Confusing Earth - Chapter 17: Glasses

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Chapter 17: Glasses

Breathing heavily, Bella got out of the primitive spaceship with no flying devices and said to Nathan, “Okay let’s find some teething gel.”
Nathan led the way. They walked through the area that primitive spaceships with no flying devices are parked in and went into the shops. They then went into one that had letters above the top of it. They went into it and Nathan led them to a spot where there was some medicine. He picked up the teething gel and passed it to Bella.
“Do we need anything else?” asked Nathan.
“No” said Bella, “I don’t think so”. They went to the checkout and Bella put the teething gel on the black thing that moves at the checkout. The lady served her.
“That will be five dollars and sixty cents please” said the lady.
Bella looked blankly at the lady at the checkout. She then nervously felt her bit of cloth that was stuck to the pants she was wearing that she supposed you could keep things in.
‘Jack’s got all of that money stuff that we had’ thought Bella. Bella suddenly became aware of how long she had been silent. Obviously, so had the lady.
“Five dollars and sixty cents please” repeated the lady. Bella looked pleadingly at Nathan, who was standing behind Max and Maree behind Bella. He had not been paying attention. He quickly realised what was going on and faced the lady.
“How much?” he asked.
“Five sixty” said the lady, clearly frustrated. Nathan gave her the money and they took their teething gel. When they were a short distance from that shop, Bella turned to Nathan and said, “I’m sorry. Jack had all of our money.”
“That’s okay” said Nathan, “What’s five dollars sixty really? Anyway, when do you get paid?”
“Paid?” said Bella.
“You know. Paid from work” said Nathan.
“Oh yeah,” said Bella, “I’ve been meaning to get one of those job things.”
“You’ve been meaning to?” asked Nathan.
“Yes” said Bella, trying to save face, “I chose to stay home and take care of the children but I have been planning to get into work.”
“So do you get money from Centrelink or did Jack make too much?” asked Nathan.
Bella didn’t know what a centre link was but she knew she wasn’t getting any of that money stuff from anywhere so she replied with “Jack made too much.”
“Okay” said Nathan, “Hey it’s getting late and we haven’t had breakfast. I don’t know about you guys but I’m starved. How about I shout us just this once to breakfast?”
“Breakfast would be nice” said Bella, “But you don’t need to shout at us all the way there.”
Nathan laughed. “Okay breakfast it is” he said.

Nathan lead them to the food court where they all got breakfast. At the table across from them was a couple with an infantile human just like Liam. Liam and the infantile human were close to one another as their high bottom holding devices were in the middle of the two tables. They could reach each other if they really wanted to. Liam looked at the infantile human. He remembered what the organisation said about his communication and that he could communicate with other infantile humans. He tried to talk to them and out came babble. The infant smiled and babbled back but the sound made absolutely no sense to Liam.
“Oh Neptune” thought Liam, “They were wrong. We babies can’t communicate with each other. I can talk to no one since this odd change in me.”
Max ignored the baby alongside them as well as the adults. He was immersed in his nutrition called breakfast. A rich squishy red half circle thing was alongside a long brown thing that tasted unusual but good and that was alongside a white thing that had an orange circle in it that was on top of a hard, crunchy edible rectangle.
Bella looked at the baby. He was so adorable. His chubby cheeks, his little smile, his little tufts of fur growing on the top of his head and that yellow stuff hanging out the bottom of his smelling appendage on his face made for such a cute sight.
Liam looked at the baby too. ‘I have to be able to communicate with him’ he thought ‘Maybe I’m just doing it wrong.’
Liam thought, ‘I need to communicate I can’t talk.’ Liam looked at the baby and then pointed at his mouth. The baby blew a raspberry.
‘I’m not getting through to him’ thought Liam, ‘I need to get his attention.’ Liam flung his arm out and swung it so it touched the other baby. The yellow stuff hanging out the bottom of the baby’s smelling appendage went all over Liam’s arm. Nathan nudged Bella.
“Better clean your baby up” said Nathan, “He’s got that kid’s snot on him.” Bella got up to clean Liam. She grabbed him out of the high chair and as she did he flung his arm up near her face. The yellow stuff went all over Bella’s face. Bella grabbed some rectangles that humans clean their faces and hands with after eating and used them to wipe the stuff off of her face and off of Liam’s arm.
“Well that was disgusting” she said, and she thought ‘maybe that part of him wasn’t so cute.’
“The joys of having kids, hey Bella?” said Nathan.
“Yeah” said Bella, putting Liam back in the highchair. They went home soon after.

