The Talent of Kindness

“Cripes!” Peachpit stumbled onto stage and frantically swept the phoenix feather into the air just as it began to combust. Peach managed to get the fire hazard off the wooden floor and was rewarded for her efforts by a light sprinkling of ash landing on her black suede witch’s hat. “Magnolia, I told you to clean up after your phoenix!”

“Sorry!” A voice called from off stage.

Peach gave one of her classic sighs and began to sweep the ash off stage. When she volunteered to manage the school’s talent show, she didn’t think it would be this much babysitting. Half of these witches would lose their familiars if they were bound to their souls.

Just beyond the main curtain, she could hear the ruckus the crowd was making. That was a hex all on its own. A senseless gibbering that was making every girl on her side of things nervous and sweaty. Even Peach, who as far as she was concerned had no talent to offer or to be judged upon, was feeling second-hand anxiety for all her performers.

Especially the little one.

White-haired Apple Blossom was kicking her velcro shoes together in the wings of the stage. She was a first-year witch, which meant she was about as magical as a sunset. Definitely, not talent show material, if the dressing room gossip was to be believed.

“Mind if I park my ash here?” Peach scooted her small pile of flotsam into the corner next to Apple Blossom.

“Nope.” The young lady smiled up at her senior.

“Ready to put on a show?” Peach leaned on her broom and tried to look casual. Somehow she always managed to pull it off around girls, but as soon as a boy looked her way she was sprawled out on the floor.

“Mhm.” Apple clutched her stomach.

“Nervous belly?”

“No.”

Peach nodded along, then crouched down to the girl’s level. Looking casual was overrated anyway. “What’s your talent anyway?”

This is when Apple Blossom smiled, looking quite proud of herself. “I’m going to pull a rabbit out of a hat!”

“Wow!” Peached whooped! She glowed with the false pride adults reserve for children when they do mundane things. “I bet that’s going to be so cool! Where is the little guy?”

The young witch lifted up the hem of her jacket, and a tremendously fat bunny rolled out. With her Witch’s Eye Peach could detect nothing spectacular about the beast, it wasn’t even a familiar, just your run-of-the-mill morbidly obese bunny. “Ta-da!”

Peach smiled, charmed by the young girl. “That’s not a hat.” She protested.

“Well, I don’t want to spoil the show for you!”

“Mmm.” Peach nodded her head, making sure she looked thankful for the witchling’s generosity. “Thanks for looking out for me.” She stood back to her feet. “You seem to have everything handled over here. Do you need anything from me?”

Apple, who was all smiles and butterflies before, was now scowling at Peach. “You didn’t even ask his name.”

Again Peach couldn’t stop herself from smiling, she did smack herself in the forehead though. “Geez, I’m such a cretin. I’m very sorry Mr. Bunny.” Peach gave a bow. “To whom do I have the honor of meeting?”

“Melvin.” Was Apple’s laconic response.

“Ah, well Sir Melvin I can tell that you’re a professional. Is there anything you need to ensure Apple wins that trophy tonight?”

“Melvin’s gonna be my familiar.”

Peach nodded along. “I can see that. He’s a handsome boy. He’ll make an excellent squire for any witch.”

Behind Peach another one of the student volunteers tapped her on the shoulder. “Hey Peach, the gremlins are back.”

Peach craned her neck to the rafters, and sure enough, she could see sparks flying out from the lights. “Aww cripes.” She sat down on her broom and floated upwards. “Break a leg Apple, you’re going to do great!”

Poor kid, they were going to eat her alive. Everyone knew that the talent show was just for the older students to show off their fancy spells in front of the town. Younger students hardly ever participated, and definitely not first years. Geez, they must have been the only school in the whole state who didn’t have a single guitar player lined up.

Alas, some lessons had to be learned the hard way.

Speaking of which. “Hey, squares!” Peach floated up to the rafters where a dozen or so creatures sat around. The rat-like gremlins popped up the collars on their leather jackets as Peach joined them. One was chewing on a wire to a light like it was a line of black licorice. “I thought I told you jabronies to scram.”

“Hey, why ya gotta be that way, huh?” Zzzzrak, the leader of the pack said in his own cool way. “We’re just here to watch the show.”

Peach brushed away the gremlin who was chewing on the wire. “Well, no one’s going to see it if you turn off the lights. Besides, if you want to watch the show you can buy a ticket like everyone else.”

