Roar of Dragons

[Xander – 12 years]

"Is everything okay, Xander?" Mr. Trey asks when he answers the call.

"Maybe," I answer. "Mr. Trey, is it okay if I try teleporting back to the house? Greyson's 'Guide to the Art of Teleporting' seems to work but I was only teleporting around the workshop, so I don't know if I can do longer distances."

Mr. Trey doesn't respond immediately. Does that mean I did something wrong? But I was never told I'm not allowed to learn teleportation magic and I even mentioned wanting to do that to him earlier! What did I do wrong?

"You may," he answers after a few moments.

"Okay," so I'm not in trouble. That's good. "After I test that, is it okay if I go to the fairgrounds and see if I can handle the crowd? S.G. and Connor and Sam and Isaac are there right now and they keep posting pictures in the chat and it looks like fun. It's also close to dinnertime, so I'm getting hungry and want to try the fair's food."

"You can," he says. "Are you still planning on going to the bowling alley after?"

"I am," I tell him. "If I have time, can I bake some stuff? Greyson's got a 'Guide to Baking With Magic' on the system, too, and I've already learned the spells. It can make everything except the preparation stage a lot faster."

"And how does that work?" Mr. Trey asks.

"It uses a mixture of time, force, and heat or cold magic to cook or cool things more quickly," I tell him. "I adapted some of the spells and learned how to breathe fire and ice."

I inhale deeply, then exhale and as I do, fire billows out of my mouth. Since I'm outside right now, it's easy to aim that away from anything which could burn.

"And… why did you do that?" Mr. Trey asks.

"So that if someone tried to force me to-"

"Okay, okay," he quickly says. "I understand."

"But I didn't say it."

"I can make an educated guess," he says. "You do need supervision for baking, so ask Katie if she's there."

"Doesn't she have the day off after breakfast?"

"It doesn't hurt to ask," Mr. Trey tells me. "She can say 'no' if she wants to."

"Okay," I say. "By the way, Grandpa Adrian was here when I arrived earlier. I think he was checking something Greyson made. He was inspecting a toy Greyson made when I showed up. I think he's a dragon."

"Why do you think that?"

"Because that's the impression I get from his mana," I answer. "He claims he's just a person with unique aspects to his mana, but Santa said that he can fool my ability to know when people are lying, and Santa's a god so I'm sure he'd be knowledgeable in this."

"Okay," he says.

"I'm going to go now," I tell Mr. Trey. "Bye."

"Bye, Xander," he chuckles, then I hang up and pocket my phone.

I return into the workshop and grab my backpack. Not the old one, though. That's stuffed inside of this one, along with the other two.

It's possible to put spatial pockets inside of others when they're part of an item like a bag. Greyson's notes on enchanting spatial pockets was very clear on that, as it's no different than stuffing a backpack inside of another backpack, or a bottle into another bottle. As long as the object itself can fit into the other space, then it's fine. The pocket spaces only take up as much space as the object they're a part of.

With my backpack on, I cast the teleport spell. Greyson's had some weird parts to it so I removed those and adjusted some of its aspects while doing the shorter teleports, and the casting is a lot faster now. Almost seven times as fast.

Well, it was already pretty fast before, but this makes it even faster. And the spell costs a lot less mana. I really want to know why Greyson thought the spell needed all of that extra stuff, so I'll probably ask him the next time we're both here. If I remember to.

When the spell completes, I appear in front of the doors to Mr. Trey's house. I open the door and enter, then slip off my shoes and find Ms. Katie, who's starting to make herself dinner.

"Hello, Ms. Katie," I say.

"Hello, Xander," she says. "Did you want to eat here? I can fix something up for you."

"I was going to go to the fairgrounds and see if I can handle the crowd for dinner," I tell her. "Mr. Trey said to ask you if you would be okay with supervising me when I try to use magic to bake after I finish dinner."

"Magic to bake?" Ms. Katie asks.

"Yeah," I nod. "Greyson has directions on how to do that in the digital library he created for me and I read up on it. To bake something, it uses a mixture of force, heat, and time magic. The directions were extremely clear on what to do and I want to give it a try. I can use the stuff I bought yesterday. There was plenty extra. Mr. Trey said to ask if you were willing to supervise me even though it's your day off."

