The rest of my afternoon was quiet and boring again. I was excited at first. After my second session with Cass Underwood and actually getting to speak with Cassandra I made plenty of notes in my case file for her. Or them.
I was really eager to discuss the new information with Emma, but when I got the chance to speak with her she told me to save it for our regular weekly staff meeting. I knew she was right, that was the appropriate thing to do. And I knew she was busy with her own clients, but I couldn't help feeling like she just wasn't interested in talking with me. It left me feeling like I'd become the office pariah.
By the time I headed out to the car I was feeling dejected again, and when I slipped into the drivers seat I ended up just sitting there staring at the dashboard as I thought about how much things had changed in the last five days.
I knew I should have just gone home, that Amy and Siggy would both try and cheer me up one way or another. Instead I sat there quietly in the staff parking area, second guessing my actions last Friday and questioning whether or not I was cut out for any of this.
I was still there a few minutes later when my phone started to ring, so I slipped it out of my purse to check the call display. I immediately sighed when I saw it was my mom. I wondered if she somehow heard about what happened, if she knew my career was in jeopardy. I was tempted to let her go to voicemail, but after a second or two I ended up swiping the screen to answer.
"Hi mom," I said as I held the phone up to my ear. "What's up?"
She sounded concerned as she asked, "What's wrong Theresa? You sound upset. Am I calling at a bad time?"
I shrugged, "It's fine. I'm just having some issues with work lately?"
Mom asked, "Do you want to talk about it? I thought you enjoyed working at that clinic? It's the same one I saw when I was there for your birthday, isn't it?"
"Yeah it's the same place," I nodded. "It's just..."
I sighed as my voice trailed off, and I was quiet for a second or two. I decided to give her a very brief overview, but once I started talking I couldn't stop.
"I had an opportunity to help one of my clients last week in an unconventional way?" I began. "She's a seventeen year old girl and while she was really happy about how I helped her it got me in trouble with her mother, which in turn got me in hot water with my boss. Now I'm on probation with work and my career might be over before I even got started."
I wanted to stop there but the words kept coming, "I'm still waiting for Bev's final decision, but in the meantime I feel like a pariah around the clinic, my coworkers don't want to talk to me and my boss seems stressed whenever she looks at me. It's only been a few days and I'm already starting to question how much I want to keep working here, even though I used to love the place and the people I work with. Now I don't know what to do, not that there's anything I can do, other than wait until my boss comes to a final decision."
By the time I was finally finished I felt shaky and upset, and there were some tears starting to pool in my eyes. On the other hand it also felt good to vent a little like that.
My mom was quiet for a few seconds before finally asking, "This unconventional help, was it um, did it have anything to do with magic? Was it something related to your girlfriend?"
"Yeah," I sighed again. "My client's trans, but she was still in the closet? She was afraid her parents wouldn't let her transition. I helped her get an instant transition, from her original masc body to a completely new feminine body. And uh, that happened in my office, in front of her mother."
After another couple seconds mom asked, "Is she happy? The trans girl I mean?"
"Very," I nodded. "She was absolutely ecstatic and euphoric. It was a literal miracle for her, a wish come true."
"Then you've done a good job Theresa, and I'm proud of you. I'm sorry that it's led to problems for you at work, and I'm sure there's nuances and details I don't know about. But the bottom line is you helped someone in need and you made her happy. That's what matters most," she responded.
The thing that hit me hardest was my mom really did sound proud of me, and she sounded like she believed everything she said. I wasn't used to getting that kind of support from her, but hearing it made me feel a lot better.
"Thanks mom," I smiled as I wiped a few tears out of my eyes. "So that's all my news for now. How about you? You called me, what did you want to talk about?"
"Oh there's nothing in particular," mom replied in a tone that immediately told me there was definitely something specific she wanted to discuss.
She continued, "I was looking again at the email you sent me at the end of June, about your cousin Niamh and her family over in Ireland? You mentioned the possibility of a family reunion over there next summer, and I think that would be a lovely idea Theresa. I know it can take a while to plan these things, but if we start now that should give us plenty of time."
"I never put much thought into our extended family before," mom added. "My mother was never comfortable talking about her family overseas, so the subject never really came up. But looking at the family tree information you sent me... I suppose it's helped me to realize that we should reconnect with those roots."
I could tell none of that was the real reason she called. Not that she was lying about being interested in a reunion, but she was using that subject to cover for whatever was really on her mind.
Rather than put her on the spot I went along with it for now, "Ok mom. I think I sent you Niamh's contact information along with that other stuff? But I'll make sure to email her and let her know you and I are both interested. I'm sure she'll talk to her parents and the other relatives over there, and we'll see how it goes."
