The Infinite Noise

by Lauren Shippen

  “What do you mean?” Buzzing starts under my skin as Adam looks at me out of the corner of his eye. I’ve made him nervous. Good. Maybe he’ll actually start talking to me then.

  “You’ve been weird all night,” I argue.

  “Well, sorry for not keeping you entertained,” he drones, but I feel the swirl of anxiety and self-disappointment as he says it. Shit, now I feel bad.

  “No,” I say, backpedaling, “I didn’t mean—I’m just worried, I guess.”

  “Worried?” he scoffs. “What the hell does that mean?”

  “It means that I can fee—” I bite the words back, changing the shape of them in my mouth before I speak again. “I can see that you’re drowning and I don’t know what to do about it.”

  Adam looks like he’s been slapped. Feels like it too. There’s the caffeine jolt of fear, a toxic addition to the sludge sundae we already have going on. I want to take it back, want to apologize, but my own frustration is still strong enough to be drowning everything else out.

  “If you don’t want to be here, Caleb, you can just leave.” He fails to meet my eyes and the fear evens into a steady stream.

  “That’s not—” I’m getting even more frustrated now. “I don’t want to leave, I just want you to talk to me. I’m just—I’m here.”

  Adam’s jaw clenches as his eyes wander the room, looking at anything but me. I want to grab his face, steer it toward mine, rattle it and not let go until the truth starts falling out of his head.

  God, if this is how Dr. Bright feels when getting me to talk, I owe her, like, a thousand apologies.

  “It’s not your problem, Caleb.” He shakes his head and my frustration wanes a bit. That’s the second time he’s said my name, and it makes the fluttering in my stomach rise.

  “I’m your friend, aren’t I?” I say gently. “You know you can tell me stuff.”

  “Oh really?” he snorts. “Isn’t that exactly what I said to you? And you don’t tell me jack.”

  Okay, he has a point there. I know better than to try and win an argument against Adam, but this is so not the same as me not wanting to tell him that I have a superpower. Not that Adam knows that, but still.

  “I tell you lots of stuff,” I counter, even though I don’t tell him anything about the biggest thing in my life.

  “But you’re hiding something, I know you are.” Adam turns to look at me now, his gaze burrowing into me as the fog makes room for annoyance.

  “Well, apparently so are you!”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” he mumbles.

  “Neither do I.”

  We’re sitting side by side, arms crossed, not looking at each other, both filled with irritation and sadness, and I’m just about to get up and leave when Adam says—

  “We’re being assholes again, aren’t we?”

  My body releases a breath I didn’t realize I was holding, my shoulders coming down from up around my ears. I turn my head slightly to look at Adam. He glances up at me through his eyelashes, face set and stubborn, his mouth a tense line.

  “Yeah,” I sigh, “I think we are.”

  “Why is this so hard?” he groans.

  “What?”

  “Being a person.”

  I wish I could answer him, but I don’t know how to be a person either. Sometimes I feel like I’m not even human, but instead some sort of emotion-meter with legs doomed to be crushed under the weight of other people’s problems.

  Adam is looking expectantly at me, which flatters me as much as it bothers me. Why should I have the answer? I like that he thinks that I have the answer. But I don’t. I want to.

  “I don’t know,” I say honestly.

  “Yeah,” he sighs. “I know.”

  He exhales like he’s seen all the woes of mankind for centuries—like he’s carrying the entire world on his bony shoulders. I want to reach out and touch him. Take his hand or smooth down his hair or hold him close until the bags under his eyes disappear.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” I ask, genuinely not knowing for once. The fog is still there, but it’s paled, becoming lifeless and limp where it was once an aggressive, all-consuming force. Adam feels withdrawn—distant in a way that makes my insides ache. Even when I get pulled under by the tide, I miss his feelings when they aren’t there.

  “Almost never,” he laughs darkly. My heart clenches in pain—my own pain. I would give anything to make Adam okay.

  He glances up at me again, before rolling his eyes at my worried expression. He sighs again, quick and overblown, his cheeks puffing out in drama.

  “I don’t know,” he says after a moment. “It comes and goes in waves, you know?”

