Luz was jolted from sleep when King started barking. Luz felt around the bed for the lump under the covers and started patting her dog's head.
"Aw, are you dreaming?" Luz asked sleepily, breaking into a yawn. "So was I…"
Luz climbed out of bed and slogged over to her desktop computer. The tablet was still where she left it, the page open to her drawing program where she'd been coloring in some line art for a close up of Azura and Jayson.
As she settled into her desk chair, she remembered now why she'd left off here last night. She was supposed to be coloring Jayson now, but this was his first close up. She had no idea what color his eyes should be.
King finally woke up and crawled out from under the covers, shaking his shaggy black body so that his license tag jingled.
Luz decided to go with purple. She wasn't sure why the answer came so firmly now, when it'd frustrated her last night, but she didn't want to question the inspiration. Maybe it had something to do with whatever she'd been dreaming. She didn't remember it now.
The shades of violet were bringing out the lust in Jayson's eyes, not that Luz would really know anything about that.
At almost fifteen, Luz had been comfortable in her bisexual-skin for three years, but she'd still had never kissed anyone, boy or girl. No one had even ever asked her on a date, or looked at her even a tiny bit like Jayson looked at Azura.
But that was okay, Luz told herself. She was too busy trying to balance everything in her life as it was.
When she wasn't updating Azura on strict schedule, she was doing homework or trying to find time to hang with Gus and Willow, her two best friends in the world.
And then there was work. Luz worked part time at a café her adoptive mother owned. Luz joked that it was child labor, but Eda always just laughed and threatened to close to café and open a sweatshop instead.
"You don't know labor, kid! You have it easy!" She would say.
Luz knew Eda was only kidding, and the café really wasn't that bad of a job. She only had to work on weekends, and usually it wasn't too busy. Luz was a waitress, but next year, she'd be allowed in the kitchen.
She pretended to be excited by that prospect, even though the cooks had much longer shifts and less free time.
Luz's phone alarm jolted her once more and she put down her tablet—she then picked it back up and saved her work—before jumping back onto the bed and reaching to the nightstand for her phone.
"Hey, kid!" Eda threw open the bedroom door and King eagerly darted out of the room, squeezing past Eda. "You gonna come eat this amazing breakfast I made, or what?"
"Coming! Let me get dressed!" Luz scrambled towards her closet.
"You were up, what were you doing?" Eda asked curiously.
"Homework." Luz lied, tugging her tunic on over her camisole and opening a drawer to fish for socks.
"You spend too much time on that thing." Eda glanced towards the computer. Luz quickly glanced over to make sure the screensaver was up, hiding the close up of sexy Jayson.
"It's school stuff." Luz said, and then tacked on when Eda looked skeptically. "…Mostly."
"Well if you're not too far behind in school, can you take a shift today after school? Just for an hour or so. Hooty called out again." Eda rolled her eyes and growled. "I don't know why I ever hired that unreliable drunk—"
"Hooty's not a drunk! He's just…weird." Luz felt defensive over one of the few people who actually talked to her. "Besides, you're one to talk, Miss Martini!"
Eda pretended to chase Luz down the stairs as Luz pulled her jacket and messenger back on with a laugh before skidding to a halt at the table. She picked up a plate and shoveled eggs into her mouth, tilting the plate so that King could catch the toast that fell off.
"Stop feeding that thing all my good food, he's gonna get fat!" Eda picked up a bottle of apple juice from the counter and drank it straight from the container.
"Sorry!" Luz said thickly, her face muffled by bacon. She quickly swallowed and zipped up her jacket just as she spotted the school bus coming down their road from the wide sliding glass door. "Bye!"
"Wait, Luzzie, aren't you forgetting something?" Eda asked with mocking sweetness.
Luz ran over to Eda and kissed her cheek.
"Love ya!" She then grabbed the apple juice from Eda and ran out the door.
Willow always saved Luz's seat with her oversized backpack, which she dropped to the floor as Luz boarded. Luz slipped into the seat beside her and downed the rest of the juice.
"Aw man, I have to start drinking coffee." She sighed.
"Rough day? It's seven-fifteen!" Willow asked.
"It's never too early to stress." Gus turned around in the seat in front of them and peered at Luz over the edge. "You seem paler than usual, though. Are you getting enough sleep?"
"No!" Luz pulled up the hood on her zippered sweatshirt, hoping it's bulky grey form hided her hideous school uniform for now. "School's kicking my butt! And so is…Azura." She said in a whisper.
