AN: Can someone tell me why Sheila B. isn't on the character list? Unless I'm overlooking her.
"Focus Bonnie."
Bonnie Bennett took a deep breath, trying to relax her mind and her body. Ever since she finally accepted her Grams' revelation that she was a witch she has been trying to embrace it. She's been here at Grams' house every day since that whole incident of setting a car on fire at the car wash and nothing has happen. Not a flame on a candle, not a burst of wind. Nothing.
Bonnie is starting to believe in was in her imagination.
"You have to be in control of your emotions, baby. Especially when you're first starting out," continues Sheila Bennett. She has seen the frustration on her granddaughter's face and while she wants to help she knows it'll be better in the long run if Bonnie is able to hone and control her magic on her own. "Remember, magic is a part of you. You are magic. It's as much a part of you as your hair or your fingernails."
Bonnie nods her head. She understands where Grams is coming from. But she doesn't feel it.
"And remember, magic comes from nature. You are its servant. But it also will serve you."
Bonnie closes her eyes, determined to make this work. To make Grams proud. She calms her trembling fingers and holds out the candle, determined to set it alight, on purpose this time. She thinks about fire, its possible destruction, its possible rebirth. She thinks of the words related to fire—heat, flame, torch. She thinks of the words in the language she never thought about until now that Grams have taught her—ignis, fax, ardor, incendia.
Nothing.
Bonnie can't stop the tears that come to her eyes and she tries to hide them, although she knows Grams can see them well. "Maybe it skipped me."
"Bonnie," Sheila begins but is interrupted by the upset girl in front of her.
"Maybe I'm not that…good at this. Maybe the car and the candles were coincidences."
"Bonnie…"
"Maybe I'm not that good of a witch."
"Nonsense. I've seen your future. You're destined to be one of the most powerful witches our line will ever produce. And our line has produce really powerful witches."
Bonnie stares at her grandmother's raised eyebrows and the tiny smirk on her face. It was her 'just try and challenge me' look. Bonnie never did. The two times she had in the past she never won.
"We're taking the wrong approach. C'mon on, let's go." Sheila grabbed her things and Bonnie followed suit and soon they were in the car, heading out of town. The car turns down a long dirt road and drive a few miles before Sheila stops it. She gets out and before Bonnie can question her starts walking into the dense woods. Bonnie jumps out the car and follows in the direction of her grandmother, wanting to make sure she didn't lose her. After about half a mile they enter a clearing, circular in nature. It's obvious someone cleared this out and Bonnie wonders who.
"Witches did," Sheila answers without having to hear Bonnie's question out loud. "It was a place where they could gather and convene with one another without the townspeople getting into their business. It's protected by spells centuries old. Only witches can even find this place, much less enter." Sheila walks confidently into the middle of the circle. Bonnie stands on the outside, watching her Grams.
"Well, come on in child. No one has all day." Bonnie is hesitant, but she knows Grams would never steer her wrong. She slowly approaches the circle, unsure of her place. She catches her Grams' eyes and sees the older woman giving her a confident nod and Bonnie steps foot into the circle, one after the other, and that's when she feels…something. She can't place a word on it, but it encompasses her, surrounds her, reassures her. It makes it feel like she belongs here.
When she gets to the center Sheila places Bonnie in front of her, Bonnie's back to her front. She whispers a few words and the something Bonnie felt is gone and it just feels likes the woods.
"Like I said before, we are magic. But magic is also nature. Because we serve it, it serves us. And it does so by letting us control it. All aspects of it." Sheila brushes the hair off of Bonnie's shoulders, bringing it back behind the teenager girl. "We are in our natural realm. You will never feel more comfortable then where you are right now."
It was true. Bonnie felt oddly at peace in the middle of these woods, in this circle carved out by witches centuries before she was even a thought.
"Now, I want you to focus. I want you to close your eyes, take a deep breath, and just…feel."
Bonnie did as she was told. She closes her eyes and takes two deep breaths and focuses on all that was around her. She focuses on the smell of the pine trees and the singing of birds. And she waits.
And waits. And waits.
She's about to call out to her Grams when she feels it—a tingling in the base of her stomach that slowly, so slowly, but surely spreads up her spine and down her legs simultaneously. She feels it reach it toes and her fingers, and she felt it touch the top of her head.
And then she feels the wind, none when she got there but then a slight breeze that became more powerful the more she lets it. She can feel the swaying of the tree branches and the birds flying from tree to tree and the squirrels running up and down the trunks of those same trees and the grass, standing, reaching. She can feel it all. Bonnie opens her eyes and sees leaves, just beginning to change colors, floating up and down, side to side, swirling as if they were in a mini cyclone of their own doing. But it was her doing and she knows it is her doing. Something tells her to hold her hand out and she holds out her right hand, moving it left and right and the spiral of leaves followed with each movement. A smile as bright as the sun shines on her face and Bonnie can't help this feeling of euphoria. She did this. She is doing this.
"Bonnie, look." Bonnie glances back at her grandmother but Sheila is looking up at the sky. She follows Grams' lead and Bonnie sees hundreds of butterflies, their wings all colors of the rainbow, floating down around them. Several of the butterflies land on her arms and one even lands on her nose. A laugh erupts from deep inside of Bonnie.
"Grams?"
"Yes?"
"Am I…"
"Yes."
Bonnie looks at her Grams and can see a look of pride on her face, pride combined with love and respect. Sheila digs into her oversized purse and pulls out a small white candle and holds it at the base. Her smile is reassuring, and Bonnie knows what she has to do. What she can do.
And with the swirls of leaves and the butterflies surrounding them, Bonnie looks at the wick and thinks about fire and she can feel the heat rising through and out of her and suddenly the wick is on fire, the flame bigger than what would be considered safe. But she doesn't particularly care about that. She finally lit the candle.
Bonnie's eyes leaves the flame and lands on her Grams' eyes. They're green, like hers. It's a family trait. Her mother had green eyes as well and so did her great-grandmother. And while Sheila is happy to have this moment with her grandchild, she can't help but be a little sad and think that this should have been her Abby's and Bonnie's moment. But right now she wouldn't be anywhere else.
"Grams?" Bonnie's voice brings Sheila out of her thoughts and she focuses back on the teenage girl in front of her.
"Yes, baby?"
"I get it now." Bonnie shakes her arms and the butterflies fly away. She thinks the word stop and everything does, the leaves fall back to the earth, the wind goes away, the flame is extinguished, and it's now just grandmother and granddaughter in the middle of a circle of cleared woods. Except the something Bonnie felt when she first walked into the clearing is back and it feels like it's hugging her. Welcoming her. Bringing another sister into its folds.
With her eyes clear and knowing, she says the words that she feels so instinctively.
"I'm a witch."