  “I do.” I nod vigorously to keep from laughing at Adam’s choice of words. “I really, really do.”

  “There’s something strange about you, Caleb.” He squints at me and I feel a small curl of curiosity bend out of him and tickle my ribs. I should be worried that I’ve shown my hand—that he’s getting suspicious—but then I feel a bit of that good blue softness stretch out of him and meet my yellow. Suddenly, we’re in that green space and the tiniest ghost of a smile is trying to come to life on Adam’s face.

  I look away, instantly shy at the swell of positive feeling between us. It’s fragile and precious and I know if I open my mouth I’ll ruin it.

  “I don’t think that’s a bad thing, by the way,” Adam says, and I can hear the small grin in his voice. I want to see it, so I look at Adam again and the butterflies reenter my stomach, stronger and more welcome than ever. The desire to reach out to him grows and Adam is looking at me like he’s thinking the same thing. His face leans closer to mine just a fraction and time stops. There’s a fizzy feeling in my chest but before I can do anything about it (or let him do something about it), panic takes hold of my body and I flinch back.

  “Caleb?” Adam’s voice is small and I feel the hot rush of embarrassment wipe out all the butterflies like a meteor.

  “I’m fine,” I lie on autopilot (it’s always a lie). “I just—I remembered that I promised my dad I’d help him with something tonight before bed and it’s getting to be that time so I should go.”

  A fight-or-flight response has kicked into gear without my permission and, before I know it, I’m hopping off the bed and moving toward Adam’s bedroom door.

  “Oh”—Adam stands too, blushing—“okay, yeah, I’ll, uh—I’ll walk you out.”

  He does and it’s awkward and we just stare at each other when we say good-bye instead of fist-bumping or waving or, I don’t know, hugging like normal fucking people who might have kissed five minutes ago if one of them hadn’t totally freaked out. Half an hour later I’m lying in my own bed wondering what the hell my own weird-ass behavior was about.

  I wanted to kiss Adam. I’m … adjusting to that. That thought has come up a few times and it’s like, that’s cool. That I can do. I think. It’s been a long time since I’ve kissed somebody. And I haven’t kissed anybody since my ability started up, so that’s a whole other wrench to throw in the machine.

  I’ve also never kissed a boy. But that’s less of a concern than I thought it would be. Like, it doesn’t even fucking register as something to worry about. Adam’s face makes me feel a certain way—a way that I didn’t feel looking at Caitlin at the dance—and that hasn’t happened in a long time and who cares if his face is male-shaped.

  No, the problem is that I think Adam wanted to kiss me too. Again, not necessarily a problem. For most people—most normal people—that would be a good thing. The person you want to kiss wanting to kiss you should be all high fives all around. But it’s got me second-guessing everything. What if Adam’s wanted to kiss me for a long time? What if the only reason I want to kiss him is because he wants to kiss me?

  God, what if none of my emotions are my own? Even now, in my bedroom alone, I can feel my parents and Alice. It’s faint but it’s there. I haven’t been alone with my own feelings in months. How on earth can I trust them? />
  32

  ADAM

  “You don’t have to listen but I thought it might be good for when you guys go to away games,” I explain, trying to look Caleb in the eye despite the fact that I feel like I might throw up. “I know the team kind of drives you crazy sometimes. Especially on the bus. So this can be, like, you know, like a distraction or whatever. And you’ve got that scrimmage coming up this weekend so…”

  I’ve become more inexact in my language since meeting Caleb. But I can’t blame him and his inability to communicate clearly (though I do blame some other things for that). He makes me nervous. I’m always two steps behind.

  Like this past Saturday night. A night when I’m having a particularly bad time and he’s cool about it. Yeah, he asks questions, but he doesn’t judge me or run away. He sits with me and doesn’t make me talk and I’m so grateful that I almost feel better. And then I do feel better, the cloud lifts just a tad, and we have a Moment and he gets all weird and leaves.

  I want to chalk it up to gay panic. That Caleb could see my feelings written all over my face and had a hetero-freakout. It’s Occam’s razor: the simplest solution is usually the correct one. Caleb now fully knows that I have a crush, and was trying to be sympathetic to my feelings by excusing himself (un)gracefully.