Gus and Willow were the only people in the world that knew Luz was the author of The Good Witch Azura. It used to be, they were the only ones that knew about Azura, period, but then something happened.
About six months after Luz had started publishing Azura on a blogging site to a wide audience of two, someone shared it somewhere else, and then the views started shooting up!
It seemed that everyone who liked it then shared it with someone else, so by the time Luz made the next update, it had so many people alerted that had gone to number five in popularity on the whole site!
That number shocked Luz to her core. She sat, slack-jawed at her computer until nearly 4 am that night, watching the comments and likes and shares pour in.
But then it went down, whatever hype that was. Now Azura climbed to around the teens-to-twentieth most popular spot when she updated, or maybe even in the tens when a particularly juicy bit of something happened in the plot.
Luz wasn't sure why it wasn't more popular. It had magic, romance, and action, after all! But if comments were much to go by, it seemed that most people knew she had to be fairly young, based on her drawing and writing style.
They left tons of encouraging words, but it was obvious that they all felt it was someone's first work. Not her magnum opus just yet, thought Azura felt like her whole world to Luz.
In a way, Luz was glad her loyal following was somewhat smaller. They were respectful of her age, and didn't hound her for updates or ask her to draw lewd stuff between Jayson and Azura.
They didn't ask Luz anything about herself, which she was glad for. No one on the site knew anything about her other than her username.
BRUJA22 – admin.
AGE: uh.
LOCATION: earth?
FOLLOWERS: 25.5k FOLLOWING: 7
Luz had been vague when setting up her profile and she was glad. No one needed to get in her business after all. But she often wondered what would happened if she updated her age to be truthful, or changed her profile picture from King to her actual face.
But she didn't want to lose whatever fans she had. It was one think to let them think she was a kid, it was another to confirm it.
"Boscha beat me again." Willow sighed as Luz tuned back into the conversation.
"I thought you planned out your whole debate argument before hand this time?" Gus asked.
"I did." Willow squeaked. "But once I got to the podium…everyone was looking at me so…expectantly, and I just croaked!"
"You shouldn't let Boscha get to you." Luz said, not looking up from where she was actually trying to finish some homework before they got to school.
"You know that's not so easy. What about you and Amity?" Willow pointed out.
"Amity!" Luz made a show of growling and crumbling her scrap paper in her fist.
"I don't know why you hate her so much." Gus said. "Willow was the one she hurt when Amity ditched her in kindergarten."
"I just…do." Luz bent back over her work so her friends wouldn't see her face grow red. "Anyone who hurts my friends hurts me too."
Gus took the spotlight the rest of the ride, acting out his triumph in the spelling bee against their classmate Mattholomule. Gus was two years younger than Luz and Willow and ten times as smart. Luz sometimes wondered if he was smarter than Amity.
Amity Blight was at the top of the freshman class. She had perfect grades, perfect teeth, perfect eyeliner, and a rotten attitude.
Luz was just glad she didn't have to see Amity until first period, as her older siblings drove her to school. Amity was too good for the bus.
They were all too good for the bus, actually, Luz thought as she stepped off the bus and immediately tried to scrape gum from off the bottom of her sneaker.
"Look, it's Baby and friends!" Boscha met them with a mocking wave as they started towards the school.
"Does she mean me? Am I a baby?" Gus asked in a whisper.
"No, she means me because I chocked yesterday." Willow whispered back.
"Ignore her." Luz said to Gus and Willow through gritted teeth.
"Baby Owl! Your mommy let you leave the nest this morning! Did she change your diaper first?" Boscha called and Luz froze in her tracks.
Owl. The Owl House was the name of Eda's café, but she had no idea what Boscha meant. She wracked her mind, but the only thing was that Boscha must have seen Luz there one day and maybe saw Luz give Eda a kiss or something.
"Since when is kissing your mom something to be ashamed of!?" Luz whirled around to face Boscha, Willow and Gus gasping behind her.
"But…she's not your mommy, is she?" Boscha placed a hand under her chin and tilted her head in a patronizing way, her pink-dyed hair framing her face. "Where's your real parents, Luz?"
Gus and Willow gasped again in shock, this time at Boscha's words. Even Boscha's gaggle of friends—girls Luz didn't know—eyed her with surprise, as if they didn't know Boscha would sink so low so early in the morning.
"Eda is my mother." Luz snapped. "She adopted me when I was three months old, is that not good enough for you!?"
"Apparently you weren't good enough—"
Luz acted without thinking. She launched herself at Boscha with a war-cry, but was wrenched back by someone grabbing onto the hood of her jacket. Boscha recoiled as Luz stumbled back to see Principal Bump holding her back.
