Despite the warmth of the other night, the final gasps of winter are giving their last hurrah and I suck in a deep breath of cold air as I replay the last seconds of our phone call over and over again in my head. He said he liked me and I said “me too” and asked to talk and he said he would leave therapy early to come find me. We should be inside, in one of our houses—the sun has just dipped below the horizon and there’s that sharp-soft feeling in the air that comes just before snowfall. But this doesn’t feel like something we can hash out indoors, where there are other people and other feelings and so much that can get in the way.
I’m waiting for a boy who can feel everyone’s feelings. I’m waiting for a boy who is something more than human.
I’ve spent the past twenty hours trying to piece it all together—my parents’ weird jobs, my mom calling him “perceptive,” everything that Caleb’s told me, the fact that he has a special therapist who knows about him—and none of those revelations or questions are as important as “I like you too.” There’s a part of me that’s beating myself up for even thinking that way. I hate being the teenage cliché who cares more about romance than actual, real-life superhumans—but wait, that’s not a cliché. This is entirely new territory and I can’t believe that I’m the one charting it.
I pause in my pacing as I take another gulp of cold air. The park is completely empty—as bare as the trees that line the pathway through it. It’s a surprisingly quiet night, as if the city knows that something important is about to happen here and is trying to be respectful. The hush is like a blanket over the block, making everything still.
Inside me, there’s a cacophony of sound. My head and my heart are battling it out. My head says, “No way, this can’t be. You’ve read it wrong. This is all a trick, he doesn’t have a superpower, and he definitely doesn’t like you. Think about it: it doesn’t make any sense.”
My head is right. It doesn’t make any sense. Me standing in the middle of a frigid city park on a school night when I haven’t finished any of my homework for tomorrow (like I was going to get any work done with everything Caleb told me last night running around my brain) makes no sense. But my heart doesn’t care.
My heart is screaming yes. It’s saying, “This is right, this is how it’s supposed to be. You knew. Somewhere, deep down, you knew this was true. He’s it. There’s no version of this story where this doesn’t happen.”
To which my head of course says, “Stop being a fucking sap, life isn’t a story; even if he does like you, it’ll be a mess because you’re not someone who can be normal about this—”
And just as my head is about to talk me out of feeling excited, hopeful, all a-whirl with infatuation, I hear rapid footsteps behind me and I spin around so fast I nearly trip over my own Twizzler legs.
Caleb comes to an abrupt halt as I turn. He’s out of breath, like he’s run here (oh my god, did he run here?), red-nosed and completely fucking beautiful.
“Hi,” he breathes, sticking his hands into his letterman jacket, eyes searching my face. His expression is unreadable and I want to trace the lines on his forehead with my frozen fingertips.
“Hey,” I say, my voice faraway-sounding to my own ears. My head has officially exited the proceedings. My heart is demanding I listen to it, pounding against my rib cage and being lifted up by butterflies fluttering madly under my diaphragm.
We stand like that, ten feet apart, our breath curling like smoke between us, and stare at each other. What’s supposed to happen now? What do I say? Am I supposed to do something? The problem with my head taking a much-needed vacation is that I’m stuck with a heart that wants so much and no executive functioning left to act for it.
“How was therapy?” I ask, like that’s exactly how I’ve been planning to start this conversation. I’m treating this like any other day in the park—like we’re at school on our lunch break. But this is different. I know that and I have no idea how to behave.
All I know is that Caleb is looking at me with those gorgeous green eyes and I’m so in love that I momentarily forget my own name.
“Oh, who the fuck cares?” He laughs, and then he’s walking toward me. I see it all in slow motion and I’m moving in slow motion too, unable to react to anything that’s happening. Caleb is smiling, a spark lighting up his eyes, which haven’t stopped moving around my face as he takes two long strides to me. It’s like he’s trying to memorize what I look like—trying to capture my face in his mind’s eye. Like I’m something important, something worth remembering.