"I don't mind," she tells me. "I don't have other plans and baking with you's fun."

"Fun?" I ask.

It can be fun to bake with me? I know that I am starting to find it fun to bake, but is it really fun to bake with me even though I keep messing things up?

"Yeah," she says. "You have fun at the fair, okay? And remember your earplugs or headphones if things get too noisy for you."

"I'll try to remember," I tell her. "Enjoy your dinner, Ms. Katie."

I put my shoes back on, then teleport to the entrance of the fairgrounds. I've been here before in the past, with my old foster family. They forced me to come to the fair with them even though I struggled to handle it. Having been here before makes it easier to teleport than having not been here before, since I don't have to do calculations for the teleport spell.

Now that I'm here, I walk up to the booth here and pull out my wallet. Mr. Trey gave me money earlier just in case I decided to come to the fair.

"Hello," I greet the lady at the counter. "How much is it to enter?"

"It's free," she tells me. "But you can buy tickets and bracelets here. Most games take one or two tickets, and most rides take two or three tickets. Tickets are two for a dollar. If you want a bracelet, which gives free rides for the duration of the fair, it's thirty-five dollars. Are your parents with you?"

"My parents are dead."

"O-oh," she looks uncomfortable for a moment. "Who's in charge of you?"

"Mr. Trey," I say. "He's my foster dad. But he's attending a fancy barbecue. He said I could come here and gave me money for it. I want to meet up with some friends and their dads and aunt. They're already inside."

"Oh," she says. "Okay. Do you want some tickets?"

"I don't think I'm going to play games."

"Okay," she says. "If you want to play games, you can buy tickets at any of the stations set up around the fair, though the booths will also let you play for a dollar per ticket they'd accept. So if it's not paid for with a ticket, it's one dollar."

"But that's twice as much."

"It is," she says. "That's just how it is."

That makes no sense. If I do play games, I'll make sure to buy tickets.

"Okay," I say. "So I can go on in, then?"

"You can," she says. "Have fun!"

"I might," I say, then enter the fair.

It doesn't take me very long before I put in the noise-reducing earplugs that still let me hear human voices without being too loud. I want to try and find the other boys without asking them for where they are, but I might have to text and ask. This place is huge and crowded.

Oooh! That looks good!

[Sig – 13 years]

"Hi, Hunter!" I wave to Hunter, who waves back.

"Hey, S.G.," he says. "Hey, Connor."

"Who's this?" Sam asks as we walk up to the booth where Hunter's working.

It's for the smoothie shop he works for, they've apparently set up a tent here. Hunter's wearing his uniform, which consists of green pants and a pink shirt. It looks… weird but awesome.

"His dad works with mine," Connor looks at me. "How do you know him?"

"His dad's the one who was helping us yesterday," I tell him. "He came over to help, too! So you're working here, too?"

"Yeah," Hunter says. "You guys having fun?"

"We are!" I answer. "It's build-your-own smoothie?"

"Gotta pay per addition," he says. "It's a dollar for the base, and we can do up to three fruits and up to two syrups and sauces. You can see the prices here."

The prices are based on the portion of each fruit which goes in as well, so a third-cup of strawberries costs less than half a cup of them. We each buy a smoothie, then start looking for the dads, which Aunt Rachel is now a part of. They told us to meet them near the main food area for dinner and-

"Is that Xander?" Sam asks.

"Where?" I snap my head to the direction he's looking. "It is! Wait. He looks so funny."

We all giggle a little at how Xander looks. He's got a massive funnel cake with powdered sugar, ice cream, blueberry and strawberry compote, banana slices, and walnuts. He's balancing it on his left hand with a to-go cup of lemonade held against his chest with his arm, and is eating the funnel cake and toppings with a fork in his right. However, he's made a little bit of a mess and has some of the powder and topping on his nose, cheeks, and chin.

Every time I've seen Xander eat, he's quickly wiped his face if something got on it. Every time. That's probably why we find it so funny that he's got toppings there. That, and he looks so dorky like that, especially with the oblivious look on his face.

"Xander!" We start calling out to him. "Hey! Xander!"

It takes us a minute to get his attention, especially with him walking around. He keeps sniffing the air, too, and I think he's following his nose somewhere.

"Xander!" I move in front of him and he jumps a little, nearly dropping his plate and cup. "Oh! Sorry!"

