For just a second, I felt awfully happy about all the good stuff Avenglade was offering me, then that feeling crashed.  “I feel bad about you and Lola,” I admitted.  “You moved here for me and neither one of you protested when I said I wanted to join the coven, but I feel like I’m getting all the benefits out of this move and you’re not.”

“I wouldn’t say that.”  Dana looked thoughtful.  “Lola’s getting the chance to attend college with us in town, which she didn’t have before.  And I’m getting the chance to sit back and rethink my life.  Becoming a doctor made sense, but now…now it’s not what I want to do.  I’m not sure just what is a good fit, but not that.  Anyway, though, I’m not just rethinking that.  You know what I said about my mom?”

I nodded, remembering our conversations about her.

“I’ve been wondering,” Dana said slowly, “if the reason she had me was because she felt isolated from the House, even if she was officially a member.  She was physically weak and knew she wouldn’t live as long as most of them, and I wonder if she wasn’t lonely.  I even wonder if she didn’t think she had permission to make me – from what I could gather, her and my dryad parent were involved for a while, and she wasn’t the kind of person to do something like that without permission, which makes me wonder if she asked and my dryad parent just thought it was a joke and said yes because they didn’t realize vampires could reproduce with them using blood, not realizing she was serious.

“Point is,” she leaned back in the chair, “my mom was a full-blooded vampire, but she had her own problems and burdens.  Then I look at Bonnie and her community, mostly shifters, and they’ve got their struggles right now, too.  And what you said about Rhys and his parents not understanding him.  It makes me wonder if we’ve – well, I, at least – have missed what’s going on in other people’s lives sometimes.  I’ve always assumed hybrids have the worst of it, or less ‘acceptable’ races like banshees or even people like male witches, but just because we are treated poorly doesn’t make other people’s struggles less real, you know?  Bonnie and her friends – that’s a very legitimate problem, being uprooted like that.  Just because shifters aren’t often discriminated against like hybrids doesn’t mean they don’t have their own struggles.  I think what I’m trying to say is I’m realizing that non-hybrids have their own struggles, too, and just because they’re different than what we deal with doesn’t necessarily mean they’re easier than what we deal with.  And I think that might be more important than what I’ve been focusing on for so long – that I have genetics from two extremes of magic.”

“Empathy,” I agreed.  “Like Violet, right?  She’s a fairy, that’s usually pretty different than vampires or banshees or dark magic witches, even, but she didn’t have any problem with any of us, and you could tell she kind of felt bad for me.”

Dana nodded.  “Yeah, like that.  I don’t know if her life is easy or not, but that’s not even the point – we feel more agreeable towards her because she treated us kindly and empathized, and that had nothing to do with what kind of supernatural she is.  There might be people who will never accept me no matter what, but maybe if they understood that I’m a friendly face – regardless of what species I am or what kind of magic I have – and that I empathize with them and their struggle, no matter how ‘big’ or ‘small’ it is, maybe that’s what I’ve been missing.  I’ve been too busy trying to convince people rationally to understand that I’m connected to them in some way, rather than trying to take a moment to actually listen to them and understand them.”

I considered that.  “If it helps,” I offered, “I actually think you were really good at listening and understanding me, but after I woke up, I wasn’t so much your patient, so I’m not sure how things are with your patients.”

She nodded firmly.  “That’s not wrong – you didn’t need my medical help much after you woke up, and I did relate to your story, especially how your coven treated you, so you were more like a friend to begin with and would have been an exception as a patient.  I think…I suspect I might not have been as open with the patients, but all that really tells me is you were right – being a doctor isn’t the right career for me.  I just wish I knew what was,” she added ruefully.

“Me too,” I sighed softly.  “Not just you, but me.  I feel so overwhelmed sometimes still, just trying to process everything, and while I mostly feel like I can keep afloat, if you will, I can’t start swimming.  I don’t even know what direction to try swimming in – most of the careers I was familiar with were from my town, related to coven life or simple town life, and half of those aren’t even available anymore and what else is available, isn’t necessarily something I’d want to do.  I just…don’t really know where to start.”

