"I'm going to get some juice." Skylar stretched as they turned away from John's bookcase. "Do you want anything?"
Ten pages since the momentary interruption and Skylar still wasn't back yet? He licked his lips, not that there was much moisture to spread. Setting aside his book, John decided to find them.
John found Skylar without any trouble, they were in the kitchen as he suspected. But he stopped in the doorway without saying anything.
Skylar was holding their arm up to their face, grinning with bugged eyes at the insect crawling up and down their arm.
Skylar was holding a finger in front of the big cockroach, letting the creature's antenna flutter around it. Their mouth and lips moved, but not in English.
"You can speak roach?" The question gurgled out of John.
"Yeah. Did you know Rhonda here is the seventh generation of cockroaches to live in your house?"
"No." John blinked a few times. "And maybe it's time to fumigate."
"Shhh!" Skylar covered the roach with one of their hands. "Don't say the f-word in front of Rhonda!"
"Fum-"
"Shhh!" Skylar glared. "What has Rhonda done that deserves death?"
"Er... Carry diseases."
Skylar rolled their eyes. "So do you. And as long as you leave Rhonda alone you won't catch anything from her."
“Well,” John chewed his cheek, but didn’t get a chance to respond before Skylar, who had been nodding at Rhonda, interrupted his lack of thoughts.
“Oh, and Rhonda says if you want to have chemical warfare against any insect, she says the ants would love to bring you into their hive mind, so maybe you should take care of their anthill before they swarm your house.”
“Uh, right.” John scratched his neck. “Wait, how would they even do that?”
“Rhonda doesn’t know since she turned down their invitation last Tuesday.”
“The ants gave Rhonda an invitation.” John tilted his head. “To a picnic?”
“No, to join the hive mind.” Skylar glanced at Rhonda. “Oh, right. The invitation was to both, a picnic and the hive mind.”
“Right.” John sighed. “Just tell Rhonda to stay out of sight. I won’t say anything but if my parents see her or any other cockroaches they might go through drastic measures.”
“Oh, speaking of your parents, Rhonda just wants to say your mother’s crumb cake was delicious.”
“Thanks, um, I don’t think I’ll tell her, but uh, I hope Rhonda means the stuff that fell on the floor the other day.”
“Yes, Rhonda is very good at cleaning up your food crumbs before they grow moldy and make you sick.”
“Okay, I get it, Rhonda is helpful.” John’s phone buzzed and he pulled it from his pocket to check the text. “Now let her scurry back to her hiding place, my parents are on their way home.”
It was only when John and Skylar made it back to John’s bedroom did he realize he forgot to get something to drink.
Word count: 492
