Granny snorted and rubbed a hand over her face; what time was it? She looked at her alarm clock; a little after nine. Sighing, Granny swung her legs out of her bed and put her feet into big fuzzy slippers. Tying her robe around herself, Granny walked out into the hall. There were the fragrant smells of butter toast, fried eggs, fresh lemonade and salty popcorn drifting in from the kitchen. Confused, Granny walked into the tiny room and was surprised to see her grandson Andy bustling about the kitchen, an apron tied around his waist, happily making breakfast.

"What are you doing?" she asked sharply.

Andy jumped and looked around, dropping an egg. His kittens, whom Granny did not see dancing all around the kitchen, giggled and went to lick at the raw egg yolk. "Gah! No, don't!" Andy lunged for his kittens, snatching them away. "Oh! Granny! Hi!" he recovered, setting his kittens on the island. Granny scratched her head and sighed. "What are you doing up so early? And where did all this food come from?"

"I'm makin' brekky!" Andy replied, beating an egg in a little ceramic bowl. "And luckily enough, I thought to bring along some food stuffs from home until we can go shopping later this afternoon." The kittens looked at each other and began scheming as to how they could be in on this little food-gathering excursion.

Granny laughed. "Now, you don't have to go off on errands, this is your summer vacation--" Andy cut her off, waving her protests away.

"Naw, it's fun. Now you go back to bed and I'll finish making brekky here. Don't worry about a thing. I'll leave some egg and toast out for you." Granny smiled, secretly relieved not to have to worry about her grandkids not liking whatever she had planned to make for breakfast, and padded back off to bed.

"Can we come?" asked the kittens. Andy turned around. "Come where?" he asked. The kittens giggled and bounced around. "To the store, silly!" Andy's pale face grew even paler and he gripped the spatula he had been using on the eggs. "Oh no...no no NO!" The kittens stopped and looked up at him with big eyes, purring hopefully. Andy rolled his eyes. "Grr, okay. But you HAVE to behave."

"Can we get checkout cheese?" they asked. Andy ignored them and finished making breakfast for his siblings.

Violet blinked and rolled over in Deker's bed as Andy came into the room, carrying a large tray. "It's about time," she muttered, and sat up, her golden mop of hair wild around her sleep-flushed face. "Whadid you make us?"

"Good stuff," Andy replied, and set the tray down on the bed. Violet gave a long gasp and attacked the food with a passion. Andy's eyes widened and he stepped away from the girl. "How about thank you?" Violet muttered something between a huge bite of toast.

"You didn't cook any tomatoes, didya?" asked Jules in his high squeaky voice.

"Tomatoes for breakfast? You crazy?" Andy replied.

"I hate tomatoes." Violet gnawed on an egg and frowned. Jules looked up at her, surprised. "Does that mean you don't like me?"

Violet choked. "Well, I'm not eating YOU, haha!" she retorted.

Andy peered around. "Where's Deker?" he asked. Violet shrugged and pointed up, slurping lemonade. Andy tipped his head back and looked up at the skylight; his older brother was busily typing away on his laptop on the roof. "Deker! Get your head out of the clouds and come eat brekky before it's all gone!" Deker dropped into the room, caught up a piece of toast, and climbed back out into the sunshine again. Andy rolled his eyes and began eating his meal. "I can't do this every morning, you know," he said. "I didn't bring that much food from the apartment."

"We have to go shoppin'," Violet said matter-of-factly. The kittens grinned at each other.

"I know what you're thinking; you can't get checkout cheese," Andy mumbled, but his kittens ignored him and laughed at one another.

"How will we get ta th' store, heh heh?" asked Jules, hopping around.

"We'll go on our bicycles, those old things we keep in the shed back around the side of the house," Deker muttered, typing crazily.

Violet whined. "I don't wanna peddle all that way into town!" she groaned. "Can't I ride on Jake?"

"People might think it weird, seeing a person flying around on nothing," Andy pointed out, and Violet smacked him.

"I don't care! I'm flying."

"Smack me again and I'll--"

"She can fly if she wants to," Deker said, coming down into the room and packing his laptop away. "It's all settled; hurry up so we can go before it gets too hot."

Ten minutes later, the boys were peddling for all they were worth along the forest road, Andy keeping an eye on Violet, who was happily riding on Jake above them. Andy's kittens were laughing as the wind tickled their whiskers as they rode in the basket on the front of his bike. Jules was sitting most uncomfortably on Deker's shoulder, nearly falling off every time there was a curve in the road. Keeping a sharp eye on the Graces, stalking them through the woods, Caspar followed at a distance, rubbing his hands together and grinning wickedly.

"Just you wait," he was rasping to himself. "It's coming, dear Graces, it's coming."

Andy was slowing down to retie his shoelace and caught a glimpse of Caspar as he hid behind a tree, cloak trailing the ground. Andy frowned. "Don't look now, Deker, but naughty Caspar is following us."

"Ignore him," Deker replied, stopping his bike.

"What's wrong down there?" Violet called from Jake. Andy shook off the unsettling sensation that had been clinging to him ever since they'd left the house, and carried on.

