So Apparently I'm A Witch Solo

July 2, 2025

My eyes flutter open to sunlight hitting my face. The lacy blue curtains have been pulled back from my windows to let the light in, and I know it must be late if my mother woke me up like that. I can see my forest in the distance. Forest is a generous description for the small copse, nothing more than a couple dozen trees in a rough circle near the edge of my home.
I shrug off my blankets, the blue hues falling onto the hardwood floor as I shrug off sleep and get dressed for the day. A glance at the calendar hanging on the pale gray walls tells me that today is a Wednesday. Wednesday means I’ll be deep in my woods in a matter of hours, watching the wildlife, my brain a million miles away.
A pair of dark colored jeans and a random t-shirt later, I grab my book off the nightstand and open my door. A pair of dark brown irises look up at me from my dog’s shaggy golden face. A neon green tennis ball rests between Trey’s front paws. I pick it up and chuck it down the hallway, bouncing off walls and doorways. Trey scrambles after the ball, claws clicking desperately against the wooden floor. With a sigh, I open my book and walk down the hall towards the kitchen.
My mother stands in front of the stove, eggs frying in the pan. Her shoulder length blonde hair is tucked into a careless messy bun, and her clothes are carelessly thrown on, clashing horribly. The rest of the room is unnaturally clean for our house, making it clear that my mother has been up since long before dawn today, hit by another one of her random insomniac episodes.
I quietly pull out a chair, sitting down silently as I watch a pair of lovers fight a battle to the death. My extremely quiet nature, still waking up mentally, and my book lead me to making no sounds until a couple minutes later when I let out a loud, painful sigh as the main characters do even more stupid things.
“Harper!” my mother exclaims as she turns around to look at me. Apparently she didn’t know I was there. Must have been a pretty sleepless night.
“What?” I ask, looking up from my book at my mother. Her eyes, the same gray-blue as mine, are smiling even though her face says otherwise.
“You’re so quiet. You’re brothers are always so loud, especially in comparison to you. Not that it’s a bad thing,” Mom says as she plops a plate of eggs down in front of me, “Eat some eggs. You need protein if you’re gonna be messing around doing whatever mischief you get up to in those trees of yours.”
“Yes Mom,” I answer obediently. I turn back to my book while I absentmindedly eat my heavily salted eggs. A snuffling at my feet tells me Trey is back, and I take the tennis ball out of his mouth. The racket the ball makes when I throw it makes my mother turn around, securing my downfall.
“Harper Rae! You know you’re not supposed to read while you eat.” Mom snatches the book from my hands and carefully places the bookmark in my spot. She knows better than to lose my spot in the book. I begin rapidly eating my food now that I lost my entertainment, trying to finish as soon as possible to continue reading.

