BLUE VENOM

One

"Eat don't play" I ruffled her hair and she grinned up at me.
"I'll play, and then I'll eat. It's called work hard, play hard. Daddy says you need to do balancing or life will outweigh you."

"Oh, toothgap. You're really young to think about balance."

"Kenzie, listen to your sister", mom said over her magazine. Kenzie grimaced and I grimaced back at her, pointing her to eat.
"Morning", I said to them all - the rest of them - like I'd just seen them and I walked over to the open kitchen area and scanned the fridge for food. Porridge, fruits, my protein shake and some almond milk. The cereal boxes I shoved aside: I had never been a fan of sugar. I'm fact, just a gram of it made me sick to the stomach. I didn't know why Aron shoveled that stuff like each gram would make him richer.

"Masie dear, could you please pick up the newspaper?", Mom called from behind me.
Just about to pop a bite into my mouth, I put my breakfast back on the counter by one of the barstools and said: "Sure".

The big flat screen TV in the lower lying sitting area flared. The news were on, to be exact, and a news anchor in a dark blue suit earnestly reminded us all, that this was not meant to be fun, but it would be over fast and we were all to take our part of the populations responsibility seriously. ...So the usual.

I put the cap back on the almond milk and stalked through the hallway and the beige colored walls towards our front door. The morning breeze was fresh and clean, as state wide air pollution filters made sure that's how it was, and I walked towards the all surrounding bamboo hedge, that completely engulfed the world beyond and only opened where our main gate was. A path of flat grey stones lead up to it. Behind the fingerprint gate stood our mailbox. But suddenly Mom appeared behind me and pressed her finger to the scanner, causing the gate to hum and slide open.

I looked at her questioningly. "I said I'll fetch it", I said, laughing.

"No you can't", she reminded me. "I forgot. You turned seventeen this month and today is the test. On test day, they deactivate all seventeen year olds fingerscans. You can't open anything until you've tested negative, remember?"

"Right." I'd forgotten too. This was a way too force the kids to actually attend the test and for them to not to try and skip it. Pretty smart of them. Besides, the virus needed three months to turn infectious so they had to check all the seventeen year old in a monthly rhytmn, not yearly like some of the ever complaining people demanded from the politicians.

I was itching to know if it was true. Was I blocked from everything now? How exciting. I pressed my fingertip against the mail box scanner and the display buzzed and red: ERROR 1007. And just like that, I knew it was real. My heart's pace should probably speed up now but I just watched Mom unlock the mail box. When the slot with the mail sprung open and I grabbed a stack of letters and a rolled together newspaper, to hand it to her (honestly my presence here now was kind of useless) I felt eyes stinging into the back of my neck.
I glanced across the street and saw Kain crouching by the hedge of his mother's estate. Kain Longfort was the son of one of the richest cosmetic heiresses on this planet. His mom owned everything from drug stores to skin care boutiques in every major city. You'd think somebody this surrounded by gold and glam would be more... Well, glam.

His shaggy black hair hung into his face and his unfriendly, cutting blue eyes pierced right through me. He was sitting on his black bike, to be exact and the only thing really missing were his idiot level bike friends.

"Oh no", Mom said, when she followed my eyes across the street. She sniffed. "Don't tell me you kids are still fighting. I thought that was sixth grade history."

"He made the whole school hate me, Mom."
"You broke his bike."

"It was an accident. I was eleven. I apologized. Then he picked fights about it." Like the rude little piece of clay he was.