  But something in my hind brain is sending up the alarm at that straightforward (pun not intended) solution. I wasn’t lying when I said there was something strange about Caleb. Something … queer. And not in the current version of the word (though I’m still holding out hope on that front too)—in the “odd or unusually different” way. If I had spidey sense, it would be tingling all the time around Caleb.

  He’s holding the thumb drive I just handed him like it’s something precious and unfolding the piece of loose-leaf paper I’d pulled from my notebook in first period and hastily scrawled all over. I should explain more—tell him he doesn’t have to read my reasoning for why I picked these songs (please don’t read this in front of me)—but my brain is stuck on Caleb and tingling so I don’t hear what he’s saying until he’s halfway through his sentence.

  “—cool. Thanks.” He looks sideways at me as he pulls a textbook from his open locker. His cheeks are getting redder and redder and my stomach clenches in fear. Have I embarrassed him? This was meant to be an olive branch—a way of saying, “Don’t worry about Saturday, I promise I’m not like that all the time and I won’t try to kiss you ever, let’s just be friends”—but what if he thinks playlist-making is some sort of overture? That I’m hitting on him with music?

  Oh god, that’s exactly what I’m doing.

  “Hey, listen.” Caleb closes his locker and turns to me, face serious. Here we go. Caleb was trying to let me down easy and now comes the flat-out rejection. I should have seen this coming when Caitlin told me about the dance—if he doesn’t want her, he’s definitely not going to want me. I’m just relieved that this is happening between classes, that soon the bell will ring and this won’t be a drawn-out process.

  “I’m sorry about Saturday,” he says. “I didn’t mean to just bolt out like that but I—I just had stuff I had to do.”

  “Oh,” I say, confused.

  “Yeah,” he continues, “it wasn’t anything to do with you, I was having a really good time. I mean, I know I fell asleep and everything”—he blushes harder—“but it was fun. Thanks for having me over. Or, you know, for letting me in when I just showed up without texting first.”

  “Yeah, of course,” I say, “you’re always welcome.” I’m speaking on autopilot, turning into the consummate host that my parents have raised me to be. My mind is racing. I’m relieved at Caleb’s words, but how did he know exactly what I was worried about? Two steps behind turns into five steps behind and I want to tear my hair out.

  “Are you—” he starts, hesitant for once, instead of trying to keep the words in. “Are you okay? Like, after this weekend, are you—”

  “Yeah,” I rush out, “yeah, I’m fine.”

  He looks at me skeptically, a muscle in his jaw jumping like he’s mad.

  “You’re lying,” he says, matter-of-fact.

  “Isn’t everyone always lying when they say they’re fine?” I quip.

  “You have no idea.” His eyes roll heavenward, his voice heavy with wisdom that he has no right to have. He brings his gaze back down to my face. “But you don’t have to lie to me. I don’t want you to.”

  “Haven’t we been over this?” I ask, starting to get irritated by the double standard of information flow between us.

  “I just … I’m here, okay?” he repeats. “Just—if you ever need anything. If you want to talk or whatever. I’m here.”

  His green eyes are big and earnest and I was not at all prepared for this level of sincerity this early on a Monday morning. Now I’m the one blushing and I look away, feeling vulnerable under the scrutiny of his strange x-ray vision. I mumble something in response—an agreement, a thank-you, a deflection, who knows—and it makes him smile a little. That’s good enough for me.

  The bell rings and Caleb thanks me for the playlist again, putting the flash drive into his pocket. He asks me if I want to get lunch later and I nod automatically before he gives me a little wave and goes down the hallway to his class. I watch the back of his head as he walks away, hoping that if I stare hard enough his skull will open up and all his secrets will come spilling out.

  33

  CALEB

  I have a new nightly ritual. I lie on my bed, stare at the ceiling, and think about Adam.

  I’m pathetic.

