[ She thinks about it, and she's honestly not sure whether the library or the reading came first. She's pretty sure that she was left at the library because it was safe and open late enough to act as a free babysitter, and that the librarians didn't call her family out on it because they felt bad for her. But she knows that, either way, there were days that she would spend six hours sitting on a beanbag with a Yoo-hoo or cherry Coke, stacks of books around her, going through entire series in only a few weeks.

Taking a deep breath, she nods, tries to reorient the way she's coming at the idea of magic. She feels slightly less intimidated, but it doesn't change the previous issue she'd pointed out: she can feel the magic but doesn't know how to harness it. And Nadine doesn't seem to have the feeling that she does, the awareness of magic in the air like spiderwebs constantly brushing her skin. The way she speaks is slow, like she's actively trying to work through it as she talks. ]

Okay, so, like I said, I can... if I try, I can feel magic. It's there. But it's like tryin' to squish a gnat in mid-air. Sometimes you can get it, but usually the air movin' with your hands pushes it away. So how do I make it hold still?