"Luz and Boscha! What on Earth is going on here!?"
"She tried to attack me!" Boscha cried. "You guys saw, right?"
"She started it!"
Principal Bump let go off Luz and Luz slowly turned to see that Boscha's friends were gone. In fact, everyone who had stopped to watch the impending fight fled when the principal showed up. Only Gus and Willow were loyal enough to have stayed behind, still off to the side, ready to back up Luz's word.
"She did, Principal Bump!" Gus said and Willow nodded. "She said Luz's mom—"
"I don't care what she said." He shook his head. "That's no excuse for fighting like uncivilized hooligans! Now, I'm going to let everyone off with a warning, as it's much too early for me to have to fill out demerits. Now, get to class!"
Luz was too angry to care what Principal Bump said, or to even thank Gus and Willow for sticking by her side. She was doing everything she could not to cry. Her anger always showed itself in tears, as if this wasn't humiliating enough as it was.
Luz turned on her heal and ran into the school, past her friends and principal. Even pushing past the few students who'd lingered at the top of the steps with hopes to watch someone get punched.
Luz ran faster as her vision blurred. She was going to cry, she knew. She was too worked up not to, but she wasn't going to do it here. She made a beeline for the girls room and smacked right into someone leaving.
"—Ah!" Amity Blight stumbled back. "Watch where—Luz—Are you?"
"Leave me alone!" Luz muttered, breaking into a choked sob as she pushed past her and went into the bathroom. She locked herself in a stall and sobbed into a heavy wad of toilet paper.
What the hell was Boscha's problem!? What, was teasing Gus and Willow not enough? That was likely it, as they didn't react to the insults with near as much emotion as Luz did.
Willow was so shy that she just froze in place, internalizing her tears and shame. Gus would usually just calmly fire back insults made of words so big that Boscha was left trying to decipher them. Luz was the one who would cry, and that's what Boscha wanted to see, obviously.
And what the hell was Amity getting at—asking if Luz was okay!? Like she cared! If she'd been out there with the others, she probably would have teased her right alongside Boscha.
Luz blew her nose on the toilet paper and washed her face in the sink. As the bell rang overhead, Luz prayed the halls would be empty when she left. She didn't want Willow trying to comfort her now.
Still, Luz couldn't bear to face leaving the bathroom yet. Boscha words still stung, though Luz knew they weren't true. She needed something…something to lift her spirits just a tiny bit before she went to class.
Luz took out her phone. She just wanted to scroll through her photos of her with Eda and King, when a notification popped up.
You have 1 new comment(s) on "The Good Witch Azura"
Luz blinked in surprise. Usually she stopped getting comments on the newest chapter about a week after she posted it, and it had been almost two since the last update, as Luz was a tad behind schedule. She opened it, feeling that familiar spike of excitement.
WITCHCHICK128: just rereading this amazing chapter again! it's so beautiful! i can't wait to see what jayson says to azura!
"Whoa…a reread." Luz gasped. People read her stuff more than once? Intentionally?
She was just thinking of a response when the bathroom door opened. Luz gasped and shoved her phone in her pocket as some freshman girl went to a stall. Luz ducked around her and into the hallway.
She'd reply after class.
Luz slipped into her seat as the teacher's back was turned towards the door. Luckily, Mr. Hammond kept the classroom door open most of the time.
Luz quickly got out her notebook and supplies and spread them out on the desk. Everyone was already doing the warm-up, and they only got ten minutes to do it. Luz began scrawling something out, eyes darting up to the board to make sure her response made some semblance of sense.
"Luz…" Amity whispered beside her. Luz ignored her.
"Luz…"
"What?" Luz glanced over.
"This rolled off your desk." Amity placed a pencil back on Luz's desk before turning back to her own work. Luz just stared at her for a moment before finishing her work.
"Alright, please take out your homework." Mr. Hammond started collecting their assignments as Luz fished around in her bag.
Oh crap. Luz found her homework and saw where she'd left it half-finished on the bus. Shit, shit. Luz grabbed a pencil and hurriedly tried to write more answers when the teacher stopped in front of her desk.
"Ahem." He cleared his throat. Luz looked up at him and tried to hide her guilt with an awkward smile as she handed him her homework, still with a few problems left unsolved.
"Here, Mr. Hammond. I finished it yesterday afternoon."
Amity handed her homework over and smiled smugly. Luz stared daggers at her, but Amity only smirked at Luz. So much for whatever that was this morning.