"Oh! Hi, S.G.!" He says. "I was looking for you guys."

"You were?" I ask.

"Yeah," he nods. "I'm hungry and it's time for dinner so I figured you'd all be somewhere there's food. I can smell cooking meat this way and figured that might be where you are."

"How long have you been here?" I ask.

"We would've found a place to meet up if you told us," Connor tells him.

"Yeah," I say. "We could've even met you at the gate!"

"Roughly seven minutes," Xander answers. "I had to wait in line for the funnel cake and that took four minutes. It's really good. And that's fine, I wanted to try and find you on my own first. Do you want a piece?"

It seems like he's only offering part of the funnel cake to me for some reason, especially since he then offers some to the rest of us after a look of realization crosses his face. We all get a piece of it, then walk with him to the big food center, where the dads are talking.

"Hey, boys," Mr. Michaels says.

"Hey, Xander!" Mr. Thompson says. "You came?"

"For dinner," Xander nods. "But I stopped for a funnel cake with lots of toppings. It looked delicious. It is delicious. But I'm almost done. And I'm really hungry. Mr. Trey gave me money in case I came here, so I can buy stuff. But I have my own money, too."

I noticed it earlier, but Xander's talking a lot more. Not in a hyper way, just in a sort of babble kind of way. It's making the "weirdness" in how he speaks obvious. I really hadn't noticed it before the other day, but he does talk a little bit different.

Not that it's a bad thing, though. Those two really were jerks over it for no reason. We can understand him just fine.

"Alright," Mr. Thompson chuckles. "Let's get everyone some food. And Xander?"

"Yes, Mr. Thompson?"

"When we come to things like fairs," he says. "We dads pay for the boys to eat, taking turns. It's Mr. Michaels's turn this time."

"I'll buy as much for you as I do them," Mr. Michaels tells Xander. "You're one of the boys now."

"I've always been a boy."

"No-that's not-" Mr. Michaels seems a little flustered, which causes us boys to snicker as Xander just looks confused.

"Xander," I say. "By 'the boys', he's referring to us. As a group! You're one of us now!"

"Um…" Xander shifts a little. "I'll still eat a lot. So I'll pay with what Mr. Trey gave me."

"Let me pay for at least a meal," Mr. Michaels tells Xander. "You're one of the boys now, alright?"

"Okay…" Xander seems confused a little.

We get in line to wait for our turn to order and once we get our food, we find a table to sit at to dig into our food. Xander doesn't say a word, just chows down on his food until it's gone… and he goes through three burgers faster than it takes me to eat one!

Damn, he's hungry today!

"It was nice hanging out with all of you again," Xander tells us as we throw our trash away. "I'm leaving now. Have a good rest of your day!"

"Hey, wait!" I say. "Are you coming to the sleepover tonight?"

"I haven't decided yet," Xander says. "Maybe. Bye."

Xander walks off and we look at each other. Well, us boys do.

He said "maybe", which is more than he's really given us on any offer to join us than before. We're making progress!

"Hey, Sig," Connor nudges me with a sly grin on his face.

"What?"

"Xander likes you."

"I think he likes all of us."

"Not like that," he snickers. "He only offered you his funnel cake at first!"

"That was just him trying to offer to all of us," my face heats up. "He just realized that it came off like only offering to me."

There's no way Xander likes me like that, he's just comfortable with all of us. And he's got a lot of other stuff on his mind.

I do hope he comes to the sleepover tonight, though. Hanging out with Xander is a ton of fun, even if it can be a little aggravating at times. Why did he come here to eat with us if he wasn't really going to talk or anything?

Those thoughts disappear as we go back to playing games and getting on rides, with us winning various prizes as we go. As the day wears on, we start to get tired and it starts to near the time for fireworks, so we meet up with the dads.

There's a big field near the fairgrounds where people are setting up spots, and Mr. Richardson claims one for us while we're meeting up with the other dads. We'd have a hard time getting a space if we waited until we were all grouped up due to how many people are here. Mr. Richardson has a big blanket spread out for us to all to sit on and bottles of lemonade and soda for us to drink while we wait.

"So," Mr. Thompson says. "How'd you boys enjoy the fair?"

"Really good!" Connor answers. "My favorite game was the one where you threw beanbags to try and get them into holes."