"Even if we can't organize a big official reunion we could still go over there ourselves to visit," I added. "Most of them all live in the same small village, we'd just need to find somewhere nearby we could stay. If I remember right, the only one who's not local is Niamh's cousin Aidan?"
Mom replied, "Let's wait and see what they say. If we could arrange some sort of reunion that would be best I think?"
I nodded, "Sure mom. So what else is going on? I get the feeling there's something else you wanted to talk about?"
She went quiet, but I was sure I heard her stifle a sigh in the background.
After a couple seconds I asked, "Mom? Is something wrong? What's going on?"
This time her sigh was more audible. She finally admitted, "Things haven't been so good between Harvey and I lately. We've been having some arguments over the past couple months, and it feels like things are slowly getting worse."
I sighed, "Mom I'm sorry. Is there anything I can do? Or do you want to talk about it?"
"I'm sure everything will be fine," mom responded. "I really don't want to trouble you with my problems. Especially not when you're under so much stress yourself with work."
"All right mom," I frowned. "If you ever need to talk though I'm here for you. Just call, text, or email."
"Thank you Theresa I appreciate that," she said, and she really did sound grateful.
At that point my phone pinged with an email notification, but I ignored it for now since my mom was talking again.
"How are things with Amy?" she asked, changing the subject. "I take it she's still doing her um, goddess stuff, if she's helping you give out miracles to people?"
I grimaced, "Amy's good. And yeah, she's keeping herself busy with that stuff I guess. Oh and the two of us adopted a cat? That's a bit of a long story but the short version is we now have a cute little tortoiseshell named Siggy."
Mom sounded like she was smiling as she replied, "You'll have to send pictures. I didn't know you were interested in owning a pet."
"Like I said it's a long story," I responded with a shrug. "We didn't set out to adopt a cat, but the cat adopted us. I'll try and remember to email you some pictures later. Anyways I should probably get going now? I'm sitting in the car in the staff parking lot at work."
"Oh!" mom exclaimed. "I'm sorry, I thought you'd be at home by now. You should have said something Theresa!"
"It's ok mom," I told her. "I'll talk to you later, alright? And like I said, if you need to talk or vent or anything at all, please don't hesitate to reach out to me."
"Thank you Tess," my mom replied. "I love you hon. Keep well."
I smiled, "I love you too mom. Talk to you again soon!"
After disconnecting I checked that email notification and saw it was from my work account. With the way I was feeling about work I was tempted to leave it until tomorrow morning, but in the end I decided to have a look at it. And as soon as I opened it up I was glad I did.
It was a message from Hannah, and it definitely helped bring my mood up a bit.
"Hi Tess!
Thanks again for everything! Not just the miracle on Friday, but all your help in the earlier sessions too. I'm grateful for everything you did for me and how much you seemed to care about me as a person.
I'm really sorry but I don't think I'm going to see you again this Friday.
My mom said she doesn't want to bring me back to the clinic, she doesn't want me to see you again. She's probably still freaked out from what happened last week?
The good news is my parents are taking things a lot better than I thought they would. They're still getting used to the idea of having a daughter and stuff, but they're actually doing what you and Amethyst said? Like trying to learn about what being trans really means. They're listening to me more too, when I tell them about what it's like and everything.
The other good news is they're not going to sue you or anything. I don't know if that's something you were worried about? But I asked them about it and they promised they won't. My mom was totally freaked out about everything on Friday but she's calmed down a lot since then.
So I was wondering, can you do miracles like that for other people? Even if they aren't clients? I've been talking to my friends online, sharing selfies and stuff, and some of them really want miracles of their own. I'm not sure if they can come to your clinic though, a lot of them don't even live around here.
Thanks again for everything!
- Hannah"
I ended up reading through the email twice, before I started thinking about how to respond. It only took me a few seconds to realize I should probably talk with Amy about it first. I was sure she wanted me to do more miracles, to keep up my cleric work for her, but in this case I thought it would be better if Hannah's friends just prayed to Amethyst directly.
Fortunately the drive home didn't take long, and in less than ten minutes I was walking in through the apartment door.
"Hello love!" Amy called to me from the balcony where she was relaxing in one of the plastic chairs. Siggy was out there as well, laying across Amy's lap.
I smiled and waved on my way to our bedroom, so I could get changed into something more comfortable. Shorts and an old t-shirt weren't the least bit fashionable, but they were a lot more cosy than my work outfit. I brought my phone with me as I visited the kitchen to get myself a glass of wine, before finally joining my girlfriend out on the balcony.
