"Girls! Dinner's ready." Prue sighed, the last thing she felt like was dinner with another one of her dad's girlfriends. "Do we have to get rid of her already?" Piper asked her sisters. "I mean, I don't feel like having a fight with Dad again, it's not like we see him that much." Phoebe looked at her sister. "You're the ones always chasing them away, I don't have a problem with it at all." "It's two against one apparently Prue." Piper told her sister. "If you say so." "Gee Prue, no argument?" "Just leave it Piper." The eldest sister bit back. "What's with her?" Piper whispered in Phoebe's ear while Prue went downstairs. "Dunno" Phoebe shrugged her shoulders.
Mary's jaw almost dropped when they arrived at the party. "Act cool." Andy whispered in her ear, he obviously had noticed that she was impressed by the party. "Just act as if you're used to it." Mary nodded, still not convinced. "Where's Prue?" A girl Mary recognized as a cheerleader looked at her and back to Andy. "She couldn't make it" "Hi I'm Laurie" The girl introduced herself and she wasn't even acting to her like she was a geek. "Mary." She answered quietly. "Are you ready then?" Tom had joined them as well. "We have to go on." Mary nodded and followed Tom to the space where they'd put up the instruments. She put herself behind the microphone while the others took her position.
"Guys!" Dean had taken the mike and was asking the attention of his guest. "The band is gonna perform some songs for us tonight! Prue Halliwell couldn't make it tonight, but we introduce to you Mary! Take it away guys!" The 'audience' applauded as the band started their first notes. And Mary just started singing and the cheering of the others made her sing better than she'd ever done before, this was just amazing!
"This is really good, Joanna." Prue started the conversation. Victor looked surprised at his eldest daughter, why was she being so friendly? "Yes, what's your secret?" Now Victor was certain something was wrong. Sure, Piper loved to cook and knew a lot about it, but she wouldn't normally say anything like that when he had women at the table. Joanna was blushing. "Actually, it's an old recipe of my grandmother." "Really?" Piper did sound genuine, Victor thought, and he knew his daughter rather well. "My grams teaches me a lot about cooking as well." There it was. Penny, they were going to chase Joanna away by bringing up Penny. "It's important to have a good bond with your grandmother." Joanna continued. "I think so too." Prue joined the conversation again. "She lives with us." Phoebe added, just to say something.
"She sounds like a nice woman." Joanna didn't understand why Victor had warned her so much, these girls were really friendly. "She's great. But a bit too bossy sometimes." Phoebe grinned. "Dad knows all about that." Prue added her little sister's comment and got Piper's foot against her leg. "Aw." "Do you dear?" Joanna looked at Victor and grinned. "Yes, my mother-in-law is quite a handfull." It was best just to be normal about it.
"Do you have kids, Joanna?" Phoebe always asked that question, everytime Victor had a new girlfriend she asked that particular question. "Actually I do have children." But that was not the answer they usually got. Victor knew of course, but the girls didn't. "I have a daughter, Maura, she's eleven and a son Jay, he's five." "Our sister Paige is eleven as well." Phoebe said. Piper looked at her sister with a much meaning look, before freezing both Joanna and Victor. "I thought we were going to give this one a break?" She asked her sisters. "You just told her about Paige." "What's wrong with that, it's just the truth." "Yeah, but if we go a bit further she'll discover that dad was cheating on mum, mum was cheating on dad, you know." "Piper, you're overreacting." Prue interrupted. "Look, she seems nice, maybe we shouldn't dig too deep in her life just yet, okay?" Her sisters sighed. "Okay." Piper unfroze her father and his girlfriend. Victor apparently had noticed the change in his daughters and looked suspicious at Piper, who acted as if nothing had happened.
"You have another sister?" Joanna asked. "Half sister." Victor corrected her. "My wife has another daughter." Joanna nodded. Prue could see she was doing the math. "So Joanna, what do you do for a living." She quicky changed the subject. "I own a book shop." Piper eyes widened. "That's so cool" She loved reading. "Do you have books about wicca?" Phoebe asked curiously. "Actually my shop is specialised in books about the occult." "Oh really?" It was Prue's time to be surprised. "Why, are you interested in Wicca?" Joanna asked Phoebe. "No, I have to do research for school." "If you want, you can drop by after school sometime. Here's the adress." Joanna took a business card from her purse and gave it to Phoebe.