The Incredible Danny Phantom

Family Dinner

It was dinnertime at the Parr home.

"Do you have to read at the table?" Helen asked Bob as she quickly used a spoon to scoop up dribbling baby food from Jack-Jack's face.

Bob, who was reading his newspaper, didn't hear the question. He was distracted by the news.

"Uh-huh, yeah," he said distractedly.

Helen sighed and turned to Dash. "Smaller bites, Dash," she suggested. But Dash didn't seem to hear her either. "Bob, could you help the carnivore cut his meat?"

Bob sighed, put down his paper, and reached for Dash's plate with a fork and knife.

"You have something you want to tell your father about school?" Helen asked Dash.

"Uh . . . we dissected a frog . . . ?" Dash asked, hoping to divert his mother's line of questioning.

Helen raised her eyebrows. "Dash got sent to the office again," she said matter-of-factly.

"Good . . . good," Bob answered, still reading the paper out of the corner of his eye as he cut the meat on Dash's plate.

"No, Bob. That's bad."

"What?" Bob said, finally looking up.

"Dash got sent to the office again," Helen repeated.

"What for?" asked Bob.

"Nothing," Dash said quickly.

"He put thumbtacks on his teacher's chair during class," Helen said.

"Nobody saw me," Dash argued as Bob continued cutting. "You could barely see it on the tape!"

"They caught you on tape, and you still got away with it?" Bob said with some pride. "Whoa! You must have been booking!"

"Bob!" Helen said. "We're not encouraging this."

"I'm not encouraging," Bob said, trying to hide his excitement. "I'm just asking how fast-" A sudden crack interrupted the conversation. Bob stopped cutting Dash's meat and looked down. Inadvertently using his Super strength, he had cut through the plate and the dining room table.

"I'm getting a new plate," Bob said, heading for the kitchen.

Helen turned to Violet, who was poking at her dinner, her lengthy hair covering most of her face. "How about you, Vi? How was school?"

Violet shrugged. "Nothing to report."

"You've hardly touched your food," Helen said.

"I'm not hungry for meatloaf," Violet answered.

Helen offered to get Vi something else. "What are you hungry for?"

"Tony Rydinger!" Dash teased.

"Shut up!" Vi said to him.

"Well, you are!" Dash laughed.

"I said shut up, you little insect!"

"Do not shout at the table!" Helen said firmly and called Bob, who was still in the kitchen. "Honey!"

"She'd eat if we were having Tony loaf!" Dash giggled.

"That's it!" Vi shouted in frustration, lunging at Dash and then vanishing. Dash wrestled free and ran around the table in a blur. Jack-Jack giggled happily. Violet stopped Dash with her force field as Helen stretched her arms in all directions, trying to catch them. They dove under the table, continuing to wrestle.

. . .

In the kitchen, Bob read the newspaper. Under the headline PALADINO MISSING, Bob read, "Simon J. Paladino, long an outspoken advocate of Supers' rights, is missing," Bob couldn't help wondering what had happened. Simon Paladino was the secret identity of Gazerbeam, a former Super and one of Bob's friends.

Then he heard Helen. "Bob?" she was calling desperately. "It's time to engage! Do something!"

Bob snapped out of it and entered the dining room. He hoisted the dinner table and his family over his head. Helen hung over the table as Dash and Vi dangled from her stretched arms. They continued fighting, twisting Helen's arms into a hopelessly tangled knot. Jack-Jack, loving the excitement, shrieked with joy.

Then the doorbell rang.

Everyone froze. Bob lowered the table, and the family resumed a "normal" dining position. Dash calmly stood up and answered the door.

"Hey, Speedo! Hey, Helen!" said a voice in the doorway. Everyone in the Parr house relaxed. It was Lucius Best, formerly known as Frozone!

"Hey!" shouted Bob warmly. "Ice of you to drop by!"

"Ha!" answered Lucius. "I never heard that one before."

Lucius Best, who wrote the book about being "Cool," hadn't changed much since the old days. Sure, he had to hide the chilling Superpowers he had used when Lucius was known to the world as Frozone, but as with everything else, he was cool with that.

Bob ran to the hall closet and quickly grabbed his coat and bowling bag. "I'll be back later," he said to Helen.

Helen seemed confused.

"It's Wednesday," Bob reminded her.

Helen shook her head, remembering. "Oh . . .!" she said. "Bowling night."

She looked back at Dash and Vi, who were still ready to go at it, and sighed.

"Say hello to Honey for me," Helen said to Lucius as he and Bob headed out the door.

"Will do," Lucius answered. "Good night, Helen. G'night, kids!"

Helen turned back to Dash. He would not get out of discussing his trip to the principal's office.

"I'm not the only kid sent to the office, ya know," Dash said.

"Other kids don't have Superpowers," Helen said, trying to be patient. "You were almost caught. Now, it's perfectly normal for you to feel-"

"What does anyone in our family know anything about being normal?" Vi interrupted. "The only normal one is Jack-Jack."

Jack-Jack, the only member of the Parr family who didn't seem to have any Superpowers, gleefully spit a mouthful of baby food onto his chin.