I’m almost halfway done with the eggs when a heavy clomping reaches my ears. Ben, coming downstairs from the heights of the attic where he sleeps.
“I do seem to catch your drift,” I say thoughtfully. The attic door opens with a loud creak, and a disheveled six year old Benjamin Song walks out. His short blond hair is sticking up in tufts all over his head, and a fluffy blue blanket is clutched around his shoulders. My other brother, eight years old and lazy, won’t wake up for a few more hours.
“Ben, can you go get the post?” My mother asks, gesturing to where the post was pushed through the letterbox by the postman several hours earlier. Ben collects the post and dumps it on the worn wooden table in a haphazard stack, completely ruining the spotless effect of our worn down kitchen. Mom leaves to go wake up my other brother, Carl, when a firm knock echoes from the front door.
I doubt Ben has any intention of getting the door, so I sprint across the room towards the front door and slide to a stop in front of the door.
“Hello?” I say curiously, looking at the strange woman standing before me. Her raven black hair perches on the top of her head in a painful looking bun. She is wearing an odd emerald green robe, which makes her already tall frame appear even taller. She raises an eyebrow at the book in my hand, and I can almost see my cheeks blush.
“Are you Harper Song?” The woman asks in a cold tone as she references an old looking piece of yellowed parchment. I’m confused. Why would this strange woman be looking for me? I hesitate before I answer, but her fierce glare dissolves my willpower.
“As a matter of fact I am,” I tell her, regretting it almost immediately as she sniffs haughtily and mutters something under her breath.
“Are your parents home?” She shifts her stance as she speaks, and I catch a glimpse of what appears to be a highly polished stick, the width of a pencil, but much longer and expensive looking. I’m contemplating what it might be when she clears her throat, somehow grumpily, and I realize that I didn’t answer her question.
“Yeah, my mom’s here, why?” I responded hurriedly, not wanting to upset this strange woman even more. She lets out an exasperated sigh, and I flinch slightly.
“Could you retrieve her then? I need to speak with both of you.” The woman sits down on the front porch chair and gestures at me to hurry up and continue.
I run and find Mom trying to wake Carl up, which is futile really. She follows me out to the front porch, which is where we find the woman.
“Thank you,” she says dramatically as she stands up. “I have other visits to attend to you know.”
My mother looks at me curiously, and I just shrug.
“I’m Rachel Song, Harper’s mother. How can we help you?” Mom holds out her hand to the still nameless woman (rude really), and they shake hands.
“I am here about Harper’s education.” Her voice is grave now, and Mom and I exchange glances. We’ve had people come to our door asking about the effectiveness before, but they have never been like…this. We always send them packing of course, because my education is perfectly fine and I have the reading level of an eighth grader thank you very much.
“We’ve been over this before. Harper and my boy’s education are splendid. I was an English teacher before I had kids and I can assure you that they all are doing excellent at school for their ages.” Mom says calmly, her voice changing from warm and polite to icy cold.
“Well that’s splendid, because that’s not why I’m here. I work for Hogwarts. We are the top school for people like Harper.” The still unnamed woman (Even ruder at this point. Honestly, some people.) says in a professional tone.
I latch on to two pieces of information in her words. The first being the school she comes from. What kind of name is Hogwarts? Secondly, people like Harper. What is that supposed to mean? I’m not special or particularly talented at anything except sneaking around, and I doubt anyone wants me to go to a special school for that.
“What do you mean people like Harper?” My mother asks suspiciously, staring at the woman as she stops on the same question I did. Like Mother like Daughter I guess.
“Why Witches and Wizards of course!” The sun seems to stop shining as she says those impossible words.
Witches aren’t real.
Even if they are, I certainly am not a witch.
But…I keep thinking back to two years ago, when I was nine.
That stupid concert I didn’t want to go to but my parents were frustratingly bent on going to. I had stormed into my room and slammed the door, yelling at them about how I wouldn’t go, and that it would be boring anyways. I can still hear the loud click the door made instead of a bang. I was locked in that room for hours, The door wouldn’t open, the window wouldn’t budge, and the walls refused to cave. I shake myself back to reality, and find myself staring the strange woman in the eyes.
“Ridiculous. I think it's time for you to leave.” Mom is trying to shoo the woman away, but the only movement she makes is to reach into the depths of her robes and pull out the wooden stick I noticed before. A full inspection shows that it is even more beautiful and treasured than it appeared in the shadows.
“Is that your wand?” I butt into the conversation before my mother can tell this strange witch off again.
“Yes.” She raises her wand, mutters something under her breath, and moves her arm in a specific looking motion, pointing it at a cushion on an unoccupied chair. I watch as the cushion rises slowly into the air, wobbling slightly, before staying put there.
“Wow,” I gasp in awe, reaching my hand underneath the cushion. I turn back to the stony faced woman. “So it’s true? Magic is real?”
She nods her head solemnly, and I turn towards my mother. Her eyes are hard, staring at the cushion still levitating in the air. Her hands are tapping furiously on her legs, and I wonder what she’s thinking.
“Mom? Can I go? If I’m really a witch, then I need to learn how to do magic. Please?” I beg, hoping that Mom will listen to the hard facts.
“I suppose so,” Mom says softly before turning to the woman. “My daughter had better not get hurt if she goes to this school of magic. Tell them Harper will be there.”
“She won’t,” the woman promised. “All the information is here.”
She hands me an envelope of yellowed parchment, and I can see my name written on the front in emerald green ink and fancy lettering. With nary a goodbye, the woman turns around and steps off the porch. In the moment she does, a loud crack echoes through the air as she vanishes from sight.