Zzzzrak swaggered over towards Peach with the unearned confidence of a monster ten times his size. “Well you know we would, but it’s like,” He shrugged. “We don’t recognize the sovereignty of human currency. Ya see we gremlins do all our transactions via mischief.”

Peached rolled her eyes, these guys weren’t even worth one of her sighs. “I know, and the exchange rate is terrible.”

“So then it would seem we are at an impasse.”

“Not really.” Peach tilted her head. “Scram or I’ll loose my familiar on you.”

Zzzzrak puffed out his little hairy chest. “Oh like we’re scared of some raven.”

“Not a raven.”

“Some talking fish.”

“Not a fish.”

“A fellow freakin’ rat.”

“He’s a cat.”

“A cat?” Zzzzrak squealed like an actual mouse, his big manly bravado not so big after all. “Why why why why, why ya gotta going bringing a cat into this? We’re having a friendly conversation and you pull the cat card? I mean really lady, your words have power. I can’t believe I gotta tell a witch this.” Peach just shrugged and raised her fingers to her lips, as if to whistle for Sebastian. “Woah woah woah! Alright, okay.” Zzzzrak held up his hands in defeat. “Fine we’re going, but next time you leave a sock unattended.” He snapped his fingers. “It’s mine.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” She shooed the fiends away like the vermin they were.

Down below the main curtains were opening up, and the show was beginning. The MC welcomed the crowd to the night of their life, while Peach stealthily descended down into the wings with the talent. “Melon Vine you’re up first.” She hissed to a blonde student and then began to corral the others in the order indicated by her handy dandy clipboard.

“Now put your hands together, For the fantastical, the fierce, the fire marshal’s worst nightmare Melon Vine!” The MC’s voice roared over the speakers, as Melon Vine’s choice of music kicked in and filled the auditorium.

“Pine, you’re on deck.” Peach tapped the next girl in line, and then let herself gaze out on stage. Melon was the number one witch in school, so her performance was guaranteed to be a good one. Even her practice runs during rehearsal sent Peach shrinking with inferiority.

With good reason. Out on stage Melon was kicking her legs high into the air with grace and power. Out from the tips of her toes fireballs shot into the air. She warmed the audience up with a few orange, and red, and yellow flames. Then once they thought they knew all she had to offer then came the blue, and the indigo, lavender, green, periwinkle, chartreuse, and pink. The audience gasped and cheered with each colorful display, not just at the wonder needed to produce such lovely colors, but by the choreography of her movements. Each kick, each spin, was perfectly timed to the music. When the song wound down, Melon took on a powerful stance and raised her hands to the air. Sparks flew from her fingertips, and danced in the air in high arcs. The audience stood up and cheered, but the mighty Melon wasn’t done yet. On each of her fingers, a tiny flame formed a different color for all ten, like a pilot light on a stove. Then Whooooooooosh! The ten-colored flames extended from her fingers in bright rivers of light and extended all the way up to the curtains. A klutz like peach would have set those babies on fire, but not Melon, no sir.

The audience was screaming their throats raw with praise. It was a fantastic showing for a witch who was going to go on to do things that no one in the auditorium could truly imagine.

All around her Peach felt the other witches shift uncomfortably, inadequacy infecting the lot of them like a plague. Poor Pine had to follow that up with her fortune-telling. Even so, the girl kept a brave face as she went on stage and set up her crystal ball, she probably saw it coming anyway. No it was poor Apple Blossom near the back of the line that was taking it the hardest. Her crying reached Peach’s ears and invaded her heart.

She abandoned her post at the front of the line and headed back to see what was wrong. “Apple, is everything alright?” She whispered, trying not to ruin Pine’s performance. Which lacked the music and explosions of the previous show.

The white-haired girl had her leather witch’s hat pulled over her face, no doubt decorating it with snot and tears. “I’m not going to win!” She bawled, miserably.

“Um, duh.” Peach laughed. “Of course you’re not, this is your first year here. You’ve got nine more years to get better. You didn’t want to join just to win the trophy did you?”

She pulled her hat away from her face, and yikes. She was about as red as her namesake and leaking from her eyes, nose, and mouth. “I guess not.”

“No, right? You wanted to show everyone your cool trick, and have fun with Melvin, I bet.”

She pouted. “No one is going to like my stupid trick now!”

“That’s not true, people will like it.”

