#fun fact this won't even be musically jarring in a 'where the fuck did this motif come from' way

[roseverdict]

things that might be a sign that i need sleep: when i combine the 20020 "how many teams are in this game" reveal progression with charles' song from thsc and realize "wait this actually works out really well for a scene in that viddygame in my brain"

it looks like this without even needing to transpose anything btw

[boop-le-snoot]

masterpost • main masterlist • taglist & faq

previously on...

Chapter 1! Reader's job has no chill and Wanda means well (Tony does too), but, as we know, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Reader discovers the source of some peculiar things and can't help but be overcome with curiosity. F-bombs galore!

Fun fact: this story's main soundtrack is Claire de Lune, for some reason. Usually I can't stand classical music.

I didn't anticipate my first day at the bodega to be remarkful in any way but I was quickly proven wrong. My expectations were low: few customers, some of them flat-earthers of the garden variety, perhaps one or two of those 'witches' from social media blogging platforms and an overzealous Satanist or two, since I was pretty sure I saw an Ouija board and a silver pentagram hanging in Odette's office on the day of the interview.

Boy was I wrong.

We averaged a customer every fifteen minutes with each person requesting increasingly strange items: healing quartz and sage were on the closer end of normal; I felt like I had teleported to Hogwarts and was now attending Professor Snape's Advanced Potions class, having to race between the high shelves and memorize the exact location of each and every ingredient. In the end, I sacrificed a few dollars and bought one of the beautiful, leather-bound notebooks off Odette to write down the shelf and position number for the most commonly requested items and planned to begin memorizing them at home.

There's a little bit of Ravenclaw in all of us, I supposed. My curiosity only extended further: sometimes, a haggard looking person would come up and declare they had an appointment with Odette and was quickly whisked away by my boss to her office, coming out looking slightly less haggard in about half an hour or so.

I adapted to the routine fairly quickly, choosing to make my personal peace with the strange customers and Odette's mysterious meetings: after all, I got the job because I needed money - who was I to judge her for doing Tarot readings and spiritual séances for an extra dollar?

The bodega's atmosphere did grow on me rather quickly, as I had thought it would. It was warm and homely even on the rainiest afternoons, there was an unlimited supply of herbal tea, free of charge, and I grew to appreciate it just like I learned to find the positives in my job at the café. That remained a constant, mildly interesting affair too - my regulars, especially the superheroes, had started coming in during the morning hours and we were able to resume our chit-chats without a hitch.

Wanda still fished for my most recent, memorable reading and Dr. Banner left his incomprehensible scribbles on every napkin within an arm's reach for me to return to him on his next visit. The fully grown man with multiple PhDs didn't fail to blush like a schoolgirl every single time it happened, causing Mr. Stark to double on his own salacious jokes, should the engineer have had come with. They often came together, blabbering things I couldn't even fathom understanding even with the help of Google.

"Penny for your thoughts?" Wanda sounded surprisingly chipper for it was freaking seven in the morning.

I blanched, banging my arm against the display door painfully with a softly muttered, "Fuck!".

The witch frowned. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," I muttered, hoping my face wasn't portraying the mixture of confusion and fear that I felt. "Something weird happened at my other job yesterday, I'm still processing," I replied honestly, looking to the side.

In fairness, I didn't know what to think. The situation wasn't something that should have shocked me, with aliens and magic people an abundance in NYC, but seeing it with my own two eyes had been jarring.

A limping, paranoid young man had arrived for an appointment with Odette shortly before closing time; I had escorted him to her office without as much as a blink, only noticing he was dripping oddly colored blood when the door behind him had closed. I cleaned it up, dead set on confronting Odette about the obviously injured person - the blood, it was more of an attempt to clean it, since it merely stuck to the rag, refusing to wash off it with water or any of the organic cleaning solutions kept under the sink.

I had to leave the rag in a paper bag, acutely aware of the fact it could not have belonged to a normal person. My best guess was that a man was a mutant - NYC had plenty of them living behind a blue wall. Odette's office wasn't soundproof: I heard a pained yelp and then a vocalisation of relief as whatever was causing the man to bleed had been removed. In a few minutes while I was closing the cash register, he came out looking almost brand new - and as I paid him a more careful look, he was missing his scleras, leaving his eyes to look slightly terrifying.

And then he winked at me, a surprisingly human, boyish gesture - the smile that crawled up my face was purely automatic. I was sure it looked frozen. He disappeared without a word as Odette herself emerged from the backrooms, a tired sheen to her brow.

"Did you manage to clean up?" She asked, eyebrows raised at the lack of stains on the hardwood floors.

"It stuck to the rag," I replied, eyeing her warily. "The rag is in the unmarked bag next to the sink. I didn't know what else to do with it."

"Sometimes it does that," her sigh was very telling. This was to be expected to become a regular occurrence. She motioned for the notebook I got to keep track of everything in the store, rattling off a recipe for a cleaner and solvent combo, made purely from the items she had inside the store, giving me stern instructions to add the ingredients in the exact order I was told. I sighed but added the footnote. Odette was a far cry from the greasy git from Hogwarts so she deserved the benefit of the doubt at least.