"Mine was trying to knock the bottles over!" Isaac says.

"I wanted to do the Ferris wheel again!" I say. "But the lines were super long once we'd done enough other stuff. Maybe next time!"

"Maybe next time," Aunt Rachel ruffles my hair.

"Aunt Racheeel!"

"What about you?" Mr. Richardson asks Sam.

"The dunk tank!" Sam exclaims. "I managed to dunk the guy on my first try!"

We keep talking about the fair until it's time for the fireworks to start. I wish Xander were here to watch them with us, he's missing out on something really cool!

[Xander – 12 years] → starts after he leaves the group during Sig's PoV

"Hello, Ms. Katie," I greet Ms. Katie. "I'm back."

"Welcome back, Xander," Ms. Katie is already in the kitchen, setting out stuff for baking. "I wasn't sure what you wanted to bake, so I brought out what should be enough."

"Pies," I tell her. "And make ice cream, too, if that's okay. It's for the bowling alley. And I was thinking of maybe making extra for the sleepover. They told me before that they usually have food for it. And they had snacks for the one they had at Connor's last night. I was invited to that one, too, but I declined."

I did want to go to that, but I was still really scared. Now I know magic that can defend me if someone tries to do something, and I can teleport away in an emergency, too. So I'm now safe.

"So you're planning on going?" Ms. Katie asks.

"I still haven't decided yet," I tell her. "Oh! But I was thinking while I was eating dinner and… oh. Ms. Katie, I think I messed up."

"How?" She asks.

"Um…" I pull off my backpack and set it on a chair before entering the kitchen. "I forgot to talk during dinner. I was focused on eating and what I was thinking that I forgot to socialize. Do you think they'll be mad at me and tell me I can't come if I decide I want to?"

"They probably won't," she smiles. "Want to share what you were thinking about?"

"Maybe," I answer. "But I will anyway because it's important for the baking. See, Greyson's guide on how to cook and bake with magic uses time magic to speed up the process for the baking or cooking or chilling. But I also learned recently that he accelerates his own personal time to allow him to move faster.

"So after I left the fairgrounds," I continue. "I went back to Greyson's workshop and looked up his temporal alteration spell. It allows him to interact with objects like normal even if they weren't in contact with him when he cast the spell, though it had some weird parts to it. I removed those parts and cleaned it up before trying it out and it works.

"What I was thinking," I tell her. "Was that I could maybe use that to speed up even the measuring and mixing stage, since the stuff I'm messing with will be in my time. Oh, and it doesn't affect my aging, so even if I triple my speed and stay there for a year, I'd still be just a year older, not three years older. Greyson must not want to grow up too fast."

Ms. Katie doesn't say anything for a few seconds.

"I don't blame him," I say. "I don't want to grow up too fast. I just want to grow up normally, like a normal boy."

"As you should," she says. "So you want to try doing the prep stages with time magic as well?"

"I do," I say. "Mr. Trey already gave me the okay on that, I asked him after I tested the spell. He did say you have to supervise, though. Well, and I don't remember the recipes fully. If we have time, I want to try making a cheesecake this way, too."

"Alright," Ms. Katie says. "Let me know when you want some help or need to remember something."

"Okay," I say.

I pull on my apron and wash my hands, then get to work. Greyson's version of the temporal acceleration spell costs four times as much mana as my version of it does for the same acceleration rate. That's as good a sign as any that Greyson's was inefficient, and I can't help but wonder why he didn't improve it.

If I were able to figure it out this easily, then Greyson definitely could have. He's been studying magic for years.

What was he thinking, leaving it so inefficient?

"Okay," I look at Ms. Katie. "The pies are ready for baking."

"I'm curious," she says. "How does it work when you use the oven?"

"It doesn't use the oven," I tell her. "Um… is it okay to ask you to please step back a little? I'm not sure how big of a field it'll create. Greyson's directions were a little vague on that."

"Okay," she chuckles as she steps back a little.

I hold my hands in front of me, and the four pie tins begin to float up in the air as the spell weaves together. Adjust the formula like this for the temperature they should be at in the oven, then manipulate time like so and… there!

Air begins to ripple around the pie crusts, a sign of the heat magics at work. Before my eyes, the pies rapidly cook, but not rapidly to them. They're in a temporal bubble of their own so time is passing faster for them, sort of like it did for me while I was preparing things but not exactly the same.