In a millisecond, he’s right in front of me, his hands coming out of his jacket pockets and rising to my face. I feel his cold palms on my cheeks and I should flinch at the sudden burst of ice but he’s leaning toward me and then—
And then.
The cacophony inside of me transforms into a symphony. There’s no warmup, no build; just instant, intricate, immeasurably beautiful music. The icy weather is a distant memory—every part of me is drowned in the most comfortable fire. I’m more aware of my body than I ever have been but also my entire world is narrowed down to Caleb’s lips on mine.
His fingers wind into my hair, clutching me closer to him, like I’m not the only one who’s wasted hours imagining raking my hands through his hair and down to his neck. I’m holding on to the back of his letterman jacket for dear life. Caleb is still moving with the momentum of walking to me—so quick and decisive—that we nearly tip over. One of his arms leaves my head to wrap around my torso, catching me, and I melt. That’s it. If I wasn’t a goner before, I sure as hell am now.
Minutes pass. Seconds. Entire centuries. It’s impossible to tell. With Caleb’s arm around me, I feel weightless, like if he lets go, I’ll float away into the starry night. There’s a perfect, cloudless sky where my brain should be. I’m dizzy. I’m faint.
Oh. I’m not breathing. Like, at all.
We separate, gasping for air, our breath creating a swirl of fog between our too-close faces. Caleb puts his other arm behind my back and I lean away to get a look at him. His face is red and I can’t tell if it’s from the cold or if he’s blushing but it doesn’t matter because his smile is enormous, reaching his eyes and beyond. His perfect hair flutters minutely in the frigid breeze and I give in to months—years—of repressed desire and touch my hand to the edge of his hairline. The gesture makes something in his smile soften and I’m embarrassed at giving in to the impulse.
“Hi,” he says again, leaning his cheek slightly into my palm as my hand moves down the side of his face.
“Hi.” I’m at a loss for anything profound to say but it doesn’t seem like Caleb cares. He’s looking at me like he just translated a particularly hard section of Latin and it makes me nervous. Unsure.
Oh, hey brain. Nice of you to rejoin the party, but could you give us a second, please?
“So…” I start, my head completely ignoring my heart’s plea for it to stay out of this, “you like me, huh?”
Caleb licks his lips and closes them around his teeth like he’s trying to hold in a laugh.
“Um, yeah.” He grins. “Is that not obvious? Wait—” A cloud passes over his expression. “Why are you nervous? Did I … was that not … good?”
His hold on me relaxes as he starts to move backward. I notice I’ve been standing on tiptoes, and I’m thrown off-balance by his retreat. I panic and pull him back to me with the lapels of his jacket.
“No, no—” I assure him, “no, I just—I didn’t think you would. I thought it was just me.”
“I’m sorry I was so weird about everything—” He’s trying to apologize for something that neither of us understands.
“No, you weren’t weird, I was weird—” I interrupt.
“But you…” He swallows, looking away from me for the first time. “You too? I mean, with the feelings and stuff?”
It’s not an actual sentence but I get what he means. I want to tell him how endearing it is that the boy who can feel everyone’s feelings can’t for th
e life of him talk about it, but then I realize I’m not much better.
“Yeah, I do.” I nod. “Have the feelings and stuff.”
“That’s good.” He echoes the end of our phone call.
“It’s you that I can’t…” I shake my head, unable to say it out loud.
“What?” Caleb tilts his head.
“You’re you,” I say, like that explains everything. “Of course I like you. I just can’t believe you feel the same way. It doesn’t—it just doesn’t compute.”
“Okay, brainiac.” He’s smiling again, touching my cheek like he can’t help himself, and that’s good. “Think you can wrap your head around it long enough to let me walk you home?”
“Yeah,” I breathe, “yeah, I think I can manage that.”
“Good.” He’s doing that thing again—looking at me like I hold all the answers. Like I am the answer.