"Thank you, Amity." Mr. Hammond added their papers to the stack. "Luz, I expect you to be more responsible unless you want a demerit."
"Yes, Sir." Luz sighed.
"Some people are such slackers." Amity muttered under her breath.
Throughout class, Luz tried to focus on taking notes, hoping that most of the lecture would be the answers for tonight's homework, but she was distracted.
Not only was Amity distracting, flipping her freshly-dyed mint green hair over her shoulder as she took her perfect notes, Luz was also distracted thinking about that comment on Azura.
Boscha's words didn't seem important now. What was important was the fact that someone out there liked Azura enough to read the same chapter twice. Luz wanted to reply to them, but she did want to take her phone out in class. There'd been too many close calls already with detention—and it was only first period.
Luz finally found the time to reply at lunch. Though she sat with her friends, she didn't share the comment with them. They'd be happy for her, of course, but Luz wanted to keep a bit of the Azura fandom to herself.
BRUJA22: thank you so much! i'm literally crying, ahh!
"Wow, that's weird…" Willow said. Luz looked up from her phone and turned around. She followed Willow's gaze to see Boscha sitting alone. "Her friends are over there with Amity. Weird that they ditched her."
"Probably because of what she said about Luz. That was so low…and for like, no reason, too." Gus said.
"She was just trying to get me worked up. I shouldn't have taken the bait." Luz watched Boshca's friends and Amity at their table. They seemed to be talking quietly and laughing. Amity seemed to be doing homework on her lap.
That seemed like a good idea to Luz, actually. She should finish up some homework now if she wanted time to finish Azura after work.
"That reminds me, I gotta work after school. You guys coming by the restaurant?" Luz asked.
"Sure." Willow nodded.
"Sounds good. I get iced coffee, right?" Gus asked.
"You're too young to drink coffee, you know." Luz smirked. "It'll make your heart race super fast!"
"That's why I like it!"
After school, Luz went straight to the café and stashed her school bag under the bar. Eda was already there, mixing herself a drink.
"How was school, kid?" Eda asked, eating a few olives straight from the jar.
"Fine." Luz crouched down behind the bar so no one would see her quick change, tugging off her uniform tunic and pulling on her work polo.
"Really? I got a call from Bump." Eda said it casually, though Luz could hear the almost pride in her voice. "Did you try and fight some girl who was picking on you? That's my kid!"
"She started it! I know it was dumb." Luz tied her apron on behind her back.
"Eh, it's only dumb if she didn't deserve it! I know it'll go on your permanent record, but they erase that thing when you graduate." She downed her drink. "Besides, colleges don't care about that."
"Well, I do. I don't wanna spend my afternoons in detention."
"How the heck are we so different?" Eda shook her head and smirked. "We you adopted or something?"
Luz's shift seemed to drag on forever. None of the foods or drinks they served were very complicated, but it still felt like everyone had a million questions about the menu. Luz just kept a smile plastered to her face and tried not to constantly check her watch.
"How're you guys doing?" Luz went out to the patio tables where Gus and Willow were chatting and doing homework over iced tea and coffee.
"Fine." Willow smiled.
King lifted his head from the ground at the sound Luz's voice and Luz heard his tail thumping on the ground. Eda only let King in the café if he stayed outside. Luz couldn't pet him if she was going to handle food, so she just gently placed her foot on his back.
"Hey, Gus, we're almost done, come on." Willow whined when Gus took out his phone.
"Sorry, hold on, just reading something." He giggled at the screen. Luz peered over his shoulder and gasped.
"Is that Azura!?" Luz asked in a hushed whisper.
"Of course. I'm your number one fan, remember?"
He did proclaim that, Luz knew. He always gave her feedback and asked her a million questions about the lore of the story. It was nice that someone cared so much, but at the same time, Luz wondered if he'd be that into it if he wasn't her best friend.
"Wait…was that you this morning? Who left the comment?" Luz asked, feeling her heart plummeting.
"Huh? What comment?" He glanced up.
"Nothing. Never mind." Luz could see a new group of people taking seats in her section through the window and she started back into the café.
Luz was pretty sure he'd tell her the truth if it was him or Willow leaving comments on Azura. In fact, Luz had seen them comment before, so she knew their usernames. Besides, she was pretty sure the username of the comment was Witchchick meaning it was a girl.
She was just making a mental note to check the person's profile tonight out of sheer curiosity, when she halted and gasped by the new table.
"Hi, Luz!" Edric Blight eyed her nametag and waved.