That night, Bella coughed and sniffed and felt just awful. Max heard her coughing in the middle of the night and figured she was unwell. He got up from the couch and went into Nathan’s room where food is made. He opened a thing with a door that you store things in in that room and pulled out a clear roundish thing with a flat bottom. As he pulled it out, he knocked over a few others which made a smashing sound. He went over to the tap and turned it on, putting water into the clear roundish thing. He then went into Nathan’s guest room, as he had called it, turned the light on and saw Bella. He dropped the clear roundish thing in shock. It smashed and water ran across the floor. Bella stared at Max startled by his crashing. Max stared at Bella, startled by her appearance.
“Bella” said Max, “You look like what we used to be”.
“What?” said Bella and she sniffed.
“You look Banbazoidian” said Max, “You’ve changed.” Bella quickly stood up and looked in the reflective clear thing on the wall. There she was in her Banbazoidian form, then she was human, then she was human but with her Banbazoidian foot. She breathed in deeply.
“Oh my stars, what’s going on?” she whispered. She coughed.
“That’s it” said Max, “Your illness. Obviously being unwell triggers a weakness in our human disguises.”
“What are we going to do to stop …” said Bella but she was stopped midsentence by a scream. Max turned around and Bella looked up to see Nathan near the door staring at Bella and screaming.
Nathan ran away and Bella and Max followed him.
“Wait” said Max.
“Wait” repeated Bella. Nathan continued to run away. He ran towards the kitchen. Max ran to one door of the kitchen and Bella kept following Nathan. Now Nathan was in the kitchen, with Bella following him and Max at the other door. They came closer to him. Nathan felt himself getting backed up into a corner full of cupboards. Bella slowly approached Nathan.
“It’s okay” said Bella, “It’s me Bella.”
“What the hell are you?” yelled Nathan back.
“It’s okay” said Bella, “Look, we are aliens okay?”
“Okay, okay” said Nathan, “That’s not okay. I know what you’re going to do. I’ve seen the movies. You’re going to pull my brain out and study it and then you will put out my organs and take turns eating them and just leave my carcass behind for one of your kind to put their own brain and organs in so they can use it as their body.”
“Eww” said Bella.
“That’s disgusting Nathan” said Max, “Where did you get that idea from?”
“I told you, movies. You know, on the tv” said Nathan.
“You shouldn’t believe everything you see in fictional holograms Nathan” said Max.
“I don’t” said Nathan, “But if you exist, God knows what can be real”.
“Calm down Nathan” said Bella, “Please listen to me. We do not want to hurt you.” Bella stepped closer. Nathan reacted by screaming and grabbing a glass out of the cupboard and throwing it at her. Bella stepped back.
“We come in peace” said Bella, “Our planet is running out of resources. We are a test group to see if we can assimilate into your planet’s way of life and to see if you have resources we can use. We are not here to hurt anyone, just to join you.”
Nathan grabbed another glass and held it in his hand.
“How do I know I can trust you?” he asked, passing the glass back and forth between his hands.
“You don’t” said Bella quietly, “You don’t know and it’s hard to trust something blindly. But we need you Nathan. I deserted our commanding officer for being too insulting and you agreed to help us. Please, Nathan. To have helped us before, you must have thought we were good people. Does the fact I’m not quite what you think I am really change me from being good?”
Nathan contemplated this information carefully, still passing the glass back and forth in his hands. After what seemed like an eternity, he put the glass down.
“I guess not Bella” he said, “This is just some scary crap you have just dealt me. Right now, I’m at the point of hoping this is a dream.”
“This isn’t a dream sweetheart” said Bella, “but it doesn’t have to be a bad thing.” Nathan breathed slowly, taking in the depth of what had just happened. He then looked at the drops of blood on his hand and then looked up in the cupboard. He looked at Bella and Max.
“Okay, one more question then” he said, “Who else has been breaking my glasses?”
Max looked down at the ground. “Me” he said quietly.