Chapter five: Good Bubbles . . .? (Spitfire's POV)

"Okay, Nue, got it. I'll take care of that matter."

I sighed and went back into the appartment, but suddenly I heard loud noises coming out of the bathroom. I stopped in the middle of the living-room. The noises stopped after a short while, but it was enough to alert me. I headed directly towards the bathroom aas fast as I could. When I opened the door I found Phoenix sitting in the bathtub covering herself with her arms and boh hands and surrounded by the countless shampoo-bottles which I always stuffed into the small cupboard haning on the walls of the bathroom.

I looked up and recognized that the door of one of the cupboards were open. It seemed that it had swung open because I've tried to fill the place inside with to much of my beloved shampoo-bottles. My cheeks got warm and could feel a blush growing on my face.

Oh my god, just because I am so damn paranoid when it comes to my hair that little girl was attacked out of nowhere by flying shampoo-bottles.

I swallowed hard and carefully asked:

"Uhm, is everything okay?"

I mean, of course it wasn't, but I wanted to know how much she had gotten shocked by getting in contact with one of my weird habits.

"I-I'm . . . I'M VERY SORRY!"

"Huh?"

The comment wasn't pretty intelligent, but this kind of reaction had been the last one I'd had ever expected.

"It wasn't my fault . . . well, not entirely. I swear I had no idea what would be happening. I'm so sorry!"

She didn't change her self-protecting position and I suddenly got the feeling that she was scared of looking at me.

"Did you get hurt?", I asked carefully while I felt guilty for what had happened.

It took a moment till she mentioned with a shy voice:

"I got hit on the head by one of these . . . these things, but it's no heavy injury."

I felt relive growing inside of me. She sounded like a pouting little child who had been scolded for something which han't been his intention to make it happen.

"Phew, what a relieve . . .", I mentioned and walked towards the bathtub. Phoenix winced when she heard him approaching.

"You know", I kneeled down to pick up the bottles which had fallen at the floor beside the bathtub, "I was seriously worried that you would have gotten hurt worse."

I knewly didn't look up at her, but I could hear that she was moving slowly and after a while I felt the look of her red eyes on my back.

She swallowed than spoke up with a shy voice:

"Really?"

This time I raised my view to face her.

"Of course . . . I don't like it if somebody gets hurt on my fault."

"But it wasn't your fault."

A clear tone did enter her voice. It felt amazingly relaxing to listen to her right that moment and I kinda was reminded of the the last tuning I had to go through a few months ago. Ine's voice still was a bit different, but it was the same effect. I took a deep breath and looked at Phoenix for a while. She looked back at me, but then broke off the eye-contact and started collecting the shampoo-bottles which had fallen into the bathtub.

"It was my fault, because I've put too much stuff into the small cupboard. It's a bad habit of mine . . ."

I did put the collected bottles from the floor into the wash-bowl.

"The stuffing or the many bottles?"

I turned around towards Phoenix with a surprised expression on my face. She looked up at me and handed him the collected bottles. They seemed so big compared to her small hands hands and I felt guilty again, but when Phoenix recognized the worried wrinkles on my foehead she smiled broadly.

"Don't worry, eveybody has bad habit . . . nobody's perfect."

A chuckle escaped my lips.

"I guess you're right."

I took the bottles from her and and placed them where I had put the others when suddenly a thought entered my mind.

"Do you wanna wash your hair?"

"Naaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah . . . ."

She sat back in the bathtub and covered her head. "I don't want to."

"Why?"

"Because shampoo creates foam on my skin and foam consists of thousands of little bubbles and I don't like bubbles."

An angry look appeared in her eyes, but I wouldn't let myself get neither discouraged nor convinced that easily.

"But the foam-bubbles are good bubbles."

She looked at me doubtfully and narrowed her eye-brows. "Good bubbles?"

"Yeah . . ."

"There are no good bubbles."

"Of course there are."

"So . . . why are foam-bubbles good?"

"They can clean your skin. Come on, what did you use on the street to wash yourself?"

"Soap."

I grinned, there was the mask of the pouting child appearing on her face again. But when I answered I looked at her seriously.

"Phoenix, I don't know why you are scared of bubbles" – she was just about to open her mouth to respond – "and you don't have to talk about it if you don't want to, but would you let me proof to you that I don't wanna harm you at all?"

A great silence grew between us and I waited patiently till se finally removed her arms from her head, but she didn't move towards me.

"Maybe . . . but I want you to put some of these foam-bubbles on your hand to proof that they're harmless."

"Sure."

I grabbed ome of the shampoo-bottles and kneeled down next to the bathtub. I did put one hand into the warm water and when I took it out of the water again I did put some of the light-blue shampoo on the skin of my hand. I rubbed both hands against each other while foam started growing between them. Phoenix was completely focused on the white foam while she was siting at the other end of the bathtub.

"See?", I raised one hand to let her see the faom more clearly.

"It's getting more the more you are rubbing your hands.", she mentioned matter-of-factly.

Another chuckle escaped my lips.

"Yeah, that's right, but now you can see", I did put my hand back into the water and the foam suddenly got off my hand, "it's harmless and it makes your skin smelling nice."

"I think it smells weird."

"But do you still think that the foam-bubbles are bad bubbles?"

She bit her lower-lip and kept shewing it for a while.

"I guess they're different from the bubbles I know", she finally admitted.

"Do you wanna wash your hair then?"

"If you help me."

I raised my eyebrows in surprise.

"Why?"

"Well, my hair is quite long." As tp proof that she took a few strands of red hair in both hands and pulled it a bit away from her head to show me their length.

"Well, I guess that'd be possible."

She smiled and moved towards the place where I had kneeled down while I looked for the right kind of shampoo. When I had decided I kneeled down again and dispersed the shampoo carefully on her already wet hair ad slowly started rubbing.

"Is it okay this way?"

"Mhmmm . . ."

Some time passed without anybody saying a word, but then suddenly Phoenix raised her voice again.

"I'm sorry for bothering you with this story before", she whispered.

I stopped rubbing her head for a moment. A sad feeling entered my heart, but I continued rubbing after a while.

"You didn't bother me with that", I answered while focusing on the wall behind the bathtub.

"But you've been angry back then."

"I wasn't angry . . . I was shocked."

"Why were you shocked?"

I swallowed hard before answering with a low voice.

"It's a sad and cruel story."

"I know." Phoenix sighed.

"You do?" I didn't know which feeling was stronger – the one of relieve or the surprise.

"Of course I do, but that doesn't make a difference."

There it was again . . . this clear voice. I took a deep breath.

"I really like you and so I was afraid that you wouldn't like me anymore after listening to that story. It's a terrible one I know, but please . . . please don't be upset about it. It had happened to me and getting angry about it now won't change a single thing about it."

My throat became tight. I felt her wet hair and her small head through the foam under the palms of my hands. A sudden warmth entered my heart and I really had to fight hard against the urge to hug her.

I finally sighed. By looking at that girl everybody would take her for a little child, not being older than eleven, but I had a certain feeling that there was so much more behind these fire-red mirrors of her. She seemed to be wiser than an old woman.

"You're right", I finally managed to answer. "But would it be okay if I'd keep that story in my mind? As a memory of the day when I met you for the first time?"

She raised her foam-covered head and a shy smile laid on her lips.

"I guess, that'd be okay", she whispered happily.

I smiled, too.

"That's great . . . and now let's get rid of that foam", I mentioned grabbing at the shower head.

"Yay."