“Vocational counselors might be able to help both of us,” Dana murmured, “but it’s harder with you because we’d almost need to talk to a supernatural one.  It’d be really difficult to explain the full picture to a human.”

I wondered if it could be that simple.  Dana and Bonnie kept telling me not to stress about figuring out a career right this minute – some people could take longer to find the right fit for them, and that didn’t even include my background – but I still felt like I should be doing something.  I just didn’t know what.

I didn’t have a lot of time to wonder about stuff like that, though.  Now that I had officially joined the coven, Angelique was having members teach me how to make potions and some of them even volunteered to help me with magic.  One of them, a witch named Kelly who was almost as tall as Rhys, had previously practiced dark magic and only made the switch to light magic in the past couple of years, so she was pretty familiar with some of the basics and tried to help me figure out the extent of my witch magic.

On top of coven stuff, I was still learning from Henry and trying to take classes to get a GED, too.  Come to think of it, maybe Bonnie and Dana were right.  Maybe it was okay if I didn’t know all the answers just yet.  I had enough to keep me busy for now, and maybe after things settled down a bit and I got used to coven life – not needing as much training to do things – I’d be able to figure out better what my career plans could be.

Maybe it was okay to take some time to figure things out.

~~~~

“So this is my new place.”  Bonnie motioned us inside.  “Just renting a townhouse, nothing special, but there are several other supernaturals in the area, so at least that helps some.  Makes me feel like if something happened, I’d have someone I might be able to talk to.”

Lola looked around curiously, bringing with her a plate of cookies.  Lola and I did most of the cooking in our family, since Dana drank blood and didn’t exactly know how well things tasted together, and she’d been excited about bringing an official house-warming gift of food to someone we knew.  Apparently she’d never had that opportunity before.

“I saw a lot of kids outside.”  Dana observed, taking a moment to glance out the backyard.  It was fairly clear with just a look out there why Bonnie had chosen this place – the fences were tall enough people couldn’t see over them and the place was a little older, meaning the trees were well-established and helped block the view of neighbors from upstairs windows.  Meaning that Bonnie had a nice-sized backyard that was reasonably safe for her to run around in while shifted.

“Yeah.”  Bonnie smiled a bit.  “There’s an elementary school nearby, and there’s a park with some playground equipment at the end of the street.  I like kids, so I kind of like hearing them run around playing outside, even if I don’t know them.  Though I’m trying to!”  She pointed at a markerboard.  “I’m going around and introducing myself to my neighbors, humans and supernaturals alike.  I’m trying to write down who belongs to what house, kids and pets included.  I figured it could be helpful to know stuff like that.”

I nearly commented that Bonnie was taking this more seriously than I expected when I realized why.  To Bonnie, where she lived was her community, even if they were humans who didn’t know what she was or were supernaturals who may not feel the same way about it.  Bonnie wanted to look out for those around her, just like she had with us at the apartment complex.

Suddenly, I found myself a lot less worried about Bonnie’s future.  I knew she was still not adjusted to the idea of not living in a supernatural-only community, but she hadn’t realized yet that she was adopting the community feel wherever she went.  Maybe it wouldn’t be only supernaturals, but I suspected she’d adjust to that and be quite happy with human friends, too.

While Dana and Bonnie were talking about stuff to do with the house itself – electricity or something, I wasn’t sure – Lola came over to me, a slightly worried look on her face.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have come,” she murmured.  “Bonnie’s trying to make friends here, and if the other supernaturals see me, it might not be a good thing.”

“You’re Bonnie’s friend,” I countered.  “I suspect she’d chew them out if they had a problem with you.  Besides, we’re going to keep coming over and having dinners and stuff, so they might as well get used to it.”

She gave me a ghost of a smile.  “You’re so sure people will just get over me being a banshee.”

“Of course.”  I nodded immediately.   “If they get to know you, they’ll know you’re a sweet, thoughtful person.”

Lola gave me a real smile this time, a bit of embarrassment in her face, but her response was cut off by my phone ringing.

