Mentorship: Two Ways PV Callista closed

☁ Interacting ☁
@Callista Lovis

Willow had been in the same position Calli had, emotionally and physically. Knees pulled up to her chest, sobbing into her knees hoping for everything to start making sense. It was a position she held for a hefty month after her grandmother died. It was a position she would soon resume, the dull ache of the unknown creeping up on her once more during the bitter cold months. In winter, there was nothing to keep her warm besides the beating of her own heart, nothing to help keep her going but her own brain knowing that things would resolve themselves. It was a fact that continued to roll around in her brain as the seasons changed. What she didn't know is this worry wouldn't go away when the grass began to sprout, when there was more blue sky than grey, when flowers were finally in full bloom, and she could be outside without being in physical pain from the icy wind.

For now, she could fix someone else. Could help direct the red string between their thoughts and connect them all together. Could fill in the gaps of information and spout out everything that she knew from her mere 13 years as a human, her two and a half of being a witch. Despite the conversation being what it was, Calli somehow had a look of wonder, as if she was being told a fairytale story. Admittedly, the meet cute of her parents was pretty fantastic. It was a love story that always directed Willow for her own. If it wasn't a love like her parents' it wasn't a love worth having. Perhaps that was the magic of growing up, figuring out exactly what love is supposed to feel like. No one ever seemed to really have the correct answers about it, all of them contradicting each other. The only one solid piece of advice that seemed to transcend experience was 'When you know you know.' But to not know was one of the most frustrating things of them all.

Her body posture remained open, legs crossed, slightly slouching don't tell her mom, and hands resting on her ankles. She didn't speak when Calli asked if she could ask another question, just nodded. She feared that if she spoke she might shatter her resolve and scare her off. Calli was addressing the elephants in the room of her mind, and Willow was the mouse attempting to navigate the space without scaring her off. Calli's question was a bit of a surprise, she didn't think the conversation would go that way. Though it wasn't unwarranted. Willow kind of just threw that out there hoping she knew what it was. But, not everyone had parents like Willow's that tried to make sure she knew just about everything she could when it came to current social issues (that she could handle as a child).

Willow's nose crinkled up in thought, her eyes looking up to the ceiling as if it had the definition to non-binary written on it. "Um- It's like- not a boy or girl? They're neither. But there's a bunch of sort of like-" She paused and looked back at Calli, her hands moving in circles trying to think of how to explain it. "Its not just one definition. People kind of define it in the ways it explains them. There's a whole world of gender identities. Non-binary is kind of an umbrella term for a bunch of them. But it's something outside of the realm of boy and girl- I think?" A small blush spread across her face in embarrassment. She could've explained this so much better if Google was accessible here, but instead she had to rely on her memory of something her and her mom talked about one time when she was small. Sadly, Willow was in the very early beginnings of her gender exploration and nothing would click for her here. A shame.

She gazed at Calli for a moment, letting her whispered question hang in the air. She leaned forward slightly, a bright grin on her face. "What do you want it to feel like? Think about it. Give it a second to sort of... bubble in your brain. What would the ideal be? When thinking about being in love- what do you think of? I'll think about it too and we can kind of compare answers." Willow leaned back on her hands, legs still crossed. Her head tilted up to the ceiling and she closed her eyes. Genuinely searching in her brain for what she hoped love would feel like someday.

Credit: Scarlet Salvatore

Interacting | @Willow Anderson	@Annie Morgan | Mentioning
Date: 12.18.2021	#5e638d | Hex

Crinkling her nose in thought, Callista listened to her captain with rapt attention. She was a good student if nothing else. "Neither boy nor girl..?" she repeated. At the young age of 13, she was still pliable in her mindset, open to new thoughts and shapeable by the gentle hands of her elders. This, however, was something she had never considered, let alone heard about. How can someone be neither a boy nor a girl? Isn't someone's gender decided at birth? "Gender identities?" Callista wasn't sure where to begin with her questions, instead repeating Willow's words once again, a confused look on her face.

For a little while, her overactive mind was taken off the thought of 'love,' turned instead to this new idea of 'gender.' Soon enough, though, the topic resurfaced.

"When thinking about being in love- what do you think of?"

As Willow tilted her gaze upward, Callista tilted her gaze downward. While she usually fought to stay grounded to reality, this time, she allowed herself to be lost in the wonders of her mind. When she closed her eyes and let herself think about that abstract idea, love... warmth tingled from the tips of fingers, spreading up her arms and into her chest until she could hear the steady thump of her heart. Love was... care. Love was her mother, telling her stories as she sank into a fever-ridden dream. Love was her sister, holding her hand as she cowered from the artificial jump scares of a supposed haunted house.

Love was taking time out of your day to care for others. Love was a... stirring sort of emotion somewhere deep in your chest that somehow empowers you to do things you never would have before. Love was illogical and senseless, all instinct and little logic. It just was. There was no manual for it, no explanations of what it's supposed to feel like. Even so, it wasn't a blank space that Callista faced when she tried to imagine it.

It was happiness, but it was more than that. It was fire, coursing through her veins and filling her with heat. It was─it was in Willow's hug, a bit. And... it was there, that day¹. The weight of Annie's head resting in her lap, the lighthearted banter that bounced between the two, and the faint warmth from a cup of lukewarm hot chocolate. The mere thought of the long-buried memory stirred up the fluttering wings of a caged bird, desperate and delicate, wholly irrational and logical at the same time.

Perhaps... this is what love was. It was visceral and contradictory, at once all-consuming and subtle, hotter than an open flame and cooler than a freshwater stream. Love was caring for someone, something, a force that gave wings to the heart and overtook the mind.

The idea of love still seemed just as abstract, but a couple of minutes ago, Callista felt the same way about love as she did about Mount Everest─she knew the definition, had seen pictures, and knew the height of it, but unless she actually visited the mountain, she would never be able to fully comprehend what the height─mere numbers on a page─really meant. Until she could see it for herself, she would never be able to fully understand its great majesty, would never feel the biting Himalayan wind, and would never properly appreciate the stunning beauty of its icy landscape.

But now, she knew.

She had gotten a taste of what love was like, could understand that it was so much more than its definition. It was indefinable and forever abstract, but that didn't mean it couldn't be understood. Love, like fear and anxiety, required a tacit understanding, a resonance deep within you, pulsing from the core that had been passed down from the ancient civilizations of bare feet and makeshift clubs.

Finally, Callista was able to grasp a slight sense of what love was. She had a bundle of wispy smoke, threatening to dissipate from her fingers at the slightest shock, but it was there, in a way that it never was before. At its simplest, love was... an overwhelming sense of care.

When she reached this conclusion, she opened her eyes again, sneaking a glance at her captain. Callista's blush had returned again, coating her cheeks in a cherry pink. Willow had said that they would compare answers... should she go first? Quietly clearing her throat, Callista asked, "What did you think of?" Was it her imagination, or did she sound a tad more comfortable? In her visualization of love, she had filled herself with feelings of warmth, and now it spilled over and radiated out in waves. A serene smile rested on her face, and her eyes sparkled with pleasure.

She was, in the simplest of terms, in love with them both.

Stats: Sta: 6 | Eva: 8 | Str: 3 | Wis: 9 | Arc: 7 | Acc: 7
Abilities: Perfectionist | Beast Master
Actions: Forming her own definition of love
Context: ¹02.14.2021