Denice is flagging a little by then, but happy to see Julie anyway.

"Hi there kiddo!" says Julie. "How was the bus trip?"

Not bad. She likes the kindle. And a lot of the poetry was cool. (Yawn.) Maybe talk about that later though.

"Yeah, let's get you to the house and you can take a nap, travel's exhausting," says Julie.

The car has seatbelts.

There are straps. Why are there straps.

"Those are seatbelts," says Julie. "If we have a car accident, they keep you from slamming into anything. These have movable anchors so you can get them on the wing-compatible seats, see? They look a little weird but as far as we can tell from crash tests they're as safe as regular seatbelts."

She starts edging away - she's going to bolt in a second, from the look of it.

"- Janet? What's wrong?" says Winona.

They want to strap her in there! (And in the background, memories of being strapped down, in pain, and drugged.)

"- you'd have the catch in reach the whole time, just push a button to get out," says Julie. "It's to keep you safe in case I hit something driving."

That sounds fake.

"...here, lemme show you," says Julie, taking Winona's backpack and emptying it out and then opening the trunk to get a grocery bag. "Picked up some food on the way here, place was mobbed last night - okay, here's this egg." She pulls out an egg and puts it in an outer pocket of the backpack.

"What are you doing, Julie?" says Winona.

"Demonstrating," says Julie. "So I zip up the egg in here so it's all snug, right?" She does so. She then swings the bag wildly around in a circle by a strap, and opens the pouch to display the egg, uncracked. "If I don't zip the pouch -"

"Julie, you're going to smash an egg on someone's car."

"I'll aim for the tree," says Julie. She swings the backpack around again. The egg goes flying out of the pocket and hits the tree and breaks messily.

But she didn't even do anything.

"- no, you didn't," says Winona. "You didn't do anything, this isn't something we're suggesting because we're mad. It's a safety rule everybody -"

"Well -"

"Everybody who isn't very foolish follows when they get in a car. The bus didn't have them because the bus is huge and if it got into an accident there would be enough bus around you to protect you, plus the driver was a professional, which Julie isn't. We're going to wear seatbelts too."

This is bullshit, she wants them to know that. She will put up with it the once and then she's figuring out how to do wings.

"The only reason I even know how to drive is that sometimes it rains," says Julie. "Winona never learned, God nudged her when she was younger than you are. If you really can't stand it you could maybe drop enough pounds to let us carry you?"

She looks distant for a moment, and then alarmingly thin.

Julie scoops her up, mostly having Denice sitting on her forearms so she doesn't damage the moth wings. "- trouble is Winona can't drive... okay, we leave the car here, Winona flies along, you stay with her at the house while I go return it." And she takes off, Winona following.

She's trembling, a little. Snuggles up, insofar as that's an option.

Julie will obligingly snuggle her while she flaps and uses the occasional burst of magic to keep the extra load in the air. It's about ten minutes to the house by air, and when they arrive she sets Denice on the doorstep. "There. No straps. Now put your squish back on or my grandmother will possess me and force me to bake cheesecake."

Yeah, okay. Squish. Hug.

Hug! Julie ruffles her hair and takes off again. Winona has a key and lets them inside the house, which isn't very lived in since no one was living in it last week but has furniture and wall art and rugs.

She looks around but doesn't wander off; she's staying a little closer to Winona than she tended to on the trip, actually.

"Want the grand tour?" Winona asks.

She kind of wants a nap, actually.