Sitting on their porch, enjoying the cool morning before the hot afternoon ahead, were two old ladies, rocking back and forth and knitting. "Don't see as how he could have jumped off that haybale," said one. The other nodded. "It's too high!" The other nodded again. They were silent for a moment. All of a sudden, Violet swooshed by on Jake and the two old ladies nearly fell out of their chairs in astonishment.

"Hi there!" Violet called, and waved. The ladies grew pale and one of them screamed. Violet laughed and urged Jake faster on.

Soon the forest thinned and the rushing cars of the small downtown area came into view; Jake flew past the red lights and Violet laughed as Deker and Andy had to stop and wait for them to turn green. The heat began to intensify, rising in wavering patterns off the hot cement, but finally the Graces made it to the grocery store and walked into the cool building, leaving Jake to chase sparrows above the roof.

"Now kittens, behave," Andy said warningly.

"Let's get pizza rolls!" Violet shouted, and several people looked at her with raised eyebrows. Suddenly she tipped her head up and yelled, "Jake, get OFF the ROOF!" An employee looked at her and asked, "Who are you talking to?"

"Jake," Violet answered. Andy leaned forward and whispered in her ear. "Stop it."

"Who's Jake?" asked the employee.

"Violet..."

"My dragon," Violet said, a wicked grin upon her face.

"Stop it or I'll smack you!" Andy hissed.

"No you won't!" Violet shrieked. "He was gonna smack me, Mr. Employee!" The store worker looked startled. Deker came forward and dragged them both away into the produce aisles.

Jules looked remorsefully at the stands of fresh ripe tomatoes and shuddered. He hopped along the wooden sides of the stand until he came to look at an especially large tomato and grinned stupidly at it. A bald guy walking past rummaged around in the tomatoes and Jules was horrified to find himself being suddenly picked up by a large meaty hand.

Deker heard his character squeak in terror and whirled around. "No, sir, that's MY tomato!" he shouted, lunging forward and grabbing Jules away. The bald guy stared at him a second, then shrugged and walked off. He had snatched up the character by accident and had been about to stuff Jules away in his bag, along with the normal tomato he'd originally been grabbing. Andy cast a nervous glance around at his older brother and began gathering the things they needed. Every so often, a passer-by would hear the little sunburnt boy shout something like "Kittens! Get off the such-n-such!" Once the three fluffs climbed on top of a rather tall canned goods pyramid, and it came crashing down. A store worker came forward, his face red, shouting threats at Andy, who scooped up his kittens and made a run for it.

"Get some paper towels and straws, I'm gonna go and get a shopping cart," Deker told Andy, who nodded and got a tighter hold on his kittens, dragging Violet along behind him. The little girl was begging for candy.

Deker walked through the store, Jules squishing along behind him, and suddenly got an unsettled feeling that tingled through his fingers. Try as he might, he couldn't shake it off and made sure that his tomato was close to him. Reaching the rows of shopping carts, Deker moved to pull one out and suddenly froze, feeling eyes watching him. Looking up, he saw a tall skinny boy with a blue mowhawk, a shadow of a girl with black lipstick and purple eyeliner painted onto her snow-white face, and a short fat little boy with chocolate stains on his tattered shirt, all staring at him. Deker looked back at them for a moment, wondering what their problem was, then suddenly remembered the punk in the diner along the way to Grandma's. Staring closely at the blue-haired kid, Deker realized it was the same punk, and quickly jerked his hand away from the shopping cart handle. The three weirdos were staring at him with unblinking eyes, and when Jules bounced to his shoulder asking when they were going to get a move on, the punk moved his eerie gaze to rest on the tomato. He could see the character. Deker fought back a shiver and suddenly whirled on his heel and strode quickly back through the store to where Violet was trying to get away from Andy's tight grasp.

"We need to go, NOW," he said in an urgent voice.

Andy looked at him, startled. "Where's our basket--"
Deker caught up some corny dogs from the freezer, stuffed them into a bag, and frowned fiercely. "Now," he said. "Where are your kittens?" Andy looked around, horrified, and heard his kittens calling from the toy aisle. "We won't go until we have checkout cheese!" they squeaked, pawing around through the stuffed toys. Violet giggled at them.

Andy went over and waved his arms at them. "We gotta go!" he cried. "Noooo!" the kittens squealed. "We want cheese!" Andy heaved a sharp sigh, ran over to the cheese section, and picked out some cheddar. "Not that kind, we want Swiss!" the kittens chorused. Deker cast a nervous look towards the shopping carts across the store, and thought he saw the punks still standing there, watching them. "Hurry up," he muttered. Andy grabbed some Swiss cheese and tore his kittens from the midst of the stuffed toys. Deker yanked Violet behind them, hastily paid for their purchases, and then herded everyone outside where the hot afternoon was beginning to bake the asphalt.

"What's wrong?" Andy demanded, turning around and putting his fists on his hips. "Why did we leave so quickly? We only got about half the stuff we needed to."

"I'll...I'll explain later. Now we need to get home." Deker swung his leg over his bike and made sure Jake had Violet safely on his back before leading the way back to Grandma's as fast as he could go. Caspar leaned in the shadows of the grocery store and grinned to himself, watching the Graces head for home. Then his eyes cut to where the three punks were slinking out of the store, their hands in their pockets, their shifty eyes watching Jake fly through the cloudless sky.