I didn't dare to ask any more questions about the strange man; not that day, not after I had suprised Wanda with a quick recap of my story. It's not like I had anything against mutants - as long as they were peaceful and didn't harm humans with their abilities, I was content to co-habit, share my space and even be friends with them. A very nice old lady who came by three times a week had gills peeking out of the top of her turtleneck and she was just the most polite, sweetest thing.

Wanda's curiosity was understandable and not suspicious in any way: I was under the impression she was a mutant, too, along with her twin brother - so the feeling of dread that blossomed within me as soon as the two suited figures entered the small store I attributed to the larger size of the man and vulture eyes of the woman. They both appeared extremely out of place with their black two-pieces and badly hidden pistol holsters, topped off with badges I couldn't take a good look at without losing my customer service facade.

I decided to play it dumb, self-conscious of the thudding of my heart in my ribcage. My body screamed 'danger' at me. "Hello, how can I help you?"

The woman cast an observant look over me, my plain clothes, lingering on my star-patterned scarf and matching hair band. "Are you the owner of this store?"

"No," I frowned, not liking where this was going. "Do you have an appointment with Odette?"

"We'd like to see her," the man pointedly moved his arm, exposing the gun and the badge.

I dropped the nice act, staring him down in earnest. I never liked self-righteous, pushy government officials; even less so, when they didn't follow protocol and started the conversation with demands instead of proper introductions. As I shot a quick text to Odette, noting that there were 'strange people in uniform' looking for her, my suspicions were only confirmed when the woman looked around the store with eyes that knew what they were looking for. Those two definitely weren't cops or even feds, they were straight up shady.

Odette all but flew to the bodega, the imposing, suffocating aura I'd seen only once on full display. It was hard to breathe standing so close to her; with muted satisfaction, I noticed both agents squirm, their fingers twitching, as they took in shuddering inhales through their, undoubtedly, lying mouths.

The whole spectacle was over quickly. I had managed to serve and quickly usher out Ike, one of the Satanists (yes, we did, in fact, have a few of those as regulars) with his paper bag full of powdered goat horn and a fresh cat skull under his armpit before the curtains parted and the two agents left without saying a word. I thought their eyes looked - wrong, like glass marbles, dull, lifeless and unseeing.

Odette dismissed my worries with a frivolously waved hand: "They won't be bothering us anytime soon," closing the door to her office - it reeked of strong incense and horseradish, for some reason. Like she'd been making some hell salad in front of the two nosy officials.

I took a deep breath in and then a deep breath out. The weirdness should've bothered me more, I knew, but I couldn't bring myself to decide whether I wanted to know what that interaction was actually about or live in blissful ignorance, where my boss might be some sort of a mutant or an actual witch that helps other mutants.

The longer I thought about it, the louder anti-mutant propaganda articles screamed at me: children being killed or abandoned because one day, they woke up and could fly or move things with their mind; every potential situation could end up like Carrie or Brightburn - two movies so blatantly obvious in their point to instill fear against children that could grow to work alongside Earth's Mightiest Defenders.

Needless to say, my conscious calmed down pretty quickly. I had felt the hairs on my nape stand up as soon as the agents entered the room and in my experience, a reaction like that was never good. I had been taught to trust my gut.

Odette had cancelled her visits for the day, holing up in her office as the whole store rapidly filled up with the stench of horseradish, old blood and sage. The occasional noise came from the office, interrupted by mumbling, and I was quickly told to just turn up the old, vintage radio if it bothered me.

I was too busy taking in the contents of her office - the table that previously stood in the far end of it, stood in the middle, folded out into the shape of a circle. Something was drawn on it, something the color of dried blood, and there were light candles, white and blue, littered on almost every possible surface. The air was clouded with incense smoke, so thick, it made my eyes water.

Odette's grin was sardonic as she met my eyes, wide and shocked, that had previously landed on what looked like a pot- or a cauldron, emanating the strongest bitter stench that wafted even through the lead curtain of incense. No wonder the whole store reeked.

Before she gently shut the door in my face, I caught the centerfold of the whole show - an extremely large, tattered, leatherbound tome with yellowed pages and a heavy metal padlock laying next to it. Overcome by stupor, I didn't manage to make out the intricate silver letters on its cover.

Needless to say, walking home that day was an adventure. In part, I was cautious that the agents would find me, follow me home, interrogate me - I've never been arrested even by usual cops and it was unlikely that shady government agencies were delicate in their approach. A larger part of my brain was wondering about the implications of what I had seen, I'd nearly chewed off my fingernails remembering the vacant, lost face expressions on the agents' faces.

As soon as I got home, I set to do some serious googling. And find information, I did. Plethora of minor details - candle colors, herbs used, deeply individual incantations and mythical deities that chose to work with a particular witch. It was nothing short of a whole science; I'd go as far as to say it was a complete lifestyle. The use of magick bled into every aspect of daily life, from sleep to food to communication with others.

