The beginning of class came and went the same as our other two classes. Lydia would walk in shortly after me and we would have a short conversation until the teacher came in and began her lecture. Then it would be another disappointing session inside the practice booth for me. Except that time, I wasn’t doing too much practicing.

Instead, I was trying to give myself the strength to ask Lydia if she wanted to hang out sometime. That should be easy, right? It’s not like I was asking her out on a date. All I wanted to do was be friends with her.

I practiced the hypothetical conversation a few times out loud with Dog standing in as my Lydia. He didn’t look too amused by it and was staring at me like I was crazy. But he still stood there and accepted the role as my acting partner.

It went like that until the time was up and everyone was leaving. So I picked up Dog again and waited outside of my room for Lydia.

When she came out of her room this time, she was completely dry. Though she still had her goofy smile and walked directly towards me “It really feels like I’m beginning to get the hang of this! How about you? Any success today?”

There still wasn’t even a hint of jealousy with me. All I felt was happiness for her “I uh, I did okay. Still a lot for me to learn.” Dog looked up at me as he knew I was lying.

“That’s okay, learning is what we’re here for, isn’t it? Did you read any of the books in there? That’s what I mostly did today, and I learned so much about a bunch of different techniques for Water magic! It was so fun practicing all the stuff I was learning!”

“Oh I read a bit of them on the first day but I haven’t looked at them much after that.” Dog gave me a little bark because he knew I was lying.

At that time, those books probably would have been valuable to read. Since I inherited my Fire abilities from my dad, he wasn’t able to teach me anything about techniques when I was growing up. Men didn’t even attend the magic courses during high school. And he never really cared about the history of Fire magic either. I basically learned nothing from him.

Everything I learned about Fire magic, I learned from school. So it’s not like I was completely oblivious to it. Just most witches learn a bulk of their magic from their parents. Too bad that I didn’t have a living parent that cared enough to teach me anything.

“Well I should probably get going now. Cordelia gets a little antsy when she’s out of the lake for too long. See you Monday yeah?”

This was it. I couldn’t let this moment pass me by “Wait!” I almost shouted, stopping her from leaving. She tilted her head to the side and smiled at me “Yes? What’s up?”

The nerves built as I used up all of my courage to call out to here. Everything I was practicing in the room completely disappeared from my mind. She was staring at me, waiting for me to say something, anything.

“I was uh… w-wondering if you maybe wanted to hang out one day? Like outside of class I mean.” my heart was racing and there was a bit of sweat on my forehead. I was so nervous she would say no.

But she didn’t. Her smile grew and she responded “I would love that! I’ve been meaning to ask you out one day as well, but I kept forgetting. I’ve been too distracted with school and some other issues I’m having at home right now.”

I was stunned. It was hard for me to think of the right words to say, and I needed to respond calm enough as to not scare her away “Cool! I’m look forward to it.”

She giggled “Yes, I just can’t this weekend. I have to deal with those issues at home and they could last the whole weekend. But any day after that I would love too!”

Without thinking, I became a bit too intrusive “Oh is everything okay?”

Even though I felt as if I was getting to personal, she didn’t seem to mind “Yeah everything is fine. It’s just some relationship issues, you know? Everything should be solved after this weekend.”

After that, we said our goodbyes, and she went on her way with her familiar bouncing behind her. I looked down at Dog who was already looking up at me. He was able to tell that I was in a good mood and it made him quite happy as well.

He wiggled around in my arms, signifying that he wanted to be put on the floor. It’s a rare moment when he’s actually willing to be walking around by himself, but I wasn’t complaining. I did as he wanted and put him on the ground.

“C’mon, we still have to stop by the store before we go home.” I said to him, and he gave me a happy bark in response.

My walk through town was different that time. I was no longer looking at the ground and avoiding looking at the groups of high school friends that gathered in the town center after school. There was nothing to be envious anymore. I had actually made a friend! Something good actually happened to me for once.

I was so happy that I basically skipped to the market.

The market didn’t allow familiars to stay inside, so I instructed him to sit outside and wait for me. He plopped his butt down and looked up at me with his tongue out and a big smile. I scratch behind his ears for a bit then told him I would be right back.

Usually when I shopped for myself, I would only ever buy the good stuff for Dog and cheap, low effort food for me. But that day, I was feeling really good and wanted to treat myself. So I got the ingredients to make my favorite meal, curry. I picked up an onion, carrots, pork belly, and a box of the spiciest roux available. I felt myself getting a giddy as I was checking out.

As I was at the register, I could see that Dog was still waiting where I left him. But when I met him back outside, he was staring off somewhere and was too distracted to see me walking up. So I said hi to him, where he looked up at me, then quickly back to whatever he was staring at before. Curious, I looked to where he was staring.

There was a nice breeze that day and the warmth of the sun felt nice against the side of my face. Everything had felt so peaceful. There were a few tourists walking around the town and enjoying the sights. The ward around the town caused them to see everything around town as if it were normal, which meant they never freaked out at the sight of magic or an animal that shouldn’t have been there.

Which is why I found it really suspicious that there appeared to be someone from out of town walking around the courtyard as if they weren’t affected by the spell at all.