by Laura Winter
I frowned. “I just feel like I’m being dramatic. It’s done with, yet everyone still has to be worried about me.”
“You are not being dramatic,” Nate stated. “We worry because we care about you. It’s not fair what you had to go through, but we can’t change that.” He stuck a loose piece of hair behind my ear. “Would it help to talk to someone? It doesn’t have to be me if you don’t want.”
“It’s either you or our parents, and I don’t want to make anything worse,” I shrugged. “I can’t exactly tell some therapist that I have panic attacks and blow shit up because my dad killed me, I came back to life, then almost died again in my dad’s shadow revenge plot. Not to mention almost getting killed by our doppelgängers.” I took a deep breath. “Nate, I feel like I’m going insane.”
“Look,” he said, thinking hard. “I’m not going to pretend I know what you’re going through. I didn’t face what you did, but I was there with you, and I’m pretty sure what you’re feeling is a perfectly reasonable response to the shit you went through. And I’m here now, so what can I do to help you?”
“That’s the thing,” I said, shaking my head. “I don’t even know what I need. I don’t have the answers, and I don’t like not knowing what’s going on with me. I feel lost. I’m willing to try anything at this point, and I want your help, but I have no idea how long that’s going to take. You’ve already been so patient with me.”
“And I’ll keep being patient, as long as I need to, but I need you to be patient with me if I don’t get it right. I really want to help, and if I’m pushing something too hard, you need to tell me. You need to tell me when these things happen.”
“Okay, I promise,” I said. “Thank you.”
He smiled and pulled my face closer to kiss me. “So do you have to go home and change before school or were you planning on stealing one of my shirts again?”
“I brought everything, so I only need to steal a towel. It’s really inconvenient living so far away from you. I wish our parents would just let us stay together. It’s not like we do anything crazy when they’re home.” I rolled out of bed and picked up my bag to go shower.
“I mean, I’m pretty sure they know we sneak around, but we haven’t gotten in trouble yet. You’re such a bad influence on me.” Nate’s alarm started going off, but he let it play for a few seconds before turning it off.
Carry On. Young Rising Sons.
“You know,” I said through the bathroom opening, “if we lived together we wouldn’t have to sneak around all the time.” I turned on the shower and watched Nate stretch before standing up.
“Not that I don’t love that idea, but we are still in high school and have no place to live. Now hurry up because I need to shower too.”
“Or we could shower together and save time,” I shrugged, sliding my shirt off.
“My parents are still here.” Nate raised an eyebrow as he leaned in the doorway to watch me. I snagged his shirt and pulled him in anyway.
“We can lock the door.” I smiled and leaned up to kiss him.
3
Nate
Letting Clara play any competitive sport in PE was a terrible idea. Someone was going to die if they underestimated her today, especially after she didn’t get enough sleep.
The slow pitch teams were already picked so there were an even number of girls and guys on each team. Luckily I was on hers, but that was probably an unfair advantage. I had played before and Clara was good at everything she did. No one else really cared.
“We don’t have any left-handed gloves, sorry,” Coach Sullivan said, digging through the old bucket of equipment.
“It’s fine. I’m ambidextrous. Plus, I’m playing third.” Clara snagged the mitt on top and smiled. She was way too excited about this.
Coach had made rules that the girls would play in the outfield, but he knew Clara was competent. He just shrugged and walked to the mound to pitch.
“Since when are you ambidextrous?” I asked, chasing after her.
“I have no idea. It just felt weird thinking about playing left-handed. Actually, now that I think about it, the idea of hitting right-handed in volleyball sounds weird too.” She paused for a second, lost in thought, before snapping out of her trance. “Whatever, just go play first. I need someone who can catch a ball over there.”
She pushed me in the opposite direction as she ran to take her position away from the guy who was already standing there.
The first half inning went quickly. All three outs went to the shortstop as everyone tried to get used to Coach’s pitching from behind a screen. A couple guys were in the middle of lazily making our lineup, but before anyone could decide the order, Clara grabbed a bat and headed to the plate. They noticed, but shrugged it off.
I was surprised to watch her settle into the right side of the box, but it looked oddly natural for her. A few of the guys in the infield made the mistake of scooting in while she could still see them which pissed her off. I don’t know if they moved in because she was a girl or because they assumed she was typically left-handed, but I was right. Someone was going to die.
The first pitch came in flat and I saw Clara smirk. She loaded and swung with perfect form and connected with every bit of the ball. It was absolutely crushed. Everyone stood stunned, including Coach, as they watched the ball fly over the fence. Even my jaw dropped.
Clara smiled and flipped the bat before strolling back to the dugout. You didn’t have to run if you hit a home run, but Coach probably hadn’t expected anyone to actually hit it over the 250-foot fence.
