Simon
Normality. That's how it feels to return to Watford after six agonising summer weeks in whatever care home I have been dumped in. It feels like coming home.
As soon as I walk through the opening gates to my school, my home, I am almost swept off of my feet by Penny's embrace, her magic washing over me like a vibrant sea of colour, sinking weeks of restlessness and agitation. I can hardly keep from grinning, so I drown my smile in my best friend's bushy hair. "It's so good to see you!" She squeals and can't stop chattering as we make our way over to Mummer's house so that I can dump my bags, her eyes bright and animated as she recounts her summer; seeing her like this makes me feel more awake than I have for months, as if for once the Normals are the far-fetched dream and not this spectacular world I have come to know as my own. For a second she slows down and stares deep in to my eyes, her stare penetrating me as it always does, yet her eyes are momentarily glassy "Oh Simon, you look terrible" she breathes. "The usual return from the Normals then?" I grin back, unnerved for only a beat and she just laughs, yet the worried crease in her brow remains.
After putting my stuff away, we head over to the dining hall for tea and sour cherry scones- Damn those scones are good. Sometimes I find myself dreaming about them after months of cheap, tasteless food in the summer. "So how's Micah?" I ask Penny through a mouthful of crumbs. Penny's face lights up at the mention of her American boyfriend "he's really good actually, we are really good". I smile at her affectionately. I'm happy for her, for both of them but I can't help the pang of sadness that I feel when I think about her going to live so far away after Watford. "Have you talked to Agatha at all since..?" she inquires. Agatha. Although she trails off, both of us know exactly what she's talking about. "No, you know that no one's allowed to contact me in the summer". Penny just nods but looks at me questioningly before sipping the rest of her tea. I look away.
After a few days, I settle into the simple, routine life that Watford offers me. I get used to being around friendly (although sometimes awed) faces instead of the cruel, thuggish ones that surround my summer homes. I get used to the magic in the air, in everyone and in constant use; pencil cases flying across classrooms and Penny reheating food that I take too long to eat. I get used to the luxury of my own room- one that I will not be able to enjoy for long due to the antagonizing existence of my roommate. Baz.
Although I hate to admit it, Baz may have one of the biggest influences on my life here at Watford, and most definitely the worst! He's evil, and I'm sure he's a vampire even though no one believes me. I still can't decipher why he hasn't yet been expelled for the numerous pranks and sometimes even crimes he has committed against me; like that time with the chimera… Merlin, I hate him. Still, he doesn't make the worst roommate- the anathema stops him from harming me inside the room and he keeps all his stuff tidy and out of the way (probably because he's worried that I'll mess it up). None of this stops me from worrying over what he's plotting next though, and I can often barely sleep knowing that he is just across the room, his almost silent breathing still ringing like a warning bell in my ears.
But perhaps the worst part about being roommates with Baz is the way Agatha, my girlfriend, looks at him. And the way he responds. Agatha is beautiful, the most beautiful girl I have ever seen, but not arrogant or stupid or silly. Agatha is pretty much perfect, which is why I wonder how she ended up with me- the most defective chosen one ever. No wonder she stares longingly at Baz with his flawless, marble skin and ebony waves of hair, not to mention his amazing power and control of magic. Merlin, I hate him and soon he will return and just about ruin every lesson we share with his constant mocking and unruffled responses every time I try to retaliate. Every time he smirks coolly at Agatha and she can't look away from his cold, grey eyes. Every time he murmurs something in her ear and she giggles like it's the funniest thing she's ever heard. Every time she gazes at him like he's the only boy on the planet.
Merlin, I hate him.
Time passes quickly at Watford, like a spell has been cast over me so that sunny days and tranquil conversations slip through my fingers, ungraspable as leprechaun gold, classes drawing ever nearer. It's not that I don't enjoy school here- it's the only place I feel as if I belong, as if I am tied somewhere or part of something bigger than myself, a crowd of unwanted kids and even my own uncontrollable destiny. I love being here, but I don't love the anxiety that comes with lessons, expectations and, of course, going off. Despite being fore-told for generations, featured in nursery rhymes for magician's children and taken from the unwanted kid's home by the Mage himself, my magic isn't like anyone else's, it doesn't flow through me like a fucking river or liquid fire or however anyone else describes it. When I draw on my powers, it's more like an explosion: irrepressible, wild, deadly.
I saunter slowly across the Great lawn, the last of the burning summer sun preventing me from moving any faster than an amble, even though I know that I'll be late for tea with Penny. As I'm passing past the big, wrought-iron gates I see a car pull up and I stop in my tracks. It's Agatha. I falter, torn between running over to her and pretending that nothing has changed or avoiding her completely. I choose the latter but wait too long and she's seen me and she's waving and she's smiling her pearly white smile (is it me or are her eyes not smiling with the rest of her face?) and in any case it's too late to run away. Raising my hand hesitantly, I try to smile back, all grimacing teeth and snarling lips. Agatha must see through my terrible acting as she stops waving and walks slowly but purposefully over to me. I pull her into an awkward hug that she returns half-heartedly. Smiling weakly into her sky eyes, I ask how her holiday was even though she looks uncomfortable "Fine, nothing out of the ordinary". She doesn't ask me about mine. Everyone stopped asking about my holidays years ago. We exchange a glance and I see in her eyes that she can tell that I saw her and Baz last year. She takes my hands in hers, mine rough and ugly against her porcelain skin. I wonder if the nothing I feel as we touch has always been there. I wonder if it was there the last time I saw her or if she felt a spark when she held Baz's hands like this in the woods last term, a burn of desire as her magic mingled with Baz's fiery one. I take a shuddery breath before I meet her gaze again, trying to make my eyes as unfeeling as possible. "Simon" she whispers and I can feel the pity in her voice as she tells me that we should take another break. As if we haven't had enough already. But this is how it has always been with Agatha; our perfect, inescapable destiny together too boring and too immovable for her, so that she has to pretend that she is free of it, for a time, before she comes back to me. And of course she always comes back. But before then is the awkwardness of her sitting away from me and Penny in the hall, alone and closer to Baz than to us (of course).
I feel the familiar anger stir inside of me as I think of Baz- his insane widow's peak making him as stereo-typical as a villain that tries to steal the hero's girl. The only non-stereo-typical part about him is that it often looks like he might succeed. (She'll come back, she'll come back to me.) (Will she? She will). I say a decidedly unemotional goodbye to Agatha (I'll see her in class) and go to meet Penny, my hopes of a picture-perfect few weeks before lessons begin and my enemy returns dashed in a creamy white hand and a soft voice.
Merlin, I hate him.