A Magical Moment

“So? What do you think?”

Taylor knows what she’s supposed to think. The look of expectant, self-satisfied glee in Aggie’s eyes tells her that she’s supposed to think this is the greatest birthday gift she’s ever received. And it is, isn’t it? Her witch girlfriend is offering to cast a spell that will enable Taylor to share in her magic powers for a full day. She’s going to be magic. It’s the kind of thing that ordinary people dream about. So Taylor swallows down the panic rising in her chest and puts on her most convincing imitation of a smile. “It’s... great!”

It isn’t great. It’s terrifying. Mortals are not supposed to experience this kind of thing. How does Aggie live like this all the time?

As soon as Aggie is finished casting the spell, Taylor can feel the borrowed magic under her skin like a living thing moving around in there. Is it supposed to feel like this? She spends the next few minutes feeling exceptionally paranoid, studying every person they pass on the street to see if they’re staring at her. The magic feels very, very visible. She feels like she must be glowing or sparkling or… something.

But, of course, Aggie walks around with these powers all the time, and if Aggie hadn’t opened up to her about being a witch on their third date Taylor never would have guessed it. Aggie looks just like anybody else - well, in Taylor’s opinion she’s about a hundred times more beautiful than anybody else, but she might be a little biased on that count.

Taylor looks down at her own hands. Her fingertips are tingling with unspent magic. Her palms are warm and buzzing. They look totally normal, though. The same boring hands she’s had her whole life.

And she hasn’t caught anybody staring at her, either. The magic under her skin may feel about as comfortable as a new and ill-fitting sweater, but it doesn’t appear to be anything a stranger would notice.

Aggie reaches over and squeezes her buzzing hand. “Awesome, right?” She looks so excited and proud of herself, like Taylor’s the one who’s giving her a present instead of the other way around.

“Right!” Taylor answers with what she hopes is an appropriate level of enthusiasm.

“What do you want to do with them?”

“Oh, uh, I don’t know.” Taylor rubs the back of her neck nervously. Just holding the magic in her body is weird enough. She isn’t sure she even wants to know what using it would feel like.

Aggie blinks at her in surprise. “You don’t know? Really? You don’t have, like, a list of things you would do if you had magic powers?”

“Nnnnnoooo? Do most people?”

Aggie shrugs. “Usually when people find out I’ve got powers they say they’ve got a list of things they would do with those powers if they could. But I don’t know. I’ve had them my whole life.” She gives Taylor a shy smile. “I’ve got a list of things I would do without them, though.”

“Really?”

“Uh-huh!” Aggie lets go of Taylor’s hand and starts exuberantly counting her list off on her fingers. “Wash dishes by hand, do laundry by hand, cook a meal from a recipe, fly in a plane…”

Taylor laughs. “I bet most non-witches would love to never have to do any of those things.”

“But not you?”

Taylor considers. “I guess not? I don’t really mind washing dishes and doing laundry and stuff. Like, it’s not my favorite, but it’s fine. And I actually really like cooking.”

“What about flying?” Aggie’s eyes light up. “Ooh! Ooh! Wouldn’t you like to fly?? It’s super cool.”

“Uhhhh…” Taylor’s heart starts flopping around like a dying fish. Flying. Everybody wants to be able to fly, right? She’s seen Aggie do it a hundred times. Aggie’s even taken her on a couple of short flights, and those were fine. Kind of exciting, even, although also a bit terrifying. But Aggie was handling the flying and steering and everything, and Aggie could only get them a few feet off the ground with the extra burden of Taylor’s weight. She’s seen Aggie fly much higher than that on her own. What if Taylor’s bad at flying? What if she goes too high and can’t come down again?? What if--

A warm hand touches Taylor’s shoulder gently, bringing her mind back to reality. “Tay? You doing okay?”

“Y-yeah! Doin’ great! Flying! Awesome! Let’s… Let’s do that.”

Aggie gives her a mildly concerned look. “Yeah? You want me to teach you to fly?”

“Mhm! Yup!”

“You’re sure?”

Taylor forces a grin. “Do I seem unsure? Let’s do this thing!” She gives Aggie a double thumbs up.

Flying is a terrible idea. Taylor should at least have asked Aggie if they could do the flying lesson indoors. As soon as she’s hovering and inch off the ground, regret floods her body. By the time she’s looking down on rooftops, she’s afraid that she’ll blackout and plummet back to earth.

Aggie seems like she’s having a great time, though. She beams proudly at Taylor, which gives her a nice feeling even though wow they are really dangerously high off the ground. “You’re doing awesome, Tay! Don’t you want to look down, though?”

“I’m just… really enjoying… all the clouds? And stuff?” If she looks down, Taylor’s going to see just how tiny everything is below her and how far away she really is from being safely on the ground, and then it’s all going to be over.

“The clouds are pretty amazing, aren’t they? Babe, you’re a natural at this!”

“Really? Thanks…”

“Hey, you wanna make this interesting?”

“This is already super, super interesting; I don’t see how it could possibly be more interesting.”

Aggie grins at her conspiratorially. “We could have a race!”

Oh, god, please, no. “A… a race?”

“Don’t worry; I’ll go easy on you since it’s your first time flying on your own.” Aggie points to a barn on the hillside over a mile away. “Race you to that barn!”

“Wow, that’s, uh, pretty far.”

“Yeah, but flying is so much faster than running! We’ll be there in no time; you’ll see. Besides, you’re in much better shape than I am. It’ll be fun to finally beat you in a race!”

“O-okay, uh…”

“On your mark…”

“My mark, uh…”

“Get set…”

“I guess I’m…”

“GO!” Aggie shoots off like a bullet toward the barn. Taylor follows after her as well as she can, feeling like she’s swimming through a pool of molasses. A pool of molasses that’s roughly thirty feet off the ground.