That’s another thing that doesn’t make any sense. How is this even possible? He’s telling me it’s true and I can see it on his face but this is so much harder to believe than the existence of superpowers.
Caleb is grinning like he has the answer but I’m stuck on the equation that got us there.
But then he kisses me again and I realize it doesn’t matter how we got there. Caleb is every answer that I need.
40
CALEB
I didn’t realize it could be this good.
Now that Adam and I are officially together, my happiness is doubled, tripled, an endless loop of joy. He’s happy, which makes me happy, which makes him happy—he doesn’t even need an empath power, he just sees me smile—and we just go round and round until we’re grinning at each other like total nutjobs.
As April goes on, the world thaws around us and overnight everything is green, inside and out. I don’t have to try and hide who I am anymore and Adam’s walls start to dissolve. The big, unpredictable waves between us don’t seem so scary now. We’re floating.
Adam is way more chill about my ability than I thought he would be. I guess his parents do some pretty weird science kind of stuff, so that part wasn’t as hard to believe as the fact that I like him. I tease him about that a lot and he doesn’t try to swallow his smile.
“What’s Dr. Bright’s deal?” he asks me one day, tilting his head upward to look at me from where it was resting on my chest. We’re lying on the grass in my backyard, soaking up the spring sunshine, and his face is so close to mine I can count his freckles. I want to bend down and kiss the ones on his nose and then I remember that I can and I give in to the impulse. I instantly feel stupid about it but Adam moves his face to kiss me for real and I forget to feel self-conscious.
“So … what’s her deal?” he repeats a few minutes later, sitting up on his elbows, arms draped over my torso so he can look at my face right side up. “How did she get into this line of work?”
“I don’t know.” I shrug, making his arms pop up a bit. “It’s not like we spend my therapy sessions talking about her.”
“But aren’t you curious?” he asks. “I mean, you said she has other patients like you—wouldn’t you want to meet another empath?”
“Fuck no.” I laugh. “That sounds like a nightmare.”
Adam’s face scrunches up as he thinks it through. “Okay, yeah, point taken. But still, don’t you want to know who her other patients are? What they can do?”
In this moment, my answer is yes. I’m filled to the brim with Adam’s burning curiosity, a soft fire that makes me want to get up and run around. There’s stuff that I get excited about, but I’ll never really understand how Adam feels this way about learning so much of the time.
“I guess,” I answer truthfully. “I don’t know, it seems complicated. I’m only just now starting to get my own life under control, I’m not sure I want to add a bunch more freaks to it.”
“I’m the only freak you need?” Adam smirks, but there’s a sliver of self-doubt running through the teasing.
“You’re not a freak,” I say, before smirking myself. “You are a total dork, though.”
He swats at my shoulder and I grab his hand, maneuvering it into mine, looping my fingers through his. Satisfaction pours out of Adam.
“Well, you’re a total meathead,” he says and laughs.
“But such a good-looking meathead,” I offer, Adam’s affection making me feel confident in a way I never feel without him. He just laughs at that, shaking his head and leaning in to kiss me again. But his hunger for more information itches, distracting me.
“I think it’s nice you’re curious about it,” I say, laying my head back down on the ground. “I can ask Dr. Bright about it if you want.”
“Do you think she’d tell you anything?” he asks, running his free hand through my hair. He does that a lot.
“I don’t know,” I say.
“Hm.”
“What?”
The fire is turning cold, pulling inward from my limbs to sit in my stomach, hard and light like titanium. Determination.
“I have an idea.”
41
ADAM
I don’t actually expect Caleb to go along with my half-baked idea, but he does. He hears me out, fiddling with the watch on my wrist where it rests over his heart, as he nods along with my proposal. I think he starts to tune out my rambling at one point, because his eyes soften and seem to get stuck on my mouth, which makes my stomach do somersaults. But he finally catches up because he says:
“You want to spy on my therapist?”
