Maggie Grey #2
“Yeah, I remember this,” I nodded before quickly adding. “I mean not this exact moment, but I know the picture. I made friends with some neighborhood kids before we moved.”
“That doesn’t look like anyone in particular to you?”
I stared at the little girl who was fighting the reflection of the sun in her face before looking up at Ayira.
“It is not me,” she said with a wave of her hand. “My hair does not curl like that.”
“And the fact that you’ve never been here,” Asha added dryly. I stared back at the picture. She looked exactly like a younger version of Ayira which could only mean…
“You think this is her twin sister?”
“Possibly,” Souxie shrugged. “It’s weird, right?”
“Yea….” I said slowly before shaking my head. I was just about to speak when Asha suddenly gasped.
“Oh! I spoke to you!” She blurted out. I was still trying to wrap my mind around Hillary, my mother’s backyard and the girls in my house with Namir.
“Maggie, we spoke! You somehow reached out to me and told me to tell Namir you were coming back! You were on your way back! I told everyone I saw you.”
My mouth fell open before closing. I started to open it again before scrunching my face with a tilt of my head. Asha’s excitement slowly faded. “You don’t know what I’m talking about, do you?”
“Honestly, it really just felt like we were gone a day, some hours even…Maybe two days? I dunno… I didn’t see or connect with anyone if that’s what you’re asking.”
“I swear, you were right there in the water talking to me, clear as day. It was your voice, and you were mentioning Namir.”
“I’ve always said you’ve had witchy tendencies, Asha,” Souxie added. “You should look into it.”
“No! I’m telling you; it was Maggie.”
“It wasn’t me. I didn’t…I was literally trying not to die in the desert either from a dragon or fighting Ayira to the death.”
“I would never,” Ayira said with a dignified tone, but her smirk was there. I shook my head with a wave of my hand, trying to reset and start over.
“Wait, back to going to my mom’s house?”
Souxie nodded.
“All of us did. It wasn’t planned that way but somehow that night…we all showed up at the same time. Namir included.”
“Namir too?”
“Everybody boo,” Asha grinned as my mouth dropped. “You have one big, weird ass family, including us now.”
“Oh!” Isis shrieked as she looked at her phone. “Ayira is probably the second most famous person in the Underground now! Look at how they’re talking about her! That's all they can talk about!”
“They probably don’t want to mention what Maggie did at the games.”
Isis showed me her phone where there were dozens of pictures and videos of Ayira and people talking about Ayira the Dragon Princess. The long hair, the blue eyes and blue flames in the comments, it was all over the socials in the Underground.
“She’s the next…Namir? The first woman to win the games…” I read out loud before looking at Ayira who shrugged.
“I do not know what that means, but maybe my father had to know all about this and sent the dragon my way. I just know it.”
“Babe!? Babe!? Look who it is!” Asha suddenly yelled into her phone. She flipped the screen around, showing a man with locs driving behind the wheel. He had round glasses and pointed ears when he glanced down at the facetime call and chucked his chin up in a silent greeting.
“Is this the boyfriend you’ve been hiding?” I asked, taking the phone.
“He is one of the planners behind the stadium too,” she boasted.
“When I told him what was going on, nobody, I mean nobody expected you or Ayira to pull up. We just knew they were going to use something to keep everyone contained inside, and he had it to where the emergency exits were charm and spell free at the last minute. Now did it work? Somewhat,” she shrugged.
“But it was the best idea I could come up with. Babe, I will call you when I’m about to go to sleep. ”
“Aight,” he said. Asha groaned with her phone pressed against her chest as she fell back.
“Why is my man the coolest mothafucka in the world!?” She screamed with a kick of her feet.
“She’s so in love,” Isis groaned playfully.
“And the dick is bomb! Ugh!”
“Get a hold of yourself,” Quan snapped. “Nobody cares–––”
“Obviously you do Garfield of the Bikini Bottom head ass–––”
“Wait, wait wait,” shaking my head as I gave Isis back her phone. Before those two could go at it, I wanted to hear everything. “Start from the top. What happened while we were gone?”
Annnnnd so begins the tales of what happened when Ayira and I disappeared for a night.
From a missing idiot named Xavier Martin to a peculiar woman named Himora Clarke who I…
am related to? My grandmother was in Savannah in what they’re calling a retirement home?
When the hell did that happen and what did she retire from?
