"Hey, hey, Mom! Mom, hey! Look at this, Mom! Can I get this, Mom?" Ten-year-old Dashiell Parr was bouncing up and down eagerly in front of a shop window, his nose pressed right up against the glass. "Can I? Can I? Can I?"
"Dash, come back here," his mother called. With a reluctant sigh, the boy sped back to rejoin the group, using a puff of air to speed him along. Dash had inherited his mother's Airbending skill, but very little of the serenity that usually went along with it. "We're here to buy you a suit for your graduation, not a toy."
"It is not a graduation," Violet muttered sullenly, walking beside her mother. "He's moving from the fourth level to the fifth level."
"It's a ceremony," Helen Parr said firmly. "We're all very excited, and we're all going. If you want a new dress to wear, you can have one too."
"I don't want a new dress." Violet folded her arms and turned away.
Helen gave a great sigh. "What do you want, Violet?"
"Tony Rydinger," Dash chanted from Helen's other side.
"Shut up!" Violet hissed.
"Well you do..."
"I said shut up, you little insect."
"Well, she does!"
"Enough," Helen said firmly. "We're in the middle of the street. Try to act like adults, you two."
They walked a few paces in peace, Violet's face hidden behind her long black hair.
"She'd buy a new dress," Dash murmured, "if Tony were coming to my graduation."
"That's it!" Before her mother could react, Violet had dived behind her and lunged at her younger brother. He yelped and fell to the ground as his sister rained blows down on him. Dash thrust his feet out and propelled himself forward, out of his sister's grip, and began to run circles around her, smacking her every time he passed. Small puffs of air sped him along, until he was running so fast he was almost a blur. Violet gritted her teeth and responded in kind, shaping a large ball of air and blowing it into her brother's path. He smacked into it and fell back onto the ground, rubbing his forehead.
"Hey, no air spheres!"
"You started it!"
"Enough!" Helen thundered, bending the sound straight into the children's ears. They both flinched, doubly so when Helen buffeted them both to the ground once more with air skills of her own. "Please! Is it so hard for you both to behave?"
Dash shrugged and jumped up, speeding down the street in pursuit of something else to do. Violet got to her feet more slowly, her hair hiding her face once more.
"I think we've had enough shopping for one day," Helen said quietly. She called out for her son to come back again, and the three of them headed for home.
The Parr residence was located on the edge of downtown. Dash, as always, sped up as they approached so he could be the first in the door. Helen watched him run; her unfailingly energetic son moved with with the customary grace of the Airbenders, but also an enthusiasm that he could only have inherited from his Earthbending father. Bob Parr met his eldest son at the door with a hug, and, a minute or two later, his wife with a kiss. Violet ducked his greeting and headed upstairs to hide herself away in her room.
"How did shopping go?" he asked Helen with a smile.
"Oh, not too bad. Your eldest two children got into a fight in the middle of the street, but it could have been worse."
"I ran circles around Vi so fast she couldn't even see where I was!" Dash said with pride.
"That's great, buddy – uh, I mean, you really shouldn't use your powers to terrorise your sister." Bob's attempt at sternness under his wife's disapproving gaze only made Dash chuckle as he sped outside to run laps around the yard.
"That boy," Helen said with a rueful smile. "I just don't know where he gets his energy." She drew an arm around her husband's waist and leaned into him. "Where's Jack-Jack?"
"Napping," Bob replied. Their youngest child was the only non-bender in the family, but he was unbelievably spoiled regardless. "They really had a fight in the street?"
"Right in the centre of the city." Helen sighed. "I don't know, Bob. Vi's having a tough time with that Firebending boy, and Dash is... Dash, I guess." She kissed her husband's cheek. "Want to give me a hand with dinner?"
"Sure, honey." They moved into the kitchen. "Hey, did I ever tell you about that kid who used to live opposite me before we married?"
"I don't think so."
"His name was Buddy. Young kid, maybe Dash's age... He wasn't a bender, but he'd follow me around all the time, trying to show me these little metal machines he'd made."
"Sounds sweet," Helen commented, lining vegetables up on a cutting board.
"Eh... He got under my skin sometimes. It's weird being trailed after all the time. I think he moved away, because I stopped seeing him after a while."
"What made you bring him up?" Helen asked.
Bob hesitated, then sighed. "Jack-Jack," he confessed. "I was thinking about him today... What if he feels really out of place growing up in a household full of benders?"
"Stop that," Helen said, laying a hand on his arm. "Jack-Jack's no more and no less special than Vi or Dash... and a lot less trouble. All we have to do is make sure that he grows up knowing that, and he'll be fine. He's bound to have his own talents. Who knows? Maybe he's just a late bloomer."
"Yeah, maybe." Bob tried not to make a face as he watched his wife prepare the strictly vegetarian stew.
"Don't sulk," Helen said, without glancing up from her work. "I'll make a fruit pie for dessert to make up for it."
Bob wrapped his arms around his wife's waist and planted a kiss to her head. "You know me too well."