“Judging by the look on your face,” she observed, “I’m going to assume it’s Rhys.  Go ahead and take it, I’ll go tell Bonnie about my classes I’ll be taking.”

I bit my lip as she left, trying to hide my smile as I answered the phone, always happy to hear from Rhys.

“How was your day?”  I asked.  “How’d it go with your brother?”

“Work was fine, but,” he sighed, “it didn’t go so good.  Drew had his reasons and explained them.  He said my career influenced his interest initially, but now he’s just sure it’s the right fit for him.  He’s a smart kid, he seems to have good reasons for his interest, and he’s got his mind set on it.  It probably would be a good career for him, the way he explained it.  He’s definitely thought this out and it’s not just a whim.”

“That sounds good,” I responded cautiously.  “But I’m guessing your parents didn’t think so?”

“They were there, they heard everything he had to say, but…they still blame me for his career choice.  They only heard the part about me influencing his initial interest and think that if it weren’t for me, he’d never have thought of becoming a police officer.  Maybe so, but they missed everything that came after that, how he explained that it is what he wants to do and he thinks it’s the right thing to do.  They’re still too focused on the idea of him becoming a doctor or lawyer or something like that.”

I thought it was unreasonable of his parents to blame him for that, but also to even expect a particular career out of their kid.  Shouldn’t they just want whatever was best for the kid?  Maybe they thought they were doing that, wanting a career that would be financially stable and not physically dangerous, but Rhys’s brother was a nightwing, so he would be less likely to die in any police altercations anyway, plus, well…there was something to be said for a career that made you happy, even if it wasn’t the best-paying situation.  Look at Dana.  She had been a doctor for a few decades and didn’t enjoy it at all.  It seemed to me that forcing someone into a career they didn’t want wouldn’t have good long-term consequences.

“So?”  I asked a little more hesitantly this time.  “What are you going to do?”

He didn’t even pause before answering.  “I’m going to be a good big brother and support him no matter what.  I’ve let our parents dictate our relationship for too much of our lives, and I think he wants to break free from that.  He started working out with me a while back, but he never mentioned it to our parents – I think he wants us to be closer, but he also just doesn’t want to do what the parents dictate, so if he’s taking that risk, so will I.  I have a lot less to lose from it than he does, anyway.  Plus,” he sounded a little embarrassed and a little touched, “I’d like to be closer to him.”

“Good.  Then I support him, too, and so will Dana and Lola – Bonnie, too.  We’ll have both of your backs if you need us.  Also, you should have him over to dinner sometime, maybe – without your parents.  Maybe you can really talk to him, see how he feels about stuff.”  Currently, it sounded like they almost only encountered each other in their parents’ house, which was probably due to the tight strings Rhys’s parents kept on his brother, but if his brother wanted to break free?  Maybe knowing someplace safe to talk would be a start.  “And sometime I should meet him, too.  And Lola and Dana, too.”  Then I paused.  “Will he be okay with them?”  I asked a little anxiously.  “I know you are, but your parents had more of an impact on his life, but since he’s important to you, I really would like it if he would like them, too.”

“I’m sure he will.”  Rhys’s confidence was contagious.  “Besides, he knows you and I are soulmates – I may have mentioned that during our last workout, because I talk about you sometimes – so if nothing else, he’ll realize how important they are to you.”

I smiled happily, if a little shyly.  I’d told Rhys about us being soulmates right after we’d become official and Dana had explained to me what it meant.  As it turned out, he’d suspected as much, partially because of how he could almost sense me in a room, even when it was a crowded bar room, as a random example, and he wasn’t facing in my direction and hadn’t met me yet.  That was apparently more how soulmates felt for nightwings, but he was afraid he was overestimating himself and had been a little afraid to suggest we were soulmates, but hearing that I’d seen his eyes change colors relieved him on that topic – the same way hearing that nightwings’ soulmate clues were present with me for him helped relieve my mind.  It was kind of nice to know that we’d both recognized the clues, even if in my case I had to have someone else explain to me what it meant.

 “I hope so.”  I wanted to like his brother.  So far, from all I’d heard of him, he seemed potentially nice, but what mattered to me the most was that he cared for and supported Rhys, especially since their parents just…didn’t.