Amy asked, "How was your day? You're a little later than usual, I hope everything's ok?"
"Sorry I'm late," I apologized. Then after a sip of wine I replied, "Today was ok. Mostly the same as yesterday, but I had two client sessions that were rewarding. Then after work I got a call from my mom, so I ended up talking to her in the car in the parking lot before coming home."
"I also got an email from Hannah Greer that I wanted to talk to you about," I added before another sip of my drink.
"What did Hannah say? I hope it's good news," she responded.
"It is," I nodded. I still had my phone with me, and opened up the email so I could share it with her.
Once she'd read through it she handed my phone back and said, "That's very good news! I hope that means your boss will finally relax and you can return to business as usual again."
"Me too," I replied. "That's not what I wanted to discuss though? It's about Hannah's friends. As much as I'd like to help them, I don't think it's a good idea right now. I don't think it would look good for me if Bev found out I was doing that while my career's still at risk. So I was thinking I should just suggest Hannah tells her friends to try and pray to you directly?"
Amy smiled as she reminded me, "You couldn't perform more miracles right now anyways. You have a two-week cooldown on that magic, remember?"
"And yeah, your suggestion is the best way to handle things. Hannah's friends can pray to me directly and I'll see what I can do for them," she added.
"Thanks cutie," I replied. "I'm glad we're both on the same page. And thanks for reminding me of the two-week recharge, I'd actually forgotten about that."
I drained the last of my wine then set the glass down and started tapping out a reply to Hannah's email. As I did that I asked Amy, "How was your day? Anything interesting happen, or have you and Siggy had another quiet day lounging around doing nothing?"
"Hey!" Amy protested. "Just because I can work from home doesn't mean I don't do anything with my day."
I smirked, "You haven't even bothered to get dressed today cutie. You're still in your nightshirt, so you can't be working that hard."
My girlfriend pouted, but she didn't deny the accusation.
Instead she changed the subject, "I actually have some good news as well. Remember when we saw my sister, she told us she had a big interview coming up? She heard back from them today, she got the job. So we're going to get together with her and Alex on Friday to celebrate."
"Sounds good," I responded as I re-read my email to Hannah, before sending it off.
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The rest of my afternoon was quiet and boring again. I was excited at first. After my second session with Cass Underwood and actually getting to speak with Cassandra I made plenty of notes in my case file for her. Or them.
I was really eager to discuss the new information with Emma, but when I got the chance to speak with her she told me to save it for our regular weekly staff meeting. I knew she was right, that was the appropriate thing to do. And I knew she was busy with her own clients, but I couldn't help feeling like she just wasn't interested in talking with me. It left me feeling like I'd become the office pariah.
By the time I headed out to the car I was feeling dejected again, and when I slipped into the drivers seat I ended up just sitting there staring at the dashboard as I thought about how much things had changed in the last five days.
I knew I should have just gone home, that Amy and Siggy would both try and cheer me up one way or another. Instead I sat there quietly in the staff parking area, second guessing my actions last Friday and questioning whether or not I was cut out for any of this.
I was still there a few minutes later when my phone started to ring, so I slipped it out of my purse to check the call display. I immediately sighed when I saw it was my mom. I wondered if she somehow heard about what happened, if she knew my career was in jeopardy. I was tempted to let her go to voicemail, but after a second or two I ended up swiping the screen to answer.
"Hi mom," I said as I held the phone up to my ear. "What's up?"
She sounded concerned as she asked, "What's wrong Theresa? You sound upset. Am I calling at a bad time?"
I shrugged, "It's fine. I'm just having some issues with work lately?"
Mom asked, "Do you want to talk about it? I thought you enjoyed working at that clinic? It's the same one I saw when I was there for your birthday, isn't it?"
"Yeah it's the same place," I nodded. "It's just..."
I sighed as my voice trailed off, and I was quiet for a second or two. I decided to give her a very brief overview, but once I started talking I couldn't stop.
"I had an opportunity to help one of my clients last week in an unconventional way?" I began. "She's a seventeen year old girl and while she was really happy about how I helped her it got me in trouble with her mother, which in turn got me in hot water with my boss. Now I'm on probation with work and my career might be over before I even got started."
I wanted to stop there but the words kept coming, "I'm still waiting for Bev's final decision, but in the meantime I feel like a pariah around the clinic, my coworkers don't want to talk to me and my boss seems stressed whenever she looks at me. It's only been a few days and I'm already starting to question how much I want to keep working here, even though I used to love the place and the people I work with. Now I don't know what to do, not that there's anything I can do, other than wait until my boss comes to a final decision."