Aggie beats her to the barn easily. Taylor is just relieved that she didn’t vomit on anyone along the way or pass out and plummet to her death.

“Babe, you’re so good at this!”

“Th-thanks… Uh, c-can we land, now? Please?”

Once Taylor has solid ground beneath her feet once more, her legs collapse. She would kiss the earth, but Aggie’s watching her and she doesn’t want Aggie to think she’s ungrateful for her gift. It’s amazing; really, seriously, totally amazing. She’s full of magic! She can fly! It’s a dream come true! A very, very, very scary dream she wants to wake up from! But Aggie looks so excited and pleased with herself for giving Taylor such an incredible gift, and Taylor’s not a heartless monster. She just can’t bring herself to rain on Aggie’s parade.

“So, what next? You want to transmogrify something?”

“Do I want to what, now?”

“Transmogrify! Make something into something else! It’s really cool. Turn a lamp post into a sword or a teacup into a bathtub, that sort of thing. We don’t have to, though. There’s lots of other things we could do. Levitate stuff, summon stuff… Hey, have you ever played air chess?” Aggie laughs at herself and bops herself in the head with the heel of her palm. “Duh, of course you haven’t; sorry, I’m just so pumped to get to share all of this stuff with you.”

“Air chess sounds nice,” Taylor says hopefully.

“Yeah?” Aggie contemplates for a moment, her mouth pulling into a pensive frown. “I don’t know, though; air chess takes so much time, and I can only share my powers with you for so long… Besides, it’s not that different from regular chess, and we can play that anytime. We should do stuff you can’t do just as easily without magic, y’know?” Her face lights back up. “Ooh! You wanna talk to the dead??”

“Talk to the… You can do that???”

Aggie waves her hand casually. “Sure, I do it all the time. Mostly I talk to my meemaw; she’s a pretty cool lady. She’s got tons of great recipes, plus she has amazing stories about her time as a nurse in World War II. You could meet her!! Oh my god, I tell her about you all the time; she’d love that!” Aggie grabs Taylor’s hand and starts striding quickly down the street. Taylor really hopes she’s not leading her to the cemetery. “C’mon, let’s--”

Taylor digs in her heels, pulling them both to a halt. “Aggie, wait.”

Puzzled, Aggie turns to look back at her. “What’s up?”

Taylor draws in a deep breath. She can’t keep this level of discomfort to herself anymore. Aggie understands Taylor better than anybody else in the world. Surely she’ll be able to understand that a rejection of her incredible gift isn’t a rejection of her. Surely she won’t be heartbroken and offended and never want to see Taylor again.

Aggie rubs her thumb tenderly against the side of Taylor’s hand. “Taylor, what is it?”

 “I… I can’t. This…” Taylor raises her free hand. Every nerve sings with magic, and it just feels wrong. “It’s too much. I’m sorry. It’s such a cool thing you’re doing for me, and I don’t want you to think I’m ungrateful, but… This just isn’t me. It’s you, and I love you, but it isn’t me, and I can’t get comfortable with it.”

Aggie’s just staring at her with her mouth hanging slightly open. Her hand has gone limp in Taylor’s. Taylor can’t decipher from her expression whether she’s messed things up irreparably or if she can still salvage this.

“Say something, Aggie? Please? A-are we okay? I really do appreciate what you’re doing for me; I just--”

“You love me?”

Taylor’s brain takes a few seconds to adjust the trajectory of its spiral. A surge of hot blush rushes to her cheeks. “Um.” She really did just blurt out a declaration of love, didn’t she? It’s been perched on the tip of her tongue for nearly a month now, but she’s never had the courage to actually say it to Aggie’s face. Aggie’s eyes are wide and staring, but they look more surprised than upset. Under her shock, she looks like she might actually be… pleased? Taylor summons up every drop of her courage. She’s already said the words; she might as well commit to them. “Yes. I… I love you, Aggie. Is that… okay?”

“Is that okay??” Aggie lunges forward and pulls Taylor into a fierce hug. “Are you kidding me!? It’s the best.” She pulls back so that Taylor can see the look of pure joy on her face and the earnest light in her eyes. “I love you, too, Tay.” She cups Taylor’s face in her hand and leans in for a tender kiss, which Taylor is almost too relieved to remember to reciprocate. It’s so nice that Taylor is almost able to forget the magic bubbling beneath her skin until they pull apart again.

“S-so you’re not mad? That I don’t want your present?”

Aggie’s brow furrows. “Why on earth would I be mad about that? Magic’s not everyone’s cup of tea; I can totally get how it might be overwhelming if you’re not used to it.” She squeezes Taylor’s hand. “I do wish you’d said something sooner, though. You can be honest with me, you know?”

Taylor squeezes her hand back. “I know. I’m sorry. I’ll do better.”

Aggie smiles. “I’ll do better about making sure you’re comfortable, too. Sound good?”

“Definitely.”

Aggie takes both of Taylor’s hands in her own. “So do you want me to take it back now? It’ll only take a minute, and then if you want we can go find a better birthday present for you.”

“Actually… Maybe it can wait a little bit longer?”

Aggie raises an eyebrow. “Yeah?”

Taylor nods. “Yeah.” She smiles sheepishly. “Do you, uh, do you really think your meemaw would want to meet me?”

Aggie beams with a sudden and radiant delight. “The person who just declared her love for me?? Are you for real??? She would love to meet you!”

Taylor smiles, and this time it reaches all the way down to her heart. "Okay. I trust you." She links her fingers with Aggie’s. “Lead the way.”