The door to the comic book shop opened and Hazel walked inside, shivering from the winter cold even in her big coat.
“Hazel, over here,” Eric said, waving her over.
With a grin, Hazel strode over. Eric was looking at the shelves for sci-fi comics. There was a new issue of Swifter than Light that must have just come out. Hazel picked it up off the rack and flipped through it.
“I’m not sure about the name Hazel,” she admitted, before tucking the comic under her arm. “I wanted to hold onto it, because it’s the last thing me, Summer, and Autumn talked about, but it just isn’t entirely sitting right.”
“Do you have another name in mind?” Eric asked, scanning the racks for anything eye-catching.
“Maybe Diane?” Hazel replied with a shrug.
“Diane Nguyen? Could work. I feel like I’ve heard that somewhere before, though.”
“I’ll think about it some more before I decide.” Hazel’s eyes drifted over to another rack, where a new issue of a magical girl comic sat, enticing her to draw closer. “How has your winter break been?”
“The tiniest bit lonely,” Eric admitted, folding his arms. “We used to hang out every winter break, remember? I didn’t realize I looked forward to that so much until I remembered that it wouldn’t be happening anymore.”
“I’m sorry about that,” Hazel replied, picking up the magical girl comic. “I figured that you wouldn’t want me around anymore, after everything that happened. Your dads probably don’t even want me to hang around me at all.”
“I never told them what happened, actually.”
“Well, that’s nicer than I deserve.” She sighed. “But, at any rate, I’m a girl now and they probably wouldn’t want us spending time alone.”
Eric chuckled, admitting, “You’re probably right.”
Hazel smiled softly. Things weren’t back to the way they used to be. They never would be, after what Hazel had done. But it was certainly a lot less awkward between the two of them.
“I wouldn’t mind visiting if we had more people over,” Hazel said. “If that’s something you’d be up for. But I think that all our friends are doing things with their families.”
Eric led them over to the merchandise section, nodding sadly.
“Yeah. It’d still be nice if we were able to do something together,” he said. “I like hanging out with you, but I hate that it always has to be in such public spaces.”
“I’m just lucky you want to hang out with me at all,” Hazel replied, her eyes landing on a little android figure standing on a shelf.
“You’re harder on yourself than anyone else is, Diane.”
Hazel frowned.
“No, now that I hear it in the wild, I’m not thrilled about Diane,” she admitted.
“Whatever name you pick is going to end up sounding beautiful on you,” Eric said.
Hazel couldn’t help but blush a little, and turned away so Eric wouldn’t see.
“I meant it,” Eric continued, “when I said I wanted to hang out with you more.”
“Well, there’s always some kind of sci-fi movie playing around Christmas,” Hazel replied, “if you think you can stomach the idea of hanging out with me at the movies.”
“I wish you wouldn’t put yourself down so much.”
“I wish I didn’t feel like I had to.”
They stepped over to the counter to pay for their things. It felt good for Hazel to be able to pay for herself for a change. That after-school job was definitely proving its worth.
When they stepped out into the cold, Eric said, “I’d love it if you could come home with me for dinner. My dads will still be there, so you don’t have to worry about us being alone, and they’ve been asking about you a lot recently. They want to know how your transition has been going on.”
“I… I’d like to, Eric, but I don’t deserve it.” Hazel frowned. “I don’t understand why you’re still so nice to me after everything I did.”
Eric paused for a long time, then scratched the back of his neck before admitting, “I do still like you, Hazel. I hated you for a while, it’s true, and if anyone else had done what you did to me I don’t think I could have ever forgiven them. But you’ve always been my best friend and if I’d known you were a girl all along we probably could have skipped all of that. I don’t want to lose my best friend just because we didn’t know that we could be in that kind of relationship. Dating Luna was fun, but I think dating you would be even more fun because of our shared history.”
“I… I still really like you, Eric.”
“Then how about dinner at my place tonight?” Eric asked, holding out his hand. “We’ll start slow and see if this works out even after everything that happened.”
Cautiously, Hazel took his hand. Eric curled his fingers around hers and smiled gently. Hazel let out a deep breath and bit her lip. This was going to be a huge gamble.
***
Traffic in the city really made Hazel glad that she lived in a relatively small town. It was past noon when they finally arrived outside the octagonal stone building. Rosalie’s mentor was away for a bit and she wanted some help with a personal project.
Rosalie brought them through the building and to a small room filled with shelves and a cauldron in the center. Up and down the pedestal the cauldron sat on were lines of runes that Hazel didn’t understand. Eric stood off to the side, practically buzzing with joy.
“Let me just put the heat on,” Rosalie said, sticking a wand underneath the cauldron and igniting a flame. “Alright. I’m really glad you two could come.”
“Happy to help,” Hazel said. “What do you need us to do?”
“In order to get to the next phase in my education, I need to submit an amalgam spell of my own creation,” Rosalie explained. “That’s a spell that’s some combination of potions, rune work, enchanting, anything like that, as long as it covers several categories. But I can’t ask anyone for help, I have to design it on my own. I’m hoping that having some friends do the mundane work, I can stay on top of my notes and perform the actual magical work. First off, we’re going to be preparing reagents for the potion.”
They were given cutting boards and Eric started chopping roots while Hazel crushed herbs. Rosalie continued lining up things that they needed. She kept referencing her notes, and Hazel could see the stress creeping into her expression even now.
“There are a lot of ways that magical energy can be harnessed,” she was explaining to Eric. “Some creatures have always been able to do it with the ease of using a muscle, like faeries. Every human has a similar magical potential, but on a much smaller scale, and like a muscle it needs to be trained repeatedly to be useful.”
