Chapter Text
A few years ago, during a particularly brutal summer heat wave, Qin Su learned the reason why, for all of the effort she'd invested in hanging onto the outskirts of conversations and shoehorning herself into social gatherings she was only tangentially related to, she never quite found a space where she belonged. She'd been lying on her grandmother's sofa during a particularly nasty spell of heat, fanning herself with an odd piece of junk mail lifted from the ever-growing pile on the kitchen counter, while the older woman flipped through various television channels until landing on one about a young witch learning her powers.
"Oh rats!" Qin Su's grandmother had exclaimed before directing a sheepish glance at her only daughter's only daughter. "I forgot."
As it turned out, like the girl on television, Qin Su also descended from a long line of witches, famous in their craft for all brands of mischief. But, as the years passed and technology and science won out over mysticism and sorcery, it became much easier to press a button than to round up all the components and spend the time brewing a potion or crafting a spell. Microwaves, air conditioners, automatic vacuum cleaners—with such inventions, why go through the bother? At least that's what her grandmother had said in her own defense.
"I meant to get around to it, dear, but what practical use is there for such things anymore? Unless you want to turn someone into a frog, which is honestly far more trouble than it's worth. They sell them in pet stores now, did you know?" Then she went into a long tirade about finally perfecting her scrying spell after ten years of practice, only to be outdone by the invention of the doorbell camera within mere months of her accomplishment.
But Qin Su would not be denied her heritage, not when it gave her a purpose she so severely lacked, so her grandmother spent the last few years of her life departing the knowledge she should have received as a girl. When the woman passed—
Which wasn't a sad affair, by the way. The death of a witch is a splendid thing for all parties, as it is more a rebirth than a loss. And Qin Su's grandmother made her way back home after a fortnight, inhabiting the body of a silky black cat missing the same exact front tooth the woman had spent half her life without, picking up the television show she'd been watching at the same episode as she'd left off!
—the lessons came to an abrupt end and Qin Su had to continue her own education from the books left behind and a blog she'd found at the very bottom of a YouTube rabbit hole.
So it should go without being said that Qin Su was a bad witch. Not malicious…but a tad bit incompetent in every conceivable way. For the first few years on her own, the spells she practiced tended to produce unpredictable effects. Nothing harmful, just inconvenient. (Turning her long haired grandmother cat into a short haired grandmother cat in an effort to quell her allergies rendered the animal completely hairless but for two comically untouched eyebrows, which the feline used to express her obvious displeasure.) (There was also the never ending soup spell that flooded the first floor of the house with beef stew, and the mind reading spell which did grant her the inner musings of the young boy she fancied—but from his own tongue as the spell forced him to verbalize every single thought that crossed his mind for an entire week.) (He didn't return her feelings.)
Now, approaching her twenty fifth year, she'd finally found her stride. The last twenty or so spells she'd placed had gone off without a hitch! Her lawns were green and thriving, the temperature in her house remained a cool 69 degrees regardless of the temperature outside, and her hair arranged itself into a neat style every day without the use of tools or expensive products. To her grandmother's credit, most of that could have been achieved easier without sorcery, but that didn't negate the pride she felt with every successful spell.
She'd finally become confident in her skills—which was an absolutely horrible condition for a young, self taught witch when that same witch happened to be, as Qin Su happened to be, meddlesome.
When one was irked by injustice and also had the skills to address such injustice, how could one just sit on their rump and allow unfair events to transpire? There wasn't a witch's oath like doctors swore; she wasn't required to use her powers to intervene when necessary, she just chose to do so because she could. So, when standing in line at the bank one early summer's morning, and bearing witness to the absolute horrible treatment the beautiful black and red adorned man suffered from the rather frigid banking executive standing before him, she couldn't just let it go.
The man was kind hearted; witches had a way of telling such things and even if they couldn't, she'd have known by the stuffed toy sticking out of the man's backpack. Evil men don't walk around with those sorts of things.
But the man he was pleading before? Brr! Colder than a witch's—um. A witch's—well, the thing was, witch's tits weren't actually cold. She knew this, being in possession of two of her own. Many things were colder. A witch's freezer. A witch's iced latte. A witch's snowman. But, her grandmother found the phrase terribly funny and said it all the time, and now Qin Su did as well.
Anyway, the man was coldly explaining all the reasons the kind faced man wouldn't qualify for a home loan. And in such excruciating detail! The man's credit? Poor. His job history? Spotty. Current income? Inadequate. Even the home he was applying for got raked over the coals for being in horrible shape and uninsurable.
"But I'm going to make it insurable! I'm good with my hands!" the kind faced man implored, only to have the bank executive's placid expression remain unimpressed..
"That is none of our bank's concern. You've made your case to several of my employees, their managers, their manager's managers, and now myself. My decision is categorically and unequivocally no. Good day, Mr. Wei."
Well! What was she to do? The bank executive's reasons might have been legitimate, but did he have to speak without an ounce of empathy? And did he have to embarrass the kind faced man in the lobby of the bank for everyone to see? Men like that rarely suffered consequences for their abhorrent behavior, and the world is the worse for it. But that day, Qin Su was there to witness it.
It wouldn't take much. The paper tea cup the executive disposed of as he left the building would suffice, and the kind faced man shed like crazy. It wasn't hard to find a hair left behind where he'd been kneeling. Yes, she'd do it. Just a small little spell to give the bank executive a taste of what it was like to live in the other man's shoes. A bit of the empathy he lacked so that, the next time he woke, he would feel the shame and embarrassment he caused the kind faced man as if it were his own.
Qin Su rushed home with excitement, and set to work perfecting the spell. How lucky for the kind faced man that he was there to witness his injustice!
How lucky indeed.