By the time I was finally finished I felt shaky and upset, and there were some tears starting to pool in my eyes. On the other hand it also felt good to vent a little like that.
My mom was quiet for a few seconds before finally asking, "This unconventional help, was it um, did it have anything to do with magic? Was it something related to your girlfriend?"
"Yeah," I sighed again. "My client's trans, but she was still in the closet? She was afraid her parents wouldn't let her transition. I helped her get an instant transition, from her original masc body to a completely new feminine body. And uh, that happened in my office, in front of her mother."
After another couple seconds mom asked, "Is she happy? The trans girl I mean?"
"Very," I nodded. "She was absolutely ecstatic and euphoric. It was a literal miracle for her, a wish come true."
"Then you've done a good job Theresa, and I'm proud of you. I'm sorry that it's led to problems for you at work, and I'm sure there's nuances and details I don't know about. But the bottom line is you helped someone in need and you made her happy. That's what matters most," she responded.
The thing that hit me hardest was my mom really did sound proud of me, and she sounded like she believed everything she said. I wasn't used to getting that kind of support from her, but hearing it made me feel a lot better.
"Thanks mom," I smiled as I wiped a few tears out of my eyes. "So that's all my news for now. How about you? You called me, what did you want to talk about?"
"Oh there's nothing in particular," mom replied in a tone that immediately told me there was definitely something specific she wanted to discuss.
She continued, "I was looking again at the email you sent me at the end of June, about your cousin Niamh and her family over in Ireland? You mentioned the possibility of a family reunion over there next summer, and I think that would be a lovely idea Theresa. I know it can take a while to plan these things, but if we start now that should give us plenty of time."
"I never put much thought into our extended family before," mom added. "My mother was never comfortable talking about her family overseas, so the subject never really came up. But looking at the family tree information you sent me... I suppose it's helped me to realize that we should reconnect with those roots."
I could tell none of that was the real reason she called. Not that she was lying about being interested in a reunion, but she was using that subject to cover for whatever was really on her mind.
Rather than put her on the spot I went along with it for now, "Ok mom. I think I sent you Niamh's contact information along with that other stuff? But I'll make sure to email her and let her know you and I are both interested. I'm sure she'll talk to her parents and the other relatives over there, and we'll see how it goes."
"Even if we can't organize a big official reunion we could still go over there ourselves to visit," I added. "Most of them all live in the same small village, we'd just need to find somewhere nearby we could stay. If I remember right, the only one who's not local is Niamh's cousin Aidan?"
Mom replied, "Let's wait and see what they say. If we could arrange some sort of reunion that would be best I think?"
I nodded, "Sure mom. So what else is going on? I get the feeling there's something else you wanted to talk about?"
She went quiet, but I was sure I heard her stifle a sigh in the background.
After a couple seconds I asked, "Mom? Is something wrong? What's going on?"
This time her sigh was more audible. She finally admitted, "Things haven't been so good between Harvey and I lately. We've been having some arguments over the past couple months, and it feels like things are slowly getting worse."
I sighed, "Mom I'm sorry. Is there anything I can do? Or do you want to talk about it?"
"I'm sure everything will be fine," mom responded. "I really don't want to trouble you with my problems. Especially not when you're under so much stress yourself with work."
"All right mom," I frowned. "If you ever need to talk though I'm here for you. Just call, text, or email."
"Thank you Theresa I appreciate that," she said, and she really did sound grateful.
At that point my phone pinged with an email notification, but I ignored it for now since my mom was talking again.
"How are things with Amy?" she asked, changing the subject. "I take it she's still doing her um, goddess stuff, if she's helping you give out miracles to people?"
I grimaced, "Amy's good. And yeah, she's keeping herself busy with that stuff I guess. Oh and the two of us adopted a cat? That's a bit of a long story but the short version is we now have a cute little tortoiseshell named Siggy."
Mom sounded like she was smiling as she replied, "You'll have to send pictures. I didn't know you were interested in owning a pet."
"Like I said it's a long story," I responded with a shrug. "We didn't set out to adopt a cat, but the cat adopted us. I'll try and remember to email you some pictures later. Anyways I should probably get going now? I'm sitting in the car in the staff parking lot at work."
"Oh!" mom exclaimed. "I'm sorry, I thought you'd be at home by now. You should have said something Theresa!"
"It's ok mom," I told her. "I'll talk to you later, alright? And like I said, if you need to talk or vent or anything at all, please don't hesitate to reach out to me."