“Holy shit,” I said when she was finally back next to me. “Is there anything you can’t do?”
She grinned. “Yeah, soccer. I’m really bad at soccer.”
Somehow I didn’t completely embarrass myself hitting in the fifth spot, drilling a line drive in the five-six hole to score a run. Unfortunately the bottom half of the lineup didn’t really have the skills, nor did they care, so I was left stranded.
But Clara’s home run had sparked some competition with the rest of the guys. They didn’t like being shown up by a girl, and you could see their swings get bigger and bigger as they tried to hit the old, deformed ball over the outfield fence. One guy missed, but still connected enough to hit a screaming shot up the third base line. In a swift move, Clara backhanded and picked the ball before firing it over to me at first. I wasn’t surprised she had a cannon for an arm, but once again, she made everyone’s jaw drop.
At the end of the game, Clara had gone three-for-three with two home runs and a double off the top of the fence. Of course, she was pissed that she missed the last one, grumbling to herself about the mechanics of her swing. I thought maybe she would have been in a better mood after Coach had practically begged her to join the softball team, but she wanted no part of it.
“C, you singlehandedly destroyed the other team. How are you so good at softball?” I tossed our gloves in the box as we headed back to the locker rooms.
“No clue,” she shrugged. “I doubt I played back at The Complex since I had no friends.”
I hesitated, realizing I should have been more careful asking questions since she still didn’t remember anything from her past.
“Okay, then why didn’t you take Coach up on the offer to play for the softball team?”
She shook her head. “The last thing I need is attention. With everything going on, I think I need to focus on figuring out what’s going on with me. I’d hate to have a panic attack in public and not be able to do anything about it.”
Clara didn’t seem that upset with my question, but I didn’t bring it up again. She was right; she had enough to worry about outside of our teenage responsibilities. We changed and I met her back at her locker before we walked to lunch. Somehow Glitch had already heard people talking about Clara’s display during PE.
“Why do you not play any of the sports here? You could have made softball the new town favorite instead of volleyball. Shit, you could have made our boys
basketball team better.”
Clara rolled her eyes. “Your town is weird about sports.”
“Hey, you live here too, idiot,” I said, sticking my tongue out at her.
She laughed and shook her head. “You aren’t half bad at sports. Why didn’t you try out for baseball?”
“Half bad? Rude.” I crossed my arms. “What were your words again? I like to leave people wanting something they can never have.”
Glitch looked up and waved as Luci walked closer to our table.
“Mind if I join?” She smiled and nodded to our empty seat.
“Only if you don’t mind your social status dropping a few points. You’re already getting some looks. Nate really brings down our average,” Glitch shrugged.
Clara grinned wide. “Yeah, but having Luci here effectively cancels out Nate’s negative points. We’re just slightly below average now.” She tried to poke my side, but I smacked her hand away.
“Why am I always getting picked on?” I asked.
“Because C would kick our asses if we tried anything with her, and she and I are the smart ones,” Glitch chimed in, giving Clara a fist bump as Luci watched the entire interaction carefully. She seemed a little uncomfortable with not knowing our dynamic, but that was just how Glitch was. Once you were in the group, you were in.
“So, Luci,” I said, trying to bring her into the conversation again. “As you can see my best friend and girlfriend only keep me around for their personal entertainment.”
“Oh,” she said, smiling. “Glitch told me it was a requirement to pick on you if I wanted to hang out with you guys.”
Glitch burst into laughter and Clara threw her hand over her mouth to contain hers. Wow, Luci was going to get along well in our group… and with Glitch.
Clara moved her chair closer to mine instead of pulling me over to her like she usually did. With Luci hanging around now, we would have to be a little more careful about using our powers. We’d also have to find better topics of conversation instead of powers, Complexes, and death. I’d be getting the brunt of a lot more jokes.
“You know we love you,” Clara said, leaning her head onto my shoulder and looking up at me.
I winked and wrapped my arm around her. “Yeah, I guess you’re okay.”
Luci looked between us as Clara stuck her tongue out at me. “Okay, seriously, you two are the cutest.”
Glitch leaned back in his chair, smug. “I’m still taking credit for that.”
“I don’t think you’ll ever let us forget,” Clara said. She picked off a piece of her sandwich and threw it at him.
“That’s good for me to know, though,” Luci said, looking over to Glitch. “Now I can expect you to roll out the red carpet for me if you’re the one responsible for them.” She gave Glitch a playful hair flip.
“Oh, I like you,” Clara said. “Whip him into shape.”
“Let’s go back to picking on Nate,” Glitch groaned. “Clearly I’m doing better than him because I set up our first date in a week and they’ve been together for eight months and still haven’t gone on one.” Glitch stuck his tongue out at Clara.
