Secretly Use the Stick on Sandy

“Okay, I understand,” replied Amy as she reached into her purse with her right hand to touch the wand. “Well, it was good to meet you, Sandy! And I hope tomorrow treats you better than today!”

Amy extended her left hand for a handshake goodbye. It was a little unusual with the left hand, but there was a reason. More importantly, Sandy took the hand in her right, which was what she wanted. Amy pondered what sort of trick she should pull. She could make the sticky goo again, but decided against it. She wanted a little bit of magic, but nothing too horrifying. As Sandy took her hand, Amy concentrated and made a mental command to the stick.

“Thanks, Amy! I hope so, too!”

But as Sandy tried to draw her hand back, she was met with a sudden resistance. Her eyebrows raised in confusion. Now it was time for Amy to apply her acting talent.

“Sandy? You can… you know… let go now.”

“Uhh… so… this may sound weird, but… I’m trying to.”

Amy gave a few strong tugs, pulling Sandy’s hand along with it. “Then why are you still holding on?”

“I’m not, I swear! I think out skin’s, like, stuck together or something?”

“Stuck together? How? What did you have on your hand?”

“I… I don’t know! Nothing, I thought!”

“Yeah, well, me neither. So, what happened? People’s body parts don’t just randomly get stuck together for no reason, Sandy!”

“I know they don’t!” Sandy said, defensively. “But I really don’t have any idea what’s doing this. Honest!”

“Okay, I believe you! Geez! Never mind. Let’s just figure out how to get ourselves apart.”

They tried walking away from each other and pulling. It didn’t work. Sandy braced her foot against Amy’s thigh and tried pushing off. Nothing. The two of them might as well have been cuffed together. But after a minute or two of tugging, Sandy actually started laughing! Amy laughed back. They made eye contact and had a good chuckle!

“Why are we laughing at this?” Amy asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe because this is such a ridiculous situation. I mean, who’d believe it if we told them? ‘Oh, yeah, I met this nice stranger at the waterfront, and when we shook hands, our hands got stuck together for no reason!’”

“Maybe we’ll leave this part out when people ask us how we met later on.”

Sandy smiled. “Yeah, we can leave this part out.”

They looked around to see if anyone could see them, but the small waterfront dining area was still mostly private. Knowing they wouldn’t be attracting attention, they kept struggling to pull their hands apart. But soon they were both giggling and playing again. It was kind of fun! Eventually, they worked themselves out of breath, and sat down on the picnic bench again as they gasped for air.

“What do we do now?” Amy asked. ‘Spend the evening together,’ was the answer Amy intended to get from her, but she had learned it was always best to make the other person think it was their idea.

“I don’t know. It’s not coming apart. We might have to go into the emergency room if we can’t get it on our own.”

“Yeah, we might. Won’t that be embarrassing, showing up like this? Especially when we can’t even explain how this happened. They’re going to have a LOT of questions we can’t answer.”

Sandy winced. “Ooo, you’re right. Holy moly, I hope it doesn’t come to that. Maybe we could loosen it if we soak it in water or something.”

“Loosen what?” Amy asked.

“Loosen whatever’s holding us together.” She brought their hands upward to look at where their hands met. “Yeah, that is the weirdest part of all this. I can’t actually see anything between our hands. I guess we could try.”

“Maybe it’ll loosen on its own over time,” Amy suggested.

“Good grief, I certainly hope so! I guess you’re stuck with me until then,” Sandy said with a silly smile.

“Yeah, we’re pretty stuck,” Amy agreed.