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“So Virgil, brother dear, how does it feel to be the only witch in our family, in generations, to not have a familiar?” Janus teased as he and Remus entered the living room.
Sometimes hanging out at Roman’s house could get real annoying real fast, seeing as Roman’s brother was dating Virgil’s brother. So now, a day before his ‘disappointing the entire family’ eighteenth birthday party, Janus is still here to rub it in.
Virgil hissed at his brother in response, something he’d definitely didn’t learn from said brother in the first place… okay maybe he had. It was all Janus’ familiar’s fault after all.
Janus’ familiar was a snake he had randomly found in the garden one day. Virgil was pretty sure his mother had freaked out when she saw it wrapped around Janus for the first time. However he was five at the time and Janus was seven so the exact details were a bit fuzzy.
Ever since Janus bonded with the animal he would hiss out of annoyance, a habit his younger brother, who still idolized him back then, quickly copied.
Their hissing fits had their family wondering if Virgil’s familiar would be a snake as well, or maybe a cat, like his mother had hoped. So far neither animal had clicked. In fact, no animal had, but not for a lack of trying. Virgil tried and tried and tried.
When Virgil was six, he had somehow managed to catch a mouse. He’d claimed high and low that it was his familiar, still not fully understanding what that entailed. His parents were skeptical, but played along. When Virgil would find his actual familiar they’d laugh about it together. Yeah… great plan… until Janus’ familiar, named Dragon, ate the poor thing. His excuse was that he wouldn’t have done it if it was an actual familiar. He just thought Virgil decided to feed him for once.
When Virgil turned eight, he was officially older than his brother had been when he’d found his familiar. Not that Virgil hadn’t been trying. He’d caught and touched many animals, he’d even managed to drag in a seagull once, but none had clicked. When Janus had dared him to go after a wasp, his mom had to step in. “I don’t think that’s your familiar honey.” She’d said lovingly, while simultaneously glaring at her oldest son. “You just have to be patient, they’ll come and find you. And when they do, you’ll know.”
When Virgil was nine, he met Logan. A new student who’d just moved to town. The two instantly clicked. Logan was the first person his age to not say he had a wild imagination, or tell him they didn’t want to play, whenever he told them he was a witch. Logan might not fully understand it, but Virgil was fun, a good friend, and he didn’t laugh at Logan for actually liking math and spelling. Virgil’d drag Logan on adventures, trying to find his familiar and Logan taught him chess and fun word and number puzzles.
Virgil was the reason for the only time Logan had ever gotten detention, when they got caught after he’d dragged his friend into the classroom, during recess, to see if the class hamster was his familiar.
It was not.
When Virgil was eleven, Logan introduced him to Patton. He said more friends would be good for the both of them. At first Virgil disagreed, but it was hard to dislike Patton. Especially when Patton took him to the animal shelter every month just to check if one of the cuties there was Virgil’s familiar. Even though he was highly allergic to most of the animals there himself.
Virgil liked Patton a little less when he brought Roman into their little group. Roman was two years older. He was in Janus’ class. That’s how Virgil had known him already. His brother Remus had been friends with Janus for a while and often threw worms or other gross animals at him to see if any of them would click. Luckily none ever did.
It was a bit of a rocky start, but Virgil would come to learn that Roman was nothing like his twin. He was caring, sweet, a bit overenthusiastic, but overall a great friend.
Roman would drag him along to a theatre class to get his attention away from nearing his twelfth birthday, still being familiar-les. And while Virgil wasn’t made for the stage himself. He found out that he loved helping out backstage and maybe even more than that, loved seeing Roman perform. It was like watching a magic spell work for the first time, after trying for months. Just… well… magical!
Even at fifteen he was still so enamored by Roman that he himself got super confused when Logan admitted having a crush on Patton to him. It wasn’t that he had missed the signs or anything. Just… He might have gotten a bit jealous. Which made no sense as he himself was definitely crushing hard on Roman.
His jealousy got especially bad when Logan and Patton actually started dating. He wondered how Patton dared to take Logan from him like that! Which was when he realized he seriously needed to back off. Just because Logan was his best friend first, didn’t mean he had any claim over the man, jeez.
The funny thing was, that when Virgil and Roman started dating too, Logan had been dragged along by Patton to confess to Virgil that he felt a bit jealous too. It took a bit of figuring out, but eventually the four decided to try all dating each other, which had worked wonderfully so far. It also brings us back to now.
Virgil sat on Patton’s lap, with his freckled boyfriend patting (punny I know) his head in sympathy.
“Have you tried a good ol’ Florida alligator yet?” Remus said with a manic smile. “I bet we can find one nearby, we can keep it in the pool! Maybe the chlorine will mutate it so it gets superpowers… or an extra leg that grows inside out for some reason!”
“While living in a chlorinated pool won’t be ideal, or healthy for an alligator. It wil most definitely not cause any rapid growth spontaneous mutations.” Logan responded from the other side of the couch.
