We spawn in the living room, and I see the faces of my little brothers and sisters looking at us with wide eyes.
"What's going on?" Dorothy wants to know.
"Are they okay?" Molly asks.
"What happened?" Violet asks.
"Calm down, everyone," Ricky says. "It's good now."
"But, what was bad? Molly wouldn't tell us," Johnny wants to know.
I glance at the door.
I don't sense our parents coming.
"Look, we'll tell you what happened, but you can't tell Mom and Dad, okay?" I say.
"Wait," Molly says. "You don't want to tell Mom and Dad? How are we supposed to keep the fact that there is a family of superhumans living two floors beneath us a secret?"
"There's another family of superhuman? Was that girl a superhuman?" Dorothy cries.
"Shush," I say. "If you quiet down, I'll tell you."
My little brothers and sisters fall silent and look at me with curious eyes.
I look at Ricky, thinking to him, 'How long 'till Mom and Dad get here?'
He looks at the clock on the cable box, then looks back at me.
'10 to 15 minutes, give or take,' he thinks back.
I nod. I turn back to the rest of my siblings.
"Alright, yes, there is a family of superhuman that lives downstairs," I begin. "They had a situation. Some of them got hurt, so their little sister must have known that Ricky lived here and come for help. But, don't worry, they're safe now."
"How did she know where Ricky lived?" Johnny asks.
"That girl didn't look like anyone's little sister," Dorothy says.
"I'm not sure how she knew I lived here, but she is a shape-shifter, so she made herself look like her older sister. But, she is the Masked Spider's sister so... Oh, wait," He notices the wide-eyed expressions of our siblings. "Yeah, I kind of know the Masked Spider, or Innie – that's what her real name is."
"The Masked Spider... lives two floors below us..." Molly says incredulously, brow furrowing as she tries to process the information. Her expression relaxes as she understands. "The girl that got burnt; she's the Masked Spider, isn't she?"
Ricky nods.
"You've been talking with the Masked Spider?" Dorothy cries.
"Yeah, I have," Ricky admits. "For a while. But, I didn't know she lived in the building."
"But, we can't tell Mom and Dad about any of this because they're..." I drift off, trying to explain the situation in the lightest way possible.
"They're trying to stay hidden. People are after them, people that will hurt them if they find them. So, we can't tell anyone, not even Mom and Dad, okay?" Ricky says.
"Mommy and Daddy won't hurt them," Violet says, frowning.
"Yeah, we know they won't on purpose. But, sometimes bad things happen even when people are trying to help," I say. "And, we don't want something bad happening to them because they're our friends now."
"Don't worry, Mom and Dad won't find out. We can keep a secret," Dorothy says.
"Yeah but what about keeping this from Dad?" Johnny says. "If he thinks something is wrong he'll read our minds to find out what it is. And when he does, something bad will happen to us for lying to him."
I hadn't thought of that.
"I can put up a mental block," Dorothy suggests. "So, can you, Johnny."
"Exactly," I say. I'd forgotten that Dad had taught the two of them to put up mental blocks, too. "I can probably put one on Flora if I need to." I glance over at Flora, who's fast asleep on the couch I'd placed her in when I'd dropped her here.
"Yeah, but everyone else, just don't think about it," Ricky suggests.
"That's harder than it looks," Violet says.
"Well, it's not like Dad's just gonna read our minds for no reason," Molly says. "He'll only do it if he thinks something's wrong that we're not telling him about."
"You can do it, Vi. Remember Dad taught us how to do that, too, for the same reason he taught us how to put up mental blocks," Dorothy says.
"Okay," Violet says. "But, Daddy didn't want us to use it against him."
"We can't think of it like that, Vi," Johnny says. "Think of it as us using it to protect someone else."
"Right," I say. "Mom and Dad don't want us using our powers to help other people at school because it could reveal our powers to all the normal people. But these aren't normal people, they're people with powers. And they don't have people like Mom and Dad looking after them, but they do have us. So, right now, that means not telling Mom and Dad about them. Does that make sense, you guys?"
"Yes, it does," Violet says.
"You didn't have to tell me twice," Dorothy comments.
"I understand, Dan," Johnny says.
"Good," I nod approvingly.
I never thought I'd have to explain why lying to our parents is the right decision. But, just like how Mom and Dad sometimes hide the truth from us to protect us, this is pretty much the same thing, except we're doing it to protect someone outside our family. We've never been close enough to another family to do something like this for them. Even at our old school, all the friends we had were just in passing.
"And besides. You know Mom and Dad, they would totally throw another family into a train if they thought that family was a danger to us. Which, they totally might think is the case, especially if they found out that it was the Masked Spider's family we are protecting," Molly says.
"Mols, don't say something like that!" I say seeing Dorothy, Johnny, and Violet's confused faces.
"She doesn't really mean that, guys. She knows Mom and Dad would never hurt anybody," Ricky says quickly.
"Yes, I do mean that. We're already going to be lying to Mom and Dad enough, and since Ricky's been dating the Masked Spider since we moved here, he even has practice. We don't need to lie to Dorothy, Johnny, and Vi, too, especially not about the real reason we're lying to our parents," Molly continues. "If Mom and Dad found out about them and how much information they know about us, they would probably turn them into the people that are hunting them themselves."