  Dr. Bright is always telling me to meditate, and I don’t think I can really claim to be doing that, but it’s the same idea. Meditation is just so boring. Who wants to sit in silence and think about nothing? How do you do that? I guess that’s the point—clearing my mind is supposed to help me figure out how to balance emotions so that I can be around other people without blowing my lid—but yikes. What a yawn.

  So, no, I’m not meditating, but I am trying to clear things out a bit. I have to wait for everyone to be asleep before I can wipe my body of feelings that aren’t mine, which means that I’ve been staying up late and then getting less sleep, which makes me less able to balance, which then makes it harder to clear stuff out. It’s not the perfect system, but until I can drive myself to the middle of nowhere, it’s all I got.

  And, hopefully, I will be able to do that soon. Mom and Dad are still insistent that I stick to the learner’s permit and only drive when they can be there to help. They’re worried about road rage, which, yeah, okay, I get it. Maybe being on the road with a bunch of other people while operating heavy machinery is not the best idea for me. But, god, it’s annoying to have to take the bus everywhere.

  Anyway, back to the nightly ritual of obsessing over Adam. Maybe obsessing is the wrong word. I’m trying to … puzzle it out.

  I pull the track list he wrote for the playlist he made me out of my pocket. It’s crumpled from me shoving it in and out of my pocket for the past four days. I smile as I play with the frayed edges of the paper, reading it for the hundredth time.

  Just something to keep you company on the bus—Adam

  “Can’t Feel My Face”—The Weeknd (I don’t know if you even realize you’re doing it, but you mouth along with the words every time this song comes on.)

  “Hard Out Here”—Lily Allen (yeah, yeah, it’s a girly song, but Lily speaks true.)

  “Here”—Alessia Cara (I don’t think anyone has ever described so well what it’s like to party with our classmates. At least, I assume, I don’t know; you’re the one who actually gets invited, you tell me.)

  “Strawberry Swing”—Frank Ocean (I know you love Coldplay, but trust me—once you hear this, you’ll never go back to the original.)

  “Grade 8”—Ed Sheeran (idk, this song just reminds me of you.)

  “Water Under the Bridge”—Adele (all hail Adele—this is my favorite off her new album.)

  “You’re Not the
Only One”—Jamie Cullum (words to live by.)

  “Super Trouper”—ABBA (I’ll always be in the crowd in spirit.)

  The whole thing is just the most Adam thing that Adam has ever done. He was nice to listen to me complain about how team bus rides drive me up the wall (without a concrete explanation for why) but he didn’t need to come up with a solution for it. And he definitely didn’t need to write out the songs on the playlist and give his reasoning, but that’s just who he is. It’s well thought out and explained, sentimental but also snarky—reading it is like feeling his feelings. Like feeling his best feelings—the times when he’s laughing at me or talking about the book he’s reading or … or looking at me.

  I move from the notebook paper to look at my phone, pulling up the texts we exchanged after I first listened to the mix.

  So … do you like the mix?

  You have the weirdest music taste I s2g

  What do you mean? Most of it is songs I KNOW you like.

  ABBA???? Really??? ABBA???

   … okay, yeah, the ABBA was all me.

  But you liked it right?

  Caleb?

  Yeah of course I fucking liked it. It’s abba.

  Don’t tell the team.

  Your secret is safe with me.

   … super trouper.

  Ur a dead man.

  Reading over the texts, my heart does that stupid thing again where it spasms and it sort of hurts but it also makes me feel energized and nervous, like the way I feel before a big game. Are we flirting? Is that what’s happening? I think I might be. Ever since that moment at our lunch bench after our fight, there’s like a neon sign inside of me saying, “You like him!! He makes you feel the butterflies!! You want to kiss him!!”

  But what if I don’t? What if the only reason that sign is glowing is because Adam’s the one powering it? The butterflies feel different from the ones I felt from Caitlin—I don’t have the impulse to immediately squash them—but I’m still filled with uncertainty. Dr. Bright would say this is why meditation is important—that I need to clear my head in order to understand what I’m feeling. But closing my eyes and imagining a river with leaves floating down it or whatever isn’t helpful for me. Instead I lie on my bed and stare at glow-in-the-dark stars on my ceiling.