It takes only three minutes for the pies to finish baking and once they're done, I make sure to carefully set them down on the cooling racks. Ms. Katie will put them into the stasis boxes I bought yesterday once they're cool enough.

"They're done!" I start bouncing a little. "Ms. Katie! I did it! I baked them with my magic!"

"I can see that," she smiles. "That was very impressive, Xander! I don't really understand how that worked, but congratulations!"

I keep bouncing for a few moments in my excitement. It takes me a couple of minutes to calm down, but once I do, I start on making the ice cream. That gets chilled with my magic and some temporal acceleration while being churned with force magic.

"How's it going?" Mr. Trey asks as I set the bowl down, and I look over.

He's just gotten home, I guess.

"Going good!" I point at the bowl. "Look! I churned it and cooled it with my magic! I followed the direction from Greyson's guide, except I changed the spells so that they don't use as much mana and have all of the extra bits in them. They're more efficient now. I think maybe he was using them inefficiently in order to train his own magic and build up more mana reserves."

"That's very impressive," Mr. Trey tells me.

I was looking in his eyes, so I know he's being honest. He thinks it's cool that I can bake with magic!

"It is!" I start scooping the ice cream into two of the freezer buckets I bought yesterday and a normal bucket for ice cream. "Is it okay if I make cheesecake, too? In case I decide I want to go to the sleepover?"

"Go ahead," Mr. Trey says. "Do you want me to take pictures and maybe a video as you make it?"

"Ms. Katie was doing that," I say. "Um. But you can if you want."

Mr. Trey takes my phone from where Ms. Katie set it and uses it as I start working on the cheesecake. The magic for it is a little bit trickier since I have to first bake it with my magic while making sure to maintain the water bath so it doesn't sink, then I have to mix in some air magic with the cold magic when cooling it.

"Oh, um, Ms. Katie," I say as I remove the cheesecake from the springform pan. "One of the pies was for you, as thanks for helping me when you're on an off day."

"It was?" Ms. Katie asks.

"Yeah," I nod. "The fourth stasis box was for the cheesecake."

"Oh," she says. "Thank you, Xander. Let me pull that out real quick."

After we swap the pie for the cheesecake, I help put the dirty dishes into the dishwasher, then Ms. Katie starts preparing the bag of toppings and dishes for the ice cream.

"Do you want to watch the fireworks when it's time?" Mr. Trey asks me. "With your earplugs or headphones, they shouldn't be too loud."

"No," I answer. "Fireworks bore me. Is it still okay for me to go to the bowling alley?"

"It is," he says. "Can I bowl with you tonight?"

"If you want to," I answer. "S.G. and the others won't be there because they're going to stay at the fair until the fireworks, then watch that, then head to S.G.'s aunt's new house."

"Alright," Mr. Trey hands me my phone, and I put it in my pocket. "It's nearly time to get ready to go if we're driving there, so go ahead and do that."

"Okay."

I get ready to go, then Mr. Trey drives me to the bowling alley. Lena is at the desk when we arrive, and I make sure to give her one of the pies and the normal tub with ice cream in it. She returns the tub from last week, cleaned and dried.

"No fireworks?" She asks.

"I find fireworks boring," I tell her. "And I wanted to bowl again. It's Tuesday, and you're open."

"Yes, we are," she chuckles. "Have fun!"

"I'll try."

I bring my stuff over to Lane 20, then change into my bowling shoes. After that, I head down to the concessions area with Mr. Trey, who's also changed into his bowling shoes, and we order food before returning to our lane.

"Mr. Trey," I say. "Do you want the first turn?"

"You can if you want," he says.

"Okay," I say.

I put in "XANDER", then Mr. Trey puts in "TREY", and we start bowling. He's better at it than he was the first time, and manages to score a 139 in the first game, and a 137 in the second. I score 300 on both games, and I wasn't even using the animation spell. Does that mean I never used it while bowling?

That's awesome!

"You look pretty happy," Mr. Trey tells me.

"I am," I nod. "I didn't use my animation spell at all, I was checking. It was all me!"

"You were worried your skill came from the animation spell?" Mr. Trey asks.

"Yeah," I nod. "But it wasn't, which means it really was all me."

