue jeans, I pull on my favorite pair of shoes, tall boots with studded crosses on the right sides. After makeup and hair, I'm on my way out, I grab my lap top bag, where, my lap top, of course, is as long as a few books, and an extra shirt I'm packing in case it gets colder out. I really only have one jacket, and that's enough, because this is my leather jacket I got from Forever 21, with the reddish – purple colored satin inside it.
It's very interesting, walking around San Francisco with both headphones in, listening to electronic of all kinds, some alternative and folk, but mostly British seventies music and some classic rock.
It's enlightening.
I walk to one bus stop, and wait for a few minutes before it returns and I get off a few blocks away from the final destination, still rocking to the music when I get there, and when I do, I spot someone leaving just as I'm coming up to the house, the woman holding a large folder to her chest as she closes the door, and then let her arm hang next to her as she walks down the steps, then she sees me and smiles.
I take out a headphone just as she greets me.
"Prue, well, it's nice to see you," she says, smiling wide as we come closer and hug. It feels nice to hug Aunt Piper, she always feels homey, like an actual mother, not a shrink. I hug her back, and we stand like that for a while, after all, it's been, what? Ten days since we last saw each other? Maybe two weeks, oh no, it was just before Loopy became possessed, so… last, Wednesday? Hmm.
"I've missed you," I told her truthfully, I can never lie. I'm a horrible liar, and I can't keep secrets, a hundred and ten percent Phoebe, is what people call me, and sadly, it's true. I just hope I don't end up like her, but as long as I'm the teenager her, it's cool.
"You've missed my cooking," she reprises, taking a step back, her arms still wrapped around me, like I'm a coveted present she doesn't want to let go. I love Aunt Piper.
"That too," I add sheepishly, smiling and then I kiss her on the cheek. "I love you," I tell her and start walking towards the door.
"I love you too, hon," she says as she walks toward her car. I open the door; it's unlocked, as always. The weird thing in this family, we're awfully trusting of one another, after demons and warlocks and vampires and everything, we still keep our doors unlocked, either that, or growing old with senility, and just being used to it.
I feel familiarity walking into the manor, yeah, it's not the same as our townhouse, ours is more cluttered, with only three bedrooms, two and a half bathrooms, and with Loopy just going from bedroom to bedroom. She doesn't like to sleep alone, and we don't really feel right, letting her after all of those suicide attempts, yeah, she's taking medication for multiple personality disorder and paranoid schizophrenia. She's not really; she just likes drugs, and is a really good actress, so it works. Though, ironically, it's starting to mess with her head… or she's messing with us, you never know.
Opening the door to Melinda's room, I'm not surprised to find her not there. Her room is kind of clean, in the way that it is pretty bare, but creative at the same time, she just doesn't need a whole lot besides her Wicca, art and surfing. I'm about to close the door, to just go up to the attic and check out the book and read books, but I walk to the dresser she has, and the wide antique mirror she has on top of it, choose a lipstick of hers, it's something pink and I try it on instead of my usual brown, taking a cloth of hers to wipe my lips off first.