Calyx

My ice-cream began to melt, and I made a big show of catching that falling drop for Fable’s sake, before I started to actually eat the stuff.

This was insane. No, this was more than insane.

Here I was, sitting at a booth in an ice-cream shop, with a child who we have possibly kidnapped, and my neighbor, Bia. But wait! It get’s better! We all have inhuman super powers. And if that’s not enough, we all now how to use them. I think.

“Bia, I don’t know. What if we get in trouble? Fable, she shouldn’t be here. We need to return her.” I tried to keep my voice hushed, but sure enough, Fable had been using her mind ability, and had picked up everything I just said.
“Nope, un-uh, not gonna happen.” Fable licked some chocolate ice cream off her lip and looked up at me, destroyed. Apparently, sending her back was worse then us going to jail.

Bia pretended she hadn’t heard me. Instead, she licked at her mint chocolate chip cone furiously, trying to stop it from melting so fast. But I could tell she didn’t care about the ice-cream. She was just as worried about this as I was, wasn’t she?

She had to be.

We were criminals. We had a stolen kid. A stolen kid for Pete’s sake. Didn’t anyone care? I surely did. And I wasn’t about to go to jail because I messed up.

Messing up is not allowed.

Strictly against the rules for me.

If I messed up, even once, then everything might come out. Things would be said, charges made, it just wasn’t as easy as sitting in an ice-cream parlor with a stolen kid. Was it?

It couldn’t be.

“Bia,” I tried to speak her name, but my tongue had swelled up. Oh shit. This wasn’t good. “Bia,” I tried again. “ What’s in this ice-cream?” My demand came with much urgency.

“Uh, I don’t know. Maple flavoring, Pecans, something like that.” Bia flicked an abandoned chocolate chip off the table absent mindlessly.

“Okay. Just wondering.” I thought for a moment. How was I supposed to break it to Bia that I was having an allergic reaction the pecans, without worsening the state of my tongue?

“OH MY GOD! ARE YOU OKAY? WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOUR MOUTH? IVY, IVY IS SHE HAVING AN ALLERGIC REACTION? IVY, DO SOMETHING!” A chubby boy from a few booths over began to scream.

Well, that’s one way.