Super•Villainous

V

After a very brief interaction with my step-father, where he saw us three moving to the door and shot me a meaningful look. Peering at me over the back of the couch, he said one word, a reminder, "Grounded."

"You never said my punishment included not leaving the house," I pointed out.

Leigh finished the thought. "And even if it did, Other Dad said he needs to think on the punishment so technically the grounding isn't in affect until he wakes up."

Adrian blinked at her once, long and slow. Finally, turning back to the morning news, he grunted, "I'm changing the locks," which I took to mean we were free to go.

"But then I'll have to get a new key!" Leigh protested, as Nicole dragged her to the door.

"Thank you!" Nicole called behind us. "We'll make good choices!"

"Stay off that leg!" he hollered just before we clicked the door shut.

"How is your leg?" Leigh asked, twirling her car keys in a loop around her pointer finger.

Her car was parallel parked on the street due to restricted parking within the apartment complex itself. It was an expensive beast, even I could tell that much with my limited vehicular knowledge, gifted to her on her sixteenth birthday by her wealthy tech entrepreneur parents. She'd been illegally driving us around in it since the day she got her learners permit, luckily without any fiery crashes. We settled inside, me in the backseat, and she pulled out onto the road.

"My leg is fine, much better than yesterday, at least. I thought I'd broken it at first, but nope. Just a wee little sprain."

Nicole shifted around in her seat to stare incredulously. "How? The news footage made it look like you almost lost the limb!"

"Don't believe everything you see on television?"

She grabbed a stuffed dog plush Leigh kept on her dash and chucked it at me. "I don't want to hear that from you."

"Children! Children!" Leigh chided, clucking her tongue. "Don't make me turn this car around. And don't mess with my things, either. Put that back."

"Are you going to tell me where we're going, yet?" I prompted, placing the little golden retriever in her awaiting palm.

"First things first, we're getting coffee. After that... I'm open to suggestions."

I sketched up a brow that she couldn't see with her eyes on the road, but let her hear the flat skepticism on my voice. "You dragged me out of my apartment without a plan?"

"I do have a plan!" She said indignantly. "Coffee."

~*~*~*~*~

Fifteen minutes and twenty dollars later, we settled into a small table nestled within a cozy corner of the over priced, yet cozy, Nutmeg Cafe.

"Smile!" Leigh crowded into the side of the booth where Nicole and I had both already slid into, holding her iced caramel latte to her lips and her phone up in selfie mode. Before I got the chance to protest, let alone convert my deer-in-headlights expression into something more flattering, the shutter sounded and she bounced back over to her side of the table, eyes trained on her screen as she flicked through filters and aggressively punched out captions to post onto her various social media accounts.

"Could you not," I said, caught somewhere between groaning, begging, and commanding. "Even if I looked presentable right now, which I don't—"

She absently waved off my concern, not looking up, "You look fine!"

"Which I don't," I repeated, "I don't want my face out there for the media to latch onto. If someone recognizes me..."

"You dyed your hair! Who's gonna recognize you looking like this?"