It was all so much to process but when the bedroom door opened again, we all turned our heads to look, seeing my dad, Reginald Norwood, Bellamy Holmes, and the little one only known as Aunt Raven, standing in the doorway.
Gasping, I scrambled to my feet, seeing my dad’s eyes widened in surprise at the sight of me before we immediately clasped each other in a tight hug.
“My dad and my best friends in the same room!?” I let out with a drop of my head before singing towards the ceiling, “that’s craaaaazy!”
Then I heard her voice call out my name.
The pain in my heart and the thorn at my side knew how to call a child’s name.
As soon as I heard MAGGIE?! I bolted down the hall until I saw my mother standing by the front door.
She dropped the bags of ice. Her usual weight which gave her the plump motherly look of a healthy woman was all but gone.
She held her arms out with tears, actual tears coming down and then I saw the blood form from the corner of her eyes.
All the questions I had for this woman were answered in a single drop of blood as we held each other and cried.
I almost knocked her back out the front door when I saw two more people walking up with a baby in a car seat.
A tall light skinned man that was all smiles when he saw me and a rigid woman with bright orange hair and square glasses.
“About time y'all came back!” Raven shouted before tapping the back of my leg. “That’s my twin brother right there. That’s your Uncle Trevor and Aunt Himora with their baby Dawn.”
“Hey hey family!” Trevor shouted, holding up a grocery bag in one hand while carrying the car seat in the other. Raven immediately went to unclick the baby out of the seat to hold as she walked back in the house. He came up the steps and smiled down at me while my mother still held on.
“I guess I’m your niece?” I asked.
“Aside from the freakish God shit you did at the games, you seem more normal than the rest of em,” he said. “I like that, stay like that. Sick of all this magical bullshit anyway, and yes. I’m your mom’s older brother so that makes me your uncle.”
We both laughed as he stepped inside, and I just knew my mom was going to have a time with him if that was her brother. His wife, Himora, stepped up shortly after and stared at me.
“Interesting,” was all she said.
“Himora! Don’t get all weird on her! Come here!” Trevor shouted. I extended my hand out as she adjusted her frames on her face.
“Nice to meet you.”
“Likewise. When you have a moment, I would like to speak with you,” she said, ignoring my hand as she walked in. Okaaaaaay, weird Aunt in the family is officially scratched off the bingo card.
“Maggieeeeee!”
I knew that squeal from anywhere. I pulled from my mom to see cousin Lovely running back into the house barefoot with Draco and Carmilla coming in from behind. Everyone was here, even a pregnant Maze!
“This here is your family,” Raven said as she stood proudly by my hip. “Those are my two daughters, Bree and Leslie and their chirren…Uh… you got…”
Everything around me became a blur as I hugged and greeted just about every new face in the home until it was filled with those calling me family.
Even wolves who stepped in the house gave me a hug and welcomed me to their pack.
Trevor stood to the side as he began telling me how he found out he was family and ultimately telling the story on how he fell in love with his wife.
Bellamy stayed in the corner, keeping true to his anti-social nature while Lovely overwhelmed Ayira with questions about her ancestry.
Aunt Raven was giving out orders like a general while Quan was still being followed by the cat only known as Felix.
It was my mom who refused to let me go as she tried to smear the blood stains from her cheeks, but she couldn’t hide it between her teeth.
She started to say something when I caught more headlights pulling in front of the house.
I started to say let’s move from the door when I saw Seth get out of the car first, yelling and arguing with someone.
Then I saw him. The passenger door opened as Namir stepped out with no shirt on, quiet as his brother cussed him out.
“Maggie,” my mother started. “We have so much to talk about. I want to know…”
I pulled away from her, no longer hearing her voice as I rushed down the steps of the house. Seth’s eyes widened before he quickly rushed over to stop me.
“Hold up! Hold up! He hasn’t been responding well to anybody! Hold up Maggie–––”
Namir and I stared at each other, and I could see him crack his neck to the side like he was fighting off a shift, but his eyes were soft, and full of guilt.
“Namir has gone through some hormonal changes. Just give him a second to adjust,” Seth half joked while nervously glancing at his brother. “He hasn’t been able to get a hold of his shifting…full moon and all…He’s been anxious all day.”
I took another step as Namir closed his eyes, squeezing them tight, and gritted his teeth in an attempt to not show his fangs at me.