Pull Over

"Mom," Josh said. "The police are telling you to pull over."

She looked worried, but didn't respond.

"Mom, pull over. Right now."

Mom pulled over the car to the side of the road. As they stopped, she turned around to Josh.

"WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU THINKING? YOU TELL YOUR SISTER TO STRIP AND NOW YOU'RE GROPING HER? YOUR SISTER?! WHAT IS WRONG WITH-"

Josh knew full well how much he messed up. He didn't need her reminding him. "Mom, you're not allowed to yell at me until we get home today."

She stopped yelling at him, and stuck two fingers in his direction. He understood what that meant - they'll talk about this later.

As the cop walked up to them, Josh suddenly remembered the naked elephant in the room.

"Melody! Put your clothes back on!" he urged.

She nodded and began putting her clothes back on as the cop walked over, and knocked on the driver's side window.

"Hello, ma'am," the officer said. "May I have your identification?"

Their mom reached into her pocket and pulled out her drivers' license, handing it over to the cop.

"I noticed that there was an unclothed woman in this vehicle? Is that true?"

"Oh, no, that's not true, officer," Mom said. The officer looked into the back seat, where he saw Melody swiftly pull her top down over her body.

"Are you sure?" the officer asked. "I have it on my dashcam."

"I- uhh..." Mom stammered. "I-"

"Ma'am, would you like to explain?"

"I-I-I... Nothing happened in this car."

"So you wouldn't mind if I talked to these two?" The officer asked, pointing towards Josh and Melody, who was now fully clothed.

He walked over to the back door and opened it up.

"You two, tell me what you know." he said. "The girl first. Ma'am, were you unclothed a few minutes ago?"

"I was, officer," Melody replied, clearly nervous.

"And why were you unclothed?"

Come on, Melody. Say something other than-

"Because my brother told me to," Melody said.

Josh facepalmed. This was it... they were gonna go to jail over this.

"Your brother told you to?" the officer asked, turning to Josh. "Is that correct?"

"N-No!" Josh argued. "I didn't tell her to take off her clothes. She did that on her own!"

"What?! Josh!!" Mom shouted, shocked at his lie.

The officer turned back to Melody. "Ma'am? Have you ever heard of indecent exposure?"

"I have... but... he really did tell me to..."

He turned to Josh one more time.

"Sir, I'm going to ask again, and I want you to be honest with me. Did you order your sister to take off all her clothes?"

Josh sighed. The least he could do was take some responsibility here. "Yes, yes I did."

"Sir, you should've said that the first time. You're free to go."

"I- wait, what?" Josh asked, caught off guard by the unexpected response.

"If she was only doing it because you told her to, then it's not against the law." the cop said.

"I-It's not?!"

"Nope." he replied. "Nothing you did today was illegal. In fact, if I were to arrest either of you two, that would be illegal. Sir, what's your name?"

"I- it's... it's Josh. Josh West."

"Alright, Josh West. I'll make a note to the precinct about this vehicle so this doesn't happen again."

The cop walked back to his car and drove away, to Josh's flabbergasted surprise.

Mom stared at Josh for a few seconds before lashing out. "Why'd you say that you didn't tell her to do that?!" she asked. "You could've saved us time!"

"Why didn't you, if you knew how this works!"

"I wasn't worried about getting arrested, I was worried about having everyone know my son is a perverted deviant who gropes his sister. But even after Melody explained, you're dumb enough to say that she was lying... if you had doubled down, all three of us could've gone to prison. What is wrong with you?"

"Alright, alright," Josh said. "I get it, I know how this thing works now. Can you take us to school now?"

Mom sighed and started up the car again. "You and I are going to have a conversation about this once we get home."

"No we're not," Josh said, testing out the bounds of his abilities. "Mom, Melody, Forget everything that happened between our house and here."

"Huh?" Mom asked. "Where are we? How'd we get here?"

"Yeah, I thought we just left the house..." Melody muttered.

It worked. He didn't think it would work, but it did. People can't usually forget things on command... was that a testament to how powerful his powers were? He definitely needed to test his powers even more later.

"You drove us, Mom..." Josh said.

"I must be getting old, because I feel like we just left."

She pulled back onto the main road as Josh's vision began spinning and the voice in his head returned.

"Josh... Your orders are above the law... Just explain yourself to avoid legal and institutional consequences for you and your subjects..."

"Yeah, thank you, mysterious voice. That would have been helpful ten minutes ago."

"Josh? Who're you talking to?" Melody asked.

"No one," Josh said, with the reality of the situation sinking in. He could get away with anything, even in broad daylight.

Oh boy, school was going to be fun.