Pedro Madrigal the second was 15 years old with twin 20 year old sisters, Savannah and Sofia, a 42 year old widower father named Alexander Madrigal-Castro and the power to give people related to him powers, which his family called gifts.
ever since his mother, the previous owner of his ability, had died there was the mark of the miracle on his forehead and the back of both of his hands.
his mother had told him and his sisters about their other Madrigal relatives and how badly they treated her. Pedro had never actually met his maternal grandparents or his two aunts, but he did know his mothers own abuela, tia, eldest sister and occasionally all of the others except her youngest cousin and parents, were terrible to her because she was like Pedro and didn't get any powers on the appointed day she was meant to.
Pedro was thinking about all this while sitting on a line of stone bricks with his best friend, and crush, Juan Diaz. being attracted to someone the same gender as you, or switching gender was rare in their town but it wasn't frowned upon.
'love is love' and 'it isn't your fault if you were born with the wrong gender' were often said when someone was revealed to be one of these or even both, although that was even rarer.
"what you thinking about?" Juan asked, snapping Pedro out of his spiral of thoughts.
"oh nothing, I was just thinking about my family" Pedro casually replied, avoiding eye contact with Juan.
"you mean about how you never met your extended family on your moms side?" Juan responded.
Pedro nodded. him, his sisters and his father were quite close to his paternal grandparents, his fathers fraternal twin brother David and his adopted cousin Aaron.
"I'm just wondering how they're doing" Pedro admitted.
"its been 26 years since your mother left her old village, I think they're doing fine by now" Juan replied.
"yeah" Pedro mumbled before standing up, Juan quickly following.
"come on, my parents are making arepas" Juan stated, gesturing for Pedro to follow him as he began walking closer to the center of town.
"oooo, yeah! I love those things!" Pedro exclaimed before running to Juan's side.
.
the next day Pedro was walking through the streets alone.
he was wandering the streets randomly like he usually did, although he normally did it with Juan.
as he entered town center he saw his sister Savannah with her recently official boyfriend Daniel. he could tell they were flirting with each other because his sister was brushing her long hair with her hands, she always did that when she was doing anything romantic.
"hey Savannah, Daniel!" Pedro yelled, running up to the pair.
"Pedro! we're having alone time" Savannah stated once he was only about 5 feet away from the pair.
"but your my sister, I gotta make sure he's not treating you badly" Pedro replied, his mothers same sly smile on his face.
"I've been close friends with him since I was your age, he's not going to hurt me or anything" Savannah quickly spat back.
"well I've still got to protect my baby sister" Pedro replied in a sappy baby voice.
"I'm 5 years older than you!" Savannah shrieked back. steam had begun appearing at her feet. Savannah's gift was pyrokinesis, fire manipulation, while Sofia's gift was cryokinesis, ice manipulation.
"leave her alone Pedro" a voice calmly replied. a thin sheet of ice covered the back of Pedro's shirt as the person walked past.
Pedro looked to see it was Sofia, who was pushing her shoulder-length hair away from her face as she walked away.
"hey! no fair" Pedro stated, running to Sofia's side.
"Pedro, me and Savannah are definitely older than you. when we met you for the first time, we had already had our gifts for 2 weeks" Sofia remarked, creating a tiny ice cube in her hand just to show off.
"just wait until I find an ice spell!" Pedro retorted. because of being the host for the gift giving magic, Pedro could cast spells. but they were incredibly hard to come by. right off the bat his mother had the gift giving spell. she then found a light spell in some ruins of her own grandmothers old village a year before Savannah and Sofia were born. so the only spells Pedro knew were gift giving and creating a tiny ball of light in his palm.
.
that night Pedro couldn't sleep, he didn't know why but the stories his mother had told him and his sisters when they were younger kept spinning around in his mind.
he raised his hands in the air and stared at the yellow butterflies on the back of both of his hands.
after a few minutes he sat up and got out of bed.
he ignored the shirt he had left on a chair next to his bed for the next day and went to his cupboard.
he grabbed the headband and custom fingerless gloves from the bottom of the cupboard.