"Molly, stop it, first of all, I'm not dating the Masked Spider. We're just friends. We met because I accidentally saw her without her mask. Second of all," He turns to Dorothy, Johnny, and Violet. "What Molly is trying to say is that Mom and Dad always put us first, which is a good thing. It means they love us."
"Exactly," I agree. "And they love us so much that they don't want us ever to take any risks, even if it means letting something happen to someone else so we don't get hurt. But, other people are important, too, especially other people like us. For now, protecting those people means not telling Mom and Dad about them, yet. We might tell them eventually if that becomes what's best for our friends. But, now we just have to keep it to ourselves so nothing happens to them that we could've prevented by leaving our parents out of it. That makes sense, right?"
"It does," Johnny says.
"So, Mommy and Daddy just love us a whole lot. And sometimes that means loving us more than everybody else?" Violet says.
"That sounds about right," Dorothy says. "But Molly is right, too. You guys just sugar-coated it."
"I prefer the sugar-coating," Johnny says.
"Me too," Violet says.
"I'm sure Molly does, too," I say, sending her a pointed look. "Everything our parents do is because we are the most important things to them. And we're not going to attack them for that."
"I wasn't attacking them. I was just being honest," Molly replies.
"I know, you were. But there is a difference between being honest and being brutally honest, and you crossed that line," I say.
Ricky lifts his goggles and turns towards the front door. "Mom's coming. Act natural everybody. Consider this a practice run for when Dad gets here."
Johnny snaps his fingers and flicks the TV on just as we all plop ourselves on the floor and pretend to be interested in it.
The front door opens a few seconds later. Mom comes into the room and sees us all watching TV. I turn to look at her.
"Hey, guys," Mom greets.
"Hey," we chorus back.
I stand up, noticing that Billy looks a little sicker than he did yesterday. I rub his back, then I look at Mom.
"Did his powers show up today?" I ask her.
"Not yet," she shakes her head.
"He doesn't look so good," Johnny comments.
"Is he okay?" Violet asks.
I put my hand on his cheek and he feels warm, plus he's sweating a lot.
"He's fine, guys. You all were this sick right before your powers showed up," Mom assures us.
"But, his powers will be here soon, right?" I ask.
"Patience, Dan," Mom says. "If I recall correctly, which I do, you didn't get your powers for a full two weeks after your third birthday."
"Well yeah, that's because my hair and eyes spent two weeks changing color," I point out.
According to Maryanne, for a week before I got my powers, my hair went from brown to blonde, and my eyes went from brown to nearly purple. Then, my telepathy showed up.
"Exactly, powers manifesting is not a simple thing, Daniella. We have no idea what kind of changes are going on inside him right now. I'm going to put this guy to bed, alright?" Mom says, then she leaves holding Billy. Though she appears calm for our benefit, I can tell she's worried. I frown but don't say anything.
"He looks pretty messed up," Dorothy says.
"Hey, don't worry about it," I tell her. "We were all really sick when we got our powers."
"Yeah," Ricky agrees. "I went blind. That's pretty much as sick as you can get." He chuckles half-heartedly.
"You did not 'go blind,'" Molly interjects.
"I did!" Ricky insists.
"For, like, ten minutes, until it turned into lasers," Molly says.
"That's beside the point. I'm just saying he'll be fine," Ricky says.
"What about Flora? She normally doesn't nap for this long," Violet asks.
"She's fine, too," I tell her.
"Shh," Ricky warns, and we go back to pretending to watch the TV.
"What're you guys watching?" Mom asks, returning to the room.
I actually look at the TV and see that some kids' show is on.
"Fresh beat band," Johnny answers.
"I didn't know you guys like this show," Mom comments.
"It was just on when we turned on the TV," Dorothy answers honestly.
"What happened to Flora?" Mom asks, noticing her fast asleep on the couch. She walks over to her and places a hand on her forehead.
"Nothing to worry about, Mom," Ricky says. "She's been napping a lot after coming in from daycare."
"She has?" Mom looks up in surprise.
"Not like that, Mom," I send a look to Ricky. "It's just been hard for her at daycare without Billy."
"Oh," Mom rubs Flora's back. Flora, wearing a peaceful expression, doesn't stir. "I don't doubt that."
"I'll go start dinner, you guys will be fine in here?" Mom asks.
"Of course," I say. Mom leaves the room and I look at Ricky.
'Careful,' I think to him.
He nods. He looks towards the front door and lifts his goggles. At the same time, I sense Dad near the door.
"He's here, game faces on guys," Ricky tells us.
I focus only on the dancing actors on screen.
"Hey, Dad," I say turning to him as he enters.
"Hey guys, how was your day?" He asks.
"Great," we all reply, looking back at the screen.
The tinny, whimsical song the colorful dancers are singing is getting stuck in my head, and I've only been listening for a few seconds.
"You guys like this show?" Dad asks.
"I do," Violet says, and I can tell she genuinely does.
I look at Dad.
"I don't, but if they do..." I shrug.
Dad laughs. "I'm going to help your mom with dinner."
He slips out and I release the breathI'd been holding. Keeping this secret is definitely going to be a challenge.