I really didn't feel well enough yet to be driving, so I walked to the nearest stop, and then took a light rail to the closest clinic. I hated the clinic, mostly because I had to come here so often despite how much I didn't want to. It felt like a chore, and a tedious and uncomfortable one at that. That and it always smelled sterile like antiseptic.

The nurses and doctors at the clinic were nice enough, and they recognized me by now and knew that I donated blood every week, but they didn't know the real reason I did this. Today the nurse on duty was nice enough to give me a banana bag first, recognizing the symptoms of dehydration even though it was entirely my fault for going overboard last night. I felt much better after getting some more electrolytes in me though.

The reality is, I was born with wild magic. I've had it since I was very young, and it started manifesting in the world around me back in grade school. Its genetic, not something I can get rid of no matter how much blood I donate, and because dear old daddy didn't want to deal with the problems that my wild magic creates, he only ever taught me to donate blood to lower the potency of it enough so that it won't rip the roof off of buildings or turn the couch cushions into potatoes. Yes, both of those have happened. But roofs can be replaced, and new cushions can be purchased, and for him, that was a lot easier than having to spend even a few minutes in a room alone with me. Not that he would have been much help to me anyway.

Wild magic is unpredictable, and incredibly hard to control, from what little I've learned about it from my own experiences over the years. Dad has it in his genes too, but not as strongly as I do, and he's been able to learn enough magic to use his to manipulate finances somehow. I don't know the details of it, but I do know he uses it to his advantage for his job and clients. Maybe Sammy wouldn't be so terrible at his chosen career field if he'd inherited some of the wild magic too, but he didn't. I don't know if it just skipped him or if he has so little of it that its useless. Lucky me, I must have gotten his share, because I have so much of it I can't even remotely control it.

Either way, I have it and its a burdensome inconvenience I have to deal with way too often. Donating your blood is a noble act of altruism for most people, but its a necessary evil for me. It doesn't matter how nice your nurse is when she's stabbing you with a needle every week, you're bound to end up hating the experience after several years of it.

Even with weekly blood draws, incidents like last night's melting and exploding glass are still bound to happen. They legally won't allow you to donate more blood than I already do, but even that isn't enough to keep all the wild magic I have contained all the time, so I still have to suffer incidents like every plant in a 2 mile radius blooming all at once, and out of season. Or accidentally freezing gasoline solid when my car went in for repairs. Or that time I was at a pool party and my wild magic decided it would be a great time to have a clear sky turn into a raging thunderstorm out of nowhere in under 30 seconds. Actually that last one was hilarious, and really easy to blame on the constantly fickle Colorado weather.

Needless to say, I have basically no control over it. I thought this week I might be able to postpone my weekly blood donation by a day or two since Rei and I had attempted that powerful summoning magic a few times the night before last, but I guess I was wrong. Wild magic seems to be the gift that keeps on giving.

Some days it just feels like a venereal fungus that won't go away, other days it feels like some sort of voodoo hex that someone put on me to suffer for all eternity. A lot of what should have been the best moments of my life were spoiled by this horrible genetic problem.

I haven't deep-dived into magic usage in the past, although I am aware that spells exist that can exhaust some amount of magical ability like the one Rei and I tried. Since most of them rely on control and an abundance of magical power, and I can't rely upon my magic not exploding in my own face above the very low-levels I try to keep it at, it seems pointless to pursue learning to become a witch. I'd never be able to be a very powerful one anyway, not with the way I have to keep bleeding out wild magic into donation bags every week just to keep my phone from being melted. Rei has been into magic for years, and she knows I have some, but I've never told her about my wild magic problems. Its humiliating to admit that even though she has so little magic by comparison, she's light years ahead of me in terms of control and ability just because of the nature of mine. And she's not a charitable enough soul not to mock me mercilessly about it if she ever did find out.

So wild magic is my own private hell. Never knowing when it might start acting up, never feeling like you're fully in control of your own life, these are all part of the package deal that is my life. I think I've done fairly well so far at not losing too many marbles.

Right as we were finishing up with my mandatory blood-letting, I got a text from Rei. Apparently there was a cold front moving in this weekend, making it pretty likely that some tornadoes could form. If anyone liked the thrill of storm chasing as much as I did, it was Rei. I texted her back immediately, telling her that if she did want to go storm chasing, to count me in.

Rei really was a great friend, I mused as the nurse put a piece of gauze and a band aid on my elbow. She had tried to comfort me earlier, which wasn't her strong suit, and she'd left me alone when she saw I didn't want to talk. I didn't have any delusions that I'd get away with this kind of behavior for long, because eventually she'd press me to talk, but until then I could be grateful for what a great friend she was.

I didn't really have anything else to do today, so I walked around for a bit, picking up the butter-laden garbage I'd promised myself from a Wendys and chowing down. It was nice weather today, a pleasant rarity.

As I was walking back towards the light rail stop, I noticed someone loitering outside the back side of the forensic lab I interned at. I didn't recognize him, but it was kind of far away. He looked muscular though, and he seemed to be looking for an entrance into the lab, even though the front and side doors really were the only two doors into the building. I shrugged and kept walking, he wasn't my problem to deal with. I didn't notice his eyes trailing after me when I went by.

If the forensic lab got robbed, then maybe I wouldn't have to do anymore shifts with Joe either. Now there was a happy thought. Not that the lab really had anything worth stealing in the first place though. I almost choked on a french fry laughing when I imagined him as some surly baby-daddy, come to steal some PCR test so he wouldn't have to pay child support. Honestly it seemed like the likeliest scenario.

My phone buzzed again before I could get across the street to the light rail stop. This time it was a group text from Mina, apparently she and one of the guys from last night were hitting it off and he'd invited her to another party tonight. Well good for her! Shows what I know, thinking she was dressed too much like a prude to attract anyone. She didn't want to go to a party alone though, so she wanted Rei and I to go with her.

Rei wrote back before I could reply. Sounded like she wanted to look through the spell book tonight to see if she could find anything that might explain the wild magic incident from last night. I shrugged off my guilt, not my circus, not my monkeys. Except, it kind of was my circus and my monkeys, I just didn't want Rei to know about it. I sighed, weighing my options.

I could volunteer to help Rei try to hunt down what kind of spell had done this, but it would just be us chasing our tails and me lying to her face, since I already knew it wasn't a spell that had caused the destruction. Option 1 off the table.

I could try to convince Rei to come to the party with me, so that all three of us could go together, but I did know my best friend well enough to know that as much as she loved parties, she loved magic more. She'd be like a blood hound on this issue until she figured it out, and I wasn't looking forward to that. And derailing her efforts now might give her enough clues to figure out it had been me. Option 2 off the table.

I could agree to go with Mina by myself to this party her new boyfriend had invited her to, but I didn't know who her boyfriend was and I still didn't feel back up to a full gas tank after how much I'd drank at last night's party. Especially after getting my blood drawn. Option 3 didn't look too appealing.

Final option, I could make up a lie and not go to the party with her, but that would leave naive, innocent, little Mina either going alone with some guy I didn't know and certainly didn't trust, or forced to turn down the only date invite she'd seen in so long I couldn't remember. I decided this was too cruel, and not something a friend would do to another friend, even if they were feeling lousy. Option 4 off the table.

I sighed, resigning myself to going to another party tonight as I texted her back that I'd be her +1. At least this time I wouldn't break any light bulbs, right? There's no way I could get into any serious trouble at a party the same day I'd donated blood to reduce my wild magic, and decided (just this very instant) now to drink any hard liquor at.

I was so, so, incredibly wrong.