Page 69 of Potion Sickness

“We don’t even have any hedges.”

“We have a lilac bush,” Englebert says, “and it will serve.”

Gabe stifles a laugh.

“I haven’t seen Bandit do any show,” Emma says.

“Me neither,” Addie confirms.

“Lily may reaching the age where lying begins to get ambitious,” Hannah says.

I’m halfway through agreeing with her when I think about what Lily said again.

“Wait a second, Lily. What kind of sword?”

“A little one.”

“How little?”

She holds her hands apart… dagger-width.

“Wooden?” Emma says, catching on. “Or the rubber one?”

“Wooden. It’s painted.” Lily looks around at all of us, confused about the attention she’s accidentally acquired, but seemingly decides she likes it. “It’s got the shiny stuff on the end.”

“That’s the metallic varnish,” Hannah says.

Emma flips the pages on her clipboard to ‘VANISHINGS’.

Everyone at the table looks at the screen door, but the porch is empty save for an empty bowl that formerly contained ziti.

* * *

Addie finds him. She goes out the back and stands on the lawn in the last of the evening light. She doesn’t have to say anything. Standing there with her arms folded is enough. Bandit comes out from under the forsythia and sits down a few feet away.

Whatever passes between them takes a while. It ends with Addie walking back to the porch with her hands in her pockets and Bandit following several steps behind.

“He wants to say it inside,” Addie announces. “Just like everyone else did. And he wants everybody to know he’s confessing voluntarily.”

Bandit comes into the dining room. He’s been begging to do this for months, but doesn’t seem to be in a position to enjoy the victory. He climbs onto an empty chair by the window and sits very upright.

“I want to start,” he says, “by saying that none of it was stealing.”

“Here we go,” says Englebert.

“I was just finding. Someone puts something down. I pick it up. I find it. It’s found. That’s the rule.”

“Whose rule?” Gabe asks.

“That is not a rule,” Englebert says.

“It’s an old rule.”

“It is not a rule,” Englebert says. “It has never been a rule. This has never once been a rule.”

“Finders keepers,” Lily nods. “That is a rule.”

“Where’s the dagger, Bandit?” I ask, before the three of them can get any further.