May 20, 2018- My Recap of the Past 12 Years (Phoebe)
It's not very often you find someone you are completely in love with unconditionally. I found love with Coop. Coop and I were engaged in late 2006. He proposed under weird circumstances.
I had bought the pregnancy test, peed on it, and waited thirty seconds. There was a blue plus and I think I cried a little. Just kidding I cried for about an hour. My highly empathic Cupid husband must've sensed the tears and he Beamed to me instantly. After asking what was wrong, I told him I was pregnant. I showed him the test, and the three others I took before this one. At the time, I was at least two months along. We had a whirlwind engagement and two months later, we were married. We set up in the back garden of the Manor. We set up fountains with cherubic angels perched on top who sprayed water out of their arrowheads. It was very small, with only my sisters, my two nephews, Elise (who I had told about magic soon before that), my dad, Billie (who was the maid of honor), and some assorted magical creatures. Grams presided. October 28, 2006 was one of the best days of my life.
Despite being four months pregnant at the time, I barely showed. The next four months were all in preparation for our baby girl. My condo had two rooms and, of course, Coop and I stayed in the larger one with the bathroom. The smaller room was being used as a home office. I had Ask Phoebe letters everywhere, a corkboard full of columns and a whole other desk dedicated to the book I was writing. We bought the crib, the bassinettes, the changing tables; the diapers, the creams, so on and so forth and we set them up… in our room. We figured that we would have to wake up all through the night anyway, so why not have her in arms reach. Soon after, I gave birth to Prudence Joanna Hart. Coop had to have some records made so he could put his name on the birth certificate. He chose the name Cooper Hart and he was born on February 14, 1973. Valentine's Day (I shook my head at that one). I published my book a year later and the next year, I found out I was pregnant with my second child. By this time, Casey was a toddler and I had moved her into my office. I took all of my stuff out and set it up in the living room. When I found out about or new miracle, I knew we weren't going to be able to have two children in such a cramped space. We set out trying to find a house near the Manor.
We eventually got a house on Prescott just four houses down from Piper in a four bedroom, five baths. The money from my first book, Why You Shouldn't Do That and the advance pay from Are We Really Married? paid for the down payment for the house. By the time I was six months pregnant, we were living in our new home. By this time, I was still writing Ask Phoebe, and my book and the occasional article in The Bay Mirror. Elise made me second-in-command after Richard Dillard, the original second-in-command quit to be an editor to another paper; I took the job happily because of the pay raise. I released m second book the day before I had Parker Marie Hart. She had the same shocking blue color as her sister's. I took the recommended number of weeks off (okay maybe a week or two less) and I was scheduled to go on tour the following month. I didn't want to leave my children or my husband, but I wanted my books the sell. My kids come first but my work is important too. I left the kids with Coop and went out on a three-week book tour. I was number two on the New York Times Bestseller List for eight weeks straight after that tour and my first book, which I didn't have a tour for, was number five for nine weeks. I was ecstatic and Coop was so proud. With that money we went on a second honeymoon to Jamaica. That honeymoon brought about our third and last child, another girl.
Patience Elizabeth Hart was born on September 12, 2012, two months early. That was the hardest time in my life. I can't explain how it feels to think that our child is going to die. It was a very real possibility. I have no idea what I would have done if she had died and when I think about it I thank God she is still with us.
Casey started school two years later and I dropped her off to kindergarten myself. She started going to Magic School the summer between kindergarten and first grade because her powers showed themselves later than most peoples'. She started out with the power to slow down time. It was like a weaker version of Piper's power. She knocked a glass of milk off the table and I waited to hear the shatter of glass. By the time I got over to look he glass was about six inches above the ground, still falling. I laughed very hard and praised her. I gave her the speech about not 'pointing at things' in public and only doing it at home. The three year old Liza saw all of this attention and she decided to let us know that she had a power too. We set her in her baby bed (which was lined with rails) for the night. Coop and I sat on the couch to watch Gone With the Wind (one of my favorite movies) and in the middle of the movie we looked over to see Liza sitting there watching it with us. She looked at us and giggled. Coop knew what was happening instantly and instead of explaining it he asked me to watch. He placed her back in bed, closed the door, and we waited. Not even thirty seconds later a pink cloud materialized beside us on the couch. Liza appeared, looked at us and laughed. I tickled her and praised her too. Lauren didn't come into her powers until the summer before she was supposed to start school. She couldn't reach the cookie jar on top of the fridge and, already being denied permission to have cookies before dinner, she decided to try anyway. As I was sautéing some mushrooms, out of the corner of my eye, I saw Lauren twitch her finger and I saw the jar sail off of the fridge and directly into her head. I ran over to her and she had a cut on her head and it was trickling blood. She was unconscious. I called for Paige and she healed her. I hugged my daughter and explained to her what happened. She understood completely and from then on, until she started training at Magic School, she was afraid to use her powers.
My powers were restored to me in early 2007. Well empathy was granted back to me in early 2007. Levitation was for ever lost and I really didn't miss it. It helped in the middle of a fight, but whenever I used it, it felt wrong. My premonitions were now in full color, and for all of my premonitions of the future, I seemed to posses someone else's powers and I saw things in their point of view. I got more information this way. My empathy allowed me to feel the emotional climate of the vision enabling me to get a really good read of what was going on. My empathy grew to. A couple of years later, as I was negotiating a deal for my first book, I saw that, if I thought hard enough, I could push my thoughts into the heads of others. For example, the number I was thinking off in my head, the agent said out loud. It was as if I was controlling his thoughts. This came in handy a lot, especially in the heat of a battle when I can't talk to my sisters. So I had this great new power, the greatest family ever and a very successful career. So life is good right? Well yeah… until the demons came back.