Pedro then opened a drawer of his desk he hadn't opened for almost 5 years and grabbed 3 small, yellow gems out of it.
alongside the 3 gems was a pair of hand chain bracelets and a chain headpiece, both colored golden. the 3 gems fitted perfectly into the spots of the chain accessories that touched the back of the hands and the forehead.
Pedro sat at the desk and placed the headband and gloves on the desk.
he then opened a lower drawer and pulled out a tiny bottle of glue.
.
when Pedro came out of his room the next morning he was wearing his normal outfit but now with the black headband and black fingerless gloves. the headband and gloves now had 1 of the small gems each. glued onto where the marks were underneath. his mother had found the gems alongside the light spell, the gems allowed her to use spells while covering up all of the butterfly marks, as long as there was at least 1 gem in a very, very small radius of each of the marks.
"you look different" Savannah stated as she walked by, leaning back while holding a large basket of clothes.
"yeah, just thought I'd try a new look" Pedro replied.
"well, we're gonna visit Abuela and Abuelo for lunch, tio David, tia Ana and primo Aaron will be there too" Savannah casually explained before continuing to walk down the hallway to most likely hang the laundry up to dry.
"thanks for telling me" Pedro responded before heading to the kitchen.
when Pedro entered the kitchen, his father was cooking some white rice and avocado while Sofia was making tiny ice sculptures at the table.
"no gifts at the table" his father stated, not even turning around to face Sofia.
Sofia groaned and turned all of her tiny sculptures into ice cubes and opened the window.
she then made the ice cubes leap out the window and into the grass outside to melt.
after waiting a few moments Pedro sat down at the table across from Sofia.
"hey" Sofia loudly mumbled.
and then their father came to the table holding a plate of rice and avocado in each hand.
he then put the plates in front of Pedro and Sofia and went to get him and Savannah's plates.
"so what's with the change of clothes?" Sofia asked.
"I just thought I'd try a new look" Pedro explained.
"weirdo" he heard her mutter under her breath.
he scowled at the word before he began to eat his breakfast.
.
"hey Juan!" Pedro cried as he ran up to Juan, who was waiting for him outside his house.
"hey Pedro!" Juan said, sitting on the fence.
"you wanna wander about?" Pedro asked as he walked in front of him.
"sure" Juan replied, hopping off the fence.
after a few minutes, the two boys had wandered into a more secluded part of town.
Pedro took a deep breath before talking.
"Juan, I have something to tell you!" Pedro exclaimed with nervousness.
"sure, what is it?" Juan asked.
"I...I like you, romantically" Pedro told him.
"oh, um" Juan replied, too nervous and shocked to give a proper answer.
Pedro looked at him anxiously.
"Pedro, you're a wonderful and powerful person and I don't deserve such an amazing person like you but..." Juan stammered.
the next thing Pedro knew, Juan had pressed his lips against his.
.
"dad" Pedro asked his father a week later.
"yeah?" he replied, in the middle of putting up the laundry.
"did you ever meet gramma and grampa?" Pedro nervously asked.
"oh, no. see when your mom was your age, she ran away from home and came here, I only properly met her almost a year after" his dad explained.
"did she ever tell you about them?" Pedro asked him.
"well, her mama had the gift of healing food and her papa was constantly getting stung by bees, which he was allergic to. besides that, your mom didn't really like talking about them, I don't even know if anyone in her old village is still alive" Pedro's papa told him.
"what was her old village called?" Pedro questioned.
"Encanto" his dad said, going back to hanging up the laundry.
a determined expression appeared on Pedros face.
.
early the next morning Pedro quickly got dressed, grabbed his mothers old mochila bag, quickly wrote a note that he put on his bed and rushed to his bedroom door.
he grabbed the doorknob before stopping in place.
"wait, how do I find my mamas parents?" Pedro asked himself, looking over at his bedroom window.
for a moment, he thought he saw the window sill move but he shrugged it off to the fact he had gotten up an hour before he normally did.
"meh, I'll figure it out as I go" he shrugged before leaving the bedroom.
he shut the bedroom door.
the sound of Pedro quietly sneaking down the hallway and leaving the house could be heard.
suddenly, the window closed on its own.
the sound of thunder caused a dim yellow light to be revealed in every gap in the walls for a moment.