"That's good," he says. "Let's clean our stuff up and go. Do you want to go to the sleepover?"

"Yeah," I nod. "If that's still okay."

"It is," he says.

We clean up our stuff and put the bowling balls away, then leave the bowling alley.

"Xander," Mr. Trey says as he drives me to Ms. Rachel's new house. "Remember, it's okay to leave if you feel you want to. If you get scared, or too anxious, it's okay to leave. And let the other boys know if you need some space to calm down if you start getting overwhelmed, okay?"

"Okay."

"If you want to get picked up," he says. "Just let one of us know. Or if you're going to teleport… just let us know. I've already texted Quinn, so he'll be waiting somewhere nearby if you want him to pick you up, okay?"

"Okay."

"And Xander?"

"Yes, Mr. Trey?"

"I'm sure they'll understand if you need to go to sleep sooner than them," he says. "So don't try to force yourself to stay awake. You're already nodding off."

"I'll try to stay awake," I tell him. "But I might not be able to."

"If you feel unsafe at all," Mr. Trey tells me. "Or someone tries to force you to do something inappropriate or illegal, it's okay to get out, okay?"

"Okay," I nod. "I'll try to remember that. Also my magics, like teleporting and fire breath and ice breath."

We arrive at Ms. Rachel's new house a few minutes after that, and Mr. Trey walks me to the door and tells me to knock, so I go to do so.

"Open the screen door first."

Stupid fucking me.

I open the screen door and knock on the heavy door. A few seconds pass, then Ms. Rachel opens it.

"Hello, Xander," she greets me. "The boys are downstairs, if you want to go ahead and go down."

I look at Mr. Trey, who nods.

"The stairs to the basement are through the door over there," Ms. Rachel points toward the kitchen as I enter her house.

"Okay," I say. "And hello, Ms. Rachel."

I go to the basement, making sure to close the stair doors on the way down. There's a small room when I first get to the bottom of the stairs, but it's easy to figure out that the other boys are through a door at their base.

They're kind of noisy.

I open the door and enter and they all stop what they're doing and look over. They were all wrestling around. They're all also just wearing shorts. I'm not going to be expected to do that, am I? I don't want to wear only shorts for the sleepover. This is a lot different from swimming in a big, open space.

Maybe coming here was a bad idea.

"Xander!" S.G. exclaims, wriggling his way out of Sam's grip before jumping to his feet and running over. I flinch back at the sudden rush. "You came!"

"Yeah," I nod. "That's okay, right?"

"Of course!" He says as the others reach us. "Is that pie and ice cream?"

He's looking at the containers in my hand.

"Yeah," I nod. "And the bag has toppings. There's also a cheesecake. That's the bigger box. Um. You guys have lots of snacks already."

The coffee table down here has a lot of food on it. Big bottles of soda, a big jug of fruit juice, bags of chips, packages of cookies, and more. There are even a few bowls of fruits and veggies.

"There's always room for dessert!" S.G. says. "I'm gonna go get some bowls and stuff!"

Before I can say anything, S.G. is running past me to go up the stairs.

What do I do now?

"Here!" Connor moves some stuff to the side on the coffee table. "You can put them here, Xander!"

There's not really a whole lot of space, but I put the boxes and tub down where Connor made space. Too close. He's too close. I scoot away a little.

"Are you okay?" Connor asks.

"No."

"Oh," he says. "Um…"

"I don't have to wear just shorts, do I?"

"It's what we're wearing to bed," Connor tells me. "You can wear something else if you want."

Good.

"Pajamas."

"You can change in Sig's room if you want," Sam points at one of the doors on the back wall. "That's it there. That one's the bathroom if you want to change in there."

"We're going to bed?"

"No," he snorts. "We're going to stay up a bit later and have some fun! But we get changed once we're all ready for the night so we don't have to worry about it when we're getting tired."

That seems really weird but I guess that's what we're supposed to do for sleepovers. I don't want to change yet, but I don't want them to make fun of me for not changing now. I really want to be able to hang out with all of them. It's fun.

"Oh," I shift a little. "I'm going to go change."

I go into the bathroom and pull off my backpack, then change into a pair of green pajamas. My dirty clothes are put into a bag in my backpack, then I leave the bathroom and join the others by the sofa and loveseat. S.G.'s already come back down here and has some plates and bowls and forks and spoons.