“Please don’t encourage him with reason, specs.” Roman sighed, taking his feet off Logan’s lap to sit cross legged. “You weren’t there when he tried to get every possible zoo animal to touch Virgil.
“Hey! You guys liked getting to feed the giraffes!” Remus argued back.
“Yeah once we were sure we wouldn’t have to sneak a whole ass giraffe home! You know how much magic that would probably take!” Virgil threw his arms out in a scarecrow pose, “this much!” It was honestly a bit of a childish move, but he only got a few more hours of not being the only one under eighteen in their group so… sue him.
“I highly doubt there is a witch with a giraffe as a familiar” Logan brushed off his knees as he spoke. “I’m getting something to drink.” He stood up and walked to the twin’s kitchen. They heard the electric kettle being filled and turned on.
“Ooh, can you get me a lemonade please!” Patton, the only one of them who didn’t like hot tea, called out to him, getting a hum in response.
“I think the most annoying thing is that I don’t even know what it feels like to get a familiar.” Virgil sighed. “To have that connection and shit…”
Janus sighed as well, sitting down on the coffee table in front of Virgil. “It’s like…” he started hesitantly, he swirled his hand around a couple times in thought. “This instant click. A connection that can’t be broken. Like… becoming best friends in mere seconds.” He grabbed Virgil’s hands. “Knowing each other and what the other needs or wants without having to ask or tell them anything. Having an animal companion for the rest of your life, who’ll help you develop your magic and knowledge Something like that.”
“Sounds nice.” Virgil shrugged, pulling his hands from Janus’. “Guess I’ll just have to figure all that out alone.”
“You’re not alone!” Patton chastised him, softly hitting his head. “You’ve got us! Roman and I can be your cheerleaders and Logan already helps us study all the time!”
“Thanks Pat.” Virgil finally started smiling again. “You guys are the best.”
Logan walked back in the room with a tray carrying four glasses of tea, one glass of lemonade and a bottle of gatorade. He shoo’ed Janus from the coffee table so he could put it down and handed Virgil the gatorade.
“You know, just tea would have been fine…” Virgil did however gratefully accepted the beverage.
“Yeah, I know.” Logan smiled. “But you wanted gatorade.”
“I did.” Virgil hummed.
Suddenly, Remus, who had been walking towards the kitchen to get some hot sauce for his tea, stood completely still. He turned around slowly and stared at Virgil manically. He then looked at Janus and then Logan and Virgil again, continuing his weird loop until Janus called him out on it.
“Spill.” Janus said with a suspicious look in his eyes. “What crazy idea do you have now.”
“I know Virge’s familiar! I know Virge’s familiar! I know Virge’s familiar!” He sang excitedly.
“Dude, you think this is the time for you to nam another crazy animal?” Roman said with clear annoyance in his voice.
“Nah, I’ve accepted it by now.” Virgil joked. “Tell me, what do you think my familiar is?”
“Logan.” Remus grinned from ear to ear. Until everyone started laughing. Clearly thinking he was joking. “No, seriously! Virgil never said he wanted gatorade, but Logan got it anyway!”
“Because I know he likes gatorade and I saw it in the fridge when I got lemonade for Patton.” Logan argued. “And, maybe more importantly, I am not an animal.”
“Logan! Did you forget that humans are mammals?!” Janus said in faked shock. “But seriously Remus, I don’t-“
“And Patton just said that Logan helped them study!” Remus added before Janus could tear his theory down. “Virgin, has Logan ever helped you study magic?”
“Uh… yeah?” Virgil was starting to get a little red from all the attention that was on him and Logan right now. Logan wasn’t fairing much better.
“You are the first person I’ve ever connected that quickly with.” Logan pondered.
“You can’t be seriously humoring him right now!” Virgil gave Logan a small push, careful of the hot tea on the table.
“Don’t forget about you guys being super jealous of the other when they started dating someone else.”
“Roman!” Virgil screeched, absolutely mortified.
“What? You literally said that it had felt like Patton was taking Logan away from you.” Roman shrugged and Patton burst out in giggles
“Oh Logan said the exact same thing!” He said in between giggles.
“You guys are ridiculous!” Virgil finally got up from Patton’s lap. “Logan isn’t my familiar, he’s human, he’s one of my boyfriends!”
“So… I just texted mom and…” Janus took a sip of his tea for dramatic effect. “Apparently we have a great great great great aunt or something like that, who claimed her husband was her familiar.”
“Janus…” Virgil whined.
“She’s totally not curious why I asked her about human familiars by the way.” Janus took another sip of his tea. “Told her to just ask you.”
As if on cue, Virgil’s phone started ringing. He had barely picked up when his mom started her interrogation.
They would look into it more tomorrow, but for now, nuzzling against Logan’s chest, Virgil was secretly very happy to no longer be the only one in the family to not have a familiar. Even if it’s just for one night
(it wasn’t)