"Thank you Tess," my mom replied. "I love you hon. Keep well."
I smiled, "I love you too mom. Talk to you again soon!"
After disconnecting I checked that email notification and saw it was from my work account. With the way I was feeling about work I was tempted to leave it until tomorrow morning, but in the end I decided to have a look at it. And as soon as I opened it up I was glad I did.
It was a message from Hannah, and it definitely helped bring my mood up a bit.
"Hi Tess!
Thanks again for everything! Not just the miracle on Friday, but all your help in the earlier sessions too. I'm grateful for everything you did for me and how much you seemed to care about me as a person.
I'm really sorry but I don't think I'm going to see you again this Friday.
My mom said she doesn't want to bring me back to the clinic, she doesn't want me to see you again. She's probably still freaked out from what happened last week?
The good news is my parents are taking things a lot better than I thought they would. They're still getting used to the idea of having a daughter and stuff, but they're actually doing what you and Amethyst said? Like trying to learn about what being trans really means. They're listening to me more too, when I tell them about what it's like and everything.
The other good news is they're not going to sue you or anything. I don't know if that's something you were worried about? But I asked them about it and they promised they won't. My mom was totally freaked out about everything on Friday but she's calmed down a lot since then.
So I was wondering, can you do miracles like that for other people? Even if they aren't clients? I've been talking to my friends online, sharing selfies and stuff, and some of them really want miracles of their own. I'm not sure if they can come to your clinic though, a lot of them don't even live around here.
Thanks again for everything!
- Hannah"
I ended up reading through the email twice, before I started thinking about how to respond. It only took me a few seconds to realize I should probably talk with Amy about it first. I was sure she wanted me to do more miracles, to keep up my cleric work for her, but in this case I thought it would be better if Hannah's friends just prayed to Amethyst directly.
Fortunately the drive home didn't take long, and in less than ten minutes I was walking in through the apartment door.
"Hello love!" Amy called to me from the balcony where she was relaxing in one of the plastic chairs. Siggy was out there as well, laying across Amy's lap.
I smiled and waved on my way to our bedroom, so I could get changed into something more comfortable. Shorts and an old t-shirt weren't the least bit fashionable, but they were a lot more cosy than my work outfit. I brought my phone with me as I visited the kitchen to get myself a glass of wine, before finally joining my girlfriend out on the balcony.
Amy asked, "How was your day? You're a little later than usual, I hope everything's ok?"
"Sorry I'm late," I apologized. Then after a sip of wine I replied, "Today was ok. Mostly the same as yesterday, but I had two client sessions that were rewarding. Then after work I got a call from my mom, so I ended up talking to her in the car in the parking lot before coming home."
"I also got an email from Hannah Greer that I wanted to talk to you about," I added before another sip of my drink.
"What did Hannah say? I hope it's good news," she responded.
"It is," I nodded. I still had my phone with me, and opened up the email so I could share it with her.
Once she'd read through it she handed my phone back and said, "That's very good news! I hope that means your boss will finally relax and you can return to business as usual again."
"Me too," I replied. "That's not what I wanted to discuss though? It's about Hannah's friends. As much as I'd like to help them, I don't think it's a good idea right now. I don't think it would look good for me if Bev found out I was doing that while my career's still at risk. So I was thinking I should just suggest Hannah tells her friends to try and pray to you directly?"
Amy smiled as she reminded me, "You couldn't perform more miracles right now anyways. You have a two-week cooldown on that magic, remember?"
"And yeah, your suggestion is the best way to handle things. Hannah's friends can pray to me directly and I'll see what I can do for them," she added.
"Thanks cutie," I replied. "I'm glad we're both on the same page. And thanks for reminding me of the two-week recharge, I'd actually forgotten about that."
I drained the last of my wine then set the glass down and started tapping out a reply to Hannah's email. As I did that I asked Amy, "How was your day? Anything interesting happen, or have you and Siggy had another quiet day lounging around doing nothing?"
"Hey!" Amy protested. "Just because I can work from home doesn't mean I don't do anything with my day."
I smirked, "You haven't even bothered to get dressed today cutie. You're still in your nightshirt, so you can't be working that hard."
My girlfriend pouted, but she didn't deny the accusation.
Instead she changed the subject, "I actually have some good news as well. Remember when we saw my sister, she told us she had a big interview coming up? She heard back from them today, she got the job. So we're going to get together with her and Alex on Friday to celebrate."
"Sounds good," I responded as I re-read my email to Hannah, before sending it off.
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