"Where are the napkins?" I whisper to S.G.

He looks at the stuff he's put out, then giggles and hurries back upstairs, returning after a minute with napkins. It seems they didn't have any yet despite having lots of food already out and even partially-eaten.

"Um," I shift a little as we sit in a circle after getting dessert. "Sam, you said 'have some fun'. What kind of fun? Because I'm not going to do anything illegal if it's that kind of fun."

"We don't do stuff like that!" Isaac bounces. "We just wrestle around and play games and stuff! Since we're eating stuff, we can do something like play cards or True or Dare."

"Truth or Dare?" I ask. "What's that?"

"It's a game!" S.G. says. "Um… hold on!"

S.G. grabs a glass soda bottle that's empty and checks the inside, then he locates its cap and screws it back on before setting it in the center of the circle.

"There are a few variations but what we do," he says. "Is we spin the bottle like this," he spins the bottle, and when it stops, it's pointing at Sam. "And then the person it's pointing at has to say 'truth' or 'dare'. If they say 'truth', then the person who spun the bottle asks them a question and they have to answer honestly. If they say 'dare', then the person who spun the bottle dares them to do something. And if they don't want to answer the question asked or do the dare issued, then they have to do five push-ups, five sit-ups, and five squats."

"Oh!" Isaac exclaims. "And the dares can't be anything illegal, or which takes you out of the room. So nothing like 'run naked down the street'. It can require something that isn't in the room, as long as it's reasonable. So 'slow dance with a broom' means going and getting a broom since there's not one down here."

"What's 'slow dance'?"

"We'll show you if you need it," Sam says. "It's my turn, so dare!"

But I still had questions.

"I dare you to fit as many grapes in your mouth as you can!" S.G. tells him. "And no chewing or swallowing this time!"

Sam giggles, then grabs the bowl with grapes and starts plucking off the stems and shoving them into his mouth as he drops the stems onto a napkin. He manages to get a lot of them in, but it looks really weird. The others seem to find it funny because they keep giggling, and Sam eventually has to spit them out, though he does start eating them.

I'm sitting on S.G.'s right and the one who spins is the one to the left of the last one who did, so I'm the last to spin on the first round. The bottle doesn't point at me before then, just the other boys, and they all do dares instead of truths.

"Um," I say once it's my turn to spin the bottle. "What if it points at me when I spin it?"

"Oh!" S.G. bounces. "Forgot that! If it points at the person who spun, they just spin it again!"

"Some groups do where they have to do a truth or dare from each other person," Isaac says. "But we don't do that."

"Okay," I say, then spin the bottle.

When it stops spinning (it doesn't spin very long on the carpet), it's pointing at Sam.

"Dare," Sam says.

"Um…" I try to think of something. "Um… what happens if you try the dare but can't finish it?"

"Then I've gotta do the exercises!" He says. "Unless it's something that I can just put my best effort into, then I'm good. But I bet I'll do it! What's up?"

"I dare you," I try to remember what I'd come up with. "Oh, right. I dare you to stand on one foot until it's your turn again."

Sam's two after me, so he'd have to do a one-foot stand through both S.G's turn and Connor's.

"Ooh! I can do that!" He says. "I think!"

Sam gets up and stands on his left foot, then S.G. spins the bottle and it points to me.

"Truth," I say.

"Okay," he says. "If you were trapped on a deserted island with no way off, what would you do?"

"I have to ask additional questions before I can properly answer that," I say. "Is that okay?"

"Sure!" S.G. asks. "What's up?"

"When you say 'no way off'," I say. "Do you mean it's impossible to leave, or like, I don't have a boat and can't teleport off for some reason?"

"The second one!" He bounces a little. "So you could get picked up by a boat or something if it came by!"

"Okay," I say. "Then I'd probably try to make sure I had food to eat while I waited for Greyson to learn I'm missing, because I'm sure he'd come and rescue me. And even if he couldn't teleport off of it, too, then I'm sure he'd just build a boat. Actually, it's Greyson. He might figure out what's blocking teleportation, destroy it, and then teleport us off. There might be explosions in the process. Connor, it's your turn!"

Connor grabs the bottle and spins it.

This is a little bit fun, even if it's really confusing. I hope they all do a "truth" for me so I can ask them the deserted island question, too.