Opposites Attract

Rooftop Conversations and Moody Mornings

After dinner, I was upstairs in my room, bored. I grabbed the bottle of water on my night stand and poured some into my left hand, using my fingers on my right to swirl the water up, out of my hand, and into the air in these little spirals.

Will's bedroom door slamming shut made me drop the puddle of water all over the floor in shock, and I quickly dried my hands on my jeans, before going to investigate.

I timidly knocked on his door, and got no answer. Taking this as having not got a protest not to enter either, I slowly opened the door.

Clothes and paper were strewn all over Will's room, but he was nowhere to be found.

Then I felt a gust of air blow gently through the open window and ruffle his curtains. Will's window led out onto the roof, so that's probably where he would be.

I wandered over to it to find him sat on the roof, staring out silently at the garden and the rest of the street underneath him.

I quietly climbed out of the window, and carefully manoeuvred myself to sit next to Will in silence.

I cleared my throat to say something, but Will and I both turned when we heard the rustling of leaves... Layla.

"Hey Layla," Will greeted.

"Hi guys," she beamed, coming to sit on Will's other side.

We all sat in silence for another moment before Layla asked, "How did your dad take it?"

I was curious to this myself, having seen Will go off to tell Dad about his lack of powers.

Will went silent.... oh, he didn't.

"Well what was I supposed to do?!" Will exploded in frustration, "He showed me the Secret Sanctum!"

"Will..." I murmured, raking a hand through my hair in disappointment.

"You have to tell them," Layla told him firmly, and we all knew she was right.

"Layla, Rosie and I have the greatest and most popular superheroes on the planet as our parents- it's hard to live up to those expectations. Everyone expects greatness from us," Will complained, and I could see his point, our situation was pretty pressurising at times.

"Well, you are great," she told Will as I lay back on the roof.

"Oh yeah, you too, Rosie," she quickly saved herself.

"I know," I muttered cockily, smirking.

Will and Layla laughed; "Thanks," Will muttered, still pretty bummed about being a sidekick.

"So you're a sidekick," Layla reasoned, "It's not the end of the world. When life give you lemons, you make-"

I jumped as a tree started to sprout to our left, and Layla picked a fruit from it. I leaned forward to see if she'd finally mastered lemons, to find her holding an apple.

I giggled, laying back down, as Will joked, "You make apple juice?"

"I can't do lemons," Layla pondered, "I don't know what it is..."

"But see, you have a cool power- you could've made hero easily, like Rosie," Will said, vaguely gesturing to me.

I rolled my eyes.

"Eh, I'm not into labels," Layla admitted. Truth be told, neither was I, but I hadn't been informed by Little Miss Flower Power that the two of us would be flunking our powers to stay with Will and our friends!

"But why would you want to be a sidekick?!" Will asked in disbelief.

"Because, I think the whole thing is stupid, dividing people into groups like that, I mean, what is this?" she asked aloud.