“Spying is such an ugly word.” I smirk. He smirks back and, just like that, we’re off to the races.
* * *
The next three weeks are a total dream. Not only do I have a boyfriend (Is that what he is? We haven’t actually defined anything but that’s what I’m calling him in my thoughts because it makes the oft-dormant pleasure centers of my brain light up), but he’s kind of a superhero. I guess there’s never been a “Mr. Empath” or “Super Emotion Man” but the point is: Caleb isn’t fully human. And that is just. So. Cool.
While I am curious about Dr. Bright’s other patients—and Dr. Bright herself, though I don’t think we’re quite at the point where I can just introduce myself to Caleb’s therapist—I mostly want a concrete excuse to be around Caleb. It’s not like there was ever a concrete excuse before—we would just hang out. But now that we’re … whatever we are, I want to have an activity. A reason for Caleb to keep spending time with me. Because there is no way that Caleb wanting to kiss me and talk to me and be around me is going to last. It feels too much like a dream in the self-deluding sense.
While we had our awkward moments before, there’s a new kind of uncertainty that pops up between us now. Things had been … tense for a while and now I know why: the double whammy of reciprocated-but-not-confessed romantic feelings and hiding a freakin’ superpower. But Caleb is still tentative around me. Even though he doesn’t try and stop himself mid-sentence anymore, I think he’s worried he’s going to spook me if he shares too much. Which is just … well, the irony is not lost on me.
We’re sitting on a bench in the small park across from Dr. Bright’s office, conducting our second “stakeout,” though really, we’re paying more attention to each other than the comings and goings of her patients. And here’s one of the ways that Caleb is more hesitant: he blushes a lot more now when he flirts, like being intentional about it is embarrassing. I try to tease him about it but, of course, he has to go all sincere on me.
“I’m still getting used to it, I guess,” he says into his lap, cheeks red at my laughter.
“Used to what?” I ask, a little breathless.
“Feeling happy,” he says, and my breath hitches. “You feeling happy.” My breath stops completely as those green eyes look up, earnest and probing.
“How did I feel before?” I ask, not really wanting to know the answer. Now I’m the one looking away, uncertain where this conversation is going to lead but knowing it’s probably nowhere good.
“No, come on, I want to know,” I plead, like the masochistic idiot I am.
“I mean … you were sad a lot. And lonely.” He drapes his arm over the back of the bench, his fingertips brushing my shoulder. The stray thought pops into my head that Caleb would make a good doctor—excellent bedside manner.
“You could feel that?” I ask quietly.
“What, you weren’t lonely?” There’s hope in his voice. He knows the answer, better than anyone, but he still hopes it isn’t true. It makes all of my insides ache.
“No, I was,” I admit, “I just didn’t realize ‘lonely’ was an emotion.”
“Oh yeah, it totally is.” Caleb nods, a little more surefooted. He likes explaining his ability to me. “But there’s different kinds. When I get lonely, I get really, really sad and kind of, I don’t know, hopeless, I guess? You felt … tired with it, if that makes sense.”
“Yeah, that makes sense.” I choke around a lump in my throat. The observation stings in its accuracy. I was tired. Because I assumed it would never change—that I would be lonely forever. That no one would ever understand. That no one ever could understand. But here’s proof that I was wrong, sitting next to me, all flesh and blood and genuine in a way that I’ve never before experienced. For some reason, that breaks my heart.
Now that I know about Caleb’s ability, I see how much what I feel affects him. I start to smile, and look up to see him already smiling. I get sad and his shoulders get heavy. And, as much as it’s been nice to not have to explain certain things, it makes me feel helpless. I can’t control my own happiness, how am I supposed to be responsible for someone else’s? How on earth is this actually going to work?
I’m trying to get us back to the easy flirtatious mood of a few minutes earlier when I see a vaguely familiar shape out of the corner of my eye.
The Infinite Noise Page 23