“But Melon…”

Peach cut her off. “Who cares what Melon did? If you don’t let yourself do something because you’re not the best, then you’ll never have any fun.” She grabbed Apple’s hands. “We express ourselves because we need to, and because it gives us joy. We can look to others for inspiration and encouragement, but we can’t compare ourselves to them.”

“No one’s going to cheer.”

Peach squeezed her hands. “They’ll cheer.”

“How do you know?”

“They’ll cheer louder than they cheered for Melon because they’ll see that you did your best.”

Why why why, did she just say that? Maybe because it seemed to cheer Apple up a bit. She sniffed and sucked in a disturbingly long train of snot back up into her head. “Really?”

“Aww cripes.” Peach lamented her error. “Of course! I just need you to make sure Melvin’s ready to go. He struck me as a bit of a diva, so don’t let him back out on you, okay?”

“Okay.” Apple finally broke a smile.

“Alright.” She paused. “And uh, maybe wipe your face down before you go out.” She flagged down her stage assistant and had her take over the show. “I’ll be right back, I have to go take care of something.”

Peach darted out of the auditorium and ran around the school looking for any signs of the gremlins. The dumb little things always showed up when they weren’t wanted but the moment she was actually looking for them they were nowhere to be seen. Having checked every trashcan in the school with no luck, she went outside to check the dumpster, the queen trashcan. Sure enough, Zzzzrak and his cabal of rodents were having tea with her majesty.

“Hey, squares!” She called out. “No smoking on school property!”

Zzzzrak flicked a burnt-out bud at her. “Buzz off, we’re not going to ruin your precious show, okay?”

“About that.” Peach squatted down to get a better look at the tiny critters. “I’ve changed my mind, you guys can watch.”

Zzzzrak squinted his beady little eyes. “Well, maybe we don’t want to no more?” He crossed his arms and turned away. “You kind of hurt our feelings back there, being all rude and such.”

Peach almost sighed, but reminded herself that they weren’t worth it. “I’m sorry for stopping your obvious attempt to turn off the lights and ruin the show. It was wrong of me.”

“Was that so hard?” No one can look as smug as a gremlin who just got his way. “What changed, huh? Why do you want us?”

Peach smiled and held out her hand, so the rodents could jump on. “We just started accepting payment in mischief.”

When she got back to the auditorium, Apple was up next. That show list burned into her memory. Peach couldn’t believe she missed most of the show just looking for Gremlins. Why did she get involved in stuff like this?

Peach set each of the gremlins down on a chair in the rear filling up most of the back rows. The MC came out on stage and introduced the youngest performer of the night, Apple Blossom! The audience gave a polite round of applause.

“Hey everybody!” Apple screamed, not quite trained enough to have a stage voice. At least she made sure everyone could hear. “I’m a little witch, but what’s a witch without her familiar?” She paused, maybe for an answer, or perhaps a laugh. Whatever it was she didn’t get it, so she soldiered on. She struck a cute pose and popped her hat off her head. “Nothing up my hat!” She showed the empty accessory to the audience. “Do you see him in my jacket?” She unzipped her hoodie and opened it up for audience inspection.

“No!” Peach shouted from the back. She was a sucker for some good audience participation.

“Well…” Apple twiddled her fingers dramatically and stuck them into her hat. “Presto, Rabbito!” Not an actual magical incantation by the way. “Tada!” Out of the hat, game that fat little bunny we’re all so fond of. She hefted the great beast over her head and held it up proudly.

Most of the audience being young ladies meant the whole room filled with ‘awws.’ Melvin was really putting on a show. What a ham.

Then from the back of the auditorium came shouts of joy and amazement. “Did you see that? Did you see that?” Zzzzrak and his pack cried out in wonder.

“How’d she do it?”

“Where’d it come from?”

“I can’t believe my eyes!

And other such cries of astonishment and stupefaction. They hollered, they cheered, they clapped their hands, and created such a whirlwind of joy and excitement that they swept the entire crowd up in the revelry. The applause was infectious, and before anyone knew what was happening they were all on their feet giving praise to the brave little girl, and her incredible rabbit.

Peach beamed as the loving spirit overtook the room. Magic is sometimes more than fireballs and card tricks. People finding joy in making a little girl happy is magic too.

The stage manager looked at Apple glowing with pride, and Melvin who accepted the applause with the cool grace of a natural celebrity. In that moment as she basked in the glow of that little girl’s smile, she realized that maybe she had talent after all.