Inktober 2019 3: Bait

TW for attempted child molestation, implication that it was more than “attempted” in the past.

This one was hard, and I feel like it kind of trails off rather than ending. Which probably means it wants to be a much larger piece, not a ficlet, but Inktober’s about doing the ficlets, so oh well. I may expand it at some point in the future.

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Minna was very, very reluctant to let Jasmine come to her house for a sleepover; Jasmine had to work on her for most of the school year, despite Minna coming over Jasmine’s house over a dozen times. But finally, in May, Minna agreed. “My dad’s going to be out of town,” she said, “so you can come over this weekend.”

“I don’t understand why I can’t come over when your dad’s around?”

“Uh, my dad likes peace and quiet, that’s all.”

On the night of the sleepover, however, it turned out Minna’s dad was in town after all, his business trip apparently unexpectedly canceled while Minna was at school. “Oh,” Minna said. “We ought to cancel this, then. Maybe you should call your parents?”

“Don’t be silly!” Minna’s mom said. “It’ll be fine, won’t it, Jake?”

“That’s right. I’ve got no problem with you having a sleepover, sweetie. Who’s your little friend there, honey?”

“I’m Jasmine.” He didn’t seem like he was angry, or mean.

“Jasmine?” He laughed. “Is that old-lady name making a comeback now?”

“I was named after my grandma. My friends call me Jazz, though.”

“That’s great,” Jake said, grinning. “You like board games, Jazz? You even heard of board games? I know you kids, always playing on your VR sets, but did you ever play real games like we used to when we were kids?”

Jasmine happened to know that if Jake was the age he appeared to be, his childhood was probably spent playing video games on 2 dimensional screens, but she didn’t challenge him. “I like board games, sure!”

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