Part of me felt incredulity at the implication of sacrificing so much to get results that might be the opposite of the ones desired. A larger, braver part of me - the very same that used to push me to explore abandoned buildings with my friends and drink booze given by a stranger - admired the work and the dedication my boss and her kind put into their work.

Having received my first paycheck and successfully having made it through rent day without having to make excuses, my conscious allowed me to treat myself to a few items - I decided to give into my curiosity and placed an order for a few books on modern witchcraft, happily waiting for the package to arrive next afternoon. I went to sleep with my head full and a new world at my feet to explore.

The books were late - or more like, never showed. The refund couldn't come soon enough. My curiosity began to reach unbearable levels the longer I worked the front desk at Odette's. These days I didn't need much assistance anymore, ready to help any new or returning customer with the help of my notebook. Time after time, I noticed a certain working order, a pattern to things if you may - and was able to recommend a few things here and there. In short, I stepped over my initial apprehension and dove into the world of natural remedies and energetic manipulation headfirst.

It made all the sense that Odette would start to take absence from the bodega as my training progressed. On the days she had fewer or no appointments, she would don her favourite scarf and trot out the front door, large purse in tow, to run errands or restock on the rare, pricy items that couldn't get delivered directly to the shop. I'd grown accustomed to locking up on my own; the spare key to the entrance door was my pride and joy, the dull silver a warm comfort hanging on a chain around my neck. Its antique design made a fairly pretty necklace.

The customer coming to pick up a special order hardly disrupted my time. I had Janis Joplin blaring from the old radio, my skirt swayed to the rhythm of the song together with me. The elevated mood while working in the shop was something I appreciated fully - with a kind smile, I departed for the backrooms to search for the package with the customer's name, not finding it anywhere near the proper place. A call later, I was opening Odette's office and extracting the paper-wrapped shoebox from the fridge, passing it into the customer's arms with utmost care: 'FRAGILE. KEEP REFRIGERATED AT ALL TIMES.' read on it in Odette's sharp cursive.

The bell above the door rang as the woman departed but I was already inching behind the curtain, overcome by sudden inquisitiveness.

The book. It stood right in the middle of Odette's desk, shut, but missing its padlock, beckoning with the thick gothic letters spelling out 'PRACTICAL ALCHEMY'. I noticed it as soon as I stepped into the office, confused and puzzled by my own unbearable desire to approach it immediately. I knew something was amiss, yet, my legs had a mind of their own and my hands firmly placed themselves upon the heavy cover of the book, seemingly without the input from my brain.

"What the hell..." I muttered to myself, finding the books contents to be - for the lack of a better word - peculiar. "Protect a babe born on all Hallows Eve..." I numbly mouthed the first words that my eyes registered. The pages made a soft noise as my shaking fingers turned them, one after the other. "Bestow healing upon a barren womb... Punish a thief..." There were - spells, and potions, and so many plants I've never even heard about before.

The pages turned and handwritings changed - at the start, words were written out precisely, the cursive neat and sharp, obviously written by an ink pen. Some things were scribbles, pencil or charcoal, so barely intelligible I had to guess about a third of the words written. Towards the end of the book pages made with a typewriter appeared - blocky letters and numbers, language modern, ash and cigarette smell coming from the paper.

I couldn't believe what I was seeing. The longer my hands touched the pages, the stronger the tingling sensation became - I failed to notice it at first, attributing it to the exhilaration of finding something so strange yet so precious, but as I was finishing a page that contained a fairly short spell for protection of a witches' home, the discomfort of my palms rose into a mild stinging pain.

"Fuck," I yelped, casting a look at my fingers. They were hot, angry, as if I had briefly touched boiling oil - and the skin on my fingertips began to blister, little white pustules forming where I had gingerly held the pages of the book in place. "What the fuck?" Was my reasonable question to nobody in particular.

The books contents were, no doubt, interesting but I was more concerned with the state of my hands - had I ignored the pain for five more minutes, I might have had to go to the hospital to treat what was beginning to look like a second-degree burn. I slammed it shut none-too-gently, placing it exactly as I found it and winced when barely a second of touching it brought on more excruciating pain.

The healing peppermint oil salve I knew people bought for mild burns only soothed the initial sting, so I had to suffer until I clocked out, stopping by a drugstore on my way home to purchase some much-needed burn cream. And while it didn't make it worse, I knew that my next day at work was going to be Hell.

Most thankful, however, I was to my voice-to-text option on my cell. Not only it allowed me to communicate with my friends without hurting my abused skin even more, but it also dutifully saved the short, simple spell that was supposed to protect my house. There was no harm in trying it, I supposed, after seeing what I didn't doubt was the book's own protection wreak havoc on my snoopy little hands.

The tag list is open until the story is finished.

@couldntbedamned @mikariell95 @letsby @sleep-i-ness @toomanyrobins @mostly-marvel-musings @persephonehemingway @schemefrenzy @lillsxd @bluecrazedandbeautiful @slothspaghettiwrites