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Chapter 11

Chapter 11.

After Luke stopped in a Bath and Boy Works shop on the way back to the hostel to get us some showering items the same way he‘d gotten our clothes, I jump straight into a shower. Before getting in I shrug off my clothes. They are stiff and once I take them off I realize how dirty they really are. I am surprised that I wasn’t getting more strange looks, although, I guess I could have looked like any other down in the dumps grungy young women living on the streets of L. A..

I threw my clothes on the ground and got in, turning the water to the hottest temperature it could possibly go. The water felt good on my skin, and I stood for a while, just letting the water flow over my naked body. I washed my hair and I washed my body. Then I stood under the flow coming from the small spigot for a while longer.

After a while, I step out, wrapping a towel around my body. When I’m relatively dry I grab a new tank top and pull it over my head. The clean cloth feels good on my newly clean skin. I pull on bottoms and a pair of jeans.

When I was dressed and only slightly damp I went back into our room. Ella, who had snagged a pack of cards with breakfast was playing BS with Vaughn, June, Gil and Devin. The rest were showering. I sat down and watched the games for a while. When the other came back, the ones playing went to shower. Ash stood and announced he was going out for a walk.

“I just need some more air.” he says.

Luke and Figgie stand. “We’ll go with you.” Figgie says. She and Luke are still holding hands. Ash shrugs and the three of them leave.

An hour or two goes by when the three of them burst back into the room. “I just saved some guy’s life!” says Ash loudly. We all jump up a little with excitement.

“What do you mean?” asks Vaughn, bewildered.

“Exactly what I said!” he says. Luke shuts the door behind them and drags Figgie to a abed. They both look flushed and worried. “We were standing around outside that corner store when I saw a dude walk in with a gun! Well, I followed him in because he shouldn’t have a fucking gun. For one he was like only 17, and it’s also a fucking gun in a store! B-but but anyway.

The guy milled around the isles for a while and then went to the register with a bag of chips, he demanded that the three of us get on the ground and that the cashier give him all the money in the register! Well the guy refused. I mean, we got on the ground, I mean we didn’t want to get shot! But the kid was about to pull the trigger at the guy when I threw the gun out of his hand with my power!” He shook his hands animatedly, looking at us excitedly.

We all looked at each other nervously, exchanging glances. I didn’t like the way he said ‘power’.

“I just moved the air around the gun to throw it out of his hand!” he looks so happy, but it starts to fade when the rest of us don’t join in on his joy. His grand smile fades, slowly being wiped off his face. “Come on. Be happy! I just saved a man’s life!” He looks happy, but frustrated. Now he’s breathing a bit heavy, his body is tense.

“Well it’s great, but not really concerning, is it? Besides, you can’t just do that. You could expose us. We want to remain low profile for now.” says Gil.

“For now? How long it that? For this week? Month? How long will we just sit here for? I can’t think about that, I think we should do what I did. Save people.” retorts Ash heatedly.

I can feel that this has been building under all of our skin’s for a while. “We aren’t superheroes!” says Ella loudly. “You say it like we’re some kind of comic book creation.”

Ash laughs, “But we are! Telepathy?” he says, pointing out Brian, who goes red and hides his face, shaking his head. “York had fuggin’ super strength! Alexia had Telekinesis. How can you say we’re not comic creations?”