"I love this place. It's so cute!" Emira Blight looked around at all the owl themed décor before locking eyes with Luz.
Edric and Emira Blight were seniors at Luz's school and they both happened be super hot. Neither one of them were ever going to be interested in some freshman kid, but Luz couldn't help but get super nervous whenever they came in here.
She forced her feet to move, a nervous smile on her face, feeling her palms sweat as she took out her order pad as she approached.
"Hi! What can I get—" Luz froze once more. As she got closer, she saw now who was sitting in between Edric and Emira. Amity Blight was sitting in between her siblings, studying the menu.
It was so weird for Luz to see Amity outside of the school uniform. She was wearing a cute pink and green striped sweater and black leggings. If she thought it was weird to see Luz in work clothes, she didn't say so. She didn't even sound mocking when she asked about the menu.
"Do you guys have soy milk?" Amity asked.
"Um…y-yes." Luz nodded, feeling hate boil in her veins.
"Cool. I'll have—"
"Aw, Mittens is so lactose intolerant!" Edric ruffled Amity's hair and Emira laughed.
"Shut up!" Amity growled, her whole face red.
"We'll have three Owl Lattes." Emira said. "One with soy."
"G-Got it…" Luz wrote that down and went back to the bar.
That was so weird, to see Amity being picked on by her siblings. They were even cooler than Luz thought! Someone to take Amity down a peg. If only someone would do that to Boscha.
Luz made the lattes, drinks being one of the few things she could make, before taking the tray back over to their table. She approached from behind Amity, catching heated words.
"—She's just such a bitch lately. I don't know what her problem is."
"Oh, Mittens, is that why you're hanging with us and not her?" Edric laughed. "I'm touched."
Luz wondered if Amity was talking about Boscha. Strange for Amity to have bitch-boundaries when she herself could definitely be one. Luz forced her smile back on and came around to the table.
"Lattes!" She began setting them down.
"Thanks, cutie!" Emira winked at her and Luz blushed, hand trembling as she set down a coffee in front of Amity without looking at her.
Amity stood up from the table to pull off her sweater. Luz tried not to stare at the swatch of pale skin at Amity's belly and instead focused on setting down Edric's drink.
She then glanced up and caught sight of Amity's t-shirt.
A familiar green-haired witch in white robes was casting a magic star beam from her long staff. Her eyes sparkled in a way that could only mean that the artist was an anime fan.
It was an anime-inspired portrait of Azura. Amity was wearing a shirt of Azura.
Luz's mouth fell open as she spotted the fancy signature—A.B.
Amity drew Azura. Amity liked Azura.
Luz dropped the latte in her hand.
"Whoa—!" Edric jumped up as hot coffee spilled over the table and dripped onto his lap.
"Oh, God, sorry! Sorry!" Luz grabbed a wad of napkins from her apron pocket and tried to mop it up. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Amity glancing down to make sure no coffee splattered onto her shirt.
"Don't worry about it, cutie." Edric grabbed more napkins from the table dispenser and started cleaning himself up.
"I'll—I'll get you another! I'm so sorry!" Luz turned on her heel and ran over to the bar and ducked down.
She let the coffee machine whirr as her heart pounded. Her clumsy mistake wasn't what she was focused on.
Amity's shirt. Amity liked Azura. It wasn't just a coincidence—a character that happened to look like Azura, it was her. She had the hat and the staff and the long green braid. Heck, was that why Amity died her hair green?
Luz tried to recall if Amity had had green hair before or after Luz started posting Azura. She couldn't remember now.
Her heart was still pounding as she finished the drink and took it back to Amity's table. She refused to look at her, her face her shirt, as she placed the drink down over the napkins Edric had used to cover the stain.
"Thanks."
Luz couldn't even respond. She just gave an awkward grin and bolted. Hooty showed up a few minutes later. Luz didn't even stop to see if he was sober. She just tugged off her apron, tossed it at Eda, and ran out to the patio seats.
"Let's get out of here!" Luz threw her arms around King, who started wagging his tail.
"Luz, what?" Willow looked up.
"Amity." Gus spotted her table through the window. "Let's go."
Luz was glad they didn't ask questions about what Amity did. Maybe they knew her presence was just enough to get on Luz's nerves.
It was. Luz felt her heart pounding even as she took King's leash and they started towards her house. Amity. Amity, with her perfect teeth and perfect grades like Azura.
She loved Azura, actually, enough to make a t-shirt.
The comment, Luz realized, it must have been left by Amity.
"Oh, cramity."