So I could not teleport or blend into shadows like my favorite X-Man. It was now broad daylight, and downtown bustled with some typical Friday lunch hour activity, and I had to walk right through the heart of it. I figured my newly discovered telepathy might come in handy here. I just broadcast a blanket signal convincing anyone who saw me that there was absolutely nothing unusual about me. It was useful, but it gave me a headache. I wondered just how much longer I'd absolutely have to keep this up, and if there was anything else I could do that would help. Was I pyrokinetic? I tried to hex bolt that lighter and ended up moving the flame. But that did not explain how this morning I had smashed into smithereens, rather than burned or melted, my alarm clock. Besides, pyrokinesis struck me as useless except to perhaps lower our heating bills or keep a barbecue going, and I had more important things on my mind.
I hate to compare my two children, but I often hear much more about my daughter Grace- named for the legendary Irish pirate queen. Grace, the gifted child whose boundless energy and curiosity became more difficult to channel as she grew increasingly bored with third grade. Ian may have been named after actors who happened to play villains like the Emperor Palpatine and Magneto, but he did not embody any of those qualities. His teachers typically only commented on the compassion far beyond his six years coupled with the innocence not found often enough any more in children that same age, and maybe said something about his voracious literary appetite. However, in the only other instance he'd been in trouble at school, it was huge- an almost Hulk-like reaction to a fourth-grader's bullying, without the turning green and the rapid gain of body mass, of course.
Of course? I couldn't take even that for granted any more. Maybe he really did Hulk out! I mean, if I could wake up with Nightcrawler's looks and who knows who else's powers, who knew what my kids could be doing at any moment? And this was the first time I was called in the middle of the day for a private conference with the teacher and principal!
I arrived at the school thoroughly worried as well as feeling just plain sick from keeping my stealth telepathy on high gear for fifteen straight minutes. I decided to just let that whole thing go, and stepped into the front office just as I was without directing people's thoughts and reactions. At least the school was still standing, and I spotted Ian with tears still on his cheeks and lip still quivering from whatever happened, sitting in the hallway with the school secretary.
I also overheard a heated discussion in the principal's office.
"It strikes me as inappropriate at best, perhaps even an expression that all is not right at home, that Ian, during a lesson on honoring one's father and mother, should portray his mother like this, and then insist that that's the way she really is," said his teacher, Mrs. Evans. "I've always figured there was something a little off about his mother, anyway."
"The O'Malleys are certainly different," said Sister Mary Xavier. "The parents make no attempt to restrain their own fertile and often bizarre imaginations, and the effect that has had on the children has been profound. For better, I might mention, much more than for worse."
Hey. I didn't geek out about the kids having a school principal with that name. I was restrained!
"I have only known Mr. and Mrs. O'Malley to be good parents," Sister Francis continued. "If there's anything worth reporting, we will not hesitate to act accordingly. Regardless, I'm grateful you've brought this to my attention. I just do not wish to overreact."
"Sister Francis? Mrs. Evans?" I said, figuring I might as well go ahead and make a dramatic entrance, "You wished to see me?"
Mrs. Evans paled, then turned bright red, her mouth hanging agape in stunned silence, a single sheet of paper, the cause of this commotion, fluttering from her hand onto Sister Xavier's desk. I couldn't suppress a fang-y smile as I took my seat. Under the caption of "I love my famlee," stood four stick figures, three with yellow hair, blue eyes, and curving smiles, one with blue with yellow eyes and a zigzag jack-o-lantern grin.