14 Potions

Instantly, Tabitha felt her feet leave the ground as she floated to the ceiling, bumping her heard.

"Ouch," she yelped, grabbing her crown as she bounded up and down. She heard the stampeding feet of her pursuer and immediately stretched her body into corpse yoga position. "Please don't look up. Please don't look up." she chanted silently to herself.

The footsteps outside the door halted, and Tabitha watched as the doorknob turned. Holding her breath, she felt herself begin to float toward the floor. Panicked, with the door opening stealthily, she took a breath, and darted back to the ceiling, hitting the bone in the back of her head this time. "Guess I know how I'm getting down from here," she thought, rubbing the tender spot.

"Gotcha!" Trent yelled, throwing the door wide open. Tabitha almost lost her concentration trying not to laugh. She clapped her hands over her mouth but began floating back to the floor as her breath stopped. (You don't really think about breathing until that's all you have to think about.) She closed her eyes and made herself breath in-and-out, in-and-out. Normally. Like this game.

"Tabitha?" Trent asked the air. "I know you're in here. I can hear you."

Tabitha watched him begin looking under tables in the lab. Bunsen burners, glass beakers, and petri dishes cluttered the table tops. Trent dragged his hand across the surface, the sound of glass breaking as the instruments hit the floor. "When I find you," he taunted, "you'll be sorry for this mohawk!"

Squeezing her eyes closed, Tabitha stifled the guffaw trying to escape her lips, and continued the chant in her head: in-and-out, in-and-out.

"Now what do we have here?" Trent asked the room. Tabitha opened her eyes to see her brother reaching for one of the vials. It was hard not to yell out, tell him to be careful. But to do that would mean giving up her position. She wasn't ready to end the game yet.

Trent chose a vial -- bright green, the color of a freshly mowed lawn or sour taste of a Granny Smith apple. He unstoppered the vial, smelled it, shrugged his shoulders and drank.

"Yuck -- nasty!" Trent shuddered. Right before he poofed into thin air.