Tickling the Giant Squid and other Grand Adventures

43. Avila

I watched as Karou did some flips and turns and swung herself from one part of the playground to the next like the parkour pro she was.

After breakfast, we'd walked into the muggle town she lived by, and she'd been teaching me parkour since. Karou had decided to teach me about parkour, and had lead me to an empty playground to start off. We'd spent the better part of the morning doing flips and jumping from the roof of the slide to the tops of the monkey bars, despite the cold, and occasional ice covered surfaces.

Several of the people who lived here had stopped to watch us for a bit on their way past. The kids who lived here had been watching us for longer, fascinated by Karou's ability to jump and swing around the whole playground without touching the ground. One of them had seen Karou and run off, returning with more kids. To be honest, I was with them: she was amazing.

I'd been doing a good enough job at keeping up with her, with a minimal number of missed handholds and falling off the slide, but what she'd just done was far beyond my current capabilities. I gave it a try anyway.

I got a running start, and jumped at the monkey bars, quickly pulling myself up, before jumping on the toadstools that connected the monkey bars to the jungle gym. I jumped for the jungle gym, but my hands slid on some ice I hadn't noticed, and I slipped, landing hard on my back in the mulch.

I got the breath knocked out of me and took several deep breaths before Karou appeared in my vision.

"Oh my god, are you okay?" she asked, offering me a hand.

"Yeah, yeah," I breathed, looking past her. Snow had started falling without either of us noticing, and I realized I was laying on a thin layer of snow. "Why don't we come back to this? I could use a break. Besides, if the snow gets much harder, we won't be able to make it back to your house."

Karou looked up, and then around, and I knew she hadn't noticed the snowfall either. "Good point. Wanna get lunch? Mom gave me some money."

I finally accepted her hand, and she pulled me to my feet. "Yeah, food sound great. Is there a place we can get a hot sandwich here?

"Um, I think so. Let's go get some gatorade first though, after this, we need it. Then we can go to the cafe around the corner for lunch."

"Then get paint and go home. Sounds like a plan." I agreed. "You still have the list of paints we need right?" Karou pulled it out of her pocket and waved it at me. I nodded. "Let's get food."

"I think Lemon-Lime and the other fruity ones are the most popular, but I like Watermelon best," Karou told me, reaching for one of the pink bottles. "Want to try it? I still can't believe you've never had gatorade before!"

I shrugged. "They're brightly colored and full of sugar. Mom would freak. I'll try this clear one," I grabbed the bottle and looked at it's name, "Ice Punch."

"My favorite's Strawberry-Kiwi," a familiar voice said. The two of us turned around and came face to face with Aaron.

"You live here?" Karou demanded, her face breaking into a grin as she hugged him. I sighed at her bluntness.

"Yeah." Aaron nodded with a laugh. "Do you? I've never seen you around here before."

"I live one town over." Karou said. "It's a wizarding town, and it's kinda boring. I come here all the time to do parkour on the playgrounds. Avila's staying with me over break."

"Wait," Aaron smiled. "You're the Parkour Princess?"

Karou scrunched up her nose. "Parkour Princess?" she repeated.

"Yeah. It's what we call the girl who's always doing parkour on the playgrounds. Nobody knows who she is."

"Oh. Yeah, that's me. I was teaching Avila this morning. We're gonna get lunch and then pick up some paint to paint my room. Avila said she knew how and offered to help me paint mine."