Converting Amy

Even though Jared had managed to turn Holly into something resembling a lesbian James Bond, it didn't mean she could expect a hundred per cent success rate in bedding any woman she set her sights on. However, nobody else in the family, at least that she was in touch with, came close to having Holly's understanding of the curse. She had always been someone who dealt with her fears by researching the thing she was afraid of as well as she possibly could to best prepare herself for it. Nothing had ever scared her as much as the Petersen curse, and as a result she had researched it exhaustively for the past decade.

That meant that, with a Master who seemed happy to let her use his commands as he own personal wishes, Holly was in an almost historically unique position of being both able to and capable of making the maximum advantage out of the curses immense power. It also meant she knew the limitations of the curse when it came to influencing other people. She could not be given magical powers over them, such as her Master had over her. She could not control or read their minds. Non Peterson's, after all, had not been the target of the ancient witches wrath.

Holly could, however, now read visual or verbal cues - body language, tone, phraseology - to the level of a highly trained FBI agent, maybe even better than that. She was also now a walking encyclopaedia who could pull any information she wanted to impress her target with, or use to lead to the perfect conversation, from thin air. Perhaps most helpfully of all, she was able to read someone's level of interest in her accurately and in real time, like in one of those video games where the player can see an NPC's favourability rating of the MC go up or down depending on the selected line of dialogue. Holly decided that, with this being the first time she had ever attempted to hit on a woman, she may as well treat it as a game, keep her expectations in check and have fun with it.

She walked over towards the red haired woman who had caught her eye earlier. Already Holly's decision to switch from guys to girls was looking justified. The young woman Holly was approaching was way more attractive than any of the males in the bar were.

Holly could read her odds here very accurately. The woman's interest level in her was actually decently high, but so was her level of resistance. This was probably someone who would consider herself to be straight, and it wasn't going to be anywhere near as easy to convert the beautiful stranger as it had been for Jared to convert Holly a little earlier.

The woman was reading a book. That was a great conversation starter and, of course, Holly would have no problem talking about it.

"On the Road? Great choice, I love Jack Kerouac"

"Oh really?" the woman looked up in surprise "So few people in our age group have even heard of him. It's not my favourite of his though"

"Mine neither" Holly nodded "I prefer The Dharma Burns, such a serene and meditative read"

"It really is" the red haired woman agreed, looking quite impressed now.

"Do you mind if I sit with you? It's so rare to meet someone else in this town who appreciates the Beat Generation." Holly asked.

"Um, sure why not. I'm pretty new around here, it would be nice to make a friend with great taste. I'm Amy"

"Laney" the brunette replied, deciding she felt more comfortable as her alter ego when trying something like this "You're from the West Coast aren't you, Amy? I can tell from your accent. I'm guessing Oregon?"

"Holy shit, how did you get that?" Amy looked genuinely amazed "I didn't think Oregonians had that much of a specific accent?"

"You do. It's all in the vowel shifts and relaxed tone. It's pretty cute, actually"

"Are you FBI or something?" Amy asked only half jokingly.

"No" Holly laughed "Just a good study of people"

"Okay then, what's my star sign?" Amy challenged.

"Shall we make it interesting? If I get it right you buy us both a cocktail" Holly suggested.

"And if you get it wrong?"

"I'll buy us both a cocktail. You've got an eleven out of twelve shot at winning this, and either way you get a drink at the end of it"

"Sure, why not" Amy folded her arms and tried to look as inscrutable as possible "Go ahead then, what's my star sign?"

"Let me see if I can remember them all first. So it's Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo.."

Holly listed all of the star signs, pretending to refamiliarise herself with them while actually looking for tells from Amy. She got one. When she listed Libra Amy's lips twitched slightly, as if trying not to spill a secret.

"You're Libra" Holly announced confidently after working though all of the signs.

"Damn, you're good" Amy broke into a smile for the first time since being approached "How did you guess?"

"Libra's are charming, intellectual and a little guarded. That seemed to scan with you" All nonsense made up on the spot, but it had the desired effect.

"Wow, well I guess I owe us both a drink then" Amy conceded as she waved the bartender over.

Holly still had a way to go, but Amy's attraction towards her had been solidified now. She just needed to work on lowering her natural inhibitions towards trying something new. A cocktail would definitely help with that.