Giliam's Experiment

              Giliam had lovely eyes—when they weren’t shielded behind oversized, thick plastic goggles. We were in our 8 a.m. lab class, Chemistry I—Gil because he loves experiments, me because he dragged me into since I needed a science credit.
         The vial was smoking and hissing something fierce but the intense look on my lab partners’ face had me worried even more. His concentration had me glancing quickly between his current concoction and the door. Even while the rest of the class backed away slowly from the puffing and pouring bluish smoke, Gil observed, his pen scribbling whatever realizations and reactions he was gleaning from the miniature liquid smoke bomb. His eyes darted from the temperature gauge and the vile-smelling vial.
         A loud exclamation from the doorway broke the moment and Giliam looked up to see his lab mates on the verge of bolting and the reddening face of the newly-returned professor.
         I turned back from the door when he asked, “Anne, what’s the matter?” Gil looked genuinely confused for a second but continued anyway. I should have known better than to ever let him talk me into setting off the professor’s office alarm as a distraction. Not if this was the result. “Hand me that stopper, quick!”
              I step forward a few inches to stretch my hand to him, passing the small cork which was then abruptly stuffed into the vial’s opening.
              “Giliam Rupert Nifter! Take that cork out this second and diffuse that travesty to science.” Mr. Warble was swiftly turning from shocking maroon to stark white. “Now, boy, before it…”
              His sentence was abruptly cut short. Gil turned and dove at me, knocking us both, harshly, to the floor. Just in time to escape the blindingly blue flash of light which was quickly followed by a resounding explosion. Those that hadn’t ducked when they saw Gil leap were thrown unceremoniously to the ground.
         Three hours of shouting and rioting later, Gil and I were seated in front of the Head Magistrates Office awaiting the verdict.  I could hear parts of Mr. Warbler’s hysterical testimony.
         “….a travesty I said! Those two…..MENACES….out…”
         I glared at Gil, in his sapphire-tinted clothes, knowing I was similarly colored. He was scribbling in his notebook. He studied the back of his navy hand, looked at the clock, and then resumed writing. Noticing my pout, Gil sighed. “Really Anna, how was I supposed to know that anyone in contact with the smoke would get stained various shades of beryl? That’s half the reason we did this!”
                I folded my azure arms across my indigo splashed chest and replied. “Gee Gil, I dunno, maybe since you were conducting the experiment you would have had some idea as to the outcome. And having recruited my help, you could have informed me of the freaking possibilities and furt…wait,” I paused, rolled my eyes at his reasoning. “Oh what, dare I ask, was the other half of our reason—scratch that, your reason for doing this?”