Eric was listening with rapt attention. It made Hazel smile to see just how invested he still was in magic. Her, though: her heart ached at the mention of pixies. They hadn’t even been gone all that long, but she dearly missed Summer and Autumn.
When Rosalie sent Eric out to get a tool from another room, Hazel took the opportunity to ask, “Are you okay with Eric being here? You did have a really big crush on him, and now he and I are kind of dating again.”
“It’s fine,” Rosalie insisted, waving a hand dismissively. “I did a lot of soul-searching over the past few months. Honestly, I don’t like him that same way anymore. In fact, I’ve been texting a guy who’s studying magic himself.”
“Oh? Do tell.”
Rosalie chuckled, admitting, “I don’t want to jump the gun or anything. We’ll see how things go when we meet up in person before I start gushing about him.”
Once the potion was boiling and all the ingredients were in, Rosalie finally seemed to relax.
“We can get started on the rest after dinner,” she told Hazel and Eric, glancing at her phone. “And I think we deserve a treat. Follow me.”
The kitchen was very open, with small counters but no walls separating it from the main living area. Rosalie pulled out a small book and a bunch of ingredients. To Hazel’s surprise, she started mixing them all some drinks.
“Surprised?” she asked, seeing the look on Hazel’s face. “I enjoy a good virgin cocktail when I’m out here working. You’ll enjoy this. It’s called a pussyfoot.”
Hazel and Eric sat down on the couch with their drinks while Rosalie stoked the fire. She plopped down in a big chair and sat her drink on the side table. Rosalie pulled out her phone and fiddled with it for a bit.
“We’re just going to order delivery,” she said. “I can’t be bothered to cook tonight. What do you guys want?”
Once food was on the way, they started to get cozy. Hazel leaned up against Eric, slowly sipping her fruity little mocktail. Rosalie sat with her legs underneath her, facing the two of them but playing on her phone. Eric was asking her questions about magic, and in between moments of distraction Rosalie would answer him.
It was so comfortable. Hazel honestly could not have imagined something like this happening seven months ago. Not only was she a girl, she was actually dating the boy she’d had a crush on this entire time. Rosalie had gone from that one girl in the group who could do magic to Hazel’s best friend. At least, Hazel thought of them as best friends.
“Rosalie, are we best friends?” Hazel asked absentmindedly.
Rosalie chuckled and replied, “I guess so. Why?”
“No reason.”
A warm feeling bubbled up inside of her.
***
The school year was finally nearing an end. The group was gathered at the strange little coffee shop. They’d pushed two tables together to get enough space.
“There you two are,” Catalina said as Hazel and Eric sat down. “Did you just spend twenty minutes making out in the car?”
“Shut up,” Hazel retorted, her face turning flush.
Hazel had plenty of cute clothes now thanks to the after-school job. They were mostly what she’d fished out of the bargain bin, but they were cute on her and that was all that mattered. Now that it was finally summer again, she could even wear most of them.
Nearly a year of magical HRT had done wonders for her. It had been slower than Hazel would have liked, of course, but there was no denying that she looked the part of a teenage girl now. She only got misgendered by strangers a third of the time, and less often when she was wearing affirming clothes.
“So,” Jacob said, clasping his hands together. “End-of-year trip. We’re going to the beach, right?”
“That’s the plan,” Violet said, taking a sip of coffee.
Hazel and Eric exchange a brief look. They had been eagerly awaiting some unsupervised romantic time alone together. Hazel’s house was too small for privacy and Eric’s dads were, as Hazel had predicted, determined to keep the two from doing anything too explicit.
The door to the coffee shop opened and the little bell dinged. Hazel didn’t react; everyone she was expecting was already here. Then Eric tapped her on the shoulder. Turning, Hazel practically jumped from her chair at the sight of the yellow and orange pixies floating over to them in loose traveling clothes.
“Summer! Autumn!” she cried, scooping the two up in her arms. “You’re finally back!”
“Yeah, sorry it took longer than we thought it would,” Summer replied, pulling herself from Hazel’s grasp.
“How have you been?” Autumn asked.
“I’m great. Everything is great. Better than I could have ever hoped. Hey, you’re coming to the beach with us, right?”
“Beaches aren’t really my thing,” Autumn replied.
Summer rolled her eyes and retorted, “Oh you are such a downer, Autumn. You need to learn to relax and have some fun.”
“I’m plenty of fun, Summer, without needing to completely dive headfirst into any and every idea people come up with.”
“Good to see you two haven’t changed a lick,” Hazel said, scooping Summer back up into the hug. “So, tell us everything. Where did you go? What did you see?”
The attention was fully on Hazel and her pixies. Summer and Autumn exchanged a glance, then pulled themselves away from Hazel to sit on the table. Everyone around the table leaned in to listen closely as they began relaying their tales of adventure.
After a while, though, Hazel’s attention began to drift. She’d heard a lot of this already through the messages they’d sent her. While they regaled everyone else with their tales, Hazel leaned up against her boyfriend, settling comfortably into the crook of his arm. It was a comfortable place for her to be.
Hazel and Erik are so cute together ❤️
cute story
but also damn kinda disorienting for a story to suddenly shift to having a main character with my chosen name
I really like how everything is OK in the end
Thanks for the story!
Thanks for the good read!
It was a bit tough to get through sometimes with all the flaws the main cast had to work out, but I'm glad they all got there in the end. Kinda wish we learned more about "Frost" and/or Rosalie's mentor, though.