“Wait,” Luci said, shocked. “You two haven’t gone on a date yet?”
“We’ve been busy,” Clara said to Luci while glaring at Glitch. Us being busy involved a lot of subjects we couldn’t discuss around Luci.
I reached out and grabbed Clara’s hand as she pushed off the table to stand up. “We’re going out tonight, so you can’t make that joke much longer.”
“Yay.” Clara’s unenthusiastic, monotone response confused Luci, but she didn’t say anything.
“Come on, C,” I said, squeezing her hand as she looked down at me. “I know you pretty well. Trust me, you’ll enjoy tonight.” And no reading my mind.
I hate surprises. She narrowed her eyes.
You’ll be fine staying out of my head for a day.
She raised an eyebrow. You’ve been keeping me out of your head since paintball, so I’ve given up trying.
“So, weirdos, care to join the real world again?” Glitch pulled us out of our trance. He knew we had been talking telepathically. That must have looked strange to Luci.
“Nah, we’re gonna go make out before class. Nice to see you Luci!” Clara pulled me out of the chair as my face got hot. Luci looked even more uncomfortable than before, but shook it off when Glitch turned to talk to her.
“At least they aren’t gross or anything.”
4
Clara
It was really hard not being irritated that Nate wouldn’t tell me where we were going. I wasn’t used to being left in the dark, and I really didn’t like being out of my comfort zone. Surprises were new territory for me. Being able to read everyone’s thoughts made it easy to see everything coming and prepare appropriately. Since Nate was keeping me out of his head, I was forced to wait for something to happen.
I did love him, though, and he was letting me wear jeans and Converse, so I put on my least gross looking top. I’d actually never seen the shirt before. I’m not sure if that’s because I never looked at the nicer side of my closet or if it was because House made me something for my date.
“Let me see your outfit, sweetie,” my mom shouted from the bedroom. In my distraction, I hadn’t heard her come in.
“Ugh, mom,” I groaned, walking out of the closet.
Her smile faded the moment she saw me. “Seriously? Why won’t you ever wear something nice?”
“These are my best pair of jeans,” I countered. “I even put on a real bra for this.” I pulled at the strap, already regretting it. Why were these things so uncomfortable?
“Can you at least brush your hair?” She was quick to give up on me changing my outfit, bargaining for a different thing she could try to get me to change.
“I did brush it.”
“When?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Last week?”
“I don’t know, maybe. Why do you care so much?” I asked, crossing my arms. “You told me you raised me to be brilliant, strong, and fiery. I like dressing like this.”
“Brilliant, strong, and kind,” she corrected. “Fiery was your own doing.”
“I think the strong and kind parts got lost along with my memory of Finnley,” I grumbled, hiking up my pants.
I could see her hesitate at the mention of Finnley. It was a sore subject between us, and we had all but stopped talking to each other over it.
I really tried to stay out of her thoughts, but I knew she wasn’t happy I hadn’t gone back to my real name. To me, the name didn’t feel right when I couldn’t remember who I really was. For a while, I had made efforts to remember things, but even my mom’s stories about Finnley didn’t trigger anything except more stress about my missing memories. About a month ago I had stopped trying completely, for fear of making my panic attacks worse, which only made her more frustrated.
My mom gave a halfhearted smile and got up to leave. “I’m sorry, sweetie. I love you. You are your own person now. Make good decisions tonight.”
“I love you too.”
I barely got the words out before she had left the room.
* * *
I was already waiting outside when Nate pulled up in the car.
“Wait, you’re ready early?” he asked, confused as I tossed my backpack in the back seat and hopped in.
“Yeah. Long story. I’m staying with you tonight,” I huffed as I buckled my seatbelt and folded my arms.
“Is it about your mom?”
“Yeah.”
“Finnley related?”
“Isn’t it always?” I groaned.
Nate reached over and forcefully uncrossed my arms so he could hold my hand as he started driving. “Clara, I love you. Always forever.”
I leaned on the console so I could rest my head on his shoulder. “I love you too. I’m sorry. I’ll be in a better mood for our date, I promise.”
“Oh,” he said, grinning, “it’s impossible to not be in a good mood when you see
what I have planned for you.” He pulled my hand up to kiss it.
“Planned?” I asked, my eyes widening. “As in, there’s multiple things lined up?” Now I really felt overwhelmed by the unknown.
“Just be quiet so you can be surprised for the first time in your life. I promise it’s worth it,” Nate said, squeezing my hand.
That didn’t help my nerves. Nor did the fact that we were driving into downtown Forest Hills which didn’t help me solve any of the surprise. There were too many restaurants and possible things to do.
